CHARLIE WATTS/JIM BOUTON/MORE MANNY

This Charlie Watts death is kind of a big one. For me it's like Aretha, Prince, or Bowie. I remember when I was 8, they had a video for the song 'Start Me Up.' I was only 8 but I knew there was something sexual going on. They had disgusting tight white jeans. I remember the drummer laughing at everyone the whole time. I loved this. 

A thousand years later my friends Gabe and Tom (who is a drummer) were over and we were listening to 'Get Yer Ya-Ya's Out!' 'Midnight Rambler' was playing and Tom said "When you get sick of Keith and Mick you can always just listen to Charlie." I have done that. He is totally right. Charlie barely ever hits the crash in the song 'Let It Loose.' I fucking love this guy. At one point on the album above Mick Jagger says to the crowd, "Charlie's good tonight, isn't he?" Cool. 

There was a baseball writer/book called 'Ball Four' that exposed the use of greenies by baseball players. This guy was castigated for writing this book and tarnishing the sanctity of baseball. That is horseshit. Jim Bouton was on a terrible team, they had played like 20 games and had not won one. Not even a single one. In the 9th inning before they went out for the last at bats the manager would say, "Go out there and get this over with, then we'll go to the clubhouse and we'll pound those Budweisers."

I bought this book for my father like 10 years ago. He didn't know a single thing about the internet. When I bought the book I bought it directly from Jim Bouton, I emailed him and everything. I asked him to write my father a note in the front. I had Jim write: 'Happy Birthday you fucking dinosaur.' My father was turning like 73 or something. He totally wrote it. My father was astonished that the author had personally written him a note, that whole idea was beyond him. Awesome awesome awesome. 

When the Red Sox got Manny Ramirez I called my father and we talked about it. Then I called my sister and talked to her about it. Then I called my father and talked to him about it. When I hung up my girlfriend at the time said, " I just heard you have the same exact conversation 3 times."