So Who is Going to Win This One?

 There are all sorts of polls and predictions as to what the outcome of Tuesday's election will be.  I will make no prediction, but I will make observations, and my primary observation is that this one has, for me, that same eerie feeling that the 2016 election did.   Organized Media is reporting record turnout for the early voting.  That in and of itself doesn't tell you who is going to win.  What that tells you is that a lot more people are voting earlier than ever before.

What does that mean, anyway?  Why is that happening?

No one knows what it will be like out there on Election Day.  No one.  People might be fearing social unrest.  They might be fearing the Wuhan Virus.  They might be fearing the long lines they might encounter if they wait.

Why did I vote early?

In my case it was for a different set of reasons.  I have been working a lot of overtime lately, and I mean a lot.  I am being compensated for it, which is great, because that doesn't always happen when you're salaried.  We had a major deadline of today to get a lot of things done, and I didn't know if I would be working another crisis on Tuesday.  I voted last Friday when a rare opening on my calendar emerged and took advantage of that opportunity.

It was extremely tempting to wait until this coming Tuesday.  I'll tell you why.

I very much wanted to lie to an exit pollster on my way out, though I'm also going to have to admit here that the Good Lord wouldn't exactly have smiled down on me for doing that.  Yea verily, I will admit that I get tempted to do things like that.  I'm not going to hide that.  If you're looking for an example to follow, on some days (if not most) it might be to your benefit to look to someone else besides me.

Regardless of the outcome:  get ready for riots Tuesday night, which will continue for several days.

No, you didn't hear it here first.

Eddie Van Halen is Gone

 At work today I checked a website that I've been known to frequently visit, and I learned of the passing of guitarist Eddie Van Halen.  It hit me like something of a sucker punch because I had no idea he was on his way out.  I knew that he had part of his tongue removed for cancer, and that was some years back, but not being a Van Halen fan I wasn't really keeping up what was going on with him or his bandmates.

Yes, I am very familiar with Van Halen.  They broke in early 1978 and they broke big.  One memory is driving up to Mt Hamilton in San Jose with Hal and KOME played "Jamie's Crying".  I didn't know at the time it was Van Halen and I heard from both Mark and Hal about this new killer song called "Runnin' With the Devil" by Van Halen, and I thought OK, there's this guy with the first name Van and the last name Halen who is breaking national.  I figured out soon it was a band named Van Halen after the two brothers who were in it.

There is no doubt that if you're going to sit down and compile a list of great guitarists, you're going to have to put Eddie Van Halen on that list.  The man no doubt had a talent that wasn't readily resident in most other guitarists.  He had his own style.  That's the mark of a great guitarist.  

I stated more than once, in another forum where Van Halen came up for discussion, that Eddie Van Halen was simultaneously their greatest asset and their greatest liability.  He was an integral part of the soap opera that came with that band.  I'm referring, of course, to his working relationship with David Lee Roth, Sammy Hagar, and Michael Anthony.  One manager of another well-known rock group once stated that success changes bands.  They (the members) start fighting.  And it all goes downhill from there.

All of that said, I can't describe myself as a Van Halen fan.  I never saw them.  I liked some of their songs.  I didn't like some of their other songs.  I got a kick out of "Take Your Whiskey Home" and I thought their cover of "You're No Good" was the best ever done of that song.

Eddie Van Halen played hard.  Eddie Van Halen partied hard.  And Eddie Van Halen died hard.

The shame in all of this is that he didn't (to my knowledge) patch things up with Diamond Dave, Michael Anthony, and the Red Rocker.