I’ve been lucky enough to work with a lot of talented people on projects big and small. Today, the story of meeting a band I loved in high school and making an unofficial video for one of their songs.

Senior year of high school, the fall of 1984, must be when I first heard Los Lobos. “Will the Wolf Survive? didn’t hit big on radio, but it got constant MTV play. It’s about trying to preserve Mexican culture while living in mainstream America. It’s also a metaphor for musicians who want to be heard. A white high school kid in Iowa can’t relate directly, but I think everybody knows about feeling like an outsider.

Not long later, Los Lobos’ biggest commercial success was their 1987 cover of “La Bamba,” from the Ritchie Valens biopic starring Lou Diamond Phillips.

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Doritos is learning from the Oreo overlords. Give us a new flavor and we’ll buy it at least once to see if it’s any good. I’m looking at you, Carrot Cake Oreos. The latest fad flavor, Tangy Pickle Doritos, is mostly available at Dollar General and Circle K, although I got mine from a local unbranded convenience store.

Most disappointing – no dill in Doritos Tangy Pickle. There’s a Lay’s Dill Pickle potato chip, but Tangy Pickle Doritos just has vinegar, garlic, and salt. Lay’s and Doritos are both PepsiCo brands, so you know dill can be done.

Tangy Pickle Doritos are sour and salty, but taste nothing like a pickle. If you like vinegar potato chips, these are a cousin – or maybe Flamin’ Hot Limón Doritos if they weren’t hot. More frustrating, Tangy Pickle Doritos have, temporarily, forced Doritos taco-flavored tortilla chips  off shelves. You can use the Doritos product finder to track flavors in your zip code and Taco is nowhere. C’mon – “Taco” goes back even further than “Nacho Cheese.”

As a palate cleanser, here’s a Taco Doritos commercial from 1977 with Avery Schreiber and Vito Scotti. Vito doesn’t talk here,  but he was in everything from “Hogan’s Heroes” to “The Godfather,” and was Italian Cat in “Disney’s The Aristocats.”

Time for another edition of Down the Rabbit Hole where I start with a nugget of pop culture and, like Alice in Wonderland, see where we end up.

The sitcom “Night Court” ran on NBC from 1984 to 1992 and, as I write this, is in reruns on LAFF, which is on Dish Network and probably one of the digital subchannels in your town like 5.2 or 8.3.

Harry Anderson starred as Judge Harry Stone, a young and unconventional judge working the evening shift in Manhattan Municipal Court. Before “Night Court,” Anderson was mostly known as a magician, appearing on “Saturday Night Live” and “Cheers.”

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You didn’t think this 1982 Top 20 hit from Steel Breeze was Rick Springfield, did ya?

It’s mostly the chorus that sounds Springfieldian, but I would swear I had a Limewire download that said it was Rick.

I’m not going to waste your time with beers I don’t like – unless I spend a lot on it and the review proves it was a business expense. Big Swell IPA from Maui Brewing Company is one of my favorite semi-nationally available IPAs. Bell’s Two Hearted and Cigar City Jai Alai are nice too, but today, we’re talking Big Swell.

Big Swell is dry-hopped, meaning hops are added after brewing/boiling. That helps cut down on the bitterness that makes some folks hate IPAs. It’s still very “green”, but more delicate. Wine drinkers talk about notes of leather or cherry. Big Swell tastes tropical – orange, pineapple, peach. It also has the malt sweetness to take off the edge. If you absolutely hate IPAs, you might not like this one either, but it’s very balanced between grassy resin and barley. At 6.2 percent alcohol by volume, Big Swell can also sneak up on you. By comparison, Bud Light is about 4.2.

I’ve visited Maui Brewing Company’s production brewery/restaurant in the Kihei area of Maui and would recommend the tour. The brewery there is “off the grid,” 100-percent powered by solar and biodiesel. They even toast the coconut for their Hiwa Porter on site. On the other hand, the other national Hawaiian beer brand, Kona Brewing, is produced in Hawaii, Oregon, Washington state, and New Hampshire.