December 31, 2007
2008
...the management does not condone this sort of behavior...
it is a holiday centered on watching a clock hand move. it's a holiday based on math and physics and gravity and the universe (and remarkably includes no mention of god...thank god). it's a holiday when man gathers as a group and formally recognizes his and her complete inability to fathom the cosmos and our place on it (which is why there's drinking). therefore, it is the logical agnostic component to this year-end holiday season. hence, it is the most reality-based, easy-to-use, universal part of the entire shebang. and unlike the famous one of last week, it is far from silent...
so maybe it's just a number, but let there be toasting anyway. whenever four billion mortals shake their fists skyward, I think it's a good thing...
happy new year.
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December 27, 2007
UNCLE SANTA
...why is it that now is the time I finally feel like lampooning the big blobitty-blah? perhaps because I've been subjected to the music and the lights and all the nonsense for months on end now...or maybe it's simply because I'm back at work and everyone's on vacation and I have time to play blog...at any rate, the sentiment is genuine...I do hope we have a more peaceful world in 2008...but with the assassination of Benazir Bhutto, I'm guarded in my optimism...
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December 26, 2007
SANTA SESSION
here's a video featuring the only xmas figure I actually do believe in - santa claus - and a recent experience he had doing an overdub of his signature catch-phrase..."actually go middle one, middle one, top one..."
(been there done that)
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MERRY XMAS (YOU'RE A DRUNK)
...amusing enough to merit inclusion here...
merry christmas I'm a drunk....yes I'm a drunk, and as I'm fond of saying this time every year: no more christmas bunk...
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TOM SINGS HIS CHRISTMAS SONG
Tom Waits sings one of my very favorite xmas songs....not 'silent night'...the other one...
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MAGIC
...the late great lenny breau...
"Shortly after Knowles released the album (The Legendary Lenny
Breau-Now!), a guitar society in Fort Worth, Texas, asked him to do
a concert at the Fort Worth Community College for about 100 people.
Knowles took the gig and managed to persuade the guitar society to
hire Lenny as his opening act. Lenny was in fine form for the date,
and ended his set with an extraordinary rendition of "My Funny
Valentine" that, Knowles says, provoked a mystifying reaction from
the audience.
'Lenny played that tune a lot, but that particular night he took it
way out there like I had never heard it any other time, [inserting]
key changes and big impressionist sections before coming back to
the tune. It went on for four or five minutes and then he stopped .
. . and no one applauded. The room was frozen. And so he stood up
like he was going to take a bow or something. Nothing. Still the
room was frozen. And then a little girl, maybe three years old, got
up out of her seat and ran up to him and hugged his legs. And then
everybody started applauding. Now what was that little girl
hearing? What made her do that? She didn't know him. What was he
broadcasting? What was he telling us with that performance? It's
one of the most remarkable things I ever saw.'"
(excerpted from "One Long Tune," Forbes-roberts, 221-222)
December 25, 2007
December 22, 2007
MERRY ELFING XMAS
CLICK HERE FOR THE THE 2007 STRATCAT FAMILY CHRISTMAS SPECIAL...
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December 21, 2007
RESPECT AND BE CHILL
...a recent shot of myself at home with the kids...
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December 19, 2007
DO NOT GO GENTLE INTO THAT GOOD NIGHT
Before we turn our eyes back on those we lost during the past year, let me first start by recognizing something of much greater significance here amongst the living: my little sister's 40th birthday!
HAPPY BIRTHDAY LIZZIE!!!
my sister has been a vocal supporter of this space, and voice of encouragement to me (even when she doesn't agree with me--just one aspect of her enlightened worldview and wisdom and-dare I say?-class) to keep keeping on with my bad self and these here scribblings. So before we ponder recent death, let us celebrate some life.
you should be so lucky as to have a sister like I do. a champion. in the best sense of the word...
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December 16, 2007
ONCE MORE THE STORM IS HOWLING
HE BIDS HIS BELOVED BE AT PEACE
by: William Butler Yeats (1865-1939)
I HEAR the Shadowy Horses, their long manes a-shake,
Their hoofs heavy with tumult, their eyes glimmering white;
The North unfolds above them clinging, creeping night,
The East her hidden joy before the morning break,
The West weeps in pale dew and sighs passing away,
The South is pouring down roses of crimson fire:
O vanity of Sleep, Hope, Dream, endless Desire,
The Horses of Disaster plunge in the heavy clay:
Beloved, let your eyes half close, and your heart beat
Over my heart, and your hair fall over my breast,
Drowning love's lonely hour in deep twilight of rest,
And hiding their tossing manes and their tumultuous feet.
"He Bids His Beloved Be at Peace" is reprinted from The Wind Among the Reeds. W.B. Yeats. London: Elkin Mathews, 1899.
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I read this at my brother's wedding back in '96....I self-publish it today for my little boy....for I too hear those shadowy horses on this cold december night...
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December 14, 2007
OLD JACK FROST
The Snow Man
by Wallace Stevens
One must have a mind of winter
To regard the frost and the boughs
Of the pine-trees crusted with snow;
And have been cold a long time
To behold the junipers shagged with ice,
The spruces rough in the distant glitter
Of the January sun; and not to think
Of any misery in the sound of the wind,
In the sound of a few leaves,
Which is the sound of the land
Full of the same wind
That is blowing in the same bare place
For the listener, who listens in the snow,
And, nothing himself, beholds
Nothing that is not there and the nothing that is.
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WHAT A GETAWAY
...still on vacation this week...maybe I forgot to mention...heavy duty baby feeding schedule....every four hours...until I return to work week I cover the night shift...not much beauty sleep but baby boy is a sweetie and an excellent late night companion...
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December 08, 2007
I GOT A NEW ROSE I GOT IT GOOD
...I had a chance to get away from the nursery for a few hours today to play some music...some time with the new telecaster jamming with thuddy on upright bass and his new jazz bass...it was fun but I've got to get beyond the distraction of the guitar itself--stop ogling every chord and inversion and play the instrument more, dig in, be musical with it...it's rather like acquiring a maserati and spending the first few hours enjoying the smell of the leather seats...after yesterday evening's efforts at resetting the intonation, with a little adjustment to the truss rod and a bit more filing of the nut, it played with a very smooth feel...and with a pair of small amps in an emptied dining room, it sounded three-dimensional...so today a little gallery of the small details that go into this superb new creation, in the hope that I can get over my ongoing dazzlement and hit it square...
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December 05, 2007
BACK TO REALITY
...we now pause for a public service announcement...
It's been very difficult, these past few days, to run a new post and thereby move my beautiful boy's cute little foot down the line, but life does go on. And I think I found something that is so absurd, so alarming, and so damn funny (well this might tell you something about my lack of sophistication whatsoever) that it seemed the perfect thing to shake this space out of its life-pondering reverie and get back to the snark.
oh those japanese. an infinite source of merriment and wonder...I wonder what was the inspiration that combined the genre of the exercise video with the phraseology pertaining to a physical condition which would totally prevent said activity. if true, the dancers' complaint would most certainly preclude them from moving so freely, and so cheerfully. but forget all that, just get into the groove and enjoy the rhythmic hook...if you're like me, you'll find yourself throughout the day chanting, "I have a bad case of...."
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