The first Americans may want to repossess it about now...

Saw this over on Landshark's blog and couldn't resist reposting it:



Actually, I met Mark Lindsay (lead singer for the Raiders) once, in 2002 or 2003, when my town was having an Old Town Festival, and he was our headline act one night. As a Chamber of Commerce board member, I was tasked with escorting Mr. Lindsay and his band to and from the motorhome that'd been set up as a makeshift 'green room' and the stage (the same festival I got to be 'paymaster' to, and visit with, the Beatles tribute band Me and My Monkey after their set).

Anyway, Mr. Lindsay was very down-to-earth, and before his set held court in the motorhome, recounting stories from back in the day, but not in a boastful or cocky way. He was nursing some form of macrobiotic [non-alcoholic] vegetable juice concoction that he said was good for his vocal chords. It didn't look very appealing, but he sounded great, so I suppose it worked.

For most of the show, I stayed around the back or to the side of the stage. About 2/3 of the way through, an attractive woman, a few years older than I, approached me, and asked if I could get her a brief meeting with Mr. Lindsay after the show. Nothing untoward, mind you, she said she'd had her room plastered with his posters as a teenager, and she wanted to see if she could get an album cover signed.

Knowing the band was on a tight schedule following the show, I didn't make any promises. As the show ended the band came down the side steps of the stage, and almost sprinted the seventy-five or so feet to the bordering fence next to the motorhome. Just as we reached the fence, Mr. Lindsay turned to thank me for assisting them, and I asked if he had time to sign a couple of autographs. He very graciously agreed, and I motioned to the woman to come over.

About a week later, I got a very nice thank you card from the woman, complete with a picture of her and Mark Lindsay. She'd driven up from Waco to our festival to see her teen idol. She apparently worked in the Waco chamber and had tracked me down through counterparts in my town.

Fun times.

Now, if only there were only enough Sioux, Apache, Navajo, Caddo, Cherokee, Iroquois & Cheyenne braves left to surround Capitol Hill and 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue and maybe do a Little Bighorn Redux. I guess the rest of the country is finally coming to terms with what the native Americans have known for over a century-and-a-half: Getting screwed by Washington, D.C.