Fridaz Theme Music

It’s a sighing kind of day. Sunshine is spare as rain falls and gray clouds swallow the valley. 46 F now, we’re almost at our high. Yes, good to have some rain. But not so good for my spirit today, Frida, December 5, 2025. On the plus side of things, Wordle, Connections, and the Spelling Bee were all easy. So I have that going for me.

Mom and sis are again having issues. These are also adjustment things. Relates to how things used to be done when Mom and Frank lived together and Frank ran Mom’s errands. Sam’s Club was being used as Mom’s pharmacy. That was cost-effective and convenient for them. Sam’s Club was just less than ten minutes away, an easy drive. Frank enjoyed going through, picking up the prescriptions, doing some shopping, getting gas. Sam’s Club is nowhere near sis’s house. Going through is an hour plus investment of time and effort deeply affected by traffic and weather. Sis asked Mom to change her pharmacy to CVS because it’s just a few minutes away. Mom said she called the Sam’s Club and told them. No, Mom needs to call her doctor and tell them. She says she did. They told another sister that Mom’s message couldn’t be understood. Sis asked Mom to call them again. Mom said, no, she’s only allowed to call the doctor once a day. WTF? So yeah, confusion, frustrations, and stress are rising. Doesn’t help sis that she’s working this week so much of this is being conducted via phone calls and text messages while she’s at work. It’ll pass. Hopefully that’ll happen soon, and without much bloodshed. This sort of reminds me of the novel, Corrections.

Today’s music is dedicated to Trump and his enablers. After news reading that encouraged headshaking, groaning, growling, and sighs, The Neurons put Linda Ronstadt in the morning mental music stream with her cover of “You’re No Good”.

My wife raised this issue today: why didn’t the Trump Regime pick up those two survivors of the boat attack and question them for intelligence and information? Answer: because it’s about killing and making a show, and not about truth, facts, facts. She continues to advocate for the guillotine. She believes drastic changes will be needed once Trump is gone, and the only way to emphasize that We the People are serious is to lop off a few heads. Mitch McConnell tops her list. Weird to hear this lifelong pacifist advocate cutting off heads but that’s where we’re at.

Coffee and I are making nice again. Time to get out and do other things. Hope peace and grace light your day for a bit. Here I go, into the rain. Cheers

Mundaz Theme Music

57 F was our morning air temp, giving us a comfy chill for an Ashlandia summer morning. Clouds were squirreled into one sky corner, presenting the sun with an open path. A high of just 82 F, below our average, is expected to crown the day. No smoke; no fires, knock wood.

I’m just climbing back into the world today. Yesterday was chill. Wife and I visited the Oregon Cabaret to see Disaster! and have a brunch. Quite a silly musical, exquisitely campy. Taking off on the disaster movies which ruled like Marvel movies back in the 1970s, the setting was a casino on a docked ship. The dock was new, incomplete, and built on a fault line. The shady owner skirted regulations and cut corners. We had earthquakes, a tidal wave, fire, explosions, and a few love stories. One love story was behind a retired couple’s story while the other was about a couple with an aborted wedding. All this was structured around popular music from that era, such as “Saturday Night”, “Hot Stuff”, and “Sky High”. A couple of the performers, such Molly Stillens as the singing nun — it’s a 1970s disaster setting, remember? — really leaned into the campiness and made it shine. Good food and a fun show that fostered multiple belly laughs.

Back home in mid afternoon, reading to finish a book due back to the library was undertaken. Ministry of Time was well written, with deeply drawn characters and an interesting variation on standard ‘time-travel’ concepts. Kaliane Bradley is beautifully inventive polishing phrases. Then I wrote for an hour, followed by yard work. Little news was taken in.

Today’s song is “After the Gold Rush”. The Neurons remembered the song as I took coffee on the front porch and investigated nature’s plate with idle curiosity about what was planned, what was done, what was to come sort of montage. Neil Young wrote it and released it while I was in high school. Many covered it later. One famous cover came from a trio of famous singers: Dolly Parton, Emmylou Harris, and Linda Ronstadt, which was released in 1999. While Neil’s version as as heartfelt and raw as Neil sings everything, the trio’s harmonizing lifts the lyrics into another realm. Hope you enjoy it.

Time to let Munda stamp me with its intentions. Coffee has been had. Let me go forth. May peace and grace find you this day and everyday. Cheers

Tuesday’s Theme Music

Mood: judgemental

Hello,Tuesday. I’ll drink to that.

Yes, it’s Tuesday, November 14, 2023. We’re approacing November’s midpoint. I have predictions: here in Ashlandia, where the seasons come and go and come and go, will get colder, and the snow line will descend closer to the valley floor, and the sun will be up there but cold fronts will mock its heat.

Inspired by clutching chilly fog and bored, drizzling rain, the temperature is 51 F and might squeak up to 57 F today. Sunrise was at 6:58 AM and darkness will return to the stage at 4:51 PM. Yep, becoming dark earlier as the days chase down the year’s end.

Ah, in news, I see that Truth Social has lost almost 75 million in two years. Clap your hands if you’re surprised that a Trump endeavor lost money.

Had a good laugh over the Supreme Court’s toothless Ethics Code. They use word salad like, “A Justice should avoid impropriety and the appearance of impropriety in all activities,” and “A Justice may engage in extrajudicial activities that are consistent with the obligations of the Judicial Office.” Such nebulous terminology tries to pretend that they’re taking this seriously — look at those serious words! — but they leave them right where they are. What is ‘impropriety’? We each have a definition for it; the way many Democrats and liberals view Justice Thomas’s activites were outside of the ethics expected of a U.S. Supreme Court Justice. He and convervatives didn’t see it like that. So, nothing resolved.

I know, I know, I should be an optimist and say, baby steps, or anything is better than nothing. But I’ve seen this series before and believe I know how it’ll end.

The writing part of me feels pressed for time and energy; the writer doesn’t want much to do with the world outside my wife and cats at the moment. Maybe that’s why The Neurons plugged Linda Ronstadt’s terrific cover of the Rolling Stones’s song, “Tumbling Dice” into the morning mental music stream (Trademark sinking). While aware and considerate of my writing aspirations and the schedule and efforts it generates, they still come to me with offers and requests. And me, being a middle child who wants to help everyone, feels guilty when I can’t accomodate them all. Plus I’m flattered that people trust me for help or advice, or requests my company.

Yeah, if that’s all I have to worry about, I’m doing good, right? And should be happy that others care for me or want my company. Well, that’d be logical, and the passion of writing spits on logic.

Carry on, positive and strong, and lean forward for one another. We can’t make it alone. (Yeah, funny that I say that after complaining that I can’t be left alone to write. SMH. It is a complex existence.) Coffee has jumped into the morning melee and I’m ready to partake. Here’s the music.

Cheers

Saturday’s Theme Music

Sunshine began crowning around 7:15 this morning in Ashlandia, and then came the sun’s piercing rays through trees and over snow-topped mountains at 7:34 AM. White and blue has been sprayed-painted on the sky. The paints are still resolving their form. It’s still and cold, 29 degrees F. Saturday, January 21, 2023, has been reached.

The other end of the day will come with the sun rolling away as the planet spins on at 5:11 Ashlandia time. We’ll have clouds and sunshine and other fun stuff with an ultimate high temperature of 54 degrees F.

I’ve been reading about state responses to electric cars. Many manufacturers declared that they’re shutting down internal combustion engine production by specific years. Some states have mandated that only electric cars will be sold within their borders by an established date. In response, other states, such as Wyoming, are attempting to ban electric cars in their state by 2035.

It shouldn’t be a surprise that we’re seeing this. We saw the same happen when ICE cars were introduced over 100 years ago. States drew up actions to throttle enthusiasm for these noisy vehicles and people rejected them as foolish. In one memorable article in the Saturday Evening Post, Alexander Winton recounted how his banker called and berated him about buying a car.

‘My banker called on me to say: “Winton, I am disappointed in you.”

That riled me, but I held my temper as I asked, “What’s the matter with you?” He bellowed: “There’s nothing the matter with me. It’s you! You’re crazy if you think this fool contraption you’ve been wasting your time on will ever displace the horse.”

From my pocket I took a clipping from the New York World of November 17, 1895, and asked him to read it. He brushed it aside. I insisted. It was an interview with Thomas A. Edison: “Talking of horseless carriage suggests to my mind that the horse is doomed. The bicycle, which, 10 years ago, was a curiosity, is now a necessity. It is found everywhere. Ten years from now you will be able to buy a horseless vehicle for what you would pay today for a wagon and a pair of horses. The money spent in the keep of the horses will be saved and the danger to life will be much reduced.”

It is only a question of a short time when the carriages and trucks of every large city will be run by motors. The expense of keeping and feeding horses in a great city like New York is very heavy, and all this will be done away with. You must remember that every invention of this kind which is made adds to the general wealth by introducing a new system of greater economy of force. A great invention which facilitates commerce, enriches a country just as much as the discovery of vast hoards of gold.”’

Skepticism and denial are natural in the face of change. While Wyoming’s legislature is rationalizing why electric cars shouldn’t be brought to their state, the backdrop is that they, like Texas, who is also contemplating anti-electric car legislations, is trying to protect the fossil fuel industry. Their state economies depend on fossil fuels.

In other news, I sometimes just stop reading and turn the page, frustrated and depressed again by the rise of murders, particularly shootings, and the obstinance always flashed whenever reform is addressed. The same lies are given fuel over and over. Meanwhile, the emerging agendas in several states who are trying to stop social change often by suppressing votes and others’ rights, has me thinking of Linda Rontstadt. The Neurons brought up her cover of the song, “You’re No Good” from 1973.

The coffee is half consumed but I might refresh the cup and sip a bit more before facing the cold and going off to the coffee shop to write. Stay positive and enjoy your day, summer, winter, whatever, best that you can. You can complain about it, like I do, but don’t let that stop you from trying.

Here’s the music. Cheers

Sunday’s Theme Music

This is Sunday. We’ve awoken to that fact. Other information filters in. May 15, 2022. Almost half of May numbered as the past. Almost half of 2022 joining the historic ranks. Sunrise, 5:50 AM, was bright and strong. There to see it, because Papi stayed up and outside to see it, and called me to come see it. Temperature is 56 F. Anticipated high is around 77 F. Sunset: 8:25 PM.

The neurons floated multiple songs through the morning mental music stream, creating, for a while, a morning mental music stream medley. Yeah, I went there. Most of these songs were from the late 1970s. Putting it together, I think they go well with the age I was in a dream and put it all down to wishful thinking about when, where, and was.

The medley eventually thinned. Linda Ronstadt rose with “Blue Bayou” from 1977 and took over the MMMS. I once won a small wager with this song. About ten years after it’d been a hit for Linda, a young guy was talking about the song. I realized that he attributed it to her as the original artist and told him that Roy Orbison had it as a hit when I was a child. He was flabbergasted. We went through several other songs that night, including, “Knocking on Heaven’s Door”, which he ascribed to Guns ‘n Roses, and “A Hazy Shade of Winter” ‘by’ the Bangles.

I love that one line from the song, “If I could only see that familiar sunrise through sleepy eyes, how happy I’d be.”

Okay, coffee time. Stay positive and test negative. Be on guard, but chill. Here’s the music. Cheers

Tuesday’s Theme Music

Yesterday was in the mid-nineties. Today we’re looking at ninety-eight to one hundred degrees. Heat warnings out, etc..

Can’t complain too much. Had a scorcher back in May, and thought, oh, no, here comes the heat. But June turned mild and rainy. Different from what we usually get, and tres acceptable.

I’m not an air conditioning fan. Prefer not to run it in the house. Seems like a sledgehammer approach to things. I don’t usually run it in the house until the temp inside goes to eight-three. To do this, I cool the house at night, right? Sure. Everyone’s with that. But last night didn’t cool too much (seventy at eleven) (that’s degrees at o’clock PM). The house was comfortable through and it’s comfortable now, but, well, we’re looking at eighty by eleven (temp/time, AM).

Speaking of time and clocks (or writing about them), I was thinking about counter-clockwise. I was following some instructions which used that statement. Which cause wonder, what’d they say before clocks about turning things? I suppose, reflecting on technology, not many things were turned before clocks, and they just said, left or right.

Also, though, kids. Their clocks are digital. Aren’t they? Are they? Don’t have children, so I don’t know what’s in school, and whether that’s still taught. Kind of assumed it wasn’t, since they’re dropped the whole cursive writing business.

But if they’re not shown standard round clocks, being told about turning something counter clockwise must cause a minor brain freeze.

Back to the music. For today’s heat, the theme is “Heat Wave” as covered by Linda Rondstadt back in the last century. The original song was excellent, and there are many terrific versions, but Linda’s version popped up in 1975, so I associate it with driving around and partying as a young adult.

Let’s go with it.

Linda Floofstadt

Linda Floofstadt (floofinition) – American singer/songwriter, with hits in diverse genres in floof music, inducted into the Hall of Floof as both a performer and a songwriter.

In use: “Besides winning awards as a solo act, Linda Floofstadt won a Floofy Award for Best Country Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocal, Trio, with Floofy Parton and Emmyfloof Harris).”

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