Tag: Bruce Springsteen

Sunday’s Theme Music

Sunset, sunrise. Sunset, sunrise. Heat down, heat up. Heat down…

Same ol’, same ol’. A routine enjoyed as a child. Now, admiring the wilting, crackling brown leaves and bushes and dried out grasses, I’m less enamored of the beautiful rain-free broiler days.

Hello! Welcome to Independence Day in the U.S., the 4th of July, aka July 4, 2021. Many will celebrate the holiday with swimming and boating, grilling out, and music. Others will be working to help the rest of us celebrate independence.

We will be without fireworks this year. No parades, either. The flyover, symbolic of, um, something, would be taking place in five minutes. We’d be at Pam’s house. One of the few brick houses on Siskiyou. Built over seventy years ago, the house is a treasured mix of modern thinking, modern when it was built, modernized at different remodeling eras.

Carrying our food in — my wife usually made her Mexican quiche, which is very popular — we’ll put it on the big wooden dining table with the other food offerings and eye the assortment. Fruit salads often dominate. Someone, though, will bring a cobbler. Others will ferry in pies. Additional quiches will compete with my wife’s dish. Variations on potatoes always draws a crowd. Cookies will be in the mix, and cinnamon rolls. Baklava. Coffee, lemonade, water, and tea is available. Greetings will be given to people we rarely see, updates provided on health and life events since the last encounter. Then seats will be sought on the road so we can see the parade.

Not this year, as it wasn’t last year. But, like last year, our friends came through and carried on with some small measure of routine. Root beer floats and fireworks are part of our tradition, thanks to these friends who know how to socialize and somehow like us. Well, they like my wife and permit her to bring me along. She does, because I drive her. No fireworks, but the root beer floats were a joy to the palate, and the conversation in the small group was relaxed and entertaining. Made for a memorable fourth by what was there and what was missing.

All this holiday thinking brought out CCR and Bruce Springsteen. I went with Bruce for today and “Born in the USA” from thirty-seven years ago. Stay positive, test negative, wear masks if/when/where they help, and get the vax. Here’s the tune. Happy holiday. There go the jets. Not.

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Thursday’s Theme Music

Hello, and welcome to this edition of Thursday. Today’s date is February 18, 2021. The temperature is 39 degrees F under sporadic rain, a vast difference from yesterday’s sunny disposition. The sunrise was at 7:03 AM while sunset is expected at 5:47 PM in Ashland. You know that means we’re moving closer to springing ahead, right?

We’re not enduring those horrible winter storms challenging most of the nation. We stayed too warm due to some weather system off of Oregon’s coast. It doesn’t save anything north of Eugene. Up there, they’ve been battered. Move east, the storm managed to sweep down over the plain states and invade Texas. Those proud Texans are asking for help. Some, like elected officials such as Mayor Tim Boyd of Colorado City, and Senator Ted Cruz, don’t particularly care. They could be wearing Melania’s infamous, “I Don’t Care Do You?” jacket.

‘Boyd told people without water to “think outside the box to survive” and called people waiting in the cold because they have no power “lazy” – even as authorities were telling people to stay home to avoid icy roads.

“Bottom line quit crying and looking for a handout!!” he said, before finishing off his message in capital letters,”DONT [be] PART OF PROBLEM, BE A PART OF THE SOLUTION!!”‘

That’s leadership. Meanwhile, Ted Cruz, demonstrating his concern, flew to Cancun.

Today’s song choice is “Glory Days”, a 1985 Bruce Springsteen offering. Glory days is an affliction that affect many as they peak at an early age and then continue to tell stories about who they once were, and what they did. I was thinking of it because I wondered if the United States was afflicted by glory days, telling about what we once did as the nation falls apart. Hope you enjoy the music. Remember, stay warm, positive, and safe, and test negative.

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Wednesday’s Theme Music

I had “Some Enchanted Evening” stuck in my head last night. The song is from the musical, South Pacific. I know all of South Pacific; Mom had the soundtrack — on 33 RPM vinyl — and played it often.

The words were a little different for me last night. Instead of singing “stranger”, I was singing, “Kitty”, as in cat, because I was singing to a cat. Youngblood (aka Meep, official floof de plume, Papi, but aka the ginger boy) was sitting in a chair across the room watching me. I sang to him. He didn’t look impressed. His expression said, “I see no food…”

To get that melody out of mind, I began entertaining other songs. I’d seen Bruce Springsteen on SNL last weekend, so I started shuffling Springsteen tunes. “Brilliant Disguise” (1987) caught and stayed.

Here we go. Stay positive, test negative, wear a mask, and get a vaccine. That is all.

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Bruce Floofsteen

Bruce Floofsteen (floofinition) – Floofmerican vocalist and songwriter, leader of the Floof Street Band.

In use: “Among Bruce Floofsteen’s many songs are “Thunder Feet”, “Born to Bark”, and “Playin’ in the Dark”, but ask one of his many fans and they’d probably name a dozen more.”

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A Knowledge Dream

This dream could’ve been named a number of things. I first referred to it as the “Born to Run” dream. Then, as I remembered it, I decided the new title was more appropriate.

I was traveling by airlines in America through multiple, crowded airports. After going through Duluth, Minnesota, I went through Fargo, North Dakota. After Fargo, I found myself in a huge building. We’re talking a Superbowl stadium size.

Old, the building was well-maintained, with cavernous but mostly empty rooms except for towering gray cabinets. A woman introduced herself as a director. I was at a knowledge warehouse. Speaking to the air, the director told her staff to assist me with whatever I wanted. She told me to fill out my requests on a request form. The request form should include a learning objective. Catalogs of learning objectives were in the cabinets. I could use them to expedite the process.

Six other students showed up. They’d arrived before me but were coming to meet me and continue with their requests. The director asked me how I got there. After thinking, I said that I’d come through Fargo because that was the best way to get there. After acknowledging that, she departed.

I quickly completed a half-dozen learning objective requests. The other students went off to continue their learning. Thick folders for the first learning objectives soon arrived. Within minutes, I had a stack of them in front of me. Perusing them, I selected one for attention and started reading it as I walked around.

I found myself with a microphone. The warehouse was lit like a stage so I decided to perform “Born to Run”. As I was doing my performance, I realized that security cameras were present. Embarrassed, I quit my performance. Someone was trying to raise me, but I ignored him because I didn’t want to be mocked.

Wandering the warehouse, I soon found myself in wooded thicket. Movement ahead drew my interest. After some investigation, I saw a squirrel, and then a cat, and realized that the cat was chasing the squirrel.

I was summoned back to a meeting room. The other students were there. We sat at a table and talked about our learning objectives. More folders arrived for me. The director called for a few of us to go into another room with one specific folder. It was our choice which folder to bring.

Aha, epiphany. I needed to decide where I wanted to go, and it was a journey to a different, isolated location. I also had the responsibility to educate myself but resources were available to help.

Now, weirdly, the dream ended with “Sunshine, Lollipops and Rainbows” by Lesley Gore (1963).

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Sunday’s Theme Music

Today’s theme music is another throwback that popped into the morning’s music stream.

Born in the USA was a huge hit album for Bruce Springsteen. Released in 1984 when we were stationed on Okinawa, in Japan, it was the first CD that we bought after buying a CD player and then searching for something to play on it. Seems like a lifetime ago. Was, when you think about the years, what’s that, 2019 minus 2084? Yeah, do the math.

I enjoyed every song on that album but the one my mind chose to stream today is “Cover Me”. “The whole world is out there, just trying to score. I’ve seen enough, don’t want to see any more, cover me. Wrap your arms around me, cover me.”

We saw Bruce perform “Cover Me” during his Tunnel of Love tour in Frankfurt, Germany, in 1988. Good show.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r13kXZKe4IA

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Friday’s Theme Music

Watching Bernadette Peters in Mozart in the Jungle reminded me of the movie she did with Clint Eastwood, Pink Cadillac. I never thought much of that movie. It seemed to drag and was straightforward, without much comedy or thought. But, my synapses also linked up to a song, “Pink Cadillac” by Bruce Springsteen. Released in 1984, the song echos with a beat and sound from decades before, with a quasi Peter Gunn feel. I like it. A good song to stream while walking through a day trying to find spring.

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The Best & Worst

Several good results emerge from being able (and maybe allowing myself) to stream music in my brain.

  1. A power supply is always available. Don’t need to worry about AC/DC, plugging in anywhere, or recharging anything.
  2. No headphones, speakers, or ear buds required.
  3. They’re already paid for, so financial expenditures are limited to acquiring new materials, if and when I’m required to pay for them.
  4. A lot of my favorites are played.

Some negatives do exist.

  1. It’s hard to turn some songs off.
  2. The mental streaming algorithms seem to favor repetition.
  3. It’s a limited library of songs.

And of course, free will is often derailed. For instance, right now I’m streaming this.

The highway’s jammed with broken heroes on a last chance power drive
Everybody’s out on the run tonight
but there’s no place left to hide
Together Wendy we can live with the sadness
I’ll love you with all the madness in my soul
Oh-oh, someday girl I don’t know when
we’re gonna get to that place
Where we really wanna go
and we’ll walk in the sun
But till then tramps like us
baby we were born to run

h/t AZLyrics.com

It’s not by choice, and it’s been running about thirty minutes. Stream along with me, if you know the tune.

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