Tag: Metallica

Satyrda’s Theme Music

Welcome to Smoky Satyrda in Ashlandia. The smoke isn’t heavily visible but the smell of sodden wet wood hangs in the air and shifts my sinuses into overdrive to flush the crap back out. Yeah, poor me, right?

It’s 77 F now in Ashlandia with 99 F projected. The local troposphere looks up to it with blue skies gleaming down and a mighty sun raising up. Wouldn’t surprise to break 100 F; that’s the forecast for the valley overall.

A friend has fig trees on her land and gifted us with about five pounds of fresh, ripe figs. These things are huge and gorgeous. I’m married to a fignatic. We just spent $11 for a pint of figs the other day. They weren’t the best of figs but my house’s fignatic was happy to have them. You can imagine her joy from this gift. The figs are also a great addition to my morning diet. Yum. Pairs well with bananas. No so good with coffee.

I subscribe to multiple newsletters about books, writing, and publishing. One email subject said, “New Horror for your Summer”. I was like, no thanks, I have enough of that crap in the MAGALand daily news. For instance, when Trump’s gestapo rounds people up, their pets are often left alone in homes and apartments to die of thirst and starvation. This is Trump’s United States: cruel, mindless, thoughtless, heartless. Should I add greedy? That’s pretty fuckin’ self-evident when Trump brands and hawks new trinkets and consumer goods every month. Beyond that, there’s climate change and growing natural disasters around the world. As a couple nations war on each other and the wars threaten to engulf more geopolitical regions, TACO cuts back on the State Department and retreats.

Trump also announced he’s rolling out new tariffs. Will he or won’t he? TACO loves getting attention from making these announcements. Project 2025 goons installed in his regime loves him to do it, as they continue to operate under the distractions he generates with his blithering dithering — or is it dithering blithering? Trump makes announcements as the world burns and crashes around him, and the MAGAts clap in approval.

All that brings me to the morning mental music stream offering. After a surprisingly restless night and just one remembered dream (but a good dream), I found myself in the kitchen with a specific chorus echoing in the MMMS.

“Never free, never me, so I dub thee unforgiven. You labeled me, I’ll label you, so I dub thee unforgiven.”

Yes, that’s Metallica with their 1991 offering, “The Unforgiven”.

The Neurons were dubbing ICE agents as unforgiven. The entire damn Trump Regime is dubbed unforgiven, as are those senseless MAGAts who rolled this mess into existence. They’re unforgiven.

Have the best Satyrda you can. I plan to do the same. Cheers

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Wednesday’s Theme Music

Mood: Cuspsized

Fog and a cool 58 F greeted Churchill Valley on Wednesday, May 29, 2024. Today’s high will be lucky to break 66 F. Thunderstorms are possible.

Thunderstorms hit us again last night. I was out at my sister’s house for dinner. My BIL was grilling some serious beef, shrimp, and chicken. The smell of rain lingered in the air. Chonky gray clouds cruised overhead.

Rain broke, soft at first, warning shots, but the serious stuff arrive about an hour later. Weather warnings lit the phones. An hour later, the storm had significantly decayed, but I encountered chunks of it while driving home.

I’m on the cusp of heading home. Flight is early tomorrow morning.

My feelings are on a trampoline of reactions. I look forward to being with my wife and fur buds. I look forward to taking on some adulting needs and getting to work on stalled projects.

But I’ll miss Mom and my sisters and BILs, and all the children. Sharing a time zone with them has been very satisfying.

I feel like the nation, even the world, is also on a cusp. Donald Trump’s criminal trial has reached the jury deliberations stage. Analysts, pundits, lawyers, and relatives are all given opinions about the outcome, and why. And then, regardless of the verdict, what’ll happen? We’re on the cusp of finding out.

We’re on summer’s cusp in the northern latitudes. Violent storms have been striking the U.S. Destruction is rising. Travel is disrupted. So are supply chains. 23 are dead in the U.S. People’s power has been cut off. Is this an aberration or the new climate change norm? We’re on cusp of learning.

Israel attacked Rafah on Sunday. ‘All eyes are on Rafah.’ What will happen there next? I’m not arguing the right of Israel to defend itself, the role of the U.S. and other nations, nor the reasons why Hamas launched their attack last October, triggering this latest season of death and destruction. I’m like many, wondering if we’re on the cusp of a greater conflagration.

While we’re at it, Russia continues its assault on Ukraine, and Ukraine fights back. The deaths mount. More NATO resources might get involved. Are we on the cusp of world war? Could this be the cusp of a long-feared nuclear war?

And we’re on the cusp in the U.S. of finding out how extreme the GOP will be to keep people from voting. We’re on the cusp of finding how much of democracy they’re willing to destroy to keep the voters silenced and stay in power.

Looks like we’re on the cusp of a long, historic summer.

Being on the cusp of so many possibilities incited The Neurons to fill the morning mental music (Trademark almost ready) with “Enter Sandman” by Metallic. I can see The Neurons’ reasoning: this summer could be a nightmare, and that’s what the 1991 sound is all ’bout.

Hey, ho, here we go. Be strong, stay safe, be well, and Vote Blue in 2024. Here’s the music video. My coffee tank has already been filled.

Cheers

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Monday’s Theme Music

Monday scurried in under a rain cloud shouting, “I’m not late. I’m not late. I’m here. Maybe a little late. Not my fault. All that rain, and there’s snow, too. People are driving crazy. Traffic is a mess.”

Yes, it’s Monday, November 7, 2022. Winter has flexed again. Mists, ice, and snow layer our uppers. Snow hasn’t found its way down into the valley’s lower elevations, but we are surrounded. 6:51 AM is when the sun joined the mix, lightening the black and gray tones embedded in the ocean of thickening clouds above us.

34 F is now the temperature. No fear; it’ll bounce up to 7 C before daylight flees at 4:57 PM, the weather they say.

The Neurons are again floof-influenced with the morning mental music stream selection. (Say that three times fast before you had some coffee.) Weather drove Papi and Tucker in. They follow me around asking for sunshine. “I can’t do anything about the weather, boys.” I don’t explain that only nature and powerful Gods can control weather, as that would shatter their belief system. They think that I can do almost anything. I mean, they practically worship me.

Anyway, the cats were following me about, even after I fed them. To amuse the three of us, I run into the other room. They followed, confirming that they were going to stay right by my side.

Which, boom, caused The Neurons to say, “Hey, that’s just like that Metallica song.” Naturally, I responded, “What Metallica song?” The Neurons then commenced with “Until It Sleeps” from 1996.

“Have some coffee,” The Neurons tell me.

“Okay,” I answer, “is it ready?”

They scoff. “Did you make it?”

So, gotta go get some juice going. Stay positive, test negative. Mask as needed, if it’ll help stay some of the reach of those circling viruses. Here’s the music. I’m getting the coffee going, and then I’ll drink it until I sleep.

Cheers

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Sunday’s Theme Music

A foggy autumn day. Reds, golds, and greens shimmer faintly in the wet air. Sunshine is diluted and gray as dirty dish water.

This is Sunday, October 10, 2021. Sunrise was at 7:18 AM. Sunset: 6:37 PM. Temperature: 51. Forecast high: 55. The AQI is 13.

Early morning was dependent on minimalism. Basic elements. Breathe. Stand. Walk. Left foot, right foot. (Cue The Simpons.) This way. Feed the cats. They were urging me, faster, faster, me-now. Okay. That got done with little incident (although a lot of feline drama.) Now. Coffee. Nothing else matters. Not yet. Ah, there. A pulse.

But. My mental Alexa (my own private Alexa) had picked up on ‘nothing else matters’. Played the Metallica 1992 tune by that name for me. It’s looping through the morning mental musical stream. My pre-coffee voice sounded like Hetfield’s low, guttural growl employed throughout the song. I pass it on to you.

Stay positive. Test negative. Wear a mask as needed. Get the vax. Here’s the music. Coffee is getting cold. See ya.

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Tuesday’s Theme Music

As I settled down to sleep last night, I found that sleep was coming fast, like I’d opened a door and invited the sandman in. That brought forth amusing memories of Mom talking to me about the sandman when I was a little boy. She also used to sing “Mr Sandman” to me. But after all that thinking and remembering, the Metallica song, “Enter Sandman” (1991) crashed in.

A much different and intense song, I always enjoy its beginning. Then there’s the lyrics:

Sleep with one eye open
Gripping your pillow tight

Exit: light
Enter: night
Take my hand
We’re off to never never land

h/t to Metrolyrics.com

 

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Thursday’s Theme Music

I’d planned a two-mile walk yesterday evening. Starting I’d end up at the pizza place where my friends and I meet for beers and conversation once a week. Then I’d walk home, giving me a nice, round three-mile walk, a pleasant cap to the day.

A brief thunderstorm had passed through right before I started out. The temperature remained about eighty-five, but thunderstorms still haunted the mountains around our valley, and the humidity had climbed. I heard thunder as I went up the hills, planning to climb high and then descend. As I walked, the temperature dropped about twelve degrees. Rain ratcheted down on me and then stopped. Thunder boomed. Calling an audible, I descended and set on a path to meet with my friends.

Somewhere in all of this, I’d been thinking about plans and priorities. From that, I started streaming Metallica, “Nothing Else Matters”. Now it’s stuck on a loop so I’m putting it out there to release myself.

Enjoy.

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Thursday’s Theme Music

Let’s start with a wall of sound to blow these thoughts down, the thoughts that arrive after another mass shooting hits the news, another school’s day marked in red.

We’d just returned from living in Germany for four years, courtesy of our favorite uncle, when this song was released back in 1991. Another time? Well, we’d gone to war and were going to war back then, and we’re at war now, so nothing changed there. The Berlin Wall was torn down back then, a great moment in history, but the American border wall is being expanded this year. We thought the nuclear threat was diminishing because the U.S.S.R. had dissolved, but here we are, moving closer to midnight on the Doomsday clock twenty-six years later. Crime was higher then than now, but mass shootings were lower in 1991 than they are in 2018.

The worst mass shooting in 1991 the Luby’s shooting in Killeen, Texas. The gunman killed twenty-three people that day. It was the worse mass shooting in the U.S. at the time. It’s been surpassed. We’ve had five worse mass murders by a single shooter since then, including February 14th’s shooting in Parkland, Florida. That one, at a high school, ranks number one in the number of murders at a high school shooting in America, passing Columbine’s 1999 murders of thirteen people. 

Let’s listen to Metallica with “Enter Sandman” and think about our national nightmare.

 

 

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The Funeral

“I have my funeral planned,” he said.

I was getting my hair cut. We’d been talking about Christmas music. I’d complained about Bob Dylan’s rendition of “Hark, the Herald Angels Sing,” recorded in two thousand nine. It’s not my favorite Dyan song, or the best version of that song I’ve heard. He sounded painfully raspy, to me.

“I’d like to hear Metallic do Christmas songs,” my stylist said.

I said, “I’d like to hear Disturbed do a Christmas album.” I was thinking of their cover of Simon and Garfunkel’s “Sounds of Silence.” I’ve come to like it better than the original.

“Funny you should say that,” my barber said. “I’m going to have that planned at my funeral.” He then described his other music choices, like Madonna and Gwen Stefani. He was having it catered by Luigi’s in Medford. His casket was going to be black, with the Batman emblem on it.

“Why Batman?” I said.

“He’s my favorite guy.”

Ah. “What’s the genesis for planning your funeral?”

“I was sick and had some health issues a few years ago.”

Must have been serious, went unsaid. Instead, I said. “I feel bad. I haven’t given any thought to my funeral music.”

I guess there’s something else to put on my to-do list. It’s always something.

After walking away, I did a search for Disturbed’s Christmas music. Knowing that group, you know it has to be out there already.

 

 

 

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Today’s Theme Music

Ah, Sunday morning.

An overcast sky hides sunshine. Temperatures in the upper forties keeps the light rain from becoming something more, and daffodils and blossoms on trees are powering serious Spring imagery. The coffee is brewed…soon pancakes will be prepared. Something light is required for such a serene sense of home and harmony.

Naw. Fed by dreams of insistence and resistance, the soul is hungering for something with a meaty beat. Enter Metallica. ‘Enter Sandman’. Enter 1991.

This song was released a few months after my arrival back to the United States. Living in the super-expensive SF Bay area, we were signed up for base housing. Meanwhile, we lived in a large one bedroom apartment on Mathilda Avenue in Sunnyvale, less than two miles from Onizuka Air Station, where I worked.

That area of Mountain View, Sunnyvale and Los Altos enjoyed gorgeous weather nine months of the year. By May, the standard forecast called for sunshine, blue skies, and a temperature of seventy by ten AM. We enjoyed our Sunday mornings with the SF Chronicle and a light repast. Frozen unbaked croissants were purchased at the Milk Pail Market at the corner of California and San Antonio in Alta View. We defrosted them and let them rise overnight, baking them early in the morning. Add some fresh fruit from De Martini Orchard in Los Altos, a cup of Peet’s coffee, and three sweet cats to supervise the meal, and it’s the ingredients of wonderful Sunday mornings and pleasant memories.

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