Posted on 02/28/2006 6:07:12 PM PST by smoothsailing
TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 28, 2006
Power of Parrotheads put to the test
BY BO PETERSEN AND CHRIS DIXON
The Post and Courier
After a big Kosher pickle and a cold draft beer, which way do Parrotheads steer?
The Columbia chapter of an international Jimmy Buffett fan club hopes it'll be toward the DMV.
The club wants the S.C. General Assembly to create a "Parrothead" specialty license plate for motor vehicles, with $10 of the cost of each $34 plate going to the Palmetto Chapter of the Alzheimer's Association or the Upstate South Carolina Chapter of the Alzheimer's Association.
The plate was the brainchild of several fan club members, said club president Venning Morrison. Club members meet today with a House judiciary subcommittee.
"Basically, the plate would cost $10 more over a two-year period than a regular plate, and the monies would go to the state's Alzheimer's chapters," Morrison said.
Buffett is the beach-party-atmosphere singer of songs such as "Cheeseburger In Paradise," a somewhat tongue-in-cheek rocker about heaven on earth being "a huge hunk of meat" with lettuce and tomato, Heinz 57 and the rest. His Margaritaville line of retail shops includes a King Street store downtown.
His legion of fans - who regale in Hawaiian shirts, crazy hats and tropical libations - are called Parrotheads. Lowcountry Parrotheads were surprised to hear about the license plate, but ready to grab a screwdriver.
"I think it would be awesome," said Bo Taylor of Mount Pleasant, who brakes for cheeseburgers and tracks the Buffett Web site for concert dates. "I think the Parrotheads are going to make it happen."
Joe Kersey, vice president of the approximately 120-member Lowcountry Parrot Head Club, took a more political tack. The plate would be great if it calls attention to the public service work the group does, he said.
"The perception probably is, Here's a bunch of drunks who love Jimmy Buffett music," he said. But the Lowcountry club raises funds and awareness for groups such as Beach Sweep and the Ronald McDonald House, including a fundraiser this weekend for the Alzheimer's Association. Parrotheads have a heart tug about the disease. Buffett's father, James Delaney, died of it in 2003 after a long struggle.
Of course, the fundraiser is a Shem Creek pub crawl. That kind of real-life, live-it-up contrast is part and parcel to Buffett's lyrical world. The six South Carolina clubs, among 200-plus clubs nationally and more than 750,000 members worldwide, have the rallying cry of "Party with a purpose."
"Everybody is pretty much into the 'Living and Dying in 3/4 Time' motif," said Kersey, referring to the album that made Buffett a star.
The plate's design hadn't been worked out yet, Morrison said.
Virginia already has a Parrothead plate that features a cartoon parrot in a ball cap, palm fronds and a shark fin in the water, with the word "Parrotheads" teetering across the bottom.
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This article was printed via the web on 2/28/2006 8:52:12 PM . This article appeared in The Post and Courier and updated online at Charleston.net on Tuesday, February 28, 2006.
It'd make patrolling the highways like shooting fish in a barrel.
This parrot is dead...HE HAS CEASED TO BE
LOL Exactly my thought.
One of the best spots for nightlife.
jimmy buffett... very liberal democrat who supports the fifth column members.
Virginia already has parrothead plates.
"We are the people our parents warned us about."
'E's not dead, he's just pining.
Buffet's a lefty? That surprises me, since he's a shining example of capitalism...he took 2 or three hit songs and made a business empire from them.
buffets played for so many lib election rallies, i lost count.
Parrothead ping, DW
Parrots Against Prejudice spokesbird Polly Wanacraqr today demanded the "Parrothead" plate be shut down.
"These caricatures of parrots are offensive to parrots everywhere and demean us as co-equal inhabitants of this Earth."
Elsewhere, Radical members of the PAC (Parrots Against Cages) rallied at the statehouse, burning Hawaiian shirts and dousing passing legislators with margaritas. One group attempted to sing "Buffet-burgers in Paradise" but kept forgetting the words after having drank the rest of the dousing margaritas.
Capitol police seemed stymied how to react at first, but the raucous crowd dispersed quickly when a band of elderly ladies with blue hair and birdcages showed up shouting "I want my damn bird back."
LOL!
Jimmy should just stay out of politics
Well that's just sad.
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