Whensday’s Theme Music

Whensday, August 10, 2022, slipped in when our backs were turn. Looks like he’ll stay a day. Maybe two.

You feel that it’s Whensday, a day when questions rise like a two-year-old learning to talk is following you around. Your neurons bombard you with questions. “When is the pandemic going to end? When are things going to get better? When will I be able to relax? When is my package arriving? When is dinner?”

Yeah, I feel very Whensday today.

Sun arrived like a teenager sneaking into the house at 6:13 AM. Won’t go away until 8:19 this evening. I cannot help but notice the reduced time allotted for sunshine in my valley, the product of the orbital spins and revolutions. Temperature is cool but pleasing 18 C. Only anticipating the heat to push the mercury up to 86 F today. Our air quality leaped into the red zone yesterday. The air red zone isn’t the same as in American football. Air red zone means it’s starting to be unhealthy for breathing creatures. It’s dropped back down to the moderate zone this AM. All depends on the winds. Yes, the answer is blowing in the wind.

“Young Americans” by David Bowie (1975) is circulating through the morning mental music stream. (The stream, BTW, is like a rambunctious labyrinth with several connected levels. It’s a boulder strewn rockin’ place.) It arrived after reading through news stories and then taking a contemplative stance to question, “What will the future be like?” What will the young Americans be like? Will real and sustained change arrive. An eternal optimist, I reply, yeah, but it’s gonna be messy. Won’t be straightforward, will be more like a shuffle back and forth, left and right, up and down, just like most of history has been.

Anyway, here is the song. Hope you enjoy it. Speaking of enjoying, I believe young coffee is patiently waiting in the other room. When will I drink it? I think now is the time. Stay positive, test negative, etc. Cheers

August 10, 2022 0

Monday’s Theme Music

Monday’s 5:35 AM sunrise was sharpish, white light and warmth. The cats were first to say hello before launching into their good morning sunshine song. Our June — this is June 6, 2022 — continues spring’s cool, wet trend. It’s now 51 F. Will likely reach 71 they say, with lots of clouds AND sun. They daylight portion of the day will see its finale with an 8:44 PM sunset.

My neurons, of their own volition — they’re like wild mustangs galloping through my head — began singing snippets of “Life on Mars” by David Bowie from back in the last century, 1973. I enjoyed their snippets and decided I wanted to hear the song in its fullness. Choices were to find it on the net or go to the music collection. The first choice was easiest because I was already on the computer. I found this live version, which brought youthful chords back into the moment. It’s a mood maker, a song where you chew upon the words and let the music take you over, under, and up. Lot of Bowie’s music was so.

Stay positive, test negative, wear a mask as needed, and, etc. The coffee is at hand; the moment is near. Here is the music. Have a good day on Earth. Cheers

June 6, 2022 0

Friday’s Theme Music

Some call it the end of the business week. The last working day. Others call it the start of the weekend. In this 24/7 world, it’s none and all of these. We can agree that it’s Friday, January 28, 2022.

The sun’s golden light silently came up and over the valley’s horizon at 7:28 AM and will take its light and leave at 5:21 PM. Our mild temperatures, a result of stalled systems, continue. Last night’s low was about 36. It’s now 56 and pleasant, and we expect a high of 62. Meanwhile, I’m reading about the bomb cyclone hitting back east, also known as winter storm Kenan, about to do a massive white dump on the U.S. Two feet of snow in places, flooding, possibly hurricane level winds. That, friends, is winter.

I have a David Bowie song fluttering through the morning mental music stream. “John, I’m Only Dancing” was limited in release. Just too risqué for the U.S. in 1972, the very important people in charge (VIPIP) pronounced. I heard it through some small Pittsburgh station who liked rebelling against such restrictions and then I later owned it on Changesonebowie, which came out in 1976, a terrific album for Bowie fans. I could listen to it forever and a day, as Mom would express it.

Here’s the music, and my coffee, right on schedule. Stay positive, test negative, wear a mask as needed, and get the vax and boosters when you can. Cheers

January 28, 2022 0

Monday’s Theme Music

Another Monday has dragged itself to our doorstep, whimpering, here I am. We have no choice but to take the poor critter in and make the best of the day. “We’ll call it December 20, 2021,” we declare.

This Monday is little different from others this season. Windy, with temperatures slogging through the forties. A bleak sun huddles among clouds, displaying a marbled blue-gray sky. Daybreak came at 7:36 AM and sunset is due at 7:41 in the afternoon. Of course, we’re in a valley and the sun sets behind the mountains. Mountain shadows overtake us about 3:30 in the afternoon, cutting off the sun’s scant heat almost instantly.

Was out last night checking out the moon. Strong one, it burst through the clouds, which anointed it with a colorful corona. The clouds restlessly paced and squirmed. Stars and planets showed their faces but were gone in seconds. All that kicked in a David Bowie song, “Starman”, 1972, into the mental music stream. It still resided there this AM. Because the song sings about a starman being out there.

There’s a starman waiting in the sky
He’d like to come and meet us
But he thinks he’d blow our minds
There’s a starman waiting in the sky
He’s told us not to blow it
‘Cause he knows it’s all worthwhile

h/t to Genius.com

Well, let’s hope we don’t blow it. We often seem on the verge.

Stay positive, test negative, wear a mask as needed, and get the vax and boosters when you can. Stay informed and alert. I have my coffee. Now I’m gonna listen to the music. Cheers

December 20, 2021 0

Saturday’s Theme Music

Sun nuzzled us through thinning clouds at 7:17 AM, inviting us to ogle a deep blue sky. Temperatures were hovering in the low forties. Will get up to the mid sixties. But the air is clear and fresh. Leaves are turning colors more rapidly, dropping from trees with alacrity, affecting trees with empty branch syndrome. Sunset on this Saturday, October 9, 2021, will be at 6:39 PM.

I found myself with David Bowie’s song, “Sound and Vision” (1977) in the mental morning music stream. All because of the blinds. The blinds were closed, as we do every night. Renders the house tres dark. Seeing it, I thought, “Pale blinds drawn all day, nothing to read, nothing to say.” Which is a line from the song. Realizing that some song line had randomly dropped into my head, I had to drop a dime to the gods of recall. Success came as more song sputtered in, followed at last by the salient details of artist and year. Had to verify the year, though, via Wikipedia. Was tenuous to me.

First time I ever heard the song, it made me impatient. Like, this is boring. When will he start singing? But I think, retrospectively, that’s what it’s all about. Waiting. Killing time. Especially, if, I imagine, you’ve just gone through some issues, as Bowie had before writing this song. Not my favorite Bowie song — like most music, it depends on my mood — but it still interests me. Plus I like his voice. Cool voice. Much better than the gruff sound that emanates from my coffee hole.

Stay positive, test negative, wear a mask, and get the vax, yeah? Here’s my coffee. Here’s the music. Enjoy. Cheers

October 9, 2021 2

Saturday’s Theme Music

Powerful sunshine kicked in the day. I blinked against the golden warmth. “Sol. What time is it?”

“Time to raise your derriere from the dead.”

“Seriously, time.”

“Time to rise and — “

“Sol, it’s too early.”

“6:32 AM.” Sol sat, flipping rays back from his face. “It’s also Saturday, August 28, 2021, if that matters to you, the last Saturday in August.” Sol sighed. “September is next week, you know. Soon, I’ll be a wintry sun, mourning the cold land from a sad distance.”

“Not everywhere. Just up in the northern climes.”

“True.” Sol sniffed. “An advantage of being omnipresent. I’m always somewhere. Got any coffee?”

“I’ll make some.”

My slumber ended, I peed first, then shuffled into the kitchen. Cats greeted me, falling into step. The necessary feeding detour was executed. “How long are you here today, Sol?” I asked the sun as he joined me in the kitchen.

“Until 7:52 in the evening, thereabouts.” Sol perched himself on the counter. “And I’m in a hot mood. Think it’ll be ninety-five to a hundred today.”

“Ouch.”

Sol watched the coffee making. “Make it strong. I like it strong.”

“Of course.”

“I am the sun, you know.”

“Right, right, got that.”

Sol and I began channeling David Bowie music, falling back into some of his early seventies stuff as coffee brewed, basically working through a compilation album with “Diamond Dogs”, “Rebel, Rebel”, “Space Oddity”, “Changes”, and “Suffragette City”. By the time we finished our first cuppa, we were belting out “The Jean Genie”. Sol and I agreed that should be today’s theme music.

As Sol told me, stay positive — “Like me, I’m always sunny, hah!” — test negative, wear a mask as needed, and get the vax. Here’s the music. Cheers

August 28, 2021 2

Wednesday’s Theme Music

Welcome back my friends, to the show that never ends. Today is Wednesday, March the third, 2021. The great ball of fire rose into our sky at 6:43 AM and will do its exit at 6:03 PM here in southern Oregon. Blue dominates the sky. Although the mercury is at 37 degrees F at this moment, yesterday it went to 63. We expect more of the same as we move through Fool’s Spring and creep back toward Late Winter, projected to hustle in next week.

An old David Bowie song needled its way out of the Wayback Machine into my mental stream this morning. “Fame” was a 1975 hit for Bowie. Bowie, Carlos Alomar, and John Lennon wrote it together. It was Bowie’s first number one hit in the U.S. I think “Fame” is an apt song for the current GOP in the U.S. as Trump sucks the life out of it. He doesn’t have a platform, just a crush of hate. If he weren’t wealthy and famous, he’d probably be locked up for his protection.

Fame (fame) makes a man take things over
Fame (fame) lets him lose hard to swallow
Fame (fame) puts you there where things are hollow
Fame (fame)
Fame not your brain it’s just the flame
That puts your change to keep you sane (sane)
Fame (fame)
Fame (fame) what you like is in the limo
Fame (fame) what you get is no tomorrow
Fame (fame) what you need you have to borrow
Fame (fame)
Fame nein it’s mine is just his line
To bind our time it drives you to crime (crime)
Fame (fame)

h/t to Metrolyrics.com

Yeah, with Trump, what you get is no tomorrow. The gods know he’s had to borrow…

Okay, beat that to death. Stay positive, test negative, wear a mask and get the vax.

Cheers

March 3, 2021 0

Friday’s Theme Music

Well, this is definitely a redux.

I enjoy Bing Crosby and David Bowie’s Christmas duet of “Peace on Earth/Little Drummer Boy” from 1977. I was stationed in the Philippines that year and didn’t see it for over another year. I enjoy the two of them together, legends in their own right, and wildly different. Crosby was 73, and Bowie was 30. Newsweek’s tale of the two is entertaining reading. The banter and setup is true to that television era, and makes me cringe a bit, but their voices blend well.

Happy Christmas to you. Stay positive, test negative, and wear a mask.

December 25, 2020 2

Tuesday’s Theme Music

I went with an old familiar from David Bowie and Queen today. Queen’s Freddie Mercury is gone, along with David Bowie, unnecessary reminders about our final destinations.

They made their marks, though. Thanks to technology, solace can be had by listening to their performances again and again.

As today is election day in the USA (prompting some mental hearing of Alice Cooper and their song, “Elected”), but “Under Pressure” (released in 1981) seems more of a fit. Sadly, that’s because Trump and his followers, abetted by the GOP, are working hard to create obstacles for this civic duty. Once upon a day, the United States had low turnout but the elections themselves were flawlessly executed. A lot of that changed with the hanging chads debacle in Florida in 2000. At least, such is where it seems to start in my mind, as the SCOTUS was called upon to interpret state laws, halt the recount, and declare a winner. Since then, campaigning and elections have become more contentious in the USA.

The nature of Trump’s campaigning and the attributes of his base have added to the pressure. Trump wants votes to not be counted, squalling like an infant over cheating that doesn’t exist, threatening to challenge results in court beforehand, obviously attempting to intimidate voters. Gun and ammo sales are up. The FBI is warning of the threat of violence from armed Trump supporters.

More pressure yet comes from COVID-19. Again, politics are in play. Republican led states are leading as COVID-19 cases climb. As cases climb, hospitals fill, but our healthcare system under greater and greater pressure.

That pressure comes atop the economic pressure instilled by necessary measures to flatter the curve. Experts consistently warned that a sizeable chunk of the US population is working poor, without emergency savings, living from paycheck to paycheck. All that was swept under the rug. Now, coronavirus has curtailed the service and consumer economy, and people are under pressure to have enough money to pay the rent and buy food.

Yeah, it’s a mess. All of that is just a tiny fraction of the mess we’re in – so many things weren’t mentioned because I didn’t want to go too ranty before my coffee – but it all adds to the pressure that we face in the United States, part of the pressure we’re facing in the world, making the Queen/David Bowie song “Under Pressure” my choice for today’s theme music.

Now I need to go see a machine about some coffee. Cheers

November 3, 2020 3

Monday’s Theme Music

Thinking about a big coming out party, someday, after the crises is resolved. (A.C.: After COVID-19. We’ll start a new reference system – “In 2 AC, the first normal baseball game was played.”) Maybe the theme should be dancing in the streets.

The song, “Dancing in the Street”, and its many versions jumped into the stream. I do enjoy the Mick and David version. But I don’t want to show favoritism, so here’s a few offerings. Looking at them, I’m surprised that it has sprung up as a new cover by some one, like, I don’t know, Kelly Clarkson.

David Bowie and Mick Jagger, 1985. Boy, the disco era is really displayed in their clothing style. Fitting for responding to a global problem, as this collaboration was done to raise money and awareness for “Live Aid” famine relief.