In Which I Blow and Suck

Never learning to play an instrument with any proficiency is one of my greatest regrets in life. Now it is yours, too!

I’m ahead of myself. First, a little on my musical background beyond my well-known mad percussion skillz.

I sang in a band in high school for about six months.

Our repertoire consisted of a few ‘80s Who songs, a crappy number by prog-rock supergroup Asia, “Rock This Town” by the Stray Cats, the Van Halenized version of “Oh! Pretty Woman” and “Hungry Like the Wolf” by Duran Duran. (We briefly brought in a female classmate to stand next to me and do the moaning at the end of “Wolf.” Absolute closest I came in high school to losing my virginity.)

We went through guitarists like Spinal Tap went through drummers, just without the bizarre gardening accidents. Shortly after we finally found one who was really good (that would be him on the left in this video playing with ‘00s Top 40 alt-rock band Splender), they realized they needed a singer with a vocal range exceeding four and a half notes.

In college, I taught myself to play some basic blues harmonica riffs so I could jam with my roommate, a nine-and-a-half finger guitarist, while we drank too much Keystone on Thursday nights. You can image how that went.

I took piano for a few months in my 20s through an adult education class. I was at the top of the class. Sound impressive until you learn my competition was all grandmothers. With arthritis. And periodic gout.

I took bass guitar lessons for about nine months from one of Bob Dylan’s first electric sidemen. Result, I can play bass guitar like I’m wringing a neck. Not confirmed but I may have been the student who drove him to move to Israel.

So when Neil of Citizen of the Month asked me last year if I would contribute something to his next Christmahanukwanzaakah Online Holiday Concert, a joyous annual post of bloggers singing and playing their eggnogged noggins off, I immediately said yes. Never let it be said that I let my lack of talent stand in my way.

Below you will find my solo musical debut, but I encourage you to visit Neil’s site and enjoy the entire Sixth Annual Christmahanukwanzaakah Online Holiday Concert. It’s a blast:

My Love’s unvarnished reaction when I finally showed her this yesterday: “So is this why the ladder was in the living room last week?”

Get the whole "Always Home and Uncool" experience: visit the website, follow on Twitter and like on Facebook .

Naked Again

How desperate are people for me to get rid of this growth on my face?

The folks at Philips Norelco not only sent me, free of charge, their Vacuum Stubble and Beard Trimmer Pro but also their super high-end SensoTouch 3D Electric Razor.

Then they forked over $15,000 to the cause our band of Movember Dads has been growing these goofy things for.

All I had to do is use them … and let the world watch me as I did:

Ahhhh. Smoooooth.

Thing 2 has already said he’ll let me kiss him again since I’m not so “prickly.”

Thing 1 was too busy texting to comment. Once the cell phone battery dies, I’m sure she’ll look up and say something. Maybe even something nice.

My Love … well, she says she likes me better clean shaven but I think secretly she dug the ‘stache. Let her pretend she was snoring next some strange other man every night.

Well … strange, definitely.

# # #

If you want to be smooth like me, I can hook you up with a special holiday rebate on the SensoTouch. Just click that link in the previous sentence.

The FTC Full Monty: Philips Norelco and its PR firm, Zocalo Group, sent me the razor and trimmer for free. No charge whatsoever. I used them, filmed it and wrote about it solely for the money ­- a $15,000 donation to our team raising money to fight prostate cancer. For that, my fellow "bros in mos" and I are incredibly grateful. Nonetheless, the opinions and typos contained in this post remain mine and mine alone.

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