Category: pop culture

Saturday’s Theme Music

Being limited in travel, my mind has been muttering about how it’s been a while since we’ve done different things. With many of these things, it’s been a while with or without COVID-19 and its associated policies and limitations; it’s just life that these things have been a while.

My brain likes to explore these thoughts, hook up with the main theme, and then regurgitate a song with that theme in it. Today, it’s Staind with “It’s Been Awhile” (2001). Because, brain does what brain does. (How do you like that tautology?)

Other than the self-questioning, my life has little to do with this song. “It’s Been Awhile” is about drug addiction, with a reflective nuance about the stupid things that he’s done which haunt him. Now I can relate to doing stupid things; I wouldn’t be me without executing a stupid idea once in a while. (“It seemed like a good idea at the time.”)

So, I can relate to it being a while since I’ve done some stupid things. Guess I’m overdue.

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Twisted Floof

Twisted Floof (floofinition) – American hard floof rock (flock band) originally from Floof Jersey, but more recently citing Floof Island as home.

In use: “Twisted Floof’s songs, “We Are Gonna Take It” and “I Wanna Run”, have long been recognized as rebellious anthems appealing to adolfloofents.”

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Friday’s Theme Music

Masked up and went walking yesterday. Of the ten pedestrians I encountered, one was masked. So, about eighteen percent are masked when out and about, contrary to guidance.

Our little town has a reported ten COVID-19 cases. That’s an unofficial count. The county has had fifty-two cases. Social distancing and sheltering-in-place has been practiced, but most only wear masks when in stores, because the stores demand it. So, I suspect our low count is due to our rural nature, limitations on travel, and luck. I hope it all holds.

While out exercising my legs, I realized I was humming a song and identified it as the Rush song, “Freewill” (1980). I have one friend who was a devoted Rush fan and another who can’t stand Rush because they don’t like Geddy Lee’s voice. The Rush lyrics rushed in with these memories (sorry for the pun).

A planet of playthings
We dance on the strings
Of powers we cannot perceive
The stars aren’t aligned
Or the gods are maligned
Blame is better to give than receive

[Hook]
You can choose a ready guide in some celestial voice
If you choose not to decide, you still have made a choice
You can choose from phantom fears and kindness that can kill
I will choose a path that’s clear, I will choose freewill

h/t to Genius.com

These lyrics are taken in different ways by different people. (Well, words, right? That’s how it goes with words.) I’ve always thought that the song referred to thinking for yourself. I like to believe I think for myself. I wear a mask because that’s recommended; studies show it helps reduce viral transmission.

Maybe I am sheeple, as non-mask fans charge. Perhaps my twenty plus years in the military conditioned me to obey orders without question. Don’t think so, myself; I was known for challenging orders.

Then again, we select and frame the information and memories that best suit what we want to know as the facts, don’t we? We’re each in our own bubble. We try to control what comes in and goes out but there’s quite a bit beyond our control.

Nebulous? No, complicated. One thing that I’ve discovered as I’ve aged is that I’m not the person who I think I am. My window into myself is as limited as my windows into others. My body is often doing things that I don’t know, responding to chemicals in ways that science knew but I didn’t, and my brain often reacts before I think. We depend on surface impressions and isolated moments to inform our decisions. Some of them are magnified in importance – in our heads – rising on waves of emotions and intellect.

Such complicated beasts we are in a complicated world. Which takes me back to “Freewill” and Rush. You make a choice. Sometimes it seems to work, other times, it seems to flop, but a lot of times, we’re forever waiting to learn the results.

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Dream Snippets

So many diverse dream elements last night. Here’s two of five. It’s too exhausting and time-consuming to recount more. These left the greatest impression. First, the game show.

A flood had wrecked a place. I felt it could be salvaged. Seeing how it could be done, I convinced the network to give me a chance to execute.

Things immediately started going wrong but I kept persevering. I ended up with two basketball hoops at one end. Two young women were assisting. I had a nerf basketball. Then I started attempting explaining what was supposed to happen. As that’s going on, it was announced time’s up. You’re going live.

I wasn’t supposed to be on the air, but there I was, throwing the nerf ball and falling miserably to make a basket. I kept throwing the ball to the hoop; it fell well short. I then decided to bank it off the backboard. That fell well short.

“It can’t be done,” I said. “We need a different ball.”

One assistant replied, “We’ve been doing it with this ball.” Another man stepped up, threw the ball and made a basket.

Everyone was laughing at me. Embarrassment and frustration flooded me. The network said, “Hey, people are watching you. They’re enjoying this. You have a hit.”

The next segment took me into the kitchen. My wife and I were cooking. She put a pot on the stove and turned on the fire. The pot immediately boiled over. Calling my wife, I removed the pot from the stove and turned off the flame. The yellow flame didn’t go off, but spread, going over other food and dishes on the counter, horrifying me. Then the flame went out.

My wife came in. I told her what’d happened but she made a comment, took the pot, announced, “That’s done,” and left, telling me to turn something else on.

I reached for the stove. Yellow flames sprang up and spread. I withdrew my hand. The flames went out. Nothing was burning; it was just flames.

Outside now, in a new section, my wife, friends, and others were talking. My wife had won something and had a large clear bag of stuff. “I don’t know what’s in it,” she said. I suggest we open it and separate it.

We found car parts. Toilet cistern repair kits (which looked nothing like it should, but I knew what it was). I was suspicious, thinking that several piles had been mixed together, but didn’t voice that. My wife took what she wanted and tossed the rest.

A friend came by, complaining that another friend had lost some things and telling me where the other friend said he’d left them. As he went off, I called after him, “Was it car parts and toilet parts?”

The other friend kept walking away. The dream ended.

 

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Whitefloof

Whitefloof (floofinition) – Hard floof rock (flock) band prominent in the late 1970s and throughout the 1980s, known for their ballads and power chords.

In use: “Whitefloof’s most well-known song among floofs is likely, “Here I Floof Again” (1982), which was a major hit in the U.S.A.”

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Thursday’s Theme Music

An old familiar song entered my head yesterday as I did yard work. Written by John Fogerty, the Status Quo cover of “Rockin’ All Over the World” (1977?) kept me coming.

The mind introduced the song toward the yard work’s beginning. Addressing an issue that I had to do, I told myself, “Here we go.” That invited the song’s refrain, “Here we go, here we go,” in. Once invited in, like a vampire, it can do whatever it was; I’d let it in.

It’s a simple rock song, upbeat and happy, a throwback to simpler times. Your impression of simpler times will vary according to your mileage and mindset, but it works for me.

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Wednesday’s Theme Music

I often wish that I was more ignorant of the world, that I lacked the capacity to see the big picture, understand the science, recall history, and remember the lies.

Not a genius nor overly bright or educated, I recall matters and critically examine almost everything that crosses my mind and my eyes. Doesn’t help that I’m married to a similar person; we feed off one another. Nor does it help that throughout my military and civilian positions and work, others saw these traits in me and honed them. I become overly critical and analytical; any skill that becomes too dominant can be a liability.

I’d like to live in a ‘just-pretend’ world where things are better, which is probably why I write. I’m attracted to writing detective stories where the main character is deeply flawed and struggles with seeing the good in others over his insights into the wrongs that they do, no matter how small the wrongs. Always on the top of that list is his own wrongs.

Likewise, dystopian fiction, where governments, corporations, religions, and individuals have misled others so they can advance themselves or keep themselves in power, always attracts me. It’s a dark world for my characters.

No surprise, then, my thoughts on the novel coronavirus pandemic of 2020 is that civilizations are poor learning organizations, not infrequently out of step with one another. It’s a messy dance floor where different music is heard by almost everyone. It’s the nature of trying to meld political weld out of individual agendas. We advance by degrees. I always think we could advance more quickly. Yet, too, disagreement and debate are required and healthy for relationships, including governments, societies, and civilizations. It’s when facts become distorted that it gets unhealthy.

Into this mess of morning thinking, prompted by a restless night of writing in my head and chasing dreams, is Jackson Brown’s first hit, “Doctor, My Eyes”, from 1972. His lyrics about seeing too much, looking too long, and how it has influenced his life view, has always been a favorite.

It’s worthy theme music for a rona Wednesday.

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The Stone Floofs

The Stone Floofs (floofinition) – A floof rock (frock) band hailing from Floofchester, England, formed in 1983.

In use: “The Stone Floofs song, “Fur Sheds”, is considered one of the greatest comeback songs for any frock band in history.”

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Tuesday’s Theme Music

I have a few pieces of the old Berlin Wall in my office, along with a piece of the original original barbed wire. Yeah, so it’s all claimed; none of it is authenticated.

They’re symbols of oppression and come to mind now because of the constant chatter about people being oppressed. Businesses aren’t permitted to open, or open with severe restrictions. The restrictions are in the name of health and safety; the people protesting them believe that either the government can’t be trusted, that the restrictions are part of a larger plot, or that state, local, and Federal governments don’t have the right to make such restrictions in the name of safety and security.

Anyway, the discussions and disagreements are building metaphorical walls. The Berlin Wall eventually fell; the Great Wall still stands. I wonder how high our walls will go and how long they’ll stand?

Meanwhile, a John (Cougar) Mellencamp song, “Crumblin’ Walls”, 1983, came to mind. I saw him in concert twice, surprisingly in Germany both times.

Enough of this verbal nattering. To the music.

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Iron Floof (II)

Iron Floof (II) (floofinition) – Commercially successful English heavy floof rock (flock) band formed in 1975, considered a leader of the new wave of heavy flock. Not to be confused with Iron Floof (I), an American heavy flock band famous for its long composition, “In-A-Kitcha-Da-Vida”, which was a floofstream hit in the late 1960s.

In use: “Iron Floof’s third studio album, The Number of the Floof, became the band’s first number one album in the UK, but was followed by many more as the group’s floof base increased.”

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