Tag: winter

Monday’s Theme Music

Mood: Mondacious

Hey Terrans, it’s Monday, March 4, 2024. Snow has relented and sunshine has won the hour. Temps are back up into the 30s and climbing the scale. A 43 degrees F high is on the ropes. Snow remains on the ground, 3-4 inches in my realm with a fine crust but streets and walks are clear. A winter storm warning is still on until 10 PM tonight so who knows what’ll happen. Whatever does happen, snow made the point, winter is not yet over.

I was checking out Foxreviewsrock last night and found an entertaining post about Ronnie James Dio and a tribute album, Ronnie James Dio -This Is Your Life. (BTW, the Dio tribute album post is one of many enticing posts, and I hope you do check them out.) Dio, as the post notes, was a rock and heavy metal legend. His songs often projected the quintessential metal sound. As I read the post and listened to the videos, and remembered and thought, I ended up on a completely different path this morning. I figured one of Dio’s many fantastic numbers was going to be in the morning mental music stream (Trademark coming in two weeks). Lead singer on several bands along, his voice and style is memorable.

But no. This morning found The Neuron had inserted Saga with “On the Loose) into the morning mental music stream. That was wholly unexpected for me. Could be dream related as a passel of dreams from last night are in the memory circle. I think, though, it was more a matter of time and place. See, Dio fascinated my buddy Rick. If we were out somewhere and something with Dio came on the radio, TV, or juke box, he’d launched into a admiring spiel about Dio. That was fine. But Rick tripped out over Saga and how they emphasized “Loose” in the song, so hearing this song, Rick would go on about that, singing and grinning, “Tonight we’re on the loose.” Coming out in the early eighties, it definitely has an 1980s sound to it. Give it a listen and let me know what you think.

Be strong, stay positive, lean forward, vote, and drink coffee. The last is optional. All of it is optional; it’s your life. But I hope you’ll abide and at least vote Blue in the US when the chance comes in 2024.

Be good, travelers. Here’s the music. Cheers

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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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Monday’s Theme Music

Mood: coffeegized

Rain is bashing Monday’s windows in Ashlandia, where the beer is above average. Today is the 26th of Feb, 2024. We closing in on March. Winter has begun an offensive to take back its season in our area. Today’s high was 42 F, reached about an hour ago. Now it’s 40 and is expected to drop to 29 F. A winter storm advisory or watch or something is in effect until tomorrow. The cats are dissatisfied with this state of play. Both wanted out. Tucker returned shortly. Papi is matloafing out there under the patio’s protection, staring at the rain with slitted eyes. Either he’s drifting to sleep or he’s sending stinging eye messages to nature to stop this now.

Looking out, my wife proclaims, “It definitely looks like it wants to snow.”

Found myself with “How to Save A Life” by The Fray from 2006 in the morning mental music stream (Trademark coming in two weeks). The Neurons aren’t owning up to why the song is being played. I don’t recall the last time I heard the song but the adult contemporary rock tune seems to stay popular with FM radio station and can also be heard time to time on streaming radio and satellite venues. Not a bad song but it sounds quit a bit like their other big hit, “Over My Head”. “How to Save A Life” has been used a number of times on television shows, so we’ll always have repeats to hear it again. Nothing wrong with that.

Papi is back in. The temp has dropped to 36 F. Rain fails. Stay positive, be strong, lean forward, vote. I’m also drinking coffee, so I have that going for me. Here’s the music, and here we go.

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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Thursday’s Theme Music

Mood: Winbivalent (not sure if it’s winter)

My fellow Terra-zens. Today is February’s 1 in the common era of 2024. It’s a Thursday and local Ashlandia weather is trying to decide if it’s sprinter, spring, or winter. Things are blooming and growing like spring has taken over but the air has a wintry bite and colder temperatures are destined to arrive in the week’s tale end. Temperature is now 54 F after an overnight low of 46 F, on our way to a 56 F high. Rain is also expected but the wind has desisted from its menacing ways. It’s calm, with sunshine highlighting high, darkening clouds against azure sky.

So many ways of looking at the end of January, beginning of February. Like, OMG, 2024 is already a month gone. Or, less than two week until Valentine’s Day, and Christmas is less than eleven months away. If you’re going to school, you might be counting the months until you’re freed from the classroom, whether it’s remote, virtual, or physical. If you’re into the summer, you’re marking your calendar and grinning; just a few more months until summer.

This morning’s morning mental music stream (Trademark coming in two weeks) is “Only You Know and I Know”. Dave Mason wrote the performed the song in 1970. Delaney and Bonnie and Friends released a cover in 1970. I was a kid then, 13-14 years old. When I heard the D&B’s version, I was taken back. First, I recognized the backbone of the melody, began realizing the song, and then realized, “This isn’t Dave Mason. It’s someone else.” I don’t know why that jarred me so much then, hearing it on my clock radio in my basement bedroom that I remember it so vividly today. Not like I’d not heard covers by different people before. One of those baffling aspects of meself. Fascinating how memory seems to work. From what I read, I might think I remember this but am actually customizing memories to fit my need.

I’m offering Dave Mason’s version first just cuz I enjoy it, and then included a D&B w/ Friends version, one of the friends being Duane Allman in this instance. Hope you like the song and enjoy both versions. Let me know how it goes.

BTW, reason The Neurons plugged this song into my MMMS is a line which goes, “You know you can’t go on getting your way, ’cause if you do, it’s going to get you someday.” And yes, I was thinking of Mr. DJ Trump on the heels of the case of Carroll v. Trump, and the finding that he now must pay 83 million dollars. I am hopeful other things will catchup with him and get him before November of 2024.

They’re starting our house-painting tomorrow by powerwashing it. I wanted to do it myself but my better half wisely talked me out of it, pointing out that it would cut into my writing efforts. That awoke the musi, who shouted, “Yikes! We can’t have that!” Having the house painted is the first step in selling it so we can move away. We’re still searching for where we’ll go. We know we’re heading to the northeastern region of the US but haven’t pinpointed it more. We figure, we’ll pack up, go back to the greater Pittsburgh, PA, area, rent a place, and then begin a serious search. That’s the plan but you know and I know that plans change.

Stay strong, be positive, and keep leaning forward. Coffee has been brewed and sipped, and caffeine is slinking its way among The Neurons. Hey, ho, here we go. Cheers


			

		
	
	

					
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Monday’s Theme Music
			

				

Mood: springergetic





Thou has come a distance, traveler. You’ve reached the holy land of Monday, January 29, 2024. Please sit and rest. Something to drink? Wine, coffee? Something stronger?





We have dense fog and high wind warnings out. Fog isn’t in my view; that’s blue with lazy lacy white ribbons of unrolling clouds. But wind is beating down those trees, shaking the bushes, and causing the cats to hunker and blast back in when they have a chance. Now 62 F outside my home, today’s high will be 70 F.





Wait, what?





Yeah, I read that right on my goto weather site. It’s wonderfully comfortable. Makes you feel like a new lover is touching you. But alas, it ain’t good for our general situation. Our snowbank is only 36% of the standard. We do have more wintering to do and there is generally a change in February and a final winter push in March, but to be at this snowpack level at this time of year is wince-inducing for what the summer will be like. Fingers and toes and legs and arms are crossed that summer won’t be life in a burning charcoal briquet again. 





The Neurons have “I’m Just A Singer (In A Rock & Roll Band)” by the Moody Blues playing in the morning mental music stream (Trademark coming in two weeks). I was thinking about what I wanted and needed to do this day when Der Neurons began playing it and I sang along. I know the song well, even though the majority of my high school friends and people since weren’t Moody Blues fans, forcing me to enjoy them alone. Except for “Nights In White Satin”. Lot of my friends knew and enjoyed that song.





What interests me about this 1973 song, and it probably only interests me, is that I played this song last year, that is, January of 2023. What is it about January or this song that they meet in my mind in January?





Looking at last year’s Moody Blues post, I wrote: 





Today will reach 55 F or so before the sun vanishes from the Ashlandia sky around the 5:20 PM time period — it’ll be earlier in the mountains’ shadows by an hour or seem like the sun has set — but the forecasters are warning us. Winter is going to get serious. Lower temperatures will be coming by, clouds are collecting, and rain and snow are possible. Then, fanfare, Monday will see an Arctic blast. Lows will freefall into the teens. Daytime highs will scrap into the thirties. Break out extra binkies and some space heaters, hope power doesn’t fail, and take measures to ensure your pipes don’t freeze. The hardest part, though, will be convincing Papi to stay in. He’s gonna test the temps, I know.





Lots to do today. Food and Friends deliveries in about thirty minutes. That’ll eat 90 minutes. Writing and editing. Call Dad. Text Mom. Catch up with Sis. Store for a few items, nothing critical. Finish and submit my taxes. I usually have them in by now. Can’t believe I’ve waited this long. 





Stay pos, remain strong, and lean forward. Here we go. Coffee up and dance. Here’s the music. Cheers










			

		
	
	

					
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Friday’s Theme Music
			

				

Mood: bubbly





Hello, friends. It’s Friday, January 19, 2024, which means we have eleven months left in this year to get things done. 52 F here right now, we’re again trapped in a spring-like day in Ashlandia, where the valley is narrow and the days are pleasant. Striated clouds in shades of blues and grays are offering a promise of more rain and a high two degrees further up the thermometer. 





Read news about a killing done with a hammer, new titanium dentures for a celebrity (just 850K if you want to get some), a messed up speech by Trump where he displayed confusion and forgetfulness, and an Oregon teen who witnessed a winter accident and saved a child. In the last, the individual said she saw a car slide on ice into a power pole. It killed three of the people in the car but she saved the fourth, a nine-month-old. Meanwhile, the US is in conflict with Houthi rebels in Yemen. The Houthi have been launching missiles at ships in international waters, and the US has begun conducting air strikes against these missile strikes. Will it escalate? Escalation seems to be the pattern in vogue when it comes to violence in this century but I hope not. 





Out of nowhere this morning, The Neurons have offered “I Am A Man of Constant Sorrow” by the Soggy Bottom Boys to the morning mental music stream (Trademark all wet). The song has been around over one hundred years. I’d known it by others like Bob Dylan, Judy Collins, and Ginger Baker before this fictional singing group was featured in the movie, O Brother Where Art Thou? in 2000, but truly enjoyed the fake performance of a delightful song. Anyway, it came up today so it’s my theme music. These at the musicians and singers who put it together for the movie, although there are some substitutions here. 





Of course, I sang a modified version to my cats, which could be called, “I Am A Floof of Constant Hunger”. As usual, they were not impressed. They seemed quizzical about why I was singing to them when they really wanted me to feed them. 





Be strong, stay positive, and lean forward. Here’s the music. I got coffee and a cat sleeping by the ‘puter, but I need to put some pants on. Cheers










			

		
	
	

					
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Wednesday’s Theme Music
			

				

Mood: snowgo





Snow dilutes the light through the windows and blocks the solar tube and skylights, wholly changing the house’s ambiance. Yes, we’re part of the snowstorm holding the Pacific Northwest hostage on Wednesday, January 10, 2024, which is today. It’s 32 F now, as it has been for the last five hours. Snow continuously fell during that period, alternating the flakes’ speed, size, or density, but it falls nontheless. The road has been plowed a few times. I’ve seen one bird and no other animals out there. I hope the homeless are okay; the emergency shelters have been opened. 





The snow is expected to yield to rain later. Looking out as a tow truck motors down the hill past my house, it looks like the snow is more sleetish. Snow is falling off tree branches, wires, and fences, so something is going on. 





I’m happy, though, because the snowbank is climbing, part of the complicated, multi-faceted process for delivering us summer water. 





My eyes yelp against the white-sheeted landscape’s intensity whenever I look out, like the snow is sucking up the light and then firing it back with a tenfold intensity. Sunglasses help but it feels odd wearing sunglasses in the house while looking out the window.





Les Neurons have loaded “Snowblind” by Black Sabbath from 1972 into the morning mental music stream (Trademark stuck). Lyrics easily return from when I listened to the album, Black Sabbath Vol 4 back in high school. Scott — a high school peer — gave it to me because he didn’t like it because it was too dark and brooding. “Kills my buzz,” he laughed with that light in his eyes. He was such a trip.





I understood what he meant, though. This song in particular felt like a downer with its plodding sound and semi-screeched lyrics. Still, they come back to mind with little problem: “My eyes are blind, but I can see. The snowflakes glisten on the trees. The sun no longer sets me free. I feel the snowflakes freezing me.” I sometimes sang them to myself countless times since learning them when walking in the snow in Ohio, Pennsylvania, South Korea, Germany, Oregon, and other places. 





Stay positive, test negative, be strong, and lean forward. Coffee has come my way. Snow still falls, delivering fatter flakes to the four inches on the ground. Here’s the music. Cheers










			

		
	
	

					
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Monday’s Theme Music
			

				

Mood: wintslow (wintry and slow)





Yes, it’s a wintslow Monday on this January 8, 2024. First off: how long after New Year begins is it acceptable to wish people happy New Year or variations of that? After I challenged a person telling me happy New Year, I countered, Merry Christmas: it is coming. 





Winter holds court outside. Snow sketches lines over the mountain ridge’s dark pines and firs. Grey clouds mute the sun’s impact and diminishes the land’s colors, though the starkness of snow and mountains across the valley is majestic and pulls eyes and thoughts. It’s 33 F now, with 46 F offered as a cap to today’s warm streak. 





Most are pleased that snow has fallen at last. One young woman, a high school senior, told me yesterday that when the big flakes started really dumping, she went out and danced in the snow. ‘Course the skies and snowshoes have come out and people are heading for slopes and mountain treks. 





Just a pause to note that one person conversing with me yesterday claimed the local hospital is full of COVID patients. She’s a nurse so I have some faith in her observation. 





Football and award shows about popular culture hold forth in the news today, although some elements are also addressing the upcoming Iowa caucuses. Many world and national events are still ignored, or not spoken about, at least, part of the stalemate in communications which we’ve reached. F’r instance, the economy is ‘better’ and ‘doing great’ but that doesn’t mean much if you’re hanging on to pay for necessities or are suffering food or shelter insecurity. Just as it’s been for hundreds of years, maybe thousands. There are some who have more than enough to indulge whatever they want for themselves, and a chunk who live in desperate situations. Fault lines shift but the bottom line throughout history is that the rich get richer. After all, from being born to advantage, to having people grovel before them because of ‘who they are’ — i.e., the money they have, which begets power — to being able to buy favoritism and special treatment, money moves our civilization and the wealthy are indulged with preferential treatment.





The Neurons, being who and what they are, served up “Do You Wanna Dance” to the morning mental music stream (Trademark launched). This came as I was asking the cats as part of our morning routine, are you hungry? Do you want something to eat? Yes, they told me, Tucker in his quiet and understated manner, Papi in his youthful, energetic, more vocal style. Meanwhile, The Ramones had taken over my head with their 1978 cover of the song had my head jerking and my feet tapping as I dished out pate to the floofs. 





Stay pos., be strong, remain calm, and lean forward. I am presently leaning toward my coffee; once I drink more, I hope to right myself. Here’s the music. Sing it to your floofs. Let me know what they think. Cheers










			

		
	
	

					
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