laughing at you/the detroit cobras

I want to be in a band that plays songs like The Detroit Cobras. SOOO badly. Listening to them makes me incredibly happy. I know that they are ultimately a covers band but, well, I've never heard the songs they cover before. Particularly fantastic would be playing those punchy little guitar riffs and shouting those backing 'ooh's, sha la la's, cha cha cha's, ahhh's and hey's' into the microphone at the same time as the rest of the band. Definitely Dinnyhayser's style. We always maintained we were a band of backing singers.



Di organised for a bunch of us to give blood on Thursday night. It has been years (six in fact, which is remiss of me and I felt ashamed when I worked that out) since I have donated. The little travelling Red Cross caravan was a hive of activity. Such amazing organisation, in a slightly flustered style, and we were all in and out in what felt like no time. My favourite thing was the nurses. Like buzzy busy bees. I don't think I've ever been called "dahlin'" so much in all my life. I also don't think I stopped smiling the whole time.

I joined Di, Brad, Sarah and Ben for trivia afterwards. They are veterans apparently... at losing. They come last every time. I think they were hoping I might be of some assistance. As Brad put it in his blog which made me giggle like a fool:

"We may have come last at Trivia at the Red Brick Hotel last night by the slimmest margin in our team's history. I think we got about 47, with the second last team getting 55. Our brilliant performance was due in no small part to the presence of Erin 'T-Bone' Gebert whose brilliance, especially in the music department was unsurpassed."

The new nickname: T-Bone. Do you know what? It's growing on me, I dig it. And with a nickname like T-Bone I think I am justified in using the expression 'I dig it'.



So, the story behind T-Bone? Trivia was a new experience for me. I had little idea of what was actually going on and could barely interpret the questions via the muffled microphone work of the beloved 'Bomber'. At one point I'm sure he said "moofarloorangadungeee." Or something. In other words, I didn't understand, though that was a source of amusement in itself. After one of the rounds he said something which caused my friends to start telling me to "Go downstairs! You get to spin the wheel, you get to spin!!!" So, after some protesting on my behalf (not unlike a child that doesn't want to go home "NO!, I don't want to!"), I start walking downstairs as they got up and walked to a part of the balcony where they could see the action. I was thinking that there would be a few more people from other teams doing the spinning too but no, just me. So amidst tables of fellow trivia buffs, 'Bomber' is talking gibberish in the microphone, people are milling around, I'm kind of loitering wondering what is happening and looking up at the grinning faces of my friends.

Bomber: (gesturing for me to come closer) "Spin the wheel, give it a goood spin!"
T-Bone: (looking from Bomber to the balcony) "Okay..."

So I spin the wheel, admittedly not a very goood spin and I stare at what it says on the tab it stopped at and have no idea what the prize is. Luckily...

Bomber: "Aww, c'mon! What kind of spin was that? A GOOOD spin, spin again!"
T-Bone: (silent, glances at balcony, grabs the wheel and spins with enough gusto to think the wheel was going to topple over and crush her in a crazy pub trivia accident)

I think this time something came up saying "FIVE POINTS OR FIVE TICKETS".

I kept staring at it thinking to myself "...WHAT?!" I looked up at the balcony again and they are gesturing for me to spin again, so I look at 'Bomber', he's writing something on a piece of paper, so I look back up at them and they are still telling me to spin again when a lady at the table in front of the wheel shouts at me; "TAKE THE TICKETS LUV, TAKE THE TICKETS!!" and I turn back to Bomber and say "they want me to spin again..." so he gives me the nod, I spin again and it comes up "T-BONE." Di says she shouted out "BUT SHE'S VEGETARIAN!" I think 'Bomber' may have heard because he started writing out the prize and says, "Aww, I think they're all vegetarians!" I just laughed, said thanks for the prize and walked back upstairs to sit down. Surreal. Brad then decided, I guess to commemorate the occasion in which the team came last with my assistance, that it might be appropriate to call me T-Bone from now on.

Oh, and luckily Bomber said we didn't have to have T-Bone.

He said we could have anything we like.