Oreilles Gauloises (Mid-life Crisis Edition) - Goat (The Jesus Lizard)

If you're like me - 40ish very happily-married straight white male who's been with the same partner for close to two decades - then you know how deliciously pleasant it is to once in a (very great) while capture the attention of an attractive, sometimes younger, woman, and practice the lost art of flirting for an hour or two. I find these rare instances to be particularly pleasant precisely because they're...well...rare, and because I have absolutely no ulterior motives or intention to act on anything, other than to be able to tell myself at the end of the encounter that I "still got it". I realize this is very likely completely delusional on my part, and quite comical to most of my female friends (including the missus), but indulge me for a minute, if you please.

 The last time this happened was this past fall when I went to see The Jesus Lizard at the Music Box in Hollywood with my friend Joe. He opted to stay back to avoid hearing damage, and I ended up by the front of the stage, next to this nerdy-but-supercute, book-ish-looking woman who was, granted, slightly inebriated, and who proceeded to get friendly with me.

She was quite charming, and I was feeling that rejuvenating burst of energy of knowing that, while I was a somewhat older concert-goer, I had tons of musical street-cred, and at that moment, I looked relatively cool with my Mission of Burma t-shirt, and maybe even younger than I actually was. I decided to go into full flirt-mode, and off I went. I, of course, managed to mention - with great subtlety I might add - that I had "seen these guys way back in the 90's", when they were first touring, and "nobody knew who they were". You have to be careful when you play that card because it can easily backfire: on the one hand, you will likely impress the younger lass and score coolness points, but you will also loudly announce that you're way past your early thirties, and that could be a deal-breaker for some. In any case, we talked for a while, and I was having a great time. She kept dropping obvious hints in the conversation about her being single, and needing a ride home after the show. I was enjoying myself a great deal, feeling like I was 25 again. But then, some drunken idiot decided to butt-in and see if he could get in on the flirting action! While I was no match for his youthfulness and goods looks, he was really quite drunk, and completely incoherent, which played in my favor. Still, the intruder decided to stand between me and the target of my charm offensive, despite my body language conveying quite clearly that I was there first, that he was ruining the moment, and that he should get another Bud Light while he still could before the band begins their set. Alas, I lost that battle, and my cute English Lit major concert companion eventually got bored, and moved away from us.

But it was fantastic while it lasted!

Oh, and yeah: the Jesus Lizard have this awesome album called Goat. It is their second, and best record. They played through the 90's, and split up at the end of the decade. Like many bands from that period, they reunited last year, and a small group of married nerds like me got to go see them play live again for the first time in 15 years, and a yet-even-smaller subset of us even got to flirt with a younger and attractive member of the opposite sex for a brief moment in time while watching the band tear through their set...and we felt not so old, bald, or out of shape.