I woke up this morning thinking of Wilford Brimley which is hardly the image I prefer to have lodged in my groggy noggin' so early in the day (or even late in the day, for that matter). While this confession could lead one to believe that I am a deeply troubled individual, there are far better examples from my psyche from which to draw that conclusion.

No, I think that I had Wilford on my mind because someone had mentioned the name Phil Kaufman to me recently. Those of you neck-deep in music lore might recognize the name as Kaufman is arguably the most famed road manager in rock and roll history and is part of the myth of the late, great Gram Parsons as Kaufman was involved with cremating Parsons' body in the Joshua Tree desert.

My fiancee's mother has long been a friend of Kaufman's and I had met him years ago (in the presence of Marianne Faithfull, no less). For whatever reason, right or wrong, to me, he bore some resemblence to Brimley. I think it was a moustache thing.

So, I'm struggling to awake, pondering Wilford Brimley and - and I am likely not alone here - my thoughts turned to Quaker Oats. I mean, who from the States that watched any television during the past twenty years can forget his stint as their pitchman and his rather gruff declaration that the consumption of those oats was "the right thing to do and a tasty way to do it."?

But why Wilford? Had he been genetically bred in a lab somewhere by Quaker Oats specifically to shill their product? No. I knew that he was an actor, although I couldn't remember anything he'd been in aside from an episode of "Seinfeld," and the movies "Cocoon" and "The Natural." For all I knew, the man was some legendary stage thespian with a trove of Tony Awards that required him to consume ridiculous amounts of Quaker Oats just to maintain the strength to cart them around.

Well, there's no Tonys on Wilford's mantle (unless he's nicked one), but he has been in dozens of movies since an uncredited debut in "True Grit." However, his name, his face, his voice - for me it will always conjure up the mug of a Quaker on a box of oats. He occupies the same region in my cranial landscape as Jared from the commercials for Subway - little more than a ubiqitous and occasionally annoying spokesperson. Perhaps I imagine them somewhere in heated debate over the nutritional merits of their respective employers' products.

I'm feeling better, though. I have had some coffee. I have gotten this episode out of my system. Now, all I need to do is cleanse the mental palatte, completely evict Wilford and his oats of malice from my headspace.

Maybe I merely need to throw on some Gram Parsons and sonically strafe him Wilford from my consciousness.

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