This sucker took me 4 hours to put together!

I'd ordered this shelf set weeks ago; the huge box was sitting in my living room for over a week. Cats loved sitting on top of the long box and acting cocky, but I'd completely dreaded having to open it and put the shelf together. 

 

Finally, on a Sunday afternoon/evening---when there was a multi-hour stretch of good TV (Cowboys football plus "90 Day Fiance" and "Sister Wives")---I finally made myself do this chore!

Took me 4 hours. And many contortions of body and hand, screwing in all the screws. (Note: I'm over 50, not overweight but a smoker---putting this together was actually strenuous and I had to take frequent breaks---albeit to drink and smoke... And I woke up the next day SORE from lifting the whole thing this-way and that-way so I could get the right angle to screw the screws in!)

Anyway: It's done, and I really like how it looks.

 

Paul McCartney: Ram On (written 1971; here, live at Rotterdam 2012)

As a teen, Paul used to call himself "Ramon" and pretend to be a Latin Lover who could barely speak English when meeting girls. "Ramon" / "Ram On"

Also: Paul's dad was a local musician who played in bands post-WWI, and the ukulele was a popular instrument in the 20s. Very creative and interesting and sweet for Paul to incorporate.

When a co-worker dies but you've never met him

I've been working from home since 2020. I got hired right after Covid, and none of the group ever went back to the office.

We've had 3 meet-ups in the past 3 years. Aside from that, we'd get an e-mail every now and then: Someone has cancer, someone's brother died, someone's father died, someone's wife died. Can we contribute for flowers or a meal plan, whatever.

The man in question: His wife died last year after going through cancer treatment. Before she died, he sent many positive messages to the work group saying that she'd beaten cancer. Once she died, we all contributed for flowers.

I knew that he was in his 60s. And that when we transitioned from one company to another in July 2023, he chose to retire instead of going to the new company. Just got a Teams message today that he was dead. He wasn't sick, as far as I know. I'm guessing that he committed suicide, but who knows.

I'm living in the world of "who knows." I am completely isolated from any human and any actual human interaction. There was no one person in the work group that I could send a message to to find out more about this human being who had just died, and why he died. 

I get these drastic messages and obediently send PayPal money for flowers in blank memoriam.

Joan Crawford: Apartment Love

I just saw an Ozu film for the first time a few days ago.
Note the red plastic cup near the upper left of the shot. (What does it MEAN?)

Floating Weeds (1959, Yasujiro Ozu)

The first Ozu film I've ever seen. (Thank you, soon-to-be-gone Netflix!)
Very beautiful and carefully shot. And, despite its quiet-ness, also emotionally life-honest (both humorously and tragically).

Message to self: While there may not be any One in your personal life, there is always ART that you can rely on to reflect, or negate, what you're feeling or thinking. 

It's nicer and warmer, of course, to have a real-life person to exchange ideas with... But in lieu of that, the thoughts and images of decades and centuries past also serve to make you feel less alone by reflecting universal thoughts---ideas and emotions that you've had, and that all of these people 1000 years ago or 100 years ago or 50 years ago also had. We're never alone as long as we have the thoughts of our human ancestors with us, to either agree or argue with.

Partnerships that would have lasted barely a year (if that)...

...had the man only once had the balls to say to his woman, even ever-so-gently: "My dear, please shut up. You are full of shit."

Caesar/Marc Antony and Cleopatra
Edward VIII and Mrs. Simpson
John Lennon and Yoko Ono
Colin Kaepernick and Nessa Diab
Prince Harry and Meghan Markle
My brother and his Marxist teacher wife ("Social-Emotional Learning" devotee, now brainwashing Austin's kids as the principal of a middle-school)

Some bad decisions are world-changing, some only music- or sports-changing. Some, like Harry or my brother, don't matter at all in the grand scheme of things. But all involve sadly weak men who couldn't think for themselves, who didn't dare stand up to their less-intelligent, but much more adamant, partners.

Of the above list: Hey, at least my brother still has his generic middle-class career (he's a journalist---having a left-wing teacher wife in Austin doesn't damage him publicly at all; though soul-wise... he did used to call himself "libertarian"--Ha! Whatever happened to that?).

The Smiths - Cemetry Gates (1986)

A dreaded sunny day
So I meet you at the cemetry gates
Keats and Yeats are on your side
A dreaded sunny day
So I meet you at the cemetry gates
Keats and Yeats are on your side
While Wilde is on mine

So we go inside and we gravely read the stones
All those people, all those lives
Where are they now?
With loves, and hates
And passions just like mine
They were born
And then they lived
And then they died
It seems so unfair
I want to cry

You say : "'Ere thrice the sun done salutation to the dawn"
And you claim these words as your own
But I've read well, and I've heard them said
A hundred times (maybe less, maybe more)
If you must write prose/poems
The words you use should be your own
Don't plagiarise or take "on loan"
'Cause there's always someone, somewhere
With a big nose, who knows
And who trips you up and laughs
When you fall
Who'll trip you up and laugh
When you fall

You say : "'Ere long done do does did"
Words which could only be your own
And then produce the text
From whence was ripped
(Some dizzy whore, 1804)

A dreaded sunny day
So let's go where we're happy
And I meet you at the cemetry gates
Oh, Keats and Yeats are on your side
A dreaded sunny day
So let's go where we're wanted
And I meet you at the cemetry gates
Keats and Yeats are on your side
But you lose
'Cause weird lover Wilde is on mine

Scooby Doo, Where Are You! (Intro 1969)

The Banana Splits/The Tra La La Song (1969)

Tra la la, la la la la.
Tra la la, la la la la.
Tra la la, la la la la.
Tra la la, la la la la.

One banana, two banana, three banana, four.
Four bananas make a bunch and so do many more.
Over hill and highway the banana buggies go
Comin' on to bring you The Banana Splits Show.

Makin up a mess of fun
Makin up a mess of fun
Lots of fun for everyone.

Tra la la, la la la la.
Tra la la, la la la la.
Tra la la, la la la la.
Tra la la, la la la la.

Four banana, three banana, two banana, one.
All bananas playing in the bright warm sun.
Flippin like a pancake, poppin like a cork
Fleagle, Bingo, Drooper and Snork.

Happy Birthday, George Jones (September 12, 1931)

 

Silver Threads and Golden Needles (1993)

Would have been the best video ever had they gotten George Jones to show up at the door---and maybe bust it down!

George Jones: "The Corvette Song" (1985)

George Jones: Austin City Limits (1980)

I think I've posted this at least twice before in the 25 years of this blog. But here it is again. George Jones and his music are so important. Featuring Johnny Gimble on fiddle.

Last Night I Dreamt That Somebody Loved Me (The Smiths, 1987)

Last night I dreamt
That somebody loved me
No hope, no harm
Just another false alarm

Last night I felt
Real arms around me
No hope, no harm
Just another false alarm

So, tell me how long
Before the last one?
And tell me how long
Before the right one?

The story is old, I know
But it goes on
The story is old, I know
But it goes on

Oh, goes on
And on
Oh, goes on
And on

Last night, I really did dream that several people loved me---in fact, I was a bit TOO popular! I woke up feeling cynical instead of beloved: "Yeah, like THAT will ever happen!" Pretty sad that you can't even feel like a truly loved person even in your own dreams!

Part of the dream was me roaming around among various groups of partiers, indoor and outdoors. There was a classroom, where I wasn't prepared. And then various meanderings. I was wanted by a cute girl on a reality TV show (moreso than her onscreen partner)---I couldn't believe it, but she appeared sincere. And then, on a train, a friend from 30 years ago said to me something like, "We've missed you. Will you come to our birthday party later?" But then there was a catch: The Cute Reality Show girl and the Old Friend were both possibly thinking that I was someone else! Apparently, there was another girl roaming around who looked liked me, except younger and with bleached-blonde hair and much cooler AND who was a drag queen!... No one was sure if it was me or this random girl that they wanted.

What a mind-fuck! You would think that at least dreams would be heartening and/or reassuring. Nah! I woke up feeling simultaneously good and like shit, i.e., neurotic. Is there no escape from the neurotic?

You must either develop a sense of irony or else shoot yourself in the head (or perform acts that are the slow-form coward-equivalent of shooting yourself in the head). As for me: Post-Sandra, 2015, was about it for me. So much bullshit since I was a teen, from '83 to 2015. I'd, I've, had enough. (But still, I'm kind of wistful: Can't my dreams even include someone nice?)

Paul McCartney: Maybe I'm Amazed (1970)

When I read/listen to too much decadence (Kerouac et al), McCartney always cleanses the palate.
He's a sweet soul, with only the basic neuroses---nothing awful.

GEORGE JONES: WHITE LIGHTNING (1959)

Same year (1959) as the Kerouac appearance on the Steve Allen Show (see post below).

George Jones had been to every part of the country that Kerouac bragged about, and had grown up with and interacted with all of the same types of people, but he didn't subsequently claim that he was holier-than-thou (i.e, "more spiritual" than the rest of us).

Example of how two working-class guys handled their experiences and subsequent fame. Jones did it surrounded by his own. Kerouac was corrupted by NYC "intellectuals."

JACK KEROUAC on THE STEVE ALLEN SHOW (1959)

Pretentious as shit. Kerouac looks and sounds like a fool.
(And: Please shut up, Steve Allen, with your idiotic jazz noodlings. I so hate "noodlings.")

George Jones: If Drinking Don't Kill Me

I've been reading a lot of Kerouac bios recently, and just finished "On the Road" (re-reading after 40 years) and am halfway through "Dharma Bums." The difference between Kerouac and Jones (both working-class, both great) is that Kerouac took himself too seriously; and he, as a young man, hooked up with a decadent, drug-addled, literary NYC crowd that also took themselves very seriously, while living completely crummy lives but simultaneously claiming they were god-like. George and company, on the other hand, were equally great and wasted but made no such personal claims to either profundity or godliness.

Kerouac died of alcoholism at age 47 at his Mommy's house. Jones died at age 81 in a home he'd shared with his wife of 30 years, after off-and-on sobriety for 30 years.

The Beatles: From Me To You

Just ordered my T-shirt.

 

Neal Cassady: The First Third Excerpt

For anyone idolizing Cassady: His wife-of-20-years Carolyn said later that he was very bad in bed (as was Kerouac). And then there's this excerpt of Cassady's very-bad writing:

These events in themselves are no more interesting nor important than are, even to me, any of those child-dull ones yet told and which, like them, are put down mainly to get on, simply by recounting chronologically episodes that now plague memory more readily than others concerning a particular period. Like, here it was I entered that stage when a child overcomes naivete enough to realize an adult's emotional reaction as sometimes freakish for its inconsistencies, and can, on his own own reasoning canvas, paint those early pale colors of judgment resulting from initial moments of ability to critically examine life's perplexities, in tentative little brain-engine stirrings before they fade to quickly join that train of remembered experience carrying signals indicating existence which itself far outweighs traction effort by thinking's soon-slipping drivers to effectively resist any slack-action advantage for starting, and thus necessitates continual cuts on the hauler...

It goes on like this for a whole page. Reminded me of watching the doc of Cassady travelling around with Ken Kesey, in which Cassady both wouldn't shut up and had absolutely nothing to say. Can't write, can't fuck, can't talk interestingly---according to you and your shitty philosophy, Neal, you're thus meaningless. Cute in your 20s, but ugly/dull/bald (both physically and mentally) post-35.

Oliver Anthony Live in North Carolina

The song's only been out for a few days, and already crowds know the words. He's speaking for many.

Looking forward to 2024: Working-class people saying ENOUGH to the previous multiple years of lawless, non-merit-based, Diversity/Equity/Inclusion bullshit imposed upon us by academics and "community organizers" and the desperate Biden.

p.s. If "white people getting pissed off" is so scary in your liberal white media hearts, think back to Spike Lee's "Do the Right Thing" (1989) --- at that time, you all empathized whole-heartedly with why the black character should have destroyed his Italian employers' pizza shop, despite the fact that the owners had always been good to him. OK then...Be similarly prepared for when long-patient working-class white people get pissed off. The East Coast globalist media tries to dismiss and erase our opinions---but we ourselves are 100% aware that we founded this country, and that the sleazy globalist creeps (RINOs included) have got to be cast out of power, along with the illegal hordes that they've allowed to cross our border. Or else America ends up on the dust-heap of history, like the once-grand Rome that dumbly let in the Huns.

“Those who do not remember the past are doomed to repeat it.” --Edmund Burke

Oliver Anthony: Rich Men North Of Richmond

Livin' in the New World

With an Old Soul...

Technically, it's not even that great of an American anti-left-wing protest song. ("Okie from Muskogee" is much more clever.) But his raw voice and his feeling...This isn't about "clever." I got goosebumps from the first line and then, weirdly, started crying... WHY on earth would this make me cry? (Answer: Despite full-time employment, I was basically living hand-to-mouth up until my 40s. I wasn't able to afford to buy even a USED car on my own until I was 51. Despite constantly working since I was 16, I will never be able to afford to buy my own home.)

 

When I first went to this YouTube page, I came across multiple actual working men and women from America, Ireland, Britain, Australia, et al, who posted and told their stories about their hard lives and how much this song meant to them. This song just showed up a week ago or so... And hundreds of thousands of people of all ages are saying "thank you" to him for speaking for them...

I've been sellin' my soul, workin' all day

Overtime hours for bullshit pay

So I can sit out here and waste my life away

Drag back home and drown my troubles away

 

It's a damn shame what the world's gotten to

For people like me and people like you

Wish I could just wake up and it not be true

But it is, oh, it is

 

Livin' in the new world

With an old soul

These rich men north of Richmond, Lord knows they all

Just wanna have total control

Wanna know what you think, wanna know what you do

And they don't think you know, but I know that you do

'Cause your dollar ain't shit and it's taxed to no end

'Cause of rich men north of Richmond

 

I wish politicians would look out for miners

And not just minors on an island somewhere

Lord, we got folks in the street, ain't got nothin' to eat

And the obese milkin' welfare

 

Well, God, if you're 5-foot-3 and you're 300 pounds

Taxes ought not to pay for your bags of fudge rounds

Young men are puttin' themselves six feet in the ground

'Cause all this damn country does is keep on kickin' them down

 

Lord, it's a damn shame what the world's gotten to

For people like me and people like you

Wish I could just wake up and it not be true

But it is, oh, it is

 

Livin' in the new world

With an old soul

These rich men north of Richmond, Lord knows they all

Just wanna have total control

Wanna know what you think, wanna know what you do

And they don't think you know, but I know that you do

'Cause your dollar ain't shit and it's taxed to no end

'Cause of rich men north of Richmond

 

I've been sellin' my soul, workin' all day

Overtime hours for bullshit pay

https://lyricstranslate.com

I've been sellin' my soul, workin' all day

Overtime hours for bullshit pay

So I can sit out here and waste my life away

Drag back home and drown my troubles away

 

It's a damn shame what the world's gotten to

For people like me and people like you

Wish I could just wake up and it not be true

But it is, oh, it is

 

Livin' in the new world

With an old soul

These rich men north of Richmond, Lord knows they all

Just wanna have total control

Wanna know what you think, wanna know what you do

And they don't think you know, but I know that you do

'Cause your dollar ain't shit and it's taxed to no end

'Cause of rich men north of Richmond

 

I wish politicians would look out for miners

And not just minors on an island somewhere

Lord, we got folks in the street, ain't got nothin' to eat

And the obese milkin' welfare

 

Well, God, if you're 5-foot-3 and you're 300 pounds

Taxes ought not to pay for your bags of fudge rounds

Young men are puttin' themselves six feet in the ground

'Cause all this damn country does is keep on kickin' them down

 

Lord, it's a damn shame what the world's gotten to

For people like me and people like you

Wish I could just wake up and it not be true

But it is, oh, it is

 

Livin' in the new world

With an old soul

These rich men north of Richmond, Lord knows they all

Just wanna have total control

Wanna know what you think, wanna know what you do

And they don't think you know, but I know that you do

'Cause your dollar ain't shit and it's taxed to no end

'Cause of rich men north of Richmond

 

I've been sellin' my soul, workin' all day

Overtime hours for bullshit pay

https://lyricstranslate.com

George Jones: You're Looking at a Happy Man (1973)

"There ain't a naggin' woman in sight..."



Well, I jumped outta bed and I hollered Hallelujah
For there ain't another soul in sight
I sing a little song as I fix my coffee
'Cause she's really gone, alright.

Put on my old blue jeans and my Levi jacket
I'm gonna have all the fun I can
Tonight I'm really gonna be myself
And you're looking at a happy man.

Well, my baby left, took all of my money
And nearly everything that I had
She thinks I'm a-sittin' at home a-crying
But I'm far from being sad.

She had me a-bein' somebody I wasn't
But it's good to be me again
Now I'm free as a breeze I do as I please
And you're looking at a happy man.

Everything's gone and I ain't got nothin'
But I don't need nothin' but time
There ain't a thing I miss I like it like this
Lord, I got an easy mind.

Well, I'm not the same, I made a big change
I want everyone to understand
This old country boy is jumpin' for joy
And you're lookin' at a happy man.

Well, I jumped outta bed and I said Hot-a-mighty
There's ain't a naggin' woman in sight
She thinks I'm a-sittin' at home a-cryin'
But everything'll be alright.

Put on my old blue jeans and my Levi jacket
Gonna have all the fun I can
Tonight I'm really gonna be myself
And you're looking at a happy man.

Everything's gone and I ain't got nothin'
But I don't need nothin' but time
There ain't a thing I miss, I like it like this
Lord, I got an easy mind.

Well, I'm not the same, I made a big change
I want everyone to understand
This old country boy is jumpin' for joy
And you're lookin' at a happy man...

"Do what thou wilt"

The Devil's pronouncement. I've been recently reading multiple texts about the Beats: Kerouac, Ginsberg, Burroughs, et al. They're all ego and The Devil incarnate---I don't say that dramatically or religiously, but just exactly: This is what happens to you if you go through your life fucking and doing drugs and  adopting random religious tenets indiscriminately according to the fashion of the day. There's no "Nirvana" in store for you. What they were feeding you, and themselves, was an ugly joke and falsehood. Do your own research on Kerouac, Ginsberg, Cassady, all of them, and how they turned out.

In general, I used to be sympathetic to the Beats: I consider myself a libertarian, and don't like people telling me what to do. But after numerous accounts of these creeps having sex with 12-year-old girls or boys in Mexico (because they wanted to and could for $2) and after accounts of Burroughs' former NYC friend in Mexico (whom Kerouac lived with for months) who got off on introducing Mexican kids to heroin for the first time... sans any "judgment" from his visiting US pals... According to the Beat philosophy, all of this was fine.

Just today, I accidentally came upon this online text:  https://fallen-leaves.org/2022/01/16/jack-kerouac-on-the-road-1957/   A lengthy intellectually- and spiritually-based exploration of why the vision of "On the Road" was so seemingly freeing yet so ultimately utterly false and degrading. The voice of Sanity. Finally.

George Jones: Still Doin' Time (1981)

I think when every human realizes...

 ...that we're just the same as the cockroaches we kill or the cats we torture or the horse's leg we saw off, and that our entire lives are equally as meaningless---we might be a lot happier, or more humane. ("Humane" is the wrong word, indicating "humans." What's the word for all of life?)

As Mars dried up, we might've come from there. Or we might be a penal planet, with the worst sent here as punishment. Why else have we constantly, for the past few thousand years, been crying out for our gods/superiors? We're obviously innately missing something, have been separated from something. And multiple cultures don't just independently invent a universal source for no reason.

Elvis Presley Ed Sullivan Show Complete Performances

Sinéad O'Connor: Don't Cry For Me Argentina (1992)

Sinead O'Connor: This is a Rebel Song (1997)

Sinead O'Connor: Success (1992)

Loretta Lynn: Success (1961)

You Cause as Much Sorrow (1990)

Sinead wrote this for her mother.




[Verse 1]
I'm full of good intentions
Like I never was before
It's too late for prevention
But I don't think it's too late for the cure
So you call in your minions
And see what you can find
Night time or morning
These hands are sticky, but I don't mind

[Chorus]
Why must you always be around?
Why can't you just leave it be?
You've done nothing so far but destroy my life
You cause as much sorrow dead
As you did when you were alive

[Verse 2]
I never said I was tough
That was everyone else
So you're a fool to attack me
For the image that you built yourself
Just sounds more vicious
Than I actually mean
I really am soft
Yes, tender and sweet...

[Chorus]
Why must you always be around?
Why can't you just leave it be?
You've done nothing so far but destroy my life
You cause as much sorrow dead
As you did when you were alive

Reading "Remembrances" by Sinead O'Connor (2021)

About 2/3 of the way through. She remembers the awful early childhood stuff and the Pope-picture-tearing, but so far there's nothing about her four marriages and four kids taken away from her. (Kids being given into custody of their fathers is an oddity in either the US or EU legal system.)

Though she isn't very forthcoming about her actual life, she does give insight into her mental/psychic life: As a child, the piano at her grandmother's house speaks to her in colors, tells her there are unhappy souls trapped within it, which she can hear whispering. When she visits Prince's LA house after she records his song "Nothing Compares 2 U," he turns into a demon---she sees the irises of his eyes turn white before she literally runs out of his house to escape his bad vibes. 

Aside from the irises: When she first comes into Prince's home, he asks if she wants something to drink. When she makes her choice, he pretends he's getting it for her, then says, "Get it yourself." Which is when her radar goes off; she says this flashes her back to her childhood and her mother---this person is someone bad and something bad is about to happen.

(This scene ends with Sinead running out of the house and Prince following her in his car through the Hollywood Hills. She eventually makes it to a stranger's house, who doesn't answer her knocks on his door, though her going there makes Prince drive away.)

What Sinead says rings true with me about psychic jolts that tell you that something is utterly wrong and that you need to escape. When you feel a literal jolt like this in your mind/body, trust it.

My personal examples:  With my parents, when I was 12 or so, I got a clear, simple message from a voice outside of myself: "They're not on your side." That's all the voice said. Later, I got weird vibes from my first girlfriend, from the Internet tranny "Julie Lindberg," and from Sandra. When you're in the middle of your attraction, you think, "Oh, maybe it's just me being paranoid or something." Nah. Listen to yourself and your gut. RUN. Run to the Intelligent and to the Normal.

Joan Crawford: (Dec 1955) NYC Actors' Studio Benefit

 

After Sinead O'Connor's Death Last Week

Listening multiple times to 1987's "The Lion and The Cobra" and 1990's "I do not want what I haven't got" took me back to just that period in my life, a time span that was very intense. In the earlier part (1987 thru 1988), I had finally made close friends at college in Austin (after arriving in 1983 and still bemoaning my lost high-school love Ginny), had moved out of college dorm rooms and by '87 into my first couple of small apartments, had taken my first couple of poetry classes and fallen in love with a girl or two and made close friends with one guy that I would go on to put out a poetry magazine with. I was also paying close attention to the Austin music press and trying to be "hip" to what was going on---not liking things just because the weekly press raved about them (Husker Du and My Bloody Valentine still suck, and Hoodoo Gurus is not much better) but because I wanted to be "cool" and informed on music/trends I might possibly be missing out on... 

I learned about Sinead O'Connor's first album, "The Lion and the Cobra," through the Austin weekly press. There was no local radio to play it at the time, and no Internet or YouTube, so I took a chance and bought it, based on the raves and on the cover photo---I hadn't yet figured out I was gay, and she looked kind of cool and maybe, with her shaved head, gay like I might be. Turned out to be much more meaningful to me than just her image (and far beyond what some shallow 20-year-old college guy was writing). The album was throbbing/raw/weird/hypnotic/scary/exciting. I couldn't quite understand what exactly she was singing about (only last week learned that "Troy" was about her dead, abusive mother who had died in a car crash in 1985, when I had only thought it was about a sexual triumph), but I FELT everything she was singing about. She wasn't a dummy, media-posing sex-doll like Madonna, or a good-natured, quirky goofball like Cyndi Lauper. Sinead was sincere and raw and honest.

I walked around with those songs in my head for the next year or so, and felt more powerful for it. I was someone who GOT this music.

In the summer of 1988: I moved from Austin back to Fort Worth, to be near the twins I had met in 1988, my first very close friends since high school. I wasn't yet out of the closet, and I had a mad crush on one of the twins. Lots of drama on my part, and lots of bad feelings on the part of the twin that I actually liked better though she wasn't the one I was in love with! The main setting, though, was that their mother was dying of cancer and I was living in a 2-bedroom apartment with all of them: The dying mother in one room, the 3 of us in the other room. (Still not sure why they invited me to move in with them. Did they not understand how serious their mother's health situation was? Why didn't their mother say to them, "I'm not feeling that well right now and don't really want a stranger around.") I moved there in August, and their mother died in late September. Afterwards, they dealt with it by inviting tons of people over for constant parties. I wanted to be alone with them, to talk quietly. And, yes, to get closer to the twin I was in love with. By November 1988, I'd moved out of their apartment, and by February 1989, I'd moved back to Austin.

Met my first girlfriend ever in April 1989. (I was 23, had never had sex with anyone, and was dying to come out of the closet.) Met a very sexy but utterly sleazy/stupid club-dyke and ex-bank robber. Moved in with her in December 1989. After numerous fights, moved out in March 1990. The soundtrack to my next 2 years of trying to get back with her was Sinead's 1990 album, especially "Nothing Compares 2 U," which was playing constantly on MTV during that time, but also songs like "The Last Day of Our Acquaintance" and "You Cause As Much Sorrow" and "Emperor's New Clothes." Soundtrack of utter pain.

After that, I lost track of Sinead. She tore up a picture of the Pope on SNL (I didn't care one way or the other). Her third album was a collection of standards, which I didn't care about. Her fourth album in 1994, I bought while I was in grad school in San Francisco---it didn't do anything for me at all, so I sold it off. After that, I paid no attention to her musically, was just aware of her whenever she became a priest or a Muslim or married multiple times or publicly berated her ex-husbands and children or posted suicidal messages, or whatever her latest schtick was. She had meant something to me earlier, but she had become crass and embarrassing.

In one of her "help me" public videos, posted from a cheap hotel in San Francisco, she wailed that people needed to be kind to the mentally ill, like herself. Well, in the abstract, yes, they should be. But in reality: The mentally ill are obnoxious and hateful. No one wants to be around them. No one wants to be brought down. I've learned this myself, when I was in the midst of depression, drinking heavily and making snide comments online (and even pre-online, trying to hang out with my brother and his wife, when they clearly didn't want me around). When you're in the midst of a bad patch, most people, except the very saintly, don't want to be around you. And most people aren't that saintly. One must learn to understand that fact and learn to make your own way during those times.

In the past couple of days, I bought Sinead's 2021 autobiography, "Remembrances." And a T-shirt with the alternate "Lion and the Cobra" cover (not the one released in the US). 

I'm post-50 now, and somewhat calmed down, so I don't think reading her book will trigger anything (at least I hope not---when I listen to Amy Winehouse, for instance, I do still get triggered back to the masochistic earlier part of my young womanhood; same for reading Sylvia Plath today---as a young woman, I used to keep her "Collected Poems" by my bed like a bible. I still think she's brilliant on paper---which, for posterity, is most important. But: In my middle age, which Plath never reached, I now completely understand that you can't go around acting on your intense feelings and expect those around you to put up with them).

And I look forward to going around wearing the T to honor Sinead's memory, but also so people will understand that I'm cool and in line with that. (Not to the point of going mad, but as far as I've been able to go on my middle-class income. It's a reality---you can't go crazy unless you have family money to back you up. Ask Sylvia Plath and Scott Fitzgerald re his wife!)

The The + Sinead O'Connor: Kingdom of Rain (1989)

Sinead O'Connor: The Last Day of Our Acquaintance (1990)

This is the last day of our acquaintance
I will meet you later in somebody's office

I'll talk but you won't listen to me
I know what your answer will be

I know you don't love me anymore
You used to hold my hand when the plane took off
Two years ago there just seemed so much more
And I don't know what happened to our love

Days and days
Our friendship has been still
And we will meet later to finalise the details
Two years ago the seed was planted
And since then you have taken me for granted

But this is the last day of our acquaintance
I will meet you later in somebody's office
I'll talk but you won't listen to me
I know your answer already

But this is the last day of our acquaintance
I will meet you later in somebody's office
I'll talk but you won't listen to me
I know your answer already...

Sinéad O'Connor: Nothing Compares 2 U (1990)

Sinead O'Connor: The Emperor's New Clothes (1990)

[Verse 1]
It seems years since you held the baby
While I wrecked the bedroom
You said it was dangerous after Sunday
And I knew you loved me
He thinks I just became famous
And that's what messed me up
But he's wrong
How could I possibly know what I want
When I was only twenty-one?
There's millions of people
Who offer advice and say how I should be
But they're twisted and they will never be
Any influence on me
But you will always be
You will always be

[Chorus]
If I treated you mean
I really didn't mean to
But you know how it is
And how a pregnancy can change you

[Verse 2]
I see plenty of clothes that I like
But I won't go anywhere nice for a while
All I want to do is just sit here
And write it all down and rest for a while
I can't bear to be in another city
One where you are not
I would return to nothing without you
If I'm your girlfriend or not

[Chorus]
Maybe I was mean
But I really don't think so
You asked if I'm scared and I
Said so

[Verse 3]
Everyone can see what's going on
They laugh 'cause they know they're untouchable
Not because what I said was wrong
Whatever it may bring
I will live by my own policies
I will sleep with a clear conscience
I will sleep in peace

[Chorus]
Maybe it sounds mean
But I really don't think so
You asked for the truth, and I
Told you

[Outro]
Through their own words
They will be exposed
They've got a severe case of
The emperor's new clothes
The emperor's new clothes
Emperor's new clothes
The emperor's new clothes

Sinead O'Connor: Mandinka (1987)

Sinead O'Connor: Jerusalem (1987)

Ran down and the lady said it
It got torn down
And the priest just said
It got burned down
They give me five years, five years
It's my turn

Ran down and the lady said it
It got torn down
And the priest just said it
It got burned down
They give me five years, five years
It's my turn

Jerusalem
Jerusalem

Getting tired of you doing this to me
I'm gonna hit you if you say that to me
One more time
I want to see you
And you said you're busy
I want to stop it
And you said it would be easy
It sure takes time

Hope your next time
Gonna be the last time
Hope you don't two-time
It'll be the best time
There won't be no next time
Showtime

I hope you do what you said
When you swore
You'd make it better
Deliver all the letters
On time

Jerusalem...

Sinead O'Connor: Troy (1987)

I'll remember it
And Dublin in a rainstorm
And sitting in the long grass in summer
Keeping warm
I'll remember it
Every restless night
We were so young then
We thought that everything we could possibly do was right
Then we moved stolen from our very eyes
And I wondered where you went to
Tell me when did the light die
You will rise
You'll return
The Phoenix from the flame
You will learn
You will rise
You'll return
Being what you are
There is no other Troy
For you to burn

And I never meant to hurt you
I swear I didn't mean those things I said
I never meant to do that to you
Next time I'll keep my hands to myself instead
Oh, does she love you?
What do you want to do?
Does she need you like I do?
Do you love her?
Is she good for you?
Does she hold you like I do?

Do you want me?
Should I leave?
I know you're always telling me that you love me
Just sometimes I wonder if I should believe
Oh, I love you
God, I love you
I'd kill a dragon for you, I'll die
But I will rise
And I will return
The Phoenix from the flame
I have learned
I will rise
And you'll see me return
Being what I am
There is no other Troy
For me to burn

And you should've left the light on
You should've left the light on
Then I wouldn't have tried and you'd never have known
And I wouldn't have pulled you tighter
No, I wouldn't have pulled you close
I wouldn't have screamed, "No, I can't let you go"
If the door wasn't closed
No, I wouldn't have pulled you to me
No, I wouldn't have kissed your face
You wouldn't have begged me to hold you if we hadn't been there in the first place
Oh, but I know you wanted me to be there, oh, oh, oh
Every look that you threw told me so
But you should've left the light on
You should've left the light on

And the flames burned away
But you're still spitting fire
Make no difference what you say
You're still a liar
You're still a liar
You're still a liar

RIP Sinead O'Connor

Her beautiful, brilliant albums "Lion and the Cobra" (1987) and "I Do Not Want What I Haven't Got" (1990) were the soundtracks of my young-womanhood, from early joy and triumph to losing-first-love utter sorrow that would mar me for life. 

I am so, so sorry for how sadly her life turned out. A pure, though completely lost, spirit.

Fat = Unhappy

When I left my last job in the Fall of 2019, I weighed about 164 lbs. I know this because earlier during my time there, I'd noticed I was getting fat and started weighing myself weekly on the heavy-duty postage scale they had in the mail-room! At the most, I hit 169 lbs six months before I left, and had gone down about 5 lbs by the time I left, after months of paying attention to my weight.

Today, in 2023, 4 years later, I weigh 155. Not through intentional dieting or anything, but for one big reason: I've worked from home since 2020, and so now always make my lunches at home---sandwiches and soups and black-bean burritoes and salmon/broccoli and such. I'm not forced to take a whole "official hour" for lunch, and I don't feel the need to go get a big lunch "treat" from a drive-thru as a reward for the stress of the previous 4 hours at work! 

Ideally, I'd like to be under 150 (I'm 5'8"), but 155 feels great. 

169 felt terrible---I was very unhappy in that job, though I didn't recognize it at the time. I liked the editing work, thought it was a prestigious job---but the people there were awful and inbred. I had an argument nearly every day about every comma, and my immediate boss was an idiot, as were a couple of people who had been there for literally 25 years and were slackers in the extreme. (A couple of people in leadership positions, though not slackers, were equally dumb.) I was there for 5 years and was probably miserable for the last 3 years.

Quitting in Fall 2019 was a huge gamble. No one thought I was right for doing so, and I didn't even think I was right. When I left, I had $500 in my bank account. Today: I work with actually smart people that I respect, and I have $18,000 in my bank account, and I make $16K more per year than I did in 2019.

I made the right decision. And I weigh less! :)

NOW: With a little extra money to spare, perhaps I should take some yoga classes. One thing I've noticed: People who do yoga look long and lean, not hunched over, like I do. When I look at people walking around, I can tell if they've been doing yoga or not! (Paul McCartney, at 80+, is a great example of a yoga practitioner.) But I need to find a VERY basic class to get started in because I'm so currently creaky and decrepit... And I need to stop smoking so much. And drinking so much. After days when I don't drink and smoke (every other day), I wake up the next day feeling very energetic and hopeful... Need to intellectually incorporate this feeling: "If you don't drink and smoke, you feel good the next day." But then there's the equally strong feeling of relief at the end of a work-day with the reward of beer and cigs... It's a battle.

DeSantis '24

A homeless-looking black guy knocked on my apartment door this past weekend. After looking through the key-hole, I almost didn't open up---not because he was black, but because he looked pretty decrepit in general (black or white, male or female, this person looked rough). But I could see that he was wearing a "DeSantis '24" T-shirt, so I was politically curious.

Sure enough, he really was a DeSantis employee, there to garner my very-early opinion re the 2024 election. I told him I was 100% voting for Trump, but that I liked DeSantis and he was my 2nd choice. The pollster very pleasantly commented, while entering data into his device, that it might end up a Trump-DeSantis ticket... (Neither of us mentioned sarcastically that Trump might be in jail!)

While I am, indeed, 100% for Trump in 2024, I was also impressed by DeSantis's "get-out-the-vote" effort in Texas---a whopping 10 months before the Texas Republican primary in May of 2024! I've recently read that DeSantis is not doing THAT well financially, so it was kind of odd to have a campaign person come to my door this early in the game...

I'll Never See Anything As It Is Again

I had to start wearing glasses about 8 years ago. I'm not currently with anyone, nor do I have any current plans to travel anywhere in particular. But... If I do meet someone, I'll never be able to look into their eyes. And when I do travel somewhere, I'll never be able to see it for myself. 

I just went to have an ID card made for a new job. Though the person there didn't care, I nonetheless felt the need to explain that I used to be much more attractive in ID-card pictures.

Nothing Exists but the Past

I've been reading a lot of Kerouac (both texts and bios) for the past couple of weeks. Simultaneously exhilarating and disturbing, knowing the tawdry way he lived his life and ended his life, despite his beautiful and hopeful flow of words. He spoke/wrote often of attempting to reach Nirvana (though his chosen false venues were drugs and drink and, early on, attempting to usurp the very spirit of his buddy Neal Cassady). But all of his attempted channels turned out to be utter/literal dead ends. (By the '60s, he was no longer personally enthralled with Cassady, who was also no longer enthralled with him.)

In reading Kerouac, though, I was struck by the constant reference to Memory. There is briefly the Present, which is dissipated with each nano-second (Gone-Gone-Gone). There is no Future, other than thoughts about it. All is Past. The best parts of your life are only edited Memory.

Natalie Merchant: Verdi Cries

Originally from the 1987 10,000 Maniacs album "In My Tribe."

 

Holidays must end, as you know.
All is memory taken home with me:
The opera, the stolen tea, the sand drawing, the verging sea, all years ago.

The man in 119 takes his tea all alone.
Mornings we all rise to wireless Verdi cries.
I'm hearing opera through the door.
The souls of men and women, impassioned all.
Their voices climb and fall; battle trumpets call.
I fill the bath and climb inside, singing...

He will not touch their pastry
but every day they bring him more.
Gold from the breakfast tray, I steal them all away
and then go eat them on the shore...

I draw a jackal-headed woman in the sand,
sing of a lover's fate sealed by jealous hate
then wash my hand in the sea.
With just three days more I'd have just about learned the entire score to Aida.

Holidays must end, as you know.
All is memory taken home with me:
The opera, the stolen tea, the sand drawing, the verging sea, all years ago.

Bay City Rollers: Bye Bye Baby (1975, Top of the Pops)

What Solfeggio Hertz is this? I got goosebumps when I was 12, and I still get goosebumps now. What's the Universal Frequency, man?

All 9 Solfeggio Frequencies

Haven't tried this out yet, and some of the lower tones seem a bit sinister...
At this, my initial impression: 528 and above for me!

Baby the Rain Must Fall (1965)

This came on TCM the other night, and I couldn't stop watching... because it was so weirdly terrible!

Remick and McQueen were terrible actors with terrible non-Texas accents.
McQueen couldn't act as a singer (his singing scenes were extremely awful).
Writer Horton Foote's script was ridiculous.

Poor Don Murray.

Biden Sends US Troops to Ukraine

"President Biden on Thursday authorized US military leaders to deploy as many as 3,000 reservists to Europe in response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine."

All of the wars in the last century have been exacerbated by Democrat, self-proclaimed "progressive," US presidents.

Woodrow Wilson: World War I
Franklin Roosevelt: World War II (though US entry was precipitated by Japan's bombing Pearl Harbor, so I'll give FDR a pass!)
Harry Truman: Korea
JFK/LBJ:  Vietnam. JFK initial deployment of small amounts of troops, then LBJ vast escalation.

Biden's recent weapons sales to Ukraine and now his sending of US troops is just begging for escalation. And why? The Ukraine has been part of the greater Russian empire for thousands of years. They're the same people. Zelensky seeking Western tech money and NATO membership was, of course, going to set Putin off. (Similarly, Sweden and Finland need to be more aware of their position geopolitically instead of being greedy for Western tech money.)

I can't quite think of a similar example for the Western Hemisphere: But what if Russia started funding the drug cartels in Mexico (currently funded by China) and overtly militarized said cartels and declared that Mexico was now a Russian-supported state. Would the US govt put up with that? No. Similarly, Putin is not putting up with Ukraine, on his border, being funded militarily by both the EU and the US.

Biden sending "3,000 troops" is exactly how Kennedy started out in Vietnam. It's a local affair; it's none of our business (unless you have business interests in Ukraine and China, as Biden does).

Next of Kin

As I transition into a new job with the accompanying paperwork, I'm mildly depressed, as I was 3 years ago when filling out the same paperwork: Emergency Contact and who to leave my 401(k) money to, etc. I listed my mother and brother for people to list, but in reality: my 80-something-year-old mother will probably die before I do; and even if I die, I don't want my weak-willed brother and his utterly shitty wife to either know about my death OR get any of my money!

But, as I discovered 3 years ago, the HR people of any company think it's kind of weird if you don't want to list family members. Last time I switched jobs, I tried to have "Austin Pets Alive!" (a no-kill shelter) as my beneficiary, but doing so was a big hassle, so I ended up listing the same then as I did this time: mother and brother. (I mean, my mother has helped me out many times in my adult life, so I don't have any problem with my postmortem money going to her---but, like I said, she's in her 80s, and will probably die before I do, plus she's invested wisely over the years and doesn't need any extra money.)

I really DON'T, however, relish the idea of anything of mine ($100K at this point) going to my brother and his 3/4-Hispanic (the other 1/4 is German, but she hates that) Marxist anti-white-racist teacher wife. Or their lazy kids. But I guess one's money going "to the government" is somehow worse than any family member getting it... Ugh. Hopefully, I won't die anytime soon and will, in the meantime, figure out how to leave everything to a non-kill pet charity.

George Jones: I Just Don't Give a Damn (1975)

I was earlier mildly chastising George for not writing much after the '50s---he co-wrote this in the '70s, which is a GREAT song. 

 

I only wish I'd heard it back when I going through my various relationship turmoils! What a calm, zen thing to be able to say in the middle of everything, a la Rhett Butler: "I just don't give a damn." So there, Tammy! (Though, unfortunately, she ultimately messed him up for many years.)

There are those who'd like to change the way I'm living
It seems they just don't like me the way I am
Tomorrow I may live the way they're thinking
Oh, but tonight I just don't give a damn

I've done everything I can to make you happy
But every word I spoke you always put me down
Tomorrow my arms may ache and want to hold you
Oh, but tonight I just don't give a damn

Tonight I just don't care what happens to you and me
I wanted to get you on my side but you always disagreed
If you should ever want to call me, I'll be on my side of town
But don't call tonight 'cause I still don't give a damn

Oh, tomorrow mornin' I might wake up lonely
Oh, but tonight I just don't give a damn

Joan Crawford at Pepsi Dedication in San Diego 1963

10,000 Maniacs: Like the Weather (1988)

My first girlfriend worked the late-night shift, and I had the key to her duplex and would sometimes drive over and be in her bed when she got home at 6am. And then I wouldn't want to do anything else for the rest of the day, even though I had both school and work to go to. I really dislike her now, and will always dislike her, but at the time, it---lying in bed waiting for a lover to get home---was quite romantic.

"You've put in 'bout half a day, while here I lie..."

The ultra-bright-n-shiny video here, though, doesn't at all match the lyrics or what I felt when I heard the song: I pictured a lazy, sleepy, melancholy girl (like me) tucked in bed on a rainy day, enjoying the cozy lying in, being temporarily safe from the elements and welcoming her lover when he came home. (Definitely not prancing around spastically in day-glo with chickens!)

The color of the sky as far as I can see is coal grey.
Lift my head from the pillow and then fall again.
With a shiver in my bones just thinking about the weather.
A quiver in my lips as if I might cry.

Well by the force of will my lungs are filled and so I breathe.
Lately it seems this big bed is where I never leave.
Shiver in my bones just thinking about the weather.
Quiver in my voice as I cry,

"What a cold and rainy day. Where on earth is the sun hid away."

I hear the sound of a noon bell chime.
Now I'm far behind.
You've put in 'bout half a day
while here I lie
with a shiver in my bones just thinking about the weather.
A quiver in my lip as if I might cry,

"What a cold and rainy day. Where on earth is the sun hid away?"

Do I need someone here to scold me
or do I need someone who'll grab and pull me out of this four poster dull torpor pulling downward.
For it is such a long time since my better days.
I say my prayers nightly this will pass away.

The color of the sky is grey as I can see through the blinds.
Lift my head from the pillow and then fall again
with a shiver in my bones just thinking about the weather.
A quiver in my voice as I cry,

"What a cold and rainy day. Where on earth is the sun hid away?"
I shiver, quiver, and try to wake.

Hey Jack Kerouac (10,000 Maniacs, 1987)

How naive, the below.
These guys were hard-core and ugly and nasty.
Natalie Merchant, in the below, makes them seem like gallant rebels.
They were not. Read up on any of them.

Hey Jack Kerouac, I think of your mother.

And the tears she cried, they were cried for none other
than her little boy lost in our little world that hated
and that dared to drag him down. Her little boy courageous
who chose his words from mouths of babes got lost in the wood.
Hip flask-slinging madmen, steaming café flirts,
they all spoke through you.

Hey Jack, now for the tricky part.
When you were the brightest star who were the shadows?
Of the San Francisco beat boys you were the favorite.
Now they sit and rattle their bones and think of their blood-stoned days.
You chose your words from mouths of babes got lost in the wood.
The hip flask-slinging madmen, steaming café flirts,
nights in Chinatown howling at night.

Allen, baby, why so jaded?
Have the boys all grown up and their beauty faded?
Billy, what a saint they've made you,
just like Mary down in Mexico on All Souls' Day.

You chose your words from mouths of babes got lost in the wood.
Cool junk-booting madmen, street-minded girls
in Harlem howling at night.
What a tear-stained shock of the world,
You've gone away without saying goodbye.

Leslie Van Houten Sentence

The other night, I'd added stuff to my Joan Crawford site for a few hours, but, at the end of doing so, was still pumped up and not ready to go to bed yet. So I went to the Yahoo comments about releasing Leslie Van Houten (Manson family member who participated in the LaBianca killings) after 50+ years in prison.

The first thing I saw there was some guy saying "All you MAGA mutts don't believe in the law." Well, since I like Trump a lot because of both his policies and his boldness, I felt the need to reply: "What does Trump have to do with Manson? And why 'mutts'?"

It then went on for a while. He wouldn't stop, and I wouldn't stop. I'd come off doing Joan Crawford website stuff feeling very good, and then I descending into a crappy hell-hole. 

I kinda have to let this be a lesson to me: Don't engage with random folks on Yahoo. (Learned the same years earlier on Facebook, when whatever I would post about Joan Crawford would get some weird, nonsensical, negative comments from random people.)

BTW: My comment about the Leslie Van Houten story: She was 19, had been living at the Manson commune for about a year and went along for the LaBianca killings. (A p.s.: She'd been doing LSD and benzedrine since age 15: Thanks, Jack Kerouac/Neal Cassady/Ken Kesey for making benzedrine/LSD use seem cool.)  She stabbed Rosemary LaBianca either while alive or after her death.

Say the worst: Van Houten stabbed Rosemary LaBianca while alive: If that's the case, then Van Houten deserves severe punishment. But I think 50+ years is, indeed, "severe punishment." For a crime she did not either initiate or enact with vengeance.

Here's an example of another crime in California---the murder of actress Dominique Dunne by an obsessed boyfriend. From Wikipedia:

On October 30, 1982, Dunne was strangled by her ex-boyfriend, John Thomas Sweeney, during an argument on the driveway of her West Hollywood home. She fell into a coma and died five days later on November 4, 1982. In a court case which gained significant media coverage, Sweeney was convicted of voluntary manslaughter in Dunne's death, and served three and a half years in prison.

Three-and-a-half years in prison for an intentional murder.

So, yes, I think Leslie Van Houten should be set free after 50+ years in prison.

ERASURE: Oh L'Amour (1986)

George Jones: When the Grass Grows Over Me (1968)

Written by Don Chapel, whom Tammy Wynette had just left for George Jones.

Thank God it's over!

For those of us alone with pets, the 4th of July and New Year's Eve are hell and nights to dread. A couple of weeks before this July 4th, I started steeling myself: "OK, it's going to be loud between 9pm and 3am... Don't get mad... Don't walk out after 2am trying to find where the assholes are still shooting off fireworks from..." (Which I've done many times before. I shouldn't. But I still have an idea of some sort of limits. On July 4th, you start with your neighborhood fireworks after dark, around 9pm, and you go 'til about 12am, maybe 1am. But after that, try to have a bit of respect for your neighbors. New Year's: Maybe 12am to 3am. After that, you're just being an utter dick.)

Luckily, there were not that many fireworks in my 'hood this July 4th. Sporadic from about 9:30pm to the last around 2am, but nothing that close to my apartment. (Unlike in some past years, when some absolute dicks were setting off fireworks WITHIN the apartment complex! The one good thing about the huge rent increases in the past 2 years: Got rid of the low-rent scumbags who thought shooting off fireworks by the pool---year-round---was a great idea.)

Around 3am last night, I finally relaxed and could get to sleep. Woke up this morning, after a 4-day holiday weekend, and after 4 hours of sleep, thinking, "Thank God it's over! I can get back to normal now."

Being On Time

On July 3, I had an appointment for a state inspection and an oil change. My car shop provides free rides to and from the shop.

When the work was done, the shop called and said a driver would pick me up in 5 minutes.

I was ready, and went outside to wait after the 5 mins. When the driver arrived, he told me: "Not once has anyone ever been there waiting for me. Not once. I always have to call them and wait. Every single time."

Wow. I guess we both affirmed our faith in humanity: That the driver would arrive on time, and that the passenger would also be on time.

Reminded me of something 25 years ago:
A pseudo-friend of mine (but one that I really liked at the time) was ALWAYS late to any meeting we might have planned. Always. At one lunch-date, I intentionally showed up 15 mins late, thinking to teach her a lesson. Nah. She showed up 30 mins late. (I don't trust psychological texts, but in case you do: Psychological texts indicate that showing up late is a sign of disrespect. I completely agree---but I knew that before any text told me so.)

George Jones - "Walk Through This World With Me" (1966)

George Jones - "He Stopped Loving Her Today" (1980)

Exploring and Populating Worlds

If you "follow the science," as I try to do, the actual purpose of any living species (from humans to plants) is to procreate. The rest of us are "decoration" and/or "entertainment." And, in our current situation, that's great. Every modern society needs its entertainment, because it would, indeed, be very boring if everyone had only their own boring toddlers and teens to pay attention to.

I know that the early Jewish/Christian bible places a premium on procreation, which I used to think was just outdated teachings, contributing to discrimination against homosexuals today. Why do the core texts need to preach about the necessity of procreation, when it's an innate desire? Well, expressly because of the homosexual desire, which could possibly lead to the extinction of the species. Not a likely scenario, since gays like me are a minority of the population, but I can see why homosexuality would be discouraged in Ancient texts.

But perhaps the Ancients foresaw a period, like today, when people are encouraged to have sex randomly, to have abortions randomly, to deny their own genders. They set down the rules thousands of years ago as a warning for a simple reason: The perpetuation of the species, but a controlled perpetuation---not males animalistically mating and then disappearing and forcing the local government to take care of their offspring (or forcing their mates to kill the babies in their wombs out of desperation---or because their government told them it was an "OK" thing to do).

Going back even further: If our planet was indeed propagated by travelers from elsewhere, refugees from a dying/dead planet: Of course one of their foremost tenets that they passed along would be to continue the species. It's something very basic that we're ignoring now because we probably think all these multitudes of people are a given. When in fact, I have a feeling that tens of thousands of years ago, there was a real crisis and a real question of whether or not humans would even survive.

I wanted to end with the above, but there's also something else: I think our ancestors were all refugees/unwilling emigrants separated from our source. There's something obviously wrong with our collective life here, a sense of malaise and dis-ease, that's been only inarticulately enunciated from various quarters for thousands of years. Was Earth initially a dumping ground for criminals/malcontents? I have a gut feeling that there's something at the root that someone is not telling us.

George Jones: The Grand Tour (1974)

John Sebastian & Tony Jackson: NASHVILLE CATS

John Sebastian of the Lovin' Spoonful wrote this song in '66 in homage to country music---and now here he is playing it with Tony Jackson... How exactly is Jackson doing what he's doing? So many great/interesting songs, and so many of my favorite songs, he seems to be a part of...

And I can't find a Tony Jackson CD anywhere online! Everything I've been listening to from him tonight is GREAT. Apparently, he has only one album, from 2017---where is it??

Tony Jackson LIVE “Do I Ever Cross Your Mind”

Found the below on AllMusic.com. Jackson has only released one album, back in 2017---and that is not even available today.

Tony Jackson may have released his first album in 2017, but he's a proud throwback to classic country. His lean music is rooted in a blend of hardcore honky tonk and Bakersfield, a sound that evokes the past, and Jackson leans into that comparison by establishing his country cred with a cover of George Jones' classic "The Grand Tour." Jackson's version for YouTube turned into a minor viral sensation and was the centerpiece of his 2017 debut, which also featured covers of Conway Twitty ("It's Only Make Believe") and the Lovin' Spoonful ("Nashville Cats").

At the time Jackson released his debut, he was 40 years old and had been immersed in music for only about ten years. Born to a Navy officer, he wound up enlisting in the Marines, and while in the service he was exposed to country music for the first time. He initially didn't pursue singing, nor did he after his service was finished. Instead, Jackson worked IT at a Fortune 500 company in Virginia. After George Jones' death in 2013, Jackson was convinced by some friends to join them in cutting a version of Jones' classic 1974 single "The Grand Tour." The performance was placed on YouTube, where it was discovered by Jimmy Dean's widow, Donna Dean Stevens, who was in the process of reviving the Old Dominion Barn Dance in Richmond, Virginia. She offered him a spot, which he embraced, and after his performance was well received, she and Jim Della Croce became Jackson's co-managers, sending him to record the album that became his eponymous 2017 debut.

Tony Jackson Does Merle Haggard: The Fighting Side of Me

Tony Jackson Does Randy Travis: Diggin' Up Bones

Tony Jackson Does Conway Twitty

Seriously... Who IS this guy?? BEAUTIFUL singer!

Tony Jackson: The Grand Tour (George Jones Tribute)

I initially clicked on this YouTube video, thinking it was going to be young black people being condescending to a George Jones song (YouTube has a series of these)... But this guy SINGS it so beautifully! I had goosebumps listening to him. Who the hell IS he??

Paul McCartney: No More Lonely Nights (1984)

#2 in the UK, #6 in the US. Guitar solo by David Gilmour.

Paul McCartney: Coming Up (Live at Glasgow, 1979)

This Live version was #1 in the US and #2 in the UK.

Paul McCartney: Temporary Secretary (1980)

John Lennon: Surprise Surprise (1974)

Sweet as the smell of success
Her body's warm and wet
She gets me through this God awful loneliness
A natural high butterfly
Oh I, I need, need, need her
Just like a willow tree
A breath of spring you see
And, oh boy, you don't know what she do to me
She makes me sweat and forget who I am
I need, need, need, need, need her
Well, I was wonderin' how long this could go on, on and on?
Well, I thought, I could never be surprised
But could it be that I bit my own tongue?
Oh yeah, it's so hard to swallow when you're wrong
A bird of paradise
The sunrise in her eyes
God only knows such a sweet surprise
I was blind, she blew my mind
Think that I, I love, love, love, love, love her
I love her, I love her, I love her, I love her, I love her
Sweet, sweet, sweet, sweet love...

George Harrison: Ballad of Sir Frankie Crisp (Let It Roll)

George Harrison: All Things Must Pass (1970)

Sunrise doesn't last all morning
A cloudburst doesn't last all day
Seems my love is up
And has left you with no warning
But it's not always going to be this grey

All things must pass
All things must pass away

Sunset doesn't last all evening
A mind can blow those clouds away
After all this my love is up
And must be leaving
It has not always been this grey

All things must pass
All things must pass away

All things must pass
None of life's strings can last
So I must be on my way
And face another day

Now the darkness only stays at nighttime
In the morning it will fade away
Daylight is good
At arriving at the right time
It's not always going to be this grey

All things must pass
All things must pass away
All things must pass
All things must pass away

George Jones: Love Bug (1965)

I'm not fey like that

 

Just recently got an e-mail from Red Bubble, a T-shirt company that I often order from, with the "Pride wear that means something" header. All of the images in the mail, ranging from the creepy guys shown above to the company's gay platitudes-on-hats, etc., meant nothing at all to me as a gay/bi woman.

I realize that responding to a mass mail will most likely not reach anyone. But I had to reply:

I'm a gay female. Do you really think that your graphic of a sleazy tattooed cook smoking a joint in a doorway is a turn-on or has anything to do with me or my life?

RE "Just getting bi"---I'm not fey like that. RE "Everybody's perfect" --- I don't believe in that generic platitude at all.

It's kind of clueless, and downright dumb, that you send out a "woke" e-mail assuming that all people are the same. Enough with the "LGBTQslxkchgoijd" ridiculousness that academics and the media have been feeding you. I know you're only a T-shirt company that has a lot of woke interns. But still: Stop being sheep, and stop assuming that your gay customers are sheep.

Six Days on the Road: Dave Dudley (Live October 1966)

Six Days on the Road (1966): George Jones

Originally sung by Dave Dudley in 1963. Written by Earl Green and Carl Montgomery.

I do respect the Dave Dudley version (posted above), but... I LOVE this frenetic, speed-inspired George version.



[Verse 1]
Well I pulled outta Pittsburgh
A-rollin' down that Eastern Seaboard
I got my diesel wound up
And she's a-runnin' like a-never before
There's a speed zone ahead alright
I don't see a cop in sight
Six days on the road
And I'm a-gonna make it home tonight

[Verse 2]
I got me ten forward gears
And a Georgia overdrive
I'm takin' little white pills
And my eyes are open wide
I just passed a Jimmy and White
I been a-passin' everything in sight
Six days on the road
And I'm a-gonna make it home tonight

[Verse 3]
Well it seems like a month
Since I kissed my baby goodbye
I could have a lotta women
But I'm not like-a some other guys
I could find one to hold me tight
But I could never make believe it's alright
Six days on the road
And I'm a-gonna make it home tonight...

Fetterman Praises Biden For Helping Fix Bridges (6/17/23 in Phila)

If you're mentally non-functional, then you shouldn't be either a Senator or President of the United States.
(But at least Biden still manages to put on a pair of real pants and a shirt before appearing in public.)

First Swim + Same Old Sh**

First swim of the season at my apartment pool! Always look forward to 3 months or so of tanning and getting some fresh air and Vitamin D and a tiny bit of exercise with the few strokes that I do in the 2-or-so hours that I'm usually out there. (In the past year, my skin actually started looking "crepe-y"---I'm not THAT old, so I'm thinking that it's because I've gotten absolutely NO fresh air since last summer. I've worked at home since Wuhan in 2020, so I never go anywhere outdoors on a lengthy daily basis, and I'm always around my smoky home---at least workplaces had non-smoke-filled air!---so it was GREAT to sit outside and swim and get some sun for a couple of hours!)

As always in the 6 years that I've lived here: I try to get out there around 11am, before the dad/mom with multiple kids shows up (usually around noon to 5---after lunch and before dinner), and especially before the loud 20-somethings show up (usually after 3pm, and going long into the evening). 

On this, my first day, there was a dad with kids already there at 11am. Parents with kids are not that obnoxious; usually, it's just the minor overheard conversations I hate. The parent is aware that someone else (me) is there, so they have to speak "correctly" to their kid. In this case, one kid was yelling "Dad! Dad!" and then, because I was there, the Dad had to give the kid a lecture on not screaming.

A little later, a scruffy-looking pair of 30-something "dudes" showed up (oddly, with "arm floaties"), and promptly set up their music and starting blaring it. Being the "bitch/Karen" (aka, female requesting common courtesy) that I am, I asked them politely if they could please turn down their music "just a bit." Surprisingly, they nicely did. (Was it last year or the year before that the weirdo 20-something guy from the apartment behind mine also showed up at the pool and blared his music---but when I asked him to turn it down, he told me that if I didn't like it, I should leave!) :)

Pool Etiquette: All of us apartment residents have to share the small pool. Why do some people have the right to blare their music? Why am I a "bitch" or a "Karen" for asking people to not blast their music in a common small space? I don't have an iPod or iPhone player, but what if I did---and what if I brought MY loud music out to the small pool area? What if 5 or 10 people did exactly the same thing, and there were 5 or 10 different music choices all blasting at the same time? It would be ridiculous. My point is: Don't intrude on other people with your music at the pool. Common courtesy. Not just to others at the pool, but also to the residents whose apartments border the pool.

Again: The guys this time were perfectly nice about it, but... why should I even have to ask---and then feel like a bitch for asking?