I said last month that sometimes I really struggle to write this blahg. That still holds true. It’s June 25th and I’ve been trying to think about something to write about. Politics? No! Sports? No! Books, movies, or music? Well yes, those are good topics. Those topics have been discussed more than once in this blahg but you have to know by now that sometimes it’s all about the music…or maybe about the album jacket. Read on.
My friend Bryan is always talking about things that make for good artwork. I happen to agree and I’ll go further to say that some record album jackets make for good artwork. I happen to have a few framed ones at home. Both of them are Sinatra. One is a bit of a rarity and features Sinatra on the cover dressed as a bartender:
None of the songs on the above album are rare. I have them all on other albums so it was a no-brainer to decide to hang it in an LP frame with glass. The other album is Sinatra’s Greatest Volume 2. It’s a German issue on the Capitol label. I like it because it features Sinatra with a camera. It’s not a staged effort and certainly something you don’t associate with Sinatra.
I also have a Laurel & Hardy LP that I have framed on my wall but I’m leading up to explaining what it is I’m replacing it with. Probably not the best grammar in that last sentence but it’ll do. Here’s the Laurel & Hardy LP:
While trying to find an image link to the above cover, I came across another Laurel & Hardy LP I’d love to have:
Isn’t that cool? Stan and Ollie on a rocket! This is a UK record that I think I should track down. See, album artwork is awesome!
So what about the album that I’m hanging next on my wall? Well, this is a thrift store find from the past weekend. It cost me $2 and was well worth it. Just look at the subject matter:
Phil Silvers as Sgt. Ernie Bilko. Imagine that staring back at you everyday from a wall in your house. Well, it is in mine. There is a variant to this album issued as two 7 inch records:
You don’t see these things every day. I had to buy it and for now it’s replacing Laurel and Hardy…maybe until I get that rocket LP but then I might just hang both at that point. Artwork indeed!
When I was at the same thrift store, I picked up another album that has significance to me and a little bit of a story. Here it is:
Years ago I bought this album for $1 at a flea market. I really enjoyed it but for some reason I sold it. Big mistake. I remembered how much I loved it and I had to buy it back. I can’t remember where I bought my replacement but at the thrift store on the weekend was another copy of this fantastic album for $2 and the jacket was in excellent condition. Score! Check out the information on the back cover. You can click on it for a larger image:
Unfortunately there’s no information on the orchestra backing Yvonne De Carlo but it’s a lush sound. Give a listen to Blue Moon:
Or check out “But Not For Me”:
How about that old chestnut, “One For My Baby.” It’s funny but it’s probably the fastest song on the album.
I like it because it sounds a lot like Linda Keene’s version that I discovered a few years ago. You can read about that in my blahg TRACING LINDA KEENE, PART 3: ONE MORE FOR THE ROAD, and you can listen to that track below:
There are probably some other albums in my record library that have unique covers. I know I’ve bought albums based on covers before to find that the album didn’t live up to the cover or found great albums that didn’t have decent album covers. I can’t think of any offhand but I know I’ve always admired some of the covers to Bob Scobey albums. That was a blahg as well, WHAT ON EARTH IS SCOBEYFAN? Look at these covers and tell me what they conjure up for you.
For me, those albums suggest that there’s good jazz to be heard. Frisco Jazz to be precise. What a good place to end off. Sometimes it’s about the album cover and sometimes it’s about the music. Bob Scobey and Clancy Hayes from the same titled album above, “Something’s Always Happening On The River”:
I’ve mentioned before about my daily posts to a Sinatra list group where I posted about what Sinatra did on each calendar of the year. For a while, there have been some gaps in our listings of concerts when Sinatra was touring with Tommy Dorsey in 1940, 1941, and 1942. Recently I cam across some interesting news articles that document a Dorsey/Sinatra concert at a Bus Terminal of all places. Here’s that listing:
–May 8, 1941, Consolidated Bus Lines Terminal, Bluefield, West Virginia
Tommy Dorsey and His Orchestra with Frank Sinatra
Here’s the accompanying news articles:
I went a little further and did some research and found the following photo and text from the book “Bluefield in the 1940s”:
TWO TO CROON. Frank Sinatra (right) and trumpet great Ziggy Elman posed for this publicity photograph by J.Vincent Lewis of Nunnaly’s Studio at408 Raleigh Street prior to a concert by the Tommy Dorsey Orchestra on May 8, 1941. The concert was held at Jack Craft’s Consolidated Bus Terminal at 2100Princeton Avenue. (Courtesy of Bluefield Daily Telegraph archives.)
I thought that the listing and the photo were significant enough that I would get some reaction or comments from our Sinatraphiles group. Nothing. So, I have to ask the question again, Is It Me?
My previous blahg to this one, THE HOHNER COMET, debuted my new short story by that name. I posted about it on my Facebook page and even sent it to my children. Again, nothing. At this point, the only one who responded is my wife because I read the story to her. I’m not looking for instant gratification but some acknowledgement would be nice.
I realize the phrase, “Is It Me?” should be followed by “or” in most cases. Like, Is it Me or has the world gotten more hostile? Why are Countries fighting with each other? Wasn’t there two world wars to stop other countries from bullying those around them? Or Is It Me or is there nothing good on television anymore? There isn’t. I like 9-1-1, Abbott Elementary, and a new show called “Elsbeth.” If you really want to know what I’m watching, check out a couple of recent blahgs where I talk about movies I’ve been watching, HAVE YOU WATCHED ANY GOOD MOVIES LATELY? and SCOTT, YOUR CORDIAL MOVIE REVIEWER. I’m going to update that soon because I’ve continued to watch a number of the other DVDs I purchase recently including some Sonja Henie films.
I didn’t think I would enjoy these films but I have and I’m going to finish watching all of her available films. I think there’s 12 and I only have a couple left to view.
Is It Me or is there is there too much anger and sadness and anxiety or depression in the world or are we getting better at spotting it? The past could of days my work has been very troubling because people are holding onto old hatreds and want to trot them out to stir up new ones. Even our politicians are guilty of promoting hatred and ill manners. When the leader of the Conservative Party of Canada, Pierre Poilievre is ejected from Parliament for calling our Prime-minister “wacko” and refuses to take back his comment, it doesn’t set any good example. And then his caucus walks out in support? What are you supporting, the bad behaviour of your leader? Grow up people! Is it me or have Canadians stopped being nice?. Isn’t that our stock and trade, being nice?
I choose to put my energy into acknowledging the good that people do. I’d like to hear from you. Give me your good…not your good, your bad, and your ugly.
I’m finally getting around to unpacking my 2024 False Ducks Video Ramble. I posted that video in my blahg from earlier this month, 2024 FALSE DUCKS NEW YEAR’S DAY VIDEO RAMBLE. In that blahg, I rambled about a number of things that I wanted to talk about this year. I try to always talk separately about the things I speak about in these rambles but time passes and I don’t always get on with it as quickly as I’d like. You’ll soon find out why.
One of the hopes I had for this year was for good health. Unfortunately I didn’t start out well with that. I became sick again. In another previous blahg, “THE CHRISTMAS MAYONNAISE” I mentioned how I got Covid at the beginning of December and then how I felt generally unwell going into the holidays with my Christmas Malaise or the Christmas Mayonnaise as I call it. During the first week of January I started to have a very sore back. It was the area at the top of my buttocks and spread across from right to left. On one particular day, I also experienced a very sore right testicle. I know, too much information, but if it hadn’t been for that soreness in my testicle, I wouldn’t have known what was wrong. You see, I had this about ten or more years ago. It was the testicle thing that sent me to the Doctor at that time and I had to go on a ten day treatment of antibiotics. So, on January 7th I went to the hospital in Picton and described my symptoms and the on-call Doctor diagnosed me with Epididymitis. I believe this is what I had way back when but I didn’t remember the term. Here’s a description of symptoms:
It is most commonly caused by a bacterial infection but can also result from a virus. Symptoms typically include testicular swelling and pain on one side, which may start out as dull but can become more intense or sharp. In some cases, pain may also be felt in the abdomen, pelvis, or low back.
Yep, that was me. I wasn’t sleeping well because the back pain was intense at night. From December 24th and for the next two weeks I was up for at least an hour each night trying to deal with the pain. I finished my course of antibiotics yesterday and you’ll be happy to know I feel better and won’t talk about my testicle again in this blahg.
So, now to unpacking the Ramble. First, let me re-post the Video Ramble:
I already addressed the health issue so let’s hope I don’t have to address that again. The next thing I make reference to is the “Cool and Lam” books. Wikipedia describes Cool and Lam this way:
Cool and Lam is a fictional American private detective firm that is the center of a series of thirty detective novels written by Erle Stanley Gardner (creator of “Perry Mason”) using the pen name of A. A. Fair.
I started commenting on the Cool and Lam series in a blahg from 2021, called THIS IS 100, PART ONE. Here’s what I said then when I talked about books I had recently read:
Instead, I’ll mention two that I recently read, “The Bigger They Come” and “The Knife Slipped” by Erle Stanley Gardner writing as A.A. Fair. Gardner is famous for creating and writing about Perry Mason. Cool and Lam is a fictional American private detective firm run by Bertha Cool with Donald Lam as her main operative. Gardner published 29 books in the series from 1939 to 1970. I first became interested in the Cool and Lam series due to my interest in Frank Sinatra. The second book in the series “Turn On the Heat” was adapted for the June 23, 1946, broadcast of Hour of Mystery with Frank Sinatra as the first actor to portray Donald Lam. Unfortunately that broadcast does not appear to circulate. I always thought about reading the book from the series, “Turn On The Heat”, that the broadcast was based on. That meant starting with the first book “The Bigger They Come.” I thoroughly enjoyed it. It’s the late 1930s into the 1940s gritty detective novel.
I was then going to turn my attention to “Turn On The Heat” which was the second published book in the series. I discovered, however, that this wasn’t the second book written in the series because Gardner had written “The Knife Slipped” after “The Bigger They Come.” Here’s what Wikipedia says about it: “Originally written to be the second book in the Cool and Lam series but rejected by Gardner’s publisher, The Knife Slipped was found among Gardner’s papers and published for the first time in 2016.” Hard Case Crime published “The Knife Slipped” and after reading it, and enjoying it even more than “The Bigger They Come”, I was drawn back in again to that gritty thirties Los Angeles noir. Hard Case Crime also republished “Turn On The Heat” and that’s the copy I have to read next.
Well, my goal was to read all thirty in the series. When I recorded the Video Ramble I mentioned I had still to read four more: “Cut Thin To Win (1965), Widows Wear Weeds (1966), Traps Need Fresh Bait (1967), and “All Grass Isn’t Green (1970). Well, I’m happy to say that since the Video Ramble I have read three of those and now only have “All Grass Isn’t Green” to read. I hope to read it this weekend. I highly recommend the series.
The next two topics from the Ramble were the Polar Dip and the Christmas Malaise. I’ve already linked above to the Christmas Mayonnaise blahg but I’ll re-post here the video of my Polar Dip on January 1st:
There’s not much to say on that. It was cold and it was wet and I survived. Next stop, an ocean!
Next up was mention of the Christmas Tree launch. I’ll just re-post (I’ve used that term three times now and it’s as good a word as any) what I have said before about my annual Christmas Tree launch:
I should add that I also have a tradition of disposing of the Christmas tree. At the bottom of our property is a creek that runs fast and deep in the spring after the snow melts. Our annual live Christmas tree, after its stint in the house, rests out behind our garage until I can get to the creek in the spring and chuck it in. It’s swept up in the current and disappears. I tried following a tree one year and got about half a kilometer before the creek took a bend through a farmer’s field and was carried out of sight. In my imagination there is a Valhalla for our Christmas trees down where the creek ends or maybe it manages to make its way to the sea. More likely there’s a dam of trees somewhere along the creek route overflowing and flooding the farmer’s fields or perhaps the basement of his farmhouse.
Here is the video of the 2022 Christmas Tree launch attempt.
This year’s tree is still sitting on my deck and is now covered in snow.
I gave mention in the Ramble to my Jerry Mathers autograph. I can’t believe I didn’t post about that here. In June last year, I went down to a convention in Niagara Falls, Canada and got Jerry Mathers’ autograph on a still I found of Bob Hope and Mathers from the movie “That Certain Feeling.” That’s one of my favourite Bob Hope movies. Most people remember Jerry Mathers as ‘Beaver’ from “Leave It To Beaver.” Jerry Mathers was very nice and had fond memories of Bob Hope. Here’s that photo with Mathers’ autograph.
I found a nice video on YouTube of an interview Mathers did when he was in Niagara Falls last June:
Today is the anniversary of my Dad’s death in 2019. Wow, five years gone. I don’t want to dwell on my Dad’s death. Here’s the photo again of my Dad that I mentioned in the Ramble. I found it recently. It’s from December of 1966. My mother says it was taken at my Aunt Muriel’s house and she thinks it’s one of my older brothers in the picture
One last thing I want to pick out of the Ramble is that this year is a Leap Year. There’s an extra day to enjoy and I suggest making the whole year one to enjoy and to discover new things. The last Leap Year was in 2020 and I wrote a blahg about it, sort of, HOW I MET MY WIFE OR BEST LEAP DAY EVER! The point is, take the year and treat it like it’s a gift or an extra and find things to do that make you happy. Discover new things. In these Blahgs I am constantly talking about new things and people I’ve discovered. I’ve written blahgs on Linda Keene, Dottie Reid, Marie Carroll and about different things associated with Frank Sinatra. I’ve mentioned before that I send out daily posts about what Sinatra was doing on a particular day. For example, here’s one of the entries for yesterday, January 18th:
Television
1958 Club Oasis
Saturday Evening
Network: NBC
Time: 9:00 – 9:30 P.M.
Sponsor: Club Oasis Cigarettes
Host: Frank Sinatra
Guests: Pat Suzuki, Stan Freberg, Hy Gardner
SONGS:
I’ve Got The World On A String
All The Way
Just One Of Those Things P. Suzuki
Don’t Get Around Much Anymore P. Suzuki
Tell Her You Love Her
Come Fly With Me
That television show is not in circulation but yesterday I discovered that someone had posted the audio on YouTube for all of Sinatra’s songs. I had never heard these performances before:
Well, I’ve probably rambled enough about the False Ducks 2024 Video Ramble. I’ll leave you with some words of wisdom, ala Sinatra’s songs from that 1958 Club Oasis appearance. It’s a Leap Year and you get an extra day. Say to yourself, “I’ve Got The World On A String” and try to seize every moment and don’t do it half-heartedly but try and do it “All The Way”. If there’s someone special in your life “Tell Her You Love Her” or him or them every day. I’ll catch you in the next blahg when I invite you to “Come Fly With Me” and we’ll make some new memories for the upcoming year.
My friend Bryan used to talk about his Christmas Malaise. It seemed to be an all encompassing thing that he would trot out around this time of year. I thought it was just him being impatient with everyone and having to stand in lines and not really having a family of his own with whom he could celebrate his Holiday season. (See how I used “whom” in a sentence? The English major in me comes out sometimes.) I used to refer to Bryan’s malaise as his “Christmas Mayonnaise” as he would bring it out and spread it over everything joyful during the yuletide and sometimes I thought he was laying it on a little thick. Once, I thought about writing a humorous story about his Christmas Mayonnaise but, in the end, I thought I was making too much of it…until it happened to me.
I looked up the word “malaise” today and was struck by the definition provided:
A general feeling of discomfort, illness, or uneasiness whose exact cause is difficult to identify.
Yep, that was me yesterday. If I’m being truthful, that’s been how I’ve felt for the past week or so. Back up to the end of last month and it starts to fall into place. At the end of last month, November 30th, I got sick. My wife had been home for two days with a bad cold. I tried to avoid it and even slept in another part of the house. That didn’t help. On Friday November 30th, I woke up with the head cold and aches and a headache. I stayed home from work because the next day I was going to Toronto and nothing was going to stop me.
Jump back even further to my birthday on September 23rd of this year. I was in Toronto that day as well. I had gone up to Toronto to be taken out to lunch by my daughter Emily. Her husband Charlie, my wife Jeanette, and my son Noah were there. Abbie was still in Britain at the time. We all had lunch at a nice deli that served Reuben sandwiches because that’s what I wanted. Here’s a nice photo of Emily and Charlie from that lunch:
Here’s Noah from the same lunch:
Sorry, I don’t have a picture of my sandwich. I’m not one of those people who takes photos of their meals to try and impress everyone. My story should be enough. Emily and Charlie paid for the lunch so that was their gift to me. Noah surprised me by announcing he had purchased tickets for both of us to go see Martin Short and Steve Martin on December 1st.
So that brings you up to speed. I was sick on November 30th but I had to make it to Toronto for Steve Martin and Martin Short on December 1st.
I wont detail the evening with those two great comedians. It was awesome. I was full of medication and felt okay. I had taken the train from Belleville to Toronto on Saturday afternoon and stayed over at a hotel near downtown Toronto. I didn’t sleep well after the concert because I found the city too noisy and the head cold was taking hold again. The next day I did some shopping before taking a mid-afternoon train back to Belleville. By the time I got home, I was extremely sick. The head cold, the aches and pains, the headache, and tiredness had knocked me down. I did a Covid test and I tested positive. It was my first time getting Covid. This was after me getting my most recent booster a week before. My wife did a test and she tested positive as well. I stayed home for the next three days. I pushed myself to try and get back to work because there were some things happening that I felt I needed to be there for. I didn’t do myself any favours. I was weakened but I pushed through it.
Last week I tried to be on top of everything but felt I wasn’t getting ahead. I was planning for our own Christmas, trying to help my aging Mother with her diabetes, and trying to prepare for a Christmas lunch at work to feed around fifty people. By this past Saturday afternoon, I was sick again. I had felt better in the morning and late in the afternoon my wife and I went to do some shopping at the Belleville Walmart. I started feeling dizzy and while browsing the bedding aisle I felt weak enough that I had to sit down on the floor. Then I was lying on my side on the floor. I’m not sure what my wife was thinking but she was concerned and asked if she should call an ambulance. I said no and managed to get up and go outside to our car. The fresh air helped but I wasn’t feeling well for the rest of the night or the next morning. By Sunday afternoon I felt better but I had a twinge in my lower back that hurt and wouldn’t subside.
Skip to yesterday. Another busy week with lots happening at work and me at another building yesterday for yet another big Christmas lunch. Later, I had to go back to work and then find time to go out and look for a turkey for own Christmas dinner. I had been to three other grocery stores and hadn’t found anything I liked. I finally managed to find one at Walmart, where I managed to stay upright for the time I was there, and did some Christmas shopping for my wife. Unfortunately I found out later that I had bought something in the wrong size and it would require another trip back to exchange the item. On the way home I had to go out of my way and stop off at a fishing depot and pick something up for my son-in-law for Christmas. Driving home, I started to feel worse with a neck pain, headache, and that lower back twinge was increasing. Add to all of that, earlier in the afternoon my Doctor’s office called to say the result of my blood test from the previous day showed that my fasting sugars were too high.
When I got home I was tired and sick and pretty well angry with everything. In short I had a general feeling of discomfort, illness, and uneasiness whose exact cause was difficult to identify. I was suffering Bryan’s Christmas Malaise. I didn’t realize it then but when I went back to Walmart to exchange the item I mentioned earlier, I began to remember that this was just how Bryan had felt and the Mayonnaise was spreading over me rather thickly. It was time to start taking better care of myself. I had to lay down on the bed and I just started crying, uttered a few profanities, and just grumbled to my wife. She wanted me to stay home from work the next day but I couldn’t do that. I was determined to push through it and try to get back on track. When I finally realized it was the Malaise, I was able to step back and say to myself that I needed to slow down and just enjoy the rest of the holiday season.
My house has been festooned for Christmas for a few weeks so one thing I did was to take some photos of our decorations inside and my display outside. It helped me to focus on why I love this time of year. Here are some photos of our mantle display, our nutcrackers and our Christmas tree as well as a light-up angel we like to put out.
The outdoor display has been a bit of struggle. I had an inflatable snowman but the motor recently died and my inflatable moose had to be taken in because he wasn’t inflating fully. I had put a new motor in the moose so I think it needs to be adjusted. I also had a plastic caroller set of three children and their dog that finally had to be retired because it was cracked and broken. Here’s what my outdoor display currently looks like:
Of course it all looks nice with a little bit of snow on the ground but I’ve heard it will all be gone by December 24th. Compare that to last year when we had so much snow on Christmas day that they closed the roads in my area and my children from Toronto couldn’t get home until the 26th. You can read all about that in my blahg, HOW WAS YOUR CHRISTMAS? By the way, the pictures below show the snowman, the carollers and the moose from previous years.
One other thing that bothered me this year was related to Sinatra and Ireland. I have this app on my Ipod that plays Christmas classics. For some reason, in the past two weeks, the announcers or disk jockeys have an Irish accent and the sponsors seem to be located in Ireland. Last weekend they had a dedicated Sinatra weekend and they kept making announcements about the next song in the rotation and would give a big buildup to Sinatra. Unfortunately, it was never Sinatra. Sometimes it was Bing Crosby or Andy Williams or Nat King Cole. It got to the point where I started to believe that people in Ireland didn’t really know who Sinatra was. One of the songs they introduced was “The First Noel” and it turned out to be by Nat King Cole. If you want to view a nice rendition of Sinatra singing this song from a 1980 special, “The Most Joyful Mystery”, check this out:
A number of years ago I put together a collection of Sinatra Christmas Rarities. These were rare versions of Christmas songs from Sinatra radio and TV shows ranging from 1943 to 1985. I thought about shipping it to Ireland but just sending a CD to the entire population of Ireland seemed a bit much. Instead I’ll post some tracks here and hope that Ireland is listening. The very first is a version of White Christmas that Sinatra sang on his Songs By Sinatra radio program from December 19, 1943:
In the middle of the compilation is a beautiful version of “Let It Snow” from another Songs By Sinatra program on December 25, 1946:
There’s also a very funny version of Sinatra singing “All I Want For Christmas Is My Two Front Teeth” from the “Your Hit Parade” radio broadcast of January 1st, 1949:
There’s also a funny parody of “Jingle Bells” with Sinatra and Bob Hope from the radio broadcast of The Bob Hope Show, December 24th, 1953
I’ll close with another video of Sinatra singing but this time it’s “Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas” from a TV Special from 1985, “All-Star Party for ‘Dutch’ Reagan. That’s former U.S. President Ronald Reagan in case you didn’t know.
If that doesn’t lift your Christmas Mayonnaise then nothing will.
This blahg is not the blahg I intended to publish this week. I had another blahg all mapped out in my mind with lots of audio recordings. I won’t spoil it by giving anything away. That blahg will be coming in the next month. Part of the problem in the delay was that I lost my motivation and began to suffer some depression last week. When you’re feeling low, everything you want to accomplish either gets pushed aside or seems unaccomplishable. That’s a real word. Look it up!
A few things happened this week to take me out of my funk and inspired this blahg. I haven’t talked much lately about my mental health or even wanted to talk about mental health in general. I’ve been hearing and reading all the news about mental health and the current pandemic and I just didn’t want to tackle that topic. I wasn’t planning on avoiding it but I like my blahgs to be uplifting, inspiring, or at least entertaining. Depression to me was like something from the Seniors’ menu at a restaurant where you skip over it because it doesn’t apply to you. Me, I like to order from the kids’ menu and get that hotdog that they won’t let us adults order. Why are restaurants hiding the hotdogs? Cut it out!
My recent bout of depression was brought on by some detractors who don’t want me to fill in on a job contract for a colleague who is expecting a baby in June. I haven’t done anything wrong but sometimes the peanut gallery gets it in their mind that they think they know something or heard something and never thought to check to see if any of it is true. That’s enough of that. I should know better than to listen to the voices of the detractors but I’m human and you just want to yell “DAMN IT, I’M LIKEABLE”. I didn’t do that and so it was hard to get out of my own head and stop flailing myself with the “POOR ME.”
Last week I had an encounter with my colleague who is expecting. She had been in a virtual meeting which I had not attended but where my name was being put forth as a replacement for her while she is away on maternity leave. I was trying to feel her out on how that went without directly asking what people thought of me as her replacement. She didn’t really elaborate but I got a sense she was trying to protect me from some of the negativity. I had it confirmed later from another colleague but I began to feel guilty later that I had put my female colleague on the spot. No, it really wasn’t guilt about that as much as it was that I didn’t even ask her how she was feeling or how the pregnancy was going. Later, I went back and apologized to her and said I shouldn’t have tried to pry information from her and that I was even more sorry that I didn’t ask her how she was doing. She seemed to appreciate that and I was determined that in future encounters I was going to make sure I focused more on her.
So, this is where this blahg begins. A few days ago I saw my colleague again and made it a point of asking her how she was doing. We chatted briefly about the pregnancy and I asked casually if she had any cravings. Her answer was surprising. She said she hadn’t had any cravings but everything she ate recently seemed to her to be the best of that particular things she had ever had. She gave this example of snacking on M&M candies in the evening. She said she’s always had a bowl that she snacks on in the evening but eating them recently made her feel that these M&Ms were the best M&Ms she’s ever tasted. I commented that wouldn’t it be great if you could keep that feeling all the time and that no matter what you were eating or viewing or hearing or experiencing at any given moment was the best. It would be the ultimate ‘living in the moment’ experience you could ever have. After that, I didn’t give that notion much thought.
On my way home that afternoon after discovering this new philosophy, I stopped to gas up my vehicle and I bought a PLINKO instant scratch ticket. This ticket had instant prizes but if one of your lucky numbers matched one of the scratched and uncovered numbers with the corresponding word “CHIP” then you could take it into your local retailer to reveal your prize. I learned that a video would play at the retailer and I could win up to $10,000 instantly or a “PLINKO” chip that I could play on the real board for a minimum of $100,000 up to a maximum of $500,000. The big board is of course at the Ontario Lottery offices in Toronto and is similar to the PLINKO game we’ve all seen on the game show “The Price Is Right.” I was excited. It took me two days before I got back to the retailer and I had convinced myself that I was going to get that “PLINKO” chip for the big board. I knew the odds were against me and ultimately they were with me only winning $10 which doubled my money from the $5 I had paid for the scratch ticket. It was a disappointment but for those two days I lived that fantasy and dreamed big.
This morning, while shaving, something else happened that reminded me of that “best of something ever had” idea. I don’t know what it is but I always get great ideas while I’m shaving. Some of my short story ideas occurred while I was shaving and so did ideas for my blahgs. I probably should concentrate more on what I’m doing if I don’t want to cut myself. Usually when I’m shaving I have my I-pod playing my music on shuffle. I have such a wide range of music on there that I never know what I’m going to hear. This morning I heard “When I Am King” by Great Big Sea. The lyrics really struck me. Here they are:
Wake up
Without a care
Your head’s not heavy, your conscience clear
Sins are all forgiven here
Yours and mine
Fear is gone without a trace
It’s the perfect time in the perfect place
Nothing’s hurting, nothing’s sore
No one suffers anymore
The doctor found a simple cure
Just in time
All these things if I were king
Would all appear around me
The world will sing when I am king
The world will sing when I am king
Oh, she walks right in
She don’t even knock
It’s the girl you lost to the high school jock
She shuts the door, turns the lock
And she takes your hand
She says she always felt a fool
For picking the captain over you
She wonders if you missed her
Said she always told her sister
Oh, that you’re the best damn kisser
That she’s ever had
All these things if I were king
Would appear around me
The world will sing when I am king
The world will sing when I am king
Daylight waits to shine until the moment you awaken
So you never miss the dawn
No question now, you know which road you’re taking
Lights all green, the radio plays just the perfect song
Well, the war’s been won
All the fights are fought
You find yourself in just the spot
It’s a place where everybody’s got a song to sing
Just like the final movie scene
The prince will find his perfect queen
The hero always saves the world
The villains get what they deserve
The boy will always get the girl
When I am king
By the way, Great Big Sea was an awesome Canadian band. Below is a video of them singing “When I Am King.” It turns out the video is from a concert that was held at the Empire Theatre in Belleville, Ontario in 2006. I live south of Belleville but I work there. I’ve been to concerts at the Empire but sadly I missed this one.
As I said, the lyrics struck me. They’re about everything being great but unfortunately they depend up the singer becoming king. Immediately the lyrics struck me as the best of everything and reminded me of the conversation I had had a few days earlier with my colleague. It also reminded me of that PLINKO fantasy I had lived in for two days.
Shortly after hearing this song, I was getting ready to go into Belleville to work and I couldn’t shake the “best of everything” thought. I asked my Google speaker to play “When I Am King” again. It was at that moment that all of these puzzle fragments of thought slammed together into a clearer picture for this blahg. I was going to ask Google to play me another song in particular by Great Big Sea but then the speaker launched into “Consequence Free” by the band. Here’s another song with poignant lyrics:
Na na na, na na na na na!
Na na na, na na na na na!
Wouldn’t it be great,
If no one ever got offended?
Wouldn’t it be great,
To say what’s really on your mind?
I’ve always said,
All the rules are made for bending.
And if I let my hair down,
Would that be such a crime?
I wanna be consequence free!
I wanna be where nothing needs to matter.
I wanna be consequence free!
Just say: Na na na, na na na na na!
Oh! Na na na, na na na na na!
I could really use,
To lose my Catholic conscience.
Cause I’m getting sick,
Of feeling guilty all the time.
I won’t abuse it,
Yeah I’ve got the best intentions.
For a little bit of anarchy,
But not the hurting kind.
I wanna be consequence free!
I wanna be where nothing needs to matter.
I wanna be consequence free!
Just say: Na na na, na na na na na!
Oh! Na na na, na na na na na!
Oh! I couldn’t sleep at all last night,
Cause I had so much on my mind.
I’d like to leave it all behind,
But you know it’s not that easy.
Oh! But for just one night,
Wouldn’t it be great,
If the band just never ended?
We could stay out late,
And we would never hear last call.
Wouldn’t need to worry about approval or permission.
We could slip off the edge,
And never worry about the fall.
I wanna be consequence free!
I wanna be where nothing means to matter.
I wanna be consequence free!
Just say: Na na na, na na na na na!
Oh! Na na na, na na na na na!
Oh! Na na na, na na na na na!
There’s a theme here of “wouldn’t it be great” and of course, living “consequence free.” Here’s the video for that song:
It was coming together. Great Big Sea was selling me on writing this blahg. I drove to work humming the songs I had heard. I also started to write part of this blahg over lunch. As if that wasn’t enough, on my way home, CBC radio played excerpts from a March of 2009 concert that Great Big Sea played at the Mile One Centre in St. John’s, Newfoundland. They of course played “Consequence Free” but they also played the song that I hadn’t had a chance to ask my Google speaker to play earlier in the day. The song is “Ordinary Day”:
I’ve got a smile on my face and I’ve got four walls around me
I’ve got the sun in the sky, all the water surround me
Oh you know, yeah I win now and sometimes I lose
I’ve been battered, but I never bruise
It’s not so bad
And I say way-hey-hey, it’s just an ordinary day
And it’s all your state of mind
At the end of the day
You’ve just got to say it’s all right
Gina sings on the corner, what keeps her from dying
Let them say what they want, she won’t stop trying
Oh, you know
She might stumble, they push her ’round
She might fall, but she’ll never lie down
It’s not so bad
And I say way-hey-hey, it’s just an ordinary day
And it’s all your state of mind
At the end of the day
You’ve just got to say it’s all right
It’s all right, it’s all right
It’s all right
In this beautiful life there’s always some sorrow
And It’s a double-edged knife, but there’s always tomorrow
Oh, you know
It’s up to you now if you sink or swim
Just keep the faith that your ship will come in
It’s not so bad
And I say way-hey-hey, it’s just an ordinary day
And it’s all your state of mind
At the end of the day
You’ve just got to say
I say way-hey-hey, it’s just an ordinary day
And it’s all your state of mind
At the end of the day
You’ve just got to say it’s all right
It’s all right, it’s all right
‘Cause I’ve got a smile on my face, and I’ve got four walls around me
Here’s the video for that song:
Finally, the theme was clear. It’s all a state of mind and it’s just an ordinary day and it’s all right.
The point I want to hammer home is also that it can be more than just all right. Okay is just okay but what if moments could be the best of whatever it is we are experiencing? That’s what it’s all about. Find a moment or take a moment and say this moment is the best. It might not be the best that’s ever been or will ever be but it’s the best right now and that’s all right. I’m no philosopher and I struggle to even call myself a poet but experiencing the moment like my colleague does, sounds pretty good to me.
I had started off 2021 on a good note. There was that Ramble video from my blahg, THE FALSE DUCKS VIDEO BLAHG #4: OH, DIDN’T I RAMBLE and the subsequent explanation of that video in the follow-up blahg THE RAMBLE UNPACKED that explained what I wanted to accomplish this year. So far, I have fixed the cuckoo clock, listened to all of the records, started reading “Roses Are Difficult Here” by W.O. Mitchell, and averaged two blahgs a month with the goal of reaching 100 blahgs over the past ten years. The motivation was with me and I was living the moments by enjoying what I was doing. I even re-edited the “The Dead From The Neck Up 25th Anniversary Covid 19 Quarantine Special” that I posted last December. By the way, if you haven’t listened to the “The Dead From The Neck Up 25th Anniversary Covid 19 Quarantine Special” then check out this video below containing the remastered version of our special. It’s just the audio from our program set to images of my Christmas display this past Christmas.
When we recorded the special last December and when I was editing it in December and remastering it in January, I felt this was the best work we had ever done. Of course it probably isn’t but I enjoyed it so much that I continue to listen to it at least 2 to 3 times a week while I’m driving to work. It makes me feel happy and each time I hear it, I think “that’s the best we’ve ever done.” I’ll hold onto that thought for a while. We hope to record a new special later this year and it’ll probably be the best…at least in my mind.
When thinking about the theme for this blahg and ultimately the title, “The Best of Everything”, I was reminded of another blahg I had written in late January MY FATHER’S VOICE where I talked about needing to find a cassette that contained my late Father’s voice. It was a tape of speeches from my wedding in 1987. What I didn’t detail in that blahg was that my double cassette deck was found to be non-functioning so I decided to purchase another one off Ebay. I received that tape deck last month and immediately began to locate all of the cassettes I used to enjoy over the years. I remember that I practically wore out three of my favourite tapes once upon a time. The first was “Graceland” by Paul Simon. The second was “Cloud Nine” by George Harrison. And the last was the 1984 release of “L.A. Is My Lady” by Frank Sinatra. The Sinatra cassette was the first of the three that I had purchased and I still think it’s a great album. It seems like I might have gone off topic but really it all connects. One of the great songs on “L.A. Is M Lady” is “The Best of Everything”. I know, I’m brilliant. Still, if you want to understand everything, read some of the lyrics:
The best of everything – that’s (that is) what I wish you all
The best of everything – a Rembrandt (hanging) on your (the) wall
A yacht that wins you cups
Skateboards with style and speed
Show dogs or loving pups
The pride of the pound or the pedigreed
I hope you win that prize – pass that blue ribbon test
I hope your good keeps getting better – ’til your better’s best
The best of everything – that’s (that is) what I wish you all
The best of everything – a Rembrandt (hanging) on your (the) wall
A yacht that wins you cups
Skateboards with style and speed
Show dogs or loving pups
The pride of the pound or the pedigreed
I hope you win that prize – pass that blue ribbon test
I hope your good keeps getting better – ’til your better’s best
If you haven’t heard the song then do yourself a favour and check out this audio/video:
See? It all came together. This is the song that wishes us “The Best Of Everything”. The truth really is, though, that we already have the best of everything…we just have to realize it in the moment. I think that’s the best mental health advice I can offer in this moment.
I know it’s been more than a month since I published a blahg. I tried…really I did. I sat down to write this blahg and my server went down and I lost part of the blahg. So, many things happened since then and I’m going to try and get to them all now. First, the Toshiba saga is done. I’m going to start off with that because I’ve paid far too much attention to Toshiba and they deserve none of it. The end to my Toshiba experience is one of the things I have to celebrate. It took two months of persistent phone conversations with far too many representatives of Toshiba. I’ve been very clear that this is not the way customer service should be. But let’s close this experience. The last interaction with Toshiba that I noted was that I returned my BDX2155KC to Toshiba via UPS on May 23rd. In the box, I had included a letter requesting a phone call from Toshiba to tell me they had received the Blu-Ray player and a subsequent phone call providing a tracking number for the replacement BDX 2300.
By Friday, June 1st, I had heard nothing from Toshiba so I decided to try Mike’s personal number to make yet another inquiry. I was put through to his voice mail and I left a detailed message requesting an update. Mike finally called me back around noon on Monday, June 4th. He explained that there had been a delay in sending out my replacement BDX 2300 but it had been sent out late Friday afternoon (sure, after I called and left a message asking for it!). I was provided with a tracking number that I checked online and verified that the Blu-Ray Player had been shipped and I further discovered it was out on the truck for delivery to me. Unfortunately I had to go out and missed the Purolator delivery (yes, Purolator, even though everything had been UPS up to that point). When I got home later, I found a delivery card and arranged for Jeanette to pick up the BDX 2300 at the Purolator depot the next day. Cut to the chase. It was the BDX 2300 and I hooked it up and to my delight found that the USB port that had been on the rear of the BDX2155KC was on the front of the BDX 2300. Finally, Toshiba got something right. I inserted a USB drive and played a one hour file from beginning to end and the machine did not shut down. If you’re confused about all of this then read my previous entries because I’m done with Toshiba now.
The title of this blahg is “Some Things To Celebrate…” and I want to get onto more important things. Yes, I celebrate the fact that I finally got something from Toshiba but there wouldn’t have been cause for celebration if Toshiba Customer Service had done their job right in the first place. But as I said, enough about Toshiba and more about those other things to celebrate.
On May 30th, of this year, Jeanette and I celebrated 25 years of marriage. In my family, other than my parents and my sister and her husband, there hasn’t been a great track record in marriages. Twenty-five is a milestone that you don’t make every day and I want to take a moment to celebrate that. We did have a nice gathering of some friends and family and there was way too much food left over. My son took lots of photos but I’ll only share this one of us looking happy and cutting the cake.
Ten years ago I created a DVD Picture Show as a gift to Jeanette on our 15th Anniversary. I had scanned in many old photos and created slideshows to music of our life together and separate ones of each of our children. All of the slideshows were set to the music of Frank Sinatra (surprise, surprise). Sinatra had recorded songs with the names of two of our children: “Emily” & “Noah” but there was nothing in his repertoire with the name of “Abbie”. With a little creative license I utilized the song “Pocketful of Miracles” which is nice child like song that Sinatra recorded with a children’s chorus. For the menu, I chose the song “You Will Be My Music”, which was the Sinatra song at our wedding. For the slideshow of us as a couple, I chose Sinatra singing “As Time Goes By”. I’d like to share that with you here:
Let me share a couple of poems I’ve written over the years about my union with Jeanette. The first was written about two weeks before our wedding:
love poem # 3 (of sorts)
marry me I said
and she said
yes
but if it were
that easy
to get what I wanted
then maybe
I woulda asked fer
world peace instead
Now let’s jump ahead about 5 years later:
I’m rememberin’ a girl who could raise hackles
I’m rememberin’ a girl
who could raise hackles
in humans?
and as I remember
she turns to me half asleep
and kisses my back
where I think my hackles must be
It’s been a long time since I wrote my wife a poem, maybe in a card, but if I do write her a new one, she’ll be the first to know.
Now back to the “some things to celebrate”. A couple of weeks ago we had some graduations to attend. First, my youngest daughter, Abbie, graduated from grade 8. This may not seem significant to anyone else but to her, and us, it’s a big deal. She’s leaving a country school, well it’s in the country anyway, that all of our children have attended and she starts High-school in the city come September. This is an even bigger deal because she is not attending the same school that all of her classmates will be attending. Most of them will be going to the big Secondary school here in the County while Abbie takes a 30 minute bus ride to Belleville to Centennial Secondary School where her two older siblings have gone. The choice was hers. Most grade 8 graduates of schools here in Prince Edward County go to Prince Edward Collegiate in Picton unless they get special permission to attend a school elsewhere. Elsewhere being Belleville. Abbie applied for the Arts Program at Centennial, as did my oldest daughter Emily, and was accepted. Her brother, Noah, will be there for one semester in January but she’ll be the new kid on the block in September.
Back to her graduation. Abbie’s dress was stunning and she was beautiful (as can be seen in the picture above with my wife and I…at least Abbie’s hair looked better than mine that night). She received three awards the night she graduated. She tied with another girl for the highest academic award, tied for the highest marks in Math, and won the Language Arts award outright (pictured at left). Her Principal credited her receiving this award to all of the comics she reads but corrected herself to the term of “Graphic Novels”. Abbie does read those but she’s a voracious reader of regular novels as well. She looked beautiful in her dress and her hair, which took about an hour and a half, was gorgeous. I’m very proud of her.
The second graduation we had that week, two days after Abbie’s, was Noah’s grade 12 graduation from Centennial.
He was also an Ontario Scholar which meant he graduated with an average of 80+ and he also received a technical award for his work in Theater Arts.
He has been very active in theater and theater production at his school. He played the second lead pirate in the school’s production of “Peter Pan” this year. Last year he was Mr. Salt, the father of Veruca Salt, in the production of “Charlie and the Chocolate Factory”. He’s also been in Centennial’s productions of “The Music Man” and “Sound of Music”. Check out the photo of his proud parents from the night of graduation.
Now, readers of this blahg (again, do I have readers?) will recall that I have three children. Our eldest daughter, Emily, was not able to attend our Anniversary celebration nor her siblings’ graduations. She has been very busy herself out of country. Since the beginning of May, she has been serving as an Intern with the Digital Advocacy Research Group at the Canadian Embassy in Washington, D.C. We miss her very much but a couple of weeks ago, and the subject of an upcoming blahg, we managed to drive down to Washington over a hot long weekend at the beginning of July and spent some time with her. The picture above is the only recent photo we’ve been able to snap of all three of our children since Emily has been in the USA. Emily’s the one in the middle…not the absolute middle, that’s Lincoln. She returns in August and we can’t wait to have her home.
The last bit of celebration, which has some sadness attached to it but I will save that, too, for a later blahg, concerns a new addition to our family. We recently adopted a new kitten. It’s been about twelve years since we’ve had a kitten in our home and Abbie, being the youngest child, has never had the chance to name one of our cats. I named Frank, the subject of a previous blahg “The Christmas Cat” and before that, June was already adopted pre-named. She was adopted from Robyn’s Nest in Picton, Ontario. This store adopts out animals that have been brought into the local animal welfare society so it’s only fitting that we provided a home for a rescued kitten. I don’t know the story behind our kitten but she was either brought into the local shelter or was born there. She has made a loving addition to our home and after two days, Abbie provided her with the name “Stella”. She’s very playful and she likes to sleep on me early in the morning. She is so small that I don’t feel her walking up me while I’m sleeping. I’ll close with two cute videos of Stella on the back of the sofa watching television.
Hopefully, my next blahg won’t be so long in the making.
Well now it’s the last day of January 2012 and I’m late again with this blahg.Was that me who said I’d be posting two blahgs a week?Maybe I should have said two a month.I could give you some excuses but they wouldn’t be good ones.Let’s just agree that I’ll write some blahgs, you’ll read them, and we won’t talk about the schedule.That way we all won’t be disappointed.
The blahg this time will not be full of pictures, audio, or video.I was trying out a couple different topics but I kept coming back to the same one.If you’ve been online and read the news, then you’ll probably realize that the Internet is running scared.The news has been full of information about legislation in the United States to clamp down on illegal downloading of copyrighted material.Somebody’s losing money somewhere and they’ve got some big lawyers or lobbyists trying to get that money back.I’m not against this and the pirating of movies and music is a big time thing.Personally, I go to the movies a lot (and always seem to have someone texting on their cell phone in front of me) so I see first run movies as they should be seen.I also own hundreds of DVDs of movies and TV shows.But I’m not going to preach.
Recently, The Big One, Megaupload, was taken down by the FBI.If you’re not familiar with Megaupload then let me simplify it by saying that millions of people upload files to this site and then send or post links to other people so they can download these files.Yes, some of the files are illegal copies of films or television shows and of course music.Megaupload was also paying people for files that were downloaded multiple times.This was probably their undoing because popular copyrighted material was probably being posted and subsequently downloaded.If you look at the long list of charges levied against Megaupload they include money laundering and racketeering.More was going on there than meets the eye.
I personally have used Megaupload when file sharing with other Sinatra fans.I never posted legally licensed or professionally published material.I’ve been collecting Sinatra concerts and recordings for years and there are hundreds of unreleased concerts or audience tapes in my collection.Many have been traded with other collectors and links posted to and downloaded from Megaupload.I will not apologize for this.Every time a new Sinatra CD or DVD is released, I buy it if it contains previously unavailable material.Bootleg concerts, to me, are whole different kettles of fish.It gives me the opportunity to hear something I’ve never heard before and to share that experience with other Sinatra fans.I couldn’t go to the 700 + concerts in my collection but someone went and is sharing their experience with me.If a particular concert gets officially released then I’ll buy it.Until then, I’m not changing my opinion.
I have on occasion downloaded a CD from an artist when I wanted to hear it before purchasing it.Case in point:Songs I Heard by Harry Connick Jr.Someone posted a link to it and I gave it a listen and enjoyed it so much that I ordered an official copy.It’s a great album full of songs from our youth.I’ve also listened to some CDs from a download that I didn’t care for and was glad I didn’t rush out to buy it.It’s like hearing a song on the radio.If you don’t like it, don’t buy it.
Sometimes you find out that the CD is not well mastered and you don’t want to waste time and money there either.Blossom Dearie initially released an LP (yes I said an LP) in 1963 for a Hires Root Beer campaign singing the “Most Rootin’ Tootin’ Songs of 1963.”I’m a big Blossom Dearie fan and when I read about this LP, I tried to track it down but couldn’t.Then I found out there was a download of the LP available.I downloaded it and enjoyed it immensely.When it was finally released as an import CD, I listened to sample tracks through Amazon and found that the sound quality of the CD was flat and not as good as the LP version I had downloaded.That saved me money and aggravation.If you look at that CD now, it’s more than $100 and the original LP is fetching more than $200.Crazy!
Let’s talk TV.I have had to download current TV shows because I live in the country and get 4 channels.Not all current shows air on any of those channels.When “Monk” was airing, I had to download every episode because I couldn’t stream it for free in Canada.I didn’t want to wait a year until the episodes were officially released.The same goes for the current show, “Psych”.You can stream episodes online for free but not in Canada.I’ve been a fan of the show since it started but I don’t want to wait forever to see new episodes when the season gets an official DVD release.I might eventually buy the DVD sets but I reserve the privilege to download these episodes and watch them at my convenience.
So where am I going with this?Since Megaupload went down, it’s been very hard to download anything.Other sites like Filesonic and Fileserve are running scared.They have disabled file sharing and download links are disappearing.One of my favorite sites, Reelboys.org, went dark last week.It was a great website to download family oriented movies about children.It was a great place to find many classic films that have not been released on DVD.I don’t get Turner Classic Movies channel so this was a great source for me.After Megaupload was shut down Reelboys announced they would shut down because they were afraid of being targeted.If you go to their website now it says:
Reel Boys™ is Gone…
I like movies, music, and television but I’m not your average consumer. I do a lot of try before you buy and the Internet is a great resource.I think it should be like that.Yes, there are those who will abuse it and will break copyright infringement rules but that happens when someone rents a DVD and copies it or sneaks a recording device into a movie theater or concert.No legislation is going to prevent all that.It’s people like me that suffer.I want my downloads.I want to view or listen before committing.It’s like watching movie trailers, if you don’t like what you’re seeing, don’t pay for the price of admission.I’ll continue to post tracks here but it will usually be from things that are on LP or unofficially available.Call me an educator.Or don’t call me.I’m not posting anything I don’t already own.If you listen to it, then you decide if you’re breaking any laws.Don’t’ shoot the messenger.
…I really like the title The Death of a Big One.I have to admit it’s not the first time I’ve used that title.I’ll close with the true meaning of that title.It’s a poem I wrote in the late 1980s.Later, I expanded this poem into a short story.It should really be a movie…maybe somebody will download it.
That still holds true. It’s June 25th and I’ve been trying to think about something to write about. Politics? No! Sports? No! Books, movies, or music? Well yes, those are good topics. Those topics have been discussed more than once in this blahg but you have to know by now that sometimes it’s all about the music…or maybe about the album jacket. Read on. 
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