New Year's Eve. On the corner of Arlington and Boylston, right outside the Public Gardens. The streets are filled with people wearing their First Night buttons and, inexplicably, balloons on their heads.
Waiting for the light.
A man and his little boy. The little boy wants to push the walk light button. The man tells him not to. The little boy is insistent. The man is more so.
But why? asks the little boy. (Yeah, why? I wonder.)
The light will change, he says. It won't last forever. Then he adds: People are trying to get to work.
Huh, I thought. I look at the cars driving by. At 2:30 in the afternoon??
I wondered what other strange advice the man gives his son.
Showing posts with label actionbobmarkle. Show all posts
Showing posts with label actionbobmarkle. Show all posts
Monday, December 31, 2012
Thursday, January 5, 2012
A Playwright's Exercise: Spill It On The Floor and See What We Got
Well, it's 2012 and that really doesn't mean anything to me, but I am finding my life shifting and since I'm having a dickens of a time coming up with a project that will occupy my soul for at least six months or a year, I'm finding myself writing bits and pieces like this one. I've been writing in my journal, just putting fingers to the keyboard seeing what comes out, trying to get a bead on what's really bothering me or getting me excited. That gives a writer a pretty good indication of what he or she should be writing about. That's pretty much what I'm going to be doing here. This post is more for me more than it is for you (sorry to say that, but it's the truth.) I just want to see what's in there, and by writing to an actual audience, I'm interested to see what I'm brave enough to share. You're about to get a snootful of the flotsam and jetsam of my life as it pours out of my brain like tipping over a bucket.
Work is coming along but it's still difficult. I graduated at the end of August and it took me about eight weeks to land something. I knew I was going to teach creative writing at BU, but I needed something more. Sue and I live cheap, real cheap, but sometimes it gets down to the bare bones and that can be scary. I had a few nibbles, some that looked really promising, and by that I mean they were conveniently located or paid a lot of money but I knew by the end of the gig I'd be spiritually bankrupted. Then Boston College hired me, and as Sue and I like to always point out, things do always seem to work out. I worked there one other time for a different group, and loved it. This proved to be the same experience. I can't say enough about how wonderful it was to work for Norma and her staff, and be around all the wonderful, fun, intelligent people who work in stewardship. Norma was a sane, sensible manager, and you can walk in the place without checking your morals at the door. Just as a comparison, I just got word yesterday that a company was looking at me and the feedback was, we're afraid he has too much experience. Okay, maybe I'm gun-shy, but to me that's code for he's old. I know I play the age card sometimes (others might say a lot) but until you walk in my shoes I suggest you believe me. Age discrimination is alive and well in corporate America. It is not only tolerated, it seems to be fostered.
The downside to working two jobs, though, was my entire life was put on hold. By the end of the day I was too knackered to even go to the gym or pick up my guitar. I got fat and sloppy. And it seemed like I forgot over half of whatever I had learned in music. Big, big resolutions for 2012 are get into the gym after about a year and a half of no exercise at all, and picking up the guitar and working it. I mean, playing scales, doing the grunt work that makes you a better musician. I've inherited my father's stomach, which basically means I look like I swallowed a basketball. Not quite, but it could get there. He had a large, round, hard stomach. I could get there if I let myself go. This to me is a silver lining. If I've inherited the bulk of my father's genes, it means I won't die of cancer in ten years, following my mother.
Musically, just today I signed up for a basic ensemble class at Club Passim. I'll be studying with Kimber Ludiker and Austin Nevins. I could have taken a more advanced class, but I want to hang out with these two hip, cool, talented people; I think I can actually learn from them and I've learned in theater (and in business, too) to hang out with people you like and get along with. Kimber is an awesome musician. She's the fiddle player in Della Mae, one of my favorite bands of recent. Scroll down on their site and there's a pic of her. I want their song, Blessed Hands, sung at my funeral. (Besides Tom Sawyer, and I the only person who continually plans his funeral? I doubt if a lot of people would show up, so I want to maximize the tears.) I play their CD all the time, and if were the olden days (and someday these will be the olden days, too) it would have been said that I was redigging the grooves on the record. And who can go wrong with a guy whose first name is Austin?
And I'm seeing more sweat equity at the gym. Thankfully, I'm not that out of shape. What seemed to affect me even more than inactivity because I'd walk everywhere on campus, including up and down five flights of stairs in the library, was that bout of spinal stenosis that hammered me last fall. I think there was a little nerve damage done, and I'm just a bit unsteady on my feet, not a good thing for the mountains when you're hopping from rock to rock on a slope. So I want to drop a few pounds and tighten my stomach up, and also get some coordination back. I want to be back in the mountains this summer. It's been way too long, mostly because of school and Roberto, the Wonder Aussie.
Speaking of Bob, he's on his last legs (literally, he can't get up the stairs anymore and has a real hard time going down them.) I grab his hind legs and we have a wheelbarrow race up the stairs. He has hardly any control over his hindquarters, and no control over his bowels, which can get pretty gross in the apartment. It going to be my job to give him the shot, but I'm just not ready yet. Everyone around me, doesn't want the responsibility. I know this is a process. Just yesterday Sue said she wishes he'd just die in his sleep, but he won't; he's still too strong for that to happen. My wish is that the people around me would back me up when I say it's time, but no one wants to that. The hard truth is he's crippled, even though there are days he's happy and alert, even puppy-like. He goes in and out, up and down, and in the meantime, dog shit laced with Lysol smells horrible.
But when it comes to Bob, it's impossible not to draw a comparison between him and any of us who are getting old. What's going to happen to us when we get inconvenient, because truthfully, the bottom line is that's what he is, though trust me, it's a colossal inconvenience. Try the other day, seven degrees outside and he has shit all over him from lying in it and it's too cold to hose him off. I know so many people who silently worry about their future.
I'm not going to touch politics or the state of our country, though I think that's the thing I'd really like to write about, or at least tell a story set against the backdrop of a dying empire. Yep, that's how I see it. And I'm watching all my liberal friends do their typical knee-jerk because most of them don't own houses, have never been laid off or been in fire financial straits because, in this country, that's what really strips off the veneer of our society. When you have to make hard financial decisions in your own life, you start to see who the government and the financial markets (tied to corporations) couldn't care less about any of us. Until you've had to scrape to buy food or pay the heating bill, life has been way too easy on you and you're basically flying blind right now in this economy. They don't see how Obama is no different from Romney, who happens to be the Republican front runner (barely) and how Obama is just following the policies of Bush. They don't want to go there, because they haven't had to. It's easy for them to follow their old ways and beliefs, but what this country needs is someone to hit the ejector button. Democrats and Republicans alike are tainted. That includes Obama, Paul, Romney, Clinton, and anyone else you want to name. I've been bringing up Ron Paul a bit online, not because I support him, but because he's the only politician right now who is saying the things people don't want to hear. Then liberals do exactly what conservatives do: fall back on their doctrine or on something he said ten years ago, which means anything he says is tainted today. I don't understand people who just won't listen, period, to everyone and everything. It's like listening to Christians quote the bible. And it always reaches a point where I just glaze over and want to run away. I said to Sue, though, the only thing that's stopping me right now is how the #ows movement came about, and there are people who realize the system is broken--everyone from Obama on down. I'm not sure what to do next, but that's the start right there: If you just accept that even your favorite liberal politician is just as corrupt as Newt Gingrich, then you've just anted into the game. Before that, it's just the same old mess.
I'm growing my hair. Actually, it's more that I'm not going to a barber and therefore my hair is growing. I've gotten some compliments. Right now I can feel it tickling the back of my neck, and it's long enough so if it gets in my way I just tuck it behind my ears. I'm doing this because I'm tired of going to barbers to whom I say, I want to keep it long, and they say sure, then pull out their scissors and take a big hunk out. I had a great barber a few years ago then she quit. After going to a number of people, including Sue's hairdresser who is a woman and we figured she'd understand how to cut long hair, I got tired of shelling out twenty five to thirty bucks with tip and walk out looking uglier than I did when I walked in. It dawned on me if I want long hair to stay out of the barber and just grow the damn stuff, just like I did when I was a hippie. Hair's like writing, if you want it, just grow it. If you want to write, just write.
The bread machine actually walked off the chopping block today and hit the deck. I'm thinking this is the sort of news my aunt Marcella would have written. "The dern thing walked right off the table right onto the floor," she'd say. Now that I'm not working full-time (and my next gig will involve some work at home) I'm back to cooking. I love cooking and I like it the same way I like gardening. It gets you involved in your food, in your health. I baked a semolina bread today. When you make it yourself--bread soup, sauces, anything that doesn't mean opening up a package and firing up a microwave--it gets us back to a more natural way of living, which I think is necessary for people to have. And it tastes better and it's better for you, though I don't use "natural" ingredients because they are too hard to find and too expensive. It's gotten so only the rich and elite can eat healthy in his country, but I do the best I can.
I think that's about it. Thanks for listening, if you've read this far. This was helpful to me as a writing exercise, and eventually I'll be posting something at my other blog. Hopefully it will be good news, though there is a reading of one of my plays coming up in about a month on Cape Cod.
Work is coming along but it's still difficult. I graduated at the end of August and it took me about eight weeks to land something. I knew I was going to teach creative writing at BU, but I needed something more. Sue and I live cheap, real cheap, but sometimes it gets down to the bare bones and that can be scary. I had a few nibbles, some that looked really promising, and by that I mean they were conveniently located or paid a lot of money but I knew by the end of the gig I'd be spiritually bankrupted. Then Boston College hired me, and as Sue and I like to always point out, things do always seem to work out. I worked there one other time for a different group, and loved it. This proved to be the same experience. I can't say enough about how wonderful it was to work for Norma and her staff, and be around all the wonderful, fun, intelligent people who work in stewardship. Norma was a sane, sensible manager, and you can walk in the place without checking your morals at the door. Just as a comparison, I just got word yesterday that a company was looking at me and the feedback was, we're afraid he has too much experience. Okay, maybe I'm gun-shy, but to me that's code for he's old. I know I play the age card sometimes (others might say a lot) but until you walk in my shoes I suggest you believe me. Age discrimination is alive and well in corporate America. It is not only tolerated, it seems to be fostered.
The downside to working two jobs, though, was my entire life was put on hold. By the end of the day I was too knackered to even go to the gym or pick up my guitar. I got fat and sloppy. And it seemed like I forgot over half of whatever I had learned in music. Big, big resolutions for 2012 are get into the gym after about a year and a half of no exercise at all, and picking up the guitar and working it. I mean, playing scales, doing the grunt work that makes you a better musician. I've inherited my father's stomach, which basically means I look like I swallowed a basketball. Not quite, but it could get there. He had a large, round, hard stomach. I could get there if I let myself go. This to me is a silver lining. If I've inherited the bulk of my father's genes, it means I won't die of cancer in ten years, following my mother.
Musically, just today I signed up for a basic ensemble class at Club Passim. I'll be studying with Kimber Ludiker and Austin Nevins. I could have taken a more advanced class, but I want to hang out with these two hip, cool, talented people; I think I can actually learn from them and I've learned in theater (and in business, too) to hang out with people you like and get along with. Kimber is an awesome musician. She's the fiddle player in Della Mae, one of my favorite bands of recent. Scroll down on their site and there's a pic of her. I want their song, Blessed Hands, sung at my funeral. (Besides Tom Sawyer, and I the only person who continually plans his funeral? I doubt if a lot of people would show up, so I want to maximize the tears.) I play their CD all the time, and if were the olden days (and someday these will be the olden days, too) it would have been said that I was redigging the grooves on the record. And who can go wrong with a guy whose first name is Austin?
And I'm seeing more sweat equity at the gym. Thankfully, I'm not that out of shape. What seemed to affect me even more than inactivity because I'd walk everywhere on campus, including up and down five flights of stairs in the library, was that bout of spinal stenosis that hammered me last fall. I think there was a little nerve damage done, and I'm just a bit unsteady on my feet, not a good thing for the mountains when you're hopping from rock to rock on a slope. So I want to drop a few pounds and tighten my stomach up, and also get some coordination back. I want to be back in the mountains this summer. It's been way too long, mostly because of school and Roberto, the Wonder Aussie.
Speaking of Bob, he's on his last legs (literally, he can't get up the stairs anymore and has a real hard time going down them.) I grab his hind legs and we have a wheelbarrow race up the stairs. He has hardly any control over his hindquarters, and no control over his bowels, which can get pretty gross in the apartment. It going to be my job to give him the shot, but I'm just not ready yet. Everyone around me, doesn't want the responsibility. I know this is a process. Just yesterday Sue said she wishes he'd just die in his sleep, but he won't; he's still too strong for that to happen. My wish is that the people around me would back me up when I say it's time, but no one wants to that. The hard truth is he's crippled, even though there are days he's happy and alert, even puppy-like. He goes in and out, up and down, and in the meantime, dog shit laced with Lysol smells horrible.
But when it comes to Bob, it's impossible not to draw a comparison between him and any of us who are getting old. What's going to happen to us when we get inconvenient, because truthfully, the bottom line is that's what he is, though trust me, it's a colossal inconvenience. Try the other day, seven degrees outside and he has shit all over him from lying in it and it's too cold to hose him off. I know so many people who silently worry about their future.
I'm not going to touch politics or the state of our country, though I think that's the thing I'd really like to write about, or at least tell a story set against the backdrop of a dying empire. Yep, that's how I see it. And I'm watching all my liberal friends do their typical knee-jerk because most of them don't own houses, have never been laid off or been in fire financial straits because, in this country, that's what really strips off the veneer of our society. When you have to make hard financial decisions in your own life, you start to see who the government and the financial markets (tied to corporations) couldn't care less about any of us. Until you've had to scrape to buy food or pay the heating bill, life has been way too easy on you and you're basically flying blind right now in this economy. They don't see how Obama is no different from Romney, who happens to be the Republican front runner (barely) and how Obama is just following the policies of Bush. They don't want to go there, because they haven't had to. It's easy for them to follow their old ways and beliefs, but what this country needs is someone to hit the ejector button. Democrats and Republicans alike are tainted. That includes Obama, Paul, Romney, Clinton, and anyone else you want to name. I've been bringing up Ron Paul a bit online, not because I support him, but because he's the only politician right now who is saying the things people don't want to hear. Then liberals do exactly what conservatives do: fall back on their doctrine or on something he said ten years ago, which means anything he says is tainted today. I don't understand people who just won't listen, period, to everyone and everything. It's like listening to Christians quote the bible. And it always reaches a point where I just glaze over and want to run away. I said to Sue, though, the only thing that's stopping me right now is how the #ows movement came about, and there are people who realize the system is broken--everyone from Obama on down. I'm not sure what to do next, but that's the start right there: If you just accept that even your favorite liberal politician is just as corrupt as Newt Gingrich, then you've just anted into the game. Before that, it's just the same old mess.
I'm growing my hair. Actually, it's more that I'm not going to a barber and therefore my hair is growing. I've gotten some compliments. Right now I can feel it tickling the back of my neck, and it's long enough so if it gets in my way I just tuck it behind my ears. I'm doing this because I'm tired of going to barbers to whom I say, I want to keep it long, and they say sure, then pull out their scissors and take a big hunk out. I had a great barber a few years ago then she quit. After going to a number of people, including Sue's hairdresser who is a woman and we figured she'd understand how to cut long hair, I got tired of shelling out twenty five to thirty bucks with tip and walk out looking uglier than I did when I walked in. It dawned on me if I want long hair to stay out of the barber and just grow the damn stuff, just like I did when I was a hippie. Hair's like writing, if you want it, just grow it. If you want to write, just write.
The bread machine actually walked off the chopping block today and hit the deck. I'm thinking this is the sort of news my aunt Marcella would have written. "The dern thing walked right off the table right onto the floor," she'd say. Now that I'm not working full-time (and my next gig will involve some work at home) I'm back to cooking. I love cooking and I like it the same way I like gardening. It gets you involved in your food, in your health. I baked a semolina bread today. When you make it yourself--bread soup, sauces, anything that doesn't mean opening up a package and firing up a microwave--it gets us back to a more natural way of living, which I think is necessary for people to have. And it tastes better and it's better for you, though I don't use "natural" ingredients because they are too hard to find and too expensive. It's gotten so only the rich and elite can eat healthy in his country, but I do the best I can.
I think that's about it. Thanks for listening, if you've read this far. This was helpful to me as a writing exercise, and eventually I'll be posting something at my other blog. Hopefully it will be good news, though there is a reading of one of my plays coming up in about a month on Cape Cod.
Saturday, December 24, 2011
Happy Birthday, Alice Anne
Today would have been my mom's 94th birthday. I always remember her on Christmas Eve with a candle.
Thursday, December 15, 2011
MBTA Red Line Moment
I can put up with just about anything on the T. For starters, the people who hang by the door when people are trying to get in or out, even when they are obviously in the way.
Or people who talk loudly on the phone incessantly, like the guy yesterday morning who turned his face into the door (yes, he was also hanging out in the doorway) and still managed to share his moronic business call with the entire car.
I've even learned to accept all the commuter with their backpacks, the young and old alike, who don't seem to get that that big honking backpack 1) takes up just as much vertical room as another person, and 2) whenever they make the slightest move the backpack swings proportionately more. Think pendulum.
Yes, I can even, God love them, accept the people who sneeze, cough, or whatever into their hands, then grab the overhead bar--with the hand they just expelled bodily fluid into.
The one thing I cannot tolerate, though--the one thing that's fingernails on a chalkboard to me--are the people with the headphones who have their music on so loud, you can still hear this tinny tune going on. It's like a listening to a dripping faucet. Which is exactly what I finally told the guy this morning on the Red Line who was standing next to me. He was wearing full-size headphones, no less, and you could still hear this tinky, tinky, tinky thing going on.
I tapped his bag. Hey man, can you turn your music down a bit. It's like listening to a leaky faucet.
He did, but he didn't seem too happy about it.
Or people who talk loudly on the phone incessantly, like the guy yesterday morning who turned his face into the door (yes, he was also hanging out in the doorway) and still managed to share his moronic business call with the entire car.
I've even learned to accept all the commuter with their backpacks, the young and old alike, who don't seem to get that that big honking backpack 1) takes up just as much vertical room as another person, and 2) whenever they make the slightest move the backpack swings proportionately more. Think pendulum.
Yes, I can even, God love them, accept the people who sneeze, cough, or whatever into their hands, then grab the overhead bar--with the hand they just expelled bodily fluid into.
The one thing I cannot tolerate, though--the one thing that's fingernails on a chalkboard to me--are the people with the headphones who have their music on so loud, you can still hear this tinny tune going on. It's like a listening to a dripping faucet. Which is exactly what I finally told the guy this morning on the Red Line who was standing next to me. He was wearing full-size headphones, no less, and you could still hear this tinky, tinky, tinky thing going on.
I tapped his bag. Hey man, can you turn your music down a bit. It's like listening to a leaky faucet.
He did, but he didn't seem too happy about it.
Sunday, October 16, 2011
Google Dynamic Views Suck. It's Back to Old Blogger.
Well, that was a nice experiment with Google's dynamic views for blogger, wasn't it? I don't know how many of you got to see it in action because DV's don't work with third party analytics, so I had no idea who was checking out ABM. I know through Google Analytics there were lots of visitors, and because DVs were flashing pictures and links at you like Saturday night at the carnival, there were lots of page views, but I have no idea who you were. Or what you were looking for.
So it's back to the old look until Google gets off its high horse and realizes what people really want (or at least this peep) isn't necessary what Google wants for him.
I'm a sucker for technology. Give me a button to mash down on and I'm there. And I don't read the manual. I just dive in. And I liked the interface it gave to old Action Bob, nice and spiffy and all dynamic just like the name promised and it caused people to at least look at more content. But flash is no substitution for real content, for real information.
I'm loving social networking more and more, especially since now I see it in real action with #Occupy. About a year ago I was at a very high faluting party at BU and there was a Very Big Deal professor (tweeds, flannels, just the right length hair) there holding court for all his pretty little blonde grad students, and he was joking about technology and proud of the fact that he didn't know Twitter from his professorial ass. And this was about the time when China was shutting down the Internet and he asked me with a broad wink to his harem what was Twitter good for. I mentioned China and freedom, and that wasn't good enough for him. He fired off some dumb joke that was meant to dismiss me, but it only lowered my opinion of him to about what Obama's approval rating is today.
But you have to draw a line in the sand. I don't own a smart phone out of choice (well, I'm really broke too, so I can't afford the additional monthly payment) but I really don't want to be that connected. I still want to engage in the world, face to face, in real flesh and blood. And when I'm blogging, I want to know who I'm talking to, and what they're looking for.
I'm a sucker for technology. Give me a button to mash down on and I'm there. And I don't read the manual. I just dive in. And I liked the interface it gave to old Action Bob, nice and spiffy and all dynamic just like the name promised and it caused people to at least look at more content. But flash is no substitution for real content, for real information.
I'm loving social networking more and more, especially since now I see it in real action with #Occupy. About a year ago I was at a very high faluting party at BU and there was a Very Big Deal professor (tweeds, flannels, just the right length hair) there holding court for all his pretty little blonde grad students, and he was joking about technology and proud of the fact that he didn't know Twitter from his professorial ass. And this was about the time when China was shutting down the Internet and he asked me with a broad wink to his harem what was Twitter good for. I mentioned China and freedom, and that wasn't good enough for him. He fired off some dumb joke that was meant to dismiss me, but it only lowered my opinion of him to about what Obama's approval rating is today.
But you have to draw a line in the sand. I don't own a smart phone out of choice (well, I'm really broke too, so I can't afford the additional monthly payment) but I really don't want to be that connected. I still want to engage in the world, face to face, in real flesh and blood. And when I'm blogging, I want to know who I'm talking to, and what they're looking for.
Saturday, October 15, 2011
The Times They Are A Changing
I feel like I got shot out of a cannon when I finished grad school. Others who had gone through the program warned me about it. You're so steeped in your studies you don't realize how single-focused you are. At times, when Sue wanted me to think about something--anything, plans for the weekend, what to cook for dinner--my answer would be, let me just get through this...and this would be an assignment, finishing a scene, finishing the semester, something, anything that was so encompassing of my mind that I couldn't fit one more thing into my head without the feeling that it would explode.
And then, suddenly, you're back out in the world. And what a world it is. Occupy, and all the craziness and noise that it brings as people shout and argue their values when to me it seems so simple: Our society has been overtaken by corporate greed with a complicit government. Anything that falls from that is suspect, including your political bent (liberal or conservative), your religion, or your place in society. It's something I'm definitely excited about, but it also wears me out as people seem fixated on getting their point across. We know what the problem is. If you don't, you haven't been awake for the past four or five years.
There is an increasingly worse economy that has made it even harder for a fifty-something-year-old man to find a decent job, and by decent I mean one that not only pays enough so I can pay my bills and have a little extra, but also one that I find fulfilling.
There's a political world where the president who I had reluctantly put so much hope and faith in, has done nothing in the line of what he ran for, and he is now putting troops in Africa, even though we're fighting losing and expensive wars on two fronts.
But all this makes for things to be so exciting. My plays are getting good feedback. That's a start. That means so much to me. Those plays are the real me, so personal at their source and they harken back to me as a boy, and now it seems I'm pretty close to where I wanted to be "when I grew up."
My life is Sue grows everyday. I love her a little more each day and I don't know what I'd do without my best friend. We walk through this crazy world hand in hand and as long as I know she still loves me all is right with the world. There are a couple of lines in Highland Center, Indiana about this, where Hank says to Alice Anne, Are you scared? and she answers, Not if I'm with you. That exchange took place between me and the real Alice Anne when we were on a plane coming to Boston when she had two more months to live. See, it's all so personal, as the world should be, I think.
You can even see Action Bob has put on a new face. Google opened the door, I walked through, and though I'm not 100% happy with this new interface, I'm willing to give it a chance. What I don't like is Google forcing me to do things its way. This is just one more example of corporate greed, small yes, but enough is enough. Corporations and governments, I believe, should serve the people. Corporations (are you listening, Google?) should give their customers what the customer wants, not what the corporation wants them to want. The only company that got away with giving customers what they didn't ask for was Apple, and Steve Jobs is dead. Google is no Apple, not by a long shot. Don't give me that free-market line, either: If you don't like Blogger move. You can't. They got you locked in. The free-market, as you call it, is broken, just like our political system. And that's what the Occupiers are protesting about. If you don't get it, that's not my problem. Stay at home and watch your television. Someone will come along shortly and wipe the drool from your mouth.
There is an increasingly worse economy that has made it even harder for a fifty-something-year-old man to find a decent job, and by decent I mean one that not only pays enough so I can pay my bills and have a little extra, but also one that I find fulfilling.
There's a political world where the president who I had reluctantly put so much hope and faith in, has done nothing in the line of what he ran for, and he is now putting troops in Africa, even though we're fighting losing and expensive wars on two fronts.
But all this makes for things to be so exciting. My plays are getting good feedback. That's a start. That means so much to me. Those plays are the real me, so personal at their source and they harken back to me as a boy, and now it seems I'm pretty close to where I wanted to be "when I grew up."
My life is Sue grows everyday. I love her a little more each day and I don't know what I'd do without my best friend. We walk through this crazy world hand in hand and as long as I know she still loves me all is right with the world. There are a couple of lines in Highland Center, Indiana about this, where Hank says to Alice Anne, Are you scared? and she answers, Not if I'm with you. That exchange took place between me and the real Alice Anne when we were on a plane coming to Boston when she had two more months to live. See, it's all so personal, as the world should be, I think.
You can even see Action Bob has put on a new face. Google opened the door, I walked through, and though I'm not 100% happy with this new interface, I'm willing to give it a chance. What I don't like is Google forcing me to do things its way. This is just one more example of corporate greed, small yes, but enough is enough. Corporations and governments, I believe, should serve the people. Corporations (are you listening, Google?) should give their customers what the customer wants, not what the corporation wants them to want. The only company that got away with giving customers what they didn't ask for was Apple, and Steve Jobs is dead. Google is no Apple, not by a long shot. Don't give me that free-market line, either: If you don't like Blogger move. You can't. They got you locked in. The free-market, as you call it, is broken, just like our political system. And that's what the Occupiers are protesting about. If you don't get it, that's not my problem. Stay at home and watch your television. Someone will come along shortly and wipe the drool from your mouth.
Tuesday, October 11, 2011
What it was like for me at today's Occupy Boston protest
I feel I should get this out to people who may be either wondering what is really going on with all the Occupy cities in the United States or rolling their eyes at me going, here he goes again. John just can't keep out of trouble and he's a little too old to be an idealistic hippie.
I don't want to get into why I went, starting with the notion that I truly believe our government is completely broken and dysfunctional. I don't believe our one person/one vote notion of freedom is worth a damn anymore, and I think that anyone who says, If you don't vote you can't complain is truly clueless as to what's going on. Anyone you vote for except maybe on the very local level couldn't care less about you. They're politicians, and all they want is the office. And when they get the office they go to work for the people with the most money. That's not me, that's large multinational corporations. And then they sell off the country to the highest bidder.
It doesn't matter that Occupy Boston or Wall Street or Los Angeles or wherever (did you know they're all over the country? So many people think it's just Wall Street. No, it something like fifty something major cities) are just gathering and protesting. You hear the MSM say they are directionless and wonder what they are they protesting about? That's not the point. That's just the MSM doing what it always does. Hey, Political Candidate, what is your agenda? And the PC gives them one, just so they can tick that off their list. It doesn't matter to the MSM that tomorrow that agenda will change depending on the locale of that day's stump speech, they have an agenda. And this is where the MSM is so clueless. First, the Occupiers don't need them. The MSM is missing the boat on this one the same way they missed the boat on the paradigm that's putting them out of business in the first place. All the news and information is flowing back and forth on the social network and the digital world. At first I couldn't find any info on what was going on. I mean, people were setting up tents in Dewey Square in the shadow of the Federal Reserve Bank, and I couldn't find anything on the Globe's or the Herald's sites? Of course not. They're run by corporations, and their parent corporations aren't going to want that reported on. So I went to Facebook and Twitter and there it all was. (Right now I'm following real-time Twiitter and Facebook feeds as the Boston Police are approaching the tent city. They do this under cover of night, and won't allow the press to watch. When did our country become like this?)
Which is why last week I stopped by the tent city and I was amazed. I wanted to see things for myself. There was all kinds of organization going on there, including a press tent filled with computers. I mean, these people know what they're doing. And here's the thing: the MSM is missing the whole story. The BIG STORY is that for the first time in forty years, people are finally taking to the streets again in the United States. And today, I saw regular middle-class people, because what has been decimated in this country by corporate greed but the middle class, and there it was in full force today. In Boston there were thousands.
I had heard about the march on Facebook. Sue and I actually packed a picnic lunch and headed for the Common where students were going to meet then march to Dewey Square. It was a beautiful day, though kind of hot. We walked around and things seemed a bit scraggly. We walked around some more, and noticed the crowd had grown. People were gathering. Sue and I parked ourselves in the shade and watched for awhile, then the marchers began marching. Should we join them? It seemed weird. We passed some police officers and I heard on say that it seemed the marchers were heading one way. The cops didn't know where the marchers were going. And that's when it hit me. You know the first time you vote you felt this power, this right. I am an American and I am voting. Today I thought, freedom of assembly. That's what I'm doing. I'm free to assemble and a whole crowd can assemble and they don't need a permit from the city, who came up with that rule? This was our freedom and our right at its most basic core.
We wound our way through the Common, past the State House, passed the Fox News offices (it didn't look as if anyone was at home) through Downtown Crossing to Dewey Square. I said to Sue that if and when it comes to the police against the demonstrators, the tiny streets in Downtown Crossing would be the perfect place for the police to trap them.
People seemed awe-struck as we marched by. A lot of support, though. A lot of thumbs up. We got to Dewey Square and Sue and I peeled off and used the capitalistic bathrooms in South Station, then went back outside. The marchers, now thousands since the marchers from the Commons joined the Occupiers at Dewey Square, continued on down Atlantic Ave. If I didn't know better, I would have sworn I was marching in a walk for hunger. The march just continued on. Back through Downtown Crossing and towards the North End. We didn't know where we were going or who was in charge. We just followed the crowd. We marched past Faneuil Hall toward the Garden. It was in the North End where things went ugly. Not real ugly, but not pretty.
I was marching along thinking this is so much like a pretty day in the city, but at some point it's going to end. The nice relationship between the protesters and the police will end. Because as some point the city, as it is doing at this very moment, will impose its will on the protesters. And the police will be ordered to step in. Or you can't just quietly occupy a green space forever and do nothing. Something has to change. Because values will clash, and when that happens, people become unruly.
Check this out. This is the sort of rhetoric that is out there. This is a profile about one of the protesters on Wall Street:
I can understand that. It's how I feel. The system is broken, and isn't working for me. And it won't anymore. The government is not concerned with me or my loved ones and I have to start taking matters in my own hands. What that means I don't necessarily know. I know getting out and marching made me feel like I was doing something. And we don't know where this is going to take us. I posted something a few days ago where Chris Hedges, who has seen plenty of revolutions, talked about what was going on in the United States. I was most intrigued by what he said about the protesters in Berlin. They thought in a year they might have people crossing between East and West Berlin, and then suddenly the Wall was down. Even the leaders of the protest movement didn't see it coming.
But it was at a bridge in the North End where the police stopped the march. Traffic stopped, and by traffic I mean tour buses and duck boats (oh no, not the duck boats!) Later I read that the police said the bridge wouldn't have held the collected weight of the protesters, but doesn't sound a bit odd to you? I mean, it wasn't a suspension bridge made of jungle vines. But a couple of paddy wagons pulled up, and a couple of locals got into it with a protester in full view of the police, and one of the protesters actually pointed it out to an officer who then had to respond, and the woman said her freedom of speech was being trampled on because she couldn't yell inflammatory inanities at the protesters.
We started talking to a man who I know wouldn't have wanted to be identified, and I'll respect that. He asked what we were protesting, and I asked him, You have to ask? Where have you been the past four or five years? He agreed he knew sort of what it was about, and said it was an anit-capitalistic protest. I told him that was part of it, but also a dysfunctional government that is up for sale to the highest bidder. We had a nice conversation. Later I thought to myself that I should have asked him a question. He admitted to a six-figure income, and I should have asked him how much money in actual dollars and cents did he lose when the stock market crashed. I'm sure it would have been a lot. On that day, Sue and I looked at each other and shrugged, saying if you don't have any money to lose what does it matter? But I'm sure this guy lost big. And there's the big question: You asked me what I'm doing in the street protesting, and I have to ask you, after that, why aren't you off the sidewalk and in the street too?
I don't want to get into why I went, starting with the notion that I truly believe our government is completely broken and dysfunctional. I don't believe our one person/one vote notion of freedom is worth a damn anymore, and I think that anyone who says, If you don't vote you can't complain is truly clueless as to what's going on. Anyone you vote for except maybe on the very local level couldn't care less about you. They're politicians, and all they want is the office. And when they get the office they go to work for the people with the most money. That's not me, that's large multinational corporations. And then they sell off the country to the highest bidder.
It doesn't matter that Occupy Boston or Wall Street or Los Angeles or wherever (did you know they're all over the country? So many people think it's just Wall Street. No, it something like fifty something major cities) are just gathering and protesting. You hear the MSM say they are directionless and wonder what they are they protesting about? That's not the point. That's just the MSM doing what it always does. Hey, Political Candidate, what is your agenda? And the PC gives them one, just so they can tick that off their list. It doesn't matter to the MSM that tomorrow that agenda will change depending on the locale of that day's stump speech, they have an agenda. And this is where the MSM is so clueless. First, the Occupiers don't need them. The MSM is missing the boat on this one the same way they missed the boat on the paradigm that's putting them out of business in the first place. All the news and information is flowing back and forth on the social network and the digital world. At first I couldn't find any info on what was going on. I mean, people were setting up tents in Dewey Square in the shadow of the Federal Reserve Bank, and I couldn't find anything on the Globe's or the Herald's sites? Of course not. They're run by corporations, and their parent corporations aren't going to want that reported on. So I went to Facebook and Twitter and there it all was. (Right now I'm following real-time Twiitter and Facebook feeds as the Boston Police are approaching the tent city. They do this under cover of night, and won't allow the press to watch. When did our country become like this?)
Which is why last week I stopped by the tent city and I was amazed. I wanted to see things for myself. There was all kinds of organization going on there, including a press tent filled with computers. I mean, these people know what they're doing. And here's the thing: the MSM is missing the whole story. The BIG STORY is that for the first time in forty years, people are finally taking to the streets again in the United States. And today, I saw regular middle-class people, because what has been decimated in this country by corporate greed but the middle class, and there it was in full force today. In Boston there were thousands.I had heard about the march on Facebook. Sue and I actually packed a picnic lunch and headed for the Common where students were going to meet then march to Dewey Square. It was a beautiful day, though kind of hot. We walked around and things seemed a bit scraggly. We walked around some more, and noticed the crowd had grown. People were gathering. Sue and I parked ourselves in the shade and watched for awhile, then the marchers began marching. Should we join them? It seemed weird. We passed some police officers and I heard on say that it seemed the marchers were heading one way. The cops didn't know where the marchers were going. And that's when it hit me. You know the first time you vote you felt this power, this right. I am an American and I am voting. Today I thought, freedom of assembly. That's what I'm doing. I'm free to assemble and a whole crowd can assemble and they don't need a permit from the city, who came up with that rule? This was our freedom and our right at its most basic core.
We wound our way through the Common, past the State House, passed the Fox News offices (it didn't look as if anyone was at home) through Downtown Crossing to Dewey Square. I said to Sue that if and when it comes to the police against the demonstrators, the tiny streets in Downtown Crossing would be the perfect place for the police to trap them.People seemed awe-struck as we marched by. A lot of support, though. A lot of thumbs up. We got to Dewey Square and Sue and I peeled off and used the capitalistic bathrooms in South Station, then went back outside. The marchers, now thousands since the marchers from the Commons joined the Occupiers at Dewey Square, continued on down Atlantic Ave. If I didn't know better, I would have sworn I was marching in a walk for hunger. The march just continued on. Back through Downtown Crossing and towards the North End. We didn't know where we were going or who was in charge. We just followed the crowd. We marched past Faneuil Hall toward the Garden. It was in the North End where things went ugly. Not real ugly, but not pretty.
I was marching along thinking this is so much like a pretty day in the city, but at some point it's going to end. The nice relationship between the protesters and the police will end. Because as some point the city, as it is doing at this very moment, will impose its will on the protesters. And the police will be ordered to step in. Or you can't just quietly occupy a green space forever and do nothing. Something has to change. Because values will clash, and when that happens, people become unruly.
Check this out. This is the sort of rhetoric that is out there. This is a profile about one of the protesters on Wall Street:
"The goal to people like Ketchup is very, very clear. It can be articulated in one word—REBELLION. These protesters have not come to work within the system. They are not pleading with Congress for electoral reform. They know electoral politics is a farce and have found another way to be heard and exercise power. They have no faith, nor should they, in the political system or the two major political parties. They know the press will not amplify their voices, and so they created a press of their own. They know the economy serves the oligarchs, so they formed their own communal system. This movement is an effort to take our country back."
I can understand that. It's how I feel. The system is broken, and isn't working for me. And it won't anymore. The government is not concerned with me or my loved ones and I have to start taking matters in my own hands. What that means I don't necessarily know. I know getting out and marching made me feel like I was doing something. And we don't know where this is going to take us. I posted something a few days ago where Chris Hedges, who has seen plenty of revolutions, talked about what was going on in the United States. I was most intrigued by what he said about the protesters in Berlin. They thought in a year they might have people crossing between East and West Berlin, and then suddenly the Wall was down. Even the leaders of the protest movement didn't see it coming.
But it was at a bridge in the North End where the police stopped the march. Traffic stopped, and by traffic I mean tour buses and duck boats (oh no, not the duck boats!) Later I read that the police said the bridge wouldn't have held the collected weight of the protesters, but doesn't sound a bit odd to you? I mean, it wasn't a suspension bridge made of jungle vines. But a couple of paddy wagons pulled up, and a couple of locals got into it with a protester in full view of the police, and one of the protesters actually pointed it out to an officer who then had to respond, and the woman said her freedom of speech was being trampled on because she couldn't yell inflammatory inanities at the protesters.
We started talking to a man who I know wouldn't have wanted to be identified, and I'll respect that. He asked what we were protesting, and I asked him, You have to ask? Where have you been the past four or five years? He agreed he knew sort of what it was about, and said it was an anit-capitalistic protest. I told him that was part of it, but also a dysfunctional government that is up for sale to the highest bidder. We had a nice conversation. Later I thought to myself that I should have asked him a question. He admitted to a six-figure income, and I should have asked him how much money in actual dollars and cents did he lose when the stock market crashed. I'm sure it would have been a lot. On that day, Sue and I looked at each other and shrugged, saying if you don't have any money to lose what does it matter? But I'm sure this guy lost big. And there's the big question: You asked me what I'm doing in the street protesting, and I have to ask you, after that, why aren't you off the sidewalk and in the street too?
Monday, October 10, 2011
10.10.11 OccupyBoston Raw Video
Just trying to dump as much of the video and images I shot today. Beautiful day that started out peaceful, but you knew that was going to end. But it was a wonderful crowd, thousands out there finally feeling, I think like I was feeling, finally doing something. I'm sorry, the one person/one vote system is broken, and I didn't know what to do. You vote someone in who promises change, and they then just vote with whoever has the most money. Today I felt like I was really finally voicing my total dissatisfaction with our government, and I was doing it with thousands of great, intelligent people. When you talked to them, they weren't nutbags, they were intelligent concerned people who really cared about their fellow human beings and for society and their country.
Friday, September 23, 2011
A Della Mae Threefer
Della Mae just posted three new videos on YouTube. Really nice ones, too, that really show off not just their talents as musicians but also a flavor of the energy you'll see when they're on stage.
We got turned on to them when Sue started taking fiddle lessons at Club Passim from two-time National Fiddle Champion Kimber Ludiker, Della Mae's fiddle player. The next step was easy: Grab some tickets to one of their concerts and you'll be hooked.
Anyway, give 'em a listen. Here are their three new videos.
We got turned on to them when Sue started taking fiddle lessons at Club Passim from two-time National Fiddle Champion Kimber Ludiker, Della Mae's fiddle player. The next step was easy: Grab some tickets to one of their concerts and you'll be hooked.
Anyway, give 'em a listen. Here are their three new videos.
Blessed Hands
Polk County
Jamie Dear
Thursday, September 22, 2011
I'm Stoned Again
Two days ago I woke up and knew something wasn't right. The fact that it was 6:30 in the a.m. was part of it. I'm rarely awake at that hour. But the pain, discomfort, and general ill feeling was telling me something I was hoping I could head off with a glass of water laced with a bit of orange juice. Not a chance. When you've got kidney stones, you're a goner. Nothing, and I mean nothing, short of some serious intravenous pain killers that you can only get from serious medical professionals, can get you through what a minuscule crystal is about to put you through.
"Oooh, kidney stones. I've heard they're pretty painful." They're the one thing a man can throw at a woman if she starts going on about the pain of labor. Granted, the thing that comes out in one is nothing compared to the thing that comes out in the other, but pain for pain, women even back down from kidney stones. They're even more painful than the excruciating pain I had to bear last fall when I learned I had spinal stenosis. That's a condition caused by your spinal column being too small for your spinal chord. You know what that is, right? It's the entire bundle of nerves that run up and down your spine. Yeah, kidney stones hurt more than that. They hurt more than the symptoms I was exhibiting, numb and paralysis in my leg. Shooting pains up and down my leg, all the way to my ankle. A charlie horse that I called, the Mother of all Charlie Horses. Yeah, kidney stones hurt more than the Mother of all Charlie Horses.
In the ER, the drill is simple. I writhe in pain on a gurney while nurses take blood and my vitals. Then they hook you up to an IV to force fluids in you. You want to hose the mother out. In the meantime, I might be weeping like a Nancy or if I feel like it, vomiting. Real serious pain causes nausea, did you know that? Then the drugs come and you lie there experiencing the best dreams you've ever had in your life. Eventually they let you go with prescriptions for enough Oxy with a street value that could pay off my school loans. And now they also give you this other drug that helps you pee like a racehorse. Like I said, the idea is to hose the little bastard right out of you.
In the meantime, the stone is taking its sweet time negotiating your bladder and ureters, and your body, sensing this intruder, feels that a fever and general malaise is the best thing it can do under the circumstances.
So, you drink and drink and drink. You're supposed to drink up three quart of water a day. Night and day, you're in and out, in and out of the bathroom. Let it be known that there reaches a point in taking in that much water that it turns from drinking to drowning. Eventually, you can't stand water because you're just forcing it in. Can you say bloated?
I get to the point where I'll drink anything except water. Water with OJ maybe. Today I drank pot after pot of herbal tea with honey, but that eventually starts to get to you, too. Oh, and with all this liquid intake, there's that drug working on you, so you're running to the bathroom every whipstitch.
I don't even want to go into what happens in the bathroom.
"Oooh, kidney stones. I've heard they're pretty painful." They're the one thing a man can throw at a woman if she starts going on about the pain of labor. Granted, the thing that comes out in one is nothing compared to the thing that comes out in the other, but pain for pain, women even back down from kidney stones. They're even more painful than the excruciating pain I had to bear last fall when I learned I had spinal stenosis. That's a condition caused by your spinal column being too small for your spinal chord. You know what that is, right? It's the entire bundle of nerves that run up and down your spine. Yeah, kidney stones hurt more than that. They hurt more than the symptoms I was exhibiting, numb and paralysis in my leg. Shooting pains up and down my leg, all the way to my ankle. A charlie horse that I called, the Mother of all Charlie Horses. Yeah, kidney stones hurt more than the Mother of all Charlie Horses.
In the ER, the drill is simple. I writhe in pain on a gurney while nurses take blood and my vitals. Then they hook you up to an IV to force fluids in you. You want to hose the mother out. In the meantime, I might be weeping like a Nancy or if I feel like it, vomiting. Real serious pain causes nausea, did you know that? Then the drugs come and you lie there experiencing the best dreams you've ever had in your life. Eventually they let you go with prescriptions for enough Oxy with a street value that could pay off my school loans. And now they also give you this other drug that helps you pee like a racehorse. Like I said, the idea is to hose the little bastard right out of you.
In the meantime, the stone is taking its sweet time negotiating your bladder and ureters, and your body, sensing this intruder, feels that a fever and general malaise is the best thing it can do under the circumstances.
So, you drink and drink and drink. You're supposed to drink up three quart of water a day. Night and day, you're in and out, in and out of the bathroom. Let it be known that there reaches a point in taking in that much water that it turns from drinking to drowning. Eventually, you can't stand water because you're just forcing it in. Can you say bloated?
I get to the point where I'll drink anything except water. Water with OJ maybe. Today I drank pot after pot of herbal tea with honey, but that eventually starts to get to you, too. Oh, and with all this liquid intake, there's that drug working on you, so you're running to the bathroom every whipstitch.
I don't even want to go into what happens in the bathroom.
Monday, September 19, 2011
The Lost Notebooks of Hank Williams VIDEO
Well, the video is pretty much a seven-minute long commercial to buy the CD, but it's not like it's Netflix trying to screw you. It's not a huge box set with "extras" that so many recording artists are putting out now, either, for a couple of hundred dollars, not understanding or caring that that amount of money for some music lovers now pays for the heat or for food on the table. It doesn't sell for a lot, and it's looks like it's a compilation of a bunch of old songs never recorded by Hank Williams by a bunch of really talented and passionate musicians. I just always grind my teeth, though, when I see the CEO or president of this or that company talking folksy. I don't understand why they just don't stay in their fancy offices and continue to just pull in their overpriced paychecks. Why do they have to get out and mingle with the rest of us? Now that is something Hank would say, so I think it's totally appropriate.
The Lost Notebooks of Hank Williams EPK from Columbia Records on Vimeo.
The Lost Notebooks of Hank Williams EPK from Columbia Records on Vimeo.
Hey Netflix's Reed Hastings: Your Skin's Hanging Off Your Bones
Reed Hastings, co-founder and CEO of Netflix, came out with this big mea culpa on Netflix's blog and in text messages for raising prices, apologizing for being the arrogant, greedy bastards they are (wow, 20-20 hindsight, huh, Reed?)
What an example of damage control, huh? Take a look.
And if you believe that, as they say I've got a bridge I'd like to sell you. What you are looking at is the product of hours and hours of meetings and conference calls and emails and a helluva lot of money in costs--probably more money than many of us will make in ten years--to PR agencies and corporate communication professionals. The whole tone and premise is we want to show our human side, when all along we can see it Reed: You're skin's hanging off your bones. What you're seeing is an alien life form trying to act human.
Netflix is just one snake in a nest of snakes comprising the home entertainment business. We know the entertainment business is cutthroat, and these third-tier providers are the true bottom feeders. Netflix's business was taking in water everywhere. It wasn't just customers jumping ship. It's own "partners"--which is a business term akin to a Facebook "friend"--trying to take them for whatever they can. This business is just a passle of jackals.
"Two weeks ago, negotiations between Netflix and Starz, the premium pay-TV provider, broke down. Starz owns the Internet rights to titles from Sony and Disney, so it is an important source of films and TV shows for Netflix. But Starz is reportedly asking for a $300 million deal, or 10 times the $30 million agreement it penned in 2008 and Netflix doesn’t want to pay." Here's the source of that quote.
Netflix, partially through its own doing and partially because of the Darwinian law that rules the business, was the wounded antelope on the Serengeti, with the lions closing in. Netflix's last option was to actually try to appear human and appeal for mercy from people who don't have a clue about the true nature of the game.
What an example of damage control, huh? Take a look.
And if you believe that, as they say I've got a bridge I'd like to sell you. What you are looking at is the product of hours and hours of meetings and conference calls and emails and a helluva lot of money in costs--probably more money than many of us will make in ten years--to PR agencies and corporate communication professionals. The whole tone and premise is we want to show our human side, when all along we can see it Reed: You're skin's hanging off your bones. What you're seeing is an alien life form trying to act human.
Netflix is just one snake in a nest of snakes comprising the home entertainment business. We know the entertainment business is cutthroat, and these third-tier providers are the true bottom feeders. Netflix's business was taking in water everywhere. It wasn't just customers jumping ship. It's own "partners"--which is a business term akin to a Facebook "friend"--trying to take them for whatever they can. This business is just a passle of jackals.
"Two weeks ago, negotiations between Netflix and Starz, the premium pay-TV provider, broke down. Starz owns the Internet rights to titles from Sony and Disney, so it is an important source of films and TV shows for Netflix. But Starz is reportedly asking for a $300 million deal, or 10 times the $30 million agreement it penned in 2008 and Netflix doesn’t want to pay." Here's the source of that quote.
Netflix, partially through its own doing and partially because of the Darwinian law that rules the business, was the wounded antelope on the Serengeti, with the lions closing in. Netflix's last option was to actually try to appear human and appeal for mercy from people who don't have a clue about the true nature of the game.
Sunday, September 18, 2011
Della Mae- Blessed Hands
To anyone who has a hard life. To anyone for whom life can be, at times, hard. For all of us who find joy and inspiration in music and what it can do for the soul. This is music based in what I feel is real life, filled with human interaction and love.
Thursday, September 15, 2011
I'm Becoming a Huge Tom Russell Fan. What About You?
Been digging through YouTube for Tom Russell videos just to get stoked for his concert next Tuesday at Club Passim. And just about everything I click on I love. Great American stories. Not the crap the Tea Party/GOP is slathering on the public like lard on toast. These are real American stories, based in the Old West (stand up tall next to Sam Shepard.)
These are just a few of his songs I could listen to over and over. Real, impassioned stories.
These are just a few of his songs I could listen to over and over. Real, impassioned stories.
Tuesday, September 13, 2011
East of Woodstock, West of Vietnam
Going to see Tom Russell at Club Passim next Tuesday, September 20. Maybe you should, too.
Here's East of Woodstock, West of Vietnam.
Here's East of Woodstock, West of Vietnam.
Tift Merritt--Stray Paper
And while I'm back on posting songs, here's one I stumbled on. Tift Merritt is someone who's on my short list to see. I missed her the one time I can remember her coming here to Boston--she played at the MFA, that's the Museum of Fine Arts and I can't imagine this act playing at that staid place. She probably played an acoustic set.
I know I learned about her a while back on one of those compilation CDs that music magazines are wont to put out, a good idea that I'm sure a lot of labels balk at. I mean, you can't just give it away for free, the greasy suits with the nice haircuts say.
You can see from this that this woman has some serious rock-country chops. And she's got an awesome band backing her up.
Enough. I'm just blathering. Just listen. And hang in there because there's a nice surprise at the end.
I know I learned about her a while back on one of those compilation CDs that music magazines are wont to put out, a good idea that I'm sure a lot of labels balk at. I mean, you can't just give it away for free, the greasy suits with the nice haircuts say.
You can see from this that this woman has some serious rock-country chops. And she's got an awesome band backing her up.
Enough. I'm just blathering. Just listen. And hang in there because there's a nice surprise at the end.
The Weight--Gillian Welch & Old Crow Medicine Show
Crap rattles around in my head. The Internet doesn't help. Actually, the Internet is an enabler. I can surf and follow my nose like an old bloodhound following a scent over the horizon into oblivion. From this tree to that rock over this stretch of sand and the next thing I know I'm around the bend and everyone is out of sight. Which is usually the way I like things.
I criticize my own daughter for posting songs on her blog simply because they resonate with her. You got to add your own voice, I tell her. Give it more value and pass it along, I say in words that make me wince now that I've realized they came out of my own mouth and now that I think about it. I've been guilty of doing that more than once in this space, and who cares? Music speaks for itself, doesn't it? Do I have to add words, words, words? More noise to the world when the music simply wants to be heard?
Anyway, as I was following my nose this morning, I found this and I would have loved to have been sitting in that audience just taking it all in.
I criticize my own daughter for posting songs on her blog simply because they resonate with her. You got to add your own voice, I tell her. Give it more value and pass it along, I say in words that make me wince now that I've realized they came out of my own mouth and now that I think about it. I've been guilty of doing that more than once in this space, and who cares? Music speaks for itself, doesn't it? Do I have to add words, words, words? More noise to the world when the music simply wants to be heard?
Anyway, as I was following my nose this morning, I found this and I would have loved to have been sitting in that audience just taking it all in.
Monday, September 12, 2011
Back to Square One with the Guitar
Graduate school was one of the most intense long-term experiences I've had in a while. Not that I don't get intense experiences almost on a daily basis. I mean, check out the economy. As I used to say when I started freelancing, homelessness and starvation are great motivators. There's nothing like the realization that I may still end up on a park bench in my old age, huddled under a raggedy-ass thin blanket in the snow. Seriously, I've thought of it. What do you do when the money runs out?
Look back on that first sentence and realize that what grad school was, was long-term. It was a non-stop shot out of a canon where you just kept flying through the air and you never thought you were going to land. I'm reading comments, primarily on Facebook, of people who have started the program at BPT and they are completely overwhelmed, exactly the way I was a year ago. I mean, when do I sleep? When do I see Sue? When do I do anything except study? Even, with all the studying and the completing responsibilities toward your stipend, when do I write? Well, it all came together, you slip into a mean routine and just ride it out.
Now, I'm trying to cobble a life. I'm looking for work, and I'll probably blog about that at some point when I get over the fact that I got hammered on an interview for a job that I thought I had, but didn't really want in the first place, but I had to go for something. I mean, I think I'm done with the corporate world and I certainly don't want to shill for an insurance company, which is what this interview was for. That seriously shows how desperate I am, that I said, Insurance?--no problemo. I'll just check my soul here at the door before I wipe my feet. I never did fit in that well to begin with, and now as I've gotten older and set in the writing world, I fit in even less. I think Sue said it best, It's almost like they can smell I'm an outsider. But the work scene is scary. I want to teach, and teaching jobs are scarce, just like any other job. But I'm...hopeful.
Tonight, though, I got back to music lessons, something I had to give up while in school and something I missed so much. And maybe I'll need the lessons some day in case I need to busk in Park Street. I did have a teacher who once said, in all sincerity, that all musicians should have the experience of playing out on the street or in subway stations. I guess there's a visceral grittiness that happens that leads to the blues. I don't know.
I did get rusty. I was really cruising along, learning and growing as a musician, but then I had to make some real choices and cut things out of my life and just dedicate all my talents and energy to playwriting. Sometimes I wouldn't touch a guitar for a week or two. Or I'd just pick it up and dust it, since that's all it was doing was collecting dust. Or I'd walk past it and run my fingers along the strings like you would a picket fence on the street. That's all changed, and tonight Joe, my old timey teacher, got me started back on square one. Start reading music. Start playing E, F, and G on the first string, and tap it out with my foot. Three notes. It's all back to square one stuff. I don't mind though. I'm back at it. And I want to get into songwriting seriously. I mean, what am I really supposed to do in Park Street?--cover old Lowell George songs? Still, I do love this one.
Look back on that first sentence and realize that what grad school was, was long-term. It was a non-stop shot out of a canon where you just kept flying through the air and you never thought you were going to land. I'm reading comments, primarily on Facebook, of people who have started the program at BPT and they are completely overwhelmed, exactly the way I was a year ago. I mean, when do I sleep? When do I see Sue? When do I do anything except study? Even, with all the studying and the completing responsibilities toward your stipend, when do I write? Well, it all came together, you slip into a mean routine and just ride it out.
Now, I'm trying to cobble a life. I'm looking for work, and I'll probably blog about that at some point when I get over the fact that I got hammered on an interview for a job that I thought I had, but didn't really want in the first place, but I had to go for something. I mean, I think I'm done with the corporate world and I certainly don't want to shill for an insurance company, which is what this interview was for. That seriously shows how desperate I am, that I said, Insurance?--no problemo. I'll just check my soul here at the door before I wipe my feet. I never did fit in that well to begin with, and now as I've gotten older and set in the writing world, I fit in even less. I think Sue said it best, It's almost like they can smell I'm an outsider. But the work scene is scary. I want to teach, and teaching jobs are scarce, just like any other job. But I'm...hopeful.
Tonight, though, I got back to music lessons, something I had to give up while in school and something I missed so much. And maybe I'll need the lessons some day in case I need to busk in Park Street. I did have a teacher who once said, in all sincerity, that all musicians should have the experience of playing out on the street or in subway stations. I guess there's a visceral grittiness that happens that leads to the blues. I don't know.
I did get rusty. I was really cruising along, learning and growing as a musician, but then I had to make some real choices and cut things out of my life and just dedicate all my talents and energy to playwriting. Sometimes I wouldn't touch a guitar for a week or two. Or I'd just pick it up and dust it, since that's all it was doing was collecting dust. Or I'd walk past it and run my fingers along the strings like you would a picket fence on the street. That's all changed, and tonight Joe, my old timey teacher, got me started back on square one. Start reading music. Start playing E, F, and G on the first string, and tap it out with my foot. Three notes. It's all back to square one stuff. I don't mind though. I'm back at it. And I want to get into songwriting seriously. I mean, what am I really supposed to do in Park Street?--cover old Lowell George songs? Still, I do love this one.
Saturday, September 10, 2011
Saturday reading...
There are a few things I'd like to get out of my system here, but a couple of things.
It's a beautiful Saturday and Sue and I are soon going to meet some wonderful friends for a trip to the ICA in Boston, so I don't want to spend my time blogging, for cripe's sake.
The other thing is, as much as I'm for openness and truthfulness, I've learned to censor myself a little bit. If you want to get a glimpse of what I'd really like to be talking about here--and I'm still trying to figure out the best way to do it without shooting myself completely in the foot--check out my Twitter feed. Yeah, it's still Johnny vs. The Volcano a.k.a Corporate America. Why do I even keep trying?
But, in lieu of some hot gossip, check out johngreinerferris.com for some of the latest posts on theater and playwriting there.
It's a beautiful Saturday and Sue and I are soon going to meet some wonderful friends for a trip to the ICA in Boston, so I don't want to spend my time blogging, for cripe's sake.
The other thing is, as much as I'm for openness and truthfulness, I've learned to censor myself a little bit. If you want to get a glimpse of what I'd really like to be talking about here--and I'm still trying to figure out the best way to do it without shooting myself completely in the foot--check out my Twitter feed. Yeah, it's still Johnny vs. The Volcano a.k.a Corporate America. Why do I even keep trying?
But, in lieu of some hot gossip, check out johngreinerferris.com for some of the latest posts on theater and playwriting there.
Sunday, September 4, 2011
Kenny Fuentes Asked For This Recipe & It's Too Good To Keep A Secret
The last time I saw Kenny Fuentes, the artistic director at the Colab Theater, was last night at Krista D'Agostino's good-bye party and he was taking a poll asking if it's cheating on your spouse if you...well, let's just put aside what the circumstance Kenny was proposing.
Anyway, before that, we were talking about food. Good food. Because he and Bob Mussett, along with Krista, had cooked up a Chicken McNuggett casserole. I don't even want to tell you what these folks do with bacon.
But anyway, we got to talking about recipes and Sue said I had this kick-ass recipe for chicken that I cook at Christmastime. Kenny asked for it, saying he'd be too lazy too cook it but might find someone to do it for him.
I was thinking this recipe is too good to keep secret. So Kenny, here ya go. I hope you enjoy it as much as I enjoy hanging out with you. And anyone else who wants to give it a go, try it out.
Now, as far as your question, Kenny--Don't both people have to be alive to do that??
Anyway, before that, we were talking about food. Good food. Because he and Bob Mussett, along with Krista, had cooked up a Chicken McNuggett casserole. I don't even want to tell you what these folks do with bacon.
But anyway, we got to talking about recipes and Sue said I had this kick-ass recipe for chicken that I cook at Christmastime. Kenny asked for it, saying he'd be too lazy too cook it but might find someone to do it for him.
I was thinking this recipe is too good to keep secret. So Kenny, here ya go. I hope you enjoy it as much as I enjoy hanging out with you. And anyone else who wants to give it a go, try it out.
Now, as far as your question, Kenny--Don't both people have to be alive to do that??
Roasted Chicken with Holiday Stuffing
Recipe courtesy Martin Yan
Show: Cooking Live Episode: Feast with Martin Yan
Recipe Summary
Prep Time: 8 hours Cook Time: 1 hour 30 minutes
Marinade:
2 tablespoons dark soy
1 tablespoon soy sauce
2 teaspoons minced garlic
1 tablespoon honey
1/2 teaspoon pepper
1(2 1/2) pound spring chicken
STUFFING:
1/4 cup dried chestnuts
3 dried black mushrooms
1 tablespoon cooking oil
2 Chinese sausage (2 ounces each), diced
2 medium shallots, thinly sliced
2 stalks green onions, thinly sliced
1 tablespoon chopped cilantro
2 tablespoons oyster-flavored sauce
1 teaspoon sesame oil
1 cup cooked glutinous rice(sweet rice)
Combine marinade ingredients in a bowl. Rub chicken inside and out with marinade. Cover and refrigerate for 4 hours or overnight. Stuffing: Soak the dried chestnuts overnight in water. Place them in a pan with water and simmer, covered, until soft, about 30 minutes; drain. Discard the stems and thinly slice the mushroom caps. Place a wok over high heat until hot. Add oil, swirling to coat sides. Add sausage; stir-fry until sausage is slightly crisp, 11/2 to 2 minutes. Add shallots, green onions, chestnuts, mushrooms and cilantro. Cook for 1 minute. Stir in oyster-flavored sauce, and sesame oil. Remove pan from heat and add rice; mix well. Let stuffing cool. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Just before roasting, place stuffing inside chicken; enclose with skewers. Place chicken, breast side up, on a rack in a roasting pan. Insert a meat thermometer into the thickest part of thigh meat, without touching bone. Bake until thermometer registers 180 to 185 degrees, about 1 to 11/2 hours. During the last half of roasting time, baste chicken occasionally with pan juices.
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