In the “Better late than never” category, I present: Songs in the key of (my) life.
It’s a simple NAME THAT TUNE meme with a Mimi twist.
The Rules : Once you have been tagged (or commanded by the Queen) you are supposed to write down the top 25 SEVEN songs you cannot live without. The ones you can listen to over and over and never get tired of. They don’t have to be in any particular order. These are the songs that make you laugh, cry, think of an old friend, whatever the reason. I know it’s impossible for many of us to narrow it down to seven. There are just too many songs. Instead, make a list of seven songs that move you personally and tell us why. What memory does the song evoke? What emotion? Where were you when you first heard it? We’d like to know what’s in your musical memory bank. Name seven songs and tell us about your emotional connection to the song.
Fair enough?
Let’s get started!
1. Heart of Gold / Neil Young
My dad used to call me his “heart of gold” and whenever this song came on, he’d always say “that’s my girl”. The last Christmas he was alive (1974), he gave me a lovely gold heart with the inscription “my heart of gold” on the back. I still have it and love it and every single time I hear that song, I think of him and smile.
2. Babylon / David Grey
This song speaks to me big time with these lyrics: “Let go of your heart, let go of your head and feeel it now ….” –> that’s me in a nutshell kiddies. Love this song with a passion. Will never, ever not love it.
3. Sweet thing – Chaka Khan and Rufus
Happened to hear this song today and realized how much I love it. It’s got soul, it’s got longing, it’s got the sexay … “ohhh sweet thang, oh you know you’re my everything ….” The version I saw today was Prince and Chaka singing (well, he accompanied her mostly on guitar but also on voice a bit) and it was such a fabulous performance. (This song is my sensual side that stays on the downlow. If I could put voice to it, this would be it. Keep that a secret, k?)
4. Float On – Modest Mouse
Lauren’s theme song for the last months of her life. She had an amazing spirit and this quirky little song helped her keep moving forward when it was difficult. Always this one for my sweetie.
5. Time after Time – Cyndi Lauper
This one reminds me of my mom – back in the MTV heyday, I would force my poor mother to watch hours and hours of videos with me (don’t ask why – I have no idea other than I was a goof even then.) The woman who played Cyndi Lauper’s mother in the video looked like my mom a bit so I sort of associated the two somehow. This sort of became my song with my mom - “if you fall I will catch you, I’ll be waiting … time after time.” That was how it was with my mom. She caught me when I stumbled. That’s what moms do. (Love this song – played it for her at my wedding.)
6. “Wish you were here” – Incubus
Love this song for several reasons – one of them being the imagery of this line: “the ocean looks like a thousand diamonds strewn across a blue blanket” - I just love that. Also too – it has major sentimental meaning to me.
7. Knocks me off my feet – Stevie Wonder (speaking of Songs in the key of life)
My nearly perfect high school boyfriend played piano beautifully and learned this song just so he could impress me with it. More than that, though, at his senior prom, I recall us dancing to it and he sang the chorus to me: “Oh but I love you, I love you, I love you … more and more” – Can you imagine a 17 year old singing that truly from his heart? It was a sweet, sweet moment – one I remember 33 years later.
Oh hello there …
I should probably start keeping track of this recurring feeling because I seem to think that I experienced this exact same thing not so long ago. It’s not my meds, it’s not what’s going on in my life (or even what isn’t), it’s not work. I just don’t know what the deal is. Oh well. This, (also) too, shall pass. Perhaps once the pool at the gym is repaired, life will go back to normal. One thing my coach pointed out to me was that since water = emotion, being in the pool (for me, emo gal of the world) is where I feel most safe and comfortable. Take that away and my spazzy two year old (let’s call her Fifi) throws a fit. And Fifi has been making her presence known of late. (I think she’s the one getting all pissy at work. I will blame her entirely.)
Am still getting used to the fancy new laptop. One stray thumb out of place on the mouse pad and that cursor just goes all over the place. Plus, the screen (if not my future) is so bright, I should wear shades. Gotta love these stupid first world problems.
Decided to bail on “Breaking Bad” – I’m sure it’s a good show but I don’t need anything to drag me down right now. Maybe I’ll revisit it in the future. Oh holy cow! I just saw “Thirtysomething” available on Netflix – and I don’t even have to wait for it – it’s one of those streamable ones! YEY! I used to love that show. On Tuesday nights, with “Moonlighting” at nine and “Thirtysomething” at ten. I used to watch it on my little black and white television. (Feels really old just watching it. Before computers, cell phones …. wow.)
Now that I’ve bored you to death, I’ll stop here.
see more Lol Celebs
see more Lolcats and funny pictures
It’s Sunday night and I’m doing a weekend head dump here. Try to slog through as best you can, mmkay?
1. Max is still doing the “Mommy, I want something.” action to me and it is frustrating. I’ve tried to connect with him telepathically and I’m not getting anything upfront. I guess I need to call in my Seminary buddy, Dana, who is a magnificent animal communicator. He just feels all needy to me. Sophia is the only one of my animals who isn’t like that and I’m pretty sure it has to do with my not having raised her.
2. Interesting coincidence(?) on Facebook – I have been following a cool weather site made up of meteorology students who have been doing a kick ass job of forecasting the MD weather this winter and follow their FB feed. They recently posted about rain coming and there were about 80 comments under that post. The first one on the list was the name of a guy I adored in college. We worked together at a local department store and also attended Towson State at the same time. I messaged him and sure enough, it was he. Married now (for 25 years!) to the woman I tried desperately to steal him from with one daughter they adopted from China. It’s just really neat to re-connect with him again after so long. He was smart, funny and I just genuinely liked him.
3. That led me to think of a mutual friend we had who I haven’t talked to in forever and sure enough, she was on FB also! I got to chat with her a bit and find out she’s had a rough couple years with breast cancer. She and I were very tight back in the early 80s – she also worked at that same department store – and shared a lot of life challenges. I’m glad to see her again.
4. Hockey on a hi-def 46″ television set is amazing!! It is much easier to see, for one thing, plus I get to watch as the players blow snot out of their nose while on the bench. This, my friends, is what HD was made for! heh
5. I rented the show “Breaking Bad” from Netflix and watched part of the first episode but it left me feeling very sad. I couldn’t finish it. Maybe my meds need to be upped in order to watch it but I’m not sure I want to even finish that ep. I felt sad and hopeless after just 30 minutes of it. (Energetic shields UP!)
6. I briefly thought about giving up complaining for Lent but realized I’d have to tape my mouth shut and this blog would go silent for 40 days. (Also too – not a big Lent follower but I did give some thought to it this year.)
7. As much as I seem to you all like some crazed stalker Cookie fan, believe me when I tell you that my engagement in that world is about a 2 on a scale of 10. I’m glad there are hardcore fans because through them I get lots of goodies: videos, articles and more.
Okay, that’s all the ponders for now.
Saturday 9: Don’t Stand So Close to Me
1. Who would you like not to stand so close to you?
I’m pretty sure I don’t want to be in the vicinity of “Dick” Cheney. He has really, really (and I mean REALLY) bad energy and I just couldn’t stand being in that for very long.
2. Which of the following aspects of your life would you think rates the highest: mind, body or spirit?
Of those three, I’d have to say Spirit but intertwined very closely with mind and finishing a sad, sad third is body. I’m working hard, though, on bringing it more into balance.
3. What is your favorite movie line?
It’s from “Bridget Jones’s Diary” – Bridget says to Mark Darcy “Nice guys don’t kiss like that.” and he responds “Oh yes they fucking do.” – he’s so proper and dignified that hearing him say “fucking” like that makes me giggle. That movie is my all time favorite. No highbrow fancy pants foreign films for me. Just give me Bridget, that wanker Daniel Cleaver and my love Mark Darcy and I’m happy for a couple hours.
4. What is your favorite movie title?
It’s not my favorite but this bit of conversation between me and my Godmommy from my childhood always stuck in my head.
ME: There’s a movie called “The night of the following day” – why don’t they just call it “Tomorrow Night”?
GODMOM: Would you want to see a movie called “Tomorrow Night”?
So, that’s my favorite movie title: Tomorrow Night. heh
5. What is something that has happened to you that you would consider a miracle?
Hmm, that’s a good question. I could go all woo-woo on you but I won’t. I’ll stick with the mundane. After years and years of both feeling like a fat girl and being a fat girl, fitting into size 10 jeans was truly a miracle to me. In fact, it would feel like one now if I did that again. I have a magnet on my fridge that says “Miracles happen. Save the skinny jeans.” (They’re buried deep in a drawer but I still have them.)
6. What do you try to stay away from?
Places (even online) with very low vibration – fighting, mean-spirited comments, cruelty. In fact, I cannot even look at any stories of hurt and/or mistreated animals. It almost kills me.
7. What is it too late for?
Baby having. (Well, it was too late for that about 7 years ago when I found out that part of my body just decided to give up the ghost.) I felt really sad for quite a while, a good part of that sadness was that I felt I let my mom down. She said that was not the case but I still carried that around for a couple years.
8. Give someone credit for something and name it if you can.
I’m gonna call out the Sister-in-law of Love here … when Duty and I were engaged, she was not very happy about it for a couple reasons. In fact, she and her husband didn’t come to the ceremony. (They did, however, make us a wonderfully yummy wedding cake. MMM!) Whatever the issues were, she has put them aside and has become a wonderful friend and for that I am thankful. So, a big ass shout out to my sister-in-law of Love, Becky. I loves ya!
9. Would you rather be famous now & forgotten after you die or forgotten now & famous after you die, forever? And why?
Oh hell! I want to be famous NOW!! NOW I say! When I’m dead, you can move on but while I am here on this earth plane, I want to be adored and worshipped. (Oh no. Did I say worshipped out loud? Hee! busted!)
see more Lolcats and funny pictures
Chello again!
I am still not typing this from my new laptop but hope to be doing that soon. My little Dell Inspiron looks like a netbook compared to that big ass thing but it will be lovely to watch movies on it. I am just having a very small issue with the mouse. As in it’s off kilter a bit and I keep poking it with my thumb and it does something wonky to the screen. I better practice a bit. Also too, I fully admit that my cats sort of climb over the keyboard as I’m typing and I don’t want my new toy full of cat hair so soon.
Work has been deadly quiet lately which isn’t overly bad but when I’m bored at work, I tend to snack. I’m trying to find something to do (hence the long blog post from yesterday) but I can only look busy for so long then I want to get up and start wandering about. Hopefully, tomorrow I’ll find something fun and constructive to do.
In other just-as-boring news, my dog is driving me insane. We are pretty sure that his hearing is not all there (he’s 14 so it’s sort of expected) but that’s not what’s bugging me. It’s his new thing of coming into the room (wherever I am) and staring at me or lifting a paw and dragging it over the chair where I’m sitting. In the past, I’ve taken that as his signal that he’d like to go out for some business time. But when he does this, like, five times in a row and he’s already been out, I have no idea what he’s trying to convey. And it annoys me. He doesn’t do this to Duty. Just me. Oh joy! Oh rapture! I already feel like the pied piper with two cats and a dog following me everywhere (even to the bathroom) but now I have to decode Max’s morse code? What am I? A psychic? heh
I’d like to say that I haven’t posted since Monday because I’ve been soooo busy. I’d like to say that but it’s not true. What *is* true is that I got a new laptop and had my hair done last night and HAD to spend two freaking hours watching American Idol just because. By then, I was plumb out of creativity. So this morning I had a thought! (amazing, innit?) During my copious free time in front of a screen at work, I would write my blog post, save it to Google Docs and then upload it tonight. So, here it is.
Behold: Wednesday Whatevers
American Idol
Despite my better instincts, I’ve once again been pulled into watching this hideous show. I’m in need of some “community” and nothing creates that better than hanging on the edge of insanity that is being an AI fan. Trust me. Been there, done that, apparently doing it again. I was reading a recap over on Television without Pity and this snippet by recapper Jacob (who had a serious love/hate thing with sekrit boyfriend back in the day and was the reason I got banned like four hundred times over there) just cracked me up:
“One time the sun rose. Another time, the judges deliberated. Then it was nighttime. The lights were off in the Kodak but the judges kept deliberating. They held pictures of people we don’t know or care about in their hands, while children held hands in rooms and hotties and freaks alike sat around and acted weird. There were people in Room One. Like Kara said something was “genius” one time, and Randy said some shit, and somebody else didn’t impress Simon.”
That’s pretty much what it was like for two hours. What was I thinking? No wonder I always skip Hollywood week. I popped into the forums over on TWOP and quickly remembered why I never much ventured out of the DC forum. Those people are MEAN! Seriously. Mean. That vibration is just a bit too low for me to wade in. Blargh. I’ll wait until I have a favorite and then see what transpires from there.
Roger Ebert
Have you guys had the opportunity to read the article on him in Esquire magazine? I’ve never been a big fan (I’m not at all a moviephile) but knew who he was, of course. And I only vaguely remembered that he had some serious cancer issues but wasn’t at all aware that he’s had most of his jaw removed as a result. He is on my Twitter feed and I have to say that I find him to be one of the best ones out there. He’s on enough to be present but never too much so that you’re like “shut up already”. (As an aside, remind me to tell you about Prince tweeting. It is hiliarious.) The article in Esquire was really eye-opening and reminds me how some people find the joy in living even when some of the most basic things (in his case speaking, eating and drinking) are no longer possible.
He blogs over on the suntimes website – check it out. He writes about all kinds of stuff.
This, from the interview, is quite perfectly lovely:
“I believe that if, at the end of it all, according to our abilities, we have done something to make others a little happier, and something to make ourselves a little happier, that is about the best we can do. To make others less happy is a crime. To make ourselves unhappy is where all crime starts. We must try to contribute joy to the world. That is true no matter what our problems, our health, our circumstances. We must try. I didn’t always know this, and am happy I lived long enough to find it out.”
Go read the Esquire article – it’s not overly long and gave me a great sense of appreciation of his life, his work and beyond that, gratitude for what I take for granted each day.
Prince on Twitter
Listen, I was digging on Prince before anyone knew who he was – wayyy before Purple Rain. So I feel I have a right to tee-hee about him tweeting. First off, he typed in all caps. And what he was saying sounded oddly stilted. Like the new kid in school came over to your circle of friends and just started shouting really loudly about nothing at all. I figured it had to be the real Prince because I suspect that his social interactions with others are just as stilted and awkward as those tweets. (It’s kind of cute, actually. Like watching your child learn something new.) While he’s not quite up to Roger Ebert twitter standards, I predict that it will be a good medium for him. After all, he was speaking like that a long time ago. (“I would die 4U” anyone?)
And finally, now that I am home again, here is craptastic news: the pool at the gym (you know, my happy place??) is busted. Good thing my friend Christine strong-armed me into getting on the treadmill. I was so distraught, I almost cried right there. (Not really but I could have!) It won’t be fixed for at least another week. However will I lure myself to the gym now? (sigh)
How do I know this? Because I AM CLEANING. Yes, friends. It has come to this. This weather has driven me to the brink of insanity and I’ve read, blogged, surfed, shopped and watched some bad movies. There is nothing left to do but clean. I can’t even believe I am saying that.
Family members are now coming out of a state of shock, I know it. I have a (deserved) reputation for abhoring all manner of cleaning and only do it when I am expecting people to come over (and then I do it half-ass). I’d like to blame it on my mother and her crap example of being domestic and I’d do so with some impunity since she’d not around to argue with me but I just can’t. She worked her ass off taking care of me and my invalid (blind and then double amputee) dad all while working a full time job. So, she gets a monster pass and I have to own this one myself.
I am at home in clutter (although I am becoming less tolerant of it as I grow older) and don’t feel compelled to have a sparkling house all the time. Never has been a priority. Which is sad, I suppose. In my fantasy life (the one where I share in carnal pleasures with Cookie and Sparkela*) I love cleaning, am thin, tall, intelligent and full of joy all the time. (And insane but quietly so.)
Nope, I’ll never be someone who enjoys cleaning. I’d rather work overtime and pay someone to come do this for me. I suspect it has something to do with my challenge of living in this dense third dimension. Perhaps if I did it more, I’d become more grounded. Good hypothesis – wonder if our scientists will carry out some research.
Okay, back to cleaning the kitchen. I’m rocking the tunes (which helps immensely) so it’s not too bad. Currently playing on the iPod of love and cleaning: “Working day and night” – MJ. Great song. Always gets me moving.
Happy Monday!
(*tm by The Gal Herself)
