Science fiction, fantasy, mystery and what-not
Today’s song came via the weather. Our forecast for today said it will be sunny but a drizzle was falling, so, you know, I was a mite skeptical. When sunshine finally broke through, so did a Donovan song, “Sunshine Superman” (1966).
I enjoy this video. Television, music, and entertainment all seemed simpler, didn’t it?
Piddling through the morning and ruminating about what to do today and this week, I drifted into channels that went, “Life. It’s just a game we play.”
That naturally activated certain cells. Next thing that I know, I’m streaming Al Wilson’s “Show and Tell” (1973) because of that one set of lines go, “Show and tell. Just a game I play when I want to say, I love you.”
It’s another song from that era whose every note is familiar. Reflecting on it as I walked to write, I realize that the song makes me nostalgic for that period in a way that other songs don’t. Perhaps it’s the words and their sentiments, and the way that Al Wilson delivers them. It could be the chilly and windy weather stirring up memory flashes of being in Penn Hills, PA, when the song was popular. The sky’s color out here today harkens back to memories of snow warnings.
We don’t have snow warnings here today, but some rain is forecast. As usual, untangling the threads of memories and impressions are too much. I’ll just live with the song and nostalgia.
I didn’t know who originally did this song. I don’t know why I was streaming it this morning. Somehow, between feeding the cats, opening the blinds, making breakfast and coffee, I started streaming “Gimme Little Sign” to myself. It’s one of those instances where the why is buried, but becoming aware that I was streaming it to myself, I looked the song up and learned Brenton Wood recorded and released it in 1967.
It feels like a ’67 song, mellow and relaxed, about love and relationships, and hopeful. Perhaps, subconsciously, I was talking to God(s), the Universal, the Fates, whatever, and saying to myself (or them), “Just give me some kind of sign,” about what to do or what’s to happen, and brought this song to mind. You know how humans are.
We’re all a little crazy. We’re all just looking for a little sign.
This little pop song comes to you from me hearing it on the radio yesterday. (I was switching through channels, trying to escape Christmas music.) The song wasn’t — and isn’t — my cuppa music, but I know it well because it seems like we were saturated with it when it came out back in 1984. I was stationed in Japan then, and it was being played often on the radio. Besides that, it was catchy, with easily heard, understood, and learned lyrics. People seemed to delight in making jokes out of the title, “Wake Me Up Before You Go Go”. I returned to America at the end of ’84, and discovered the saturation was worse in America.
Here’s Wham! Sorry to do this to you, but I need to get it out of my head. Nothin’ wrong with it, mind you, just not my cuppa.
Imfloofable (floofinition) – a housepet that refuses to change its personality or accomodate any others.
In use: “Although she tried introducing other pets into the household, Flash was imfloofable, refusing to accept any other creature in the home. Like the Highlander, there could be only one.”
Weird dream. I was at a small settlement that seemed to be in the 1860s. Soldiers in Federal (Union) uniforms were present. They were holding off a force of what seemed to be Mexican-Indians.
I wasn’t part of the conflict, but an observer, drawing scenes for posterity, using pencil and charcoal on rough wooden whiteboards. The commander was particularly interested in having cards with small drawings depicting the scenes so he could send them to others without much cost or trouble.
Attacks began while I was working on my drawings. I noticed the Mexican-Indians would shoot volleys of arrows from a distance that was so far out that their arrows fell well short of the settlement. The soldiers in the settlement would stay in hiding, though, sporadically returning fire, but also from well outside of range.
It irritated me because they were both so far out. What was wrong with them? I kept telling people, “They’re all too far apart. They’re too far out. This will go on forever.”
No one listened, though. They admired my art, complimenting me on my skills and talents.
I awoke feeling exasperated.
The dream’s standoff reminded me of the 1980s Iraq-Iran war. We had opcon of the middle-east (southwest Asia, in our parlance). My job during part of that time was to brief the Commander of the Ninth Air Forces every morning. I did the Ops part, which was about the readiness of our tactical air forces and reserve forces (everything east of the Mississippi River), along with any situation reports on incidents that took place on our bases. I was the third briefer each day. Weather went first, followed by Intel.
The three-star general who was the CC and his staff were bullies. If they smelled weakness on you, they started circling, looking for a chance to take a bite out of your ass. I was too stupid to back down, though. Not so, the weather guys. They always seemed like they were about to cry.
The Intel guys, though, were covering the Iraq-Iran war, reporting on tactical sorties the two sides had flown the previous day. Most of that was about one side trying to sink the other’s oil tankers in the Strait of Hormuz in what was called, with little imagination, the Tanker War. The fighters attacking the tankers rarely did any damage because they would fire their missiles outside of the missiles’ range because they were worried about the air defense systems and getting shot down. So, the stalemate went on.
Our commander approved of those fire and run tactics, even if they hit nothing. That kept the aircraft and crew safe while keeping the enemy unnerved. So what if they shot off a missile and hit nothing. Missiles were less than five million each.
Odd how my dreams are dredging up so much past recently. Sometimes I feel like I’m excavating my memories.
Today’s music comes to my stream via the weather report. Looking ahead at the ten day, I saw rain, coming up…rain, rain, rain. With that, the neurons organized. “Rain, rain, rain, a wicked rain” began, the first lines of the Los Lobos song, “Wicked Rain”, from 1992. I like what I perceive as the song’s darkness.
“There’s just one chance in a million that we’ll make it out alive.”
The holiday season music has brought my favorite holiday song into my stream.
Here’s Bob Rivers with “Walking Round in Women’s Underwear”, a light parody.
Today’s theme music will not be for everyone. I’ll be surprised if anyone likes it, because that’s King Crimson’s nature.
The song, “21st Century Schizoid Man” (1969) was once said to be dedicated to Spiro T. Agnew.
I was biased against Agnew because my eighth grade civics teacher talked at great lengths about him, and didn’t like him at all. She particularly didn’t like how he attacked the press and its coverage of him. You might remember Agnew if you study twentieth century American politics or lived through the times. Agnew was Nixon’s first Veep until he was indicted and resigned after a criminal investigation into Maryland corruption. Whether the song is dedicated to Spiro T. “Ted” Agnew, the song’s lyrics are few but memorable. Here’s a sample for you.
Cat’s foot iron claw
Neuro-surgeons scream for more
At paranoia’s poison door
Twenty first century schizoid man
I’m thinking of this song today because I feel a little bit like a twenty-first century schzoid man on some days. Not today, particularly, but you know, some days.
My Dad was a special guest star in my dreams last night. I was a teenager in all of them, not really surprising, because that’s the era of my life that I saw the most of him, as I lived with him for three years after things became dark and unpleasant with Mom’s husband. Then I graduate from high school and left home.
In one memorable part of the dream, Dad and I were following a young tabby cat. The cat had gone down a sidewalk. I hurried after him, and discovered him rolling around on the cement walk in some freshly cut grass.
After that, the dream scenes fluttered and crackled. There was Dad and I driving in a car, and I’m looking out the window, checking out passing scenery. We throw a baseball back and forth in sunshine. I hear his laugh. Dad enjoys laughing.
The dreams grew darker and faster in nature. Then, suddenly, it became “This Is Your Life” from when I was in my mid-teens.
Life wasn’t going well. Most of my time was spent reading books, riding my bike, playing sports, drawing and painting, and listening to music. Although I enjoyed math, history, science, and literature, school was a bore. I was becoming a loner and acted out out a lot, and the dream managed to feature sharp memories of that era. In one sequence, a boy two years younger than me was riding a bike. A bunch of us children were in front of his house on a late summer afternoon. We weren’t doing much but hanging. I think I was fourteen. This kid, though, was riding around and bantering with others. Then I heard my sister say, “He spit on me.”
I don’t believe I’d ever reacted as fast to anything in my life, and I have always, from childhood on to even now, been known for amazingly fast reflexes.
He was riding his bike by me. My hand shot out, caught the rear of his bike and jerked it back, pulling it out from under him. As he fell free, I tossed the bike to one side, stepped forward, grabbed the kid, and hauled him to his feet. I told him he needed to apologize to my sister. I remember that other kids there were freaked out and afraid I was going to do something terrible to the kid. But he apologized to my sister. I released him. He took his bike and ran to his house.
His mother came out and confronted me. I was unapologetic. I told her nobody was going to spit on my sister while I was there. She didn’t know her son had spit on my sister. That changed things.
The scene was just a brief flash in my dream, the part where my sister said, “He spit on me,” and I grabbed his bike. I remembered the rest, along with other memories from that period, after awakening.
The whole dream and memory sequence left me emotionally shaken as I went about my morning routine. As I wondered why I’d dreamed so much about my father and childhood, I reached out to him to ensure he was okay.
Michael Seidel, writer 