June rambling: sister Leslie, continued

A Simple Way to Improve a Billion Lives

I take the fact that I’ve heard variations of this message about sister Leslie from three different people as confirmation of its accuracy. If you first see her, you may have an OMG reaction. But if you see her again, even the next day, you will likely see incremental improvement.

She had less swelling generally. But she can’t open her mouth yet, so communication is raising her hand, thumbs up/down, wiggling toes on command, etc.

She’s had her surgery, this time on her wrist Tuesday. They put in two metal plates. They want to be able to remove one of them in a couple weeks.

She still needs to be able to cough out the bad stuff, and she needs pain meds to deal with the 4 broken ribs.

So Leslie won’t be out of the hospital for at LEAST another week; she’s currently in the ICU. She has multiple broken bones and other issues. She’s not in peril, but this is NOT just a fall off a bike with a couple of bruises and scrapes, which I’ve experienced myself.

Incidentally, she has changed hospitals, not for good medical reasons but because her insurance required it. At least she HAS insurance, I reckon.

I’ll probably go out to San Diego sometime this summer.
***
Within 23 seconds, the Sacramento police encountered and shot dead Stephon Clark in his backyard – video looks at how the shooting unfolded

A visit to a nearby restaurant turns ugly

Can a white person use the N-word? Ever?

Still no Pride in the White House

A Senior White House Official Defines the Trump Doctrine: ‘We’re America, B!tch’

*Shady foundation that just got him sued by the New York attorney general, explained

What is impeachment for?

Rose Tico/ Kelly Marie Tran and Star Wars fandom

John Oliver: guardianship

The ‘Sex Cult’ That Preached Empowerment

How noise pollution is ruining your hearing

A Simple Way to Improve a Billion Lives: Eyeglasses

Read This Story and Get Happier

Positive Tomorrows school

Behold the magnificent glory of ‘Reefer Madness’

What Makes The Spelling Bee So Hard

What it takes to become an Olympic athlete – 15 essentials according to Nick Catlin

26-Year-Old Georgia Official Takes Her Oath On Malcolm X’s Autobiography

Ken Levine interviews Mark Evanier

Jake Tapper, Amateur Cartoonist Extraordinary

Jerry Maren, the last surviving actor to play a Munchkin in The Wizard of Oz (1939) in At the Circus (1939)

Now I Know: The T-Word You Couldn’t Talk About and When a Calendar Defeated Russia in the Olympics and The Little TV Accident that Made Miami Golden and How the Soviet Union Saved Vulcan

Tallest Bonfire in the World Made From Over 4000 Pallets

Rooneyer than thou

ihop to ihob

MUSIC

:

Helpless – The Regrettes, cover of the Hamilton song

Roseanna – Weezer

Africa – Weezer

Teach Me Tonight – Amy Winehouse, a Dinah Washington standard

Coverville 1220: The Prince Cover Story V

Rocket Man – Little Big Town

Ravel’s Bolero

Music throwback: 1-800-273-8255 (Logic)

I feel like I’m out of my mind
It feel like my life ain’t mine

It was at the Grammys broadcast in January 2018 where I saw the guy dubbed Logic perform the song 1-800-273-8255. Those digits represent the phone number for the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline. He talks about the creation of the message here, where he tries to assures his listeners “someone is there for them.”

The recording came out in late April 2017, the third single from Logic’s third studio album, Everybody. It eventually hit #3 on the Billboard Hot 100 charts.

What I somehow missed was that in August 2017, there was a seven-minute video. “The clip centers around a gay black teen (Coy Stewart, Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.) with a white boyfriend (Nolan Gould, Modern Family) coming to grips with his sexuality and his family’s reaction to it.”

Don Cheadle and Matthew Modine play the boys’ fathers, and Luis Guzman a coach at the teens’ school. Alessia Cara and Khalid, who are featured on the record, appear in the short film as well.

Where did I see this video? At church, of course. Since it was More Light Sunday, and the Albany Gay Men’s Chorus was providing the service music, I got a rare chance to attend the adult education class.

The conversation was about depression generally, then morphed into facts about suicide and the LGBT community. LGB youth contemplate suicide thrice as often, and attempt it five times as often as heterosexual youth. 40% of transgender adults reported having attempted suicide, the vast majority before the age of 25.

Watch 1-800-273-8255 here or here

A reaction to 1-800-273-8255

Lyrics to the song by Logic (Sir Robert Hall II), 6ix (Arjun Ivatury), Alessia Cara (Alessia Caracciolo), Khalid (Khalid Robinson), and Andrew Taggart [of the Chainsmokers]

I’ve been on the low
I been taking my time
I feel like I’m out of my mind
It feel like my life ain’t mine
Who can relate?

Music throwback: When I turned 4 plus 10

Freddie Scott’s best showing on the POP charts was Hey Girl, a song written and composed by him, Gerry Goffin and Carole King

One of the those social media memes claims that the song that was #1 on birthday number 4 plus 10 defines your life. Well, that’s ominous.

If I go to the Billboard Hot 100, it gives me Love Is Here And Now You’re Gone by THE SUPREMES, #1 for just a week. Oh, thanks a lot.

But that’s for the week of March 11, because of the way they calculate these things. What about if I cheat and pick the week before, which actually runs through my natal day? That would be Ruby Tuesday by THE ROLLING STONES. At work, my on-the-phone day has been Tuesday for many years, so maybe that’s significant.

Hey, maybe I should look at the soul charts. (Sigh). Same sad SUPREMES song. But for the FOUR weeks before, there’s Are You Lonely For Me by Freddie Scott. I had heard it, but I don’t KNOW it like I recognize the others. Probably it’s because it only got to #39 on the pop charts.

His best showing on the POP charts was Hey Girl, a song written and composed by him, Gerry Goffin and Carole King, which went to #10 on both the pop and soul charts in 1963.

Not incidentally, the Billboard R&B charts were not published between November 30, 1963 and January 23, 1965, ostensibly because there was so much crossover, though the breakout of both the Beatles and Motown in 1964 would suggest otherwise.

Freddie Scott’s next two top 100 pop hits were I Got A Woman, #48 pop in 1963 and Where Does Love Go, #82 pop in 1964. They did get to #27 and #30 on the comparable Cash Box R&B charts.

The “correct” song on the country charts for me is The Fugitive by Merle Haggard. But the song that was #1 for two weeks before March 11 AND the two weeks afterwards is Where Does The Good Times Go by Buck Owens, not only a sad lyric, but ungrammatical to boot.

Listen to:

The Supremes – Love Is Here And Now You’re Gone
The Rolling Stones – Ruby Tuesday

Merle Haggard – The Fugitive
Buck Owens – Where Does The Good Times Go

Songs by Freddie Scott:
Hey Girl
Are You Lonely For Me Baby
I Got a Woman
Where Does Love Go

Chuck turned 14 in 1977. Poor Chuck.

Conversely, Dustbury was born correctly.

May rambling #2: Not to be used to bribe politicians

Muppet Rawk III: Revolver by Karin Madan

Not to be used to bribe politicians

How Long Does It Take To Figure Out If a Ten-Dollar Bill Is Real?

Historically, Income Inequality Is Known As A Destroyer Of Civilizations

Mass incarceration: An American problem

His last foray into international negotiations doesn’t bode well for his Kim meeting

There’s no cost to white people who call 911 about black people. There should be

Yes, He Is Making White People More Hateful

Congressman: Rocks tumbling into ocean causing sea level rise

Why did it take so long to find the Golden State Killer suspect?

Big Pay Gaps Are Bad for Business

Outlines of a Reading Project on the Class Divide

Seven Maps to Better Understand the World

All hail the mighty balloon lobby

A SON SPEAKS OUT By Moses Farrow

Why Be a Congregation?

Stores & Brands Offering Senior Discounts

Alan Bean, 4th Person to Walk on the Moon, Dies at 86

Toobin: What you need to know about Tom Wolfe

Memorial video for Comedy Store creator Mitzi Shore

An Open Letter to Wikipedia by Philip Roth (September 2012)

The cast of The Big Bang Theory gave their own tribute to fan Stephen Hawking

Have Your Heard Adulting is Way Hard?

According to a local official in the know, plannerding is “a thing.” “Nerding” is the act of being a nerd. Planning is obvious. Being a nerd, while planning (typically involving mapping and or data analysis) = plannerding

Alexa, Stop Spying on Me

Here’s to the Losers

Now I Know: The Solution to an Unanswerable Question and The Problem with Chinese GPS and How Strawberries with Sugar Ravaged Portugal and The Restaurant With A Rotating Grandma On The Menu

Hotel Duckmaster

We Made a Tool So You Can Hear Both Yanny and Laurel

MUSIC

Jaquandor and his bride have been married 21 years

Symphony No. 2 by Howard Hanson, the “Romantic”, in memory of Dr. Janice Wade of Waverly, IA

AFRICA – Peter Bence (Piano Cover of Toto song)

Coverville 1217: The Steve Winwood Cover Story II – my request! and Coverville 1218: Covering the 2018 Rock and Roll Hall of Fame

Stand By Me Father – The Soul Stirrers

Higher Love – Lilly Winwood with Steve Winwood

The Flying Sequence from the score to Superman, by John Williams

Medley of Junk – Continental Co-Ets, surf/garage band from Fulda, Minnesota

Here’s to the losers

The Seeker – Fish

THE NATURE OF SOUND – Symphony of Science

Alright – Jain

The Song of Summer 2018

Why Stradivarius violins are worth millions

Burton Silverman’s Famous Painting

I’ll Never Hear Every Song

Stevie Nicks turns 70 May 26

“Back when she and Buckingham were just another struggling pair of hungry songwriters in San Francisco, Nicks used to visit a downtown store called the Velvet Underground.”

From goldduststevie.tumblr.com
When the tease for Fleetwood Mac appearing on CBS This Morning aired on April 25, with Mick Fleetwood, John McVie, Christine McVie and Stevie Nicks, but NO Lindsey Buckingham, I had to record it and watch it that evening.

Fleetwood said that Buckingham “would not sign off on a new tour they’d been planning for a year and a half.” Nicks, who joined the band with Buckingham in January 1975, agreed with the decision.

She said, “This team wanted to get out on the road. And one of the members did not want to get out on the road for a year. We just couldn’t agree. And you know, when you’re in a band, it’s a team. I mean I have a solo career, and I love my solo career, and I’m the boss. Absolutely. But I’m not the boss in this band.”

The band is replacing Buckingham with two performers, Neil Finn of Crowded House and former member of the Heartbreakers Mike Campbell, who was recruited as lead guitarist a few months after Tom Petty’s death.

The revised Fleetwood Mac is touring starting in October, and they’re coming to Albany on March 20, 2019. Will I go? Peut être.

Listen to all (by Fleetwood Mac unless otherwise indicated):

Rhiannon (from Fleetwood Mac, 1975), #11 in 1976 – inspired by a book she read, Nicks made the protagonist into what she thought was an old Welsh witch

Landslide (from Fleetwood Mac)

I Don’t Want to Know (from -Fleetwood Mac) – one of her compositions written before she joined the group

Dreams (from Rumours), #1 in 1977 – “Nicks’ mystical assessment of her dying relationship with Buckingham”

Gold Dust Woman (from Rumours)

Sara (from Tusk, 1979), #7 in 1980 – she had a relationship with Don Henley of the Eagles

Storms (from Tusk) – “Nicks’ lament for her brief, messy affair with Fleetwood.”

Stop Draggin’ My Heart Around – Stevie Nicks with Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, #3 for six weeks in 1981. Nicks, Campbell and Petty co-wrote this. From her #1 solo album Bella Donna.

Leather and Lace – Stevie Nicks and Don Henley, #6 in 1982

Gypsy (from Mirage, 1982), #12 in 1982 – “Back when she and Buckingham were just another struggling pair of hungry songwriters in San Francisco, Nicks used to visit a downtown store called the Velvet Underground, where Janis Joplin and Grace Slick shopped, and fantasize about being able to afford the clothes.”

Seven Wonders (from Tango in the Night, 1987), #19 in 1987

Silver Springs (from The Dance, 1997) – “Nicks intended this simmering requiem for her romance with Buckingham to be her crowning moment on Rumours… But the song (which originally ran almost 10 minutes) was too long to fit on the finished LP and was dropped.” A shorter version does appear as the B-side of Go Your Own Way in 1977.

Social media & sharing icons powered by UltimatelySocial