The Donnas were in town the other night, at the Hawthorne Theater. Just a couple of years ago I counted the Donnas as one of my very favorite bands, and while I still think they're great, both the show and the new songs were a bit of a disappointment.
September 24, 2007
BLOG!
About as often as I post something here, I post something music-related at the Wolfman Fairies MySpace page. Since I remain, for some reason, unwilling to give up the pretense of maintaining this blog, I figured I'd cross-post my latest entry.
July 3, 2007
Happy Morrison Liberation Day, everyone!
"L.A. Woman" is on the radio and I just realized that today is Morrison Liberation Day. I haven’t thought about that for years.
Morrison Liberation Day commemorates the date on which Jim Morrison shuffled off this mortal coil (or shuffled off into hiding with Elvis and Amelia Earhart, if you prefer). It was invented by two friends of mine, Missy and Ann, who hailed from a podunk town in western Pennsylvania where they were the only people who cared about music and art. I met them when I, along with my then-bandmates, moved to Camden, New Jersey, in 1989. Most of us only lived in Camden a short while before fleeing across the river to Philadelphia, but it was a very intense while. Someday the events of that time should really be committed to paper (or disk, I suppose), but….
Anyway. Missy and Ann lived with my bandmates Brenden and Aldo and my future girlfriend Sherri in a dark five-bedroom house that was literally in the shadow of the Benjamin Franklin Bridge. Like, if it had been a couple of yards to the south, it would have been under the bridge. The Ben Franklin, besides carrying 7 lanes of car traffic across the Delaware between New Jersey and Pennsylvania, also carries the PATCO Speedline, a train that ferries South Jersey commuters to and from their jobs in Philly. Because the house was near the end of the bridge, the train, on its way up from ground level, passed directly by the second and third stories. Every time it did, it rattled the house, and its occupants, to their bones. Remember Elwood’s apartment in The Blues Brothers? Like that.
I mention this because one of the highlights of the Morrison Liberation Day celebration in 1989 was lobbing water balloons at the Speedline from the roof of the house. I don’t think anyone actually succeeded in hitting a train, but it was fun to watch the faces of the riders as we tried.
Other traditional MLD activities include:
1) Listening to the Doors.
2) Smokin’ the ganja.
3) Drinking 40s of Olde English 800.
4) Saying things like, "Morrison, man…that dude was…ooh, watermelon!"
5)Watching feral cats copulate in the yard.
Some years later, long after the ol’ gang had split up, I threw an MLD bash for some friends and co-workers, and it was fun, but…well, let’s just say ain’t no party like a Camden party. Missy and Ann, if you’re out there, Happy Morrision Liberation Day, and I miss you. Also, can I have my bong back?
Morrison Liberation Day commemorates the date on which Jim Morrison shuffled off this mortal coil (or shuffled off into hiding with Elvis and Amelia Earhart, if you prefer). It was invented by two friends of mine, Missy and Ann, who hailed from a podunk town in western Pennsylvania where they were the only people who cared about music and art. I met them when I, along with my then-bandmates, moved to Camden, New Jersey, in 1989. Most of us only lived in Camden a short while before fleeing across the river to Philadelphia, but it was a very intense while. Someday the events of that time should really be committed to paper (or disk, I suppose), but….
Anyway. Missy and Ann lived with my bandmates Brenden and Aldo and my future girlfriend Sherri in a dark five-bedroom house that was literally in the shadow of the Benjamin Franklin Bridge. Like, if it had been a couple of yards to the south, it would have been under the bridge. The Ben Franklin, besides carrying 7 lanes of car traffic across the Delaware between New Jersey and Pennsylvania, also carries the PATCO Speedline, a train that ferries South Jersey commuters to and from their jobs in Philly. Because the house was near the end of the bridge, the train, on its way up from ground level, passed directly by the second and third stories. Every time it did, it rattled the house, and its occupants, to their bones. Remember Elwood’s apartment in The Blues Brothers? Like that.
I mention this because one of the highlights of the Morrison Liberation Day celebration in 1989 was lobbing water balloons at the Speedline from the roof of the house. I don’t think anyone actually succeeded in hitting a train, but it was fun to watch the faces of the riders as we tried.
Other traditional MLD activities include:
1) Listening to the Doors.
2) Smokin’ the ganja.
3) Drinking 40s of Olde English 800.
4) Saying things like, "Morrison, man…that dude was…ooh, watermelon!"
5)Watching feral cats copulate in the yard.
Some years later, long after the ol’ gang had split up, I threw an MLD bash for some friends and co-workers, and it was fun, but…well, let’s just say ain’t no party like a Camden party. Missy and Ann, if you’re out there, Happy Morrision Liberation Day, and I miss you. Also, can I have my bong back?
June 20, 2007
Space is cool
I totally saw the International Space Station and the space shuttle Atlantis last night! It was awesome! Why was it awesome?! I don’t know!
Okay, I’ll stop talking in exclamation points now. But yeah, the weather guy on the news yesterday was like, hey, you can totally see the space station and the shuttle tonight if you look 25 degrees above the western horizon at 10:35. And I was sort of pessimistic about it, because 25 degrees is pretty low, and I live in an area with a lot of clutter—houses, big trees, power lines, etc. I toyed with the idea of walking the two blocks over to the bluff, where I’d be free of the clutter, but I figured the West Hills across the river might still be too high. Plus I’d just come back from band practice and I was tired.
Anyway, I was finishing a cup of green tea and thinking about getting ready for bed when I glanced at the clock and saw that it was exactly 10:35. Just for the hell of it, I stepped outside onto the porch and looked toward the west. It being so close to the summer solstice there was still some lingering daylight, so I couldn't see any stars, although Venus was huge and bright, not far from the waxing crescent moon. Then, as if on cue, two tiny but brilliant lights came streaking into my line of sight. Dudes, they were bookin’. Apparently they travel at like 16,000 miles per hour? Damn. That’s fast.
I have no idea how far apart they were, but they were on the exact same trajectory at the exact same speed. It was a really cool thing to see. In just a few seconds they disappeared behind the trees, and I ran down the block to get a better view. I managed to catch sight of them again, moving toward what appeared to be the south-southeast. And then they were gone.
I didn't quite get goosebumps like I did when I saw Comet Hale-Bopp in '97, or the partial solar eclipse in the Northeast a few years before that, but it was still one of the coolest things I've seen in the sky. If you’re interested in trying to see them (or I guess just the space station when the shuttle’s not up there) NASA has a webpage where you can find out the dates and times to look.
Okay, I’ll stop talking in exclamation points now. But yeah, the weather guy on the news yesterday was like, hey, you can totally see the space station and the shuttle tonight if you look 25 degrees above the western horizon at 10:35. And I was sort of pessimistic about it, because 25 degrees is pretty low, and I live in an area with a lot of clutter—houses, big trees, power lines, etc. I toyed with the idea of walking the two blocks over to the bluff, where I’d be free of the clutter, but I figured the West Hills across the river might still be too high. Plus I’d just come back from band practice and I was tired.
Anyway, I was finishing a cup of green tea and thinking about getting ready for bed when I glanced at the clock and saw that it was exactly 10:35. Just for the hell of it, I stepped outside onto the porch and looked toward the west. It being so close to the summer solstice there was still some lingering daylight, so I couldn't see any stars, although Venus was huge and bright, not far from the waxing crescent moon. Then, as if on cue, two tiny but brilliant lights came streaking into my line of sight. Dudes, they were bookin’. Apparently they travel at like 16,000 miles per hour? Damn. That’s fast.
I have no idea how far apart they were, but they were on the exact same trajectory at the exact same speed. It was a really cool thing to see. In just a few seconds they disappeared behind the trees, and I ran down the block to get a better view. I managed to catch sight of them again, moving toward what appeared to be the south-southeast. And then they were gone.
I didn't quite get goosebumps like I did when I saw Comet Hale-Bopp in '97, or the partial solar eclipse in the Northeast a few years before that, but it was still one of the coolest things I've seen in the sky. If you’re interested in trying to see them (or I guess just the space station when the shuttle’s not up there) NASA has a webpage where you can find out the dates and times to look.
May 12, 2007
The Pros and Cons of MP3ing
My commute to work is not terribly long: it’s a 10-minute walk from my house to the MAX station, a 10-minute ride on MAX, and then another 10-minute walk to work. Add in a few minutes’ waiting time for the train, and it takes me about 35 minutes all told to get to work. So, not terribly long. Still, it’s nice to be able to listen to music on the way, especially if the weather’s really crappy and I decide to take the bus instead, which means less walking but usually more waiting, since the buses always seem to be running late.
I have a portable CD player, but it has a tendency—a very, very strong tendency—to skip a lot, especially if I do anything that involves any sort of motion. So last Christmas, I asked for and received an MP3 player. Notice I said “MP3 player” and not “iPod”. I specifically did not want an iPod, not only because they, like Macs, cost significantly more than anybody else’s products, but because those annoying commercials for Mac make me never want to buy anything from Apple. They also make me want to punch that goddamned scruffy-faced hipster pitchman in the nuts. But I digress.
Because of the whole skipping issue with the CD player, I went for a flash-based player rather than a disk-based one, which means no skipping but also a lot less space. My Sansa e260 only has 4 megabytes of memory, but since I have no intention of being one of those people who store their entire music libraries on their players, that’s fine. The Sansa is also black, and has black wires and earbuds (gross word), so when I see everybody—frakking everybody—else with their white iPods, I get to feel like less of a sheep.
For some reason it took me a while to get around to loading it up, but it’s about half full now. My original intention was to fill half of it with music I already owned, and the other half with downloaded stuff. I’m still feeling uneasy about the whole downloading thing, though. I mean, I clung to buying LPs well after their demise became a fait accompli, and moved to CDs only reluctantly. I still miss the more substantial…thingness of the LP. And downloaded albums have no thingness at all. I did, however, recently download my first album, so I could see how I felt about it. And then I immediately burned it to CD. (By the way, it was Lady Sovereign’s Public Warning. Highly recommended.)
The wonder of the MP3 player is, of course, its size. Mine slips easily into my pocket. And when you slip those earbuds in, you barely notice they’re there. The other day after work I went downtown to do some browsing at Powell’s (and may I just say that having the largest independent bookstore in the world at my disposal has to be one of the top five things about living in Portland). It had been sunny most of the day, but towards the late afternoon clouds rolled in from the west, and as my train crawled over the Steel Bridge, a light rain started to fall. My player was kicking Stories From The City, Stories From The Sea. When I got off the train I flipped my hood up, and it was weird…all of a sudden, I felt like PJ Harvey was inside my head. Walking down the rain-slicked streets of downtown Portland, I felt like I was in a movie, with “The Whores Hustle and the Hustlers Whore” as my soundtrack. And then, as I waiting to cross Burnside Street, who should walk right by me but Gus Van Sant. It was, like, this perfect Portland moment.
If there’s a downside to portable music, it’s that I tend to get very…involved with my music. It leads me to forget sometimes that I am, in fact, in public, where air drumming is more likely to be identified as mental illness. It can occasionally even be dangerous, like yesterday when I was walking home: I was listening to Sahara Hotnights, and I always get very hepped up at the end of “Only The Fakes Survive”, with its repeated chorus with the gang vocal. I love a good gang vocal, especially a girl gang one. “Aren’t you getting sick of being so polite?” ask the ladies. Yes, goddamit, I think, I AM getting sick of being so polite! And in my rocking-out, sick-of-being-so-polite state, I very nearly walked into an SUV that was backing out of a driveway. I guess I’ll have to learn to pay a bit more attention.
I have a portable CD player, but it has a tendency—a very, very strong tendency—to skip a lot, especially if I do anything that involves any sort of motion. So last Christmas, I asked for and received an MP3 player. Notice I said “MP3 player” and not “iPod”. I specifically did not want an iPod, not only because they, like Macs, cost significantly more than anybody else’s products, but because those annoying commercials for Mac make me never want to buy anything from Apple. They also make me want to punch that goddamned scruffy-faced hipster pitchman in the nuts. But I digress.
Because of the whole skipping issue with the CD player, I went for a flash-based player rather than a disk-based one, which means no skipping but also a lot less space. My Sansa e260 only has 4 megabytes of memory, but since I have no intention of being one of those people who store their entire music libraries on their players, that’s fine. The Sansa is also black, and has black wires and earbuds (gross word), so when I see everybody—frakking everybody—else with their white iPods, I get to feel like less of a sheep.
For some reason it took me a while to get around to loading it up, but it’s about half full now. My original intention was to fill half of it with music I already owned, and the other half with downloaded stuff. I’m still feeling uneasy about the whole downloading thing, though. I mean, I clung to buying LPs well after their demise became a fait accompli, and moved to CDs only reluctantly. I still miss the more substantial…thingness of the LP. And downloaded albums have no thingness at all. I did, however, recently download my first album, so I could see how I felt about it. And then I immediately burned it to CD. (By the way, it was Lady Sovereign’s Public Warning. Highly recommended.)
The wonder of the MP3 player is, of course, its size. Mine slips easily into my pocket. And when you slip those earbuds in, you barely notice they’re there. The other day after work I went downtown to do some browsing at Powell’s (and may I just say that having the largest independent bookstore in the world at my disposal has to be one of the top five things about living in Portland). It had been sunny most of the day, but towards the late afternoon clouds rolled in from the west, and as my train crawled over the Steel Bridge, a light rain started to fall. My player was kicking Stories From The City, Stories From The Sea. When I got off the train I flipped my hood up, and it was weird…all of a sudden, I felt like PJ Harvey was inside my head. Walking down the rain-slicked streets of downtown Portland, I felt like I was in a movie, with “The Whores Hustle and the Hustlers Whore” as my soundtrack. And then, as I waiting to cross Burnside Street, who should walk right by me but Gus Van Sant. It was, like, this perfect Portland moment.
If there’s a downside to portable music, it’s that I tend to get very…involved with my music. It leads me to forget sometimes that I am, in fact, in public, where air drumming is more likely to be identified as mental illness. It can occasionally even be dangerous, like yesterday when I was walking home: I was listening to Sahara Hotnights, and I always get very hepped up at the end of “Only The Fakes Survive”, with its repeated chorus with the gang vocal. I love a good gang vocal, especially a girl gang one. “Aren’t you getting sick of being so polite?” ask the ladies. Yes, goddamit, I think, I AM getting sick of being so polite! And in my rocking-out, sick-of-being-so-polite state, I very nearly walked into an SUV that was backing out of a driveway. I guess I’ll have to learn to pay a bit more attention.
March 6, 2007
Un' arancia in Italia
One of my co-workers is eating an orange. Just now I walked over to the printer, not expecting to smell anything except perhaps the wart remover lately being applied by another co-worker, and passed right through a cloud of olfactory delight. I stopped, staring out the window at the gorgeous sunny day--Portland is gettin' its spring on, albeit temporarily--and that whole Proustian thing about smell and memory kicked in.
Verona, Italy, almost 11 years ago. A morning in late June. I was sitting on a bench in a piazza in the sun--the Italian sun!--with a cup of coffee, some sort of pastry, and an orange. I had bought everything by pointing at it and saying, "Uno, per favore," which was pretty much the extent of my Italian. That and buon giorno, buona sera, and grazie.
The previous evening my traveling companion and I had eaten in what was essentially a cafeteria--you grab a tray, go down a line, and pick out what you want--but it was like, the cafeteria that they would have in Heaven. Everything was beautiful, and fresh, and cheap, and really really good. There was this soup that I wanted to have, but I was a strict vegetarian at the time and I thought there might be meat in it. "Do you speak English?" I asked the signorina with the ladle in her hand. She nodded. "Is there meat in the soup?" A blank stare. "Um. Vous parlez français?" A more vigorous nod this time. "Est-ce qu'il y a de la viande dans la soupe?" A more vigorous blank stare, if that's possible. Ah, well, no soup for me. It's my own fault for going to Italy without knowing any Italian.
A true sign of my dorkiness? When I got home I learned how to ask about meaty soup in Italian: C'é carne nella zuppa? (That may not be exactly right, but it would have gotten the job done.)
This post has no point, except to say that I once ate an orange in Verona. And that I want to go back to Italy. I think I'll go see if I can find a night class in Italian....
Verona, Italy, almost 11 years ago. A morning in late June. I was sitting on a bench in a piazza in the sun--the Italian sun!--with a cup of coffee, some sort of pastry, and an orange. I had bought everything by pointing at it and saying, "Uno, per favore," which was pretty much the extent of my Italian. That and buon giorno, buona sera, and grazie.
The previous evening my traveling companion and I had eaten in what was essentially a cafeteria--you grab a tray, go down a line, and pick out what you want--but it was like, the cafeteria that they would have in Heaven. Everything was beautiful, and fresh, and cheap, and really really good. There was this soup that I wanted to have, but I was a strict vegetarian at the time and I thought there might be meat in it. "Do you speak English?" I asked the signorina with the ladle in her hand. She nodded. "Is there meat in the soup?" A blank stare. "Um. Vous parlez français?" A more vigorous nod this time. "Est-ce qu'il y a de la viande dans la soupe?" A more vigorous blank stare, if that's possible. Ah, well, no soup for me. It's my own fault for going to Italy without knowing any Italian.
A true sign of my dorkiness? When I got home I learned how to ask about meaty soup in Italian: C'é carne nella zuppa? (That may not be exactly right, but it would have gotten the job done.)
This post has no point, except to say that I once ate an orange in Verona. And that I want to go back to Italy. I think I'll go see if I can find a night class in Italian....
February 19, 2007
Hello Harriet, adieu Marylou. (Sniff.)
I bought a car today! Happy birthday to me! I’ve been shopping for one for a few weeks now, and man has it been stressful. Remind me not to do that again anytime soon.
I was thinking I wanted a Honda Civic because of their reliability and great MPG, but they really are not the budget cars they once were. With the money I could afford, I was going to end up with one that was 7 or 8 years old, and every one of those I saw seemed to have close to—or in some cases, well over—a hundred thousand miles on it, and since I planned on driving whatever I bought for another hundred thousand miles, I really wanted a car that hadn’t been around the block—or, you know, the earth—quite so many times.
So I started looking at the Hyundai Elantra, which is sort of like the Civic’s slightly less attractive, less popular, less well-regarded kid sister. The Ashlee to the Civic’s Jessica, if you will. But all my research—and there was a lot of it—indicated that the more recent models are every bit as safe and reliable as Hondas, while costing considerably less. So after test-driving a few, I went ahead and bought a 2004 model from a girl who was getting ready to move to Texas for school. It only has 26,000 miles on it! My mechanic said the engine still looks new! I just took out my first bank loan ever and I am going to be totally nervous every time I drive now!
But I knew it was going to be my car when I was test-driving it, because: I was remembering how, when Hyundais were first being sold in the US, their ad campaigns said something about the name rhyming with “Sunday”; that made me think of the band the Sundays; my last car was named (in part) after a singer; therefore, if I bought this car I would name it Harriet, after the Sundays’ singer Harriet Wheeler. (WHEELer. Huh? Right?) And once she was named, she had to be my car.
I wouldn’t say I’m as big a fan of the Sundays as I am of Mary Lou Lord, although I do own Reading, Writing, and Arithmetic on cassette (hey, it was the ‘90s), and “Here’s Where The Story Ends” is still a fucking awesome song. But that seems appropriate, because no car I own will ever quite measure up to Marylou.
And what has become of her? I hear you ask. Well, her water pump went a few months back, and my mechanic told me it would cost more to replace it than she was worth. That’s when I started saving for a down payment on another car. I kept driving her, though, but I had to dump 2 gallons of water in the radiator every time I did. Then a few weeks ago we had some really cold weather, and that seemed to be the final nail in Marylou’s coffin. Since then I’ve had to take the bus everywhere, which, when you’re carrying four bags from the grocery store, is not fun.
Anyway, I will miss Marylou. She was the best car I ever had. In the 9 years I owned her, I never had to do any major repairs. She never once broke down and stranded me anywhere. And she carried me and all my worldly possessions across the frakking continent three times.
The first of those transcontinental journeys inspired a song that I think is one of the best I ever wrote. It’s sort of a response to Springsteen’s “Thunder Road”; it’s called “Mother Road”. In memory of Marylou, I present the lyrics here.
I’m shivering in the cold Nevada twilight.
I’m shaking the desert dust out of my boots, remembering how I
Stood crying beneath a New York City streetlight
When summer’s soft lover set me free with some dissembling. Now I
Would like to write a poignant line about my lover’s eyes,
But instead I’ll drive, ‘cause I’m gonna try to make Point Reyes by sunrise.
I’m seven days out of Jersey, late September.
I left with Old Glory flying high and all my debts forgiven.
I’m trying hard not to think about October.
What’s done, it stays done, and what may come’s a highway yet undriven.
The Winnemucca sand beneath my feet is cool and dry,
And the secret stars are spinning in the clear Nevada sky.
So I drive, thinking back twenty-five hundred miles or so
To deep Pennsylvania where the clouds gathered dark and low.
Just out of Youngstown lightning blazed down from heaven like a column of fire.
As the sky split wide open holy water started pouring down
And I came clean into Cleveland, cathedral town.
Walked through those doors, folks were praying to the sound of a rock ‘n’ roll choir.
And I started singing:
Mary, Mary, quite complacent. How does your garden grow?
With pretty little girlies in blue jeans all in a row.
Mary, Mary, queen of springtime, it’s autumn now, your garden has died.
Well plant your seeds and pray for redemption but I’m gonna ride.
‘Cause Mother Road welcomes her daughters with arms open wide.
I dumped my blues down in Memphis and jumped the Mississippi.
I lost Old Glory in Oklahoma City.
Saw Cadillacs rusting, sang a Lone Justice tune.
Poor Texas Panhandle groom’s got no bride to marry;
She’s living it up on the neon strip in Tucumcari.
The crows in the Canyon hanging under the moon…
I know they’ll fly soon.
If I meet the ghost of Kerouac in North Beach,
I’d like to share a drink or two, ‘cause it’s been quite a long ride
To California from a Jersey Shore beach,
But I’ve got Marylou and Rose of Sharon right alongside.
There may not be a promised land beneath the western sun,
But it’s all right, the highway’s bright, and our story’s just begun.
Can’t you hear us singing:
Mary, Mary, quite complacent. How does your garden grow?
With pretty little girlies in blue jeans all in a row.
Mary, Mary, queen of springtime, it’s autumn now, your garden has died.
Well plant your seeds and pray for redemption but I’m gonna ride.
‘Cause Mother Road welcomes her daughters with arms open wide.
Mother Road welcomes her daughters with arms open wide.
Mother Road, I am your daughter, my arms open wide.
I was thinking I wanted a Honda Civic because of their reliability and great MPG, but they really are not the budget cars they once were. With the money I could afford, I was going to end up with one that was 7 or 8 years old, and every one of those I saw seemed to have close to—or in some cases, well over—a hundred thousand miles on it, and since I planned on driving whatever I bought for another hundred thousand miles, I really wanted a car that hadn’t been around the block—or, you know, the earth—quite so many times.
So I started looking at the Hyundai Elantra, which is sort of like the Civic’s slightly less attractive, less popular, less well-regarded kid sister. The Ashlee to the Civic’s Jessica, if you will. But all my research—and there was a lot of it—indicated that the more recent models are every bit as safe and reliable as Hondas, while costing considerably less. So after test-driving a few, I went ahead and bought a 2004 model from a girl who was getting ready to move to Texas for school. It only has 26,000 miles on it! My mechanic said the engine still looks new! I just took out my first bank loan ever and I am going to be totally nervous every time I drive now!
But I knew it was going to be my car when I was test-driving it, because: I was remembering how, when Hyundais were first being sold in the US, their ad campaigns said something about the name rhyming with “Sunday”; that made me think of the band the Sundays; my last car was named (in part) after a singer; therefore, if I bought this car I would name it Harriet, after the Sundays’ singer Harriet Wheeler. (WHEELer. Huh? Right?) And once she was named, she had to be my car.
I wouldn’t say I’m as big a fan of the Sundays as I am of Mary Lou Lord, although I do own Reading, Writing, and Arithmetic on cassette (hey, it was the ‘90s), and “Here’s Where The Story Ends” is still a fucking awesome song. But that seems appropriate, because no car I own will ever quite measure up to Marylou.
And what has become of her? I hear you ask. Well, her water pump went a few months back, and my mechanic told me it would cost more to replace it than she was worth. That’s when I started saving for a down payment on another car. I kept driving her, though, but I had to dump 2 gallons of water in the radiator every time I did. Then a few weeks ago we had some really cold weather, and that seemed to be the final nail in Marylou’s coffin. Since then I’ve had to take the bus everywhere, which, when you’re carrying four bags from the grocery store, is not fun.
Anyway, I will miss Marylou. She was the best car I ever had. In the 9 years I owned her, I never had to do any major repairs. She never once broke down and stranded me anywhere. And she carried me and all my worldly possessions across the frakking continent three times.
The first of those transcontinental journeys inspired a song that I think is one of the best I ever wrote. It’s sort of a response to Springsteen’s “Thunder Road”; it’s called “Mother Road”. In memory of Marylou, I present the lyrics here.
I’m shivering in the cold Nevada twilight.
I’m shaking the desert dust out of my boots, remembering how I
Stood crying beneath a New York City streetlight
When summer’s soft lover set me free with some dissembling. Now I
Would like to write a poignant line about my lover’s eyes,
But instead I’ll drive, ‘cause I’m gonna try to make Point Reyes by sunrise.
I’m seven days out of Jersey, late September.
I left with Old Glory flying high and all my debts forgiven.
I’m trying hard not to think about October.
What’s done, it stays done, and what may come’s a highway yet undriven.
The Winnemucca sand beneath my feet is cool and dry,
And the secret stars are spinning in the clear Nevada sky.
So I drive, thinking back twenty-five hundred miles or so
To deep Pennsylvania where the clouds gathered dark and low.
Just out of Youngstown lightning blazed down from heaven like a column of fire.
As the sky split wide open holy water started pouring down
And I came clean into Cleveland, cathedral town.
Walked through those doors, folks were praying to the sound of a rock ‘n’ roll choir.
And I started singing:
Mary, Mary, quite complacent. How does your garden grow?
With pretty little girlies in blue jeans all in a row.
Mary, Mary, queen of springtime, it’s autumn now, your garden has died.
Well plant your seeds and pray for redemption but I’m gonna ride.
‘Cause Mother Road welcomes her daughters with arms open wide.
I dumped my blues down in Memphis and jumped the Mississippi.
I lost Old Glory in Oklahoma City.
Saw Cadillacs rusting, sang a Lone Justice tune.
Poor Texas Panhandle groom’s got no bride to marry;
She’s living it up on the neon strip in Tucumcari.
The crows in the Canyon hanging under the moon…
I know they’ll fly soon.
If I meet the ghost of Kerouac in North Beach,
I’d like to share a drink or two, ‘cause it’s been quite a long ride
To California from a Jersey Shore beach,
But I’ve got Marylou and Rose of Sharon right alongside.
There may not be a promised land beneath the western sun,
But it’s all right, the highway’s bright, and our story’s just begun.
Can’t you hear us singing:
Mary, Mary, quite complacent. How does your garden grow?
With pretty little girlies in blue jeans all in a row.
Mary, Mary, queen of springtime, it’s autumn now, your garden has died.
Well plant your seeds and pray for redemption but I’m gonna ride.
‘Cause Mother Road welcomes her daughters with arms open wide.
Mother Road welcomes her daughters with arms open wide.
Mother Road, I am your daughter, my arms open wide.
November 22, 2006
Is that a woody in your hoody?
When I was growing up, the article of clothing now universally referred to as a hoodie (or possibly hoody) was simply called a sweatshirt, just like it's non-hooded relative. I'm not complaining about this neologism at all; I think hoodie is a fine addition to the English language. Now we have a way to differentiate the hooded item from the non-hooded one.
Because I didn't grow up using the term hoodie, though, whenever I hear it I react in a way I don't when I hear the names of other articles of clothing. Specifically, I immediately get a snatch of song lyrics in my head. More specifically, lyrics from "Pop Goes the Weasel"--not the children's song, mind you, but the anti-Vanilla Ice diatribe from erstwhile rappers 3rd Bass. "In the hoody with the woody/Buy a disco tape at Sam Goody," says Pete Nice.
Except he doesn't. Turns out what he actually says is, "Buy a disc or tape at Sam Goody." For some reason this is incredibly disappointing to me. It's like, the way I thought it was written sets up this great image of hopeless unhipness--buying crappy music (yes, DISCO STILL SUCKS, with the noted exception of KC and the Sunshine Band) in an obsolete format from a shopping mall chain store--that supports the song's overall theme, which is that Vanilla Ice is hopelessly unhip. But the way it's actually written, it seems like it's just a cute rhyme.
The only other time this phenomenon occurs--the Instantly-Getting-Rap-Lyrics-in-my-Head-When-I-Hear-a-Certain-Word Phenomenon--is when someome mentions UPS, which my boss does sometimes because he worked there when he was younger. Then I get a stanza from (the awesome) Biz Markie's (awesome) "The Vapors", in which Biz gets back at all the losers who dissed him and his crew before they were famous, in this case a girl who wouldn't go out with his friend T.J. Swan: "The type of female with fly Gucci wear/With big trunk jewelry and extensions in her hair/When Swan tried to kick it, she always fessed/Talkin' about 'nigga, please, you work for UPS.'"
There's a related phenomenon, the Instantly-Getting-Rap-Lyrics-in-my-Head-When-I-See-Someone's-Face Phenomenon, which only happens with John McEnroe. Then, of course, it's this (immortal) couplet from House of Pain's (immortal) "Jump Around": "I'll serve your ass like John McEnroe/If your girl steps up I'm smackin' the ho." I have to say, that line is stoopid and misogynistic and I hope Everlast regrets it, but come on: he rhymes "McEnroe" with "SMACKIN' THE HO." That's pure genius.
Happy Thanksgiving, everybody.
Because I didn't grow up using the term hoodie, though, whenever I hear it I react in a way I don't when I hear the names of other articles of clothing. Specifically, I immediately get a snatch of song lyrics in my head. More specifically, lyrics from "Pop Goes the Weasel"--not the children's song, mind you, but the anti-Vanilla Ice diatribe from erstwhile rappers 3rd Bass. "In the hoody with the woody/Buy a disco tape at Sam Goody," says Pete Nice.
Except he doesn't. Turns out what he actually says is, "Buy a disc or tape at Sam Goody." For some reason this is incredibly disappointing to me. It's like, the way I thought it was written sets up this great image of hopeless unhipness--buying crappy music (yes, DISCO STILL SUCKS, with the noted exception of KC and the Sunshine Band) in an obsolete format from a shopping mall chain store--that supports the song's overall theme, which is that Vanilla Ice is hopelessly unhip. But the way it's actually written, it seems like it's just a cute rhyme.
The only other time this phenomenon occurs--the Instantly-Getting-Rap-Lyrics-in-my-Head-When-I-Hear-a-Certain-Word Phenomenon--is when someome mentions UPS, which my boss does sometimes because he worked there when he was younger. Then I get a stanza from (the awesome) Biz Markie's (awesome) "The Vapors", in which Biz gets back at all the losers who dissed him and his crew before they were famous, in this case a girl who wouldn't go out with his friend T.J. Swan: "The type of female with fly Gucci wear/With big trunk jewelry and extensions in her hair/When Swan tried to kick it, she always fessed/Talkin' about 'nigga, please, you work for UPS.'"
There's a related phenomenon, the Instantly-Getting-Rap-Lyrics-in-my-Head-When-I-See-Someone's-Face Phenomenon, which only happens with John McEnroe. Then, of course, it's this (immortal) couplet from House of Pain's (immortal) "Jump Around": "I'll serve your ass like John McEnroe/If your girl steps up I'm smackin' the ho." I have to say, that line is stoopid and misogynistic and I hope Everlast regrets it, but come on: he rhymes "McEnroe" with "SMACKIN' THE HO." That's pure genius.
Happy Thanksgiving, everybody.
October 10, 2006
Of werewolves and cranberries
This is the kind of thing I usually annoy Amy with by email, but since no one reads this except Amy and maybe three other people, why not just put it here?
There’s this (great) Throwing Muses song called "Garoux des Larmes". Somewhere on the internets, I can’t remember where, I encountered someone who translated this as "Werewolves of the Tears", which: not exactly. The French word for werewolf is loup-garou (pl. loups-garoux), loup being the word for wolf. Garou, on the other hand, is not the word for anything. (At least, not the French word for anything; I researched it once [me = tremendous dork] and found that it’s a Provençal word for a type of shrub. I don’t think that’s relevant in this context.) It appears that garou is an example of what linguists call a cranberry morpheme. If you can’t be arsed following that link, and you’re not Amy, I’ll tell you, briefly, that a cranberry morpheme is a unit of language that transmits meaning in a compound word but has no meaning on its own. Everyone knows that a cranberry is different from a blueberry or a strawberry, and that they are all berries, so "cran" transmits meaning in that it distinguishes one type of berry from another, yet divorced from its partner, "cran" is meaningless. Likewise, garou is meaningless outside of the compound loup-garou.
Just today I realized something that is doubtless coincidental yet utterly fascinating: the "were" of English "werewolf" is also a cranberry morpheme! How kooky is that? I realized this, by the way, while learning that the "were" in werewolf comes from an Indo-European root meaning "man" (hence "manwolf": makes total sense), which you can also see in the Latin cognate vir.
Cranberry morphemes are generally free to form other compounds, which is why we can have words like cranapple and wererabbit (though these are often hyphenated, which would seem to indicate that the neologists who invent them aren’t totally convinced that it’s kosher). I wondered if, in France, Wallace and Gromit had to deal with un lapin-garou, and heeeeeeeee: they did!
I love language.
There’s this (great) Throwing Muses song called "Garoux des Larmes". Somewhere on the internets, I can’t remember where, I encountered someone who translated this as "Werewolves of the Tears", which: not exactly. The French word for werewolf is loup-garou (pl. loups-garoux), loup being the word for wolf. Garou, on the other hand, is not the word for anything. (At least, not the French word for anything; I researched it once [me = tremendous dork] and found that it’s a Provençal word for a type of shrub. I don’t think that’s relevant in this context.) It appears that garou is an example of what linguists call a cranberry morpheme. If you can’t be arsed following that link, and you’re not Amy, I’ll tell you, briefly, that a cranberry morpheme is a unit of language that transmits meaning in a compound word but has no meaning on its own. Everyone knows that a cranberry is different from a blueberry or a strawberry, and that they are all berries, so "cran" transmits meaning in that it distinguishes one type of berry from another, yet divorced from its partner, "cran" is meaningless. Likewise, garou is meaningless outside of the compound loup-garou.
Just today I realized something that is doubtless coincidental yet utterly fascinating: the "were" of English "werewolf" is also a cranberry morpheme! How kooky is that? I realized this, by the way, while learning that the "were" in werewolf comes from an Indo-European root meaning "man" (hence "manwolf": makes total sense), which you can also see in the Latin cognate vir.
Cranberry morphemes are generally free to form other compounds, which is why we can have words like cranapple and wererabbit (though these are often hyphenated, which would seem to indicate that the neologists who invent them aren’t totally convinced that it’s kosher). I wondered if, in France, Wallace and Gromit had to deal with un lapin-garou, and heeeeeeeee: they did!
I love language.
September 6, 2006
June 30, 2006
This is the sportiest I will ever be.
I am not, generally speaking, a sports fan—most of the popular American sports just don’t hold any interest for me. I know baseball is the national pastime and all, but its languid pace has always seemed to me almost antithetical to the whole idea of sports. I mean, there’s more action in croquet. Plus all the gross spitting. Basketball strikes me as unchallenging, because everyone playing it is like eight feet tall. Shouldn’t they raise the baskets or something? Also their shorts are goofy. I do recall a time, somewhere in the eighties, when the New York Giants won some Super Bowls, and I was very aware of the whole thing and probably could even have identified some of the players, but when it comes to American football in general, I tend to find the level of violence disturbing. And I realize that I’m probably displaying a tremendous ignorance of the nuances and sublimity of these games, but I don’t care, because I? Am not a sports fan.
With a couple of exceptions. One of them is tennis, specifically women’s tennis, which I have been following for about twenty years now. My favorite player back then, and during the whole length of her brilliant career until her retirement, was Steffi Graf, who was one of the greatest ever to play the game (only Chris Evert and Martina Navratilova won more matches). A little later it was Jennifer Capriati during her comeback in the early aughts, as she disproved (to my great satisfaction) F. Scott Fitzgerald’s famous dictum that there are no second acts in American lives. Currently I root for Amélie Mauresmo for several reasons: 1) she’s the only out lesbian in professional tennis, 2) she’s French, et j’aime la France et les français, and 3) her game is gorgeous. She’s currently ranked the number one player in the world, but has a long history of choking at the major tournaments, finally winning the Australian Open this year when Justin Henin-Hardenne had to retire from the match. Said history only makes me root harder for her. As I write this she has advanced to the third round at Wimbledon, which began earlier this week.
Also going on right now, which you surely know unless you live under the biggest rock on the planet, is the World Cup, which brings us to my second exception: soccer, or football, as the rest of the world quite sensibly calls it. When the WUSA (the women’s professional league in the US) was extant, I enjoyed watching their games, and while I don’t always follow international football, I love the World Cup. Like a dutiful citizen I rooted for the US until they were eliminated, but now: allez les Bleus! See above re: j’aime la France. Tomorrow France plays Brazil in a rematch of the 1998 final, and I plan on busting out some vin de pays and fromage while I watch. All of this brings me to the title of this entry: as I am currently involved in watching not one but two major sporting events, this is doubtless the sportiest I have ever been or ever will be.
With a couple of exceptions. One of them is tennis, specifically women’s tennis, which I have been following for about twenty years now. My favorite player back then, and during the whole length of her brilliant career until her retirement, was Steffi Graf, who was one of the greatest ever to play the game (only Chris Evert and Martina Navratilova won more matches). A little later it was Jennifer Capriati during her comeback in the early aughts, as she disproved (to my great satisfaction) F. Scott Fitzgerald’s famous dictum that there are no second acts in American lives. Currently I root for Amélie Mauresmo for several reasons: 1) she’s the only out lesbian in professional tennis, 2) she’s French, et j’aime la France et les français, and 3) her game is gorgeous. She’s currently ranked the number one player in the world, but has a long history of choking at the major tournaments, finally winning the Australian Open this year when Justin Henin-Hardenne had to retire from the match. Said history only makes me root harder for her. As I write this she has advanced to the third round at Wimbledon, which began earlier this week.
Also going on right now, which you surely know unless you live under the biggest rock on the planet, is the World Cup, which brings us to my second exception: soccer, or football, as the rest of the world quite sensibly calls it. When the WUSA (the women’s professional league in the US) was extant, I enjoyed watching their games, and while I don’t always follow international football, I love the World Cup. Like a dutiful citizen I rooted for the US until they were eliminated, but now: allez les Bleus! See above re: j’aime la France. Tomorrow France plays Brazil in a rematch of the 1998 final, and I plan on busting out some vin de pays and fromage while I watch. All of this brings me to the title of this entry: as I am currently involved in watching not one but two major sporting events, this is doubtless the sportiest I have ever been or ever will be.
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