Only like fifteen people, total, might get this, but you know the random song on Gentleman's live CD called "Stranded in Babylon"? This is Matthias the Dread, the Cologne native who probably has the coolest white guy dreads of all time. He has a friend in Austin named Buffalo Soldier, he told me. Can't say that I've met Buffalo Soldier. (And you've got to love that, yes, Germans also know about the rabbit ears. And just the other day, I saw these two 7-year-old Dutch kids having a grand ole' time on the metro, playing their Dutch-acid-cartoon version of Rock, Paper, Scissors. Some games and tomfoolery simply transcend borders of geography, language, culture and religion).

But this photo serves a dual purpose of analyzation.
It's called the "What is '80s'?" Debate

*Note: '80s', in this story, denotes a negative connotation.

This story has nothing to do with Matthias the Dread.

Look at my shirt. It's tie-dyed. That is not a very unusual sight on American college campuses. But here, in the land of mullets, Michael Irvin temples, Ridgemont High Vans slip-ons and tight jeans, I "look like I'm from the 80s."

That's what a bunch of those German kids told me, at least. And it was confirmed by pretty much everyone else I asked about it after the festival.

This got me thinking. When I walk past some European dude -- wreaking of cologne, torso plastered by a tight Puma cutoff shirt, eyes shielded by astronaut sunglasses, Euro-mullet glaring back at his inquisitive eyes from the subway car's darkened window, reflecting the glow of lots of hair gel and hot pink-highlights, does HE think to himself, "Man, that dude in the tie-dyed shirt dresses like David Hasselhoff." ??

It's like rain on your wedding day, eh? (Mr. Kerman, my eighth grade teacher, told me that nothing in that Alanis Morisette song is actual irony -- if that's true, then I don't know what the hell they are).

If my son's generation of Americans ends up dressing like today's Euro-mullet kids, I will more frustrated than a traffic jam when you're already late.