the stomping grounds

I make mention (probably too often) about the “stomping grounds“. When I refer to this I’m talking about Killingly and surrounding areas. This is the place where I was raised and grew up. It is part of Windham County, a.k.a. “The Quiet Corner” of the State of Connecticut.

I moved away from there in 2006 and reside in Tampa Florida.

This not-so-little write-up is all about where I used to live. If you’re from there, you’ll enjoy this. If not, you’ll find this very boring.

Windham County is buried

To let you know how unbelievably buried where I lived was, we’ll use Ballouville, a tiny town in The Quiet Corner, as an example.

Ballouville is a village in the boroughs of Danielson in the Town of Killingly in Windham County in the State of Connecticut in New England in the United States.

That’s 7 tiers.

Using Tampa Florida as a comparison, Tampa is a city in Hillsborough County in the State of Florida in the United States.

That’s 4 tiers.

Big difference.

In Connecticut, counties, boroughs and villages mean absolutely nothing

Connecticut has 8 counties. Fairfield, Hartford, Litchfield, Middlesex, New Haven, New London, Tolland, and Windham. And they mean absolutely nothing. There is no formal declaration of any county responsibility whatsoever. Maybe there once was, but there hasn’t been for decades. Everything to do with a town (roads, schools, etc.) is handled by the town. One wonders why counties even exist anymore other than for a quick “Where am I?” when looking at a map - because they serve absolutely no purpose.

Boroughs and villages also mean nothing. These are throwbacks from colonial days (assumedly) and have absolutely no purpose either - not even for historical purposes. If anything, they confuse the crap out of everyone.

Remember the tiny town of Ballouville I mentioned above? If I had any say in the way Connecticut works, I would completely abolish the recognition of counties, boroughs and villages altogether. The signs can stay up for historical purposes; that I don’t care about. But all towns would be just that: Towns. Far easier to manage, far easier to maintain and it just makes sense.

If you canned the borough/county bullshit, you eliminate 3 tiers of confusion right there. It’s Killingly in Connecticut in New England in USA. That’s it. Done deal. Makes sense to me. Four tiers, just like Tampa.

But Connecticut likes to do things ass-backwards. Whatever.

“D-Burg?”

I found this MySpace page (with an excellent blog) authored by an author who chooses to wisely remain anonymous that calls the Danielson boroughs and Brooklyn “D-Burg”. The title does make sense in a cosmic sort of way even though “burg” isn’t anywhere in the titles of the towns.

I suggest reading every single word on that MySpace page and blog to experience the full dumpy-ness that is D-Burg.

Want to know the funny/crazy part about the blog? EVERYONE agrees with him. Sad but true. The authors rips the area to shreds, and justifiably so because the area fucking sucks.

What’s there to do in D-Burg?

Drink and smoke weed; it’s available anywhere in D-Burg. But being that I don’t drink or smoke weed, I was quite miserable there.

When not drinking or smoking weed, the high points (heh) of the year are:

Here’s each of those in a nuthsell:

Brooklyn Fair

Rains every year. Learn to love walking around in mud. When not raining, the place is covered by a thick fog of dirt that never seems to leave. For years that fair has been threatening to go under because absolutely no one gives a shit about it.

Woodstock Fair

This is not a fair, it’s a carnival. It used to be all about farming and down-home entertainment, but now it’s nothing but a commercialized piece of shit. And the politics.. oh the politics.. you wouldn’t believe the small-town bullshit fighting that goes on for booth spots.

Enjoy spending $5 for 35¢ worth of french fries, and $4 for 15¢ worth of soda. If you’re smart, you’ll stock a backpack full of drinks hidden by extra shirts and jeans. This is so you can get past gate security when they check your bag (and trust me, they will).

Everything for sale at the Woodstock Fair can be bought off eBay for about 90% less.

Enjoy the scenes of the slutty teenage girls walking around with their tits hanging out from shirts that are too tight. They hang out in packs and usually have dopey face paint that they foolishly paid some idiot $7 to paint on their faces.

Enjoy the scenes of the middle-aged fat husband and fat-ass wife - both wearing black Lynyrd Skynyrd t-shirts, black jeans and black boots - on a hot day. Smart? No, they’re not smart. They’re from D-Burg. What did you expect? Bonus points if the wife has a buzz-cut and the husband is bald on the top but has a ponytail. We all know that’s super-sexy stuff!

Enjoy the scenes of senior citizens giving you dirty looks just because you’re younger than they are. Hot tip: Walk right up to one and say in a loud voice “ARE YOU ENJOYING THE DAY, SIR?!” When he replies back “Fuck you..” in a grumbly voice, just say “I LOVE YOU TOO, SIR! HAVE A GREAT DAY!” Pat him on the head and walk away cheerily singing the theme song to The Sound of Music.

Enjoy the white-trash kids running around CRASHING into everyone, including you. Then enjoy their mothers yelling out for them RIGHT NEXT TO YOUR EAR.

And finally,

Enjoy the dusty walk back to the “parking lot” that’s actually a grass field you paid $7 to park in. Hey, don’t mind the door dings from the big 4×4 that parked next to you, it’s part of the fun! Speaking of which, I hope you have a 4×4 yourself, because otherwise you’re never getting out of there.

Springtime Festival

The Springtime Festival is when they close down Main Street in Danielson and run a parade thru it.

Compared to the Woodstock Fair, this event at least isn’t a human car wash. Most people are hanging out on the grass in Davis Park, a park that gets absolutely trashed from all the vendors, litter and people. But hey, it beats walking on open dirt. And there is shade from the trees.

For some really strange fucking reason there is a wave of heat coming off the paved road (Main Street) next to the park. During any other time of the year this wave doesn’t exist, but it does during the festival. NO ONE knows why. You can literally see the waves of heat coming off of it.

You are guaranteed to see at least two to three fights break out, and they always happen in or near the parking lot at the stop light next to Killingly Memorial. It’s usually a drug deal gone bad, or some kid who bumped into some other moron’s girlfriend by mistake (legitimately) but paid the price for it anyway because the boyfriend is a complete asshole.

The only good part of the festival is when the Shriners come out in their little cars and start throwing candy at the kids. This is literally fun to watch and it’s part of the parade itself.

A local shitty band plays the Springtime Festival every year. Back in my day a band called “Think Big” always played. We called them “Stink Big” because they sucked. They played almost nothing but cover songs. And their original songs sucked complete ass. Oh, but I will say that crappy band has a “reunion” MySpace page. Bring on the suck!

Don’t worry I got more to say about the local rock scene later on. I plan on ripping that to shreds. :-) Keep reading.

First Night

Elsewhere in Connecticut (Hartford) they had this thing called a “First Night”, so D-Burg figured they’d give it a shot.

It’s like the Springtime Festival but is held in the dead of winter. It’s fucking freezing outside. A bunch of people are walking around freezing their asses off because.. well.. I have no idea. I have no idea what First Night celebrates and I don’t care.

This is a relatively new thing to D-Burg so I only got to attend one of these First Night things before I moved. I distinctly remember freezing my ass off (of course) and seeing this huge fire that was purposely made a few blocks from Danielson Surplus. The best part of the night was standing next to that fire to warm up.. and that was basically it.

However I will say there’s a much better feel to First Night compared to the Springtime Festival. For some reason having all of us out there freezing our asses off just feels more.. normal. I don’t know why.

Not that I have to give a shit about that anymore. I live in Tampa.

Why is D-Burg so disconnected from the rest of Connecticut?

GOOD QUESTION, and I have a great answer for you.

The entire reason why D-Burg is cut off from the rest of CT is because I-84 doesn’t run thru there.

But it was originally going to!

Check out the original interstate design! I-84 was at one point going to connect directly to I-395! Yes! Seriously! But it never happened. The project for I-84 to run thru that area was cancelled in 1983. Yes, it truly was not that long ago.

IF that interstate was actually built to original specs, D-Burg would not be D-Burg. It would be totally different.

How different?

I’ll put it this way: D-Burg is literally disconnected from the rest of Connecticut. There is no major interstate going east-to-west in Windham County - and that’s where all the important stuff happens. The area has only north-to-south with I-395. That interstate starts in Thompson and ends in East Lyme (roughly).

D-Burg is completely disconnected from central Connecticut and hurts it so badly that you just can’t imagine the fiscal damage it does. Businesses don’t want to be there, truckers have to take ass-backwards routes just to travel thru the region, and the area’s lack of east-to-west major routes blocks new commerce at every turn. This is bad and the region suffers for it immensely.

D-Burg desperately needs an east/west interstate to get more commerce in there. If it doesn’t, what will inevitably happen is that the town taxes will get so high that no one will be able to live there anymore. At that point the towns will run out of money, dry up and fold.

Think it can’t happen? You watch. It’s already started to. Many people are leaving the area in droves because there’s no good work, the cost of living is too high, everything is far away and the area connects to nothing. D-Burg will either fold or be forced to accept an interstate. It’s not a possibility, it will happen if that area wants to survive in the next 20 years.

Count on it.

Jobs in D-Burg

The two highest employers in D-Burg according to the US Census are Frito Lay and all fast food restaurants combined.

Yep.

That’s the pinnacle of working locally. A shit job for a shit wage in a shit town.

I suggest getting a good car and working out of state. That’s what I did when I lived there. You’ll make more even if you pay two taxes for two states.

The rock scene

I got tons to say about this.

In the late 80s and well into the 90s there were lots of rock and metal bands in D-Burg. That number has dwindled significantly but there are still a good smattering of them in those parts to this day - and I’m actually aware of a few of them.

Any band who’s from D-Burg is doomed to fail as 99% of all rock bands do. If you’re in D-Burg, you can chock that up to 100%.

The bad old days

Before I get into modern-day rockers in D-Burg, let’s take a look at the past from when I was a teenager.

The best gig was the State Line Casino. This was a place right over the border in a small shit-town in Massachusetts. Want to know what happened to that place? It burnt down. And there are those to this day who say the fire was set purposely so the owner could cash in on the insurance. If he did, good for him because the place was a fucking dive.

The other gig that was there by default was the Central Hotel. I don’t even know if this place exists anymore, but a dark cloud loomed over that place like a bad omen. If you had a band and played the Central Hotel, you were guaranteeing yourself failure in the near future. It always happened. Instead of your band breaking up in the usual 6 months, it would break up next week.

There are a few other gigs from bar owners that still let rock bands play, but not many. Why? Because wherever there’s a metal show there are always fights. ALWAYS. People go, get aggressive and beat the shit out of each other; that’s just the way it works. By the end of the night, the paddy wagon’s full and off to the local pen.

And you wonder why local owners won’t let local metal bands play? Pff.. gimme a break.

The Risom Mill and the Toy Loft

In D-Burg, bands routinely set up shop (for practice) in one of two places, the Risom Mill or the Toy Loft. Both are run down piece-of-shit mills, complete with shoddy brickwork, creaky floors, busted windows, substandard electrical wiring and more fire and safety code violations than you have fingers and toes. Counted three times.

The owners of these buildings are more than happy to take money from bands for renting “rooms”. I put that in quotes because they’re not rooms; they’re spaces with “doors”. I put that word in quotes because you could count it more as a “slab thing that swings that sorta/kinda stays shut.. maybe”.

The vast majority of the “rooms” have no heat and no air conditioning. This means it gets sweltering hot in the warmer months and ice cold in the winter months. Never it is a “right” temperature to play.

It’s a prerequisite that all bands who rent “rooms” trash the place entirely. They’ll put up nudie posters on the walls, spray-paint everything and basically just wreck the place. The owners of the buildings don’t care and usually leave them that way. Hey, if you had someone who would rent a space no matter what it looked like, would you fix it? Of course not.

Let’s not forget that some of these spaces require you to climb several flights of stairs to get there. These bands are desperate, what can I say..

Theft of equipment is very common in these spaces. If you have any decent piece of musical equipment, it will be stolen. Count on it. The most common items stolen? Drums, cymbals and microphones. Impossible to trace, eBay’d easily.

More often than not, bands will hold parties in their rented practice spaces. And of course, no new songs are ever completed, every “session” is everyone getting drunk and stoned, no work ever gets done, and the guys are wondering a few months later why nothing is happening.. Geez, LET ME THINK…

Common things all D-Burg rock musicians say

“I play better when I’m drunk/stoned.”

No, you don’t. You think you do but you sound like frog choking on a bug.

“If I ever see [that band member], I’ll kick his ass.”

D-Burg musicians all hate each other. The standard threat is “I’ll kick his ass”. It doesn’t matter who it is as long as they do something musically. It is required that if you are in a band in D-Burg, you must hate at least one musician in another band. And you must threaten that person with bodily harm whenever you can. Because even though absolutely no one gives a shit, you have to assert yourself as a tough guy. Did you not read the D-Burg Rules Of Being A Metal Musician?

“Metal isn’t what it used to be”

It never was. You think your rock band from D-Burg is ever going to “get signed”? Keep dreaming, because dreams are all you’ll ever have. NOTHING HAPPENS in D-Burg.

My recommendation to all D-Burg rock musicians

Before I give you my recommendations, I know exactly where you are musically.

Ready?

Okay, let’s go.

You’ve spent money on equipment. You’ve probably spent money on a practice space. You’ve spent time making a crappy MySpace page for your band. You’ve spent time making crappy for-free “merch” that no one buys (except you) on CafePress. You’ve probably played a few gigs but have nothing to show for it. Your “fans” are nothing but locals that have no money.

Can you see the problem here?

YOU’RE NOT MAKING ANY MONEY. And don’t give me that “I do it because it’s cool” bullshit. You play because you want cold hard cash, right? Right.

Stop playing metal.

I’m not kidding.

Stop.

Start playing country music.

Are you repulsed by that statement?

Consider the following with country music:

  • You can play anywhere. No more “we don’t allow that music here” crap. More gigs = more money.
  • You live in country-bumpkin Nowheresville USA - and people there like country music. It is the #1 style you can play that accommodates all audiences.
  • You will get laid more. Lots of hot chicks love country. You know it’s true.
  • You’ll be able to play the high-paying gigs like the county fairs. A-HA! NICE! Cash, cash, cash. AND IT’S LOCAL!
  • You will earn the respect of nearly all other musicians you come into contact with. No more bullshit “Ima gonna kick your ass” nonsense.
  • You will earn yourself a solid fan following in a very short period of time by people of all ages. And these people actually have MONEY to buy your stuff.
  • Because you’re attracting all-age groups, MORE PEOPLE will come to your shows

Do you get the hint now?

Stop playing metal. Cut your hair, put on a cowboy hat, dress in blue jeans and boots, a decent shirt and play a Fender Telecaster.

You’ll get rolling in no time at all.

Music is a business. Either swim with it or fail. If other people around you start giving you shit about it, fuck ‘em. Seriously. Fuck ‘em all. That’s a true “metal” attitude, that being to do what you want. You’ll be the one making some good extra money while they’ll be scrapping for low-rent no-pay gigs. You’re the winner, not them.

Try it, you’ll see. If not for the money, do it for that hot country-girl ass. You don’t know a hot chick ’til you’ve had a girl who rides horses a lot. She’ll be leaner and tighter than any rock chick you’ve ever had. Mmm, mmm good. Trust me on that one. :-)

“Big fish in a small pond” syndrome

There is no one famous in D-Burg. Any “celebrity” there is a has-been washed out whatever-they-are that used to be famous but now settles for the ass end of Connecticut.

To be famous in D-Burg means nothing because no one knows you outside of the region. And it doesn’t get you laid either. If everyone knows your name, has this ever served to your benefit? Probably not.

Here’s an oddity of D-Burg that cannot be explained but yet it’s true:

To be famous there, all you have to do it familiarize yourself with all the locals - but say little. Meet’n’greet as many as possible with a “hi how are you”, engage in small banter, end the conversation quickly as if you have to do something else, then move on. Do this enough times and everyone in town will know you - positively. Because if you stick in any conversation more than 5 minutes you’re bound to say something that will piss someone off unintentionally.

Keep it light, keep it simple, then move on to the next person. Give it a few months, and you’re famous in D-Burg.

What will this get you? Nothing monetary. But strangely enough, people will be totally willing to do favors for you. They will think you’re important because you actually took the time to listen.

What does this say about D-Burg? It says that most people are bitter from where they live and are desperate to talk to someone.. anyone.. that will listen.

Give a listen and you’d be surprised how many will warm up to you - even if you can’t stand them.

And by the way, anyone who says “I don’t care what anyone thinks about me” is a bold-faced liar. The fact they even said that proves they do care.

Better to be loved than hated. Don’t be a rebel because it means nothing in D-Burg. What have you to rebel against? Nothing, that’s what. If you “work with” the locals so-to-speak, you’ll find out fast that’s the way things work in those parts.

But I couldn’t work that way.

I moved and am much happier now.

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