Overheard at the Counter: Brokeback Oklahoma!

Lucky Moran: Hear me out!  Rogers and Hammerstein's "Oklahoma!" ... only reworked in "Brokeback Mountain" style!

Neill Carter: That fookin' nuts.

Lucky: No it's not!  It'll be a hit.

John Steppenwolf: So the Farmer and the Cowman are not only friends, they're now lovers?

Lucky: With their own grow and dispensary!

Otis Redwing: Won't work unless over half the cast is PoC.

Lucky: Way ahead of you!  At least two characters will be trans.

Neill:  Definite hit.

 

Overheard at Booth 5: Eyedrops

It wasn't that Beatrice didn't love Dante; it was just that she couldn't stand him anymore.

Especially his nightly routine, just before bed.  GOD! it was insufferable.  Year after year, the same routine!  9:15pm, sharp, and Dante was at his sink: floss first, then gargle with hydrogen peroxide, then brush - each tooth, exactly 30 seconds, then the water-pick, exactly 2 minutes (she used to time these things until she realized that the time frame never changed - ever!), and finally, after the second rinse with a mouthwash, the eyedrops.

It was the eyedrops that really got under her skin.  He would hold open one eye and then hold the dropper over his eye, at least 4 inches, and let the drop hang in the bottle for ten full seconds, before finally dropping into the eye.

Why did he do that?  Why hold it so high?  Why wait exactly TEN seconds?  Was he imagining the eyedrops to be some champion high diver? Did he think it was more effective that way?   Was he simply giving in to some sort of Obsessive Compulsive Disorder?  It was infuriating!

So, Beatrice smiled to herself the night she decided - finally! - to shake things up.   As Dante stood there, eyedrop suspended in time - the droplet exactly four inches above his waiting eyeball - she almost ALMOST called out to him to stop, not to do it ... but she didn't.

The droplet fell, and it was a gleeful, suspenseful eternity, watching that droplet fall, a droplet of pure hydrochloric acid.

  

Overheard at the Counter: Uvalde and the Church

During these past two days, we have heard many voices opining about the horror in Uvalde, TX, when, on Tuesday, 19 children around the ages of 9 and 10 and 2 adults were massacred by an 18 year old psychopath.   We have heard the politicians weigh in, local law enforcement, national law enforcement, the NRA, liberals and conservatives of all stripes, have all commented with their opinions.  News outlets have covered all angles, from details to debunking conspiracy theories to comparing this tragedy to past tragedies, etc etc.

One group that has been strangely silent is the Church.   And by "Church" I do not mean any specific church, I mean the body of believers of Jesus Christ, the lord and savior of humanity.  Apart from one black pastor praying at a vigil, I have heard no other representative of the Church speak to this tragedy.  Not the two pastors at the church I attend, not the leaders of any megachurches in nearby cities (Austin/Dallas/San Antonio/Houston), not the Southern Baptist Convention, nothing from the Episcopalians or Methodists.   Only the Pope, the head of the Catholic Church, has spoken out, saying that America needs to get its act together.

But for the Protestant faiths?  Eerie silence.

The silence is due to the fact that the church in America has been wholly usurped by the Conservative right wing, which values unfettered access to deadly firearms over the life of any innocent child.  The church knows who pays the bills to keep the lights on, and it sure ain't God Almighty.   It's the Republicans, die-hard believers in 'Murica.  

This shames Jesus Christ.

Romans 12:18 ... as far as it depends on you, live at peace with everyone.

Romans 12:15b ... mourn with those who mourn.

I could quote other passages, but these are the two important ones here.  Regardless of any person's belief about gun legislation, the Church MUST be clear and direct with its message:  we HAVE to preach a message that we ALL have to leave in PEACE with each other.  PEACE above all else.  We have to teach it day and night.  We have to tell our children and others' children and strangers that the only way for goodness and light in this world is NO VIOLENCE, EVER!

If we do not do that, we turn our backs on God.  And He will repay us for our betrayal.

For the second passages, the Church MUST reach out to the Uvalde survivors, and their families, and flood them with love and understanding, not with speeches or with platitudes, but just with the simplicity of BEING THERE, with them, in this need.

We must mourn with those who mourn. Weep with those who weep.  We must share their pain, we must show them the empathy that our Lord Jesus Christ demonstrated to us by His life and His sacrifice upon the Cross.

If we do not do this, we shame His holy name.  And we are not worthy to be called His followers.

There is no middle ground here.  This is not a time to be silent.  This is a time for the Church, the body of believers, the followers of Christ, to stand up and show strength and faith in Him, that we will resist violence, that we will comfort the afflicted (both victims of violence and those with the potential to commit violence), and that we will defy evil in all its forms and that we will overcome evil with good.

If we are not prepared to do that, then we should shut the doors of our church, hold ourselves silent, and never speak of Him again, because we will not be worthy to utter His glorious name.

Amen.

Overheard at Table 3: Quote by Gilbert Chesterton

 

"To love means loving the unlovable. To forgive means pardoning the unpardonable. Faith means believing the unbelievable. Hope means hoping when everything seems hopeless. "

— Gilbert Chesterton

Overheard at Table 2: Sunday PJs

Sunday PJs

Sunday PJs, we
lie together, side by side,
flannel thigh by flannel thigh, your
fingers, like tiny raindrops,
in the palm of my hand,

walking piano scales in your head,
this I know, and in this
still, quiet, silence,

if I move my head
just-so,

your music I
can
hear.

MR

2022-0509

Inspired by a piano piece of the same name.

Overheard at Table 1: So You Love Liberal Tears

So You Love Liberal Tears

 

So you love Liberal tears, do you?

Good.
 
Glad you do.
 
Because those tears, that you mock, holding your pinky high 
are shed for every trans-kid who takes two dozen
kicks to the stomach, and is left
broken-nosed
on the cold tile 
of the junior high locker room,
 
for every toddler at the desert border,
pulled away from its mother by a man
in body armor, stuffed in the back
of a van and
driven away, screaming,
until the echoes die in the night,

for every Native American woman
raped and killed, body tossed like 
garbage into some drainage ditch, 
whose name will be remembered only
on some manila folder, stuffed in the back
of some filing cabinet, of some state office,
where investigators flirt over coffee and donuts.

Those are the causes of the Liberal tears
that you so gleefully ridicule.
So, drink them deep,
and perhaps one day
they may soften that 
hard, dead, clay

that, once upon a time,
your mother thought was a soul.

 MR 

2022-0506

Overheard at the Counter: Why Bruce Springsteen's "Born to Run" is Not a 10/10 Album

Why Born to Run is not a 10/10 album.

First, let me start by saying what a 10/10 album is in my book:

Each song is great, and the track listing makes a greater unified whole (basically, the whole is greater than the sum of its parts).

Second, my approach to music in general is that it has to be both interesting AND melodic.

That said: let me go, song by song (and I’ve re-listened to this album just now to make sure it was all fresh in my ears).

Thunder Road – great song, piano start, with adding instruments build up.

But this effect was done much better by Stones on “Can’t Always Get” and by Bob Segar.  Guitars sound a bit too thin.   

Tenth Avenue Freeze-Out – got a nice groove, but this song sounds like it would be better if done by Steely Dan.   Vocals are annoying.

Night – Sounds like a Jim Steinman tune done sloppily.

Backstreets – Tempo too fast.  This song would be improved by slowing it down and making it darker.   Vocals still screechy.  

Born to Run – the hit tune from the album, and rightly so.  This is the track where the production and the performance all come together.   I would have added some acoustic guitars to fill out the mix, but that’s just me being a lifelong Who fan.

She’s the One – everything about this song has already been done in other songs on this same album.  This could have been cut from the whole disc.

Meeting Across the River – musicianship is great, and the production really works on this.  Again, though, his vocals make it sound somewhat ridiculous.  Should be more subdued, or even half-spoken (like Tom Waits)

Jungleland – Like Born to Run, this is one in which the production really works.   This is anthemic at its best.  Fun and over the top.  Great song.  (again, the Who fan in me just hears the Who in this song).

So … basically, I never said it was a horrible album.  Like my review of “Born in the USA” – the songs are solid: great lyrics, musical structure is sound.  The songs are great.  The issue is with the production.  Not every song needs to be hit with a sledgehammer.  A lot of Springsteen’s tunes get stronger whenever you strip them down to basic elements and slow the tempo.  If this was done on half the tracks, then the rockers (title track, Thunder Road, and Jungleland) would sound even better.