Wednesday update

Yesterday I reported that Peter Frampton would be performing at the Orpheum on June 26. However, news has since come up who will be drumming for Frampton that night: Jason Bonham. He is the son of the late Led Zeppelin drummer John “Bonzo” Bonham. On Zeppelin’s 1980 concert tour, at times 12-year-old Jason took over the drumming, giving Bonzo a break. No one even realized the drummer was not Bonzo. Jason also drummed on several of Led Zeppelin reunions after Bonzo passed away.

I also linked to the saveMIM.org site yesterday. As I said, I am neutral in this debate, and to be fair to the other side I want to link to their point of view: Tom Lee Park redesign defended as successful festival grounds

This is not a Downtown event, but it’s one a friend of mine holds dear so I want to tell my readers about it.

Jubilee’s Mardi Gras in Memphis features a crawfish boil, a gumbo cook-off, and a 5K. It will be 11 AM to 5 PM on Saturday, March 23, at Memphis Catholic High School, currently a Jubilee school at 61 N. McLean in Midtown. Admission is $5 with kids 5 and under free. Crawfish will be $10 a box and there will be other food and beverages available as well. The gumbo cook-off is free to enter; just register on the website. They have 10×15 spaces available for $150, including 10 boxes of crawfish, if you want your krewe to have your own place to hang out. They’ll have March Madness on in the VIP tent. Register for the 5K here. If you are interested in volunteering, becoming a craft vendor or sponsoring the event call Angela Fox at 901-373-1211 or angela.fox@jso.cdom.org.

Bass Pro Shops at the Pyramid has several jobs available. These include part-time food service jobs including cook, busser, steward, host, food runner, and server. There are also full-time service jobs in Big Cypress Lodge, the hotel inside the Pyramid. These include house person and house keeper positions.

This is very cool:

Local Gastropub is having a Fat Tuesday celebration Tuesday, March 5 starting at 5 PM. There will be crawfish po-boys, crawfish pies, muffuletta pizza, king cake, live music, and drink specials.

The Orpheum has revealed its 2019-2020 Broadway season. Shows include Dear Evan Hansen, The Book of Mormon, Hello, Dolly!, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, The Play that Goes Wrong, Disney’s Aladdin, A Bronx Tale, and Come from Away.

Today there is plenty of conversation about reimagining the riverfront, Downtown, and all of Memphis. However, it was not the first time such conversations have been made. Memphis Magazine has a look at attempts to reimagine Memphis in the 1920s and the 1950s.

High Ground News has an interesting history of the train line running through the Normal Station neighborhood near the University of Memphis.

That book I’ve been talking about, The Gaslighting Effect by Reva Steenbergen, is available for a limited time directly through the author for only $3.

People have asked me to say a little more about the book, so I will. Chapter 1 explains who a narcissist is – they’re a lot more than just someone who takes selfies and makes things all about them. Other personality traits have to be present. Also, what makes a narcissist happy differs from what makes a normal person happy.

Chapter 2 describes the personality type of the victim the narcissist picks out to be the target of their abuse. The chapter describes what draws the narcissist to the victim, and what emotions and motivations are present in the narcissist.

Much of the rest of the book describes the tactics the narcissist uses to systematically abuse their victim. These include

  • Observing the victim from afar for a period of months or even years before revealing themselves; getting to know the victim’s habits, routines, likes, dislikes, who their friends are, where their favorite places to go are
  • Extremely excessive lying
  • Projection
  • Playing the victim themselves
  • Gaslighting – attempting to upend the victim’s world to the point that the victim doesn’t even know what reality is anymore
  • Denial of things the narcissist previously said or did, even in the face of hard evidence
  • In cases where the victim has children, turning their own children against them
  • Engineering situations in which the victim is likely to be caught off-guard and respond emotionally; then using those responses to show others that the victim is “crazy”
  • Flying monkeys – turning the victim’s friends against them and having them participate in the abuse
  • A few other tactics intended to rip the victim apart from the people., places, and things that make them happy, leaving the victim with nothing

If you want to understand what a victim of narcissistic abuse has been through, or if you want to understand narcissistic abuse so you can protect yourself and those you love from it, get this book. Three bucks, you can’t beat that price. Drink one less Miller Lite while you’re watching the Tigers play Cincinnati at the bar Saturday evening and you’ve saved enough money to pay for it.

Two items are dominating the news today: Trump’s meeting with Kim Jong-un in Vietnam, and Michael Cohen’s public testimony to the House Oversight Committee. However, these stories are causing a third story to fly under the radar, one which is a big deal. India and Pakistan have launched airstrikes against each other. That situation could get ugly real fast. Both of those countries have nuclear weapons, and are traditional enemies. Together they comprised British India, and when they declared independence in the late 1940s they broke apart into the Muslim portion (Pakistan) and the Hindu portion (India).

Watching the Michael Cohen public testimony to the House Oversight Committee on the New York Times website. They have some great commentary going on in a side panel as it happens.

That’s it for now. I may be late getting out this afternoon because I want to see all of the Cohen hearing. Back tomorrow with more news.