Tag: earworms

Sun(less)day’s Theme Music

Mood: Snogitation

Hey, fellow inhabitants, it’s Sunday, March 3, 2024. Snowstorms continue in Ashlandia, where it’s now 34 F. We anticipate a high of 41 F.

Weather alerts, winter advisories, and storm warning remain active through Monday evening. Snow kept up until mid-afternoon yesterday, resuming after midnight. Snow continued its shift until today’s early hours and knocked off again. We’re expecting more, but we’re also expecting rain, which should laden doing anything outside with icy delight. Temperatures are expected to boing back and forth, low thirties to mid forties, for the week, with rain and snow playing together. By Thursday, rain and snow is expected to wind down and we’ll see temperatures in the fifties by Friday.

More dreams, more music! That one dream, about using magic to protect a young magic trainee, was fascinating. Meanwhile, The Neurons have several songs bubbling through the morning mental music stream (Trademark coming in two weeks). Some are extended plays from yesterday, but “Snowblind” by Black Sabbath and “Snowbound” by Donald Fagan are both now in the mix. But another, the R&B song, “Da Dip” from 1996, is dominating. I heard the Freak Nasty tune on the radio yesterday afternoon, and those lines, “I put my hand upon your hip, when I dip, you dip, we dip, you put your hand upon my hip, when you dip, I dip, we dip,” is all over the MMMS. It’s fun singing along with those lines. I struggle with the rest because

Be positive, vote, remain strong, and keep leaning forward. Now halfway through my first cup of coffee, I feel like I can do the same. Here’s the music; hope you enjoy it. Cheers

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Wednesday’s Theme Music

Mood: Optimungry. Yes, that’s that unique set of feelings of being strongly hopeful but very hungry.

Hey, all you Solsters*. Another day worth of declaring winter is still here. Up to 37 F now, and rain continues putting its shine on everything as the sun toils behind a thick stack of clouds. 46 F is the purported high for our neck of the valley.

Wednesday, Feb 7, 2024, has descended on Ashlandia without pomp or ceremony. Nothing special to write about it here in Ashlandia, but sometimes, nothing special is good. Everyone is going about their business and nobody is veering into another’s path to make their life difficult. The furnace is heating our house’s air, the cats have staked out their nap sites, and the neighborhood is quiet, even still. No people, machinery, birds, or dogs are heard. Grant’s Tomb is noisier.

Heading off to get our latest COVID-19 vaccination shortly. Finishing my coffee first. My wife is hosting her book club tonight, and I’m attending a brewery with a of friends. Meeting with them satisfies my need to socialize, have a beer with friends, discuss news, politics, etc, and keep close to remaining sane. I’m looking forward to discussing the ruling by the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit that Donald Trump isn’t above the law as a former POTUS, including actions he took while in office. The unanimous ruling by the three-judge panel validated what I remembered learning about the Federal government and the checks and balance system while in school. Now we’ll see if the SCOTUS gets involved, and if so, how they rule. Interesting days still ahead.

Today’s song is “Foolin'” by Def Leppard from 1983. The Neurons planted the song in my morning mental music stream (Trademark coming in two weeks) when I rhetorically asked of someone else, “Who do they think they’re foolin’?” Presto chango the song launched. I complain about earworms or involuntary musical imagery (INMI), but it doesn’t bother me much. I consider them an amusing process within my mental faculties. I’ve learned through research that 1 in 5 people experience an earworm a day, but they don’t usually lost long, just a few minutes. I’ve always wonder if experiencing and remembering vivid dreams are related to experiencing earworms as I do, and if it’s something in my mental processes and neural paths. At the same time, while I’ve always had a natural tendency for dreams, I began working to remember them when I was in my early teens and started keeping dream journals. Likewise, when I experience an earworm, I don’t often try shutting them down, but instead strive to recall all the details about my experience with the song.

If you’re still reading, you’re probably muttering, “Enough about you.” I agree. Stay strong, be positive, lean forward, register and vote. I’m trying for the same. Here’s the music. Cheers

* Solster: person who lives on a world dependent on the star called Sol.

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Old Year’s Day Theme Music

Mood: chillaxing

This is it: Old Year’s Day 2023. 2024 begins tomorrow. Despite that big event, it’s chilly, wet, and foggy this morning in Ashlandia, where coffee feels like a medical necessity to get the day started. Maybe that’s just me. Don’t know. I’m in the house and not going out until I’ve have enough coffee to get un-naked. It’s a public kindness thing.

41 F now around my house while the weather masters say it’s 48 F elsewhere in town with a 53 degree high on the radar. This might have been a record warm winter month for us.

2023 was a solid year personally. I wrote a novel and revised it multiple times, and the process goes on. My family members have endured health issues, and it’s not pleasant to be a spectator to that, but they continue pulling through. My wife continues managing her health matters, and the cats are doing well.

I’m not happy with my country. While the economy is doing well, the political and cultural divide yawns wider. Social progress regarding equality and justice slid backward in many ways. Under the guise of ‘freedom’, our education system stays under attack by conservatives limiting what is taught and what can people can read, which is basically the opposite of freedom. I won’t go into the multilple failures I see in the GOP with their continuing support of Trump no matter what, except to say it’s disappointing and a challenge to all branches of government.

Gun violence remains prevalent and demoralizing in the US as the nation collectively refuses to do anything except T&P, which does nothing to reduce violence, curtail the killing, or help the victims. It’s a pathetic and inept response to hear of a these mass shootings and learn that ‘leaders’ offer their thoughts and prayers. How many years of thoughts and prayers has it been? How many more will come before anything beyond thoughts and prayers are offered? As my friend Jill would eloquently say, GRRRRRR.

As for the rest of the world, I’m disappointed that wars continue and threaten to expand to encompass more of the world, just as we were experiencing a century ago.

The Neurons fed “Time Has Come Today” by the Chamber Brothers out of 1968 into the morning mental music stream (Trademark delayed). Just thinking about time, for some reason (sure, that’s a smidget of snark, which is called smark). I posted it before, back in December, 2017, and that point was much the same: thinking about time (“Time!”) and there it is in my head.

Many people think of these song getting stuck in your head as an earworm. I’ve read that about 96% of people experience an earworm once a month or more. I seem to experience one everyday. Studies say that people who hold music as important to them experience earworms more frequently. I’ve never addressed how important music is to me, but Mom was always playing music, and it became a habit for me. They rarely bother me, these earworms, although every once in a while, a song burrows in and makes itself comfortable that does irritate me. “Yummy, Yummy, Yummy,” is one of those songs which comes to mind.

Stay pos, refresh yourself for the tilt against another year, be strong, and lean forward. Hey, ho, let’s go. Here’s the music. Happy Old Year’s Day. Cheers

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Thursday’s Theme Music

Wow, Thursday already. October, already. The fifth already. Come on, let’s back off the time accelerator. It’s all moving too fast.

Today’s music is “Spooky.” It was originally an instrumental. I once heard the instrumental and thought someone was playing it that way. I later learned that the words had been added after the instrumental was written and performed.

I heard the original version with words, by the Classics IV, in the late nineteen sixties, on my trusty AM/FM clock radio. But I awoke with the A.R.S. “Spooky” version looping in my head today, so that’s what I’m posting.

As a sidebar, I wonder what happens in my brain that I awake with songs streaming in my head? I’ve researched this earworm (ohrwurm) or brain itch, as different sources label it, and found that researchers believe ninety-eight to ninety-nine percent of people endure earworms. A two thousand three news article cited a study found which songs afflict most people:

He found that some 98 percent of listeners were at one time or another bothered by a tune that wouldn’t leave their heads. The study also found some common offenders, including the Kit-Kat jingle (“Gimme a break”), “Who Let the Dogs Out,” Queen’s “We Will Rock You,” the theme to “Mission: Impossible,” “YMCA,” “Whoomp, There It Is,” “The Lion Sleeps Tonight” and “It’s a Small World After All.”

The study also showed that musicians and those with compulsive tendencies are the most afflicted. The two are not necessarily mutually exclusive, though the act of repetition — in popular songs on the radio and on the rehearsal floor for musicians — plays a role.

The 559 students used in the study had lots of trouble with the Chili’s jingle for its baby-back ribs and with the Baha Men song “Who Let the Dogs Out. ” But Kellaris found that most often, each person tends to be haunted by their demon notes.

Compulsive tendencies? Moi? Perish the suggestion. I guess I’m fortunate that my ohrwurms rotate and offer a variety.

 

 

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