Musings on the Most Ridiculous Band I Can't Stop Listening To

Confessions

“Bro?”

“Bro.”

“You awake?”

“For my bro? Always.”

“Nice.”

“You’re my coffee.”

“Cafe Bro-Lait?”

“Love this guy.”

“I gotta tell you something, Bro.”

“Okay.”

“I never told anyone this before.”

“Bro: you can literally confess to anything to me and I will still be your Bromaha, Brobraska.”

“I think I might have killed Jerry Garcia.”

“What?”

“Seriously. I think I killed him.”

“Dude, you couldn’t have.”

“I could have! I did, man!”

“Junk Food, you couldn’t have killed Jerry Garcia: I did!”

“Don’t say that, Opiates!”

“It’s true!”

“BOTH OF YOU SHUT THE FUCK UP.”

“I killed him.”

“That’s not true!”

“No, Unfiltered Camel Cigarettes! You could never kill anyone!”

“And yet it happened!”

“ALL OF YOU SHUT THE FUCK UP!”

“I kill Yerry Mendoza! He vuz CIA! I feed him polonium-ski!”

“Vladimir Putin?”

You killed Jerry Garcia?”

“Da! MWAH-HA-HA!” Russian Bear kill Hippie Bear!”

Okay. That’s enough. Everyone stop being stupid.

You no tell Vladimir Putin what do!”

Oh, bite me, Putin.

19 Comments

  1. maggiemay

    fite me

  2. RationalExpressions

    All of the above. Plus if the stories are true about the mounds of cocaine he snorted and smoked, that had to have taken a huge toll on his weak ticker.
    I don’t like to, but when I think about the yo yo his heart must have gone through – intense touring, junk food binges, puffing down heaters, going up with coke and back down with Persian, over and over again. And he came up short in the genetic lottery as opposed to guys like Keith Richards.

    I remember a few years ago how weird it was to realize I’d outlived Jerry Garcia. A rough 53 years for that genius’ poor body.

  3. Richard Parker

    Gone 20+ years. He was dead by 1993; most of us wouldn’t admit it.

    Note to Maggie: Phish (and whoever is younger and next up) is a natural progression for you

  4. Snowmans

    Diabetes and cigarettes.

    • RationalExpressions

      I hate being morbid today, but does anyone know if Garcia was a hacker? Not in the computer sense, but was he ever like one of those heavy smokers who starts coughing and just can’t stop? The hack up a lung type. I ask because I don’t remember hearing it.

      • thoughtsonthedead

        Dude.

      • RationalExpressions

        Sorry man, but if people are going to blame the smokes for his early demise I need evidence.
        But I’ll go MaggyMay now and leave the Internet for good, literally.

        • thoughtsonthedead

          Don’t leave the internet for good. You’ll never be able to get movie times

      • RationalExpressions

        Good point. And I’ll never know how Wally ends up. I’m literally back on the Internet.

      • maggiemay

        He was so messed up in so many ways that I don’t think you can narrow it down to one thing that killed him. Didn’t seem like he was a hacker, though I don’t care to find out. Diabetes, horrible diet, smokes, heroin, no exercise and probably poor sleep all contributed to him falling apart. Things happen. That’s why you’ve gotta take care of yourself, man. idk lol

      • maggiemay

        RATIONAL EXPRESSIONS, UR OK. U R GR8. NO NEED 2 LEAVE

      • August West

        Cigarettes definitely killed his voice.
        Someone on the archive said by 84 Jerry sounded like Fozzie Bear choking on a hotdog. Pretty accurate I think. hahaha.
        By the 90s, fogedaboutit.

      • maggiemay

        That’s why I can never listen to shows past the 70’s… His voice was just so worn out. Poor guy.

      • DC Reade

        In the interest of dire bring-down historical accuracy: I remember hearing at least one interview with Garcia in his last couple of years, and his breathing had a regularly audible emphysemal gasping wheeze. COPD.

        For all that, Jerry still could belt out a ballad in 94 and 95, though. Never better, sometimes. But his lungs were about half shot- which is all too close to being completely shot. That fact has to be noted.

        Jerry also apparently had sleep apnea, a breathing syndrome characterized by loud snoring and exacerbated by obesity, that could have contributed to his death. http://www.heart.org/HEARTORG/Conditions/More/MyHeartandStrokeNews/Sleep-Apnea-and-Heart-Disease-Stroke_UCM_441857_Article.jsp http://www.webmd.com/sleep-disorders/sleep-apnea/news/20130611/sleep-apnea-may-boost-risk-of-sudden-cardiac-death

        Interestingly, the late funnyman and raconteur Tom Davis, one-time Garcia roommate during the infamous Hepburn Heights years, noted in his memoir that Garcia typically slept (& fell out, crashed, nodded, etc.) upright in a chair during that time. A sleeping posture like that would conceivably help to relieve the worst impacts of obstructive sleep apnea. It’s also possible that he might have received some physical relief from the bad effects of apnea (and possibly asthma, as JG was a childhood asthmatic) by using opiates. But that’s a terribly risky way to try to get a good night’s sleep; Jerry would have been better off ditching the cigarettes, keeping his excess weight off, and getting seriously into an exercise like swimming.

        Too bad more wasn’t known about the hazards of chronic sleep apnea in the mid-1990s- for example, I don’t think the CPAP mask was invented until the late 1990s. I think Garcia could also have benefited from vaping nicotine instead of smoking cigarettes, if he wasn’t up for summarily quitting tobacco cold turkey. But nothing tops a confirmed dedication to improving ones own physical fitness, and resorting to opiates for recreation has a tendency to interfere with such efforts. And just about everything else.

        (looks rueful, takes off forensic anthropologist coat, departs)

  5. Sir Luther Von Baconson

    sleep apnea, a punk microbiome, maxed out Doodle Poll. it all adds up man.

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