What I mean

Is do a movie that isn't about the music.
About humanity.

Do a movie about the trial
With a jazz soundtrack.
Or.
Something about his humorous side.

Compare his tantrums and his grand vision and desire to create a new world...

With Hitlers.

What is the human mind all about anyway?

A scene;
A candle lit house in Vienna,

Did you see Ludwig yesterday?
The way he was dressed?
Disgusting, Those rags look like they're about to rot off him.

So what are we going to do about it?

Why don't we just get some new clothes and take them out to him?

Later;

Hey kid, here's a pfennig for you if you take this stuff out to Beethoven's place.

Who's Beethoven?

He's that bum lives out on the Doodlestrasse.
Used to be a musician, nasty temper but mostly harmless.

Oh yeah, what kind of music?

I dunno, I never heard him play.

All this is accompanied by some....some...Satie gymnopedie?
Cage...for prepared piano.
What the hell, both at once.

I dunno, I've got to go count my money and get ready to meet with sister and hermano in ley for the salon tonight.

I just gotta stop trying to be profound.

Number nine...Number nine....Number nine

Here's what I think about Beethoven movies.
It seems that every bloody one of them has as it's dramatic pivot the first performance of the ninth symphony.
The music so overwhelms the movie that you'd be better off listening to the CD (or, in my case the Szell/Chicago vinyl version...whoops, I mean Cleveland).

"Immortal Beloved" was an interesting riff and certainly had some psychological merit.
The music didn't ruin it of course.
The music never ruins it just overwhelms.
Makes the movie irrelevant.
But it's public domain, innit?
Cheap bastards!

This last one about the girl conducting Beethoven conducting the orchestra is ludicrous.
But the music was very moving.
I guess what is knurling my driveshaft here is the cheating on the part of the movie maker.
Do a Beethoven movie with it's own music. Music that is part of the story instead of just being a cheap way to lure people like me into watching it just because it's Louie.
Try a real challenge.
Do a Beethoven SILENT movie.
Make a movie that deaf people can appreciate.
Where all the dialog is on pages from his tagbuch.

Screw it, these things seem much more important in the middle of the night.

Maybe getting tossed out of Benaroya for asking a flute player if she'd
listen to my flute concerto is God's way of protecting me from B-nine overload

What would be wrong with the European Union getting an anthem that spoke to the 200 years since that overblown song about worms screwing?

Hah?

Well?

Artistically speaking, it's not even that well written. It wanders around for half an hour then suddenly you get the big thrill, which it is, of course, for the first several iterations, but it keeps plugging on until long after you should have rolled over and lit the cigarette.

It is about sex, you do realize that, don't you?
It's a big stupid grin on the face of a score.

Any all this has been said before.
By people who know what they are talking about.
Literate people
People with educations

Danger Cat

Last night the cat, the one with the smashed head, climbed onto my lap.
Petting the thing gave me a hand wet with pus from a suppurating wound in his side. Looked like a vampire had been at him. I think a coyote or some other form of dog is more likely.
So any way this morning consisted of a trip to the vet. The cat's in the hospital for the night.
Are pets worth it?
What does it take for him to get the message?
The message being; "Don't fight with anybody bigger than yourself. Don't fight with anything that has wheels."
Comments about Alex Shapiro's wonderful CD "Notes from the kelp" will follow later, as will comments on movies about Beethoven.
If I can remember what I have to say about all that.
For now...I need a nap.

Fire

Bike ride was nice clear and sunny.
12.6 mi., 1:14:29 time, 10.4 avg., 36.2 max. speed.

Lenny Bruce commenting on "news" that's not new.
"There's a fire in Laurel Canyon"

In case you missed this in the comments section. Here's
a look at some California oxidation in the news.
Butch said...

When I was an airdale at NAS Miramar in 1967, there were terrible fires all over Southern California. I was touched by their tragedy and inevitability. So I wrote a poem. Reviewing it, it could be every bit as relevant today as then. You judge:

S O D O M

There is a fire in the mountains.
The desert is covered with a black fog.
A roaring crackling snarling thing
that devours its way through the lushness of green-brown,
burning and burning,
choking the air with cinders and sparks.
Sagebrush afire,
vermin fleeing,
whole towns gutted,
rag-dolls and mansions,
horses and fallow hay,
all burned,
blister and char.
People standing and praying,
horns blasting.
Firefighters with watery weary eyes

and hard soot-smeared faces,
and big shovels,
hearing the screams in the moment,
and for an eternity of moments.
A whole countryside burning
under clear skies with blood on the sun;
and the creatures struggling in the hellish haze,
watching toil turn to ash,
raise their collective eyes to the dark clouds above;
fire clouds,
and beyond,
and they see nothing;
no rain,
no golden thrones.

Glenn Buttkus 1967

Do visit Alex Shapiro for some heartbreaking photographs.
Have some sympathy for us landlords.
It's Christmas time.
Thank you
And God bless one and all, or whatever it was that tiny Tim said.

Joy to the world

Maybe it's just the rebound from the virus, (either I've won that battle or the sneaky little bugger is pulling a strategic withdrawal) but I feel terrific today.
Ready to believe that peace, love, and understanding are possibilities, after all.
So, whatever you may want to name this portion of the year, Christmas, Kwanzaa, Harvest festival, I want to wish you all the happiness you can stand. Even more than you feel you deserve, if it comes to that.
Even you, Meighan Pritchard, it's Christmas time, time for me to practice an all-inclusive love for mankind.
Even us dirty old men are capable of that.
You have made it impossible to forget you, so I won't.
So there.
Wherever you are, I'm sending you and yours wishes that whatever you desire in life will be given to you.
Or that you will discover that it is already in you.
Which is the actuality.
That's just the way God made it, so you're going to have to learn to live with it.

Basta! I am back to health and am going to ride today, just a short jaunt, Seward Park and back. Or, who knows, last time I tried that, I ended up riding around the whole lake. Damn near killed myself, didn't I?

So I will now stop talking and start rocking.

'Bye

Thanks update

It turns out that supplies were not limited, after all.
I still have a warehouse full.
Any time you think you deserve some, you can have some of mine.
Or, If you don't feel you deserve it, take some anyway.
Everyone deserves some thanks for all the many little things they do each and every day.
If you still don't feel right about it, just try some on anyway.
I'm sure you'll find that you like it and deserve it.
You accomplish a lot by just being there.

Violin update

The violin duet scheduled for this Friday is off.
Due to a email mixup I am not on the roster.
Come anyway.
The music is always interesting.

The piece is recorded, however, so I should be able to post it soon.

I have more things I want to say, but not today. I'm not in the mood today for any futile attempts at seriousness.

I did install the cold idle control valve on the Volvo. It will not die a dozen times between here and Renton any more.

Bye'

Thanks

Take two, They're free!
I'm giving them away today!
Special occasion!
One day only!
Supplies are limited.
Act now!
Don't miss out!
Hurry!
When they're gone, They're gone!

More links

Robert Demar's site has the most beautiful photos of San Juan Island and environs.
You already know about Robin @ "Beadlust". Here's her website.
I've posted the new and improved string quartets.
Why the one is called "Shotglass" I may never know, but there you are.
Art, go figure.

So, what do we no today, lazy and gentleman?

I have finished several little piano trio pieces along with the quartets.

There follows, like a pulse of pressure reaching the end of an oboe (or the tuned exhaust of a racing motorcycle) a bit of a creative vacuum.

The big deal is the upcoming salon at The Chapel at The Good Shepard Center (45th and Sunnyside Seattle WA. Nov. 30 8:00)where you will be able to hear the violin duet live.
Hopefully, my recorder will work properly and I will be able to post the performance.

I am beside myself with anticipation.
Which makes it a little difficult getting through doorways

I'm a bit reluctant to start composing something new.
I've been composing a series of concertos, starting with the flute and moving on down the score.
You know that I've reached the Tuba.
I'm skipping percussion for now. Who am I to be writing a piano concerto?
Eh?
The next on the list is a violin concerto.
Am I nuts?
I think I may just take a hike, as I am often advised to do.
Wander about in a dream like state, searching for "inspiration".
Actually, inspiration is easy, it's the editing that drives one bonkers.
And enharmonic spelling.

I see my cat practicing lying about the house.
It's a dream of his to be a real estate agent.

I might try that myself.
Not the real estate part.
Just lie about wasting precious time.

Tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow and maybe even next Thursday.
We will be at my sister's for thanksgiving.
It will probably be just the four of us, although Gary might show up.

Don't forget Soho, I think he's on to something.

Monday, fer shure.

Another week gets off to a rousing start.
We hit the decks running.
At least our noses do.
Meredith has taken my virus, apparently to show me how to do it properly.
I, myself have decided, whatever symptoms I may have left, to declare myself
"over it"
This, whatever it may feel like, is the new "well".
I will rejoice at my new and amusing sense of balance.
Complaining has not seemed to work.
I will think of it as psychedelia that I missed in the 60's due to having a job.

My two string quartets, still labeled "Mask" and "Shotglass" are magnificent in their final form. I will post them soon and the world can forget Beethoven, et al.

Today, I will nobly rise, I will ascend to the heights, I will repair the holes in the kitchen ceiling that occurred due to the installation of the new lighting.

Standing on a short ladder and working over my head ought to be a truly "enlightening" experience.

Oh, no, he's going to try to be funny

Well, I'm disappointed, playing "Free rice" today I failed to get to the "50" level, barely stayed above "46". A jellied mind is of no use to the hungry.

Having stayed in bed for three days, I was unable to sleep last night.
Lay there dreaming up incredibly hilarious things to post. You would have till tears laughed.
But Guess what?

I know you've heard it before, but here's the lone Ranger and Tonto joke.
I've already posted the punch line. They say "find your strength and go with it.
My strength is apparently incompetence.

So anyway, The Lone Ranger and Tonto were ridin' down the line, Fixin' every......
Wait a minute, that's a Dylan song.

Different kind of humor.

The Lone Ranger and Tonto were riding across the plains when suddenly from the south a band of fierce Sioux appeared on the horizon.
"Looks like we better head north" says the L.R.
So they turn north. Unfortunately the horizon to the north is thoroughly clogged with blood hungry Lakotas.
"Looks like we'd better turn east" quoth the masked muffin.
Unfortunately from the east rode a huge jam of Pontiacs (you could tell they were Pontiacs by the hood ornaments that lit up at night).*
"Whoops" says Silver's oppressor, "I guess it's westward ho Tonto, 'ol pal.
But no...to the west appeared the terror inducing figure of none other than Sherman Alexie, armed with naught but a 45cal Underwood.
"Well, Tonto it looks as if we are surrounded on all sides by insurmountable odds.
What can we do now?
Tonto says (all together now) "Whattya mean WE, paleface".

I'd apologize, but I not feeling quite up to it yet.

I like that joke because it gives Tonto a little dignity.
I mean his job was to go into town and get the crap beaten out of him.

Did the poor guy even get minimum wage. I think not.

Try it out
"Gimme a Big Mac, fries and a large sasparilla"
"That'll be a buck and a half, podner."
"Will you take this silver bullet?

That's when he'd get the special sauce beat out of him.

Also the joke gives a little hope to all us long suffering geniuses surrounded by implacable ignorance and stupidity.

Which Is all of us, right?

A little fantasy of striking back. Even though we know it's futile.

Anyway, last night we listened to 3 hours of Paul Anka's "variations on a theme of Beethoven" which was basically the first bar of the fifth symphony over and over and over. Fortunately they played "The Longest Day" along with it which is a pretty good movie and a lot funnier than Ken Burns' version.

Or the real thing, I imagine

This is a test, I'm trying to see how much of this you'll put up with before you sell me to Homeland Security.

Oh...Oh! D Day or the like is the only time I can imagine being glad to hear bagpipe "music" unless you were German in which case you would have the usual reaction.

I know you're out there I can hear you breathing.

Take my wife....to lunch.

Think I will.

*Not only that, some were GTOs

Thursday, if I have to.

Sick again or still brain jelly cant stand up straight going back to bed stay there forever sso sent mrs means a calendar going to shove it in their face no bike rides no spill chick phooey

Monday, i suppose

Rain.
No bike ride.
What then?
Millions of things.
More than dreamed of in what's his name's philosophy.
I'm sure we should all be happy as kings.
Read up on any kings, lately?
Are they happy?
Some, i suppose.
Read.
Write.
Go back to sleep.
Yawn.

Sunday

Last night we watched "Goodbye Lenin". Good movie.
Today, we go to hear Philharmonia Northwest.
After that, it's a few minutes with my book group, then to The Chapel at Good Shepard
to hear Octava and talk to Matt Weiss about playing my violin duet.
Then, If it don't rain on Monday I will ride Fidelio to Marymoore park and back.
Starting from Log Boom park, of course, I'm not ready for another trip around the lake yet.
If it do rain, things will get wet.
I'm about out of books by Tony Hillerman and Jonathan Gash, so I think I'll tackle some Norman Mailer. That should be safe now, I don't think he'll try to stab me or anything, but you can never be too careful with people being like they are.
I don't know if he was a "Christian" so maybe I needn't have worried.
Anyway R.I.P Norman.
A national treasure.

Actually, Mailer reminds me a lot of the poet Buttkus.

It's about time I read something of a more than entertainment nature.
I don't know why, just for the self abuse, I guess.
Like the bike trips.
None of it is making me a better human being or stronger or more socially acceptable.

Or any more imaginative.

In fact

I seem to me less and less of what I was supposed to become for having had a "free education" as time passes and I rattle along the the creaking rusty conveyor belt toward the edge of it all.
Truly, I'd just as soon get off and walk, but that never seems to work.

What was I supposed to do with all that "education" anyway?
Seemed to me that all it was was training to be a football hero or something just as unlikely.

The main thing I remember is that if you didn't go, the cops had the right to turn you into a drug addict and shoot you.

Some scumbag school admin. turkey back east somewhere punished a couple of kids recently for a hug.
A local football team, ready to go to finals, was stripped of all it's years triumphs because one of them didn't have his physical exam up to date.
It's garbage like these snotty little commie power sickos who cause school shootups,
not the poor children they so cheerfully abuse.

I don't know why, but The SSO just popped into mind.

The plot thickens as the thought sickens

Whilst more or less staying in bed for a few days, because of this cold or whatever it is, I've been reading more of Jonathan Gash's "Lovejoy" mysteries. Lovejoy is an antique dealer and a lovable rogue, consequently, there is a lot of underworld jargon, which is where I found the word "dropsy". Now I've found "crackers", it seems to mean clever, beautiful, top notch, or smart.
So...the sentence becomes "It's wise to bribe the cops before you pull your scam"

Over to you...

I've got a tentative date for a bike ride on Monday. 30 miler. Log Boom Park to Marymore Park
The two music links "Mask" and "Shotglass" have been so worked over that you will hardly recognize them. I'll post them soon.

Rosetta

You may recall in an earlier post that I'm still, after some 52 years, trying to decipher an odd sentence I read in Mad magazine.
The sentence being: "I'ts crackers to slip a rozzer the dropsy in snide".
The words that need translation are: crackers, rozzer, dropsy, and snide
I have already found "rozzer" on the telly in a channel nine British police drama.
It means "copper" (not the metal) or "pig" or "the heat" or "les flics" slang for policeman.
Anyway we've been there.
Last night toward the end of a Jonathan Gash "Lovejoy" book I found the word
"dropsy" it refers to the practice of sneaking fake antiques into an assemblage of genuine ones for nefarious purposes. Or a real into the fakes. I forget which or the practical reasons therefore.
Now, "crackers" implies some sort of moral judgment, either it means "a good idea"
or it means an "insane" idea.
"Cracking good toast, Gromit"
"Cracking up"

"slip" and "snide" go together, as in "put something into something else sneakily"
A "snide" remark, slid sideways into a conversation.

So, as best as I can figure, the sentence means "to give a policeman something on the sly is a good (or bad) idea".
Or perhaps just a necessary act that is somewhat risky.

"Dropsy" could refer to evidence, I suppose.
Or even a disease.

Anyway, I watched channel nine's Doo-Wop program last night. Even though the stuff is nothing more than simply constructed 3 minute croons romanticizing teenage hormonal maturation agony, it is still quite moving, little miniature operae.
Watching wrinkly oldsters, (even older than me, some of 'em) singing stuff like "ramalamalama" "diddywop, diddywop" and cetera, is fantastic mainly because it works so well in spite of being absurd.
Besides I couldn't do it in nine thousand two hundred and forty three years.
My own absurdity has little entertainment value

As far as I can tell the only thing that humans can really do that the saner animals can't is sing.
Don't even try to tell me about whales or dolphins.
If you consider that "singing", you and I are in disagreement, and you are wrong.
Interesting and no doubt useful to the animals in question, but I doubt that there's a hit record in the offing.

I took the Volvo to the emission testing place (runs fine again, btw) but was too late. (closes at 1:00) I'll do that Monday.
For some reason they are sending new license plates again.
What's that all about?
Nothing wrong with the old ones.
For 25 bucks you can keep the old ones.
Makes no sense.

My kinda people.

CRS

In the last few days I have thought up (been assaulted by) many wonderful little thoughts to put on this site. I seem to have forgotten them all.
So instead of the usual entertainment, I've added some new links.
They are at the bottom of the list.
I have stuffed myself with nuts and berries and will now sleep 'til spring.
You ever feel like that?
About this time of year?

Word up

Found on Soho.

Free Rice

http://freerice.com/index.php
If you go there you can guess at the meanings of words and whoever is sponsoring this site will donate rice to starving people somewhere, a truly ghoulish arrangement for the Halloween season. If they've got rice to give away, why don't they just give it away?
Instead of playing games
Statistics say something between 10,000 and 30,000 children die of starvation every day around the world, and we oleaginous (means fat assed) types want to be cute about it?
Why rice?
Why not cake?
Yesterday, while on my weekly metropolitan peregrinations it intruded upon my consciousness that more than usual of the denizens of that civic habitat were contorting their faces into the configuration known to the common parlance as a "smile".
I, of course, resisted this particular and somewhat infra-dig manifestation of public display of emotion but nevertheless did wonder the motivation for such outward fascio-muscular manifestations of internal psychological disturbance.
It did occur to me , however, that as many of these libertines were wearing clothing that transcended the usual and proper modes of accoutrement, that is to say, they were "in costume" that it was possible they felt somewhat uncomfortable dressed in this unseemly and attention attracting garb and that self-consciousness might have been causation.
I, myself, fell victim to this all too human weakness due to the density of the heels of my new shoes which made a clicking sound with every step.
I did not, however allow myself to go so far as to contort my visage into that unseemly grimace.