Archive for the ‘Bob Wire has a Point’ Category

Country Music: Good vs. Bad

By BOB WIRE. “You should write a song about that!” Any songwriter will tell you he or she hears that almost every day. Especially if, like me, they tend to write about the less-explored detritus of life, li... more

Summertime Is Time to Mess Around

By BOB WIRE - Summer camps. Play dates. Dropping off. Picking up. Enough. The revolution is on. It’s summertime, for cryin’ out loud! It’s the Season of the Kid.... more

Ladybugs To The Rescue

BY BOB WIRE- An estimated 10 quintillion insects are creeping around on the planet right now. That’s roughly the number of emails Hillary Clinton deleted from her personal account.... more

Mowing the Grass to Make Some Lettuce

BY BOB WIRE- My son, Rusty is trying to get a part-time job for the summer. Rather than donating plasma or sperm, I suggested he try his hand at lawn mowing.... more

Motivational Words for the Boys of Summer

BY BOB WIRE- To inspire my fellow denizens of the diamond, I’ve prepared a motivational speech that I’ll break out as soon as we hit our first slump. ... more

This Man’s Job is Breathtaking

BY BOB WIRE- I recently went in for a pulmonary function test. I’ve been having trouble breathing since, oh, 2008, and this spring it got pretty bad.... more

AARP’s RealPad vs. the iPad: My Senior Moment

BY BOB WIRE- My Aunt Byrdona emailed me the other day. "I want to get this tablet," she wrote. "What do you think?” I clicked the link and there it was, AARP's RealPad, a tablet for seniors.... more

Bee All You Can Bee

BY BOB WIRE- I was recently featured in a video called "Buggin' Out for the Butterfly House". In this follow-up blog I'll disccuss the green screen, lip synching, and flashing my grapes to the cast and crew.... more

Buggin’ Out for the Butterfly House

BY BOB WIRE- When a friend from the Missoula Butterfly House and Insectarium asked me if I'd be interested in helping them with a fund raising project, I said yes, on one condition....... more

Plumbing? Let Me Get My Snorkel

BY BOB WIRE- Recently I decided to investigate our wobbly, leaky kitchen faucet, but not because I wanted to stop the leak that was soaking everything under the sink. ... more

Travelodge Blues

BY BOB WIRE- On a recent family outing to Seattle for my son's lacrosse match, I made the mistake of trying to save a few bucks on a hotel one night.... more

Mr. Wire Goes to Helena

BY BOB WIRE- Everyone complains about our government. So this week I went to see Helena to see what the hell was going on there, and how I could help straighten things out.... more

There’s a Method to My March Madness

BY BOB WIRE- There's Nothing like March Madness! After sifting through all the information I gathered from every college basketball game I watched this season, I carefully filled out my bracket.... more

Getting the Vid But Missing the Point

BY BOB WIRE-I am not a millennial, but I’m old enough to have taken typing class in junior high, ridden in the back of station wagons with no seat belts, and cruised around on my ten-speed with no helmet. ... more

Missoula: Ten Books I Could Write About Us

BY BOB WIRE-Of all the books that could be entitled Missoula, an investigation into rape is not at the top of my list. Here's ten titles I could write about us.... more

My Kingdom for a Glue Stick

BY BOB WIRE-Living among a bunch of creative types keeps life interesting. And expensive. This occurred to me today as I was searching high and low for a glue stick. ... more

Inside the Glamorous World of Journalism

By BOB WIRE- Another Friday morning, another tedious story meeting at the newspaper. I had bigger fish to fry. That’s why I smelled like fish...... more

Sandwich Guy

By BOB WIRE- During Grizzly games I've been helping out at Paisano's Sandwich Counter. Oh, don't worry—I'm not actually handling the food. I handle the money and the schmoozing.... more

The Seinfeld of Blog Posts

By BOB WIRE- You think it's a cakewalk, coming up with a new topic to write a thousand words about every week? And not be about farts? Not that Missoula isn't rife with material. ... more

The Bar Gig From Hell Part 2: The Revenge

By BOB WIRE- The bartenders poured stiff drinks. That’s what got us through another night of pop country requests, complaints about the disco balls, and a general absence of love in the room. ... more

The Bar Gig From Hell, Part I

By BOB WIRE- My ego was beaten like a dirty throw rug this weekend, when we played a double-header in a new bar in unfamiliar territory. I overheard someone say, “who the hell is Bob Wire?” ... more

The Guitar that Invented Rock n’ Roll

By BOB WIRE- The Fender Stratocaster is to rock and roll what the basketball is to basketball. Its importance to rock music can’t be overstated.... more

Top Album Picks for 2014

By BOB WIRE- I'm sorry, but if you make beats that doesn't make you a musician or songwriter any more than picking up dog poop makes me a veterinarian.... more

Ten Things To Tell Your Dog Today

By BOB WIRE- My dog Houdini knows fewer English language words than Koko the gorilla. If only for one day, this magnificent beast could understand everything I’m telling him.... more

My Turkey Can Beat Your Turkey

By BOB WIRE- Our Thanksgiving meal was circumvented in a twisted, serpentine, Gordian knot of cooking contortions thanks to the numerous dietary considerations presented by our family.... more

It’s Supposed to Be No Fun. You’re Sick.

By BOB WIRE- The phone rings. "Dad," says a voice that sounds like Louis Armstrong with a sinus infection. "I don't feel good." It's Nurse Dad to the rescue!... more

You Spin Me Right ‘Round, Baby

By BOB WIRE- I enjoy moving at a high rate of speed without really getting anywhere so I was perfectly suited to participate in the second annual Ride-A-Thon, a fund raiser for A Carousel For Missoula.... more

You Can’t Take That On The Plane

By BOB WIRE- I traveled to the Bay Area last week to play some music at a fund raiser. The Delta agent looked at my guitar case like it contained fifty pounds of Ebola-infested squid.... more

40 Ways to Hog the Hot Tub

By BOB WIRE- Like to be by yourself in the hot tub? if you give one of these little conversational nuggets a try, you might be surprised at how quickly you find yourself alone.... more

Phones In Restaurants: Less Welcome Than Cockroaches

By BOB WIRE-If you're sitting with someone in a restaurant, reading this blog on your phone, I hope the waitress spills a pot of scalding coffee all over your naughty bits. And your phone.... more

My Bad: I’m the King of Inappropriate

By BOB WIRE- Who among us has not said something extremely inappropriate in a setting full of horrified witnesses? I should have a mantel full of trophies for that shit.... more

Aging Disgracefully With Rock’n Roll

By BOB WIRE- There’s a ton of great music out there, but we elder specimens either can’t hear it or can’t relate to it.... more

Turning Japanese, I Really Think So

By BOB WIRE- The decision to host an exchange student had been a last-minute one. “Should we buy some Japanese food? You know, sushi or, I don’t know, egg rolls? Rice-a-Roni?”... more

A Deed Most Fowl

By BOB WIRE-(VIDEO) When a semi loaded with 35,000 pounds of raw chicken sits in a truck stop parking lot for several days in the heat of Missoula's Indian summer, well, it ain't how they make perfume, brother.... more

Don’t Let Your Gourd Down: The Pumpkin Spice Invasion

By BOB WIRE-It shows up every fall, just after Labor Day, as predictable as foot fungus on a high school football player and as unwanted as teen pregnancy. Pumpkin flavored ale. ... more

Top Ten Debut Albums

By BOB WIRE-What makes a great debut album? I mean, besides a crappy second album. Luck plays a big part, as does talent, chemistry, strong songs and the golden touch of the right producer. ... more

Back to School: That’s Good, Right?

By BOB WIRE-Ah, the lunches have been packed, the driveway mugshots taken, and our kids have officially slammed the screen door on another summer vacation. It's back to school time!... more

Missoula South Side, Your Beer is Here

By BOB WIRE-As a man whose love of beer is well-documented and occasionally used against him, I gotta say I'm tickled with Missoula's newest brewery, Great Burn.... more

Scars: The Real Man’s Tattoos

By BOB WIRE-I don't have any tattoos, so now you know where I stand on tattoos. What I do have is a growing collection of scars. The real man's tattoos.... more

Existential Crisis in the Kitchen

By BOB WIRE- Despite what you might hear, I’m an enlightened, evolved male. I possess certain domestic capabilities. Believe it or not, I do know my Swiffer from a hole in the ground.... more

Visit Glacier Park While It Still Has Glaciers!

By BOB WIRE- Plans are underway to change the name of Glacier National Park to reflect its eventual lack of glaciers. 'Large And Somewhat Damp Mountains National Park' is in the running for finalist.... more

Visit Yellowstone Before it Blows Up

By BOB WIRE- One way to get around Yellowstone is aboard one of the Historic Yellow Buses. They can sometimes be seen roaring around a corner and scaring the bejesus out of some poor buffalo.... more

I Love Me Some Grass

By BOB WIRE- Ahhh the final glory days of a nice, green lawn. The current heat wave will surely have our yards as crispy as hash browns from the back of the griddle by the end of July.... more

Things To Do In Las Vegas When You’re Dead

By BOB WIRE-Broke, that is. Dead broke. I think we are all familiar enough with Sin City's over-the-top entertainment torrent to know that there is no end to the list of stuff to do in Las Vegas.... more

Let’s Talk About Toilet Paper

By BOB WIRE-We're talking about toilet paper. I won't even get into that whole "over vs. under" issue. That's a passionate holy war akin to the Mac vs PC debate. A little toilet paper cultural history here:... more

Bob Wire’s On the Course. FORE!

By BOB WIRE - Like a lot of men, I enjoy doing things that I’m not very good at. Like golf. I’ve played since high school, but never enough to get to the point where I’m consistently breaking 80.... more

Ladder Golf, the Latest in One-Handed Sports

By BOB WIRE - It’s called ladder golf, and it is to white trash what polo is to the filthy rich. And I am hooked.... more

TV or Not TV, That is the Question

By BOB WIRE - Our 32” tube TV, which seemed like a JumboTron when we bought it in 2002, had gone to that big Radio Shack in the sky. Buying a new set was going to require some major education.... more

Meet My Dentist, Dr. Mandible

By BOB WIRE - I just got home from a trip to the dentist. I hate the dentist. HATE the dentist. Oh, I don’t mind having my teeth worked on, I just can’t stand the guy who does it.... more

If It’s Off the Wall, It Can’t Go On the Wall

By BOB WIRE -The struggle for supremacy in the wall hangings department is an ongoing concern in the Wire compound. Our solution is to relegate the more questionable stuff to the basement or the spare bathroom.... more