Don't Start the Revolution Without Me! - Jesse Ventura [71]
We also put on a CD—very loud. “I can’t get no satisfaction,” Mick Jagger sings, seeming to make the asphalt hum along. “When I’m drivin’ in my car, and a man comes on the radio . . . and tells me how white my shirts can be.... I can’t get no sat-is-fac-tion.”
I turn to Terry, I’m sure with a wistful look. “It’s still one of the proudest things in my résumé,” I say. “That I actually bodyguarded for the Rolling Stones. Not once, but twice.” She rolls her eyes.
I was at the peak of my wrestling career then, in 1978 and again in 1981. Came the night of the second big concert, and it turned out the promoter running the show hadn’t lined anybody up to introduce them. He ended up asking me, and I got to walk out under the big spotlight and say, “Ladies and gentlemen—the world’s greatest rock and roll band, the Rolling Stones!” It was one of those revolving stages and, as I rotated to the rear, there they were!
I’d remained one of their biggest fans. So, when they were coming to Minneapolis for a concert only a few weeks after my inauguration, it was hardly unnatural for me to make my first proclamation as governor. It went like this:
“WHEREAS: In the world of rock n’ roll, to last four decades—and surely into the new millennium—is unheard of; and WHEREAS, their music is timeless for many generations of fans; and WHEREAS, Keith Richards was born on December 18, 1943, is now 55, and is still alive; and WHEREAS, the Rolling Stones have performed in Minnesota multiple times and this concert will represent the highest-grossing concert of all time at the Target Center; and WHEREAS, the Stones have always employed the best ‘Body’ guards; NOW THEREFORE, I, JESSE VENTURA, Governor of Minnesota, do hereby proclaim official recognition of February 15, 1999, as ROLLING STONES DAY.”
When their private jet landed at the airport that afternoon, one of the media handed Mick a copy of my proclamation. He said he found it “very amusing,” but was “very thankful.” When asked if he might invite the governor onstage to sing, Mick’s response was: “I don’t know. I hope he doesn’t want to wrestle.”
That night, prior to the First Lady and I being happily ensconced in our front-row seats, the whole band came over to shake hands before the show. Mick said, “No one’s ever done that for us.” I told him, “Well, nobody’s ever been your bodyguard and such a big fan, who ended up in a position like mine!” He said, “We’re very honored.”
Then Keith Richards walked up to me with a bemused look on his face. “So you used to bodyguard us in ’78 and ’81?” he asked.
I said, “Yup.”
And he said, “And now you’re the governor?”
I said, “Yup.”
And in that wonderful Cockney accent he has, Keith said: “Facking great!”
After I was out of office, the Stones came through on another tour, and played the Excel Center in downtown St. Paul. Having “insider status” now, where I can get the good tickets, I was in the second row with four of my friends.
I reminisce now for Terry’s benefit: “At the end of the concert, I noticed Keith winking at me. And boom!—he shot me his guitar pick, right from stage. Obviously he’s done it before, because boy was he accurate! That sucker flew and hit me right in the chest.”
The guitar pick has the little lips and tongue on it, and on the other side, the name of the tour. I’ve got it in a prominent frame back home in Minnesota.
After the ordeal of Highway 5, Terry is too exhausted to keep up her journal. We gas up in Rosarito, and join some truckers for ranchero food at a little café. It even has real coffee, filtered through a cloth strainer, which we are told is the traditional Mexican style.
We breeze on to the twenty-eighth parallel, where a 140-foot-high steel monument, topped by a sculpted eagle, denotes the border between Baja Norte and Baja Sur. The time changes here, too, from Pacific to Mountain, and the town of Guerrero Negro is only a few miles away. It’s big, by Baja standards, with a population of around 10,000. The name comes from a whaling ship