God's Own Drunk (Live 1980)

Watch out, Joe Walsh

Well, like I've explained all over the country before

I ain't no drinkin' man

Medicinal purposes only

No, I quit

I quit about 5:30 this mornin' in the Longhorn Bar here in Minneapolis

Swore I would never do it again

Please, God, if you'd just let my head stop hurtin', I'll never drink again

That will be echoed around the land tomorrow mornin'

But I had promised my brother-in-law

That I'd watch his still while he went into town to vote

And it was right up there on the mountain where the map said it would be

Friends, let me tell you one thing, it wasn't no ordinary still

No, it stood up on that mountain like a huge golden oak for me

And God's little lanterns was twinkling on and off in the heavens

God's big ol' yellow moon was shinin' on the cool, clear evening, and

Like I tried to explain before, but nobody believed in me, I ain't no drinkin' man

But oh, hell, it was the Fourth of July

And we couldn't get away with this anywhere else

And the temptation just got the best of me and I took a slack

Phew, that yellow whiskey runnin' down my throat tasted like honeydew vine water

I took another slack

Took another and another and another

Before I knew it, I downed one whole jug of that shit and commencing to get hot flashes

Goose pimples was runnin' up and down my body

And all of a sudden, this, this feeling comes home

Doo-doo-doo-doo-doo

It's like nothing I'd ever experienced before

It's like I was in love

In love for the first time

Sorta like Cliff and Nina on All My Children

Hey, you don't watch that crap, do you? Now come on

I don't either, but I know one thing

That Palmer Cortlandt is an asshole

He's gonna get his one day

In love for the first time with anything that moved

Animate, inanimate, cone head, no cone, it didn't matter

It's like there's this great neon sign flashin' on and off in my brain, sayin'

"Stuckey's 17 miles"

You see those all the way to Florida, you know

Then that sign reappeared and it said

"Jimmy Buffett, you fool, there's a great day a-comin'"

'Cause I was drunk

Let me explain this a little further

I wasn't deep, bro

Slip slide

Coral Reefers

Fourth of July

Commode-huggin' drunk

No, I was God's own drunk and a fearless man

And that's when I first saw the bear

He was a Kodiak-lookin' fella about 19 feet tall in his Nikes

He rambled up over the hill, expectin' me to do one of two things

Slip or fly, I didn't do either one, hung him up

He started sniffin' around my body, tryin' to smell a little bit of fear

But he ain't gonna smell it 'cause I'm God's own drunk and a fearless man

And it hung him up

Well, that's just when he ate my Vuarnet sunglasses to show me he was a badass

And you know how much those things cost

It really ticked me off

So my eyes are showin' a lot redder than his did and that hung him up

So I said

"Mr. Bear, sir, I love every hair on your 27-acre body

I know you got a lot of friends over there on the other side of the hill

There's old rare bear, tall bear, pretty bear, kelly jerry relly bear, smelly bear, spooky bear, pooky bear

I want you to go back over there tonight, and you tell 'em all I'm feelin' right

You tell them I'm God's own drunk and a fearless man

And I love each and, and every one of them like a brother and a sister

But if they give me any trouble tonight

I'm gonna have to run every goddamn one of 'em

Slap on down to the end of the Mississippi River

Way past New Orleans into the Gulf of Mexico"

That's what I told him

Well, he took two steps back, he didn't know what to say

Neither did I, but

But being Catholic and cautious, I approached him again

I said, "Now Mr. Bear, you know, in the eyes of the Lord

We're both beasts when it comes right down to it

So I want you to be my buddy"

Buddy bear, that's right

So I took old buddy bear by his island-sized paw and led him over to the still

He's just sniffin' around that thing 'cause he's smelling something good

I gave him one of them jugs of honeydew vine water

He downed it upright, you know, like one of them bears in the circus

Sipping Sarsaparilla in the moonlight

Gave him another and another and another

Before I knew it, he downed about eight of them

And commenced to doing the bear dance

Two steps, a snort, a fly turn, and a grunt

It was so complicated like that disco crap, it plumbervated me

And we had worked ourselves into a tumultuous uproar

I was awful tired

Went over to the hillside, laid down

Slept for four hours and dreamt me some tremulous dreams

And when I woke up, there was God jelly-moon shining on the cool, clear evening

God's little lanterns was twinkling on and off in the heaven

And my buddy the bear

My buddy the bear was missing

Do you want to know something else, friends and neighbors?

So was that still

Thank you, animal lover

Thank you, Lord, bu-

(All right)

Alright

This is a, this is a little song that, that I did, uh

I wrote about a year ago when, uh, when my daughter right before she was born

Popped out on the planet and I wrote this little nursery rhyme for her, and, uh

It's great when you do, uh, do something like that, uh, because you can write with your imagination

With no holes barred on it, you can go anywhere and say anything you want

And it's great to write for kids, and uh

We'll especially do this for anybody who brought their kids tonight

Or any children out in the audience that have to take mom and dad home

After they got so trashed-out on Fourth of July, Jimmy Buffett show

This is a little song called "Chanson Pour Les Petits Enfants"

If you parlay, our song for the children, song for the world