I am not here to bitch and gripe, point fingers or cause drama. I have not been a member of ASGRA very long, but have shown my support by hosting fundraising events and benefits for the cause.

I recently received an email from ASGRA and was quite floored that ASGRA was not getting support that they are in need of and with 145+ members no one seems to be stepping up to the plate. Being an owner of an entertainment biz, and drag queen, my time is limited, but I have always made sure that I was out and about to host a fundraising or charity event when and where possible.

Unfortunately ASGRA members were few and far to show up for such events. I would have to say certain members and they know who they are seemed to come to each and every charity event I held. I was shown appreciation for my efforts at your awards banquet in October and was amazed to see so many people attending that banquet. Where were these people when fundraising events were being held?

We need to look at ourselves and ask why we joined ASGRA in the first place, why we ran for Mr. or Miss ASGRA and won our titles. What did the title mean to us? I don't want to see anything happen to ASGRA. We need this in the DC Metro area and we need to be more supportive of the organization that we have chosen to be members of.

I am asking each and every member to stop and look around and then look at themselves and say "what can I do to help". Our time is limited to a point, the economy is bad and people are having hard times, but ASGRA shouldn't be a statistic in this hard time we are all a part of.

Let's band together come out and join hands and bring ASGRA back to what it was and should be. Fill these spots in our board that are open, get out and promote ASGRA when we are at bars with friends having drinks and fun. If you're out and about, stick a brochure on a bulletin board at a restaurant or bar and let people know what we are about.

I don't mean to ramble on; I'm just shocked to see what is going on in this organization. When I started I met so many nice people who showed me support and opened their arms to me and welcomed me into the organization. I want more people to be able to experience the warmth I felt, but they can't if ASGRA is no longer around.

GET UP, GET INVOLVED, AND MAKE IT HAPPEN. You will be amazed what results will show, if each and every one of us starts by just pitching in a little bit at a time.

Stormy Vain,
2008 ASGRA Volunteer of the Year

From the President

ASGRA needs your help to survive

We are an all-volunteer organization; each member has a say in how this organization is run and a responsibility to make it a success.

Our board is getting smaller and our list of people willing to step-up and fill vacant positions is also getting smaller. We need people to step up and fill the vacant positions and we need them sooner than later or we will not be able to conduct business.

Beginning in July, we will have two vacant positions on the Executive Board. As of right now, the Secretary position is vacant and in July, the Treasurer position will also be vacant. To be able to function as an organization, we MUST have these positions filled.

If no one steps up to fill these board positions, we will not survive beyond July.

If your association means anything to you, please take a few minutes to read up on what each position does and consider taking one of the two Executive Board positions.

ASGRA has the following positions available:

• Secretary (2-year term)
• Rodeo events and training chairperson (1-year term)
• Fundraising & sponsorship chairperson (1-year term)
• Public relations chairperson (1-year term)

We are also looking for people willing to serve as members of our 2009 royalty team (1-year terms):

• Miss ASGRA
• Mr. ASGRA
• Ms ASGRA
• MsTer ASGRA

Contact Mike at [an error occurred while processing this directive] if you are interested in serving in any of these positions.

Mike S.
ASGRA President

ASGRA Vagabond Chuckwagon is on the Move!!

Lonni La Bel

ASGRA Vagabond Chuckwagon
Meskerem Restaurant
Friday, April 24, 2009, 7:30 pm

Vagabond Chuckwagon Dines in DC again!!

A group of 10 of us enjoyed a taste of the Mediterranean on Friday March 20, when we met for dinner at Mykonos Grill in Rockville, MD. With a table in the back dining room, it was a bit more private and we had the chance to enjoy a variety of Greek dishes as well as some yummy desserts!

For April, it's back into DC for Ethiopian food this time! On Friday April 24th, we'll plan to meet at @7:30pm at Meskerem Restaurant, which is located at 2434 18th Street, NW (between Columbia and Belmont Roads). Although parking can sometimes be a challenge in Adams Morgan, there is a public garage to supplement the street parking, and you can also metro in to Dupont Circle on the red line and walk from there. Info on the restaurant and its menu and style of dining (plan on eating with your hands and sharing a large communal plate) is available at: http://www.ethiopianrestaurant.com/dc/meskerem.html

I will be calling to make reservations for our dinner, so I need your RSVPs by noon on Monday April 20, please!! You can contact me via email at ajtygger@aol.com or on my cell at 703-371-7865. Come on out for another fun evening with your ASGRA friends and family!

Friday April 24, 2009
7:30pm
Meskerem Restaurant
2434 18th Street, NW
Washington, DC
Phone: (202) 462-4100

* Lonni La Bel

Contact Lonni La Bel: (cell) 703-371-7865

Music Reviews

1 star - Sucks, save your money and buy a beer
2 star - Borrow it from someone
3 star - Wait for it go on sale
4 star - Don't leave Wal*Mart without it
5 star - Stop whatever the heck you're doing right now, and download this puppy  

Jake Owen

Why do some artists insist on putting old material on new albums? This irks me no more so than when the album is thin on tunes to begin with. Jake Owens sophomore offering has a mere 10 tracks to it. 9 if you discount the repeat track "Eight Second Ride." As much as I enjoy this honky-tonk hookup song, if I wanted to listen to it, I'd just play it on Startin' with Me.

Despite this slight to my country sensibilities (read wallet), Jake actually does have a pretty good album. Jake's got a voice built for the honky-tonk tunes as noted with his breakout single "Yee-Haw". With its soft drawl and just-this-side-of-deep tone, it can carry you the along with the bar-by-the-roadside tunes. It can, also, really seduce you with its charm.

The seduction quality is evident on songs like "Easy Does It"; the best sexy ballad of them all on the CD. Jake's voice cruises easily (no pun intended) through this tune about taking those loving moments slow. His voice conjures up in your mind images of low lights, desire and long, lingering sessions of l'amour.

The Honky-Tonk quality is evident on songs like "Tell Me", "Every Reason I Go Back" and "Who Said Whiskey (Was Meant To Drink A Woman Away)". All three have that party-on-paycheck-Friday feel to them. The most clever and offensive of the three is "Whiskey".

The cleverness of the song comes from the upending of the normal use of whiskey in country songs-- drowning your sorrowful memories in the stuff. This song uses whiskey as a way to pick someone up. The song tells of the lowering of one's inhibitions as they become more lubricated with the grain mash drink:

Yeah one shot will get her out on the dance floor/
One more she starts to like the taste/
A few rounds later she'll be hanging on some fella/
Right up in front of the stage/

Where the song goes overboard is in the last line of the chorus:

Another couple drinks oh they're headed to his place/
Tonight is some guys lucky day

I, personally, find it irresponsible to take a drunk back to your place due to their inhibitions being so lowered. I much prefer the approach taken in John Michael Montgomery's "Mad Cowboy Disease"; giving the person my number and telling them to give me a call when they're sobered up. We both have a much better time that way. Jake might do better to take his own album advice on this one, easy does it.

Due to this and the afore mentioned repeat track from a previous album, I've knocked this one down a star. Jake himself is a four-star country artist who, otherwise, has picked some great tunes for what he can do with a great voice. Hopefully, his next CD with achieve the same number of stars that this singer deserves.

Zac Brown Band

What a good country-garage-band album - minus the overpowering guitar and drums. When I first got this CD, I went to my favorite source for information, Wikipedia, to learn more about Zac Brown Band. What I learned was that they had self-released three previous albums; one of them a live album. This self-production shows on this fourth album from the group - and that's a good thing.

The album is a very good easy-listening country. The songs are smooth like butter cream icing in both the music and the signing. They lack any of the overdone polish and pumped-upness that can happen when an independent band gets mainstream release. This is crab shack music, beach BBQ music, background happy hour music in the best sense of the phrase. Each song easily rolls into another and while that would normally annoy me, with The Foundation, Zac Brown Band has managed to make it work.

With all the praise that I'm heaping on them, I do want to forewarn folks that The Foundation is not everyone's bottle of beer. There are some real hillbilly-hick-pickers on this CD. All which contain some heavy fiddle, foot-stomping melodies. Plus, the album is more off-center of mainstream country music. If you are someone who loves your music more Carrie Underwood than Patty Loveless, The Foundation is not for you.

In addition to the hick-pickers, the CD does also include the Kenney Chesney inspired "Toes" and "Where the Boat Leaves From". The latter of these would make Bob Marley proud. Also of note is the social commentary song "It's Not Okay". This is one of the hick-pickers on the CD that tells the story of an encounter with a homeless man asking for change. It takes the conservative view that the man is lazy, going to buy booze, won't do a thing other than pan-handle and in the opinion of the singer will just "lie there/you don't seem to care". I take a mild offense to this song. While everyone is entitled to his/her opinion my opinion is that you never know. What surprises me so much about this song is that the upbeat melody that goes with it doesn't belie what the lyrics are saying. It wasn't until I really listened to the lyrics that I understood what the song was about and its message. While I disagree with that message, I do give praise to Zac Brown Band for bringing together an incongruous melody together with the lyrics to make that statement.

On the positive side of social impact or more so environmental impact, this CD takes "reduce" to a new level. Much like Deriks Bently's CD from the March reviews, this one includes almost no plastic. It also includes no booklet (I am still picking at the case it to see if I missed a fold out or pocket or something). Additionally, when I bought this one from the store, I was shown the "now playing" version of the CD which furthered recycling by giving new meaning to "reuse". The packaging that the CD came with was a corrugated cardboard frame that actually became a picture frame. I'm not sure if that was just the demo version sent to the store and mine was a repackage that somehow lost its cover in the store room, but regardless, I give Zac Brown Band a hand for making their CD more environmentally friendly. This helps to make a great CD even better. It provides little impact on the environment and a good impact on your ears.

Blake Shelton

Startin' Fires

I actually skipped out on Blake Shelton's last two CD offerings and after listening to Startin' Fires, I realize why I've done that. Since breaking into the music charts with his hit "Austin" from his self-titled album, I've never been as impacted by his music as I was with that first CD. The Baby was a real disappointment to me, so, after that, I decided to forgo Bar and Grill and BS. While Fires is by no means as disappointing an album as The Baby, it is also an album that lacks the impact that I look for in a go-out-and-get-now CD.

This comes from the CD's lack of any tunes that really connect with me. While Blake's voice is pleasant to listen to and works well with all of the songs on the CD, there's little that grabs me; that makes me hit that repeat button again and again; that makes me say this song is my life. There are only two songs that even come close: "I Don't Care" and "Country Strong".

"Country Strong" is definitely my favorite. I did hit the repeat on this one about three to four times. This song is another one of those odes to hard-working country folk:

Cat Diesel Power cap pulled down low/
makin that bacon, row by row...
...he wears an old felt hat on his head/
got a saddle for a pillow, and the ground for a bed
...he's up in the mornin' yawnin' with those Tony Llamas on/
workin' like hell 'til the dinner bell brings him back home/
blue collar in his blood, backwoods in his bones/
no doubt about it that boy's country strong/

This well worn theme, which permeates almost every country album, could become tiresome, but Blake adds a fun melody to it. One which could sever to be a medium two-step or even a swing. Additionally, the last chorus plays homage to the female sex who are country strong and I like a song that goes both ways (pun intended):

she's up in the mornin' yawnin' with that coffee pot on/
workin' like hell 'til the dinner bell brings him back home

The song "I Don't Care" was the one that almost really had me. The lyrics speak of our desire to convince ourselves that we don't care anymore about the sex even though we still think about them; burn up when we hear they may have someone new; maybe take a cruise by their place just in case we run into them. This is a song that expresses a situation that we've all been. I was there again in my memories as I listened to the first part of the song, then, we got to the bridge:

When I got home, the light was blinkin' on that old machine/
She said, "My brother's been in town, but he just left. And, I miss you! Give me a ring."

This allows the song to come to a happy ending when Blake realizes that he does care and she does matter and that he's going back with her. I felt jiped by that ending. I felt like this song was trying to be an Austin, Part II. I wanted something that allowed me to remain in the morose feeling after the song was over as I continue my own version of self-denial, but I was robbed of it. We all need those songs in which we can drown our sorrows and this could have been a great one for that, but it missed its mark.

Despite that huge disappointment, I will say that CD does contain some other positives. The first two lead tracks contain some of dry, country humor that Blake has been noted for (think "Some Beach"). The first, "Green", is a nod to the world's new effort to go or be green.

I've got a hundred acre farm/
I've got a John Dere in my barn/
I've got a garden in my yard, full of corn, peas and beans/
I've got a guitar I play unplugged...
…I was green before green was a thing

The second track, "Good at Startin' Fires", is an ode to the hot-looking woman hanging on your arm; the one who turns everyone's head and leaves all the guys around ya burning with desire, but with you being her one and only fireman. The fun from this song comes from the final line of the chorus which states your position:

Yeah maybe babys gotten good at startin' fires/
But I'm the only one/
Ain't no doubt/
Only one that puts them out/

I like the idea of being the extinguisher of a fire. It has that cute entendre feel to it that makes it cleverly dirty.

The other positive from the CD is another potential swing track, "This is Gonna Take All Night". You don't have to be Miss Cleo to figure out just what this song is about. What makes it a nice song is the upbeat melody to it. It's not another slow, moody, seduction song. It's a cute, wink-wink, we'll get frisky later song. It takes the seduction song out of the bedroom and puts it right on the dance floor. It's one of those good foreplay songs that you could use while you are out on the town before you head in for the night (and potentially the good portion of the next morning).

Despite these positives on the CD, Fires still only gets three stars. While Blake actually offers a pretty pleasant CD, it still lacks that grab that would give it that extra star for my really recommending it. That doesn't mean that it is a CD to be passed over entirely. Just let that money burn a hole in your wallet a little longer 'til it goes on sale.

Patrick Hunter
Trail Ride Coordinator
Atlantic States Gay Rodeo Association (ASGRA)

Coosie's Corner

Roundup Potatoes and Eggs

Ingredients

2 Tbsp Butter
2 Tbsp Oil
1 ½ lbs Potatoes, diced
1 Onion, chopped
8 Large Eggs
Salt and Pepper
Dash of Tabasco Sauce

Directions

1. In large frying pan, heat butter and oil over medium heat. Fry potatoes, stir, until they brown.
2. Add onions and cook about 10 minutes, stirring.
3. Beat the eggs, season with salt and pepper, and a dash of Tabasco Sauce.
4. Add to the potatos, stir until the eggs are set, about 5 minutes.

The Old Double Diamond

Album: Old Corral's & Sagebrush

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For a limited time, Cowboy Frank is providing a stream to listen to this great song as sung by its author. Listen while you read. (should play on any player)