Friday’s Wandering Thought
Friday’s Theme Music
Hi, Friheads. It’s 31 degrees F on this sunny Friday morning. Today’s date is December 10, 2021. The high will be 36 F. The burst of gold we call sunrise struck at 7:28 AM and the sun parade will cease at 4:39 this afternoon.
We’re calling it sunny but a flotilla of long, sketchy clouds are cruising the altitudes, pulling a foggy net behind them. Then the sun fires beams at the fog and zips it away. Looks like the weather might be variable today.
I don’t know why, but REO Speedwagon’s 1980 song, “Keep On Loving You”, inhabits the morning mental music stream. Bit mellow for this Friday AM. I was thinking that I needed something with a hard beat to stir my feet. I reflected on the lyrics for a while, looking for a connection. It came out just before our move to Okinawa on military assignment. I listened to the song quite a bit on the rock but I can’t connect dots between now and then. Something with the dreams? Can’t address that. Only remember two and half dreams from last night. Nothing in them relates to the song. Cats? Doesn’t seem to be. They’ve headed outside, into the sunshine, despite the cold air temp. Wife? Perhaps something on the subconscious level is there. Or maybe it’s a response to life. Feeling a little down and weary this AM. It’s a monthly thing, where the effort and tedium just sucks the joy out down to the dregs. Life dregs are like coffee dregs: cold, black, and bitter.
Well, stay positive! (Ha, ha.) Test negative, wear a mask as needed — have you been following the Omicron developments? — and get the jabs when you can. Reading this morning that Omicron might cause the pandemic of the vaxxed, and they’re suggesting that everyone needs a boost. Got boost? I do. Hope you do as well.
Here’s my coffee. Oh, sorry, you’re looking for the music. Here’s the music. Have a better one. Cheers
Thursday’s Theme Music
“Sunshine,” my heart shouted. “Blue skies! Woo hoo!”
“I see some fog rolling in over the mountains,” my brain replied.
“Shut up,” my heart snapped. “You’re always trying to bring me down with your facts. Just let me enjoy the sunshine.”
“They say snow is on the way,” my brain observed.
So began Thursday, December 9, 2021, with a little heart and brain give and take. At 7:28 AM, the sun cracked the sky and sunshine spilled through the valley. The sun fest will continue until 4:39 PM. It’s 31 degrees F outside right now, and sunny, as my heart noted. My brain is right, though, snow levels are forecast to drop to 2000 feet and flurries are expected throughout the day. Clouds are marshalling over the ranges outside my western windows as I type.
I have “Crumblin’ Down” by John Cougar Mellencamp (1983) playing in the morning mental music stream. A general sense of change inspired the song’s entry into the brain’s holding pattern. Shifts are going on; walls are tumbling down, which led to crumbling down, which beget — well, you get it.
Stay positive, test negative, wear a mask as needed, and get the jabs when you can. Here’s the music. Where’s my coffee? I must’ve been perambulating about with the cup in hand. Now I’m on a search and drink mission. Cheers
Saturday’s Theme Music
This is it. 2021 is about to enter the home stretch and gallop into history. It’s been a rush of hours. Despite being limited in where we can go, I’ve stayed busy with writing, housework, tending cats, reading, and some limited socializing. My wife, who is more social, laments that we’re just marking time. I don’t feel the same. I’m writing, after holding off on pursuing a writing career, or even much writing effort, while working in the military and business. Wasn’t supposed to be like this; when I retired from the military, I was going somewhere to write. But no; she was pursuing her career and pleaded with me to stay in the SF bay area for that purpose. Five years later, her career was done. One company bought another and she was let go. She never worked again. Meanwhile, I worked another twenty years after putting my twenty in the military. So, not sorry. This is now my time. It may be too late as I dance through my sixties — hell, I can pull my social security now, if I wish. But I’m going on, writing and trying until health or death stops me.
Okay, that screed is out of the way. Today is Saturday, November 27, 2021. Oh, a gray day is on us. One great smear of dull gray clouds blots out the blue sky, sunshine, and surrounding mountain tops. Stillness is holding, like the valley is holding its breath. Sunrise came upon us at 7:15 AM and sunset will take place at 4:45 PM. Temperatures are warmer, already 52 F and we expect 62 F. I’m a little disconcerted by the warm trend. By this time in many past years, we’ve already experienced a few inches of snow from at least one storm. Nothing of that sort has taking place this year. The fear is that the snow we need to have piled onto the pack won’t come, leaving us mired in drought and subject to more wildfires next year. Breath held, fingers crossed.
The COVID-19 Omicron variant is the big news. Just as we thought, hey, a light, maybe it’s the end of the tunnel, another variant hurdles toward us. The world races to react and contain it, headlines blare. We know that’s not true. Many people are shrugging it off as fake news or not really that bad, or so what? Let’s take our chances and die. We’re in the same boat but same don’t care. They’ll pull in the direction that they want, and damn the rest.
Sour mood, isn’t it? And I’m already drinking coffee.
Today’s morning mental music stream is occupied by Rick Astley singing “Never Gonna Give You Up” from 1987. Started because of a cat. He was singing it to me as he tucked in against me in bed this AM, kneading my shoulder with his claws and singing a deep baritone purr. I had to get up to attend other cats and my bladder but the fur beast was singing, “Never gonna give, never gonna give, never gonna give you up.” At least, so it seems to my demented mind.
Stay positive, test negative, wear a mask as needed, and get thyself vaxes and boosters when possible. Looking at the trend started in 2020 and continued in 2021, 2022 is gonna need more patience, more masks, and more endurance.
Here’s the music. Pretty lame video. Think I need more coffee. Cheers
Friday’s Theme Music
Friday’s greetings, fellow voyagers. Today is November 26, 2021. The sun kicked in around our environs at 7:14 AM, guiding us out of the dark night into the bright day and lifting our temperatures from 35 degrees F to 37. We do expect to climb into the fifties with the temperatures as clouds and sunshine continue the battle of evermore. The sun will steel away with its light and warmth at 4:46 PM. We’ll do our best to enjoy the hours between.
Speaking of evermore, I have “The Battle of Evermore” by Led Zeppelin (1971) in my morning mental music stream. Came upon when I was out last night. We’d finished Friendsgiving on some friends’ farm. It was about 8:30 PM. I was preparing to leave. I stepped outside, out in the country a bit where their property sits, and admired the stars and breathed the air. Memories from doing this as a child, teenager, and adult throughout my life came up and stood beside me. Hence the song’s presence. We’re here for a short while, but those stars are evermore.
Stay positive, test negative, listen to the music (like how I slipped that in there?), wear a mask as needed, and get the vax and boosters when you can. Just read of another variant emerging in Africa which has kicked the stock market down the stairs. COVID-19 and its variants seem like they’ll be another facet of evermore. Don’t get complacent now.
And now, coffee time. Here’s the music. Cheers
Wednesday’s Theme Music
Happy hump day, camels. Maybe it’s hump day for you. Wednesday is often so designated. Mid-week, people consider it the hardest to bestir themselves to endure. Hardest to get up, process, and function. Even coffee and energy drinks seem to do little…for a while. But then, as the morning hours pass and the afternoon arrives, they realize, they’re going to make it. And if they can make it through Wednesday, they can make it the rest of the week.
Course, hump day isn’t always Wednesday for some people. Some feel hump day on Monday. If they can get through Monday, then all else is gravy. Or hump day is Thursday and if Thursday is survived… You get it. I’ve beaten it sufficiently that little life remains.
Today is November 24, 2021. We’re racing toward the year’s end. Just consider: next Wednesday is December 1.
Sunrise split the valley into light and dark at 7:12 AM. The sun’s warming light will fade out of the valley starting at 4:43 PM. Current temperature is 29 F, according to my thermometer, and the cats agree, declaring, “Cold. Gimme heat.” Net says it’s 39, but then the sun hasn’t actually entered my yard yet. Still just clearing the mountains and forests. Give it time, right? High temp should be 55 today. The sky is deceptively summer blue. Looks warmer than it is.
I have “Little Talks” by Of Monsters and Men from 2011 echoing in the morning mental music stream. The song came about because I was reading about how people read data about the COVID-19 pandemic and vaccinations, and reached their own conclusions about vaccines not working. They called this their truth. They then lamented that they were blocked, locked out, or shut out of whatever forum they were using because they were spreading misinformation. From all of that, I thought of “Little Talks” and the line that goes, “Though the truth may vary, this ship will carry our bodies safe to the shore.”
Yes, the truth can be complicated. What was true a hundred years ago might not be true now. We learn, we grow, we develop new understanding and discover what we held as the truth was wrong. The truth now, though, is that data supports the vaccines, masking, and social distancing. The truth, though, is also that variants will emerge and break through. The truth is that we will know more in a year, and we’re not sure where COVID-19 and humanity will stand at that time.
Damn. Now I need coffee. Stat.
Stay positive, test negative, wear a mask as needed, and get the vax and booster when you can. The truth is, that will help most of us survive. Cheers
Tuesday’s Theme Music
Today is 327, by the Julian calendar. Pretty straightforward, innit, ‘stead of all that Tuesday, November 11, 2021 stuff, but not as poetic and evocative. You give a day, say, Tuesday, and you think of things. Birthdays, work, anniversaries, songs. 327, I pretty much think of a Chevy engine, Corvettes and Camaros. I also think, 3+2+7 = 12 = 1 + 2 = 3.
Sunrise split the gauzy cloud layers at 7:11 AM. The sun will conduct business in our realm until 4:43 PM. No appointment necessary. Temperatures will be warmer for the lows (39) and colder for the highs (45) than yesterday. Rain showers are possible with no great accumulation.
I have the Boomtown Rats playing from 1977 in the morning mental music stream. I ascribe its presence to the holiday shopping season bearing down on us. While it’s supposed to be a season of giving, watching people on the television going nuts buying things really causes me to doubt the purpose behind it all. The car commercials and their enormous sales, about people spending gobs of money to buy a car to make this ‘a season to remember’ doesn’t help at all. The song is all about selfishness, and that’s what I see as the final manifestation of much of the buying going on. It’s a gimme gimme gimme time of year.
Well, stay positive — yeah, sure you’re feeling pos after my minor screedette — test negative for COVID-19, get the vax and booster when you can, and wear a mask as needed. Speaking of needed, I have a need for coffee. Catch you on the flip side. Cheers
Michael Seidel, writer 