Grateful Dead

In the summer of Jerry 65, Rhino Expeditions sent out a call to Deadheads far and wide and near and narrow saying “Come and join us on another voyage on the Grateful River.”Well the Deadheads climbed aboard the shiny new Rhino raft to float on Grateful River. More and more joined; friends who hadn’t seen each other in years and newcomers who had never even ever been on the Grateful River. And they all started talking to each other, bringing up memories of other trips on Grateful River and all the shows along the way and telling each other all about themselves. Everyone was bringing up the magic golden times and the old Deadheads smiled in reminiscing and the young ones basked in the afterglow. The sun was shining, the fish were jumping, the birds were singing and the flowers were blooming along the banks of the Grateful River. The raft was huge with all sorts of conversations taking place. As the voyage progressed people started noticing that the Rhino raft filled with golden nuggets every Monday and Wednesday. They picked up the nuggets and put them up to their ears and they heard the songs of the magic golden times. And the Deadheads started filling their pockets with the golden nuggets and put them up to their ears and listened again and again to the songs of the magic golden times. And nobody told them they couldn’t fill their pockets with the golden nuggets and listen to them over and over. The golden nuggets kept appearing in the raft every Monday and Wednesday and the pockets filled and the smiles got bigger and bigger and bigger. The Deadheads were all beaming on the Rhino raft and thought that it was one of the best things to ever happen in the land of the Dead on the Grateful River since the magic golden times. The Rhino raft was so clean and shiny and filled with golden nuggets. But then one Monday morning the golden nuggets appeared and lots of the Deadheads couldn’t even pick them off the floor of the raft and some that could get them off the floor of the raft lifted the golden nuggets to their ears and couldn’t hear a thing. And none of the Deadheads could stick the new golden nuggets of songs of the magic golden times in their old pockets. And then the Rhino raft started shaking and rolling and then WHOOSH it went over a waterfall and into a whirlpool. The Deadheads all started saying “What happened to the golden nuggets, some of us can’t hear them and none of us can keep them, what’s up?” They sent out a loud collective call to Rhino Expeditions but didn’t hear a thing back. And then some of the Deadheads started to get so mad that they were no longer being given magic golden nuggets to keep and weren’t told why by Rhino Expeditions that they started jumping out of the raft even as it kept going round and round in the whirlpool below the waterfall. Then worst of all, some of the Deadheads started calling each other names and upsetting other Deadheads and causing them to have hairballs! Well let me tell you the sight of Deadheads having hairballs is something that I wish I had never seen or heard. Then some Deadheads said that maybe some of you aren’t really Deadheads because of your behavior and then lots of the Deadheads started to question if they were really Deadheads after all. Yikes, confused yelling Deadheads having hairballs en masse on the Rhino raft. But still Rhino Expeditions did not reply. And I was there that week and I said “How many Deadheads does it take to give a silent Rhino a hairball?” But still Rhino expeditions didn’t answer. Well the raft kept swirling around in the whirlpool for over a week with more and more Deadheads jumping out of the Rhino raft. But many stayed aboard and started to relax and stopped calling each other names and some realized that they could listen to the golden nuggets of the magic golden times and others just said “This doesn’t work for me”, but they still stayed on board too. Speculation and much talk circulated about what was in store for the next Monday. The next Monday the golden nuggets appeared again but the Deadheads couldn’t keep these either. Along with the golden nuggets the Deadheads found a note from Rhino Expeditions written by a fellow Deadhead saying “We never meant for you all to keep the golden nuggets.” Most of the Deadheads were stunned and amazed at this since no one had ever told them not to keep the golden nuggets. Who wouldn’t have picked up free golden nuggets and put them in their pockets? So now the Rhino raft is still on the Grateful River but the Deadheads that are left can’t yet tell if it is still in a whirlpool or starting to float down the river again. They do have some great new friends they have met on the raft and have listened to some amazing golden nuggets. And I got the answer to my question; it takes 544 Deadheads to give a silent Rhino a hairball. Gotta go, time to check on some cats. Do I contradict myself? Very well then I contradict myself, (I am large, I contain multitudes.) Walt Whitman-Song of Myself

Over the years I've drifted in and out of my Dead craze. For some years after Jerry died, I didn't really listen at all, got into other bands. Then Dick's Pix came along and sucked me right back in, started buying those and trading boots. Then came Rhino, and I drifted again, lost interest, nothing new worth listening too. But alas, Taper's section, cool, and I was right back into it. All the while I was thinking, what a genius marketing strategy, give me a little taste, I get the addiction back. I think a lot of this has to do with lawsuits pending by Coons too, which is unfortunate, because I do believe this will alienate a lot of otherwise loyal customers. Anyway, what to do, there's a ton of good music out there these days, and without my interest being peaked so often anymore, I will spend more money elsewhere.

I stumbled across this tidbit on Yahoo! News: Satellite radio adds Grateful Dead Maybe the situation IS more complicated than it looks. Maybe Sirius wanted other official sources plugged up: they are promising exclusive content. Maybe I need to subscribe to @#$%^ satellite radio now ... Cut, paste, and remove the space between _de and ad; to use this link. http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070829/ap_en_mu/radio_de ad;_ylt=AoZG06Er2eA3smZ7iaSswmus0NUE