Charlie Daniels Band

Back in July, I saw an announcement for Charlie Daniels Band concert in November. The venue would be River City Casino, a place I was not familiar with. OK, I thought, could be interesting.

I totally despise Ticketmaster, but I signed up for 2 tickets online. Ticketmaster charged me $150 for two $57.50 tickets. Do the math. That in itself is enough reason to hate Ticketmaster.

Got the tix in the mail. Time passed, and it was November 4, date of concert. Left home plenty early for the 7:30 concert, even though we all know a 7:30 concert doesn't start at 7:30.

Turns out that River City Casino is a big deal. The casino, hotel, etc, occupy a huge chunk of real estate on the Mississippi River bank just south of St. Louis. It's a monster place, quite new. We parked and walked in, not having a clue where the music would be played.

Down a wide hallway, past a large cocktail bar, we see the entrance to the concert. Beyond that, the casino. It's still early, so we go to the bar for a drink. Then, with a few more minutes to kill, we walk into the casino.

Judy puts 10 bucks in a slot machine and loses a quarter at a time for 15 minutes, at which time we are 10 bucks poorer. Goddam smokers are everywhere in the casino, and they air purification systems are sadly lacking. We gotta get out of there.

Off to the concert hall. Charlie is busy sawing his fiddle in half. It's only 7:40, and the 7:30 concert is already underway!

We find our seats, which are halfway back on the floor, on the aisle. The venue is small, so we are close enough to see Charlie's big belt buckle and even-bigger gut, and we have an easy in/out. Great.

But the sound is very loud. Judy gets out her phone and fires up an app to measure the dB level. I see 110 on her screen. She puts fingertips in her ears. I turn my hearing aids off, which reduces the sound, and also attenuates the higher frequencies, making the music very bassy -- not at all the way you would want to listen to music.

No way she can hear me, so I text her: "We can leave anytime you want." I know we invested $150, but I am prepared to call that water under the bridge -- or is it over the dam? She reads the text and nods.

We have been in our seats less than half a song, but we get up and walk back to the entrance. Once through the doors, Judy suggests we ask for our money back. I tell her it's a long shot, but what the hell.

She finds the guy in charge and tells him we can't stay because it's too loud in there. He offers ear plugs. Judy declines the plugs and asks for our money back. While we are standing at the ticket counter having this conversation, another couple arrives asking to buy tickets to see Charlie. The agent sees an opportunity. He gets on the phone with Ticketmaster, secures a promise that our money will be refunded, and sells our barely warmed seats to the new arrivals.

I was, at that point, extremely skeptical that the cocksuckers at Ticketmaster would honor that commitment, but hey, I had been ready to walk away with no effort toward a refund anyway. I got the agent's name, Wes Randle, figuring that it could help in the argument that was sure to take place with the aforementioned cocksuckers later.

We drove home. I put a "Check for refund" reminder on the calendar.

So a week later, the Visa card website showed me a $150 refund from Ticketmaster had been posted the day after the concert. I am stunned.

Now I am going to ask the slot machine for our $10 back.

Dumb-Ass People

On a friend's recommendation, I went to the website for The St. Louis Arch. The site doesn't make it easy to find the Riverboat Cruises that they run on the Mississippi, but I found the cruises, their schedules, their prices. I bought 2 tickets for the May 31st Blues Cruise on the Becky Thatcher.

They gave me a choice: Print your tix at home, or pick them up at Will Call. I printed them at home. Across the top of each ticket it says "THIS IS YOUR TICKET." So far, so good. Boarding time is 8:00, set sail at 8:30, dock at 11.

Our friends Rick and LaVerne drove; we parked on the riverbank. They had chosen the WILL CALL option, so we stopped there so Rick could get their tickets, which were little yellow tickets marked "Very Important Passenger" in a white envelope. Then we all went to the boarding area. I checked my watch: 3 minutes until boarding time.

But we see passengers already boarding. Guess we won't have our pick of the best seating on board, I thought. Oh, well.

Judy and I presented ourselves and our "THIS IS YOUR TICKET" documents to the boarding area ticket-takers. We were refused admission.

Their THIS IS YOUR TICKET document, as it turns out, is not really the ticket you need to board the boat. The ticket-takers were sending all of us having such documents back to the window where the WILL CALL tickets are held. To get, no shit, a white envelope containing 2 little yellow tickets marked "Very Important Passenger."

What a joke! The TICKET is not a ticket. Printing at home served no purpose whatever, except to deceive and delay the Very Important Passengers who will then tell their friends.

Stupid Management. I'm telling my friends.

So we got the yellow VIP tickets and went back to the boarding ramp. Between the ticket-taker and the boat, there was a photography setup where a group photo was taken. We were encouraged to smile for the camera. My smile was not forced at all - quite genuine.











































It was not me who purchased the photo, but now I'm kinda glad to have it.

I'm still pissed.

The Saddest Thing

According to one Internet source, Ken Burns’ The Vietnam War documentary reached some 34 million viewers. That’s about 10% of the U.S. population.

It took me several months to slog through the many hours of misery contained in the 10 episodes, but I can now count myself as one of the 34 million viewers.

I think I can guess who most of the viewers were: People like me who were directly affected in one way or another. Median age of the viewers had to be >60. 

An excerpt from The New York Times’ review: 

The saddest thing about this elegiac documentary may be the credit it extends its audience. “The Vietnam War” still holds out hope that we might learn from history, after presenting 18 hours of evidence to the contrary.

I see no evidence that the present or future leaders of this country learned one goddamned thing from all the boneheaded blunders made by leaders past. Credit the NY Times for sifting through all the myriad, deep, and enduring sadnesses to name the worst.

If You Google "futility,"...

When my brother Charles ruptured his left quad tendon in 2017, he went to Christian Hospital for out-patient surgery. But then he had an infection in his leg and needed additional surgery as an in-patient. He spent several days in Room 1021, Bed 2, the one closest to the 10^th-floor window.

When Charles had a stroke on April 4, 2018, he landed in Christian Hospital again – Room 1021, Bed 2.

It seemed to me a freak coincidence that he would be in the same room again, and I poked around the Internet to gain some perspective on Christian Hospital. Turns out they have 220 “attended beds,” so it’s a little weird, but the 10^thfloor is neurology, so maybe it’s not quite so weird. Other than the fact that his 2017 stay didn’t seem to have much relation to neurology.

But the Internet dragged me much further into its web. Christian Hospital is part of BJC HealthCare, a “non-profit” group of 15 hospitals and “multiple community health locations.” With over 31,000 employees, they claim to be “one of the largest nonprofit health care organizations in the United States.”

So I Googled “biggest non-profit healthcare groups in USA.” I looked at a list of the top 32 non-profits and did not find BJC HealthCare on the list – although, at #32, East Texas Medical Center Regional Healthcare System (Tyler) has only 7 hospitals.

At #1 in the list, I found Ascension Health, another St. Louis-based hospital group, with an astounding 76 hospitals. Ascension’s website provided precious little information about revenues, and a plethora of info about all the good this Catholic organization does for the world.

Speaking of revenue, BJC HealthCare’s “net revenue” is listed at $4.8 Billion. When I Googled “net revenue,” I found that it means “gross sales minus the cost of sales, including cost of goods sold.”

Christ. I’m sorry I asked. What I was trying to find was how much profit BJC makes – but of course they don’t make a profit, because, by definition, they are a non-profit organization.

Conclusion: Stay the hell away from Google. You will only be confused in the end.