Piping Up at the Gates of Dawn

I have just read the most profoundly preposterous twaddle I've seen in a very long time (comments no longer being accepted, otherwise the author would have gotten an earful).

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/10/books/10willows.html

All about two annotated versions of one of the books I love best, "The Wind in the Willows."

My issue---putting aside suggestions of it all being about upper-class Edwardian Britain quashing lower classes, which may or may not be a matter for lawful debate---is with the alleged sexualization of the relationships.

GREAT GODDESS DEFEND US! Is there no END to the banal stupidities of alleged literary types??? Ratty and Mole's relationship is in no way homoerotic, any more than Frodo and Sam's, and I'm getting more and more revolted by moronic deconstructionists trying to foist a sexual subtext onto everything that comes along.

As for the "sexuality" allegedly present in the Piper chapter, no. Just. No. Ecstasy, certainly: it brings tears of joy to my eyes every time I read it. But "sexual"? Hardly!

Again, this relentless sexualization has GOT to stop. Before it irredeemably taints and smears every lovely thing in literature with its sneery, sniggering ickiness. Makes. Me. Sick.

Iquitarod

It's what she does. She quit five colleges before apparently graduating from a sixth. She quit being mayor of Wasilla to run for VP. Now she's quitting being governor of Alaska to run for...what? Surely she must know by now, after three generations, that withdrawal doesn't work for her?

She says she has a higher calling. Queen of the Rapture, maybe? If only! Lord, please make it so and put her out of our misery, let our prayers come unto thee, even though most of us here don't worship thee. We can ASK, right??

So let her cross that bridge to nowhere, or sit on her front porch and look at Russia all she wants, or field-dress some moose, or her husband, whatever she likes.

Since she's obviously not going to hide herself in the tundra, I say we have some fun with this. I do SO hope Letterman doesn't shy away...

James Douglas Morrison, 8 December 1943 - 3 July 1971

They gave him light in his ways,
And love, and a space for delight,
And beauty and length of days,
And night, and sleep in the night.
His speech is a burning fire;
With his lips he travaileth;
In his heart is a blind desire,
In his eyes foreknowledge of death;
He weaves, and is clothed with derision;
Sows, and he shall not reap;
His life is a watch or a vision
Between a sleep and a sleep.

---Swinburne

Happy Anniversary to Us!

24 June 1970


Married on Midsummer Day...like Aragorn and Arwen...


I used to think it was a Muse
I wanted
Then you came along
& you are not the inspiration
but the deed itself
I've fucked straw in my time
& thought it gold
But you I put on like a jewel
I wear you like a rose
---JDM, 1970




(c) Patricia Morrison

No Tents Allowed

"We cannot accept to have in our country women who are prisoners behind netting, cut off from all social life, deprived of identity," Mr Sarkozy told the special session in Versailles.

"That is not the idea that the French republic has of women's dignity.

"The burqa is not a sign of religion, it is a sign of subservience. It will not be welcome on the territory of the French republic," the French president said.


Voila un vrai homme et un brave aussi! Good for you, Sarko! It's about time someone took a firm stand against the creeping Islamization of the West.

Islamic clerics do not agree on the Koran-mandated necessity of the burqa or the niqab (a burqa is the full-length body covering with a mesh screen over the eyes, a niqab is the black full-length enveloping veil with slits for the eyes...), and even the hijab (scarf head covering) may not necessarily be required.

Muslim men require their women to cover themselves with sheets because they (the men) cannot master their own "impure" desires and thoughts, and so they insist that their women control their thoughts FOR them by removing the "temptation".

Hey, it's not the fault of women if Muslim men are a pack of juvenile lust-crazed horndogs who can't keep their minds out of their pants (or hers) every time they see a woman. How insulting is that, to both men AND women?

Grow up, guys, and join the 21st century. Show some REAL respect for women, because otherwise why should women show respect for you?

It continually confounds me that Muslims move to the West for a "better life" or whatever the hell, presumably one involving more personal freedoms, and then they get their knickers in a twist because the West won't accommodate their medieval and inhumane culture. You can't have it both ways, people! YOU must accommodate yourselves and your beliefs to US. Otherwise go back to the desert.

I believe with every fiber of my being that any so-called "religion" that allows women to be stoned to death for being out in public without a male companion, to be the victims of "honor" killings, to be kept illiterate and immured indoors, to be divorced at will, is no religion at all. And certainly not one that pleases Allah, or whoever.

That's not a religion. That's male medieval control freaks with their heads in an 8th-century tent and their souls stuffed up a camel's anus.

An Iranian woman writer (exiled) pointed out the other day that it really didn't matter WHO was the president of Iran, because she would still be subject to all the anti-woman laws regardless of who was in office, that Mousavi was cut from the same bolt of "religious" cloth as Ahmadinejad. She could still be stoned, imprisoned, killed, veiled, kept from living a normal life, all in the name of Allah.

Well, I think Allah really hates this. At least, if he's a good god, he SHOULD hate it. And if he doesn't, what woman would want to worship him? I hope he strikes them down harshly, these sour-faced mullahs and all who cleave to them and their vile teachings..

In fact...wasn't Allah originally female? Al-Lat, the (female) Sun? A GODDESS??? I do believe I read that somewhere. It's probably not true, but it's nice to think that perhaps SHE will finally take vengeance and obtain justice for Her murdered and mutilated daughters.

Sumer Has I-Cumen In, Lhude Sing Goddamm

Happy Solstice! I HATE summer, but I'm happy because now the days are getting short gain, and WINTER is on the way! Yay!

Rock On, Axeman!

June 17, 2009

Bob Bogle of The Ventures Dies at 75

By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS


TACOMA, Wash. (AP) — Bob Bogle, the lead guitarist and co-founder of the rock band The Ventures, known for 1960s instrumental hits like “Walk, Don’t Run,” “Perfidia” and the theme from “Hawaii Five-O,” died Sunday. He was 75.

Don Wilson, the band’s other founder, told The News Tribune of Tacoma that Mr. Bogle had become ill over the weekend.

The Ventures sold millions of albums and heavily influenced other rock guitarists. They were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2008. The hall’s Web site hailed The Ventures as “the most successful instrumental combo in rock and roll history.”

“Walk, Don’t Run,” written and first performed by Johnny Smith in 1955, reached No. 2 on the Billboard chart for The Ventures in 1960; a revised version, “Walk, Don’t Run ’64,” reached No. 8 in 1964.

The band’s instrumental version of “Perfidia,” a much-covered song by the Mexican songwriter Alberto Domínguez, was also a hit in 1960. (Charlie Parker, Mel Tormé, Glenn Miller, Nat King Cole and Linda Ronstadt, among others, have also recorded versions of it.)

The Ventures scored yet another hit in 1969 with their cover of the theme from “Hawaii Five-O,” the long-running police detective show that had its premiere in 1968.

The band got its start in 1958 in Tacoma. Mr. Bogle initially played lead and bass and Mr. Wilson played rhythm guitar. They were soon joined by Nokie Edwards, another guitarist, and the drummer Howie Johnson, later replaced by Mel Taylor.

“Our aspirations were to pick up nothing heavier than a guitar,” Mr. Wilson said last year. “But it just mushroomed into something where we became internationally known.”

The Ventures were particularly popular in Japan, where Mr. Wilson and Mr. Bogle played as a duo during their first tour in 1962 because the promoter couldn’t afford to pay the other two band members.

The two Americans made such an impression, Mr. Wilson recalled last year, that when the band came back in 1964, “there were 6,000 people at the airport.” He said he didn’t realize at first that the Japanese fans were there to see The Ventures.


Turk's hero. Sad. I remember hearing them back in the day, when I was in high school, and buying the singles 'cause I was so impressed with the sound. You couldn't dance to some of their stuff, at least not easily, though we did anyway, but DAMN it was fine to listen to. That lead riff from "Pipeline" is one of my all-time faves, right up there with the "Layla" riff. Well played, sir!