I blame Tony Justice.
Everyone who has known me for more than a minute knows I’m a die-hard rock-n-roller. I’m a product of my childhood — the Rolling Stones and Led Zeppelin are heavy on my playlists, and my first real concert was .38 Special at the Omni in Atlanta. George tends towards newer music, but also on the rock ‘n’ roll side, so country has never really been something we’ve listened to – or enjoyed — much.
Don’t get me wrong, we’ll both wail along to Johnny Cash or Waylon Jennings (you should hear us do “Folsom Prison
Tony Justice (left), George ParkerBlues” – it’s almost horrible), but we’ve never been fans of “new country.” This is something I quietly admitted to Misty Justice, when we had a chance to hang out together a little at the Great American Trucking Show. I didn’t tell her I wasn’t really sure what Tony sang, because they were both so nice I would have died to hurt their feelings. We agreed to do some cross promotion, and took a couple of CDs home to give away on our Facebook page.
I figured I needed to listen to the music we were going to promote, so I popped “Apple Pie Moonshine” in and gave it a whirl.
It hasn’t left the CD player in my computer since.
“Babe! Come listen to this! Have you heard this? This is that Tony Justice guy – he’s really good!”
George made it to the office about the time I was bopping around and singing along to – gasp – country music.
This is who we are and how we roooollll….out on the big road! “This is good stuff, seriously, I hate to say it, but I think I like country music.”
He shook his head.
“I don’t even know who I’m talking to. Look at you. You bought a hat because it matches the truck and now you’re singing country music. You’re ate up with diesel. I’ve created a monster.”
“Oh please. You know you like it.”
And he does like it – the music, that is. I’m not sure how he feels about my choice in hats, but I know he likes the music, because we played the crap out of that CD this last trip. It even inspired us to buy one of those old trucker music CDs in the truck stop, and that’s probably the best $7.99 we’ve spent on the road, ever.
We were both familiar with the more “mainstream” songs – “Convoy,” “Teddy Bear” (which caused me to burst into tears, over and over again), “Truck Drivin’ Man” – but neither one of us had ever heard “CB Savage.” Let’s just say I was glad we were stopped the first time we heard it, because George laughed so hard I thought he was going to choke.
So if you see us rolling down the road, singing our hearts out and bopping away to country music, blame Tony Justice. It’s his fault.
