Blog Posts

Oh man, wait until The Nadas get a load of this. At one point in tonight’s rehearsal, I said to the guys, “You know this is The Official Song Of The City Of Des Moines™, right?” But let me back up… My name is Benjamin Wagner. By day, I am a middle manager for a…

I’m a long-time admirer of CBS Sunday Morning, especially the segment before the show’s closing credits when our host (once, Charles Kuralt and now Charles Osgood) transports us somewhere tranquil and scenic for a few, restful moments. Those patiently unfolding natural scenes — from a babbling brook in Arcadia, Maine, to the desert alpinglow of…

By the time I finally got outside and dragged the canoe from the garage to the edge of the marsh, the tide was already receding. The edge of the shore was all honeycombed-mud and half-cracked shells. There would be no boating this morning. I traced the edge of the shore instead, sliding ankle-deep into the…

Everyone’s losing their job. If not, they’re loathing it. Mine’s like Whack-a-Mole or Missile Command or a California wildfire; I resolve one issue, and another pops up, or falls from the sky, or catches fire. You get the idea. Still, even at the end of a Tuesday that feels like a Thursday, at the end…

For months, I’d been trying to get my Rockwood Music Hall pals together in an amplifier-free environment. It’s not that I don’t like amplifiers. My recent bout with tinnitus notwithstanding, there are few places I’d rather be than standing between a few of ’em creating a beautiful racket. They’re just conducive to bona fide conversation.…

“We have Will Ferrell, a monkey, a snake, and a baby pool but we don’t know what we’re doing with any of them.” It was that kind of day. “People are having their picture taken, then standing back and taking pictures of their picture projected on the wall.” And it was that kind of night.…