CuriousCity: January 2012

Saturday, January 14, 2012

It's my birthday

January 14 is my alternate birthday. Why? Here is a story ...

Here is my story

Thursday, January 5, 2012

Ugly is a word we use to think of ourselves frequently. We also use "fat", "old", "stupid", and "dumb". We hear those words when we wake up, when we arrange our hair, when we brush our teeth, our friends use it, even we use it about our self, its why we don't try to make a friend and it's what we are thinking about as we fall into sleep.

Semi-tragically, we can't all be ugly, fat, old, stupid and dumb. That is as impossible as all of being above average. Just doesn't work that way. ugly, fat, old, stupid and dumb are all relative ideas. It really has do with being "more ugly than him/her", there is no pure ugly.

Not much help? We have changed from plain ugly to "uglier than _______". Big deal!

No, it helps, really. Let's think about the scale from ugly to beautiful, or fat to skinny, or young to old, or stupid to smart. Who makes these scales? We can't go to the bureau of standards and find the beauty-ugly scale in a box. It's really just a judgement call, an opinion.

When it comes to opinions there just two: mine and somebody else's. If we spend our life reacting to somebody else's opinions we'll just go crazy. It's easy for someone to make judgements about you, it costs them nothing. We bear the consequences, not them. Generally, it's just a bad idea to give the opinions of others the power to control our choices.

Ask yourself, "Am I ugly?" Whats the answer? Remember there is no pure ugly so your answer has to be "no". So maybe its just that you're uglier than Angelina Jolie?

What about "I'm uglier than Angelina"? How do you know? Better hair? Straighter nose? Taller? Slimmer? Isn't that just wishing you are something which you are not? That's not beautiful or gracious. What is inherently uglier about a rounded nose versus a long straight one? Is tall and slim always more beautiful than short and fat? (look at Rubens' portraits of women. He thought they had great beauty and they are a bit fat by today's standards)

Was he wrong?

So its all relative, nobody knows and its all a fraud. You are beautiful, strong, smart and graceful; just act the way you want to be and be the way you act.

What do you think?

You're only pretty as you feel
Only pretty as you feel inside
You're only pretty as you feel
Just as pretty as you feel inside

When you wake up in the morning
Comb your hair
Rub some sleep from your eye
Look inside your mirror
Don't give vanity a second chance
No, no, no
Beauty's only skin deep
It goes just so far 'cause
You're only pretty as you feel
Just as pretty as you feel inside
You're only pretty as you feel inside

Now you're feelin' good
Now you're feelin' pretty
Now you're feelin' good
Now you're ready to face the world girl
Go out there 'n' knock 'em silly girl
Go out there 'n' show 'em how to thrill
'Cause you're only pretty as you feel
Only pretty as you feel

Beauty isn't merely pretty, or perfect, or attractive. It includes harmony, grace, dignity, confidence and the love that shines from inside you to light your world. We can't fix our nose (rhinoplasty hurts, a lot), grow six inches taller or even do much about our shape (you can lose weight and tone muscle but your genes determine where the fat comes off first and last, which may not agree with your plan, so if you're 38-38-42 you might get to 35-34-38, but not to 36- 30-36). You can however become more confident, dignified, and loving. Work on what you can improve.

Take some risks.

Find your skin.

Wednesday, January 4, 2012

Looking into the pit

I have stage fright. I didn't think I still did. I thought I had left it behind with the girls I never asked out, the journeys not taken and the paths never chosen. Nope.

Some of you know I've been taking weekly music lessons, the over-the-top gift from mdw, who undoubtedly was as frustrated with my directionless hours with guitar as I was. So now, I've got direction but at a cost. My teacher (above) tells me the next step is public performance. Really public. Not invite the family and close friends but a real public venue. Scary. Stand-up with a band and play scary.

I am a mixed up bag of talents: comfortable in harmony or music theory, no songs memorized, quick to learn progressions, still struggling with finger position: I can reach four frets at the low end of the neck (I need five) but with fingers too fat at the bridge end. Kind of like skating in gravel.

I'm not feeling ready but I want to do it. Really, I've had enough practice playing the fool, looking silly should be no challenge. My goal is to do it about a month from now. Maybe something bluesy.

Trouble in Mind

     D7 D7 D7 A7


               D7          A7
    Trouble in mind,  Lord I'm blue
             D7         G7
    But I won't be blue al-ways
        D7          B7          E7            A7               D7
    The sun is gonna shine in my door, shine in my back door someday

     D7 lick (G G# A7)

    I'm gonna lay, lay my head
    On that lonesome railroad line
    And let the 2:19 train ease my troubled mind

    Trouble in mind, well Lord I'm blue now
    I won't be blue al-ways
    The sun is gonna shine in my door, shine in my back door someday

instrumental break

    I'm going down, goin' down to the river
    I'm going to bring some wine that I can share
    And if these blues don't leave me,
    Lord, I'll have to ride away from here

    Trouble in mind, trouble in mind I'm blue now
    But I won't be blue always
    And that sun's gonna shine in my, lord, shine in my back door someday

    I'm all alone - I'm alone at midnight
    And the lamp is burning low
    I've never had so much trouble, in my whole life ever before

    Trouble in mind, Lord I'm blue now
    But I won't be blue always
    And that wind's gonna come - it's gonna blow my blues away...

   Chords:
          D7 G7 B7 E7 A7 G#7  D lick      (G)(G#)A7
      e |-5--3--7--7--5---4------------------------
      B |-7--3--7--9--5---4------------------------
      G |-5--4--8--7--6---5----7---7---7-----------
      D |-7--3--7--9--5---4---7-7-6-6-5-5-4--------
      A |-5--5--9--7--7---6------------------------
      E |----3--7-----5---4-----------------3-4-5--

[to be continued]

Monday, January 2, 2012

Folk-rock

It's pretty much a dead genre now. That's kind of inevitable since the songs are all traditional, non-copywrited, or public stuff. No producer wants to spend much recording or publishing them. It wasn't that way in the middle 60s. There was huge cadre of folk trained musicians that had a chance to go from starving folkie to wealthy rocker, based on performance pay. It's one of the hidden reasons that this was such a creative, productive period in American music: the performers got the cash.

In my musical journey this is where I started.

Let Me In http://youtu.be/9-WB-Ip_37c this version didn't make it past the censors, can you tell me why?

Let Me In Live performance, censors no longer cared, http://youtu.be/DiGq22ZnF0Y a year later

Questions, http://youtu.http://youtu.be/zDjmmCvTH7obe/zDjmmCvTH7o

Spanish Harlem http://youtu.be/szvM7xJ6ql4

Folk rock was a happy blend of socially conscious protest and a good back beat. Folk music could be awfully whiny and even distressing, but folk-rock at least had a good rhythm and often more interesting harmony than the back-country arrangements that folk used. Finally though its hybrid nature killed it: the folk purists hated its musical innovations and the rock purists hadn't listened to the word as a message anyway.

Sunday, January 1, 2012

Music - the seduction

I thought I was pretty much normal when I was in fifth and sixth grade. I listened to top forty music on the radio. That was 61/62 the music was Chubby Checker, Del Shannon, Everly Brothers,.

Runaway was a favorite,

as was Locomotion (Little Eva) - strong backbeat I-IV-V stuff. I learned the Twist.

Green Onions and

Telstar the next year. Typical.1963 was more of same for seventh grade.

Louie, Louie ,

Surf City

and Surfing USA I didn't think so but it was all music made by a formula. It's purpose was to make money. Content didn't matter as long as the censors didn't flip-out. Fun stuff but it's hard to be passionate about.

Eighth grade was a little better starting with

I Want to Hold Your Hand and

Twist and Shout , familiar songs but the performance was better. Then at the end of the year

it started with the Kinks, You Really Got Me This was a raw performance, harmonically interesting, if predictable in content. (love sick boy)

Next year much better.

The Beatles were good, but the Stones played real music. Here's a sample there was real depth that year . So far, I found out commercial rock wasn't rock and roll at all.

66-67 (14-16)

Started hearing something really different at at church dances (we had live music every other month in those days, mostly high school kids in a band). Got to know some of them. They were talking about other bands performing in the area but getting no radio time. I started buying vinyl.

Great Society