Pardon the interruption

 
Hey, hey. We're back for a day. Let's see, it's been 129 days. That might seem like a long time, but not that much has happened since late October. Adele won a few Grammys, Davy Jones passed away, the Boss released an album and, not so harmonically speaking, Newt Gingrich paid a visit to Whitehall, Wisconsin. Honest, his wife Callista grew up in my little hometown, and her mom still lives there (bringing the population to 1,671). It's a small world, but maybe not small enough.

I was sitting on a barstool the other night at Champps in Brookfield and a thought came to me like a Ryan Braun urine sample. You know, the seal hadn't been broken but the idea had been sitting there a few days. It was impossible to tell if it had been tampered with, so I gave myself a pass.

Here I was enjoying a tasty fish fry, in fact one of the most incredible fish fries I've ever enjoyed in Wisconsin, where Friday fish fries are king. At a chain sports bar. Sometimes life rocks. The bartender convinced me to try their potato crusted cod -- amazing! -- and instead of soggie fries and an over-buttered slice of bread, King Cod came with a healthy mound of nutty wild rice and a delicious bouqet of sauteed onions and bell peppers. Ooh, la, la.

Paired with a tall glass of Rocky's Revenge, the astounding brown ale from the Tyranena Brewing Company of nearby Lake Mills, my evening was set. (By the way, Thursday night is Sweater Vest Awareness Night at Tyranena if you happen to be in the neighborhood.) I'd drink a couple more beers and watch highlights of the Honda Classic second round, then head outside to brush the snow off my vehicle (I didn't mention there was a winter storm) and drive home, blissfully, with both hands on the wheel and my shoulders rared back. This is how you live Roger Miller's song "Do Wacka Do."

But that wasn't the game-changing song that rocketed through the Champps sound system as I enjoyed my frothy glass of Rocky's Revenge. No sir. It was a blast from 1965 by the Gentrys, and now maybe you know what i'm talking about. Drummer Larry Wall's staccato lead-in to "Keep On Dancing" is like a short fuse on an M-80, then it's bombs away. You instantly forget about your recent knee surgery (if only for a moment), leap up off your stool and look around, wishing once again that it was yesterday.

And damned if it isn't.