Songs for Back to School

I am leaving Oklahoma City in a few hours, and in the meantime I have been trying to put together an MP3 playlist together for the flight home. I am thinking one of those Fall or back to class type themes. I posted a few songs on Facebook, but I want to expand on the list here in this special edition of Mang Now.

I am not going back to school this Fall, and it is the first time in my life when this has happened. It feels extremely weird and unusual, and believe it or not I actually will miss those days more than I can describe in words here—seriously. Truth be told, I doubt that feeling will ever leave me and it probably will be something I carry the rest of my life.

Nonetheless, I still love the feeling of going back to school in the fall, and hence why I am making this playlist of familiar favorites. I was never a fan of going back to school until my days in college. It was a time to see old friends again and to meet new ones, and my junior and senior years at YSU were the best years of my life so far. As a result, the following music puts me in a good mood, and that is something I usually need from time to time.

A lot of these songs come from movies associated with going back to school. I am going to try to avoid using songs we actually did listen to as kids for a lot of different reasons, most notably that they usually make me sick to my stomach to hear them. For example, “Kiss Me” by Sixpence None the Richer would not be a song I will include on this list, because even though it is a decent song, it makes me really depressed. “I Don’t Want to Wait” (from Dawson’s Creek) is another one which is a cool song, just it is attached to a part of life I do not really want to go back to for different reasons.

In short, anything post high school is fine, and anything that was before my time is cool.

A Sampling of The Mang’s Recommendations:


Grease—Frankie Valli

Hot for Teacher—Van Halen

American Girl—Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers (from Fast Times at Ridgemont High)

The Stroke—Billy Squier (from Billy Madison)

Tenderness—General Public (from both Weird Science and Clueless)

Another Brick in the Wall—Pink Floyd

No More Mr. Nice Guy—Alice Cooper (NOTE: Not including “School’s Out for Summer”)

Rock and Roll, Hoochie Koo—Rick Derringer (from Dazed and Confused)

If You Were Here—Thompson Twins (from Sixteen Candles)

Hot Blooded—Foreigner (Fall of 1978)

Burning Down the House—Talking Heads (From Revenge of the Nerds and also from Mike Rantilla’s MP3 player for our first Federal Tax exam when he was trying to get himself pumped up)

Are You Ready?—Ya Ya (Also from Revenge of the Nerds)

It’s the End of the World As We Know It—R.E.M. (I think we have all felt this at times)

Let it Rock—Bon Jovi (reminds me of senior year at YSU, as well as anything from Bon Jovi. I think I got big into Bon Jovi’s music that summer before)

Nothin’ But a Good Time—Poison

Turn Up the Radio—Autograph

Don’t Fear the Reaper—Blue Oyster Cult

Even Flow—Pearl Jam

Holiday—Green Day

There is a bunch of other stuff, but I am sure you get the basic idea.

That is all for now from The Mang. Hopefully I will see you all soon when I get back to Youngstown.

The Mang
Conservative Capo of Youngstown and Visiting Emperor of Badasses of Oklahoma City

Cimarron's Steak House and Slick Willie's Family Pool Hall in OKC!

Today I began to realize that traveling alone can be a lonely thing. Personally, I hate eating alone. I mean, I absolutely HATE it. It is not even so much an issue of the company rather than looking like a complete lame ass sitting at a booth or table by myself. I mean, there is a legitimate reason why that may be: I’m here on business and there is no one to go out with. If there is a bar, I will usually go there and eat because it does not look nearly as awkward. The waitress probably is thinking, “Shit, I have to wait on this one guy and my tip is going to be shit”. It is what it is.

In light of that, today was actually a pretty good day. Work went smoothly (thank God), and the people I worked with were very nice and personable. This has not always been the case, and I have found it is usually the workers at the stores outside the cities that are nicer and easier to work with. There are the exceptions of course, but largely this holds true.

I had an awesome steak tonight, regardless of the fact I was once again eating alone. It was at this cool place known as Cimarron Steak House. The inside was really interesting to look at: there were wagons hung from the ceiling and about forty or so saddles. There was also a ton of pictures, as well as deer heads and such. And the steak was very, very good. A guy can get spoiled here off the steak in Oklahoma: done perfectly, seasoned correctly, and juicy. Back home it is hit or miss unfortunately, so I will enjoy the steak I am not paying for while I can.

Tonight I decided to try my hand at some pool. There is a massive pool hall known as “Slick Willie’s Family Pool Hall”, though I am more than certain the world family was an error on the part of the owner.

First of all, I love pool halls. I have a certain affinity for them and if I could I would hang out in one routinely, if not on a daily basis. There is just something about them that I love, and they are almost nostalgic in a way since they are not nearly as common place as they once used to be. I always think of James Dean, Frank Sinatra, and Marilyn Monroe when I think of pool halls, which may be why I am so attracted to them. Mind you, I am not the best pool player, but damn it, I don’t care. Anyone who has seen me play pool knows I cannot break worth a damn, but the rest of my game is passable. Not great, but I can put up a decent fight.

Now, this pool hall is AWESOME. AWESOME, AWESOME, AWESOME. I mean it in every sense of the word. First, you have a ton of pool tables, so it is not a problem getting a table. Second, you have these hot girls that work the place. They are wearing these sleeveless tuxedo like outfits (maybe you would equate them with the female version of a Chippendale), and they basically set you up with your drinks and your table, and come around every five minutes to check on you. I love that, seriously. Thirdly, you have the jukebox, which is fantastic. I am also a sucker for jukeboxes. And lastly, it is 18 and older, so no kids can come in. That guarantees everyone there is legal, and it eliminates the vast majority of the high school crowd.

The problem is they get you on the alcohol. I ended up paying $17 for two hours of pool and a couple of Bud-Lites. When I go back (probably every day until I leave for at least an hour), I will not drink anything. Rather I will simply play pool, or at least have one drink so those girls keep coming around.

One thing I doubt I will be trying is the strip club next door. I am curious though, because the place is crammed with people from the looks of the parking lot. Back in Youngstown, where I have heard the quality is not very good, those places are not very busy. Here though, the quality must be spectacular, since there is really nowhere to park. On my salary I cannot afford it, so I probably will not make a stop. If I was comp’ed for it, I would, but try turning THAT in on the expense report.

It turns out Oklahoma State if a few hours to the north, so I doubt I will be making a trip up there to that campus. I am looking for some other things to do before I leave Saturday, so hopefully I will have more to write about tomorrow.

My best,

The Mang
Conservative Capo of Youngstown and Oklahoma City

Mang in Dallas!

The storms are rolling into Oklahoma City tonight and I have an awesome view from my hotel room. It really is quite a sight to see, now that I finally got used to the idea of being able to see storms without any kind of obstruction like back in Ohio. It was like this a week ago tonight when the violent storms came in. This time at least I am aware of how they will be like and can actually enjoy watching them. It is so flat out here that you can see miles around in any direction, and hence you will see, well, everything. It is really a beautiful sight, and probably the only thing I can compare it to would be seeing a storm come in off the ocean. It is a hell of a light show, just I’d prefer to not be driving in it.

So I went down to Dallas yesterday and had a pretty awesome time. I shot a lot of footage, but work ran late today and I did not have the opportunity to make Mang’s Monday version from Dallas. But rest assured, I will have the video footage up next week, along with the pictures. Actually, the pictures should be up soon.

Texas is quite the place. It was the first time I had ever been there, and hopefully it will not be the last. While a single day in Texas hardly can do the place a justice, I was happy I was able to see some of the major attractions in Dallas, however brief my time.

I first stopped at the Dallas World Aquarium, which came highly recommended from a number of sources. It was definitely worth the price of admission. There was a pretty cool penguin exhibit, along with a ton of other things: sharks, alligators, monkeys, a huge ass sloth (which ironically is not nearly as lazy as some people I know), and so forth. And by the way, the toucan is officially my favorite bird now. I mean, how is a toucan not awesome? The ones I saw seemed to have a lot of personality too. I took some footage of some of the toucans and hopefully it will fit in with the video.

I next made a stop at the 6th Floor Museum, which is the museum dedicated to the memory of John F. Kennedy. It was a great experience. The museum is on the 6th and 7th floor of the book depository from which Lee Harvey Oswald shot JFK in Dealey Plaza. You could actually see where Oswald took his shots as well as the actual vantage point. The museum was interesting, and though I was not allowed to take pictures of anything, I did get some good shots of the building, the plaza, and the underpass. Lots of history of how the assassination occurred and its aftermath. I would recommend checking it out for anyone in the area.

I stopped at Reunion Tower, which is the major observation tower in Dallas. I wanted to go to the observation deck, but discovered that even after the building itself reopened the observation deck was still closed. I got some decent pictures of it, but am a little disappointed I couldn’t go to the top.

I also ended up at this BBQ place known as Sonny Bryan’s. I heard it was supposed to be pretty good, and it lived up to the hype. Got some pretty good pulled pork and beef brisket, though the portions were admittedly on the smaller side. I was actually surprised by the portions given everything in Texas is supposed to be bigger. Oh well, it still tasted great.

That was pretty much the day, since I only had about 5 hours to spend there. I spent five hours driving to and from Dallas-Fort Worth, which ate up a lot of the time that day. But it was cool, got to see the downtown area and a lot of the stuff within it. Hopefully someday I will go back.

The Mang

Conservative Capo of Youngstown and Oklahoma City (and Dallas for a day)

Mang in OK! University of Oklahoma and OKC Memorial

I have seen a lot the last couple of days, and have roasted while doing it. You probably could cook an egg on a sidewalk down here it is so hot. It is good every place has the A/C cranked up to the max, makes things more bearable.

I am probably the only person here who drives with the windows down, as it is a rare occurrence you will find someone do that. And speaking of drivers, I think tailing people is customary in this part of the country. Anymore it doesn’t bother me because it happens every single time I get on the road here, but for that one rare occasion where the person is an inch off my bumper, I will swing around and then tail them laying on my horn for ten minutes, being the biggest JO that I possibly can be.

I made a few stops around town the last few days. I ended up at the Oklahoma City Memorial on Friday night because it was the time everyone said to go. The memorial itself is lit up in the evening, and there is a nice reflecting pool and these massive stone-lit gates on either end. There is also 168 chairs made of stone and glass that light up as well. Part of the original wall from the Murrah Building also makes up the perimeter. I have pictures on Facebook if you would like to see those.

On Saturday I made the trip down to Norman to see the home of our Big 12 foes, the Oklahoma Sooners. The campus was very impressive and it seems that there was a great deal of planning and coordination as these buildings were constructed. They have a beautiful law school there and the other colleges are also nicely designed. It is always amazing to see places like this, because in retrospect it might have been a great place to apply had I given any of the Big 12 schools some thought. That is not to say I am not 100% satisfied with my experiences with YSU and OSU, but it might have been really cool to go here.

Again, there are pictures on my Facebook page if you are curious to see what the campus is like.

I think I am going to spend the day in Dallas. One day can hardly do that city a justice, but I would like to try and spend a little time there since I am only a couple of hours away. I am not really sure where to go yet, though I have a few ideas.

The Mang

Oklahoma City: Myriad Botanical Gardens and Other Stuff

It is only day four in OKC and I have had a pretty interesting experience so far. There are toll roads out here that you do not know are toll roads until you take the exit. These tolls are unmanned and they go off the merit system. Unfortunately, they only take exact change (and no greenbacks), so I was perplexed as to what to do, particularly since I could not turn around. I expect I will be getting a ticket soon.

No matter where you are, someone is always tailing you. You could turn onto a road and see no one coming, and then all of a sudden there is some guy that came out of nowhere riding two feet off your bumper. Where he came from, I do not know, but when you have an Impala with the economy engine you cannot pick up enough speed to lose him. Traffic is actually heavy out here, much to my surprise, and I have seen traffic in this city worse than Columbus at times.

Enough about the driving though, where the hell did you go today Mang?

After work I ended up downtown today to check out this massive conservatory that is known as the “Myriad Botanical Gardens”. It is actually quite an amazing place, and I cannot remember the last time I had been inside of a conservatory. You can see a few pictures above, but there are also about 80 pictures on my Facebook page from my trip over there.

The building itself is like a huge, horizontal cylinder. There are fountains and gardens outside which are very nice, and it was a great day to walk around to see what the place had to offer. The skyline is right behind the conservatory, so it really makes for a great view.

Inside there are plants from six of the seven continents, with waterfalls and streams and a number of these gold and black butterflies which are pretty cool: they have great taste in colors after all. There are also a few salamanders that jump from plant to plant that were interesting.

The entire structure is filled to the brim with plants, flowers, and trees that stretch to the ceiling, and there are about three levels you can go through that have different plants from the different continents. The pictures speak for themselves.

Overall it was a really good experience to see this. It is not often you find a city with a conservatory of this size right downtown.

Tomorrow is Friday and I am undecided on what to do after work. I drove through Bricktown on my way downtown and it looked like a fun place to go. I will probably make a trip to the Oklahoma City memorial on Sunday and try to get to Dallas on Saturday sometime.

That is all for now.

The Mang
Conservative Capo of Youngstown and Oklahoma City

Oklahoma City! More from The Mang

Oklahoma is an interesting place. The more I go out looking around at stuff, the more I enjoy it. There really is a lot to do out here, contrary to what I thought originally. I am planning on going to the major universities soon, check out the botanical gardens downtown, head over to the memorial for the Oklahoma City bombing that happened a few years back, and check out this cowboy museum that seems to be world renowned from what I hear around here. There is supposed to be a huge statue of Reagan out there as well which I am interested in going to see. Hopefully I will get down to Dallas this weekend as well.

There are massive cornfields out here too. I was driving back from my last store today and saw this vast cornfield that seemed to go on forever. It seemed to go for a few miles and had to be a few miles deep. Whatever the size, it was nothing like I have seen in Ohio.

The route the GPS took me on was off of the major highway system, and for miles around there was nothing but plains, plains, and more plains. There literally is nothing out here in some areas, which is actually pretty awesome (and scary as hell if you are low on gas). It is easy to rock out to Steppenwolf as you are driving around out here, even without the motorcycle. And speaking of Easy Rider, I kind of want to try and find the Historic Route 66, and though it technically does not exist anymore, it lives on renamed Oklahoma Route 66. I might try and drive some of it Sunday and see some of the sites that are on it. While I am pretty sure the route those guys took in Easy Rider was not through the Oklahoma part of Route 66, it would still be cool to actually drive part of it.

Switching gears, I have received a few questions about the steak out here. I will tell you the steak is very good. Though I wanted to try and stop at the Stockyards and go to Cattleman’s, which is well known for its steaks in Oklahoma City, I decided against it when I saw the line of 20 people standing outside trying to get in. Apparently it is always this way, and it happened to be a Monday night. I ended up at Santa Fe Cattle Company, which is a small chain that operates primarily in Oklahoma and Alabama, and has a handful of stores scattered throughout the South. I had a great steak there that had no excess fat and was cooked perfectly.

I decided to try this Italian chain tonight, simply out of curiosity to see what Oklahoma has to offer in the way of Italian food. The worst of my fears were realized, and it is a shame. The place I went to is called Primo’s, and the restaurant itself has a great atmosphere. In fact, the atmosphere and design of the bar is something I wish we had more of back home. Quieter, darker, you know, reminiscent of a bar you might see in one of the older mob movies. Good atmosphere, good music, bad food. Being Italian myself, I am highly critical of the quality of Italian food more so than the quality of a steak. The sauce was heavy on the basil, far too chunky for a parmesan, and the sauce was not tossed. I wanted to offer my expertise in the area, but the bartender wanted to talk about the Sooners, which is cool, because it is a nice change to hear about the Big 12 from the perspective from someone other than a Big 10 fan.

Believe it or not, he said he thinks Ohio State will beat USC. I think he is the first person I have heard say this so far this year.

I also walked around downtown tonight, since I could not make it out there during the day today. The downtown is great and it seems like there is a lot of stuff to do nearby. I hear Bricktown is a cool place and would be worth checking out. I understand there is some decent night life there.

Oh, and to Mr. Ramon Ramos, there IS a Garth Brooks Boulevard in case you were wondering. I know you have this love for country music, as you informed me prior to my leaving on this trip. I am still waiting for my damn mix tape of your finest country music. I wanted to hear some Charlie Daniels, but he was conspicuously absent because someone forgot to make me a CD. I hope you are happy with yourself.

I’ll have more tomorrow.

The Mang

Conservative Capo of Youngstown and now of Oklahoma City

Mang Now from Oklahoma City!

The Mang is now in Oklahoma City for a full two weeks on business! Sorry about the disruption in the articles and the videos, I have been traveling and am trying to get situated in the awesome hotel I am getting comp'ed for! Enjoy Monday's Mang on this Wednesday morning. You will see why we had to delay the video Monday.

The Mang