Wednesday’s Theme Music

Today is January 20, 2021, a Wednesday. Sunrise was at 7:34 AM and sunrise is coming at 5:10 PM. Between them, the weather looks hazier than yesterday but still sunny. It’s currently 34 degrees F but we expect warmer.

Congratulations to President Joe Biden, forty-sixth POTUS, and Vice-President Kamela Harris. The inauguration ceremonies in D.C. were on the television at the same time as my wife’s Zoomercise class. There’s usually seventy to eighty people present; today there were twenty-eight. The rest were off watching the inauguration, we suspect. My wife exercised but kept the television on to hear President Biden’s speech and the Vice-President’s speech, and the rest of the pomp.

I walked two miles yesterday in the late afternoon, masking when I encountered people but trying to stay to routes that let me avoid them. Going up allowed me the privilege of gazing across the valley to where sunshine bathed green and brown hills, evidence that we’re creeping out of winter and toward spring. An Oasis song from 1996, “Don’t Look Back in Anger”, came to mind and stayed with me. I thought that it should be today’s theme music.

Slip inside the eye of your mind
Don’t you know you might find
A better place to play
You said that you’d never been
But all the things that you’ve seen
Will slowly fade away

So I start a revolution from my bed
‘Cause you said the brains I had went to my head
Step outside, summertime’s in bloom
Stand up beside the fireplace
Take that look from off your face
You ain’t ever gonna burn my heart out

h/t AZLyrics.com

Stay positive, test negative. Wear a mask. Get the vaccine, and lean forward.

Tuesday’s Theme Song

Sunshine and wind is ruling this Ashland, Oregon, Tuesday morning. The sun rose at 7:39 AM, pushing the air temp up from last night’s low of 29 F to the current 43 F. We’re hoping to hit the mid-fifties before the sun shuts down the day’s operations at 5:10 PM.

“Psychobabble”, a 1982 Alan Parsons Project song, rules the mental musical stream this morning. “Because of dreams?” you ask. Why, yes.

Tell you ’bout a dream that I have every night
Tell you ’bout a Dream that I have every night
It ain’t kodachrome and it isn’t black and white
Take me for a fool if you feel that’s right
Well I’m Never on my own but there’s nobody in sight

I don’t know if I’m scared of the Lightning
Trying to reach me
I can’t turn to the left or the right
I’m too scared to run and I’m too weak to fight
But I don’t Care it’s all psychobabble rap to me

Tell you ’bout a dream that I have every night
It’s in dolby stereo but I never hear it right
Take me for a fool well that’s alright
Well I see the way to go But there isn’t any light

h/t to Songmeanings.com

With COVID-19 pushing out variants with higher transmission rates, hospitals staggering under their loads, and the global death count over two million and still going (400,000 in the U.S. as of this morning), I’d be remiss to not remind you to stay positive, test negative, and wear a mask. Get a vaccine when it comes your way, too.

Enjoy the music.

Monday’s Theme Music

Monday in Ashland arrived with thin but all-encompassing fog and a thermostat hovering around 37 F. Sunrise was at 7:39 AM, evidenced by growing light but no visible sun. We’ll see if it shows before sunset, expected at 5:04 PM.

Looking out at the fog, I thought about what a gray day it was. No immediate gray songs leaped into the mental stream, but the 1978 Foreigner song, “Blue Morning, Blue Day”, filled the space. This song about lovers growing apart doesn’t fit anything about today, unless I stretch it as a metaphor for the United States and its political positions growing apart. Or, taking it further, I can apply it to a growing gap between the U.S. and the rest of the world. Or — stay with me here — the song can be about people losing touch with reality, getting swept out of their heads by conspiracy theories.

Naw, doesn’t really work. It’s just about lovers.

Still, the song is in me head, so I’m putting it out to you. Be positive, even when the weather is gray and cold, test negative, and wear a mask, now more than ever as these COVID-19 variants rise and spread. Hey, that’s an intriguing book title: Rise of the Variants. Someone should go write it.

Here’s the music.

Sunday’s Theme Music

Today is Sunday, January 17, 2021. Four percent of the new year has passed. Sunrise in Ashland was at 7:39 AM and sunset is expected at 5:04 PM. We creep toward the longest day of the year. The cats have been outside and report that although the temperature is 44, the sunshine is endless and warm to the fur.

Our 1985 Mazda RX-7 was featured in my dream. My wife and I bought it new when we returned to the U.S. after serving four years on Okinawa. With that in mind, I trawled memories for a song that might work today. I came up with Tears for Fear, “Everybody Wants to Rule the World”. Yes, a lot of people want to rule it for various reasons. I’m not sure I want to rule anything.

Sometimes, when I think of this song, I substitute words. Recurring themes are, “Everybody wants to pet the floof.” Especially so if an animal is around. I’ve also been known to sing, “Everybody wants a glass of beer.” Wine and cake have been subbed there on occasion. Another variant is “Everybody wants a piece of cake.” It’s a versatile song.

The weather is a quick-change artist. I sat to type and lo, the sun has skidded behind full-sky cloud covers. Showers dampened the street and walks, and a wind has launched.

Checked our toilet paper supplies this morning. Sixty rolls on hand. There are two of us. We average eight days per roll per bathroom, so we are, relatively, rolling in TP.

Stay positive, test negative, and eat healthy. Oh, and wear a mask. Cheers

Stuck Song

A friend posted on FB about her clothes getting stuck on door handles. Another responded, “their way of telling you to slow down and reflect”.

That nudged my mind into singing, “Slow down, you move too fast. You got to make the morning last.”

Then Simon & Garfunkel began performing “The 59th Street Bridge Song (Feelin’ Groovy)” from 1971. I’m sharing it with you to dislodge it from my mind. Please sing along.

Please.

Saturday’s Theme Music

Sunrise was 7:40 AM today in Ashland. Sunset is expected at 5:04 PM. Yes, we have ten hours of daylight but zero hours of sunshine expected. Cloud cover is complete on this 47 degree F day. The high is expected to be 55 F. I’m dubious; we didn’t reach our high yesterday.

For no reason that I can uncover, “Hey Soul Sister” by Train (2009) is occupying the brain’s music stream this morning. It’s a light song that features a ukulele. I guess my mind craved something light. That ties in well with my light dreams, which seemed like they were all sitcom moments, almost like a skit comedy television show.

Four days until Joe Biden is sworn in as the forty-sixth POTUS. Stay positive, test negative, wear a mask, and enjoy life as much as you can.

Thursday’s Theme Music

“Ride My See-Saw” by the Moody Blues, 1968, thundered into my head this morning, partly due to writing, partly to my young ginger feline friend, Papi, aka Meep, aka Youngblade, aka the Ginger Blade.

With writing, it was recognition of how I go up and down about how I feel about the work in progress. It’s like being on a see-saw. With Papi, it was about my sleep getting interrupted. I was up and down, up and down, letting him in and out, in and out. Very floofrupting.

This video and song is a fun slice back to what we were when. Their slender, suited shapes and mod hair. That was rock, then, for a while. Well, no, that look wasn’t universal. I never adopted it. My hair was longer and less styled. (My wife loves the fact that I used to employ bobby pins to keep my hair out my way while engaged in baseball and football. For track and wrestling, I just let it flow.) While skinny, I wore huge bellbottoms and baggy tees. My favorite tee said, “Keep America Green, Grow Grass.” A marijuana leaf was prominent in the tee’s center.

Stay positive, test negative, wear a mask, and get plenty of sleep. Here’s the music. Enjoy.

Wednesday’s Theme Music

Today is a repeat. Used this song a few years ago, but it’s a satisfying song and worthy of being the theme music today.

“Think” by Aretha Franklin came out in 1968. While I love that version, the Blues Brothers version (1980) is a tad stronger. According to Wikipedia, the thing about the movie version is that Aretha had to lip sync the song for the movie. Aretha isn’t used to lip syncing so a number of takes were required. The movie clip also features people no longer with us – John Belushi, Matt ‘Guitar’ Murphy, Carolyn Franklin, and Margaret Branch. Technology lets us enjoy them again.

The song arrived in me this morning while I was thinking about dreams. But after reflecting on its words, it’s a good song for this era of lies and insurrection. Think. Think about what you’re trying to do. Think about the consequences. Apparently, many of the insurrectionists didn’t think about the consequences of sedition, and didn’t take it well when they were arrested and put on no-fly lists. Should’ve thought about it. Of course, it starts with the outgoing Prez, who does little thinking about what’s going on beyond the little circle of his ego.

Stay positive, test negative, wear a mask, and enjoy the music! Cheers

Tuesday’s Theme Music

I’ve been feeling a change in energy for some months. We’ll see whether this woo-woo sensation of being inordinately optimistic and hopeful is founded in reality or the first stages of dementia or senility. After a particularly rousing dream set, the sensations were sharper today, leading to lyrics from the Spacehog song, “In the Meantime”.

And in the end, we shall achieve in time
The thing they call divine

When all the stars will smile
For me
When all is well and well is all for all
And forever after
Maybe in the meantime wait and see

h/t to Genius.com

In the meantime, my mind proceeded to bring the song fully to stream. I hope you enjoy it and find a worthy choice as theme music for this Tuesday morning in 2021. Stay positive, test negative, wear a mask, and vaccinate. Cheers

Monday’s Theme Music

I was watching Vera late last night. Second or third time through it, so the plot twists aren’t surprising. Always love that character as brought to the screen by Brenda Blethyn, and the production team. They mentioned the Romany on the show. My mind barked, gypsies. Cher immediately sang, “Gypsies, tramps, and thieves,” and was gone, making way for “Gypsy Woman”.

“Gypsy Woman” was a 1970 hit song for Brian Hyland. Had to look that up (thanks, Wikipedia!). This was another song for which I knew words and melodies (they’re simple and easy to learn, fitting my learning style) but knew nothing about the song or artist. I remember at the time of its release that I already knew the song, but it sounded different, which puzzled the heck out of young me. Later I discovered it’d been released almost ten before by the Impressions, who had a hit with it. Ah hah!

What I didn’t learn until now was that Curtis Mayfield wrote the song. Here it is for your listening pleasure. Be positive, test negative, wear a mask, and vaccinate. Cheers

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