Reel Big Phish?

Yesterday Mary and I had to travel northward to visit Cumberland-Perry Vo-Tech for an in-service. It was a fantastic experience and I will absolutely do it again some future summer, but what I want to address in this blog is the conversation Mary and I had on either the drive there or the drive home. I think it was the drive there, but I might be wrong... and that's not really important to the story anyway.

What's important to the story is that last week at trivia, the Educated Friends lost. This has pretty much everything to do with an ill-timed expression of concern for a dying bug. I won't say who distracted the team at such a crucial moment, but I will say that it wasn't me. And I'll also say that because folks were so distracted by the bug, no one remembered to wager fewer than twelve points on the final question (NHL History, of all things), and so we lost.

When I say "lost," I mean lost-lost. We'd been in second. We might've ended up in first... but no. We lost. No gift cards were earned last Thursday.

The winning team always gets to choose the opening category for the following week, you know, and so last week's winning team (I can't remember the team's name and Darren isn't responding to his texts) was in the process of requesting an audio clue when I overheard them and said, "You think you're gonna get an audio clue, but that doesn't mean you actually will. Remember the OAR fiasco?"

(The OAR fiasco occurred just a few weeks ago when the Educated Friends were supposed to have an audio clue and didn't. But it was fine because I knew the answer anyway and also because Adam felt bad that Pour House messed it up and so he therefore played OAR all night. Danielle the bartender loved this because she has good taste in music.)

When I mentioned the OAR fiasco last Thursday, Adam said, "Hey now! You might actually like this one. They want an audio clue for the band Phish."

On the other side of the restaurant, El Duderino booed. I guess El Duderino does not like Phish very much.

Now, all that being said, I was talking to Mary in the car yesterday about how we should listen to Phish on the drive to Cumberland-Perry Vo-Tech. We did, obviously, because we are good students and want to be prepared for tomorrow night's opening category. But in listening to Phish and recounting the comment Adam made last Thursday, I said, "You know, I get that a lot. People assume that because my favorite band is Reel Big Fish, what I actually mean is Phish. But I don't mean Phish. I mean Reel Big Fish."

For those who may not be aware of the differences between these two bands, I will provide a quick Venn Diagram:

In addition to these differences, I have been listening to Reel Big Fish since 1996, I have seen them in concert more times than I can count, I have met the band's lead singer Aaron Barrett on numerous occasions, I have been on the band's tour bus, Aaron Barrett and his wife Crysta own a copy of my book Kick It One More Time (because Reel Big Fish is actually in that book), Aaron and Crysta have a piece of my art hanging in their home, and I own all of Reel Big Fish's albums.

I only started listening to Phish about a year ago, I have never seen them in concert, and I don't own any of their albums. I do enjoy their music, though; I would never boo about having to listen to them.

So in the car yesterday with Mary, I told her about some other times that people have mixed up my favorite band with Phish. Like when my coworker Lynn told me this cool story about winning tickets to see Phish but then giving the tickets away because she knew someone who would enjoy the show more than she would... since she's not a Phish phan. But I'm not really a Phish phan either; I think she was surprised to hear at the end of the story that I've never seen Phish in concert, but that my friend Annie has. Annie has seen Phish a whole bunch of times because Annie is a phan, but she has not seen Reel Big Fish even once because she is not really a fan. Understand?

Also, my friend Charlie who lives in California once posted a Phish song on my Facebook timeline and had this hilarious comment about the lyrics in the song and how they remind him of me and how Phish always reminds him of me... and I commented on the post to say that I was unfamiliar with the song because I had never really listened to much Phish. This made Charlie feel ridiculous and he took down the post.

Anyway, that's today's blog.

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Oh! But I will add this: I went to high school with a guy named Billy and because of social media, we have continued to keep in touch. Billy loves ska music as much as I do (so does Josh from El Duderino, actually; maybe this is why El Duderino booed about Phish) and anytime Billy sees something about Reel Big Fish on social media, he tags me in it. He recently made a very funny video using Reel Big Fish's cover of Duran Duran's "Hungry Like the Wolf" to advertise his brewery. Liquidity Aleworks is located in Mt. Airy, Maryland, and you should obviously go there. So should I.

Another thing I should do is share Billy's Facebook post on my author/artist Facebook page... which I will do in a minute. If you want to view it, that's where you can find it! And make sure the volume is up because that's Reel Big Fish in the background.