Working my way through...

THE BEATLES' REMASTERED CD's...

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I've begun the arduous task of listening to the Beatles Remastered CD's that I bought last week. Do they sound all that different from the original CD's which were first issued in 1987? To my ear, not really. Maybe certain guitar chords come through more clearly, or there is more of a "rasp" to some of the vocals making things sound more 'real', but I can't honestly say these CD's are really worth springing for if you already have the Original Beatles' CD's, which were released in 1987. Remember how, on their old LP's, as well as on the original CD's, you'd hear all the instruments coming thru one speaker and the vocals thru the other? That situation isn't corrected on the updated Remasters, or if it is, it's not done all that well. There's still the agonizing feeling of hearing nothing in one ear while the guitarist takes a solo. I guess, regarding masters' tapes, "they are what they are", and can only be fixed 'so much'. However, I haven't listened to all the remasters yet, just their first three Remastered CD's. Maybe I'll notice more differences when I get to the "studio years", when the Beatles were, in effect, producing their own records. (This isn't a slight against George Martin, the Beatles' producer; it's just that as time went on, the group assumed more creative control, and Martin did his level best to accommodate them.) "Sgt. Pepper" and "Magical Mystery Tour" ought to be really fascinating in remastered form. And, I'm sure "Let It Be" will be really interesting too...an interesting insight to "Let It Be"; it was already remastered back in 2003 when Phil Spector's post-production touches were wiped off , creating what was clumsily retitled, "Let It Be, Naked".

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I don't like the packaging of the Beatles' Remastered CD's very well; the triple-gatefold jacket is good, as far as it goes, but the CD's have to be slid in and out of the sleeve, which in my view, risks putting needless faint scratches on the CD surface. I'd much prefer if those CD's instead came with one of those plastic platforms that the disc 'pops' onto. That type of packaging is designed not to let the playing surface come in contact with anything during storage. Remember when the new Eagles CD came out last year (available only at Wal-Mart)? That 2-CD set also came packaged in cardboard, so I got a couple of those plastic-lined paper CD envelopes and cut them down to fit so they would serve as a sort of 'innersleeve' between the CD and the sleeve.

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Still another drawback to the remastered CD's is more computer-inherent; you've gotta be really careful when putting your CD into your laptop "C" drive, or you'll scratch the surface on the center spindle. That's the only way you can see the little mini-videos which accompany each Beatles' Remastered CD. Laptop computers are great, but there's so little space to work with that if you don't put the CD in at an Exact Precise angle, the playing surface will get scratched by the top of the spindle in your CD drive. I scratched my 'Hard Days' Night' Beatles remastered CD that way (not severely); it's for moments like that I have a little bottle of "CD Scratch Remover"; it actually does work (pictured at slightly-above left). I even fixed a DVD with that weird-looking goopy stuff. It costs $7.99 for a small bottle, but a little goes a long way, or to quote an old Brylcreem Men's Hair commercial, "a little dab'll do ya."

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So anyway, are the Beatles' Remasters a good purchase? For someone looking for a way to get into the Beatles' music for the first time (you're either really, really young or didn't like them 'back in the day' but you're wondering what the fuss is all about), and yeah, the Remasters would provide a really, really good launching point. For me in particular, not really, because I've heard everything forwards, backwards and sideways over the years. Yes, they sound good, really really good. Do they sound so much better that you have to get them if you already have their CD's in the original versions? I honestly don't know. Perhaps a side-by-side hearing of the 'old' "If I Fell" right after the Remastered "If I Fell" would provide me with a more definite opinion. Face it, the Beatles' Remasters probably do sound better (after all, that's what a re-master should do, right?), but I'm not sure the Remasters are worth acquiring if you already have the originals.

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Then again, the Re-masters probably won't sound all that different on the little portable Sony player I have in the bedroom. Maybe I need to go out and buy an expensive audiophile-oriented high-tech sound system to notice much of a difference. My living room sound system is a rag-tag set of components I've assembled over the years, so I probably wouldn't notice much improvement there, either. The little videos at the end of the 3 discs I've auditioned are informative in a very, very general manner. Not to brag, but the 'generalized' information contained on the video portions of those discs is stuff I knew long, long ago, and I don't know that much more or less than any other foaming-at-the-mouth Beatles fan, and there's a lot of us out there. There's no way (that I know of) to, save those videos onto videotape or load them into Realplayer, so if I want to see 'em again, yep, I'll have to slide the CD's back into the laptop. Scraaaatch. Not to worry...I've got CD fixer-upper goop!

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Two other cultural items of note: Remember back in the '90s, when the Rolling Stones (who were old then, let alone now), issued a pretty good album titled "Steel Wheels"? A friend told me he heard a radio announcer say that there's a rumor that the Stones' upcoming tour will be called "The Steel Wheel-chairs Tour". Ha Ha HA HAAAAAAAA! Finally, in the little burg of Coos Bay, who played a live concert tonite? None other than the Average White Band! One of my favorite bands. 'Twas nice to see a couple of Original Members still a part of that group: Onnie McIntyre and Alan Gorrie, guitarists, are still sounding really, really good. Pick Up The Pieces!!!

SOME RANDOM PHOTOS...

It may be September, but the weather here can be Gorgeous!

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I've noticed that my posts lately have been long, drawn out, and quite possibly excruciating to read. So, every now and then I have to offset that by putting up pictures! What would life be like without pictures? Dullsville, man...

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The above two photos were taken inland, on the bay here in Coos Bay; at left is a bench that's positioned on a hillside near a Public Boat Ramp. A little further down the bay, a couple of commercial boats are having a really mellow day off. Scenery, Scenery and More Scenery. Temperatures have been warm lately; in fact, it got to 90 (F) last Monday. That's the warmest daytime temperature I've experienced in my almost-three years here.

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Later that day, I went back to the Ocean to see if it was any cooler there than it was inland (not much), and that's when I spotted this little pleasure-cruiser coming into the bay; at left, it's approaching the inlet; at right, it's in the channel. Look how much bigger this boat is in comparison to the vehicles in the relative foreground. The boat's name is the "Vaio-(something)" (hey it's hard to read thru binoculars) and it's Plain Old Huge!

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I believe I've previously posted about this, but here's visual clarification: (I think I wrote about this in an earlier post) My zany little female Pied cockatiel laid an egg recently. She'd been acting all squirrely; she'll crawl down my leg and explore the room; she was evidently seeking a safe place, and the bottom of the shelf unit must've looked okay to her, and she Did Her Thing.

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Here's a couple of end-of-the-day photos that I haven't done anything with yet; it's always amazing how big the sun's image gets as it gets ready to set. I wonder if that ever happens with the Moon; does a full moon setting over the ocean ever get that huge? I don't know, because lately the Moon has been setting Waaay south, so the Crescent Moon I captured above will have to do.

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Finally, most of the above photos were taken on the day I had my car in the shop; I had to get the drivers' side window-clamp thing-a-ma-jig fixed. And you know, I like to haggle if I can; try to get the price down to as little as I have to pay, but I don't dare give this shop any problems, for they have this little item on their Office Door...note the hand grenade...

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So there ya have it, yer Average General Posting About Nothing In Particular. Just the world as I see it, which probably ain't that important in the greater scheme of things...

LAY DOWN THAT BOOGIE...
...and play that racially-sanitized music 'till you die!
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I knew it was gonna be a hit before it ever hit the charts. It was one of those records that leapt from the turntable when it was played; it just had that "something special" which really set it apart from a whole lot of other records which had been released in that just-before-total-disco-saturation year of 1976. It was heavy, it was funky, the vocals were great, and best of all, it had one of those high-on-the-neck, wailing guitar solos. And it turns out this song is another of those "one hit wonders", but if yer gonna only ever gonna have one hit, let it be a song of this magnitude...it really did take the country by storm...
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"Play That Funky Music" was a perfect cohabitation of rock and soul, and was totally different than any of the other music of its day. I was working at a small radio station when this came out; in one of the promotional packages the Record Companies would send out was this record, and man, oh man, was this one of the funkiest, greasiest, bottom-heavy singles I'd ever heard, and even though I still hear it a couple times a week on the oldies station, it's a song that I never get tired of; it's just one of those endlessly fresh records that retains all the impact that it had over 30 years ago. The problem is, how do you top a record like this? And should you even try? The group, "Wild Cherry", certainly tried; they released four albums from 1976 thru 1980, but they couldn't score with anything else. Their albums were all okay, but nothing they ever did was as good as "Play That Funky Music". The group's followup single, "Baby Don't You Know", is cut from the same heavy-funk groove all right, and the chorus goes something like, "Baby, Don't You Know That The Honkies Got Soul", which I thot was kinda cool, ah, but it just didn't catch on. "Play That Funky Music" stands as the group's only hit, but What A Hit It Was.
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What led me to post this, is because I heard "Play That Funky Music" on the radio again today, only 'something' was a little bit different. The chorus of the song starts out by saying, "Play That Funky Music, White Boy", but the Politically-Correct Music Meanies out there have been up to their tricks it seems, for the version I heard today says, "Play That Funky Music", with the "White Boy" phrase chopped out! So the edited version of the song now goes, "Play That Funky Music, (Play That Funky Music), Play that funky music riiight", and so another 'something' that we've all grown to know and love has fallen victim to the Politically-Correct Meanies out there. We all know that phrase was chopped out so no one would be offended. But who is it targeted at? The WHITE sector of the population. I never felt offended by it. We all know that Black Music is the funkiest music of all! So, it's surprising when the White Boys are Funky! Remember the 'Average White Band'? They were a group of White Boys from Scotland who Played funky music, all right; their big hit was a 1974 instrumental called "Pick Up The Pieces". You can tell from the group's name that they're White, and they're making fun of themselves as well as the rest of us un-funky White Boys. So today, would The Average White Band have to call themselves "The Average Caucasian Musical Ensemble"? Maybe!

Most all of the Oldies stations in the USA rely on a pre-programmed satellite signal which originates from a single facility, and is beamed via satellite to other stations which subscribe to that service. There are several such "chains" around the country, each playing their own mix of top-40 hits which are beamed to subscribing stations. So the 'oldies' station may or may not be playing the edited "Play That Funky Music", but when I heard it today, I was a little bit shocked. And I'm kinda thinkin' that the Very Rev. Al Sharpton must've raised hell with broadcasters around the country thusly: "Hear ye, hear ye, if you don't take that racially charged song off the airwaves, we--and there are a lot of us--are gonna boycott all your advertisers." "But Mr. Sharpton, it doesn't refer to blacks, it refers to whites!" Sharpton: "well, in that case, never mind..." (Al Sharpton always seems to be trying to extend his 15-minutes-of-fame somehow.)
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A whole lot of late-'70s chart music was really shallow in nature, and I feel I have to apologize in part for that, since I played a lot of it on the radio. But, "Play That Funky Music" is one of those tunes that makes me grin from ear to ear every time I hear it. I must be a Honkie that's got soul...

I CAVED-IN BIG TIME!!!
But I had to do it or it would've tormented me forever...
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Let me set this post in motion by describing all the stuff that led up to it. First of all, my car fell out of alignment, and because of that, one of my tires got really worn-down, so I paid for two new tires and an alignment fix. And then I had to go get the drivers' side window repaired 'cos the brackets that move the window up and down were busted, leaving me to drive for a week in the driving, pouring rain, forcing me to leave a giant plastic bag over the open window so I wouldn't short out the control panel, the one that controls the up-and-down Car-Window mechanism buttons. Which proves that everything, somehow, is inter-connected. It was after I did all that when I noticed the little sticker the car-lube business puts on the inside corner of the front window, which let me know that it had been almost 5,ooo miles since the last time my buggy had fresh oil installed. Along with a new oil filter. So now my car is ready to go anywhere at anytime (in theory, anyway). I'm sure doing all of this stuff would've made my dearly-departed Dad proud of me, wherever he may be.

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So, if Dad was smiling down on me from above because I spent money on my car, he sure as shootin' ain't doing that anymore. Because...I spent a bunch of money on some items that wouldn't merit his approval at all. Not that I care, 'cos I don't. But I must say this about myself at this point: I AM A BIG PHONY. And I'll tell ya why. Remember, a few posts back, when I said I wouldn't buy the new Beatles' re-mastered CD's, not when I have their Original albums and CD's at home? I was prepared to stick to my guns concerning this. Except, it seems that everywhere I go, there they are! There are a half-dozen convenience stores down here that stock the Beatles Remasters right by their cash registers. I'm hearing Beatles Remastered Songs on the oldies radio station every time I switch it on. I read about them every time I go to a musical website, and even the Rolling Stone magazine I bought a couple of weeks back had the Beatles on the front cover. Talk about sensory saturation!

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After going to the cash machine and finding out what I had left in the bank after my car once again gobbled up hundreds and hundreds of my dollars, I found out there was more cash left in there than I thot there'd be. I guess that's what folks call "discretionary" income; the money that's left over when the bills get paid and expenses are met and for which services are rendered. So I went and bought all the Beatles' Remastered Discs even though I said I never would, because (1) I'm a collector, and (2) I managed to find them at a pretty good prices. List price for these CD's is $17.99 for the 'single' albums, and 22.99 for the 2 Double Albums ("The White Album" and the "Past Masters" set which consists of songs which weren't on the Beatles' British Albums. I'll explain that closer to the end of this post...) I found eleven of the remastered Discs at Fred Meyer's down here for $12.99 and one double album for $17.99. Freddie's didn't have the complete set available, so I went to Wal-Mart, where I found the one single-DVD I needed for $13.99 and one 'double' I still needed for $19.99. So I saved over $60 over the Regular List Prices for the Remastered Beatles' CDs. How about that! Fred Meyer's actually Undersold Wal-Mart! Which I think is cool. These CD's may never again priced so low once the 'initial push' is over, so if yer gonna buy 'em at a big-box store, do it soon!

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Normally, I don't give Wal-Mart the time of day, but since this music duplicates music I already have, and that none of the Beatles or their heirs need any more of my money than I elect to send their way, I'm all for saving a lot of cash in a case like this, so I broke down and bought 'em. I'll probably never find 'em as cheap again, so it was a case of 'do it, and do it now', and I did. I did! I willy, willy did it! You know, for years, I'd see the Same Old Beatles CD's in the racks, year after year after year, and I couldn't help but think, "perhaps these things aren't selling as well as they once were", and with the Remastered CD's, "Beatles.com" came up with a stroke of genius: "Let's make them all Sound Slightly Different and Everyone Will Buy Them All Over Again!" I guess the strategy's working. And I have Words Of Wisdom for you all: Don't buy the Beatles Remasters at the Convenience Stores; in those establishments, you're paying the full price.

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Finally, let me explain something I referred to here earlier: The Beatles' albums you see in the CD stores today are the BRITISH albums, which feature 14 songs each instead of the 11 songs-per-album you'd find on U.S. LP's long ago. In other words, "Meet The Beatles", "The Beatles' Second Album", "Beatles '65" and others are not being issued anymore. "Rubber Soul" and "Revolver" were both issued in the States and in England, but the U.S. versions featured less songs. In the '60s, Capitol Records, USA, shaved off songs from the British versions of those and other Beatles Albums to make "new" albums, such as "The Early Beatles", "Yesterday And Today" and the "Hey Jude" album. Each of those albums featured Singles, B-Sides and Album tracks Never Before Issued In America! Back in the '60s, All British and USA albums were different, until "Sgt. Pepper" came along in 1967. In short, Capitol, the Fabs' USA label, issued more different albums, thus selling more records and making more money. Follow the money.

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All of the songs on those old USA albums are now, and have always been, on the Beatles' British Albums. In England, some of the Beatles' Tunes never did appear on an album; those tunes have been issued on the "Past Masters" double-CD. I've read that the British record companies didn't want to issue singles on albums, not wanting the consumer to have to pay for a song they already had on 45's. Ha! Singles actually Sold More Albums in the U.S.! We'd go buy the single the first time we heard it on the radio, and then later on, we'd get the albums too! Now, just as I've clarified things, in the interest of completeness, I must confuse you further. Capitol Records issued all of the USA '60s LPs on Compact Disc 2 or 3 years ago, the theory being that U.S. fans would want CD's of the old Capitol albums they'd grown up with. I'm still not going to buy those CD's. At least, I don't think so. Of course, with me, ya never know, I guess...

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So I caved in. I did something that I wasn't gonna do. Trouble is, I knew I'd always want these remasters and I'd be endlessly tormented until I got them. A guy I know who owns a record shop says "record collecting is a disease". He's right. But, I'm not sure if I trust meself anymore. I Now Have all the Beatles' Remastered CD's. I know Beatle Music the way a Good Preacher knows his Bible. So this oughta be an interesting listening experience, and quite possibly, the fodder for upcoming blog posts. And in the end...the love you take...is equal to the love...you make...

NO, I'M NOT A FOLKIE...
...but yet, some folk groups meant a lot to me...
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I guess through the ages, there've been diehard Folk Music Purists out there, and anytime any kind of 'something different' invades their music, they become Deeply Offended. Remember the Kingston Trio? They were decried by the Folk Purists for being too smooth, for not being somber and overbearingly somber in concert. How about Bob Dylan? He was booed off the stage when he first elected to have Electric Guitars and a Full Band behind him long, long ago. I'm no rabid Dylan fan, but his more-hard-edged music reaches me Just Fine. For instance, Dylan's early acoustic version of "Shelter From The Storm" is a great song, but to me, it became better the instant I heard the "Live" version of that track (it's on the "Hard Rain" album) with a full-tilt rock band behind him, and all of a sudden the song became Really Powerful. Something tells me that while being a Purist may be a serious undertaking, it doesn't sound like a lot of fun to me. I've always been a fan of musical cross-pollination. Mix in a bit of this and a bit of that and let the fun begin!
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Peter, Paul and Mary were another of those folk groups that could cross over the lofty boundary between Folk and Rock; they had a long and spirited career, and wrote many of their songs as well as doing outside material, and they remained relevant for a long, long time. Were it not for them, perhaps Bob Dylan would be sweeping out stock rooms and washing dishes; his 'Blowing In The Wind' flew through the masses via the musical wings of Peter, Paul and Mary, who added a sense of brightness and ultra-unique harmonies to really make that song come alive. And the world, and not just the folkies, became aware of Dylan's lyrical prowess. In a way, Peter, Paul and Mary were trendsetters; long around 1968, they did a song called "Too Much Of Nothing", which is an ultra-obscure Dylan tune that is one of his most obscure tunes ever. So how did they find that song? Maybe on a bootleg album? Because Dylan himself had never Officially Released that song by that time. (1968) How about that!
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I'm sure that even the most ardent Dylan admirer will readily admit he's not, nor will ever be, the best singer ever...especially in these later days, it sounds like he's got one vocal cord that halfway works. So I value artists such as Peter, Paul and Mary, who could bring great songs to the forefront. For those of us who weren't in Greenwich Village when the Folk Music Boom was happening, hearing these Popularized folk songs was our initial experience to that whole genre. If you like a song written by a certain person, maybe then you can buy that certain person's music, but you wouldn't have heard that song unless it had been popularized by Somebody!
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It's always sad when performers we've all come to know pass on into eternity; such was the case with Mary Travers, the "Mary" of Peter, Paul and Mary.
She passed away this week. She Is Missed. Her voice and enthusiasm are timeless. Peter, Paul and Mary picked their material from a diverse selection of writers, doing songs by Bob Dylan, Gordon Lightfoot, Shel Silverstein, Tom Paxton, and Phil Ochs, giving them all early exposure in the ever-competitive music world.
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In addition, they wrote a lot of their own material, such as "I Dig Rock And Roll Music" and "Day Is Done", and they wrote an album track that I think is possibly the Greatest anti-war anthem of all (I've never heard it on the radio, but it's great, trust me), a song titled "The Great Mandella (The Wheel Of Life)"; that song caught my ears back in 1967 and still is powerful, disillusioned and bitter, and although it was recorded during the Vietnam War, its message is still timely today. ("The Great Mandella" is on their LP, "Album 1700", which got its title because it was Warner Brothers' Records Catalog Number 1700, so there's a bit of trivia). This, from the same group that wrote and sang "Puff The Magic Dragon", a song that makes me think of Innocence Lost every time I hear it.
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Peter, Paul and Mary will always exist in a corner of My Particular Musical Universe. And, the voice of Mary Travers, along with her bandmates, are indeed Voices Of and For the ages. That's quite a legacy. By the way, Yes, I know The Byrds also popularized Dylan songs, but that's another subject for another post. This post has gotta end sometime, y'know...

STAYING IN ON A SUNDAY...
...for one day, I became a hermit...
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So how uneventful was today? In a phrase, Very Much So. This is the kind of day that you watch Paint Peel. It was such a lazy day that I saw a Dog chasing a Cat and they were Both Walking. Okay, that's exaggerating things a bit, but maybe not all that much, actually. My main reason for living today was that I wanted to see today's Double-header between the Seattle Mariners and the Texas Rangers. I saw Ichiro get his 200th hit of the year this afternoon, and he's now done that 9 seasons in a row, and no player's ever done that, consecutively, for such a long time. (I know I'll sound like Rick Rizzs, the over-inflated, miniscule-detail-oriented Seattle Sportscaster, but...Pete Rose had ten 200-plus-hits seasons...but not 10 in a row...or 9 in a row.) As I type this, Game 2 is still on. The Mariners won last-night's Absolutely Drenched game, which was played in rainfall that would've sunk the Titanic; they won the first game today and are on the way to winning the second unless they suffer a severe relapse, but we all know that never happens to the Mariners...right?
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A by-product of staying in today was finding out what Captive Birds do All Day Long. Well, they eat. Then they clean their feathers. Then they climb around the cage. Then they repeat the process over and over again all day long. Of course, my cockatiels are out of the cage pretty-much all the time when I'm home. So today was spent in the ol' La-Z-Boy, trying to watch the Mariner's double-header with birds Climbing All Over Me. If I give one some head-scratches, that's what the other wants too. It's not easy to scratch two birds' heads simultaneously. It's harder than it looks. Of course, I bring bird food over to the recliner, so they can munch without having to go back to their cage. No, they're not spoiled (are they?).
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Here's Shadow, my gray-headed female whose personality is picky, picky, picky. When she's sitting on my shoulder, and nibbles at my glasses, that's when she wants a head scratch. Unless it's late afternoon; that's when she wants food. And I'm supposed to know all this. If I try scratching her head when she wants food, she'll gently 'beak' my fingers and emit a hoarse-sounding mini-screech...but actually, she is very well-behaved, being rather reserved. Although she's developing a bad habit...she likes COFFEE. She'll stick her head in my coffee cup and take a couple of beakfuls...
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The next photo features "Sunshine", my yellow-headed, pied female, which I and the pet-shop owner thot was a male, because it chirped loudly and behaved rather aggressively. This is the bird that laid an egg ON me. So it's a female. She's almost like the obnoxious brat-little-kid who's tossing food and screaming like a banshee in the restaurant booth right next to yours. But sometimes, she's so sweet. She'll sit on my knee and make her little beak-grinding sounds (a sign of contentment in a cockatiel); that tells me I've done good with her. And then she gets aggressive again. Case in point: This afternoon I microwaved a couple of those cheap little Meat Pies (hey, us humans have to eat after all), and after they cooled, took 'em both back to the bird room. "Sunshine" immediately got curious, so I tried giving her a little bit from my fork, and she backed off...not used to warm food, possibly. So I took a mouthful, and that was when she immediately crawled up my chest and began stealing food out of my mouth! It's a sort-of bird-bonding thing, I guess.
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What I'm still getting used to, is the fact while both birds will take all my energy, as soon as 6pm rolls around, they want the cover tossed over their cage, they wanna sleep and they don't wanna have anything to do with me. But ya know, sometimes that works out, because it leaves me a little bit of time in which to watch some evening baseball and do some blogging. Sometimes, if I'm going to be gone all day, and I know they'll be asleep before I get home, I'll just leave 'em be and go watch TV in the bedroom. So far, the arrangement is working out. Most days I'll spend 2-3 hours with them in the morning/early afternoon. But then I've gotta get out; if I don't, I'll start chirping instead of talking.
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Finally, here's something that's a little bit different...I've mentioned that one of the bridges down here is a drawbridge, something that a person who lives in a land-locked state doesn't come across very often (unless your commute takes you over the Mighty Mississippi). The other day, I was headed to the beach, and had to stop. There was absolutely no doubt about it. You see, there was no choice...
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Several of the larger fishing boats in this area are actually moored on the landward side of the bridge, which means they've gotta go under the bridge to get to where they're going, except that they're too tall, so something's gotta give, and in this case, it's the bridge. It's a 5-10 minute wait at the longest, and this is an instance which absolutely proves that if you bring a digital camera along, what might irritate you actually becomes something pretty cool to photograph. And below, this is the vessell which was responsible for The Big Bridge Incident...
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One night last year while headed homeward, I came upon The Dreaded Open Drawbridge, so I waited for it to close. And waited. And waited some more. I finally ended up driving a 25-mile loop just to get home, which is about 3 miles north of the bridge. So every now and then, I still find meself goin' round in circles. Finally...the Mariners swept the double-header and the Seahawks shut-out Los Angeles today. So, the birds are sleeping and My Teams Won. All in all, not bad, not bad at all...

ONE SEPTEMBER MORNING...
...it was just another day...for a while...
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I've never been an early riser. Sorry, that's just not built into my Genetic Code. As I recall, it was my Day Off. A beautiful day, not a cloud in sight where I used to live in North Idaho. And what better way to start off the day than to go out and get Breakfast! I got to the restaurant at about 11:30am (told you I'm not an early riser...) and gave the waitress my order. As I sat in the booth, the "climate", the "feel", the "atmosphere", the "aura" or whatever you want to call it was just Wrong Somehow.
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I hadn't listened to the knews on my way to breakfast, so I didn't know anything of any consequence had occurred. I was a 'regular' at that restaurant, and so quite a few people I knew were sitting around in there, talking in hushed tones, and I knew/felt something had 'happened', and that "that something" couldn't be good...I asked aloud, "Did Something Take Place that I should Know About?" When I found out, I was shocked, like the rest of the nation...
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How Awful. Another day that forever will live in infamy. All these years later, I still don't know how to sum it all up, except to say that it's a day we'll never forget. And it's a day we can't afford to forget. We were all affected by it, but to those whose lives were lost, and to those who lost family and friends on 9/11, I wish you all the best, and you're in my thoughts and prayers.
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Obviously, all of those responsible Must Answer For Their Crimes. But more than anything, I really hope our country can 'get it together' enough to somehow provide all the security necessary to make sure something like this Never Happens Again.

I'D SEND THEM A BILL...

...but they'd probably just laugh and throw it away...

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One of the roads that leads to my door is unpaved. A couple of years ago, it had some pretty nasty 'road divots', but someone got busy with their earthmover, scooping and repositioning dirt, and the surface was nice and flat again. For a while. Earlier this year, the road again began to re-acquire divots (I'd say 'pothole' but a dirt road can't have a pothole...right?), and for a while, I was able to navigate the car up and over the holes that were threatening to swallow my car. Well, on one such journey, either the potholes (dirtholes?) had gotten bigger, or I didn't steer the car just right, and, WHUMP!!! It sounded as if my car had been impaled. The left front tire hit bottom and the rest of my car followed. I was able to keep going and didn't think too much about the incident after a while.

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Well, a few weeks ago, I noticed the car was getting a bit harder to steer. Where did the power steering go? And what good is it to have the "power steering" feature when it takes more and more power to steer? I had a perfectly functioning power steering unit that wasn't power-steering! But I grew to accept it. "Old Car with a lotta miles; hey, it gets me from point A to point B" and other generalized ways of procrastinating firmly embedded themselves within the vast unpopulated regions of my Cranial Cavity. So another few weeks went by. Finally, coming out of some store somewhere, going back to the car, I looked at the left front tire, and, you guessed it, there was major wear on the outside edge of the tread, and I thot of the dreaded "A" word, as in "Alignment", or in this case, The Lack Thereof. As it turns out, it was a fairly severe case of The Lack Of Any Kind Of Correct Alignment.

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To make a long story short, I'm $300-dollars poorer this evening after the date I had made earlier today with the Tire Company. They fixed the alignment, then put two new tires on the front, the 'best two' of my 'old' tires on the back, and stuffed in my back seat in a big yellow plastic bag is the Tire that, had I not waited so long to get the alignment checked, I'd still be using today. I asked the Tire Company if they could put the old, worn tire on a wheel so I could have a full-sized spare instead of the little Tricycle-sized spare tire that came with my car...the tire company said, "well, we can't do that because the tread is so worn down." What must be asked at this point is, what will get you down the road more easily; a worn-down full-size tire, or a teeny-weeny little spare tire, the diameter of which approximates your average Dinner Plate? And, should I send the city a bill, since it was THEIR road that resulted in my automotive malaise in the first place? Nah, I'd probably get laughed out of the county.

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As if that weren't enough, recently, my drivers' side window began acting funny. I'd try to raise it and it would freeze, or make 'klunking' sounds during the raise/lower process. Finally, yesterday, SNAP!!! The window jumped its tracks and came forward. I'd just gotten it fixed last year! The only way I can (almost) close it is by pressing the "raise" button, while gripping the window with the other hand, pushing it back, all the while trying to raise the window so it looks like it's most-of-the-way closed. I drive a Dodge, so I went to the local Dodge Dealership, and the guy said, "well, it looks like you might need a new motor assembly; we've gotta take out the door lining and poke around in there; it'll cost you somewhere around $300-dollars once we can find the time to get to it." Now, hold on a minute, wait there, pod'ner, somethin' ain't right about this Stew of Viddles I've gotten myself into. I told the guy I'd explore my options and got outta there...

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I went back to the little but still fairly-expensive shop that fixed the window last year when it malfunctioned, and they said they could fix my window for a little over $100-dollars, (One-third the price of the big automotive dealership) and the little auto-repair shop, not the big automobile dealership, will be getting my business. Hopefully I won't have to go back to them next year for the same thing. I guess that's how I stay in touch with society anymore, emerging to obtain services or trying to keep everything all paid up. All of this, of course, came hot on the heels of the $500-plus dollars I paid yesterday, which cleared my account at the Denturist, so ladies, if you want guys with all their own teeth, well, My Teeth Are All Mine, and I've got the receipt to prove it.

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So anyway, if you've read this far (and it's not an easy read, I know), a reward awaits you; a little bit of eye candy. It's a photo which I've seen in a couple of different newspapers lately, and I thot it needed just a little bit of Touching Up...

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Finally, a little humor...very little...I spied a bumpersticker which utilizes an automotive theme and takes it to new heights; it read, "My Car is so filthy, that when it rains, it makes its own gravy."

WACKY STACKS OF WAX!
...remember all the stuff they used to do to records?
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I don't have a whole lot of special pressings of albums in my record collection, but there are a few...such the Clear Yellow (gold if the light hits it just right) edition of Grand Funk's "We're An American Band" album (1973); I have a 1970-ish pressing of Dave Mason's "Alone Together" solo LP, which consists of grayish plastic with random smatterings of yellow, blue and black; it's so ugly that one Record Critic referred to the vinyl as "Vomitone". And, you probably remember Elvis' last studio album, "Moody Blue" that was pressed on, you guessed it, Clear Blue Vinyl. (Only, by that time, Elvis was so ill that half the songs on that record were recorded live on tour, since in those latter days it was very difficult to get Elvis into the recording studio...)
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If you can find a copy of Styx' "Paradise Theater" album from the early 1980's, it has both the Side 1 and Side 2 songs listed on one side; the other side has the Styx logo enlarged and Laser-Engraved right into the black plastic. I guess the etching doesn't go into the grooves, though; I can't hear any scratches when I play that side. And, of course, who can forget Picture Discs; I don't have many of those, but I've got a few...you've seen the Beatles' "Sgt. Pepper" album so I don't have to picture the cover here, but I've got a "Sgt. Pepper" picture disc; the entire album cover is on one side of the disc, while the other features an enlarged picture of the "Sgt. Pepper" drum. Pretty cool. Although, watching those colors spin 'round as the record revolves might make you wanna reach out for the seasick pills...
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But this business of messing around with record pressings is nothing new; heck, there were picture discs made from the 1940's onwards, and waay back when, in the '20s, a pair of record labels, "Pathe" and "Perfect" (which were owned by the same company) released virtually all of its discs up thru 1927 or thereabouts on a weird-looking brick-red plastic; who knows why that ugly color was chosen, although the record labels were red, and maybe they were trying to match that. Well, recently, I 'won' a group of Miss Lee Morse records (according to Ebay, 'winning' means you've earned the right to purchase item(s))...and I didn't know it, but one of the records I 'won' featured weird-looking shellac (or an early plastic known as 'Bakelite'), and it looks Very Trippy Indeed, especially for a record that came out in the mid-1920's. First of all, here's the 'hit' side...allegedly it was a hit; I have no chart information for the 1920's...I don't think there WERE record charts back then...
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Silliness ran rampant back in the "roaring 1920's"; the nation had been dragged through World War I, and once the war was over, America was in a mood to Get Silly. 'Twas the age of Flappers (party girls), the Charleston (a dance that shocked the Elders of that time), right around the time Prohibition was levied (they established the same climate for liquor, then, as presently exists for Marijuana now), so people had to go Underground to Drink, in clubs known as "Speakeasys". I don't know if "Under The Ukelele Tree" burned up the record charts back then, but certainly the title fits the times. It was time to get silly. And believe me, they did back then. When they weren't dodging gangsters' bullets, anyway...
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This is the "B" side (as is spelt out by the "B" on the label's right side), a little tune that I didn't even know existed. I've heard probably 95% of the songs Miss Lee Morse recorded, but I'd never heard this one before. It's called "Waiting", and like many of her other Pathe/Perfect B-sides, she wrote this one and it's a charming little number. I haven't seen this song posted anywhere on the internet, so it's pretty doggone obscure. Now, at this point you might be asking yourself, "what's with all those blotches on the record surface?", and well, I don't really know; it kinda reminds me of those pictures you paint at the County Fair, where they put a piece of paper inside a rotating device that spins ultra-fast, and you then squirt different colors of Ink in there, and you come out with something that looks semi-psychedelic. Well, someone at the Pathe/Perfect record-pressing labs evidently got wacky with the wax back in the 1920's, someone who was goofing around, getting silly, because after all, the '20s was a silly time. So when you get silly with the material that goes into making a record, well, here's the result:
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It's not "vomitone" but it comes pretty doggone close. An old 78 from 1925-27, somewhere in there. It actually sounds pretty good, although recordings made back then were acoustically made, and as a result, there was no "high" fidelity, there was fidelity-only; take it or leave it, I guess. Later on, electricity was applied to the recording and playback processes, the end result being records that sounded quite a lot better, although the record material itself was rather limiting; vinyl hadn't been invented back then, so the old, crusty shellac (or 'Bakelite') whirred around madly on the turntable, and your Steel Phonograph Needle tried to thread the grooves and produce at least some semblance of music. (With the weight of those old tone-arms, I'm surprised the needle didn't cut into the other side of the record!) So anyway, this is a little tidbit from the record collection I thot I'd show ya.
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Someday, when I work up the initiative, I'll get really daring and pull out the Vomitone record (I can barely stand to look at the thing) and picture it here for the world to see. Looking at the record I've pictured here in this post should prepare you for that. Finally, I don't pretend to be any kind of history buff, although I've been reading quite a bit about life and times early in the 20th century, trying to gain some understanding of what we've been through in order to get where we're at now. Kinda makes me wonder what things'll look like in another hundred years...

MY ILLUSTRIOUS CIGARETTE SMOKING CAREER...

...Ten Minutes, total, over 30 years ago...

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I was in a grocery store the other day, and I passed a locked cigarette case, and happened to glance at the price for a certain brand of cigarette that was being sold by the carton: $51.49. Over 50 bucks for a carton of smokes. No wonder they're being kept under lock and key, I guess. Oh, how the times have changed; I remember when Mom would send me to the grocery store for milk, bread, and a pack of whatever-brand-of-low-tar-cigarette she thought was doing her the least damage...as I recall, a pack ran about 30 or 40 cents back in the '60s and I really haven't kept up on cigarette prices, since I don't smoke. Dad was a Pall Mall man. Sometimes I'd get sent to the store to buy cigarettes for him as well. Most of the time, my sister and I would head out on our bikes to the neighborhood grocery store, and along with the cigarettes, we'd be allowed to buy a little something for ourselves; we'd either get a couple candy bars each, or if it were summer, we'd go for the "Mr. Freeze" frozen 'pops', which were about a foot long. What a great way to beat the heat. And a lot tastier than cigarettes!

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I remember the cigarette ads we'd see on TV, about how the different brands all had a unique 'taste'. One cigarette commercial actually Flirted with the viewer: It was an ad for Doral cigarettes, in which a cartoon cigarette would writhe, slither and otherwise manipulate itself while singing, "Taste Me, Taste Me; come on and Taste Me"...with come-ons like that, no wonder people were getting hooked. Anyway, waay back in the day, I'm sure both my sister and I probably smoked quite a few 'equivalents' of packs of cigarettes; invariably at the dinner table, Mom and Dad would both light up. I remember having to periodically fan the air in front of me with my hands as best as I could while we ate. Thankfully, the big window near the dinner table could be opened with ease (we had those easy-opening "Pella" windows), and so the smoke would dissipate. If it was a cool evening, we'd shiver a bit, but at least we got Fresh Air.

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Mom and Dad tried to quit smoking all their lives, and trying, over the years, various anti-smoking aids. One of the first wean-off-cigarettes devices was a package of fairly large pink pills, called "Nicoban". You could pop one in your mouth, theoretically, and not want for a cigarette. Like all kids, I was curious about stuff, and since I'd heard that 'Nicoban' tablets tasted like cigarettes, I asked Dad if he could break off a bit of a Nicoban tablet so I, too, could coat my tongue with the Same Sensation as smoking a cigarette; I wondered what I'd been missing. Dad obviously didn't want me to start smoking anytime soon, so he gave me about half a tablet, thinking perhaps it would be a good deterrent, just in case I ever thought about smoking on down the line...In went the 'Nicoban' fragment into my mouth, and Oh My Garsh...it was as if someone had lit up a Charcoal Briquet and stuffed it into my yap...the idea was to let the 'Nicoban' tablet stay in the mouth long enough to take away any annoying yearn for a cigarette. Me, not being a smoker, well, it was Instant "Ptoooey!!!" I spit that Nicoban Fragment out within five seconds. AAACK!!!

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Later on in life, while studying for Final Exams in College, I pulled an "all-nighter", and by around midnight, I needed a break. So I went out into the hall where the Pop, Candy and Cigarette machines were, and decided to there and then to buy a Pack of Cigarettes. They say College Finals can do crazy things to a person; it's true, it's true! I was 24 at the time, had never smoked. I can't recall which brand, but I tried smoking one, and got to where I could inhale lightly and blow the smoke out of my nose; heck, I could even make smoke rings! After that, I semi-smoked my way thru a few more cigarettes, not breathing in too far, and lo and behold, they did begin to have, not a taste really, more like an aroma. I'd finish a cigarette as best as I could, then smoke another. And another, and another, as the old Nicotine Craving monster thought to himself, "HA HA HAAAAA, ANOTHER VICTIM!!!" It looked like the Giant Tobacco Companies would soon be making tons of money offa me as well as the countless hundreds-of-thousands out there who were all seeking Tastebud Nirvana thru smoking. There was No Stopping Me Now, no-siree...

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I decided, on the next cigarette, I was gonna Really Taste It, just like all those people in the cigarette ads did. I actually tried to deeply-inhale the smoke into my Lungs, and talk about an Instantaneous Breathing Rupture...it felt like something blew up inside my chest, followed by "hack, hack, hack, wheeze, cough, cough, cough". Oh, my Gawd. My face was red; my eyebrows were sweating, and if I'd coughed any harder, my eyeballs woulda popped right outta my head. I know a lot of folks come down with emphysema, lung cancer, and other assorted respiratory maladies, and the question I must ask is, how much does one have to smoke to adversely affect their lungs? Because, based on my reaction to that cigarette, there was no way I could commit smoke-i-cide. I suppose that on down the line, something else will get me, but it won't be cigarettes. Because, way back when I almost ruptured myself from deeply inhaling cigarette smoke, is also when I quit. I'd been smoking for ten MINUTES. No thanks. Not for me. But you know, it really wasn't the coughing fit I had, it was more that I was beginning to (almost) LIKE the cigarette 'aroma'; could that be the 'taste' which smokers referred to? That certain something by which people became addicted to cigarettes? And then I thought of how many times my folks tried to quit and couldn't. With that, I placed the still-almost-full pack of cigarettes on the floor, ground my heel into them, and tossed 'em away.

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Back in the '80s, I saw the younger brother of a 1972 high school classmate; he was playing pool in a smoky bar with a bunch of his friends, and he chainsmoked all night. I knew that he'd been smoking since high school...ten years later, in the '90s, while as a cabbie, I was making a medical delivery to the hospital, when the elevator door opened, and there he was in a wheelchair, being pushed by his parents. He was wearing one of those oxygen machines. About half a year after that, he passed away. Nine out of Ten doctors will agree: Cancer Cures Smoking.

THUMBING THRU THE PERIODICALS...

...Something I haven't done much lately...

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The old joke goes something like this: "What is life? What is Life? WHAT IS LIFE???" "A magazine, you jerk!" (That's from an old Eddie Lawrence record, "Blackouts of 1984", a comedy-routine from long long ago. Although the joke was stale well before it was put on record.) Anyway, while at the Denturist's Office today, I thumbed thru the newest copy of Time Magazine, and the first thing I thot was, "Golly Gee, this thing is THIN." As I thumbed through it, I came across a few splashy pages featuring pix of celebrities doing all kinds of show-bizness related things, and the second thing I thot was, "Golly Gee, 'Time' is beginning to resemble 'People' magazine." I didn't check the price of the magazine, but I'm sure as time goes on and the magazine gets thinner and thinner, the price goes up and Up and UP...

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I've ranted about not wanting to buy Beatles re-mastered recordings, and I'm still not gonna do that, but I guess whenever a magazine comes out featuring a picture of them, I'll get it, thinking, "this will be a huge collectors' item in 64 years or whenever". The newest issue of Rolling Stone Magazine features This Beatles' Photo, (at left) taken late in their career when they basically couldn't stand each other...the enthusiasm (or lack thereof) is painted all over their faces, ain't it? The Beatles broke up 40 years ago this year. And as I read the Rolling Stone article, it didn't have very much new information at all; it was basically a re-hash of the same old stuff for those of the Young Generation, of which I am no longer a member, and haven't been for a very long time now. I still have my December 1980 copy of Rolling Stone; it's all gashed, dog-eared, yellowing and crumbling, but it's also the one that tries to (vainly) find some kind of reason why Lennon was assassinated. We'll never really know; suffice it to say his shooter was a Wacko and leave it at that.

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As I thumbed thru the rest of the Rolling Stone magazine, I marveled at how much it's beginning to resemble "Time" magazine, with its use of glossy pages throughout, and how it's also beginning to resemble "People" magazine with Glossy Pictures Of Sexy Brittany Spears and all kinds of info on Rap Stars, etc. "Rolling Stone"? Say it ain't so, Ethel! I used to subscribe to Rolling Stone waaay back in the '70s. Now I buy only their special issues, such as their 1,000th issue a couple of years back that featured a THREE DIMENSIONAL Cover! (featured at left) (I heard the magazine actually Lost Money on that issue...but it is very fantastic looking.) And, I bought another RS special issue a few years back that featured the "500 Greatest Albums of All Time" (of which I have a few)...and that issue included a free various-artists-type CD, which I thot was cool. But yeah, I've lost a lot of my trendiness and timeliness over the years. I still hear new music on the radio I like, but 75% of the time, I don't know who the artist is. Although I remember hearing a song by Coldplay the other day (I think they're a fairly current band) and the song Blasted My Ears Out. Rock and Roll!!!

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I've been thinking lately that I Am Getting Very Old. 55. In my mind, I'm the same as ever. But, my body tells me different. But maybe my being alive now (and hopefully far into the future) is my reward for not having lived 'on the edge' when I was younger. Remember when Sammy Hagar sang, "I Can't Drive...55"? Today, for all I know, he might be puttin' the pedal to the medal in one of those "Power Chairs" we hear so much about these days. Think of those rock icons who left this world early...John Lennon would be 68 by now. Elvis Presley would be 74, breaking his hips as he shakes 'em. How about others who left this world prematurely? John F. Kennedy would be 92 this year, but yet we'll always remember him as a young man. Kinda distorts the image, doesn't it? What I'm getting at here, is that time is flying by, and even if those I've mentioned in this paragraph were still alive, maybe they'd would be living rather mundane lives, passing peacefully into obscurity...

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Perhaps Janis Joplin, for example, today would be one of those "old ladies with lots of cats" that you hear about. Jim Morrison, if alive today, might be a reclusive sort who operates a cobweb-covered dusty bookstore and doesn't care if he sells anything or not. I can't help but wonder, though, had the aforementioned (and countless other) icons not met with tragic fates, they would've died later on from less celebrated causes, such as pneumonia, or a severe case of the shingles, or perhaps being struck on the head by a brick falling from a building. So perhaps those whose drastic deaths we obsess over, those people might have been gone anyway by now. George Harrison was 58, Cancer took him away. Ringo is still with us, but don't dare ask him for an autograph; he's become a Grumpy Old Man at the age of 68. Another one of my favorite musicians was Arthur Lee, who led the group "Love"; he died of leukemia in '06; that kinda shocked me, since I'd just begun really getting into his music by then. And time keeps on ticking, ticking, ticking...into the future...

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I'm still collecting old '78s by Miss Lee Morse, who passed away at the ripe old age of 57. She was a very vital recording artist in her day, but Time Swept Her Aside. If you type "Lee Morse" into the 'Search Blog' box at the top of your screen, you'll get better acquainted with her. Or, you can click on the 'Yahoo Group' Box in the left margin to see a site I've maintained for a couple of years now. For the longest time, I was thinking, "oh, it's so tragic that she died early and it's so sad no one remembers her today...". I had to put all of this into context. She was born in 1897. If she were alive today, she'd be 112 years old. (That's her picture at left.) But yet, if you see her movie-shorts ("Song Service" and "A Million Me's" can be found on YouTube), her character is fresh, warm and enthusiastic, and very human; although that grainy old footage was filmed in 1930, it doesn't seem that long ago. But the fact remains that even if she'd lived to a ripe old age, she would've still most likely passed away in the 1960's or '70s. So, all this time stuff is weird, and when you think about it on a comparative basis, it can Really Freak You Out, especially when you factor in your own mortality. Which is something I try not to do, or I Will get Freaked Out.

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Just in case, though, you'd rather deal in fantasy than with the Ugly Cold Shell of Reality that envelopes us, here's what might have become of our favorite mop-tops had they all lived long, natural lives...two of them are still with us...anyway, here's an artist's rendering of what they might have looked like at an advanced age..."will you still need me, will you still feed me, when I'm 64...?"