Preface To Gary's Favorite Indie Music Of 2010: I Live In The Shadows, Listening To Tunes All Night Long

Look! Since I've stopped doing the Saturday shows, I can start doing my "preface" posts again. I've sure missed them. I never get to write prefaces for books & stuff, so the idea that I can write prefaces for my blog pleases me. By the way, I still sometimes mispronounce "preface" in my head. I used to pronounce it "pre-face" instead of "pref-iss," probably because it helped me remember how to spell it, but I got corrected for saying it that way many times in middle school, so I started pronouncing it correctly. Except in my head.

I did the same thing with the word "reprise," which I thought sounded like "reprisal." Does anyone pronounce that word "re-preez-al"? I still think it's fine to pronounce the word "re-prize." But, I was corrected in middle school, so.

Also, I was corrected for pronouncing "ascertain" wrong. I didn't really know what it meant but I had a quote which used to word in a paper I wrote - I think it was Ben Franklin quote, & the meaning was pretty obvious in context - & I pronounced it "a-certain" not "ass-er-tane."

Come to think of it, the same person corrected me every time in middle school. It was my American History teacher Helen Lane. She was quite old, she's probably no longer with us. I got an award from her at the end of eighth grade & hugged her on stage when I accepted it. I caught some shit from my schoolmates from that, let me tell you.

I was going to write "my friends," but I didn't really have a lot of friends in middle school. Thinking about it, I had a somewhat close friend in fifth & sixth grades whose name was Phil Claunch, who moved away when his parents got divorced when he & I were in sixth grade, & it occurred to me I don't really remember what he looks like. That seems strange, doesn't it? We biked to school every day for most of fifth grade, & we walked to middle school together, but I don't have any idea what he looked like. I don't think anyone ever took any pictures of us together & I don't have school pictures from that time period. Oh wait! I still have my middle school yearbooks I think. He might be in the sixth grade volume. If he didn't move away before pictures were taken.

I'd go look for it, but they're in boxes upstairs. Not curious enough to go through the trouble, I suppose. Ah, well.