postcard from the bay

today - according to myspace - i am 100 years old ;^>
feels great! i have fantastic friends, the most incredible daughter and son-in-law in the universe, cherished family and, yes, my sweetheart.
well....even though he's in sturgeon bay, wisconsin - a far cry from southern california... his internet radio show, state controlled radio, at 5pm west coast time, today is an ode to ls.d (that's me), on www.bzoo.org. please join my natal day celebration & listen won't you?

mjk, i love you, ls.d

take it back...

okay...i didn't mean it. i'm recovered from my lengthy journey on friday and, of course, if i am lucky enough to GET a ticket, and i am not off in the wild jungles of mars or somewhere...i will return to LA...especially for the who...even more so for rachel fuller, if she plays the west. but i'm going by train!!!!!!!!!

happy birthday dear jaime...

why do i have to go to LA...

thursday night, at the troubadour, on the verge of hollywood, i saw todd snider perform. again. todd is an event. he has just released his brand new album 'the devil you know' and shared some of that album's content, as well as older songs the crowd all wanted to hear. can't fault the guy. he's pretty perfect. here's the problem. he hasn't played where i live in a very, very long time, at least not to my knowledge, in the time i have been aware of him and his music. i have such a strong love/hate relationship with LA. there is clearly an energy about the place that feels creative, fun, artistic, glitzy, trashy, plastic, boring - all coexisting with each other. depending on one's mood and emotional settings, the best of LA can shine and bring on the good times like no other city i know....or not....that's not the point here. in august the plimsouls are playing. in october roger waters is playing. in november the who are playing. there are others....the point is getting to and from, in and out of LA is an ordeal. it used to be exhausting. now it is almost unacceptable. there are a lot of thoughts that crop up while one is on the way to and from the city of angels. the first thought that cropped up for me, sitting in bumper to bumper world, was our continued refusal to accept that our main means of transporting ourselves -the car - is irrevocably damaging the planet. how are we going to heed the warnings and get on with better means of transportation. why do we ignore perfectly acceptable mass transit vehicles - wouldn't a train ride be fun?!? the second thought that materialized was the idea that we are all in these separate vehicles, determined to get where we are going and equally determined to ignore the indivduals in the cars surrounding us.


as we were driving home from the todd snider show - four of us carpooled up and back - there were a couple of girls - perhaps aged 12 to 14ish - in a car in front of us, waving to all the cars they were passing by. it was interesting to see how few people acknowledged them at all, much less waved back. we dEFinitely waved back. we even threw them our pez dipensers, fully loaded, and a candy necklace. we adopted their stance and started waving to other people in other cars as well. let me say, if the patrons in the other cars were not going to smile, wave and/or greet the little girls, they were rigid in their contempt and fearfully adamant about not waving at 4 adult women. it was all very disheartening....and by the fourth hour on the road, (in the dead of night it takes one and a half to two hours max to arrive at your destination), and still a very, very long way to go, i found myself forming the third thought which was the one about never coming to LA again. it wasn't worth it, even if it meant missing the plimsouls, roger waters and the who. i only wish the environmental problems out there on the highways or the pivotal real fear of relating to other humans could be as easily resolved.

SUN GOD

birthday cheers to p.mAcd. one fantastic subversive mother f***king hero!
TROUBADOUR OF STOMP is pat mAcdonald's latest CD. it's to go to heaven for...
go to his myspace page for more info. http://www.myspace.com/patmacdonald

the wreck of the arthur lee (1945-2006)

"By Forever Changes...I thought I was going to die at that particular time, so those were my last words."

Arthur Lee on the album released in 1967


"A human being is part of a whole, called by us the "Universe," a part limited in time and space. He experiences himself, his thoughts and feelings, as something separated from the rest--a kind of optical delusion of his consciousness. This delusion is a kind of prison for us, restricting us to our personal desires and to affection for a few persons nearest us. Our task must be to free ourselves from this prison by widening our circles of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature in its beauty."

Albert Einstein

sparked!

i have just returned from the apple store where i purchased a wireless mouse. my friend, stacie, accompanied me...she did not like the feel and/or design there at all...too 21st century....
i don't know why but it feels like the 21st century has kicked into warp speed over the last year, or maybe i am just noticing it more. there are the symptoms of a 'sci-fi' detachment that i have a difficult time accepting. i have a problem with most magazine covers these days. every cover graces a beautiful woman. but they all look like they have had botox! and, of course, most of them are under the age of thirty. i still can't wrap my head around HAVING to look younger, especially if one is under thirty! the cosmetic surgery industry baffles me. i won't have anyone cutting my face. my friend agrees. gives us the willies.
stacie says that by the time she hits her fifties, (quite a ways to go), people will either appreciate her as a great beauty or see her as some sort of freak. and she's probably right in either scenario.
i am reminded of some of my favourite movies that i have relished over time. only now these flashes of celluloid disturb me...they have come true. whether it is 'blade runner', 'brazil' or the plethora of fantastic rod serling 'twilight zones', each had hints, warning us what NOT to do. and it seems that, instead of heeding the warning(s), we have decided to make some of those sterile, yet subtle, aberrations our societal truths.
much is said about 'the power of suggestion' belief systems. well what are we suggesting globally? what are we wishing for? it would seem that a lot of disturbing images and sounds are being picked up under the radar - in our good old psyches. what are we sub-filtering? what are we retaining? what is just passing through? what are we wishing against?
it is very, very unnerving to watch the film, 'an inconvenient truth' and come out of the theatre into a sweltering heat wave with record breaking temperatures. my mind flashes on david bowie's dying planet in 'the man who fell to earth'. where and what are our purposeful directions? how relative are the changes that each of us make in a day? just the spark of an idea can go from one individual's brain to a rolled out carpet ride for someone else.
i type here and send my missive through the great cyberseance. HA! this is some ouija board!
who views? whose view...this magical means of communiqués gives me hope. if cold and dispassionate waves are being spread about like so many polluted air particles, so are the happy surprises i receive through my daily internet cruise. i relish the freedom one has online. i refuse to give up hope that humans wish to survive and evolve; it is inherent.
all i know is i have a hard time watching 'sci-fi' anymore. it seems just a little too real, and not in a positive way. i feel too uncomfortable in a space that feels too unearthly, like stacie, at the apple store.