Little River Band - Lady 1978

An example of a good song that I hated when it came out because the group was so horribly old and dorky-looking, and the music was so seemingly mushy. (On bus rides home from junior high basketball games, someone would usually lead off an a capella version of this song.)

"Feel for the winter but don't have a cold heart..."

Listening/looking today: The song is good; the musicians still look terrible. Nobody wants an accountant telling their life story!

George Jones: Shine On

George Jones: Loving You Could Never Be Better (1972)

Tammy is offstage screeching "harmony." And she's kind of ruining it. And George doesn't look happy. (Love Tammy, but not here.)

When Neighbors Have Really Loud Sex

I first experienced hearing others having sex in the early '90s, at my duplex on Rainey Street in Austin. The walls were thin, my neighbor's howls were loud. It was uncomfortable to listen to. (At one point, my own lover was on his way over, and I mentioned how loud my neighbor was and that I was about to bang on the adjoining wall... He gently admonished me: "Let them have their fun.")

Next, in grad school in San Francisco (1995), while in a one-room apartment next to another one-room apartment that housed the apartment manager and his angry-sex girlfriend. They were constantly screaming at each other and then loudly fucking each other. (Does a neighbor have the right to NOT have to listen to all of that?)

Most recently (like, TONIGHT): With the coming (no pun intended) of spring, a girl in the apartments across from me leaves her windows open. She's not there every day of the week, but perhaps once a week or so, the windows are open and she's laughing loudly until 2 am, and at the end of the hilarity comes (no pun intended) some loud sexual hollering.

Is it WRONG to be annoyed by hearing others having loud sex? Am I annoyed just because I'm jealous and not having sex myself (as has been posited by many)?

Personally, I'm not in the least bit turned on by hearing others having sex. (1) It's like hearing others' loud, intrusive music --- I'm not into what they're into at the moment. (2) I always judge the sounds of the women, which always seem overdramatic. If they're howling like they're howling, then I think they've probably watched too many porn videos and are vocalizing like they think they're supposed to be vocalizing. (3) That said: What if the guy they're with is actually making them howl that way? (Um... probably not.)

Getting My Shit Together

Post-estrangement/pre-Wuhan, my mother came over to my apartment in late February after we had had lunch. Frankly, I was embarrassed at the state of my "library," which had once looked nice but had since degenerated into a "storage room" of sorts: random boxes and bags and small bookshelves sitting everywhere, etc. In fact, my mother asked, "Are you using this room for storage?" NO! It's supposed to be my restful library!

Outside judgment, when it echoes your own thoughts, can be helpful. And so I spent 3 or 4 hours last week getting shit put away where it belongs!

Another thing: One wall in my main bathroom was completely barren and un-thought-out. I suddenly remembered the Klimt "Girlfriends" wall-hanging that I'd once had up in the bedroom of a former apartment, but since moving here had been stored away in a closet...It would be, and was, PERFECT for the bathroom spot.

"Girlfriends" and Solomon.

George Jones & Dolly Parton: Blues Man (2005)

George Jones - I Just Got Tired Of Being Poor (1972)

My life with trouble goes back to the candy

That I stole from Jessie Walker's country store

A penny separated me from choosing sides with honesty

And I just got tired of bein' poor.

Some folks eat their supper off of silver

And the only world they'll ever know is wealth

But I can't blame the rich folks for these big tall walls

This prison is the doings of myself.

Freedom ran away from me at twenty-three

I broke the lock on one too many doors

My hungry hands would not behave

When they got close to things they crave

I just got tired of bein' poor.

I remember Willie Jack who laughed at me

And the talking about the ragged clothes I wore

That's when Willie got a taste of all my knuckles in his face

I just got tired of bein' poor.

Some folks eat their supper off of silver

And the only world they'll ever know is wealth

But I can't blame the rich folks for these big tall walls

This prison is the doings of myself.

Freedom ran away from me at twenty-three

I broke the lock on one too many doors

My hungry hands would not behave

When they got close to things they crave

I just got tired of bein' poor.

I just got tired of bein' poor

Cleansing the Palate: George Jones: The Race Is On

Play loud. Survive the inanity of "stay safe" and "wear a mask."

Dolly Parton: Two Doors Down (1978)

Written and performed by Parton.

Dolly Parton: Tennessee Homesick Blues (1984)

Written and performed by Parton.

Lots of Dolly Parton on TV over the weekend (bios on A&E and REELZ), so I'm guessing she has something new coming out. Brief cynicism aside, Dolly Parton is just about the perfect performer, both deep and shallow. And she has, over the past 5 decades in public life, revealed absolutely nothing about her personal self or innermost feelings, except through her songs. (Very much a relief in today's idiotic tell-all world, where people rely, via social media, on photos of what they had for lunch or who they might've been raped by to "make connections" with others. My personal social-media-favorite "confession," aside from "#metoo": "I suffer from anxiety.") Old School = Their talent perhaps matches the exact thing you've been feeling but unable to express. And, no, not that you both just had a sandwich for lunch.

p.s. Dolly's singing here about NYC, but I personally found the city to be extraordinary and NOT phony. Phony places I've lived? Austin and San Francisco---wherever self-righteous PC people dwell. New York was/is too merit-based for such foolishness (despite the current media based there).

I Never Sang For My...

...Mother?

Friday night went to sleep on the couch, then had a vivid dream where I was literally flying to a house (dodging phone/cable lines in the air), where my mother told me that her house was sold, and then she tried to tell me about some money from a fund that was coming to me. I saw the graphics from the fund, and they made no sense, and I yelled at her that they made no sense. Disturbing.

After this dream, I woke up around 4am to "I Never Sang For My Father" on Turner Classic Movies. At the end, the elderly father, Melvyn Douglas, told his son, Gene Hackman, that he'd enjoyed listening to him sing a certain song when he was little. As it turned out, Hackman, as a small child, had sung the song with his mother at their piano. But whenever the father had come downstairs to listen, Hackman, as a boy, had immediately stopped singing. The latter-day Hackman told his aging father that he'd never sung the song for him. Douglas replied: "But I always enjoyed listening to it."

Kind of broke my heart.

Reminded me of a story my mother recently told me: In post-war Germany, she and a teen girlfriend were sneaking cigarettes. A hausfrau came upon them and expressed her disapproval: "Next, the Russians will be here." Fast forward to when I was an 18-year-old visiting Germany with my mother in 1983. We were waiting on a street-corner for a bus, and I lit a cigarette, and my mother let me know how disgusting I was. At the time, I didn't know that she'd ever smoked when she was a kid. All I knew was that she thought I was a scumbag for lighting a cigarette as an adult. (I immediately put my cigarette out; my German aunt later told my mother how respectful I was.) Point being: My mother had intentionally made me feel like a scumbag for smoking when in fact she'd actually smoked herself as a kid. Why? This same kind of thing happened over and over and over. I was always made to feel like I was doing something wrong.

Bobby Doyle Three: My Mammy

The recent death of Kenny Rogers reminded me of a former band-mate of his, Bobby Doyle. In the early '90s, Doyle used to play piano in a very small, dark Austin bar called "Ego's" on South Congress. Today, Ego's is a "hip" karaoke hangout; the young waitresses have nose-rings. Back in the '90s, though, the waitresses were 40-something, hair-sprayed, and as hard-core as the place. No karaoke, just the blind Bobby Doyle on the piano, his girlfriend sitting next to him, and Christmas lights illuminating it all.

Doyle died in 2006 in Austin. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bobby_Doyle_(jazz_vocalist)

Post-Wuhan

Saw a little chart on the news today. These things are apparently up during our Wuhan-quarantine:

Domestic violence
Drinking/drugs
Gaming
Porn watching

Though, really, the above sound more like what MEN are resorting to out of boredom. Wonder what women are doing more of?

Interesting to see stats 9 months from now: More divorces or another great Baby Boom?

Happy Birthday, Babies!

1 year old, either April 6 or April 7! Good job, Mama Hennessy, for getting them back to near my yard in the middle of those rainstorms!

Just born.

From left: Mama Hennessy, Sasha-Su, Solomon (Mini), and Mr. Pete.

Poor LIttle Fool: Ricky Nelson (1958)

To those of us who initially rejected this scenario...what did we get in return?

Wuhan Woozy

My hair looks like shit, I need a spring pedicure, I'm about to need toilet paper for real... (I got lucky with a 12-pack of TP 2 weeks ago; since then, no grocery store or drugstore has any...What are we supposed to do, use LEAVES, newspaper being obsolete.)

Luckily no beer or cigarette or Coca-Cola shortages...

Job-wise: I got REAL lucky while temping. The office shut down March 13, but the data-entry job I was doing happened to be doable from home. So I've had regular income (albeit less than 40 hours per week), enough to pay rent and bills. A real stroke of luck, for which I'm extremely grateful.

And the oddest thing: I had an hour-long permanent job interview a couple of weeks ago over the phone, right after everyone went on shut-down nationwide. And they hired me a few days later. And I'm starting next Monday, albeit "starting" means just driving to the office and picking up a computer so I can work from home. And it's $8,000 more per year than I was making at the job I quit last October! I still don't quite believe it; I guess I won't believe it until I actually meet some real-life people at the workplace!

Even more oddly: A few days before I was offered the above job, I was offered another job (which paid about $3,000 more per year than the job I quit last year). I accepted this one at first, but it fell through. Not only did it pay less than the job I ultimately got, but it also took an hour to get home in Austin traffic (although only 11 miles away). The job I finally got is only a few miles away from my apartment. At the time the first job fell through, I was panicked and desolate... but look how things turned out! A LOT more money, and a much shorter drive.

We'll see how things go after April 13...

In the meantime: THANK YOU, God, for the recent good fortune! I am very, very, VERY grateful. Things could have turned out a LOT worse.

Marty Robbins: Singing The Blues (1956)

George Jones - He Stopped Loving Her Today

Sung in the sunlight, beneath a beautiful blue sky, with hair flowing... It's almost like watching Willie... Well, except for the leisure-suit, angst, lack of groove (not necessarily a bad thing in this case), and non-stoned town-square audience...

Is George truly meant for daylight?

George Jones - Things Have Gone To Pieces

George Jones and Tammy Wynette - Milwaukee Here I Come

George Jones: Too Wild Too Long (1987)

The opposite of a poseur. Love this godawful cover, George! :)

"You always looked so good this time of night..."
"Sometimes I miss a family, sometimes I miss a plane..."

Sincerely

Every cable station that's coming back from break with coronavirus news, as well as every "we'll get through this" advertisement, plays the same saccharine/sincere music. To me, the aural equivalent of this "Three Men and a Baby" picture from years ago (which has always irritated me for some reason---I really hate it when actors, and news stations, try to act loving and sincere).

My Corona

The 1957 Asian Flu Pandemic

https://www.city-journal.org/1957-asian-flu-pandemic

Are we supposed to shut down our entire country EVERY time a global flu makes its rounds? (Which seems to happen on a fairly regular basis.) This current shut-down is getting ridiculous. I need to go to work. I need toilet paper. I need to get my hair cut. I need basketball on the TV.