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Beautifully true.

I grew up in Comer, 20 miles east of Athens. I lived there from age three until I went off to college. Mom was a nurse at Athens General Hospital (now Athens Regional Medical Center) and my dad was an officer at the Navy Supply Corps School.

Life was very slow in Comer, a true "one red light town". Really - it was at the intersection of Hwys 98 and 72. Any movies, shopping, anything beyond mailing a letter or getting gas meant a trip to Athens.

Things perked up once I turned 16 and got my driver's license, and a car. I went to Athens Academy from grade 9 to 12 on an academic scholarship. It was fantastic. One of the best schools anywhere.

I was always in Athens after that, hanging out with friends. With the drinking age only 19, and me being so tall and blessed with copious facial hair, I was never carded. Those were the days.

Athens has a real Zen about it. It's your traditional college town, like Chapel Hill, Austin, Berkeley, and countless others, with all the best that that brings. To get a taste of 1980s Athens, go see Athens, Ga. - Inside/Out, a 1987 movie focusing on the music scene. Great soundtrack, plus you can see the guy who did the album cover for the Talking Heads' Little Creatures.

Later on, I did 8 years in Augusta for medical school and residency. Augusta was OK, but it's no Athens, which is actually a good thing, or else I would not have made it through med school, I fear. And then who would be there to medic8 the masses of the Axiom forum?!

JP on the chain gang cutting grass along I75...

"Swing lowwww....sweet char-i-Ooo....comin' for to carry me hoooome"

Dig this.

I was dating a girl in the early 80's who's brother was the photographer for REM. I got to hang out (I lived in Florida but I spent a lot of time in Athens) with a lot of people and bands from that scene.

I hung out with REM, the B52's, Pylon, Method Actors etc. It was an exciting time.

I also met a dude in a little combo called Buzz OF Delight. We became friends and he later helped me get started in the music industry. This person went on to some fame (if not fortune). This person? None other than Matthew Sweet. He's the reason I ended up here in Atlanta...

Anyway, I also got to meet the late, great Howard Finster. He gave me two really cool hand painted whirly-gigs that he had made. I left them in that girl I was dating parents garage (they were very big). Years later, after Howard died, I went and asked them for my whirly-gigs back.

Her father had thrown them out thinking that they were just junk!

Can you imagine how much they would be worth now?

The reverend was a strange and cool man.

This is just so much funnier with those two simple words removed....

My, what big whirly-gigs you have.

Saline, silicon, it's all good.

Terry, Matthew Sweet was always one of my favorites. I love his vocal harmonies, especially on the Girlfriend CD. It's cool that he got you into the biz.

I have a few name-dropping stories, but nothing to compare to your industry exploits. One that I'll share, because it made me laugh, is how my mom met R.E.M. To assist in the mental imagery, imagine my Mom as Granny from the Beverly Hillbillies, maybe if Granny were 20-30 years younger. They have the same kind of country sensibilities, shall we say. Mom was also raised in Comer and enjoyed shooting, cooking, fishing, and "home remedies".

Anyway, Mom worked various units over her nursing career, with a long stint in oncology. Sadly, R.E.M.'s stage manager, Curtis Goodman, developed terminal cancer in the late 1980s (I'm thinking 1987) and was a patient of my mom's for about a week. She knew he was in the music business, but if it wasn't Waylon or Willie, it was foreign to Mom. So, Mom tells me one day that all the young nurses are going crazy, like a bunch of high school girls swooning over some hot stuff. "A-ha," she thinks, "the band must be in the building. Guess I'll meet me some real ce-leb-ri-ties! But then - imagine my surprise when I see these four grimy, ratty looking guys coming down the hallway!?! You mean this is what is driving these nurses crazy? Ain't nothin' too special about them that I can see! When was the last time they had a bath, anyway?!"

I think she also used some language similar to that in "Money for Nothing", meaning that my mom would probably be censored in Canada now, if recent threads here are to be believed.

I'm still waiting on that order i placed in September.

You don't need it - you're altered enough, eh?

And take your Winterpeg weather back ASAP!

He must have sent that weather to us!!