Aaron Watson – "Deer Blind" (2012)

Well, that old game warden

He better steer clear

There ain't no poachin' goin' on up here

While visiting my parents in recently, I had occasion to visit the local Walmart store.

The typical Walmart is truly a garden of earthly delights, and the one in Joplin, Missouri, is no exception.  Given the season, it wasn't surprising that the store was well-stocked with pumpkins.  But I didn't expect to be given a choice between pumpkins from Texas and pumpkins from Oklahoma:

Texas pumpkins

Oklahoma pumpkins

I went to Walmart to buy groceries and a couple of potted mums for my mother.  But I love a bargain as much as the next guy, so I was sorely tempted when I saw a high-quality deer-hunting blind for sale for only $999:

To tell the truth, I had no intention of buying a deer blind at any price.  I've never gone hunting in my life, and wouldn't know the first thing about utilizing a deer blind.  (Even if I managed to kill a deer from my blind, I wouldn't have a clue what to do with the carcass.)

A couple of days later, I said good-bye to my parents and headed north on Interstate 49  My destination was the Kansas City airport.

Less than an hour north of Joplin is the town of Lamar, Missouri, which just happens to be the home of a major deer blind manufacturer.  (You can click here to read more about Lamar.)  

Lamar has a population of some 4500 souls.  So it was quite a blow to the town when O'Sullivan Industries, a large manufacturer of ready-to-assemble desks and bookcases, went bankrupt and laid off its 700 Lamar employees in 2007.

Three former O'Sullivan employees and a retired bank president joined forces the next year and formed Redneck Blinds, which manufactures several thousand deer blinds a year.  

If you plan to spend much time in a deer blind, you're going to need some beer, of course.  Busch hopes that its deer-themed 24-packs of beer will appeal to thirsty hunters:

You're also going to need something to eat.  Redneck's top-of-the-line deer blind doesn't come equipped with a stove or even a microwave, so I recommend that you visit another Lamar business, the Beef Jerky Outlet, and stock up before your next hunting trip.

If your tastebuds crave a change of pace from beef jerky, the Beef Jerky Outlet also offers turkey jerky (your choice of cherry-maple, honey-barbecue, and peppercorn smoked flavors), ham jerky, bacon jerky, buffalo jerky, venison jerky, and elk jerky.

Looking for a jerky with lots of healthy omega-3 fatty acids?  Try the salmon jerky (in your choice of pepper-garlic or teriyaki flavor).

The Beef Jerky Outlet is a family business that first opened its doors in 1961.  Believe it or not, some people thought that opening a beef jerky store was a crazy idea:

[Y]ou should have seen the looks on some of our relatives' faces when they heard what we were up to.  You should have seen the look on our BANKERS' faces when we pitched the idea to them.  Horror films have less tormented-looking faces in them than what we were looking at across the desk.

Oh ye relatives and bankers of little faith!  History has proved all of you doubting Thomases wrong!  

A happy jerky lover

The Beef Jerky Outlet's website sums it all up as follows:

[T]he long and the short of it is, we took a simple idea and added some fun.  We opened the doors and hoped you would come in.  And boy have you come.  Every day we are motivated to keep it going and keep making it better.  It’s all for you, the jerky lover who for too long was neglected and force fed inferior mass-market jerky.  We hope you enjoy it as much as we enjoy doing it for you.

Today's featured song (which is from Aaron Watson's 2012 album, Real Good Time)tells the tale of a gentleman who doesn't hunt deer from his deer blind.  Instead, he puts it to an entirely different use:

I got a different kind of hunting on my mind

Thank God I got my baby up in my deer blind

The deer blind I saw at Walmart didn't look like it was well-suited for a romantic rendezvous.  But if you can't afford a no-tell motel, a deer blind might be a better alternative than the back seat of a crew-cab pickup truck.

Here's "Deer Blind":

Click below to buy the song from Amazon:

Rolling Stones – "She's a Rainbow" (1967)

She comes in colors everywhere

She combs her hair

She's like a rainbow

You could have knocked me over with a feather when I learned recently that Lilly Pulitzer clothing is now available (but only for a limited time) at Target stores.

In the sixties and seventies, the Lilly Pulitzer shift dress was de rigeur resort wear for affluent "Eastern Establishment" types.  If you were a female Kennedy, Rockefeller, Vanderbilt, or Whitney – or knew someone who was – you wouldn't think of wearing anything else when you jet-setted to Palm Beach in the winter or to Martha's Vineyard or Nantucket in the summer.

Here's Jackie Kennedy in a Lilly Pulitzer shift:

The classic Lilly Pulitzer color palette was dominated by hot pinks and greens.  Here are a few examples of vintage Lilly fabrics:

Lilly's preppy designs seemed very dated by the time Ms. Pulitzer shut down her clothing business in 1984.  But in 1993, a company called Sugartown Worldwide, Inc., revived the brand.  Today Lilly Pulitzer fashions are sold in upscale department stores (e.g., Nordstrom) and smaller independently-owned shops, and in 23 company-owned retail stores, which are located mostly in tony suburbs (like Bethesda, Greenwich, and White Plains) and posh beach communities (like Boca Raton,  East Hampton, and Palm Beach).

I stumbled across an almost-new Lilly Pulitzer store at one of my local malls yesterdays.  It was full of brightly colored shift and maxi dresses, skorts, tank top rompers, palazzo pants, beach totes, and flip-flops.  (You don't want to wear Lilly Pulitzer if you're hoping to sneak up on some one unawares – you can see her clothes coming a mile away.)

While Lilly items aren't prohibitively expensive, they aren't cheap either – a cotton shift goes for $198, while linen beach pants will set you back $128.

But the Lilly Pulitzer line that just went on sale at Target is a lot more affordable.  You'll only have to shell out thirty or forty bucks for a Lilly shift, pants, or bikini at Target.  

However, there are even better deals out there.  I spent some time at the Walmart in my home town (Joplin, Missouri) last week, and it was crammed fun of blindingly colorful women's and girls' clothes for even less:

 

There's one thing you'll find at the fancy Lilly Pulitzer store at my local mall that you find at any Walmart: this Lilly-patterned Jeep:

But if you're into hot-pink Jeeps, this electric model one is available at Walmart for only $99 bucks.  (I hear it gets great mileage.)

"She's a Rainbow" was the first track on side two of Their Satanic Majesties Request.  The Stones' producer, Andrew Loog Oldham, quit before the album was finished, "jumping from what had already become a rudderless ship" (in the words of Glyn Johns, the Stones' chief recording engineer).  

Bill Wyman described the chaos that was characteristic during the recording of the album:

Every day at the studio it was a lottery as to who would turn up and what – if any – positive contribution they would make when they did.  Keith would arrive with anything up to ten people, Brian with another half-a-dozen and it was the same for Mick.  They were assorted girlfriends and friends. I hated it!  Then again, so did Andrew (Oldham) and just gave up on it.  There were times when I wish I could have done, too.

Mick Jagger later admitted that the album desperately needed a strong producer:

There's a lot of rubbish on Satanic Majesties.  Just too much time on our hands, too many drugs, no producer to tell us, "Enough already, thank you very much, now can we just get on with this song?"  Anyone let loose in the studio will produce stuff like that.  There was simply too much hanging around.  It's like believing everything you do is great and not having any editing.

Having said that, there's a lot of good music on Their Satanic Majesties Request – including "She's a Rainbow," which Allmusic called "[t]he prettiest and most uncharacteristic song Mick Jagger and Keith Richards ever wrote for the Rolling Stones."  

The best thing about the song is probably the piano of Nicky Hopkins.  The strings were arranged by John Paul Jones, who later became the bass player for Led Zeppelin. 

Here's "She's a Rainbow":

Click below to buy the song from Amazon: