This is a copy of an e-mail I sent out to promote shows at Tt the Bears and Sally Obrien's on 2/17&18/07)

This Sunday starting at 5:00, I'll be playing a couple sets of instrumental jazz at Sally Obrien's, 335 Somerville Ave, Somerville. As usual I'll be playing tenor sax and I'll be joined by Ryan Claunch on piano, Jesse Williams on bass, and Dave Mattacks on drums. There's no cover charge and while you are in the neighborhood you can grab a pint at the Tir Na Nog, a fine little bar and music venue that is shutting its doors at the end of this month.
While I'm under the false impression that I have your attention, I'd like to invite another gig I'm doing this weekend that is an absolute Ball, Shaun and Suzi's 14th Annual Mardi Gras Ball at Tt the Bears, (10 Brookline St. Cambridge). After a set by Monique Ortiz and Bourbon Princess, I'll be playing with the Voodoo Krewe All Star Mardi Gras Band accompanying a long roster of special guests including Dennis Brennan, Andrea Gillis, Willie Alexander, Chandler Travis, Bo Barringer, Sal Clemente and The Steamy Bohemians in a set that will last for well over 2 1/2 hours. I've done this gig for several years. It's always packed and people dance like mad and sometimes behave badly. It is a delightful, booze soaked, sweaty mess.
My only complaint is with my bladder. Every year, I dash off the stage to take a quick leak and run back, only to learn later that I missed a truly inspiring moment of audience participation. This year I either wanted to perfect my timing or come up with some other remedy to my problem.
I considered not drinking beer. I didn't consider it very seriously, or for very long, but I considered it. I considered wearing a stadium bag, but I couldn't find shoes to match. Just when I thought all was lost, Capt. Lisa Nowak hipped me to the space diaper or, as any highly trained NASA astronaut would call it, the "waste absorbing garment" or WAG.
If these waste absorbing garments could keep astronauts dry and comfortable while floating around in zero gravity or when they are hell bent on traveling great distances to eliminate a rival member of the two hundred fifty mile high club, armed with little more than a garden gnome, a feather duster and a rubber chicken, then one should easily get me through a 2 1/2 hour set of silly New Orleans party music.
So, I made myself a NASA Screwdriver (Grey Goose and Tang), and thanks to Al Gore, jumped on the information super highway. I googled WAG and after coming up with too many pages of pet spas and kennels, I narrowed my search to "WAG & manufacturer." TaDa! With one click of the mouse, the eagle had landed.
I opened the company's online catalog and was surprised to learn that they made a complete line of absorbent garments and filters. One item appeared to be a much lighter version of the WAG, made of pure silk with a very high thread count, available in several rich looking designer colors. It was meant to eliminate offensive odors that might distract astronauts while in close personal contact or during docking maneuvers. It was called the flatulence absorbing garment, or FAG. They sold an item that looked like a pair of aluminum earmuffs. It was designed to protect astronauts from hearing impairment caused by repetitive, high pitched, extraneous blips, bleeps, squeaks and squawks. It was called the Noise Absorbing Garment or NAG.
Products were available for other highly specialized applications besides space travel. There was a garment that looked like a quilted apron that was apparently worn by many of the most prominent plastic surgeons: the silicone absorbing garment, or SAG.
One of the filters that caught my eye was the one designed to keep migratory water fowl from getting caught in jet engines: the DAF.
To make a long story short, realizing full well that it is already much too late for that, I called the toll free order line. I spoke to a charming woman named Klhigzsdjou and asked her if I could order a WAG. She informed me that they were only available by the gross. After I stopped chuckling, I said, "That's seems like a rather odd number." Klhigzsdjou wasn't amused. She reminded me that a gross was 144 items and being divisible by 2 it was clearly even. It didn't matter as they were all out of WAGs, but in stock and ready for immediate delivery were plenty of LAFs.