Potterdammerung!

The Twilight of the Harry...MASSIVE SPOILERS!!! IF YOU HAVEN'T FINISHED THE BOOK, DON'T READ THIS!





Where to start, where to start?

I read it in five hours flat. I thought it was brilliant and more importantly, the only way it could really logically go.

Harry didn't have to soil his soul by killing Voldemort: themes of redemption and mercy and non-revenge were big in this book. Voldemort killed himself, basically.

Harry was the seventh Horcrux! We KNEW it!

But the body count! OMGWTF HEDWIG!!!! I cried more over Hedwig than I did over anybody else. Mad-Eye! Colin Creevey! Possibly Lavender Brown! DOBBY! FRED! REMUS! TONKS! SNAPE!!!

But she had to do it. What kind of war only claims the redshirts? Harry had to lose some people he cared about...though I would have preferred, since obviously a Weasley was for the chop, to see the much more expendable Charlie bite it. Even George. I liked Fred better...

And Remus I think had come to the end of his story. He didn't seem too happy about having a wife and kid, though perhaps "conflicted" is a better word. He wasn't used to having people around who cared, and I think he'd been too badly wounded by the werewolf thing. So okay.

But Tonks! That was just cruel. And orphaning their poor little turquoise-haired baby. I guess Ma Tonks, having lost her husband, daughter and son-in-law, will have to raise Baby Teddy. At least he's not a wolf cub...

And Dobby! I know lots of people thought he was the HP Jar Jar Binks, but I was very fond of him. Still, he went out in a blaze of glory. But what about Winky the little depressive alcoholic?

And Kreacher gets redeemed! That was very nice to see.

Interesting to see that D'dore wasn't the perfect person I for one believed he was. Had a sort of Nazi Youth past, really. A mild one, and he got better..

And of course I KNEW Snape was Dumbledore's man through and through. And he wanted to die looking into Lily Evans's eyes...made me cry.

Oh, and Harry and the Walk of Death, with his parents and Sirius and Lupin. Made me weep buckets, and of course Harry and Dumbledore in heaven...just beautiful.

JKR got a bit too friendly in some spots with the Exposition Fairy, though I was glad to learn all that wandlore. But I did keep yelling at the pages "HEY!!! Life and death apocalyptic battle going on here! Get back to it thank you very much!"

Apparently JKR had gotten some flak for all her fat characters being evil or at least problematic (Umbridge, Slughorn, Dudders), so I was pleased to see she fixed at least some of them.

And we get to see religious ritual for the first time: Dobby's burial, Harry says "Thank God!", the church and Christmas Eve services, the churchyard with Wizarding families buried there with Muggle families. This pleased me VERY much. We've been aware that some students, judging by the names, were of other faiths (Patils, Hindu; Delacour, French Catholic; some Jewish and Muslim-sounding names; the English kids probably C of E), so it was nice to see that brought in overtly at last.

And Harry and Tom Riddle were indeed related. At least that's the clear implication: crazy old Marvolo Gaunt, Riddle's grandfather, claims to be descended from the Peverells, and D'dore, in "King's Cross", tells Harry that he, Harry, is the last living descendant of Ignotus Peverell (which is why he has the Cloak), born in Godric's Hollow just as Ignotus was.
Well, last descendant until young James, Albus Severus and Lily come along.

Oh, goodness, sooooooo much...

The Three Little Pigs

I don't usually pay attention to the well-publicized antics of Girls Gone Wild (henceforth GGWs) like Spears, Hilton and Lohan, the spoiled little brats. But the TV screens over the treadmill and recumbent bike at the gym have a captive audience in me (I can't read while I work out, too confusing), and so I have been brought willy-nilly (which I use in the correct sense of "will or nill", not in the bogus one of "every which way") up to speed on their recent Stupid Human Tricks.

I am amazed, I tell you, AMAZED. Lindsay back in rehab after, what, seventeen minutes of sobriety and release, and with cocaine in her pockets, it seems. Goodness me! And Britney flouncing off a photo shoot, pretty much stealing clothes and diamond jewelry, allowing her little dog to poop on a pricey dress and not cleaning it up, and oh all sorts of other out-of-control GGW activities.

And let's not even talk about Paris, because you know that's only what she's longing for.

What gets me is how brats like this GET like this, when so many other, and usually more talented, young men and women manage just fine. But we don't hear about them, no, because Kidstarz Behaving Well is so much less interesting, apparently, than Kidstarz Behaving Badly.

It doesn't seem to be upbringing, either. We all saw Paris crying for her mommy when being carted off to the slammer, so, however ineffective a parent Ma Hilton may be, at least her daughter loves her, so that's saying something.
Lindsay (amazing how much one can learn from TV gossip shows while pedaling the recumbent bike at 8mph for half an hour) has a more problematic parentage, what with her dad being tossed in jail and all, but the Lohans all do seem to care about her in some way, and not just because she's got the bucks in the family.
Britney's growing-up sitch I don't really know about, just the appalling take she seems to have on motherhood.

So it comes down to addiction, plain and not so simple. Which you would think could be dealt with, given a sufficient dedication and ethic.
But no. Because nobody SAYS "No" to the GGW. Their managers, handlers, minders, babysitters, hangers-on, sycophants, parasites...all depend on the GGW for their livelihood, so they're not gonna put a stop to the behavior that puts food on their table.
Which is stupid and short-sighted, besides being uncaring and cynical, since if the GGW ends up dead, or in jail, or in longterm rehab or a psych ward, they're out of a job and will have to look elsewhere for a new GGW to batten on.

We had addictive disorders in the 60's, of course, and I think we all know who I mean. But the problem was so less clearly understood then. People thought a few weeks spent drying out in Palm Springs could sort it out, and they were so very wrong to think so.
But even the public acting-out, and there was a fair bit of it, was on a far lesser scale than today's. Janis or Jimi or Jim may have done some dodgy things---gross public intoxication, pissing in parking lots---but stomping off a photo shoot taking thousands of dollars of somebody else's diamonds with them and letting their dog poop on clothing that didn't belong to them was never gonna happen. There were standards even among indulged and self-indulgent rockers that the GGW just don't seem to think they need to observe.

Maybe because said rockers were more grown-up? But Spears has two very young children, whom she doesn't seem to be all too maternally protective towards, so it's not that.
And the sad part is, we haven't seen the last of it. Not with Nicole Richie's trial for DUI coming up. We'll know how "serious" she is when she starts ostentatiously toting a Bible around like her BFF Paris.
God help them (Really. God! Help them!) and gods help us all.

Nor'easter Monday

We have a nor'easter, very unusual for July, going on here today. "Nor'easter" being a word that we who live in the Nor'east love to use. It's basically a backwards storm pattern: coming upon us from the southwest and swinging around with winds out of the northeast. Generally our storms come from the northwest and west...

But it means it's cool and lovely, temps in the 60s!!! And big wind coming straight in my window, billowing the curtains, and rain rattling on the a/c and hissing in the street. Lovelovelove it.

I think I shall spend the day in bed, eating fried shrimp and rereading Harry. The gym can wait till tomorrow. But tonight I get down to work in earnest on "California Screamin': Murder at Monterey Pop." I've scored the DVD on eBay, for research purposes, not that I haven't already researched extensively in numerous books, including bios/autobios of the Dead, the Airplane, Grace Slick, David Crosby, Janis, the Mamas and the Papas, Brian Jones, Jimi and the Who. Plus two superb books on the Summer of Love and the Festival itself by my fellow critic Joel Selvin (nice guy, friend of my former editor, interviewed me for Days), and a fun one by publicist extraordinaire Derek Taylor.

The murders are rather creative and pretty nasty, if I do say so myself, and Rennie meets Turk for the first time, though no blue sparks go off for them. All that comes later.

The Wizard King

Just finished reading Harry. Five hours flat. I will not spoil it. But, Jo Rowling, thank you from the bottom of my heart.

Pavlov's Hog

I refer, of course, to the unelected President of the United States and his penchant for, when things aren't going his way, trying to scare us all into doing what he wants by bringing up the threat of terrorism. He's bungled the war that he shouldn't have started, so now he's desperate.

And true to form, he's ringing that bell again. Oh, don't mistake me, terrorism is hugely real and we should all be concerned. But Shrub only ever seems to remember that there's, you know, A WAR ON TERRORISM when he's slipping in the polls (moot these days, as he could hardly go lower), he's in trouble on Capitol Hill (even his own Repuglicans, the more responsible ones anyway, are turning on him like pit bulls whipped once too often) or he feels the need to shore up his teeny weeny by sounding tough.

It is to laugh. That is, it would be if it weren't so serious and terrible. Like clockwork, whenever he's in trouble out pops the Terrorism trip, like a mad little cuckoo on the Doomsday Clock. He's the cuckoo one, though. All he does is attest to the paucity of his leadership (none) and make himself look like an idiot (well, more of an idiot). Not to mention his hired whores and bought dogs who go out there and preach this crap with a straight face, because they're as deranged and as evil as he is.

Does he really think, if one may call it thinking, that we can't see through this? Ooooh, terrorism, you won't be safe unless you rally round! ExCUUUUUSE me, who was the one who got us unsafe to start with? Yes, YOU, Shrub, you pig-ignorant, pusillanimous little festering boil on the bottom of the Republic. He's cried wolf a thousand times too often, his preferred strategy, and now nobody even pays attention.

And we all know perfectly well how it will end. He will leave this mess for someone else to deal with, the way he's done his whole little pampered chicken-hearted life. No accountability, no responsibility. He'll just stroll away from the horror he's created and the Democratic president who follows him will have to cope.

When he got drunk at Yale and threw up all over the place, I bet he left the vomit for other people to clean up. Nothing's changed. Let's just all pray the mess this time won't be radioactive.

Now I Know Why the Devil Needs Sympathy

Run, do not walk, directly to this link

www.jesus-is-savior.com/Evils%20in%20America/Rock-n-Roll/the_doors.htm

I am laughing much too hard to type effectively, but man, this is just too hysterically funny for words. Go check it out...

If the link doesn't work, because I'm, you know, of the Devil, Google patricia kennealy morrison and look for "Patricia (Kennealy) Morrison of the Doors Is A Wiccan Witch!". It's the fourth or fifth entry down.

With creepy stoopid Satanic music! And unauthorized-use pictures of me and one of Kathleen nekkid from the movie! Censored for indecency! Because bare tits are indecent! Like Jesus never drank from one! This is GREAT!!!

Oh, oh, oh! There's more! I grew up in a Satanic neighborhood of Long Island, just miles away from the Amityville Horror House! Well, no WONDER I grew up to be a witchy WITCH!!! who married a WITCHY!!! rock star who made the Devil's music! I was living in Satan's playground, who knew? It's all my parents' fault for moving us there. And think of all the other people who lived there, they're all WITCHES!!! too! Yes! They are!

And out-of-context quotes up the wazoo! I LOVE it! I feel honored and proud. And look at the WITCHY!!! company I'm in: we all reported to Brian Wilson, you know, all us rocknroll WITCHES!!! who love the devil music! You can hear it at the end of "God Only Knows" if you play it backward. Yes! You can!

I do wonder, though, why the white power, oops, Christian fundie jackholes are still calling rock and roll the Devil's music when they have Xtian "rock" all over the place. Because ours has balls and theirs does not, perhaps.

I haven't laughed like this in ages. Oh, and the rest of this wackadoodle's site is equally bonkers. I can't imagine Jesus enjoys having people of this degree of stupidity on his side...surely as a god he can do better?

Some people have suggested I should be concerned about this, or at least track this guy down through his ISP, but I really can't be bothered. Apparently this charming site gets bounced every so often, but the pinheaded little squirrel who runs it just starts it up again elsewhere. Perhaps when he escapes the confines of the psychiatric hospital he obviously inhabits.

Frankly, I'm flattered. Besides, he calls me a member of the Doors! Wow! Won't Ray and Robby and John be surprised! I played bass, in case you were wondering. Sometimes rhythm guitar. Much better than Linda McCartney. We could reunite and go on tour. At least I'd be a real Morrison, not like Ian Astbury.

Because I'm A WITCH!!! [/Monty Python voice]

Reverend Mother Superior Patricia's Parish Bulletin

I see where Pope Benedict XVI, the former Joseph Ratzinger, has pronounced that the Catholic Church is the one true onliest church evuh and anyone who worships /thinks otherwise is just not down with Da Jesus.

Yes, he actually said it: Orthodox denominations are “defective”, hence Not True, and other Christian denominations are not real churches, just religion-based communities. And only the Church of Rome is the real deal, ‘cause Jesus said so. (Well, no he didn’t, not really. BECAUSE HE WASN’T AROUND FOR IT. It all got done behind his back and after his death. Safe, eh?)

Well, bite me, Benedictus, you big ol’ skirt-wearing spiritual Nazi! Guess you learned those iron-booted Hitler Youth lessons really well, to now apply them to the bloated festering sack of ecclesiastical pus you have come to rule over.

The arrogance of this man staggers me. Yet does not surprise me. It is odd, though (or maybe not...) that the lesson he learned from his youth as a Catholic in a German Catholic family under the Nazi regime is that Catholics should become MORE subservient (he says “obedient”, I say “servile”. Potayto, potahto…) to their churchly commanders rather than learn to think more independently and tolerantly. He’s basically saying “Toe the line, you little droids, otherwise, who knows, Nazis in the woodpile may return to crush you and only utter servile obedience to the Vatican platform can save you.” Whoo! Click those heels! Heil Papa!

Once again: I attack the institution, not the dogma. And I slap the sheep upside their fat woolly flock-run heads only to wake them up to the jackals that are “guarding” the herd. So don't go off on me for being anti-Christian. I'm only anti-Church.

Oh, and in related developments, let’s not forget all the church property being sold off in LA even as we speak to pay out the massively gigundo criminal abuse settlement, biggest so far.

It is indeed criminal, and now they’re being rightly made to pay, to the tune of $600 million. It is also evil, because not only did innocents suffer irreparable damage but that money spent on atonement could have, presumably, helped others who need help just as much, if not even more: could have funded food pantries, soup kitchens, shelter for the homeless, clinics, clothing banks.

Plus the timing is just the teensiest bit suspicious, dontcha think? Right before, I say, RIGHT BEFORE the first of the abuse cases goes to trial, where he would have to testify under oath, Los Angeles’s Cardinal Mahony breaks open the piggybank and comes up with all this money to settle out of court the cases that his office long covered up.

True, as happened in my family’s Long Island diocese of Rockville Centre, bunches of that money could just as easily have gone to building a McMansion for the ruling primate, a pig of a man and a worse bishop, who turfed out nuns so that he could have a big fancy priesthouse worthy of Donald Trump, and left other nuns, shorn of the salaries and Social Security they gave to the Church, to live over people’s garages because he wouldn’t pay to have them provided for.

Hey, you know, Jesus was born in a stable and lived in a humble carpenter’s house---why don’t you spoiled priestlings try emulating THAT for a change? You live better than your god did! Now THERE’s humility for you! Not to mention the vow of poverty…

But let’s give credit. Some Catholics do a great deal of selfless work for others, and may God set a flower on their heads for it. It’s just the pederast self-entitled puffed-up lying bottom-feeders who get the attention.

And they should. Because trusting people who accept these men as sacred arbiters must know what they really are and what they really do.

What galls me right under the girth is that people still pretend this stuff is (a), not happening; and (b), doesn’t matter. They still listen to the forked and flickering tongues of cassock-robed reptiles, and said reptiles still criminally reassign offenders to, oh, say, all-boys Catholic schools, and sweep it all under the fancy clerical-seal-embroidered custom carpets in the priesthouse.

Some priestlings and fellow travelers opine that ex-Catholics who are angry about the Church are as jilted lovers, and they wouldn’t be so angry if they’d only realize they just want to be back in the Church’s bosom.

Which crap only makes me even angrier. I had quite enough of sucking at that withered and poisonous tit when I was a child and decided at age seven that this was bullshit and bogus and not for me. I would sooner be burned at the stake a billion times over than return to its arid clasp. (And I haven't noticed a papal apology to Witches and Pagans and other such folks for the horrors of the Inquisition, either...) I do not believe in its warped tenets, Pagan-based though they all are (if you do, fine; we are all still free to worship as we please, though I haven’t looked at the papers yet this morning so who knows what the Supreme Court got up to in the middle of the night), and others are as free to dis mine as I am to dis theirs.

That is, they’re free to do so when the Pagan Pope starts blithering about hers being the one true right only religion, and when the Pagan Diocese of Los Angeles pays out 600 million shekels for the wages of the sins of its clergy. And not a millisecond before.

Looking for Something to Read?

MVDF (My Very Dear Friend) Mary Herczog has published her first novel, Figures of Echo, and here is the link to buy it:

http://www.lulu.com/content/751923

Mary is the longtime author of the Frommer's Guides to New Orleans (including the one with the first post-Katrina updates) and Las Vegas.

She also writes "Los Angeles for Dummies," "Las Vegas for Dummies" and "California for Dummies.

The book is currently being filmed as a Lifetime Original Movie to be released this autumn, starring Rob Morrow ("Numbers" and "Northern Exposure"), James Denton ("Desperate Housewives") and Kay Panabaker (the TV series "Summerland" and the current-release "Nancy Drew", in which she plays George).
The film is being directed by Nadia Tass, who did the "American Girl" movies, and has a working title of "Custody of the Heart."

Mary is a native Angeleno, a great wit, a great beauty and a fine, fine writer. So check it out. Thank you.

Take It As It Comes...

Before people start asking, I thought I'd address the subject myself.

I see where someone has written a book claiming that Jim collapsed in a Paris nightclub of a heroin overdose and was brought back to his apartment in the rue Beautreillis and dumped in the bathtub, either dead or dying.

This jibes with rumors and stories told over the years by individuals such as Alain Ronay, who hung out with Jim in Paris and had known him since UCLA, and singer Marianne Faithfull, who was sharing heroin scores and a French count called Jean de Breteuil with Pamela Courson, and who has spoken of this in her own book.

As I wrote in my memoir "Strange Days", I never bought into the official partyline desperately trumpeted by Doors management that Jim died of a heart attack, and have always believed there was a lot more to it than that, and a lot nastier. When I heard about Courson's heroin use in Paris, and her various inconsistent lies about how Jim had died, I instantly accepted that she had been the true and blameful cause of Jim's death.

Whether or not she deliberately pushed the heroin on him at the apartment, or if he took it mistakenly thinking it was coke, or if he did in fact snort up at the club, doesn't ultimately matter. Courson, a well-known heroin abuser, is still the proximate cause of Jim's death, because if she hadn't been there and the count hadn't been there, Jim wouldn't have done the smack. He wasn't into it before he went to Paris, and needless to say he never would have been given it at my house. Jim and Marianne got caught up in the vile undertow of being in the presence of addicts and junkies; Marianne survived, barely. My beloved did not.

I consider this now-public information a complete vindication of the position I have maintained all these years as to the cause and nature of Jim's death, and the person responsible for it. It doesn't bring him back, but at least, painful and distressing as I and others who loved Jim may find it, the truth is finally out there.

And in the face of those who have called me a liar and worse for 36 years, I have to say I find it deeply gratifying to have been proved right. I just wish it didn't also hurt so incredibly much.

In the Immortal Words of Hermione Granger...

What. An. IDIOT.

From today's NY Daily News:


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Jim Morrison wanna-be killed in six-story plunge


BY BILL EGBERT and ERNIE NASPRETTO
DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITERS

Monday, July 9th 2007, 4:00 AM



An aspiring movie director who idolized Jim Morrison died when he went too far in emulating the rock star and fell six stories to his death from the ledge of his upper East Side apartment, cops said yesterday.

Justin Peterson, 27, was intoxicated and frolicking on his apartment's 5-inch-wide ledge about 2:30 p.m. on Saturday when he lost his balance and plummeted to the ground, police said.

He was pronounced dead on arrival at New York-Presbyterian Hospital Weill Cornell a short time later, cops sad.

"He was always saying, 'I'm going to die just like Jim Morrison.' 'I'm going to die in July.' 'I'm going to die when I'm 27,'" said his roommate Fulvio Brembilla, 29, who was not home when Peterson fell.

Morrison, lead singer of the rock group The Doors, died on July 3, 1971, at age 27 and was notorious for walking on building ledges and other daredevil antics.

Peterson had been drinking and twice was pulled back into his E. 85th St. apartment from the fire escape by two friends he had been partying with, police said.

The third time he went on the fire escape, Peterson made it to the ledge and fell, cops said.

Detectives questioned, then released, the two friends. No foul play is suspected, police said.

Peterson would occasionally show off by creeping along the ledge from the apartment's fire escape to the living room window about 10 feet away, Brembilla said.

"It was his trick, playing dice with death, like Morrison. So this is not entirely surprising to me," he said, adding that he once witnessed Peterson pull off the stunt.

Brembilla, an Italian actor, met Peterson in film school and worked with him in Italy before they moved to the East Side apartment together two years ago to collaborate on larger projects.

Peterson was about to begin filming his first feature film, a low-budget romantic comedy called "Stuck With Marty," Brembilla said.

"He was a great friend," said Brembilla. "It was a great project. This is a tragedy."


No, kid, it's natural selection in action: live by the stupid, die by the stupid. And also one way of thinning out the herd of Jim-oholics...so no sympathy in this quarter. Jim, smack this guy upside his head, willya, honey??

Requiescat

The day Jim was buried at Père-Lachaise...
I thought I’d let some of his own words speak for him…

Listen
When I am dead
take me back to the beach
Raise the black sails
Whistle for a wind
Lash mourners to the masts
Bid the sailors row
We will sing as we go
W/lewd & lawless sea-chants split the billow



~ from “Lastwords (Requiem & Love Song)”, 1971

© 2007, Patricia Morrison

'Cause You Gotta Have Friends. Or...Do You?

Flatteringly, over the past few days a number of friend requests have come in, both here and at the new MySpace site. In a bit of a policy break, I'm inclined to allow most of the requests, always aware that Doorzoid scum and villainy is everywhere in the galaxy and hoping my cordiality won't come back to bite me on the ankle.

Some of the requests have been all that one could ask: courteous, funny, moving, literate. And I allow those as soon as I read them. With pride and thanks.

Worryingly, though, I have noticed that a number of these would-be friends do not allow me access to their profiles, sites, spaces or blogs. And some of the ones that do have empty blogs and me listed as their only friend. This, as you may well imagine, makes me deeply suspicious.

People! Did we learn nothing from the Trojan Horse? Listen, if I'd been at that little bunfight, King Priam would never have let that thing through the gates...

So. If you want me to consider friending you, I require a few things up front. No, not dinner and roses. Just an email (you can send one through MySpace) explaining who you are and why you want to be my friend (and no sucking up, either. I hate suckups), and providing a valid email address and an accessible profile/blog/site so I can go there and read it.

Because you can darn well bet I'm going to be checking up on your history/attitude/style/substance. And your friend status will depend on what I find out: tiresome little gothboy, young genius and wit, someone my own age whom I might have liked in college.
If I don't like what I read, you won't be getting friended. And even if I do friend you, I reserve the right to revoke the friending at any time, for any reason that seems good to me, even if it doesn't seem good to you.

I'm sorry if this sounds harsh, but I need to know who wants to come in before I open the door (as I recently wrote in a song). There have been too many painful incidents in the past, and I see no reason to allow any more at this late date. And there are a lot of liars and poseurs out there in cyberspace.
Plus, I don't want my friends list cluttered up with people who post inane bulletins or can't write a good English sentence. I expect a lot from people, and I've found that when I do, they invariably come through, not just for me but for themselves.

Sooooo...them's the ground rules for entry into the Lizard Kingdom. If you don't like them, no soup for YOU.

It's Getting to the Point...

...where I have no room anymore (apologies to Crosby Stills & Nash). For almost 40 years, stuff has been coming here to live and very little has been moving out. And I Have. No. Room. Left. None. There is stuff on top of stuff on top of stuff. I can live with clutter, but this is getting to Collyer brothers proportions, and I live in terror that if I bring home so much as another envelope, the floor will give way and won't my downstairs neighbor be surprised.

So I've decided to have a giant clearout. On eBay, natch, since the idea of a Craigslist one and people coming to my apartment is simply not to be thought of.

This is very exciting and also upsetting. I hate getting rid of stuff: I chose it all so carefully. But let's face it, if I haven't even seen it for the last two decades, let alone worn it or read it or used it, I'm not going to miss it, and perhaps it's time to let it go to a new home where it would be loved and taken care of.

Besides, when the old stuff is gone, then I can buy NEW stuff. Always a pleasing prospect.

Anyway, if anyone is interested in checking it out, I will post here when things go up on eBay, and how to find them. I should think it will be mostly portable stuff, at least at first; no two-foot-high marble and metal Elizabethan busts or anything like that, because that would be too expensive to ship. But it just may have to go: I have plans for that corner of the mantel. Prices would be, of course, correct and quite reasonable; it's more important just to clear some floor space.

But there might be some Celtic books I've no longer a use for, or a lamp or two, maybe even some vintage clothes or posters that I have no wall space to hang...no jewelry, though. Unless I get into selling jewelry I've made.

Actually, MDF Michael, who is my eBay Trading Partner, and I have sold stuff on eBay before: I had some old vinyl that was doing no one any good sitting in the Jacobean armoire gathering dust, test pressings and promotional stuff, and we unloaded it for some serious prices to nutty collectors.
Apparently lots of other authors do this: I'm told Poppy Z. Brite has her own eBay store and always announces on her blogs when she's got stuff for sale.

Could be fun. And it would be nice to actually have room to move...

JAMES DOUGLAS MORRISON
8 December 1943 – 3 July 1971
artist poet singer
beloved husband of Patricia



RENEGADE


They can call you a rock and roll hero
but you're only a man
In the spotlight outfacing the storm
with your axe and your band
You blink in the dazzle
and see that they don't understand
Whoever they see when they watch you
it’s no face you planned

You may know something more than they do
but you don't know that much
You can make them do just as you please
but you flinch from their touch
They limp when they’re trying to follow
and you’re their one crutch
Out there on the deck you're their captain
It's simple as such

'Cause you never sought
anything like command
But you took it when
destiny touched your hand
Did you misunderstand?
Are you sailing for land?

And the faithful who love you to death
they're the ones whom you led
Gave them weapons and wonder
and magic and music instead
You think that they're listening
but they don’t hear a word that you said
Never saw you go missing and
didn’t much care where you fled

'Cause they want to sit back
and be all spoon-fed
And you were the prophet
that brought them bread
Did you get in their head?
Do they know how you bled?

{bridge}

So they bought what you sold them
and never considered the price
They bet on you sober or stoned
every roll of the dice
Perception's the name of this game
Never think to think twice
Write it up on the scoreboard of being
The great sacrifice

'Cause bread's not enough
when a hungry heart
is starving for something
that's more than art
Did you ever take part?
If you never did start?


---Turk Wayland, for Lionheart



© 2007 Patricia Kennealy Morrison for Lizard Queen Music