Tuesday’s Theme Music

Moderately hard winds moaned and grumbled through the neighborhood last night. Toward eleven, I was in the kitchen when I heard a noise. It sounded like the heater could be on but it was coming from the wrong direction, or that a faucet was running, but again, no faucets where the sound seemed to be. I walked around to localize the sound only to realize, it’s a hard rain drumming on the roof outside the vaulted ceiling in the great room. It’s so rare that we have heavy rain, I didn’t recognize its sound.

Wind and rain went on throughout the night. Nice to have rain but we need snow. I can’t believe that we’re at the end of 2022 and we still don’t have weather control. The mind reels with unintended consequences which we might be dealing with now if we did have it. Weather control was always one of my favorite science fiction ideas as a child, along with space travel, teleportation, exploring other planets, and ‘time travel’. We have none of that yet. Even flying cars have evaded us. I think it’s because extraterrestrials got in among us and have sabotaged our efforts because they don’t want us advancing, but that’s just me.

Doesn’t feel like winter outside, probably because there’s no snow and ice, not even any on the surrounding mountains. It’s all sunshine and blue sky today. The temperature is 48 F and the grass is as green as late spring. Our high temperature will be just three degrees higher, but still, this is December’s end in the northern lats. Where is the cold stuff of last week? To be fair, this is around our average high. Lows usually touch the lower thirties, though. We wouldn’t mind some of the cyclone bomb snow obliterating a lot of the U.S., although cyclone bomb sounds like a bath thing. If we had that weather control, maybe we could protect others and save ourselves from drought. Instead, we’re dithering with social media.

The sun’s influence arrived with a full blaze at 7:39, just two hours ago. Sun fall will begin about seven hours later from now, if I’m doing the math right, which is very iffy. I haven’t had any coffee.

Hearing that rain last night and thinking about how hard it was falling brought out a Dylan tune called “A Hard Rain’s A-Gonna Fall”. The song came out in 1963 but I didn’t get familiar with it until after “Tangled Up in Blue” came out in 1975. Dylan wasn’t played much on the AM radio which I listened to in the late sixties and early seventies. It wasn’t until Tangled came out and I was stationed in the Philippines that I went searching for more Dylan and discovered his earlier stuff. I was twenty then, and became engrossed with his lyrics and style, so I bought a few album, listening to them as I painted and drew when I was off duty and not partying or exercising. I deem “A Hard Rain’s A-Gonna Fall” today’s theme music. Mentioning that, the state up north and east of us is worried about this rain, because it’s going to melt the snow, opening a can of problems with flooding.

It’s Tuesday, December 27, 2022. Go have yourself a ball. I’m going to have coffee. Here’s Dylan’s somber song. Cheers

December 27, 2022 0

Monday’s Theme Music

Monday began with a crash. The cats rushed in. One tentatively walked forward, eyeing the wreck. The others sat down and looked at me. “You’re in trouble,” he said.

I knew he was right. I’d begun unloading the clean dishes from the dishwasher. A small ceramic bowl was on the counter. I picked the white thing up, thinking, where can I put this so it’s out of the way? As I turned, it yelled, “For love,” and threw itself from my hand. It crashed to the floor and splintered into forty pieces or more, like a huge white KFC offering. The bowl’s last words were, “Tis my heart,” then it was no more.

I cleaned up the mess with care. It had landed on a kitchen throw rug. I took that off and shook it out, and then vacuumed the crime scene. The cats monitored everything to ensure I did it right.

My wife came into the kitchen as I finished. “What happened?” I explained it all. I knew it would affect her. Yeah, it did. The white bowl sits in the middle of a bamboo serving tray. We’ve had it since I took my first lesson in being married. I’m still learning. We paid about $20 for it at a store like K-Mart, but you know how it is with these things that you buy when you’re poor and first starting out. They’re cheap and priceless.

Or maybe you don’t know because you were never poor or never started out, or you lack sentimental bones and think, it’s just a bowl, get over it. Oh, you heathen.

Anyway, I can still see the bowl leaving my left hand. I still wonder how it happened. I still see my wife’s look when I explained, and I still hear the noise it made when it kissed the floor.

Depressing way to begin a day but not as bad as some things which could’ve happened, I tell myself. That’s true. Just read the news.

The Neurons began my day with two songs in succession in the morning mental music stream (trademark pending). First was “Abacab”, a 1981 song by Genesis. I believe that’s in mind because of yesterday’s theme song, “Turn It On Again”. That lasted until I looked out the window and checked the billowing trees and crashing rain. Then The Neurons dropped “Manic Monday”, written by Prince, performed by the Bangles, released in 1986. But then, watching rain and wind and a single scrub jay out the window, Les Neurons pulled up another 1986 song, a reflective tune by The Steve Miller Band called “I Want to Make the World Turn Around”. It starts with a sax, which surprised me when I learned it was a Steve Miller offering. Wasn’t startled to learn later that was Kenny G. playing sax. Had that feel.

Today is December 26, 2022. Hope you and yours can seize the day. Sun rose here at 7:38 and will set at 4:45. The high will be 56 F and there’s a wind warning out. Right now, it’s 51 F. A Christmas cactus sits in sunshine in the living winter, offering some joy in its red blossoms. Other than, it’s just another Monday.

Time for coffee. Cheers

December 26, 2022 3

Friday’s Theme Music

Salutations to Earth peeps. Friday is storming in across many parts of the States. Wind and snow are shutting down airports and highways even as people hunt for ways to reach home across the land. We, though have a temperate day working out. Temperature sits at 47 F now with mild rain pecking the land. Not much sunshine in evidence as clouds veil it but a high of 52 F is modeled as probable.

Today is December 23, 2022. Seven days until the year’s end. A new one will begin and as they say, the beat goes on. The sun’s visit began in the day’s early morning, 7:37, and will go for another seven hours and six minutes. Huzzah.

My feline boys are enjoying our weather shift. Both went out to stand sentry on the front porch. Papi also did a little patrolling. They’re happy floofs for the mo’.

My wife’s holiday treat preparation lies behind Los Neurons’ song selection. Something about the season brings her to use peppermint in some of her treats. Smelling that, Los Neurons said, “Remember this 1967 song?”

“Incense & Peppermints” by the Strawberry Alarm Clock commenced playing in the mental music stream last night and still rides the brain waves this morning. Do you know this song? “Who cares what games we choose? Little to win but nothing to lose.” Nothing to lose is often heard in ‘Merica. Back against the wall in your mind and pockets empty, despair dwelling in your spirit, why not go for broke? Nothin’ to lose.

Hope you stay positive and test negative and reach the new year, and the new year becomes a new start that ends up meaningful. Here’s the music. Now it’s me to get down with coffee time. Cheers

December 23, 2022 0

Thursday’s Theme Music

“Out in the fog, the fog dancers begin moving. They only appear when it’s foggy. The thicker the fog, the more fog dancers there will be. They want humans to come out, walking in the fog, so the fog dancers can grab them and make them one of their own. If you become a fog dancer, you’ll dance for the rest of your life and never see sunlight again.

“That’s why I don’t go out in the fog.”

I don’t remember this, as I apparently did it on a whim, but my sisters insist that I told them this story when I was about twelve. My three youngest sisters said the fog terrified them for years. They said that I also said that adults know about this and that’s why they don’t go out into the fog. It worked well because Mom would always say, “Oh, I don’t like the fog,” and shiver whenever she looked out and saw fog.

As I said, the sisters claim that I told them this, and I don’t doubt them. Sounds like me. I think of it today because pretty deep fog is out there. Some trees and bushes look like fog dancers.

Remember the movie, The Fog? The sisters said that as soon as they heard of that movie, they remembered my tale.

It’s December 22, 2022. Just three days before the C holiday. And then, boom, the after Christmas shopping rush begins. It’s nutty.

36 F out there today, with timid sunshine squirming through the fog. S’posed to rain today. That’s the weather rumor. 49 F is to be our high before the sun peters out of the valley at 4:42 later today, just seven hours and five minutes after the sun kicked over the eastern mountains.

Got “Rockafeller Skank” by Fatboy Slim from 1988 occupies the morning mental music stream. I know exactly when The Neurons turned it on this morning. I’d raised the blinds, looked out and saw the fog. The Neurons responded to this by opening, “Right about now, the funk soul brother, check it out now, the funk soul brother.” Fog and funk. Sure, makes sense. I think The Neurons are losing it on some days, but I enjoy the song. Not many lyrics and easy to learn. I had a friend a few years after this song was released who always insisted, “That’s not really music.”

Stay positive and test negative.

December 22, 2022 2

Monday’s Theme Music

Long, thin shadows slash the ground as sunshine creeps out of the mists like a forgotten movie star. Monday has come on us again, regular as a calendar. It’s December 19, 2022, and the southern Oregon temperature hovers at 27 degrees F. The sunny disposition of the twenty-four-hour cycle commenced at 7:35 this morning and will be completed with the sun’s turning away at 4:41 this PM. These are colder days than we’re used to, on average. It’s 27 F now, but we’re used to the bottom being 31 F. The highs are closer to average, 46, and that’s what we’ll see today. But this extended period of temperatures dipping into the low to mid-twenties is a winter flavor that we taste in the winter months, but not every day, and it’s not winning me over as other things that I taste every day has done, such as coffee. It’s not like the cold temperatures are delivering some wonderful winter scenes of snow to give it that holiday feel. No, autumn colors have fled. Although grasses are green, the annuals are brown and naked. The land just looks weary.

Yeah, in a darker place today, a culmination of matters which really don’t matter, but try telling that to your brain and emotions, yeah? Yeah. Has me thinking of 1991. 1991 was a transition year for me, coming back from Europe to the U.S., and re-developing my relationship with American culture. 1991 seems like yesterday, as does 1985, and 1975, and many other years, but are all receding further into my past.

Today’s reflective, melancholy mélange has The Neurons playing a 1991 tune by Yes called “Lift Me Up”. Music groups have their own life cycles and Yes has a long, complicated existence. Two versions of Yes as a group were out there for a while, arguing over the right to be Yes. This song is off an album called Union with songs from both Yes factions. It was a real Yes mess but I like this Yes song. It has the usual progressive nuances which occupy every Yes song. Hope you enjoy it and it does a memory thingy for you as it has for me.

Stay pos and test neg. Endure and get on through the lows and highs, however much they swallow and lift you. Now, where is my coffee? It feels like a coffee day. Of course, so does every day, IMO. Here’s the 1991 music, courtesy of 2022 technology and commerce. Cheers

December 19, 2022 3

Sunday’s Theme Music

Sunshine casts its web over the valley. Highlighted by a blue sky, shadow places are hard with white frost under the green pines and naked annuals.

It’s 21 F out but warming, which we’ll do until petering out at 42 F. The sun’s valley march commenced at 7:34 in the morning and though the march is ever going, our view of it will fade away beginning at 4:41, when curvature and action eliminates our view and negates the sun’s effects. Then we’ll endure the cold night and the whole cycle continues tomorrow.

This is Sunday, December 18, 2022. Time to do your next to last Sunday of the month cleaning, shopping, and celebrating. I don’t recognize the next to last Sunday, myself. Disguised as just another day, it slinks past my unwitting senses and drifts into the past.

We attended a Christmas concert yesterday. Friends play in the orchestra so we support them and buy a ticket and attend. It’s a fun time. They have only four concerts a year, not for the seasons, but for holidays of the seasons. Next will be the Spring Concert, though, just to toss a spanner into it.

As the oboe played its note and the others matched it to ensure they’re in tune, I sang the note in the audience, softly under my mask. My wife heard and leaned over with a chuckle. “Getting in tune?” she asked.

Well, of course. The Neurons immediately pulled up the Who rock classic, “Getting in Tune”, from 1971. But they surprised me by shifting to another Who song, “The Song Is Over” off the same album a little later, when we were waiting to see, is this a pause between movements or is the song over? Do we applaud now? Some audience sections had been fooled once. But it was over, so we clapped in appreciation, and The Neurons planted “The Song Is Over” into my mental music stream, where it remained this morning.

That’s impressive staying power because, other music. The Neurons were barraged with the usual Christmas popular favorites, like “Frosty the Snowman” and “Jingle Bells”, and a personal favorite, “March of the Toys”. I was introduced to MotT when I attended a concert as a young boy. Then I later saw Babes in Toyland, which left a staying mark. The Neurons shrugged it off, so here I sit with the Who. Love the opening piano in this song, though. Evocative to me. Then, of course, come the other familiar Who elements of bass, drums, and guitar notes dancing with the vocals.

Stay positive, test negative, and so on. Just got word via text that a third of my Pittsburgh nieces and nephews are sick with flu, along with a sister and her hubby. All adults were vaxxed. Word isn’t known on the children. I wish them all speedy recovers.

“On coffee, on bagel, on oatmeal, and dressing.” Sorry, The Neurons got a little silly there, substituting morning things for Santa’s reindeers as they’re called out by name in Clement’s classic. Here’s the music. Catch you later. Cheers

December 18, 2022 3

Thursday’s Theme Music

Thursday is found and stuck into place. Just like that, the puzzle known as 2022 gets closer to completion. Fitting these final pieces into place is a challenge that I best face when I’m coffee-fied. They’re so very similar. Like yesterday, today, December 15, 2022, is cold (29 F this morning), foggy, with wee, thin sunshine doing little to dint the gray quilt of fog and clouds and chilly winter air. Even the floofs are muttering, brr, with Papi leveling a dagger gaze at the world in expression of his disdain for the weather.

Though sunrise kicked in at 7:32, light at 6:27 AM was astonishing. I easily navigated through the house to let Papi out. Sunset will arrive at 4:40 this afternoon to close out this puzzle piece. Our temperature’s high point will be 5 C.

My wife popped home last night from her holiday book club and said, “I have the weirdest earworm.” She then sang the Texaco jingle. “You can trust your car to the man who wears the star, the big, white, Texaco star.” I had to laugh at that one as I tried remembering when I’d last heard it.

I have a different song in my morning mental music stream. Out walking in the cold day yesterday, I spied multiple home challenged folks trying to keep warm. It’s a constant thing here. We as a community pursue multiple prongs to help, chasing something sustainable and permanent as a solution. It’s been no bueno. Watching them and thinking about them, wondering how they’ve come to be in this situation, The Neurons fed “What’s It Like” by Everlast from 1998 into the music stream. I share it with you for theme music on this December day.

Stay positive, test negative, etc. I’m up for coffee once again. Here’s the music. Hope you enjoy it and experience a day that helps you finish the puzzle that’s you.

Cheers

December 15, 2022 2

The Writing Moment

It’d been an eyeblink. He’d been writing like crazy. He swears that he felt like he just sat down and opened the docs, delving into the novel, picking up the pieces of where he is and where he was going.

Coffee remains in his cup, but it is cold. This is an icy day, and the cold coffee doesn’t entice him. His rear end resents the chair’s hard seat. He has no idea how much he wrote and revised. Three more chapters were added and edited, other sections put under the editing grinder and polished, ensuring these new pieces fit smoothly as possible for this draft.

Time to stand up, stretch, and breathe. Back to life.

Back to reality.

He smiled as The Neurons remembered that song and stuck in his music stream. Fortunately, coffee shop music flowed in and overpowered the Soul II Soul song.

He wondered, though, will it show up in tomorrow’s morning mental music stream?

December 14, 2022 2

Wednesday’s Theme Music

A winter Wednesday morning to you. No snow here in the lower levels, but the temperatures and air quality has us singing that winter is upon us. No surprise, it being December 14, 2022, a nose hair short of mid-month. -2 C and foggy out there. The fog will grumble and fuss around the trees and houses for most of the morning but burn off and permit sunshine’s entrance. Daylight crept through the valley’s fog at 7:32 this morning. By the time the sun lowers its from our presence, the air temp is supposed to jump up to 46 degrees F. It may do so but yesterday’s 42 degrees felt like 34, as they say.

After perusing some morning news headlines, I pulled an early cup of coffee, and wrote the dream journal up. Les Neurons then then pulled me down a ‘where are they now’ path about a one-time neighbor and co-worker. We were serving the Air Force together at Onizuka AFB in the mid-nineties last century. Before Onizuka was renamed to honor an astronaut killed in t he Challenger disaster, it was Sunnyvale Air Station. It went from Air Station to Air Force Base to Air Base after being renamed Onizuka.

That has nothing to do with my friend. Last which I heard of him, he’d gone to Turkey on an unaccompanied assignment, returned to Florida, divorced, and retired. He and I ‘connected’ on Facebook but little was ever there of him except for annual birthday greetings from people I don’t know. He’d quit responding to those a decade ago. Alive or dead, The Neurons wonder.

Today’s song, brought to you by The Neurons and their ‘where are they now’ tour, is “Cut Like A Knife” by Bryan Adams from 1983. This is because the tour subject loved this song. Midway through a party, he’d request it. If he’d imbibed enough and it was late enough, he’d sing and play air guitar to the song. Thinking of him, I think of that song, and cigarettes and beer.

Hope you enjoy it. Stay pos and test neg. I gather from reading digital news papiers that a growing body of folks eschews such quaint measures as masking, testing, etc. “It’s nothing,” you read more often online even as rates of flu and COVID climb. Certainly, local store experiences find my wife and I in a tiny minority when we’re masked while shopping. Oh well, live and learn.

Here’s the tunes. I need to wrap up morning activities, and head to the coffee house for writing activities. Hope your day is safe but enjoyable. Let’s go on a limb and say, productive, too, right?

Cheers

December 14, 2022 2

Monday’s Theme Music

Chilly and cloudy, Monday touched down. The 7:30 sunrise glowed over a damp land. Clouds dropped their bottoms, hiding the ridges so I don’t know if snow is up there. It’s 36 F now. The weather systems and complications of axis tilt and our position in respect to the sun has 40 F as the day’s high before we spin away from the sun again at 4:39 PM. Then our temperature will drop to minus 2 C. Despite the cloud blockade, they say it won’t rain or snow.

This is 12/12/2022. We’re approaching December’s midpoint. And we’re hurtling toward winter solstice again. Also coming into view is a bevy of holidays with all the traditions, partying, celebrating, and observances which accompanies the holidays like a rock star’s entourage.

I don’t know what The Neurons are thinking today. After I finished with my dream journal and then posted one dream recollection (a drecollect) online, The Neurons put “Elvira” as covered by the Oak Ridge Boys (1981) in the morning mental music stream. Why the heck was Elvira selected? Don’t know. I know the song and several more by them as they were on the radio, and we lived with the radio on in the car and at home during that period, first in Texas, and then on Okinawa. Also, we met up with my SIL during leave when we moved from Texas to overseas. She was a huge ORB fan at the time. Like her and many others, I enjoy Richard’s deep solo. (Yeah, I needed to look up his name.)

Sunshine is blasting through the southern windows. I think coffee will go swell with that. Stay pos, test neg. Here’s the boys with their tune. Cheers