Dean and I saw Dan Bern at Jammin’ Java last night. I think its been a year since the last time I saw him. I’ve lost track of the number of times I’ve seen him perform, but it is probably somewhere around 30. Last night’s performance was a good solid show — not particularly noteworthy except that he seemed in a good mood the entire performance.
He played The 5th Beatles which always makes me laugh. I guess I’ve not heard it enough to remember all the jokes in it. He also played a song I’d not heard before. The first line was “God is a concept by which we measure our own pain”.
I like sitting near appreciative new-to-Dan folks and seeing / hearing their reaction to some of his lyrics — last night we sat near a table of them. They laughed at all the right places: “I’ve got big balls…” “I am the messiah…”
He also played his Christmas song which I’ve embedded below. It might not be safe for work — so play at your own risk.
The icing on the cake last night was running into a friend I’d not seen in years. It felt a little like old times again.
So last night I had a Dan Bern dream. I was watching TV on a big screen television that was attached to the wall. I think I was at my parents’ house, but it wasn’t really my parents’ house. A commercial came on the television and in the middle of the screen was a book with talking line-drawn characters. I recognized them as Ted the Cow-type drawings, but now that I look at the book, what I saw in my dream was not Ted the Cow-type drawings. Anyway, two of the line-drawn characters started to sing a well-known Dan Bern song (don’t know which one it was but my dad said something disparaging about those “Yeah, Yeah, Yeah”1 lyrics) and I immediately ran to the store and bought a new shirt.
While the salesperson was ringing up my purchase (an oversized pink, lavender and aqua button-down denim shirt2) she asked what I wanted to drink — it came with the shirt, so I said a Coke. Then she said that the Coke had some strange powder3 in it and was probably contaminated, and showed me the front pocket of the shirt. Sure enough, something fizzy4 and white was floating in the Coke filled pocket of the shirt. She sent for a new shirt, but it was not the same color. I wasn’t sure that I wanted to buy it, but since it came with free Fiestaware, I figured I’d get it and donate the shirt.
On the way out I mentioned that my favorite singer, Dan Bern, liked Fiestaware6, but didn’t expect them to know who Dan Bern was. Turned out they did because he owned the shop.
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[1] This really happened once — but I was listening to Beethoven at the time.
[2] I recently found two oversized denim shirts and wasn’t sure if I should keep them or not. They are both blue though.
[3] I mis-read a mis-read comment on a bulletin board and confused Coke (as in Coca Cola) with coke (as in cocaine) and had to re-read it. Weird it would pop up in a dream.
[4] Last night my daughter had fun with suds and the kitchen counter and floor and walls were covered in soap bubbles. Before I went to sleep I worried about who was going to clean it up, since my daughter didn’t seem willing.5
[5] Dean cleaned it up.
[6] I don’t know if Dan Bern even likes Fiestaware — but he does live in New Mexico.
What you said