For no reason I can readily discern, there have been a lot of Self Help Radio episodes on May 3rd. If the show has been on for eighteen years - & it has - that's a total of one May 3rd show every three years. & here they are:
In 2006, the theme explored was Painters, Painting, & Painters Painting. (That's a theme I'd like to revisit some day.)
In 2010, & this was one of my favorites, it was Miss Brown. There were a surprising amount of songs about women with the last name "Brown."
In 2011 - just a year later! - the theme was "bounce." I don't know why I felt the need to put the word bounce in quotation marks when I haven't done that for any other theme, but there you go.
In 2013, it was necks - see, no quotation marks! - & just three years ago it was bees. A year later, the theme was Turn It & now I'm wondering, why did I capitalize that particular theme? Who knows.
What you're thinking now is, can I listen to any of these shows? The answer is, yes! But not all of them. I found a treasure trove of old shows on cassette recently but they're in a box now on the way to Oregon.
The shows you can listen to are: the bees show, part one & part two.
Plus: the turn it show, part one & part two.
Remember! You'll need a password & a username, one of which is SHR & the other of which is selfhelp. I got that backwards but it's not hard, flip it around if you get it wrong the first time.
There's a real relief on my end that I didn't do another May 3rd show today. There have been too many. For a May 3rd, anyway.
Friday, May 03, 2019
Thursday, May 02, 2019
Empty House Blues
Five days before we leave - five days! - movers came & took almost everything in our house away. As I write this, I am standing (not sitting) at the kitchen counter where my computer is. We have two chairs we've saved, but the counter is too high & I feel like a child trying to figure out a parent's or older sibling's login information, my hands seemingly above my head. But doing it standing up isn't really any better. Perhaps I should sit down.
Why, you may ask, are we sending our stuff on ahead of us? First of all, it'll actually arrive the day after we get there. That's because they move lots of folks' things. & there are only so many hours in the day to gather up a household & put it in a big truck. The fellows today - who commended my wife on her packing prowess, prompting her to ask them if she could get that in writing, maybe perhaps on a certificate - were here from around 8 till around 1.
Second of all, it was a little about comfort. We had to make the decision whether we'd want to be here, in our familiar home, obviously without a sofa or bed to sleep on, but still, the place we've lived for over two years (we're sleeping on one of these), in a more or less chill setting, than adding extra weird complications to an already weird night: first evening in a new place.
The house seems huge without anything in it. I keep wanting to wander into my room to check stuff on my computer - even though I am writing on that very computer in the kitchen! & it reminds me that it's a lovely house. I've loved living in it. But I don't know if I love it enough to stay - in Texas, where it's going to get very hot very soon; in Fort Worth, which is a fine place, but I wish were as cool as Dallas, & closer to Dallas; in a place where I can't do Self Help Radio. A house is a home, but home is where the heart is. & my heart wants to be somewhere else.
Do I have the Empty House Blues? Nah. I am looking forward to whatever's around the corner.
Why, you may ask, are we sending our stuff on ahead of us? First of all, it'll actually arrive the day after we get there. That's because they move lots of folks' things. & there are only so many hours in the day to gather up a household & put it in a big truck. The fellows today - who commended my wife on her packing prowess, prompting her to ask them if she could get that in writing, maybe perhaps on a certificate - were here from around 8 till around 1.
Second of all, it was a little about comfort. We had to make the decision whether we'd want to be here, in our familiar home, obviously without a sofa or bed to sleep on, but still, the place we've lived for over two years (we're sleeping on one of these), in a more or less chill setting, than adding extra weird complications to an already weird night: first evening in a new place.
The house seems huge without anything in it. I keep wanting to wander into my room to check stuff on my computer - even though I am writing on that very computer in the kitchen! & it reminds me that it's a lovely house. I've loved living in it. But I don't know if I love it enough to stay - in Texas, where it's going to get very hot very soon; in Fort Worth, which is a fine place, but I wish were as cool as Dallas, & closer to Dallas; in a place where I can't do Self Help Radio. A house is a home, but home is where the heart is. & my heart wants to be somewhere else.
Do I have the Empty House Blues? Nah. I am looking forward to whatever's around the corner.
Wednesday, May 01, 2019
Bolan's Thirteenth
He's a precious thing, brought home when he was a kitten from a vet clinic where he was waiting to be adopted. Despite have two other cats in the house, he glommed on to our beagles Ringo & George, & he's been much more doglike than catlike in his life.
It occurs to me I've written about him on the blog before, especially when I did a Halloween show about black cats. (Many pictures of Bolan there!)
Two other times here on the blog I focused on him: once in 2012 when I was sharing pictures of my pets & again in 2017 when I did a "meet my pets" series.
He's a sweetheart, the only cat unafraid of visitors, & definitely willing to eat your hair if you sit still on the sofa.
Happy birthday, old man! Stay with us for a while, please!
Tuesday, April 30, 2019
Yesterday In Boxes
A week from now I should be in New Mexico, in a small town a hundred miles from Albuquerque, which happens to be around five hundred miles from where I am now. The place we'll be living in Portland is over two thousand miles away so we're going to need to drive five hundred miles a day to make it. We'll be in two cars, our own & a rented minivan. The plan now is to have the dogs drive with me, & the cats in the minivan. They will be in carriers, to minimize stress. The dogs will sleep as they always do in the backseat.
As for me, I'm a little leery of such long drives. It has to be done, & we'll do it, & we won't be driving through densely populated areas, so it should be fine. When we drove from Memphis to Fort Worth nearly three years ago, we arrived in town on a Friday at four pm. It took longer, it seemed, to get from Dallas to Fort Worth than from Texarkana to Dallas.
Today I finished packing up my cassettes. I found a whole lot of old radio shows, most of them from my KVRX days. Way back when I did my seventeenth anniversary show, I tried to find a copy of the original show to digitize to share. I found it, actually. It was in another box with all my other radio shows. I listened, briefly, to a couple of them. I feel like I should digitize them - who knows when the cassettes will finally give out? - but I don't think I'll listen to them any more than I do my current shows. & no one else really wants to listen to them, do they?
A few years back - it's been ten years! - when we moved from Huntington to Lexington, I gave away most of my vinyl. (If I had known how beloved vinyl was at WRFL, I would've waited to donate it to that station.) I now have three boxes of it, including my singles. I really thought I'd have more. I have five of the same boxes of cassettes. I really need to have less. & oh shit, where the hell are my videotapes?
Also I started packing my CDs. That'll be done early tomorrow. The movers come to take all of that away on Thursday, & then - we have an empty house for a few days. It's going to be quite strange.
It's all going to be strange, until it isn't. It's such an adventure, this moving. I guess I never felt like I'd stay in Fort Worth forever. Anyway. Enough of this. More packing to do.
As for me, I'm a little leery of such long drives. It has to be done, & we'll do it, & we won't be driving through densely populated areas, so it should be fine. When we drove from Memphis to Fort Worth nearly three years ago, we arrived in town on a Friday at four pm. It took longer, it seemed, to get from Dallas to Fort Worth than from Texarkana to Dallas.
Today I finished packing up my cassettes. I found a whole lot of old radio shows, most of them from my KVRX days. Way back when I did my seventeenth anniversary show, I tried to find a copy of the original show to digitize to share. I found it, actually. It was in another box with all my other radio shows. I listened, briefly, to a couple of them. I feel like I should digitize them - who knows when the cassettes will finally give out? - but I don't think I'll listen to them any more than I do my current shows. & no one else really wants to listen to them, do they?
A few years back - it's been ten years! - when we moved from Huntington to Lexington, I gave away most of my vinyl. (If I had known how beloved vinyl was at WRFL, I would've waited to donate it to that station.) I now have three boxes of it, including my singles. I really thought I'd have more. I have five of the same boxes of cassettes. I really need to have less. & oh shit, where the hell are my videotapes?
Also I started packing my CDs. That'll be done early tomorrow. The movers come to take all of that away on Thursday, & then - we have an empty house for a few days. It's going to be quite strange.
It's all going to be strange, until it isn't. It's such an adventure, this moving. I guess I never felt like I'd stay in Fort Worth forever. Anyway. Enough of this. More packing to do.
Monday, April 29, 2019
Today's News
One: I got new glasses. They're progressive lenses, so I imagine I will have difficulties.
Two: I am going to see Endgame. The movie is seventeen hours long. So, you know. My day is shot.
Two: I am going to see Endgame. The movie is seventeen hours long. So, you know. My day is shot.
Friday, April 26, 2019
Self Help Radio 042619: April 26th
Holy moly, I am counting six times Self Help Radio has fallen on April 26th! This is interesting (to me at least) because there are days of the year when no Self Help Radio has aired. Despite doing around fifty shows a year for nearly eighteen years. That's more shows than there are days in the year! For example, there has never been an episode of Self Help Radio on February 3rd. That's odd, right? Is it because that's Norman Rockwell's birthday? I don't know!
But on April 26th, the following themes were explored:
Pennies (April 26, 2006)
Busy Busy Busy (April 26th, 2010)
Indiepop A To Z # 31 (April 26, 2011)
Indiepop A To Z # 40 (April 26, 2013)
Indiepop A To Z # 50 (April 26, 2016)
& Indiepop A To Z # 53 (April 26, 2017)
You'll notice a bit of a trend toward the end there - it's been my habit since 2014 to return to my never-to-be-finished series "Indiepop A To Z" every four months. I almost made it every three months & maybe one day I will. It will take me a decade to get through the letter S.
All of the indiepop a to z episodes are over on the Self Help Radio Archive Page. There's a lot more to listen to. Remember: username is SHR, password is selfhelp.
We are just a little over a week away from leaving. My room is a mess. I'm a little nervous. But gosh I think it was a good idea to stop doing the show for a time. I would be even worse now if I did the show up until the very last minute!
But on April 26th, the following themes were explored:
Pennies (April 26, 2006)
Busy Busy Busy (April 26th, 2010)
Indiepop A To Z # 31 (April 26, 2011)
Indiepop A To Z # 40 (April 26, 2013)
Indiepop A To Z # 50 (April 26, 2016)
& Indiepop A To Z # 53 (April 26, 2017)
You'll notice a bit of a trend toward the end there - it's been my habit since 2014 to return to my never-to-be-finished series "Indiepop A To Z" every four months. I almost made it every three months & maybe one day I will. It will take me a decade to get through the letter S.
All of the indiepop a to z episodes are over on the Self Help Radio Archive Page. There's a lot more to listen to. Remember: username is SHR, password is selfhelp.
We are just a little over a week away from leaving. My room is a mess. I'm a little nervous. But gosh I think it was a good idea to stop doing the show for a time. I would be even worse now if I did the show up until the very last minute!
Thursday, April 25, 2019
True Doctor Story
This was just shared by me on Facebook:
Today I got a physical & afterwards they handed me some paperwork I didn't bother to read.
Sometime in the afternoon, I got a call from the doctor's office.
"Mr. Dickerson?" the person on the line said. "We're so sorry about the mistake on your patient report."
"What mistake?" I asked.
"Instead of noting your blood pressure," she said, "we accidentally wrote that you're HIV positive."
"Oh my!" I said.
"We're very sorry," she said. "If you'd like to come in for a corrected report, we can give it to you."
"No, no," I responded. "This one is all right. Anyway, I'd really like to scare my wife."
Today I got a physical & afterwards they handed me some paperwork I didn't bother to read.
Sometime in the afternoon, I got a call from the doctor's office.
"Mr. Dickerson?" the person on the line said. "We're so sorry about the mistake on your patient report."
"What mistake?" I asked.
"Instead of noting your blood pressure," she said, "we accidentally wrote that you're HIV positive."
"Oh my!" I said.
"We're very sorry," she said. "If you'd like to come in for a corrected report, we can give it to you."
"No, no," I responded. "This one is all right. Anyway, I'd really like to scare my wife."
Wednesday, April 24, 2019
Too Many Cassettes: An Introspection
We are moving, as you know, in less than two weeks. I have too many cassettes. They fall into these categories:
1) Very old cassettes of me as a kid recording shit with friends & alone
2) Cassettes of things I recorded from vinyl that I either sold back or borrowed from someone (later I would do the same with CDs)
3) Cassettes people made for me
4) Cassettes I made for people but never sent (not a large number)
5) Recordings of radio shows I've done (I stopped recording them on cassette - this is true - around 2006!)
6) Commercial cassettes I either bought, got somewhere, or were given to me
7) Mix tapes I made for myself back in my walkman days (this includes tapes of albums that I taped because I couldn't carry a turntable with me on the bus)
There are a lot of cassettes. Too many. & I am getting rid of some, especially the ones that I have other forms, in better quality media. Why keep them? It's silly.
The ones that are most interesting to me are the old recordings, because I haven't listened to them in years, perhaps decades. Some of them I don't even remember making. There was a time when I had cassettes & a recorder nearby always, because I would send tapes to friends or I would want to talk into the recorder or whatever. Cassettes were ubiquitous. It's why I have so many!
But my weird insight today is this: I have romanticized my life with cassette tapes.
Let me clarify: I don't miss them. I never liked their sub-par sound quality. I never liked the fact that, if you had a certain number of minutes per side, you'd have to fill all of it, or get long hissing silences. (CDs stop when the tracks you've burned onto them end, you know.) I of course hate rewinding. I have cassettes that I have obviously "operated" on - I cracked the case & used tape to splice broken ends together. Scotch tape! Nothing fancy!
What I'm talking about is that I felt like there were treasures on these tapes. I wish I could explain it better. I thought the me on these tapes was worth preserving, & carrying around from Austin to Huntington to Lexington to Fort Worth, from numerous residences in those cities, & now to the Pacific Northwest. & you know what? It's not. The me on the tapes isn't really worth preserving.
If most of those tapes disappeared tomorrow, I might be a little sad, but I don't think I would miss them much. I don't even know if I'll ever listen to them again as it is.
Tonight I digitized one of them, a faux recording session with two friends in high school. They are musicians, I am someone trying (& failing) to be funny while yelping in a microphone. These days I am way too self-conscious to do such a thing - I guess I hadn't yet become entirely aware how utterly talentless I was - so there is a kind of wistfulness to experiencing my exuberance. I knew I was pretending to be a rock & roll star but I still also kinda believed I could be a rock & roll star. Life had yet to knock me down a few pegs, a few feet, a few flights of stairs, a few levels.
The radio show tapes may demostrate the same thing, & maybe one day I'll digitize more of them.
Still. I'm taking a lot of them to Portland. But I'm hoping to leave a lot of them behind. Half, maybe? Or more?
"What a treasure trove!" a friend said today when I sent a pic of a big box of cassettes to her through text. Oh yeah. It's treasure. But it's fucking cursed.
1) Very old cassettes of me as a kid recording shit with friends & alone
2) Cassettes of things I recorded from vinyl that I either sold back or borrowed from someone (later I would do the same with CDs)
3) Cassettes people made for me
4) Cassettes I made for people but never sent (not a large number)
5) Recordings of radio shows I've done (I stopped recording them on cassette - this is true - around 2006!)
6) Commercial cassettes I either bought, got somewhere, or were given to me
7) Mix tapes I made for myself back in my walkman days (this includes tapes of albums that I taped because I couldn't carry a turntable with me on the bus)
There are a lot of cassettes. Too many. & I am getting rid of some, especially the ones that I have other forms, in better quality media. Why keep them? It's silly.
The ones that are most interesting to me are the old recordings, because I haven't listened to them in years, perhaps decades. Some of them I don't even remember making. There was a time when I had cassettes & a recorder nearby always, because I would send tapes to friends or I would want to talk into the recorder or whatever. Cassettes were ubiquitous. It's why I have so many!
But my weird insight today is this: I have romanticized my life with cassette tapes.
Let me clarify: I don't miss them. I never liked their sub-par sound quality. I never liked the fact that, if you had a certain number of minutes per side, you'd have to fill all of it, or get long hissing silences. (CDs stop when the tracks you've burned onto them end, you know.) I of course hate rewinding. I have cassettes that I have obviously "operated" on - I cracked the case & used tape to splice broken ends together. Scotch tape! Nothing fancy!
What I'm talking about is that I felt like there were treasures on these tapes. I wish I could explain it better. I thought the me on these tapes was worth preserving, & carrying around from Austin to Huntington to Lexington to Fort Worth, from numerous residences in those cities, & now to the Pacific Northwest. & you know what? It's not. The me on the tapes isn't really worth preserving.
If most of those tapes disappeared tomorrow, I might be a little sad, but I don't think I would miss them much. I don't even know if I'll ever listen to them again as it is.
Tonight I digitized one of them, a faux recording session with two friends in high school. They are musicians, I am someone trying (& failing) to be funny while yelping in a microphone. These days I am way too self-conscious to do such a thing - I guess I hadn't yet become entirely aware how utterly talentless I was - so there is a kind of wistfulness to experiencing my exuberance. I knew I was pretending to be a rock & roll star but I still also kinda believed I could be a rock & roll star. Life had yet to knock me down a few pegs, a few feet, a few flights of stairs, a few levels.
The radio show tapes may demostrate the same thing, & maybe one day I'll digitize more of them.
Still. I'm taking a lot of them to Portland. But I'm hoping to leave a lot of them behind. Half, maybe? Or more?
"What a treasure trove!" a friend said today when I sent a pic of a big box of cassettes to her through text. Oh yeah. It's treasure. But it's fucking cursed.
Tuesday, April 23, 2019
Still Thinking About This House That Is Emptying Slowly
As I write this, a nasty storm is rolling through Fort Worth. I am not a meteorologist or anything, but I do notice that storms are nastier in this part of the world than in other places. In Lexington - which, don't get me wrong, has nasty storms as well as tornados & such - it seemed like it could rain all day & it would just be rain. No thunder, no lightning, just endless rain. That hardly ever happens here.
Another thing to note: it usually doesn't rain during the day here. It happens at night, like now, where there's always a chance the power will go out. I type frantically in anticipation of that event.
This is a dumb thing I remember about rain in West Virginia, where, like in Lexington, it didn't seem to storm much. I told a friend that the rain was more beautiful unaccompanied by lighting & thunder, that it seemed more "poetic." She made fun of me for weeks after that, she'd ask, "How is your poetic rain?" I deserved that.
My little dog Winston hates the thunder, & needs to be cuddled while it's storming. He gets nervous & shivers & for some reason wants to go outside, to panic in the rain. Like he thinks the thunder is coming from inside the house. It's a shame he feels this way, & it's something he's picked up in his later years, possibly since we've returned here. I don't know if it storms like this in Portland.
Speaking of: two weeks from tonight, I will be sleeping in a hotel room & not in this house. We moved in here at the end of the year 2016, so we only lived here for two years or so, but I have loved this place like no other home I've had. I don't know why that is - I haven't been crazy about the town, or the sad lack of opportunities for Self Help Radio, or the perpetual months of heat, but I've loved this house, this little room where I've made the show, the kitchen where I cooked, the backyard where the dogs played. I know a home is just a place & you find your home where the things & people you love are, & I trust my wife to find another place in Portland for us, but that doesn't make it any easier knowing we'll be saying goodbye to this place soon.
Now I need to see if the dogs will brave the rain before they go to bed for the night! Rain is something else we'll have to get used to, too.
Another thing to note: it usually doesn't rain during the day here. It happens at night, like now, where there's always a chance the power will go out. I type frantically in anticipation of that event.
This is a dumb thing I remember about rain in West Virginia, where, like in Lexington, it didn't seem to storm much. I told a friend that the rain was more beautiful unaccompanied by lighting & thunder, that it seemed more "poetic." She made fun of me for weeks after that, she'd ask, "How is your poetic rain?" I deserved that.
My little dog Winston hates the thunder, & needs to be cuddled while it's storming. He gets nervous & shivers & for some reason wants to go outside, to panic in the rain. Like he thinks the thunder is coming from inside the house. It's a shame he feels this way, & it's something he's picked up in his later years, possibly since we've returned here. I don't know if it storms like this in Portland.
Speaking of: two weeks from tonight, I will be sleeping in a hotel room & not in this house. We moved in here at the end of the year 2016, so we only lived here for two years or so, but I have loved this place like no other home I've had. I don't know why that is - I haven't been crazy about the town, or the sad lack of opportunities for Self Help Radio, or the perpetual months of heat, but I've loved this house, this little room where I've made the show, the kitchen where I cooked, the backyard where the dogs played. I know a home is just a place & you find your home where the things & people you love are, & I trust my wife to find another place in Portland for us, but that doesn't make it any easier knowing we'll be saying goodbye to this place soon.
Now I need to see if the dogs will brave the rain before they go to bed for the night! Rain is something else we'll have to get used to, too.
Monday, April 22, 2019
A Modest Observation
In about two weeks, we leave this home where I've lived for over two years. We are boxing things up & getting rid of things & taking things off walls. In certain rooms, there is a pronounced echo that wasn't there a week ago. In these ways does a house stop being a home.
& it makes me think: how strange it is that the last moments one lives in a place so resemble the first moments one lives in a place. Because when we moved into this house a little over two years ago, it so resembled what I am seeing now.
Except. I was unfamiliar with everything, & now I know this place as much as I've known anywhere I've lived. It's a strange sadness, a feeling of loss, & luckily keeping busy keeps that at bay.
& it makes me think: how strange it is that the last moments one lives in a place so resemble the first moments one lives in a place. Because when we moved into this house a little over two years ago, it so resembled what I am seeing now.
Except. I was unfamiliar with everything, & now I know this place as much as I've known anywhere I've lived. It's a strange sadness, a feeling of loss, & luckily keeping busy keeps that at bay.
Friday, April 19, 2019
Self Help Radio 041919: April 19th
There was an idea I had: while the show was on hiatus, I'd feature some show from the past - I mean, I've been doing this for almost seventeen years! - that happened on the same date. It turns out, April 19 is a pretty well-traveled moment on the calendar for Self Help Radio!
Two years ago, I did a show about umbrellas. Should you be so inclined, you may listen to that show in two parts right now: part one & part two. (You'll need a username & password, & that will be SHR & selfhelp in case you didn't know.)
Three years ago, in 2016, there was a show with the theme everything's fine. Do you remember, back in 2016, when everything seemed fine? Me neither. But you can listen to that show, if you want, by clicking on part one & then part two. Same password situations apply.
But wait! There's more!
In 2013, on April 19, there was a show with the theme on my mind. You were on my mind then. But I didn't reupload the show, sorry.
On this day in 2011, the show explored songs involving the word crawl. That would've been one of the earlier WRFL shows. How wonderful it might be to hear that show! But you can't.
A year earlier, in West Virginia, the show examined the theme mushrooms. No one listened to the show in West Virginia except people at WMUL, & the Station Manager himself called & said it was amazing I did a show about mushrooms on 4/20. Except it was 4/19. & I'm not that clever.
We can go way back, though. To one of my favorite episodes, which aired in 2006. I have no idea if the show is any good, but I enjoyed making it. Self Help Radio wasn't even four years old. I had the idea of making a show where all the songs were covers of 1980s tunes. I called it "the eighties, translated". I don't know if it were well-received or what. But I had a lot of fun.
Believe it or not, there are still days in the calendar which have never had an episode of Self Help Radio aired on them. April 19 is not one of those days.
Now. Back to packing!
Two years ago, I did a show about umbrellas. Should you be so inclined, you may listen to that show in two parts right now: part one & part two. (You'll need a username & password, & that will be SHR & selfhelp in case you didn't know.)
Three years ago, in 2016, there was a show with the theme everything's fine. Do you remember, back in 2016, when everything seemed fine? Me neither. But you can listen to that show, if you want, by clicking on part one & then part two. Same password situations apply.
But wait! There's more!
In 2013, on April 19, there was a show with the theme on my mind. You were on my mind then. But I didn't reupload the show, sorry.
On this day in 2011, the show explored songs involving the word crawl. That would've been one of the earlier WRFL shows. How wonderful it might be to hear that show! But you can't.
A year earlier, in West Virginia, the show examined the theme mushrooms. No one listened to the show in West Virginia except people at WMUL, & the Station Manager himself called & said it was amazing I did a show about mushrooms on 4/20. Except it was 4/19. & I'm not that clever.
We can go way back, though. To one of my favorite episodes, which aired in 2006. I have no idea if the show is any good, but I enjoyed making it. Self Help Radio wasn't even four years old. I had the idea of making a show where all the songs were covers of 1980s tunes. I called it "the eighties, translated". I don't know if it were well-received or what. But I had a lot of fun.
Believe it or not, there are still days in the calendar which have never had an episode of Self Help Radio aired on them. April 19 is not one of those days.
Now. Back to packing!
Thursday, April 18, 2019
Our Correspondence Was Very Weird
Guess what I'm doing here:
A process in the weather of the heart
He put on his clothes & stepped out & he died.
I who was shapeless as the water
Of unremembered skies & snows
Shall I unbolt or stay
Hearing the raven cough in winter sticks
My world was christened in a stream of milk
I climb to greet the war in which I have no heart but only
The jacks of frost they finger in the hives
But for the common wages
For my voyage to begin to the end of my wound
Possessed by the skies
And the doors burn in their brain
And every stone I wind off like a reel
So fast I move defying time, the quiet gentleman
How of my clay is made the hangman's lime
Escapes to the flat cities' sails
He drowned his father’s magics in a dream
Dry as a tomb, your coloured lids
Know now the flesh's lock and vice
Or waves break loud on the seashores
Being innocent, he dreaded that he died
As I rode to sleep the owls were bearing the farm away
Your sport is summer as the spring runs angrily
What I did was, I was reading Dylan Thomas poems, & I took lines from them - the first line from the first one, the second line from the second one, all the way down to the twenty-fourth line & poem. It almost makes sense!
This I'm doing instead of packing. Aren't I glad I gave up my radio shows?
A process in the weather of the heart
He put on his clothes & stepped out & he died.
I who was shapeless as the water
Of unremembered skies & snows
Shall I unbolt or stay
Hearing the raven cough in winter sticks
My world was christened in a stream of milk
I climb to greet the war in which I have no heart but only
The jacks of frost they finger in the hives
But for the common wages
For my voyage to begin to the end of my wound
Possessed by the skies
And the doors burn in their brain
And every stone I wind off like a reel
So fast I move defying time, the quiet gentleman
How of my clay is made the hangman's lime
Escapes to the flat cities' sails
He drowned his father’s magics in a dream
Dry as a tomb, your coloured lids
Know now the flesh's lock and vice
Or waves break loud on the seashores
Being innocent, he dreaded that he died
As I rode to sleep the owls were bearing the farm away
Your sport is summer as the spring runs angrily
What I did was, I was reading Dylan Thomas poems, & I took lines from them - the first line from the first one, the second line from the second one, all the way down to the twenty-fourth line & poem. It almost makes sense!
This I'm doing instead of packing. Aren't I glad I gave up my radio shows?
Wednesday, April 17, 2019
Putting Stuff In Boxes (An Obloquy)
This is the way my mind works: I decide to write about putting things in boxes, & suddenly I think of this word: obloquy. What the hell? Where did it come from?
Well, according to Etymology Online, it's from the Late Latin obloquium, meaing "speaking against, contradiction," from comes ultimately from the Latin obloqui, "to speak against, contradict."
It means verbal abuse, usually in public. But that's not what I meant. I was asking, "Where did it come from in my mind?"
Why would I want to hurl verbal abuse ("evil speaking") at putting stuff in boxes? Is that even possible? Does a task have agency? Or would I be targeting myself, as the person who is putting things in boxes? Is there any way to know? Do I even care?
This post has nine questions. Here are the answers:
1) I know!
2) Asked & answered.
3) You know a lot of words, sometimes they just pop up, unwanted. It doesn't have to mean anything.
4) You wouldn't.
5) Probably not, unless it's in a poem or some shit.
6) Again, probably in a poem.
7) No, I think the question (such as it was) was about the act, & therefore you couldn't really be obloquious toward it.
8) Sure.
9) Not really. But there's space to fill.
There's not going to be a countdown or anything, but we leave in about twenty days. That's not a lot of time. I probably should be putting things in boxes instead of talking to you.
Tuesday, April 16, 2019
It's So BORING To Talk About DREAMS
Uh oh.
This is true: I dream a lot. I always have. Sometimes my dreams have felt more real than my life, which says nasty things about my life, not my dreams. I had a dream I fell in love with a girl I never met in a dream in high school, & almost convinced myself she was real. It was only when I tried to figure out how someone could appear to you in your dreams - trying to work out the mechanism - that I realized it was only a dream. Also, she looked a lot like a girl I was crushing on in school.
There's one recurring dream - it's not that the dream is recurring - there's an element of dreams that happens or has happened enough times that it's seemingly recurring. It's this: I dream that I have written & maybe even performed a song.
It's usually just one song. In the dream, I'm reflecting on how hard it was & sometimes I even think I don't like the song, but I say to myself, "Hey! At least I wrote a song!"
& it's not like I just wrote the words. Nope, in the dreams what gives me satisfaction is that I not only did that, but I wrote the music & possibly even played some of the music.
It probably wouldn't surprise you that not only could I fail to carry a tune in a bucket but also I have no natural ability when it comes to music. I can barely grasp the basics of music theory. Oh hell yeah I can talk for hours about lyrics in a song & I can chat about some elements of the composition but ask me what key it's in? Forget it.
The treacherous thing about these dreams is not just that I am somehow goofily proud & even a little smug that I wrote a song, but that often - like this morning - I wake up thinking, "Yeah, I'm glad I was able to write that song that one time, & then record it."
Of course, I've never done that. & it dawns on me as the morning wears on & I start trying to think about the song. When did I do all that writing & music playing? Why? Where is the song now? Why am I not thinking about it all the time if I'm so durned proud about it at the moment?
Oh yeah. There's no song.
Yes, I was in a "band" in high school where I shouted improvised lyrics into a recording device. But my friend Russ went back & added all the music touches - all the instruments, really. The song was barely mine & I of course wasn't singing & didn't have a sense of melody or anything. The same thing happened in my living room fifteen years ago with friends from radio where they played their guitars & I sang along with them. But those weren't my songs.
Still, I am not angry about these dreams. They let have a feeling of accomplishment I don't normally feel in real life. If only I could remember as I'm waking up that there's no song, no song of mine, anywhere but my dreams. That sleepy realization is the worst part.
Hm, this wasn't entirely about dreams. Still, it probably was pretty boring.
This is true: I dream a lot. I always have. Sometimes my dreams have felt more real than my life, which says nasty things about my life, not my dreams. I had a dream I fell in love with a girl I never met in a dream in high school, & almost convinced myself she was real. It was only when I tried to figure out how someone could appear to you in your dreams - trying to work out the mechanism - that I realized it was only a dream. Also, she looked a lot like a girl I was crushing on in school.
There's one recurring dream - it's not that the dream is recurring - there's an element of dreams that happens or has happened enough times that it's seemingly recurring. It's this: I dream that I have written & maybe even performed a song.
It's usually just one song. In the dream, I'm reflecting on how hard it was & sometimes I even think I don't like the song, but I say to myself, "Hey! At least I wrote a song!"
& it's not like I just wrote the words. Nope, in the dreams what gives me satisfaction is that I not only did that, but I wrote the music & possibly even played some of the music.
It probably wouldn't surprise you that not only could I fail to carry a tune in a bucket but also I have no natural ability when it comes to music. I can barely grasp the basics of music theory. Oh hell yeah I can talk for hours about lyrics in a song & I can chat about some elements of the composition but ask me what key it's in? Forget it.
The treacherous thing about these dreams is not just that I am somehow goofily proud & even a little smug that I wrote a song, but that often - like this morning - I wake up thinking, "Yeah, I'm glad I was able to write that song that one time, & then record it."
Of course, I've never done that. & it dawns on me as the morning wears on & I start trying to think about the song. When did I do all that writing & music playing? Why? Where is the song now? Why am I not thinking about it all the time if I'm so durned proud about it at the moment?
Oh yeah. There's no song.
Yes, I was in a "band" in high school where I shouted improvised lyrics into a recording device. But my friend Russ went back & added all the music touches - all the instruments, really. The song was barely mine & I of course wasn't singing & didn't have a sense of melody or anything. The same thing happened in my living room fifteen years ago with friends from radio where they played their guitars & I sang along with them. But those weren't my songs.
Still, I am not angry about these dreams. They let have a feeling of accomplishment I don't normally feel in real life. If only I could remember as I'm waking up that there's no song, no song of mine, anywhere but my dreams. That sleepy realization is the worst part.
Hm, this wasn't entirely about dreams. Still, it probably was pretty boring.
Monday, April 15, 2019
The Beginning Of Six (Or So) Long Weeks
There was this book I was fascinated with when I was a kid because I like trivia, it was called the Book of Lists. I must've thumbed through it hundreds of times. At some point, one of my older brothers brought home - or I saw at his house - something called The Book Of Rock Lists (which existed because imitation is the sincerest form of flattery & also because The Book Of Lists was bestseller). I was a big Beatles fan at the time & there was a whole section for the Beatles, including something I had never heard: rumors of Paul McCartney's death & replacement in the mid-1960s. That freaked me the fuck out.
The original copy is long gone, so my memory might be faulty, but I recall a long list of how rock & rollers died. One of those was a fellow named Johnny Ace, whose music I had never heard at the time. He was in the list of "rock & roll suicides." He had died on Christmas Day, 1954, backstage, while playing Russian Roulette.
Years later, when I was finally exposed to some of his songs, I remembered that entry & wondered, "If you die by Russian Roulette, is it really suicide?" The other thought is, "How shitty is being a musician if in your down time you wile away the hours playing Russian fucking Roulette?"
It just so happens that today I was listening to some Johnny Ace & of course the story of his death popped into my mind. I wanted to read more about him. That Wikipedia article I linked to mentions how he died, but suggests a more sensible scenario, told by the bass played for Big Mama Thornton, his name was Curtis Tillman (Ace was touring at the time with Thornton): "I will tell you exactly what happened! Johnny Ace had been drinking & he had this little pistol he was waving around the table & someone said ‘Be careful with that thing…’ & he said ‘It’s okay! Gun’s not loaded… see?’ & pointed it at himself with a smile on his face & ‘Bang!’ — sad, sad thing. Big Mama ran out of the dressing room yelling ‘Johnny Ace just killed himself!'"
There must be a word for the satisfaction one feels when something that was unexplained but which one took to be true is cleared up. I felt that today. & it made it easier to enjoy the tunes I was digging.
Hey! I told you I'd write in the blog in the usual way despite the show being on hiatus! This is the sort of shit you're going to have to get used to! (For a while.)
The original copy is long gone, so my memory might be faulty, but I recall a long list of how rock & rollers died. One of those was a fellow named Johnny Ace, whose music I had never heard at the time. He was in the list of "rock & roll suicides." He had died on Christmas Day, 1954, backstage, while playing Russian Roulette.
Years later, when I was finally exposed to some of his songs, I remembered that entry & wondered, "If you die by Russian Roulette, is it really suicide?" The other thought is, "How shitty is being a musician if in your down time you wile away the hours playing Russian fucking Roulette?"
It just so happens that today I was listening to some Johnny Ace & of course the story of his death popped into my mind. I wanted to read more about him. That Wikipedia article I linked to mentions how he died, but suggests a more sensible scenario, told by the bass played for Big Mama Thornton, his name was Curtis Tillman (Ace was touring at the time with Thornton): "I will tell you exactly what happened! Johnny Ace had been drinking & he had this little pistol he was waving around the table & someone said ‘Be careful with that thing…’ & he said ‘It’s okay! Gun’s not loaded… see?’ & pointed it at himself with a smile on his face & ‘Bang!’ — sad, sad thing. Big Mama ran out of the dressing room yelling ‘Johnny Ace just killed himself!'"
There must be a word for the satisfaction one feels when something that was unexplained but which one took to be true is cleared up. I felt that today. & it made it easier to enjoy the tunes I was digging.
Hey! I told you I'd write in the blog in the usual way despite the show being on hiatus! This is the sort of shit you're going to have to get used to! (For a while.)
Friday, April 12, 2019
Self Help Radio 041219: Indiepop A To Z # 59
(All covers found on Discogs.)
Here it is, the first installment of Indiepop A To Z of 2019 - & the last Self Help Radio from Fort Worth, Texas.
It's been a bit weird, I realized that fact (you'll hear it on the show) toward the end & now everything feels a little sad. I wasn't this sad when I was at KNON, probably because I wasn't doing the show I love doing, & also from inside my home with my animals around. I have spent about two & a half years in this room of mine with all my music around me, with a dogbed under my desk & just behind me (often populated by cats), & soon enough - in just a little over three weeks - this space will no longer be mine. The power of endings is intense.
Speaking of endings, I also didn't finish the letter M. I have like three or four more bands. Why not just put them on the show, Gary? Because I didn't want to go over two hours. But in August, I promise, we finish M & start the letter N.
For those keeping count at home, we began the letter M in episode 53. We'll finish in 60. I should do some sort of accounting... No! Gary! You have to start packing!
The show is now at the Self Help Radio website. Remember to find the username + password there, or here: SHR/selfhelp. The songs I play, hopefully with the artists in alphabetical order, are below.
No new show till the middle of May! However did you get so lucky?
Self Help Radio Indiepop A To Z # 59
"Riches & Wonders" The Mountain Goats _All Hail West Texas_
"Devil In The Deep Blue Sea" Mousefolk _Hazy Tambourine Days_
"Living Room Picnic" Moustache Of Insanity _Moustache Of Insanity_
"Love Me Or I'll Kill You" Mouth _Love Me Or I'll Kill You_
"Michael, Michael, Michael" The Moving Jelly Brothers _You Can't Be Loved Forever 2_
"Blay" Moving Pictures _Without Friends_
"Save It" Stuart Moxham _Personal Best_
"Number 4 St. James's Square" Mr. Martini _Abracadabra: The "Magnificent Triviality" Of Él Records_
"Around The May Pole" Mr. Wright _The Fancy Man_
"Bent Backwards" Mrs. Kipling _Sunny Sunday Smile_
"Solace" Muggins _A Chance To Shine: A Dorian Records Compilation_
"The Two Of Us" Mumbles _Breaking Up EP_
"Demain" Mumbly _Seven Summers (International Pop Vol. 2)_
"Go Honey" Greg Murray _Go Honey_
"Dream Sequence 1" Pauline Murray & The Invisible Girls _Pauline Murray & The Invisible Girls_
"Giving Way To Trains" Murrumbidgee Whalers _Giving Way To Trains_
"Going Crazy" Musical Chairs _Time Lapse EP 7"_
"Plain" My Autumn Sons _Perfect_
"Cigarette In Your Bed" My Bloody Valentine _You Made Me Realise EP_
"Burning Hearts" My Favorite _The Kids Are All Wrong_
"She Fakes Apples" My Finest Hour _Grimsby Fishmarket 4 Norrkoeping 0_
"Better Things To Do" My Friend Wallis _Split 7" with Watermelon_
"Something" My Guru Says _3 Seasons Are Enough!_
"You Feel Loved" My Laundry Life _The Art Of Science_
"You Don't Sparkle (In My Eyes)" My Life Story _Mornington Crescent_
"Kowloon Park Swimming Pool" My Little Airport _Hong Kong Is One Big Shopping Mall_
"My Little Brother" My Little Brother _A House Full Of Friends_
"Capital Of Norway" My Little Pony _Making Marks_
Thursday, April 11, 2019
Whither Indiepop A To Z # 59?
(I had to ask dictionary.com.)
Here we are, again, listening to & talking about this almost-forgotten musical genre called "indiepop," plus progenitors & influences when possible. Do you really need me to talk about it some more? I normally program this show every four months but (in case you've really not been paying attention) (& if so, good for you!), I'll be taking a break while we move from Texas to Oregon. I have a lot of records & CDs & stuff I'm going to pack earlier than usual. The wife gets a little stressed out & we're not in Portland yet where it's legal to buy things to help with one's stress. You see?
Also: I thought I'd finish the letter M tomorrow but now I'm not so sure. I have spent the day gathering music & I always find more than I intend to. Now & then I wish I has simply gone down the list at twee dot net but of course that's not me.
Okay. Tomorrow at noon at Self Help Radio dot net, two hours of indiepop. Hope you can join me.
Should I also mention that this is the blog's 3100th post? No? Then I won't.
Wednesday, April 10, 2019
Preface To Indiepop A To Z # 59: Fifty Nine?!?
Is there a word for when you end a sentence with more than one question mark or exclamation point?
Is there?!?!
If you end a sentence with more than one period, it becomes an ellipsis. I understand that an ellipsis is generally thought of as three dots, but I've known people who use as little as two & have seen sentences end with four or more. I'm an old-fashioned three dot ellipsis kind of guy myself. Anyway, I'm not talking about ellipses. I promise...
At the radio station I just left, one of the fellows who does promotions loves to double up his exclamation points. I would link to a page but it probably won't still be there after some time so let me get a screen shot. I haven't seen this, I just know it's going to be there.
Yup:
Is there?!?!
If you end a sentence with more than one period, it becomes an ellipsis. I understand that an ellipsis is generally thought of as three dots, but I've known people who use as little as two & have seen sentences end with four or more. I'm an old-fashioned three dot ellipsis kind of guy myself. Anyway, I'm not talking about ellipses. I promise...
At the radio station I just left, one of the fellows who does promotions loves to double up his exclamation points. I would link to a page but it probably won't still be there after some time so let me get a screen shot. I haven't seen this, I just know it's going to be there.
Yup:
Seven sentences in the copy (not counting the header). Five end with double exclamation points, one surprisingly has only one (what did Cynthia ever do to KNON?), & one (the only imperative sentence) rates a period.
For me, I prefer three or more exclamation points to indicate boundless excitement & three or more questions marks to demonstrate serious confusion. But my favorite is the mixture of exclamation points & question marks that I asked about at the beginning of this post.
If there's a name for it, I wanna know. I love using it in combinations like:
This one?!?
Or this one!?!
Or some version of this one!?!?
But never ever like this!!??
Or this??!!
That doesn't make any sense.
Nor does anything I've written here. What does any of this have to do with indiepop?!?!
Tuesday, April 09, 2019
Whatever I May Misremember
I woke up this morning at 5am.
Lots of people do that, I know, I'm not asking for applause. But you must understand, most every Tuesday for the past year, I've awakened at 4am, taken a shower, let the dogs out, gave the cats a little more food, grabbed the last few things I wanted to play, & headed out (around 5:30) to Dallas to do a show. A show called the Tuesday Morning Blend. Which happened this morning without me.
Please don't think I'm sad about it. I'm really not. But my body & mind, which know things I might not be entirely aware of, wanted me up this morning at 5am. I wandered around the house - this house that I won't live in in a month - & I drank some water & I think I might have hit my arm because I woke with a gash - with my little dog Yoko licking it suspiciously - in any event, it was a lovely night, the windows were open, I went back to sleep a little confused.
That'll pass. A few minutes ago I listened to the first few minutes of today's show hoping I might get a slight mention but nope. It's not my show anymore. This is going to sound a bit envious & pathetic but it's true. I handed over the Facebook page I created for the show to its new host, & he has many, many more Facebook friends than I do & doesn't mind blanket-requesting them to like the show*. So while I had for the year I did the show maybe fifty "likes," over the past week it has more than quintupled. I gave the new host admin privileges but can't seem to delete myself, so I keep getting these likes for a page that is no longer mine. I suppose I've become numb to it but when KNON deejays who knew me, who knew I had a show, but chose not to "like" the show's page, & yet are now doing it when another person has taken it over - you know, it makes me feel I was not very much cared for at the place.
But of course I'll never be there again, & at some point I'll figure out how to extricate myself from that situation. The truth is, despite the sting of one's peers being absolute dicks to you & not even knowing it, I don't miss the place or the show. I didn't feel an emptiness or anything like when I have left other stations. But then again, those stations/shows weren't disrespecting me right & left in ways I can monitor. Maybe I would've hated that too!
Seriously, I have no idea how I cut my arm. The wound is about an inch long, & there's blood on my sheets. I remember the first time I heard about hemophilia, I worried for a moment I was hemophiliac & feared bleeding to death when I didn't know I was bleeding. What I have might be far worse. I injured myself in a kind of confusion & don't even feel pain. I just notice it later.
UPDATE: I think I removed myself as any kind of person who can affect the page. Let's hope now the notifications will stop!
* I didn't do that. I asked maybe twenty people. Many people who are "friends" with me on Facebook I haven't seen or spoken to in five or more years. I don't really interact with them on Facebook, either. They have never shown an interest in listening to me on the radio & if they "liked" the show it would be out of politeness & doubtless they'd make me like something they're doing that I would do out of obligation. I don't think the new host of the show has the same qualms.
Lots of people do that, I know, I'm not asking for applause. But you must understand, most every Tuesday for the past year, I've awakened at 4am, taken a shower, let the dogs out, gave the cats a little more food, grabbed the last few things I wanted to play, & headed out (around 5:30) to Dallas to do a show. A show called the Tuesday Morning Blend. Which happened this morning without me.
Please don't think I'm sad about it. I'm really not. But my body & mind, which know things I might not be entirely aware of, wanted me up this morning at 5am. I wandered around the house - this house that I won't live in in a month - & I drank some water & I think I might have hit my arm because I woke with a gash - with my little dog Yoko licking it suspiciously - in any event, it was a lovely night, the windows were open, I went back to sleep a little confused.
That'll pass. A few minutes ago I listened to the first few minutes of today's show hoping I might get a slight mention but nope. It's not my show anymore. This is going to sound a bit envious & pathetic but it's true. I handed over the Facebook page I created for the show to its new host, & he has many, many more Facebook friends than I do & doesn't mind blanket-requesting them to like the show*. So while I had for the year I did the show maybe fifty "likes," over the past week it has more than quintupled. I gave the new host admin privileges but can't seem to delete myself, so I keep getting these likes for a page that is no longer mine. I suppose I've become numb to it but when KNON deejays who knew me, who knew I had a show, but chose not to "like" the show's page, & yet are now doing it when another person has taken it over - you know, it makes me feel I was not very much cared for at the place.
But of course I'll never be there again, & at some point I'll figure out how to extricate myself from that situation. The truth is, despite the sting of one's peers being absolute dicks to you & not even knowing it, I don't miss the place or the show. I didn't feel an emptiness or anything like when I have left other stations. But then again, those stations/shows weren't disrespecting me right & left in ways I can monitor. Maybe I would've hated that too!
Seriously, I have no idea how I cut my arm. The wound is about an inch long, & there's blood on my sheets. I remember the first time I heard about hemophilia, I worried for a moment I was hemophiliac & feared bleeding to death when I didn't know I was bleeding. What I have might be far worse. I injured myself in a kind of confusion & don't even feel pain. I just notice it later.
UPDATE: I think I removed myself as any kind of person who can affect the page. Let's hope now the notifications will stop!
* I didn't do that. I asked maybe twenty people. Many people who are "friends" with me on Facebook I haven't seen or spoken to in five or more years. I don't really interact with them on Facebook, either. They have never shown an interest in listening to me on the radio & if they "liked" the show it would be out of politeness & doubtless they'd make me like something they're doing that I would do out of obligation. I don't think the new host of the show has the same qualms.
Monday, April 08, 2019
Hey! Didya Know?
(Remind me to tell you about the origin of the phrase "Hey! Didya know?" I could probably also share some samples.)
You might not have listened to last week's Self Help Radio, but if you did you might not have noticed something - something I am stupidly proud of.
It was I think quite an achievement - a radio show full of songs that all mentioned every day of the week. That was cool. I think I did a good job. But!
Hey! Didya know? All the other pieces, created by me & my collaborators - the interview, the fake ads, the interstitial "funnies," & the airbreaks - even the intro! - all of them also mentioned every day of the week.
Did I do that on purpose? Of course! Am I a little too self-satisfied right now? You bet!
You might not have listened to last week's Self Help Radio, but if you did you might not have noticed something - something I am stupidly proud of.
It was I think quite an achievement - a radio show full of songs that all mentioned every day of the week. That was cool. I think I did a good job. But!
Hey! Didya know? All the other pieces, created by me & my collaborators - the interview, the fake ads, the interstitial "funnies," & the airbreaks - even the intro! - all of them also mentioned every day of the week.
Did I do that on purpose? Of course! Am I a little too self-satisfied right now? You bet!