Please Join Our Bridal Party

Dear Friends,

   The Hard Taco song for March is called, "Down at the Berl." The crawfish boil, or "berl," is the classic Louisiana seafood gala. Cajuns cannot pronounce the sound oi, which is why so few of them are Jewish grandmothers. (Er! My daughter could have married that lerer, but her new berfriend is an unemplered ger! Maybe I should person his sermilk?)

The Turquoise Badge of Top Sellerness

Moonspotcollectibles101
(29303 rankings) 
100% positive feedback

Unless you have applied 20 cumulative miles of packing tape to cardboard, you are one of the millions of eBay users who can only sigh wistfully at the unattainable turquoise shooting star.

I've made an eBay bid or two in my time, and I'm happy to say I still have 100% positive feedback. I can't really claim to be proud of this, though, because everyone has 100% positive feedback. There is a bylaw on eBay's Terms and Conditions page that states that real feedback is only permitted when it is quietly sandwiched between screamed compliments.

"Great job great AWESMOE PRODUCT great communication!!!! gene hackman autograph never arrived A+++++++ THANKS!!!"

Seriously, dear friends. The A with seven plus signs after it used to mean something. The only institution with worse grade inflation than eBay is karate class. (See prior rant.)

That's why I renounced online auctioning about 10 years ago. My last serious eBay purchase took place just before my wedding. It is traditional for a groom to give his groomsmen a modest token of gratitude at the rehearsal dinner... either a monogrammed flask or any product made by Victorinox. Rather than saddle my besties with yet another swarm of Swiss Army Ants, I decided to go with autographed pictures of their favorite celebs. 

  

My third groomsman is/was a Harrison Ford fan. He likes to dress like Indiana Jones, insomuch as he always wears his belts diagonally instead of horizontally.

Third best groomsman.
(It's not only okay to rank them, it's necessary.)

I went on eBay and got him this signed 8"x10" glossy, but soon after it arrived, I started having second thoughts about giving it to him. Indy isn't even looking at the camera. Without seeing his face, how could I be sure it was really Harrison Ford?

The enclosed certificate vouches for the authenticity of the autograph,
but it does not say anything about the authenticity of the photograph.

I couldn't fathom why Harrison Ford would sign a fake picture of himself, but it didn't seem right to give a tainted piece of memorabilia to my fourth best groomsman. (Sorry for the demotion, Jeff, but those diagonal belts look really stupid. Tell Brian he's #3 now.) In the end, I found him a nice autographed picture of a Star Wars extra from a "top seller" with 110% positive feedback. The Raiders of the Lost Ark photo stagnated on my desk, and over many months it was sucked into the undertow of deep storage documents.

Then, a couple weeks ago, I was cleaning out a file cabinet and found it. Here's the dilemma... I don't want to keep the photo, but it's too valuable to throw away, and I'm certainly not going to sell it on eBay. I realize just now that the only way for this picture to fulfill its destiny is for us to recruit one more groomsman (or groomsmaid), and give it to him/her!

I would like you to apply to be that groomsman/groomsmaid. To be eligible, all you have to do is write a toast for our wedding. The only details you need are that the bride's name is Lauren and it is March 2001. (Also, everyone is excited because one of the actors from "The Usual Suspects" is hanging out in the hotel lobby, but you don't have to use that.) Feel free to make your toast sappy, funny, or embarrassing... it's your call, Groomsperson!

Send the text of your toast to znlondon@hotmail.com by the end of March, and you may be chosen as the winner. The prize package includes the Harrison Ford autograph, a doctored picture of you with the rest of the bridal party, and a personalized thank you note on original wedding stationery!

You've always been there for me and I just want to say I love you, man/woman,
Zach

1000 Generations of Rock

Dear Friends,

   At the beginning of a post-college summer road trip around the country, my companion and I endeavored to write a song about every state through which we passed. We dubbed the entire campaign, "Road Trip '97: A Thousand Generations of Rock," and by the end of the first week, we had penned anthems about Indiana, Kentucky, Tennessee, Georgia, and Florida. By time it was North Carolina's turn, unfortunately, the well we beginning to run dry, and we had to think about revising our objectives. Here is what I had written in my journal from that day:

6/12/97

Possible dream goals/life missions:

1. Write a song for every state. (Not realistic. Veto.)

2. Have sex with a unicorn in every state. (Repulsive, even less realistic. Veto.)

3. Eat at a Taco Bell in every state (Delicious, and very realistic. In fact, we already did this in the first seven states without noticing.) (Also, Crunchy.)  

And that, as you may have guessed, is quite possibly where the name "Hard Taco" came from. One song per state for one month turned into one taco per state for one month, which eventually turned into Hard Taco: one song per month. Do you believe it? I wouldn't.

This month's Hard Taco song, "For North Carolina and the Others," summarizes the rest of that road trip. It's sweet and nostalgic, and does not involve bestiality, mythical or otherwise.   

Ever since I Found America, I have been longing to share my favorite experiences with the rest of you. Here is a guide to the nation's most excellent tourist attractions. 

Tennessee - Be sure to visit the Museum of Appalachia, where you can stroll through a garden of overturned outhouses and detuned banjos. Then, watch a video of an edentulous woman holding sheep by their hind legs while enumerating her home remedies for their fulminant skin diseases. By then it will become apparent why the early settlers named the region Appalachia, the Latin word for "anything appalling."

 

South Carolina - Be sure to get tickets to the Comedy Cabana in Myrtle Beach, where every Friday is Yeats Impersonators Night. My opinion: "Young Yeats" has a better Irish accent, but "Fat Yeats" is truer to the poet's unremitting self-realization of the cyclical countertheories of spiritual life.

Georgia - Be sure to visit the beautiful coastal city of Savannah. Motor traffic in the downtown area is terrible thanks to an 1834 city ordinance that mandated that a historic anchor be placed on a pedestal in the middle of every intersection.

Florida - Be sure to visit the secluded home of Ward Stone Ireland, the man who invented the court reporter typewriter ("the stenotype machine") but didn't tell anyone, and just used it for his own home court reporting needs.

Alabama - Be sure to listen to music made by dead people while passing through Alabama. If you drive through the state at the speed limit on Interstate 65, there will be precisely enough time to listen to one song by every musician who committed suicide. If you take interstate 10 through the Southern part of the state, there will only be enough time to listen to songs by musicians who died from urinary tract infections.

Nebraska - Be sure to visit the Omaha headquarters of Bozell Worldwide, one of the oldest advertising agencies in the world. They have kept complete video archives of their client interactions dating back to the founding of the company in 1921. Highlights include a black and white film of a mustachioed advertising executive making one of their most famous pitches:

   "You're looking for something sleek, a logo with simple lines and contrasting colors that says, 'Hey, check me out!' Ladies and gentleman of the National Socialist Party, I give you... the swastika! Imagine, if you will, this eye-popping logo on T-shirts, on billboards, and on thousands of armbands. It grabs your attention, it pulls you in, it makes you want to march!"

Washington - Be sure to check out the Pike's Place market, where they are famous for throwing fish against the wall to knock off some of the loose mercury. These fish are quite pricey, but budget shoppers can purchase "no mercury added" fish.

  

Oregon - Be sure to visit Coast Redwood National Forest. The unique species of sequoia that is native to this region is the only tree on Earth that can used to make ultrathin cardboard. After a devastating forest fire here in 1992, the business reply card industry was paralyzed for several years, and no one could renew their magazine subscriptions.

California - Be sure to see the Ronald Reagan Presidential Diet Museum, and see videos and news clips about all the diets that the former president went on during his terms of office. The attached Presidential Diet Library contains his impressive private collection of over 20,000 nutritional brochures and over 30 years of the president's personal calorie counting logs.

Colorado - Be sure to bring your sweetheart to Invesco Field, where the two of you will be harnessed and suspended by "Bronco-crane" in front of the Jumbotron. Now pucker up, you lovebirds! The Mile High Photographer will take your picture kissing with the giant screen in the background. When your friends see this picture, they will be convinced that you were caught smooching on the Jumbotron!

With warmest regards,

Zach