Grammy goes to...

Everyone check out the Grammy's last night? For me, its not as much about the winners and losers as it is about witnessing which artist will take advantage of the big stage to showcase their talent... it's about those memorable performances that turn non-fans into believers and current fans into addicts...

Last night it was Sugarland's performance... Though I'm not a huge connoisseur of Country music, i have always been a fan of the true slow jams that Nashville slips out from time to time... (none of that twangy cotton-eyed-joe crap!)...

It was actually the first time I've heard "Stay" and singer Jennifer Nettles nailed it. Seems like she's amazing LIVE... the 'second act' of that set was Adele's "Chasing Pavements" which was also solid... Definitely the top performances of the night for me.. yes, even better than Jay-Z and the Rap Pack and my boy JT and Al Green...

(*$ note: sorry guys, Sugarland's Grammy performance got pulled off YouTube for 'copywright'... so instead i slid in their CMA Awards performance from '07)



So, that got me thinking... what are some of my all-time favorite LIVE performances? Here are a few keepers, in no particular order...

1. John Mayer: "In your atmosphere" - Nokia Theater, Los Angeles, 2007




2. Alicia Keys: "If I Aint Got You" - Grammy Awards 2005




3. Jason Mraz: "You and I Both" - Pepsi Smash, 2003




4. John Legend: "Where Did My Baby Go?" - Royal Albert Hall, London, 2006




5. Justin Timberlake: "What Goes Around" - Grammy Awards, 2007




6. Chris Brown: "Run It" - Grammy Awards, 2007




7. Beyonce: "Naughty Girl" and "Crazy in Love" - NBA All-Star Game, Los Angeles, 2004




8. Michael Jackson: "The Way You Make Me Feel" and "Man in the Mirror" - Grammys, 1988 (long, but damn good)




9. Usher: "Love in this Club" - Dancing with the Stars, 2008




10. U2 and Mary J: "One Love" - Grammys, 2006





If you watched each of those videos, than you already had a good day.




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Resolutions…

Promises of promise.
Declarations of faith.
An untouched canvas,
On an unblemished slate.

Visions of grandeur.
Triumphs to be told.
A cause to be hopeful,
A pause to be bold.

Dreams of distant places.
Hungry miles to explore.
North-facing compass,
Beckons wide open doors.

Reset and refresh.
Start again brand new.
Anything possible,
Everything adieu.

A year to remember.
An instant to reflect.
This time, is my time,
My moment to protect.


Shine in ’09…


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Lyrics of the Week

Champ:
In a way, I need a change
From this burnout scene
Another time, another town
Another everything
But it's always back to you...
- "Shattered," O.A.R.

Runner-up:
I’m not lovin’ you
Way I wanted to
I bet no one knew
I got no one new
Know I said I’m through
But got love for you
But I’m not lovin’ you
Way I wanted to...
- "Love Lockdown," Kanye

Take II

Welcome to the long awaited 2nd Season of Between the Gray. As you loyal followers know, the site was motionless following last winter's Writer's Strike and the rise in commodity costs... But now, with writer's back in action, oil down to under $50/barrel, and the impending recession demanding that folks spend less time staring at their dwindling bank statements and more time reading the sometimes helpful, occassionaly useless, and always thought-provoking ramblings of an aging 29 year-old.... I'm back.

With a few subtle, but important, changes.

1. I'm branded. Screw the pseudo-anonymous crap. I'm Kash, and i'll tell you what I think, and invite you to respond.
2. I've added some widgets to the sidebar, so please become a 'follower' ('follow me to freedom!'), subscribe, and check out the slideshow pics from time to time.
3. Inspired by my good pal Cyril (check out his blog on the link to the right), I'll also mix in some commentary on sports, politics, business, and entertainment news from time to time.
4.Most importantly, I'll be coming out with a 2nd blog to chronicle a very important chapter of every man's life... weekly accounts housed under the broader theme of '300 days until 30.' The infamous landmark that formally signifies the end of 'young adult/professional' and begins the chapter of full-fledged ADULTHOOD.... It makes sense to me to keep these blogs seperate, as 300 till 30 will be for a short period of time, and hopefully BTG lives on... but we'll see how things evolve... This will be a wild, confusing, revealing, reflective, and untamed ride... The countdown begins December 18th...

All these changes could, and maybe should, call for a site/name change.... but for now, I'll stick with BTG.... because, as we've all learned, our most emotive and intoxicating moments happen far from the boundaries of Black and White.... Between the Gray, TAKE II.

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It's -5 degrees and blizzarding outside...

Life is a snow storm. Really.

It’s cold, turbulent, and a few degrees below where you wanna go… it’s traffic jams of pissed off people. It's hungry kids in the back seat... It’s incompetent public officials doing a shitty job of cleaning the crap off the streets. It’s an excuse to stay indoors – away from the harsh bite of the outside world... It’s celebration of cancelled workdays, disappointment with forfeited soccer games, and frustration with messy backyards. It’s a foodless fridge with no pizza delivery... It’s beautiful views from your living room window but icy reality when you step out on the porch... It's finally meeting the hot, blonde, underwear model next door but not seeing any skin because it's hidden under eleven layers of clothing and a thick cotton scarf (damnit)... It’s overweight snowmen… It’s a breeze, until all that sticky white stuff gets in the way…

It’s a chance to snuggle at home and let the people you love most keep you warm… until they annoy the hell out of you after 48 straight cabin-feveresque hours… and then, you throw them out into the cold.

Let it snow.

Hot List

The first of regular installments... and, due to visitor requests, this week's poll - Women.

Here's my top 10... plus the first runner-up...

1. Vanessa Marcil
2. Alyssa Milano
3. Eva Longoria
4. Halle Berry
5. Keira Knightley
6. Penelope Cruz
7. Jennifer Love Hewitt
8. Jessica Alba
9. Ashley Judd
10. Kate Beckinsale
RUP Beyonce Knowles

Nice.

Yours?

The View from the Top II...

From top:
Good Morning Eiffel - room 517 balcony, Hotel Metropolitan, Paris, France;
Night Tower - 1st floor reception, Hotel Metropolitan, Paris, France;
Daylight to Redlight - Room 729, Hilton Amsterdam Hotel, The Netherlands;
Midday Brussels - street shot, Hotel Metropole, Brussels, Belgium

Translation

You don’t understand my words,
Don’t recognize my phrases.
The punctuation isn’t right.
Sentences are mazes.

We stutter out the sounds,
Missing all the bases.
Repetitively repeating.
The dialogue erases.

Pick-up lines fall flat,
Punch lines without traces.
Context clues are lost.
We’re forced to read faces.

Talking takes time,
But laughter embraces.
A smile inspires a smile.
We share unspoken praises.

A language without terms,
Expressions fuel the chases.
A touch of wanting hands,
Exchanging secret gazes.

A silent conversation,
Complete with all the phases.
To not-speak with you again…

I’ll search in all the places.

Szeretlek…

From Europe with euro's...

Ok, so I had this plan to document each day of my trek through three of Europe's most fascinating hotspots – Paris, Brussels, and Amsterdam - so each of you could relive every powerful emotion, mysterious sensation, butchered conversation, and pounding hangover... but after about Day 3, I realized that no daily diary could do justice to the monumental occurrences that peppered every day of my stay... seriously, it'd be like spending an entire night with three beautiful European strippers and then trying to sum it up in a couple sentences of 12 pt font... wait a minute.....

So yea, anyway.... while the details and devils of the trip will forever remain with my accomplice and me... here are a few thoughts from the Journey...

- You gotta love a place that has Benzo's and Beamers for taxis... When I left the U.S. (from some unsavory locale in the Midwest), a piece-of-crap 1984, orange, Dodge Caravan from 'Roy's Cab' ushered me to the airport... Upon my arrival in Paris, a 2006 platinum silver Mercedes C-class picked me up from the 'taxi stand'.... need I say more?

- Guys don’t ‘pimp’ in France. This town has whipped them into the surly belief that its walls are for Lovers, not Hunters... I don’t know if it’s the overpowering image of the Eiffel Tower in the rearview, the sentiment of Romance that echoes along the Champs Elysses… or something in those damn baguettes… but dudes don’t holla at chicks in Paris… they are either coupled up or content in their ‘friendly’ circles... this time, I embraced the culture, and kept my distance… next time, I'm coming prepared with 5-7 French phrases that I will wield at innocent female passersby... Next time, I'm starting a Revolution baby...

- Laughter sounds the same in every language.

- History and tradition. Architecture and design. Gourmet and Fillet Mignon. Style and Attitude. This continent has an air about it that's part badass, part cocky, part cool-as-hell. And 100% sexy. I like the packed streets, the overcast skies, and the long coats that hide the slimfit Prada mini-skirts... all this topped with cherries of Diversity and Culture that are unmatched... We should all move to Europe for a year... then Africa for two... the Middle east.... Asia...

- Late night dinners. Excessive drinking. Mediocre exercise programs. No steroid controversy. And a McDonalds on every corner… Yet Europeans are STILL so much thinner than Americans. How?? There's only one answer... Legalized Prostitution... It's that simple, really.

- "Window-shopping" for women in the Red Light District is like getting permission from mom to have intercourse with your 3^rdgrade teacher… it’s not only awkward, strange, ridiculous and scary… it’s a bit anticlimactic.. There's no drama... no chase... no accidental groping... And the beam of the neon Red lights are to erections and arousals as Nyquil is to that late-night cough... TOTAL-freakin-suppressant... Trust me on this one... This Red Light District stuff costs about $50, but it's more "gratis" than the middle square on a Bingo Card... and we don’t want that... There’s a reason we seek the forbidden fruit... Because it’s forbidden... Otherwise, we would just settle for the crusty Apples back home in Kentucky.

- I flew 10, 000 miles. Across the Atlantic. Another continent. A different world... And still... out of all the French, German, Dutch, Moroccan, Persian women out there... I STILL attract the Indian girls... now, I'm not complaining... it's just that, you would think a change in environment would spawn a change in female interaction... I mean, isn’t that one of Darwin's laws or something?? In any case, the rendezvous with the aforementioned girls was predictable... mildly exciting at first, aggravatingly optimistic second, and then undeniably unfulfilling in the end... though we still have her number.... hmmm...

- The art of communication doesn’t start with language... and the most important things, they don’t need to be translated. There’s an emotional, cerebral, spiritual wavelength that we all can speak... though it's only forced out at times when we don’t have the right words... or the trusty English to "insert-language-here" Dictionary....

- Forget Beijing in '08... Budapest baby... Budapest.

Scruffy...

You gotta admit...

You gotta admit that, the days you barely roll out of bed after hammering the snooze button 34 times, staggering to your feet on 3.5 hours of uneven sleep, with your unshaven face, your dirty clothes, your un-ironed shirts, your hair that you cut yourself in the morning because your bangs were too long, your eyebrows busting out of your skull like September weeds, your breath smelling like a deadly blend of last night's turkey burger and pickles and this morning's last squirt of three-month-old citrus-flavored toothpaste…

Those are the days you run into the hottest girls.

Struggling into work or stumbling into school, you come face-to-face with the prettiest chicks...you run into your dream woman walking down the halls…you run into the cute intern who’s here for a day visit and an overdue house-hunting trip…you run into the forty-something, flirtatious secretary in the skimpy dress that encouraged you with unsavory eye-contact in days-passed but today bristles by at the sight of your ketchup-stained trousers...

You run into your marketing director that you haven’t seen in two months… you run into that well-kept Biology professor that you've had the hots for since Freshman year but that has failed to notice you in the second row all semester but now engages you in maddening conversation about double-stranded DNA while grimacing in disgust at your unorderly appearance...

You run into your boss’s kids who are visiting for the first time and wanna meet people she works with and instead realize that you’re a grizzly bearded, Osama-Bin-Laden-lookin brown boy…you run head-first into an elevator packed with a devastating combination of hot blondes, upper-management, and campus security...

You run into everybody.

And tomorrow, when you put on that brand new Italian suit or mintly-pressed blouse from the Spring Collection... you aint running into anybody but Chucky the slightly scatterbrained and considerably heavy-set custodian... and even he aint gonna have time for you...

Cuz that's just the way it works...

Lessons from '24'...

Proper pronunciation of people’s first names could deter budding teenaged extremists from playing crucial roles in sinister nuclear plots.

Biting someone in the jugular to free oneself from a torture-chair isn’t usually taught in the Boy Scouts, but should be.

When two brothers - who are Brothas - each become President, suddenly the impending apocalypse makes much more sense.

The short, curly-haired dude with the squeaky voice, rambling vocabulary, and stuffy banker-blazer that lectures your boss should never be trusted…he should be beaten. Zero-tolerance for little-man-syndrome.

Racial profiling occurs almost as often in the hunt for suspected fanatics as it does at the Sig Ep house at major public Universities… except id rather give up my freedom in a detainment camp then miss out on nightly encounters with desperately inebriated co-eds. When’s the Tri-Delt mixer again?

Jack Bauer is badder than Rocky, William Wallace, Bond, Maximus, the Terminator, and even that pretty boy, arrow-flinging elf from Lord of the Rings.

Kal Penn aka ‘Kumar’ aka ‘Taj’ aka 'Akhhmedd' is officially the worst underdog to make it to the Big Dance in Hollywood history… the sheer fact that this dude shares a scene with Jack Bauer is inspiration enough for me to quit my day job, live out of my car on Ventura Blvd, and enroll in some hole-in-the-wall acting class… My cat can act better than this guy... Ok fine! I'm jealous and I'm hating. So what!

Hot, sexy, petite brunettes have no business working in the Counter Terrorism Unit. They should work in the office across from me… in tastefully revealing outfits.

It is ALWAYS an inside-job…

Say..

I liked the way she said ‘papers.’

Dancing off her tongue like an intoxicating blend of tango and ballet...

Curving, in and out... her lips paving the way for the sharp turn ahead.

A hard right followed by a steep uphill climb through her Inhibitions,

Tumbling softly into the creases of her Conversation.

A highway of racing Emotions and bumper-to-bumper Expressions,

Exiting along the passion-soaked boulevard of Expectation and Mystery...

All hidden between a ‘ps.’

I liked the way she said ‘green’…

Hiatus

I’ve been away… I know… weeks? Months? Both…

Sometimes we need to go… just so we can return… except this time with stripes on our coats and purple hearts around our necks… to win some battles and lose even more… to fight...

To redirect... to change the course of the spinning fireballs and shape-shift into another monologue...

To get a new audience... or lose the old one... starting from Square One so we’re sure the right people are listening... and the wrong people are wandering...

Winter-time hibernation to rest up for the coming search for honey…

Better honey.

Time away is good… but only when you come back.

I’m back.

The View from the Top...

From the top: Dusk over the Hudson - 52nd floor Westin Times Square, NYC;
Pacific Sunset - 10th floor Sheraton Delfina, Santa Monica, CA;
LA Palms vs. Skyline - 6th floor terrace, L'Ermitage, Beverly Hills;
LA Weather - 12th floor, Westin LAX;
Salt Lake Surrounded - seat 2A

Can I take your order?

Why is it that the best meals often occur way past midnight, hours before the morning omelet? Is it the calming effect of the post-dusk air that serenades the food like strawberry vinaigrette running over acres of mixed greens? Or is it because a chicken gordita just tastes THAT damn good?

Why is it that every thought of calories, carbohydrates, or caffeine seem to exit stage right when the Drama about late night food begins? Eaters-remorse is fast asleep while you're chewing on that fat-packed Quarter Pounder with Cheese. Potbellies hide under the blankets and Love Handles are busy making out in the driveway... Why is it that a 4am Biggie Size of fries seems like a much more delicious alternative than taking Lucy or Rhonda home from the club?

Something about that late night, drove-too-far-to-get-it and then waited-in-line-behind-nine-cars-kinda-Snack appeases all bouts of confusion or eruptions of hormone...

Something in those twilight tastings energizes us more than any Sunday morning sermon ever could. Reverend Ronald McDonald sho' do know how to preach...

And the hymns he's selling go damn good with some ketchup and a six-piece.

And we're singin' along...cuz we're saying 'screw it' with each verse...with each bite... forgetting about the morning paper or the 7am meeting... just eating something greasy and fried, and lovin' every minute of it... freedom baby... that's what ol' Rev is preachin'...


And ima believer.

Inspiration

When inspiration hits...unleash it.

Even if it's 3:43am on a workday.

Lyrics of the Week

Champ:
Lately my hands they don't feel like mine.
My eyes been stung with dust, I'm blind.
Held you in my arms one time,
Lost you just the same...

Still don't know what love means.
- Ray LaMontagne, Jolene

Runner-up:
I dont want your innocence,
I dont want you to stutter.
I dont want a commitment,
And I dont want you to suffer.
I dont want your number,
Baby I want you to wonder...
- Diddy w/ Christina, Tell Me

Old School:
Did I ask too much, more than a lot.
You gave me nothing, now it's all I got.
We're one, but we're not the same.
Well, we hurt each other, then we do it again...

Love is a temple,
Love the higher law.
You ask me to enter,
But then you make me crawl,
And I can't be holding on, to what you got,
When all you got is hurt...
- U2, One

14

It's an intoxicating balance between schizophrenia and genius...between insanity and prodigy...

A fine line that's a dance floor for only the finest of performers...tip-toeing across the stage with precision, grace, and a few well-timed pelvic thrusts.

Weaving in and out of conscious and subconscious. Fantasy and reality... The Fourteen are fearless.

Armed and dangerous, ready to lay siege on any comer...any dinner guest at the Feast that is friendship, or famine that is the lack thereof... The Fourteen are incognito.

Undercover brothers, with varying attitudes and appetites but with the same infectious laugh. Different outfits with the same bad haircut... The Fourteen are coveted.

Desired by some, unknown by many, misunderstood by most...only the richest of Landlords own the key... The Fourteen are privileged.

Tucked away beneath blankets of security...invisible to the naked-eye... The Fourteen are lonely.


I have Fourteen personalities.

You know 3.

Now accepting reservations for Eleven.

Piano...

Why is it that when you're eleven years old, the thought of 'piano lessons' makes every budding hair follicle in a young male's body stand up in unison and scream out in unkempt anguish to acres of antsy testosterone... petrified about the impending persecution of all that is manly inside his 4 foot, 100lb frame....?

Rough, stubbled, future five-o'clock-shadows in gripping fear of infinite, effeminate curtsies in pink shirts and plaid bowties... Something about an hour on the bench with Mrs.Wyman in her dingy first-floor family room never ceases to whip said 11 year old boy into a whirling frenzy, scurrying with all his might to find some excuse.... ANY excuse, to refrain from refrains, and abstain from "C minors" and tippy-tippy tippy-tippy tee tee tahs... "I am man. Me eat meat. Me play football. Me fight lion.".... So goes the male adolescent mind... the puberic (is that a word?) thought process....

The hot girl in 5th grade doesn’t want the dude who can play a mean Moonlight Sonata... she wants the dude who can boot the big, red, rubber ball over Bobby's head in left field during kickball at recess... or the brotha with the fastest shuttle run time....

So, while myself and flocks of like-minded young men continue our endless search for Professional Kickball Leagues in which we can showcase our accrued ball-kicking talent... the nerd from the back row...in Mrs. Johnson’s class... yeah, that dude...

He's hummin' his baby grand right now... spittin' out Mozart and B'tove...Bach.... and sh*t is sounding nice... NICE.... And he's doing something with his hands that we'll never be able to do with our feet.... and THAT is poetic justice... or, pianic justice.


Anyone know a good piano teacher?



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Lyrics of the Week

Champ:
In the light of the sun,
Is there anyone? oh it has begun...
Oh dear you look so lost,
Eyes are red and tears are shed,
This world you must've crossed...
- Augustana, Boston

Runner-up:
Still I wonder why it is,
I don't argue like this,
With anyone but you.
We do it all the time,
Blowing out my mind.
- Corinne Bailey Rae, Like a Star