text: It's rumored that this is the song that the Dead played more than any other between 1966 and 1995. Seemed that way to me. I always got the same delicious bad-boy identification out of it that I got listening to Merle Haggard "turn twenty-one in prison doing life without parole." But "Me and My Uncle" is a more positive and hopeful song than "Mama Tried." In both songs the balladeer is flawed and self aware, but in "Me and My Uncle," he is at least on the outside, a free man.
  An uncle is a wonderful thing to have and a wonderful thing to be. You can ride out with your uncle secure in the companionship of an older, more experienced man. An uncle can be non-judgmental but still have a measure of parental authority. An uncle can teach you and be willing to learn from you as well. An uncle can teach you things your dad won't. Or shouldn't.
  In the San Francisco music scene in the seventies, Jerry Garcia (then an older fellow in his thirties) played an avuncular role. He was genuinely interested in working with other musicians, trading licks, giving and taking.
  The title of the July 24 post, "Sandhill Trek Presents... the Avuncular Chris Locke" will change soon. It will include the title of his work in progress No Love Lost. Then, as the interview ages out toward the bottom of the page, my allusion to Chris avuncular role in the social fabric of the Internet will fade somewhat, because the post will be re-titled. But the acknowledgement of that role will remain both in this wordy explanation and in the posts of several bloggers who referred to the original title.