Are You Going Backwards, Or Are You Going Forwards?

Punk Rock Warlord:

Tin Soldiers And Nixon Coming

Students who staged an anti-war sit in at their suburban Chicago school have been reprimanded--too severely, in my and others' opinions--by Berwyn school district officials, who claim that their (by all accounts) peaceful demonstration exhibited "gross disobedience and mob activity." The students, who range from sky-high GPA achievers and varsity athletes to average students who participate in a range of school activities, could be expelled. Well, according to some parents and guardians, those middling students could be. The AP-credit darlings seem to be threatened with lesser punishments.

All of these kids should be praised. They should be poised as examples of opinion in action for other kids who are caught up--rightly so--in their own lives full of football, or senioritis, or friends, or World of Warcraft, or TRL Live, or whatever is highly important to teens across the motivation spectrum.

I've been reading about the Seventies this week, some of the text specifically about the incident at Kent State in 1970.

Can you imagine that happening now? We do have an ill-advised, secretively and ineptly executed, and plain old drug-out (as they'd say in Kentucky) war going on. My friend's brother-in-law is returning to Iraq in a few weeks--just before Christmas, of course--for a SIXTEENTH-MONTH tour. In addition to the time that took him away from his family for two other Christmases.

Who's standing up and saying something about?

And why are those who are getting the a less-pointed but still obvious sort of ire that led to Vice President Spiro Agnew to pontificate and condemn the "psychotic and criminal" elements that led to Kent State?

And where's our CSNY to remind us?

Well, I guess there's still Young. But while he's playing to smug and deep-pocketed audiences who can shell out $159.50 (plus fees) to see him play, is he saying the kind of thing that Graham Nash did after the release of "Ohio?"

"Four young men and women had their lives taken from them while lawfully protesting this outrageous government action. We are going back to keep awareness alive in the minds of all students, not only in America, but worldwide…to be vigilant and ready to stand and be counted… and to make sure that the powers of the politicians do not take precedent over the right of lawful protest."

There were some contemporary kids listening, guys.

Look where it's gotten them.

C'Mon Get Happy

I saw a commercial tonight for a feminine hygiene product, and all I can say about it is that a feminine hygiene was, like, riding a mechanical bull.

I thought the interweb would produce an explanation for this (besides that my bottle of white wine must be older than I thought), but no, I only found this.

Sound effects are um...detailed?

Now I'll Never Dance With Another

I'm trying to post blogs during this month of writing daily (I'm only--sigh--on the SEVENTH?) when I feel compelled to say something, or soon thereafter.

So, when The Beatles' "I Saw Her Standing There" began to play on the internet radio station I've favored for the past couple of days--one that I haven't needed to switch too often when something unendurable comes on like Avril Lavigne or Third Eye Blind--I immediately clicked open a new IE window and waited for a wiki on the song to load up. Before I could finish the entry, from which I learned that Lennon scoffed at McCartney's original nugget of a lyric ("'She was just seventeen,' and then: 'Beauty queen'”) and that Please Please Me was almost recorded live at the Cavern in Liverpool, the radio station made a logical but highly egregious follow-up.

Paradise Tunes, classic rock available through Itunes is not to be confused with Radio Paradise, which I got sick of after one too many afternoons of Snow Patrol followed by Air. I mean, zzzzzzzzzzz. A girl needs some classic rawk and soul to get to the bottom of a spreadsheet in the afternoon.

Paradise Tunes played--Jebus on a raft--"Ebony and Ivory" after the 1963 b-side to "Please Please Me."

And there's nothing I learned from Wikipedia that made me enjoy a single note of E&A. Nuthin. Not even Stevie. I attribute this mess to the part of Paul's brain that also made him think marrying Heather Mills was a good idea.

But I did learn that the song is favored by people who write karaoke duet scenes for their television characters.

EDITED TO ADD: Paradise Tunes has redeemed itself by playing Stevie Wonder's "Ordinary Pain" at 5:05 pm. Any entity that publicly plays any portion of Songs in the Key of Life (especially when not using a radio edit but the break-it-down part 2 of this song) is forever off my shit list.

We Can Still Come True

Today I received an email forward (is that what you call those things? Forwarded email? Chain email?) for the second time. It was the one with the pages from the 1977 JC Penney's catalogue that someone posted on their blog (and someone tell me how one gets one's blog to be read so much that excerpts are circumnavigating the cyber-globe).

Anyway, this time I read it more closely and noticed a reference to Seventies hottie (if you like blond and Lutheran--he was born David Solberg to a Lutheran minister, so I can say that) David Soul. He played Hutch on Starsky and Hutch and was a pop singer, scoring a number-one hit with "Don't Give Up On Us." So, not really the Justin Timberlake of the day but more like the, I don't know, Mandy Moore? Or that Hannah Montana girl?

Anyway, of course I had to go look me up some David Soul on the interweb. Before he was chasing bad guys by leaping from the roof of one building to another in a Sansabelt, David was a folk singer in the late 60s and early 70s, one who learned the form in Mexico while attending university there after he turned down an offer to play for the Chicago White Sox. I am not shitting you. I mean, duh, draft-dodge much, David?

His first big break came when he reinvented himself as a singer known only as the Covered Man. Yes, he'd sing and play guitar in a mask, like on the Merv Griffin Show. Things dried up some when he removed it, not surprising given his eventual popularity in the UK, where a cell phone ring can top the charts.

If that bio isn't crushed-velvet 60s enough, the title of his eventual hit album, Playing to an Audience of One, is so 70s-sensitive-guy-pouring-you-wine-by-the-fire, I couldn't believe the track listing from his greatest hits album, Best of David Soul:

Tracks
1.
Don't Give Up on Us
2.
Tattler
3.
Silver Lady
4.
I Wish I Was
5.
It Sure Brings Out the Love in Your Eyes
6.
Seem to Miss So Much (Coalminer's Song)
7.
Let's Have a Quiet Night In
8.
Going in With My Eyes Open
9.
One More Mountain to Climb
10.
Topanga
11.
1927 Kansas City
12.
Landlord
13.
Nobody But a Fool or a Preacher
14.
Bird on a Wire

I'm ready to pledge myself to you, baby, right here on your Naugahyde sofa wearing my belted fair-isle cardigan sweater but after I corner some bad guys in my striped Torino, hug my buddy, and give some skin to Huggy Bear.

Can't You See Me Standing Here, I Got My Back Against The Record Machine

I don't really understand how the whole NaBloPoMo (National Blog Posting Month) thing works yet, but I am not making the daily posts on their site, but rather here, on my own bleepin blog.

Anyway, I guess Diamond Dave had an understandably hard time finding something to rhyme with "jukebox." Because if the song went, "I got my back against the jukebox," he would've had to sing,

"My heart's all caught up in locks"

"I ain't wearing tube socks"

"I sprang outta Fort Knox"

"We're the world's biggest cocks"

"Meet Petey, my pet ox"

"You're a hot silver fox"

"Been working down on the docks"

"Just ate a bagel with lox"

Just doesn't have the same clean, plaintive tone, eh?

I'm Only Human, Born To Make Mistakes

Oops. I powered down the desktop last night and forgot to post.

I mean, it was only going to be a lazy one, a photo.

So, for a post that's supposed to have passed, here's a photo from the past, one that reminds on this day of impending bluster that'll probably strip trees of their last leaves--summer was not that long ago.

I'm Asking You Sugar, Would I Lie To You?

You Know Baby It's the Fondue Man

I receive a weekday email update called "DailyCandy." It's basically direct-marketing of female-upscale-urban-Trixie life specific to your city (there's LA, Boston, NY, DC, Atlanta, etc. editions as well), delivered into your Inbox or Blackberry in the wee early-morning hours, long after its punny, private-college-pedigreed and probably stiletto-ed writers have put their cyber-missive to bed. They are to lifestyle writers as Snoopy, atop his doghouse typing "It was a dark and stormy night," is to novelists.

Today I learned from DailyCandy that you can hire a guy--I mean, a dude--to come to your house and make fondue for you and a guest. So as to, you know, impress said guest. For only a Ben Franklin and a half, he delivers himself to your kitchen and prepares melted cheese in a pot and serves it with torn pieces of baguette and and tiny pickles you can get at Trader Joes for $3.99 a jar.

He's called The Fondude.

Here's just a nugget (or bite, as it were) of DailyCandy's typical "wit:"

The tete-a-tete makes for a magical evening. And she considers
ordering the fromage á trois for the next time around.

Cheesy but true.

At first I was thinking, Serial Killer, but then this is too chic and possibly gay to be.

Rather, it's another consumer-tunity for the Trixie/Wixie/Lixie (Logan Square Trixie--you know they're a-comin') to spend money on because her career and manis-pedis impinge on her cooking time...

Why not just cook your own fondue, since it's, um, melted cheese and bread? But cheap does not impress. Hiring a chef--that impresses.

As Kerri says:

Cheap? Not even. Especially after dropping $300 for hair cut and highlights, $30 Mystic tan, $75 mani/pedi, $85 microderm, $45 for polish lady to clean super cute apartment, $50 scented candles, $85 on La Perla bra & panties (found at Filenes...shhhh), $375 trapeze dress from super cute boutique on Armitage, borrowed Manolo's (two sizes to small but SCORE!), $4 plus tax for 2 bottles Charles Schwab (totally thought that Fondude came with fancy wine, but he doesnt, so had to speed walk to Trader Joes last minute for 2 buck Chuck and bring it home and pour it in a vase/carafe I bought at CB2), $20 on Plan B morning after pills, $45 firming/tightening/pulling/sparkling/scented body shimmer, $25 lip plumper (free
make over at the MAC counter).

But I do wonder: what would happen if you hired Fondude and dressed yourself up in your finest (or engaged in the preparation ritual Ker has described above), invited no guests and just...watched Fondude melt cheese in a Crate and Barrel pot? Just silently watched...?

Cheese encounters of a different rind.

DailyCandy should hire me.

Everybody Wants To Look The Other Way When Something Wicked This Way Comes

Alright. They have thrown down the gauntlet, and I'm picking it up, despite the fact my sinuses are on fire right now due to an old office building dust/forced-air heat/dry leaves/typical city pollution conflagration--oh, and that I have a thesis to write before May.

June. May. I mean--MARCH.

I loathe November. I love deadlines--well, not love, but deadlines make me make things happen (see above).

So, I'll bring it. I'll try to post to this blog every day. I mean, I have to have an opinion about something at least once a day, right?

And if not--hopefully posting photos is allowed.

I wish I'd taken a photo of this: I biked to work yesterday (and today--my intention until my body--or sinuses--cry "quit it!" as the temperature keeps dipping each morning), and just after I stopped at a red light at Wells/Division, another cyclist pulled up beside me. "Good morning!" he greeted me in a hollow voice. And it was hollow, because this dude was wearing a carved pumpkin. On his head. A real pumpkin. He confirmed he could indeed see through the gourd's nose holes. I rode behind him to Chicago Avenue, and man, he was poised for having no peripheral vision. The head bobbled a bit and he'd have to straighten it, but the looks on people's faces--especially those in that "I-don't-react-to-anything-strange" morning mode--were priceless.

And, for the first moment since I spied Halloween candy at Walgreen's in August, I was in the holiday spirit.