The summer equivalent of the part of winter--like, mid-February or so--when you think if you see any more snow you'll puke, when the snow's dirty and disgusting, and you're sick of sweaters--that part?--well the summer equivalent of it is when you've brought home more and more vegetables and fruit from the market, and your swamp cooler's chugging away (for the furry dog! for her, it's for her sake!), and you still have to prop the door open for the dogs to go in and out, and that means that there are FLIES. And also fruit flies. So making and eating dinner is a project involving, a. heat and b. winged pests and c. a rapidly declining good mood.
On the plus side, I obtained a used copy of Ram, the second solo album Paul McCartney made after the Beatles broke up. I was prompted to do this because my daughter's (Scotland) husband is a rabid Beatles fan, and especially loves Paul McCartney, and so it came to pass that Ram came into heavy rotation in their household, in part because my granddaughter loves it. Especially the "Admiral Halsey" medley. ("Do we get to hear 'hands across the water' now? Have we missed 'little gypsy get around'?") Now, no one will extol the virtues of John Lennon more than I--that mordant wit, that inimitable sad sack voice, the primal scream inherent in his singing even before he did that whole scream therapy thing. And if you'd like to argue, with fervor, that neither Lennon nor McCartney were as good without one another as they were when they wrote and recorded together, I will not disagree. But I must say that Ram is an expression of pure pop joy, it is splendid, and I urge you all to take a listen to it if you haven't, and to have a new listen if you haven't listened recently. Go on, have a listen. (you can hear clips here.)
The ancients or not-so-ancients of 300 hundred years ago, no doubt would ascribe the prevalence of flies this time of year to spontaneous combustion of heat and rotting fruit. In the middle ages they believed you could make mice by laying a blanket over wet straw. Not science, of course, but much more fun than reality.
ReplyDeleteI don't have dogs, but I do have fruit flies. And I rarely leave the doors open. Where do they come from.
ReplyDeleteI just gotta say I'm dubious. McCartney has always been a cheeseball. And what's up with his new record being released by Starbucks? Turned up collar, goofy expression on his face...is this guy still relevant?
ReplyDeleteI will give it a listen, though, I will.
McCartney _may_ be a cheeseball _now_, but he was not always, or if he was, then "cheeseball" was a necessary ingredient to some of the best pop songcraft of all time! (she says with no irony nor any trace of overstatement). What is it with the deciding once and for all time against people? I _like_ to give people more than one chance. Isn't it nice when someone you thought was a cheeseball comes out with something great that you didn't predict???
ReplyDeleteAnyway, RAM came out in 1971, literally minutes after the Beatles broke up. Even if you don't like every single song on it, there are totally inspired things there. It's like Syd Barrett, but without the crazy (and I mean that in a good way about McCartney and a sad way about Barrett).
I think you can make Paul McCartney by putting a 1952 Rolls Cornice in a compost heap (organic and vegan, of course). He will spring up in full St. Pepper's costume the next morning ready to sing "Hey Jude" at a moment's notice.
ReplyDeleteThat was fun.