brainsplotch

This is my final post of 2023. I woke up this morning still despondent over the Detroit Lions' heartbreaking (and highly controversial) loss to the [fucking] Dallas Cowboys. Still, I managed to scrape myself out of bed and face the world. After watching CBS Sunday Morning--a ubiquitous weekly activity--I went outside for a four(ish) mile walk to get as close to 10,000 steps as possible. As of this morning, I still needed about 8,000 steps to hit my 10,000 step per day average for the month of December. (Yes, I obsess over this stuff if you hadn't noticed). Sadly, I will not finish with as many steps or miles as 2022, but I am blaming that on one big FitBit equipment malfunction I had while in DC during SuburbsFest. I also came up short on steps two weeks ago during the particularly trying several days I went through with my mom's illness. (She is--fingers crossed--on the mend). When my exercise was over, we all piled in the Kia Telluride and drove out to tiny Metamora for a...

Following up on my Simple Minds post, I'm not even sure I can remember where I was going with that.  I had several of those albums (with the exception of Sons and Fascination and Street Fighting Years ) on vinyl, but I don't get the chance to listen to my vinyl as much as I'd like, and vinyl is not portable. As has been established in this blog, I don't like streaming in the car and really don't stream much music unless I am bored with podcasts, need some inspiration, or want to sample some music. It has been fun hearing this music on CD, and I now have heard Street Fighting Years (the 1989 follow-up to Once Upon a Time ) for the first time ever. It only took me 34 years. The album flies in the face of Once Upon a Time , as the band ventures into more subdued, almost jazzy, almost bluesy, almost prog-y directions and Jim Kerr eliminates the more bombastic, arena-ready vocals of OUaT and even Sparkle in the Rain . It's easy to see why the album didn't sell w...

I actually will get back to that Simple Minds post at some point--maybe this weekend. No promises, but I will try. I also realize that I promised to list my Spotify Top Five podcasts from the previous few years. I haven't forgotten about that.   Tonight, I decided to watch the movie Saltburn, which is now streaming on Amazon Prime. It could probably be subtitled "The Talented Mr. Quick" due to its similarity to The Talented Mr. Ripley . Barry Keoghan plays Oliver Quick, an awkward Oxford student who wants desperately to fit in with the uppercrust students. He becomes infatuated with the handsome, confident, and filthy rich Felix Catton (Jacob Elordi, of Euphoria). Eventually, Oliver and Felix become friends, culminating in Felix inviting Oliver to spend the summer with Felix and his eccentric family at the Catton's enormous English estate. Felix's parents are played brilliantly by Richard E. Grant and Rosamund Pike. As soon as Oliver arrives at Felix...

I am at home on the couch watching older son commandeer the television, which is fine because there is nothing I really want to watch anyway. I think we will have anime and funny YouTube videos in our future.  We are watching a compilation of real-life car accidents taken from dash cams--more like "fender benders" that people walk away from, and nothing catastrophic or fatal. In a weird way, these are actually quite fascinating to see. It's shocking to see how terrible some of these drivers are. I am happy to report I have started reading Absolute Beginners again, as I promised I would. I hope to finish it by New Year's Eve. I want to get just one more book into my "books read in 2023."  My four-day weekend concludes today, but I think I can handle a three-day work week. It should be pretty "chill" at work, and there doesn't appear to be any bad weather that will disrupt driving. Smooth sailing [knock on wood] to my NEXT four-day weekend that ...

I am at another family holiday thing watching family members unwrap Christmas presents. There are many, many gifts, so this might be awhile. I am sipping a bourbon on the rocks as I spectate. We saw the 2023 musical version of The Color Purple earlier and it was good, much better than I expected. I am not sure if it will make my top ten of the year, but it should make top fifteen.

I will have to put "part 2" of the Simple Minds post on hold. We just returned from our annual Frankenmuth Bavarian Inn bacchanalia. Unfortunately, for reasons touched upon here, my parents couldn't join us. I hope that next year, fingers crossed, we'll all be in good health. So now we head off to "Christmas Eve, round 2" with the other side of the family. I will get back with you tomorrow.

I recently acquired this "Classic Album Series" collection of the band Simple Minds. During this tough week, Simple Minds was my soundtrack during my drives between Lansing, Owosso, and Flint. I started from the arty, decidedly non-poppy, Roxy Music/Krautrock-inspired Sons and Fascination , into the ever-so-slightly bouncier New Gold Dream 81 82 83 84 , on to the even tighter Sparkle In the Rain , and then the post-"Don't You Forget About Me" blockbuster LP Once Upon a Time . Once Upon a Time features the hits "Alive and Kicking," "Sanctify Yourself," and "All the Things She Said." (The collection also includes the band's 1989 album Street Fighting Years , but I haven't gotten to that one yet). I wish I could say I was "cool" and was on board with Simple Minds pre-"Don't You Forget About Me," but that would be a lie. I didn't know who they were until that song became a hit in summer 1...

The "ugly Christmas sweater" post I promised you:

The "post-a-day in December" attempt will not happen. This week has been a doozy, with my mom having a health scare that landed her in the hospital on Monday. It was quite scary for a few days, but I am happy to report she is on the mend. Here is a lesson for the uninformed (as we were until recently): urinary tract infections, particularly in older folks, are serious business. We found out the hard way. Maybe later I will go into more detail. Suffice it to say the last few days have involved a lot of driving back and forth to the hospital. I am writing to you, my adoring audience of maybe a half-dozen, from I-96 on the way to pick up older son from the airport. We are looking forward to seeing him.

I don't have much to update today other than I finished the Daniel Clowes book, but was too tired to start any other books tonight. I am sure I will have much more to write about in the coming days. Tonight, I'm must too tired to write anything of substance.

Remember when I said I would pick up Absolute Beginners ? I lied. Okay, I didn't really lie. I fully intended on resuming with Absolute Beginners ...but on Friday, my library hold for Daniel Clowes' new book, Monica , came in; and my hold for a short story collection by Michigan author RS Deeren's short story collection, Enough to Lose . I generally try to read anything Daniel Clowes publishes, since he is my favorite cartoonist/comix artist/comix author/graphic novel person. So, I am reading yet another graphic novel. I have to get over my constant downplaying of graphic novels/comix. I do love them, but there is a part of me that snobbily and unfairly doesn't quite consider them "real" books. (Yet, as I said, I enjoy them quite a bit and have to get over this notion that they are somehow "less important" than non-illustrated books). I am about 2/3 of the way through Monica and then should at least try the Deeren book to see if I like it. He's ...

This morning, I did something I have never done before: I ordered an "ugly Christmas sweater," or more accurately, a "silly Christmas sweater." When it arrives, I will reveal the design and theme here. It should arrive by Tuesday.  If I had thought about getting a silly Christmas sweater earlier, I would have opted for either a Black Sabbath-themed one or one with a pentagram and the phrase "Hail Santa." Unfortunately, neither one would arrive before Christmas unless I shelled out some exhorbitant shipping price, so I decided against those. Maybe next year. I will probably have to write a reminder in my calendar for December 1, 2024 with the note, "you are probably not feeling Xmas spirit now, but order your Xmas sweater anyway." Younger son has commandeered the television, so we have jumped from a Hallmark Christmas movie on PlutoTV to some show about an airliner crash. In any case, L. and I will be heading out soon to see the new movie, Wonka. ...

The Christmas tree is up and decorated, and that is nice. Michigan State basketball rose from the ashes today and beat undefeated and 6th ranked Baylor in convincing fashion, and that is nice. The Detroit Lions shook off the doldrums and throttled the Denver Broncos, 42-17, and THAT is nice. So plenty of nice things happened today. In other news, I knocked out a five-kilometer run, which I did DURING the Michigan State basketball game because I was convinced I would jinx them if I rushed home and watched the game on television. I needed to get out there and get exercise anyway. If the weather is reasonably decent and there is sunlight, I absolutely have to get outside and take advantage of it. I did, however, watch the entire Lions game, which caused me a little bit of stress because I'm not used to the Lions playing meaningful games this late in the season. They are usually hopelessly irrelevant by this time of the year. Thankfully, this is not the case this season. With that, I w...

I successfully procured a new debit card, so here's hoping I can keep it "uncorrupted" for a while. Tonight was essentially a glass of red wine, curry chicken, naan, samosa, and then one of the silliest teen comedies I have seen in awhile, Bottoms. It is like a combination of Superbad, Booksmart, and Fight Club . Quite fun if also completely ridiculous. In short, a perfect movie for a Friday night when your brain is fried. This morning, I played The White Stripes' Elephant on the way to work and on the way hoe. How is it that the album was released twenty years ago? I already felt a little old in 2003. The album was a breath of fresh air then, after I hadn't been paying much attention to new music between 2001 and 2003. I was only vaguely familiar with The White Stripes in '03, even though they were from Detroit. That's how out if it I was.  Not sure what point I'm trying to make, other than Elephant has held up well, and of course "Seven Nation...

In today's excitement, I discovered my debit card has become corrupted yet again, so I need to get a new debit card for the second time in less than a year. Yippee! I was home alone this evening, which meant it was "watch a weird movie" night. So after I had finished dealing with all the debit card bullshit (I STILL don't have a new card--gotta do that either tomorrow or Saturday), I watched the "experimental horror" movie Skinamarink. How do I describe this flick? It was made on a shoestring $15,000 budget, and is more eerie than scary. It plays like a fever dream one might have when one is sick. The film is comprised of mainly static images on incredibly grainy film stock. As far as plot, it is basically about two young children who are left alone at home during the night--or are they? It's hard to tell what exactly is going on. Are the kids imagining this? Is one of the kids imagining this? Is there a demon that is inhabiting the house? We do see ghos...

 All we did tonight was watch the new episodes of Slow Horses and Fargo , and I could barely keep my eyes open during Fargo. Next reading, must finally finish Absolute Beginners .

Last night, when I was griping about writing in the blog, I was taking a short break from finishing this book, 1964: Eyes of the Storm , by Paul McCartney (with a great introductory essay by Harvard history professor Jill Lepore). The book features a treasure trove of photographs taken by McCartney in late 1963 and early 1964, none of which had been published before, and in fact had been in storage for decades. These candid photos of the Beatles and their entourage (Brian Epstein, George Martin, Mal Evans, Neil Aspinall, Cynthia Lennon, and others) document Beatlemania as it was exploding and taking the world by storm. As I said, Jill Lepore's accompanying essay is excellent, as she places the Beatles in historical context by discussing many of the world events of '63 and '64 (Kennedy assassination, Civil Rights Act, Freedom Summer, Barry Goldwater and the Republican National Convention) and how the Beatles fit in. Of course, the photos are the real selling poin...

I am reading right now, so this will just be a short break to get my requisite post in. I will fill you in later on what I am reading, as I will have likely finished it by then.  I have only 15 minutes to get this out there before midnight. As you can see, I am taking this "post a day" challenge seriously. Unfortunately, the upshot of this dedication is that half these post are utter crap. Maybe the crappy ones are more entertaining, though? Or maybe they're just...crap. I'll let you be the judge. Okay, let me return to my book. Goodnight!

We bought a Christmas tree today, and maybe by tomorrow we'll actually set it up in the living room. The actual process of getting the tree was so exhausting that we had little energy by the time we got home. (I am being just slightly tongue-in-cheek). Aside from the tree acquisition, I didn't do too much today. I participated in a two-hour Rockin' the Suburbs podcast recording, then we talked to Avery on a video chat, and THEN went to get the tree. After that, I must admit, I vegged out in front of the TV. I probably should have gone outside to get some steps in, but the damp coldness was uninviting. As soon as I complete this little post, I will try to get in some steps in the house before bedtime.

I finished by second consecutive graphic novel today, Strikers . If this book hadn't been so damned fun to read, I probably would not have mentioned it here. As I mentioned before, it's about a rag-tag youth hockey team (called "the Strikers") in Flint and takes place between the autumn of 1986 and winter of 1987. The historical and geographic detail is fairly impeccable, and mentions of IMA Sports Arena, the International Hockey League (IHL), the Flint Generals, the Flint Spirits, Carman-Ainsworth, and Lake Fenton (to name a few) were simply word candy for me. (To top if off, one of the fictional characters is said to have received a track & field scholarship to Michigan State). Ostensibly, Strikers is aimed at children and youth readers, but there is plenty of humor that likely goes over kids' heads. For example, at one point in the book, the kids on the Strikers team go to IMA Sports Arena to see a Flint Spirits IHL game. The adult chaperone, w...

I damned near forget to do this. It's 11:17 PM and I have a dog on my left and a cat purring in my face. Now he's licking my hand. I'm afraid this will be a nothingburger of a post. My only accomplishment of note today was reattaching a coat rack to the wall. Here's hoping the new drywall anchors do their job. Then we concluded the evening by watching season 3, episode 3 of Slow Horses. It is a damned good TV show.  I also read a bit of Strikers. Should finish it soon.

I got my 10,000 steps in and just flossed and brushed my teeth, so writing in here is my final "chore" before crashing in an hour or two. We made our annual trip to the Christmas lights at the Potter Park Zoo. It was fine. I don't get overly excited about it and eventually get bored and cold and ready to leave after about an hour. My attitude is generally, "yep, there's some lights...and there's some more lights. Yep, they're shiny and bright...okay, let's go home now." I will say that the spider monkeys 🐒 in their enclosure were pretty damned entertaining, perhaps more than the Christmas lights. (Overheard one grade school-age kid say, "Is that monkey eating...poop?!?").  Yes, I know my blase attitude about the Christmas lights must sound like a combination of Scrooge and the Grinch. I started reading yet another graphic novel. Lest you think I'm regressing mentally reading all these glorified comic books, ...

The big excitement today is that I bought tickets for Echo & the Bunnymen's May 25, 2024 concert in Detroit. So now I have something to shoot for as I/we endure the dark, gloomy, snowy winter months. After reading the first two volumes of Will Sergeant's memoirs, and finally--for all intents and purposes--completing the EATB discography within the last few years, there was no way I was NOT getting tickets for this tour. It doesn't matter to me that, at this point, it's only Ian McCulloch and Will and they haven't released an album of new material since 2014 (the album Meteorites). The only time I've seen EATB was summer 2017 at Pine Knob when they co-headlined with Violent Femmes. (I wrote a little bit about that show in this blog). Though it seemed most in the crowd that night were there for Violent Femmes, I was definitely there primarily for Echo. Every so often, the subject of the now legendary 1987 Echo/Gene Loves Jezebel/New Order tour is mentioned. A ...

I went for a run and darned near froze my ass off. Honestly, the older I get, the less I can tolerate Michigan winters, even when it's not that cold and not even technically winter. It's late and I am exhausted, so I am wrapping this up. I might return later.

I whipped through a non-fiction graphic novel about the Velvet Underground called All Tomorrow's Parties: the Velvet Underground Story . The author is Koren Shadmi. The book came through my department at the library about a month ago and I thought it looked like a fun read, and it was. Nothing earth-shattering, but a breezy read. My only complaint--and this is a complaint I have with most books--is the editing and proofreading should have been better, I noticed several spelling errors and some minor factual inaccuracies. Otherwise, the book was well done. The illustrations of the VU and the other characters are generally accurate, though Lou Reed's appearance occasionally borders on caricature, with an abnormally high forehead and rectangular head. But these are minor quibbles. If you're a fan of the Velvet Underground, you'll be entertained by this book. The book focuses on the contentious relationship between Lou Reed and John Cale, and doesn't cover much beyond t...

It is a rainy, drizzly, overcast day here in Meridian Township, Michigan. Thankfully, it's not too cold. Don't get me wrong, there is definitely a damp chill in the air, but it's at least above freezing. (My phone says it's 39 degrees). Our gutters were jam packed with leaves, branches, and muck. Who knows if the weather will ever get any better than it is today, and the next few weeks might be packed with Christmas-y preparations, so today seemed the best opportunity to clean them out. It's not a job I particularly love, especially when my hands practically freeze grabbing the muck out of the gutters, even when said hands are covered with garden gloves. I plugged away at the job, with a few podcasts as entertainment, and finished it this afternoon. I have to say that when the down spouts are unplugged and I hear that "flushing toilet" sound, it does give me incredible satisfaction. After the gutters were finished, I broke down some of our kajillion cardbo...

Another December tradition is annoying the living hell out of everyone on social media with ones "Spotify Wrapped" results (if one listens to music or podcasts on Spotify).  With the death of Stitcher, and the irritation that is Amazon music, I have moved most of my streaming listens to Spotify. And yes, I know that Spotify is yet another evil empire that we aren't supposed to like or support. I know that Spotify is problematic and that it pays musicians a pittance. I don't like that at all. But when I'm at work, I have to stave off boredom by streaming music and podcasts. I also enjoy listening to podcasts while walking or running. It feels like I'm eavesdropping on someone else's fascinating conversations and keeps my mind active while I'm either freezing, sweating, or dodging potholes in the pavement and cars on the street. I also don't pay for a Spotify subscription, so I just put up with the advertisements that run every 20 or 30 minutes durin...

It's December 1, which means it's time for the "31 Blog Posts of December Challenge." (By the way, there is no "challenge," it's just something I made up, like, just now. I did it last year, so why not try again. So right now, I am watching the NBC Nightly News (yippee--more horrible scenes from Israel) and poured myself a Friday night glass of wine. This morning, I took a break from Guadalcanal Diary and popped Depeche Mode's Memento Mori into the Mazda CX-5 CD player. "My Favourite Stranger," in particular, made a perfect soundtrack for dark, gloomy, rainy, grey 7:45 AM Lansing. The ominous foreboding sound of that song suited the morning perfectly. No sooner do I decide to write in here than the dog has decided to trot around the house with this yellow duck "baby" and cry incessantly. It's sort of his evening tradition. As best as I can tell from reading about dog behavior, he is looking for a place to bury the duck, as if ...

 I was in Austin, Texas in late October and visited the great Waterloo Records, which is one of the best record stores I have ever visited. While I was there, I barely made it past the used CD section. I bought Meat Puppets' Monsters , The Lemonheads' Lovey , Guadalcanal Diary's 2x4 , Bob Mould's Workbook , 10,000 Maniacs' The Wishing Chair , and Sloan's Pretty Together . When I was able to venture beyond the used CDs, I found The Rolling Stones new album Hackney Diamonds (which I had not been able to find in Lansing), and Alejandro Escovedo's A Man Under the Influence . All of these albums have been on heavy rotation in my car the last few weeks since we returned.  I suppose my favorite of the eight--so far--is the Guadalcanal Diary album. I've written about GD in here before and I love that band. Superficially, they are R.E.M.-like, but lead singer/songwriter Murray Attaway comes off as way more agitated than Michael Stipe (and Attaway...

On September 28, I flew to Washington, DC for SuburbsFest, my first "fest" since 2021, when I attended the very first one, which was also in "the DMV." I'd been experiencing some serious "FOMO" looking at all the social media posts about subsequent SuburbsFests and was particularly despondent about not being able to attend the Louisville fest in the summer. (We flew to Europe the next weekend, so there really is no way I could have made it to Louisville). The first day's festivities were in the Brookland section of Washington at The Runaway. Wingtip Sloat, Dear Daria, and Airport 77s performed. "The Sloat" features RTS co-host Patrick Foster and at this point only perform live a few times a year. I'm not sure how to describe them. Noisy and fun?  Dear Daria harkens back to '90s indie rock, with a band name that is a nod to the MTV animated show Daria. Airport 77s is a high energy band with three guys who all dress like airline pil...

I have been sadly, pathetically negligent of this blog for the last (almost) three months. I fully intended to get to this during the day either yesterday or today, but now am only getting to this late Sunday night on my phone. I have had a busy few months, starting with SuburbsFest (Washington, DC/Silver Spring, MD) in late September/early October, a trip to Austin, Texas and again to DC in late October/early November. I also went to three concerts (Brandi Carlile in September, Mudhoney in October, and Depeche Mode in November). All of this is icing on the cake for what has been a busy 2023 full of travel and concerts. I am ready to pack it in for the rest of the year and have a calm December. I want to go back and recount these adventures in more detail.

Aside from Waterloo Station and Waterloo Bridge, my only other "must do" in London was Abbey Road Studios and the most famous zebra crossing in the world. I need to write this now before I forget important details. On Wednesday morning, August 23, L..and I set off at about 8 AM to the Westminster Underground station to take the tube to the St. John's Wood station, a trip of about 20 minutes (about ten minutes to walk to the station and ten minutes on the train). When we disembarked at St. John's Wood, I was immediately reminded of the Rolling Stones song "Play With Fire," with its heiress who owns a block in St. John's Wood. As it turns out, much of St. John's Wood--or at least Acacia Road--is a rather toney and quiet neighborhood of large (by London standards) houses. We made our way down leafy, quiet Acacia Road until we reached the intersection of Abbey Road, at which point we turned and continued walking for a few blocks into an area ...

We were in London for about 5 1/2 days and I feel like I/we just scratched the surface. (L. was here in 1999 for about two weeks--give or take, so she'd seen more). I wanted to see a Premier League football ground "in the flesh," or should I say, "in the brick." There are none in central London: none in Westminster, none in Soho, none by Waterloo. By the time I felt comfortable enough navigating the Underground, I ran out of time. I thought about getting up insanely early on Thursday and taking the tube from St. James's Park to the Fulham Broadway stop in Fulham to see venerable Craven Cottage, a small ancient ground that intrigued me when I watched Fulham play a match on television last year. Thursday was also the day we'd planned to go to Kew Gardens, which is way out in Richmond about as far as one can get on the Underground heading west (unless one's destination is Heathrow). I knew that if I arrived back late from Fulham and held up our trip to ...

[In the Leipzig Marriott]. Back to London: So, as I was saying, the Tower of London was much larger and more extensive than I imagined. Honestly, I don't know that I ever gave it much thought before other than an ancient place that tourists were sort of required to visit. "Tower" seems a misnomer, for one thing. "Fortress of London" might be more accurate. I had no idea that it was comprised of so many buildings, and the moat surrounding it is impressive. (Kudos to the Tower administrators/governing body for planting beautiful wildflowers in the moat to promote a green environment). Before I go on to yet more blow-by-blow accounts of "things seen, places visited," I will take a step back and just mention fun or funny occurences that don't generally make the travelogue: I was walking down the street towards the St. James's Park Underground station when I saw this 30-something bloke rapidly approaching me from the other direction. His face was bu...

I've been neglectful with my travelogue, probably because after finally meeting "in person" for the first time, London and I had a torrid love affair and I had no time or energy to post. I think I left off with the National Gallery, et al. Some quick observations in the few mins I have until we board our plane to Frankfurt. (We are returning to Germany until Monday). The National Gallery was amazing. One of the best art museums I have ever been to.  The Tower of London is much much bigger and wide open than I expected. The history there is stunning. More later...

It's hard to believe we've only been in London since Saturday afternoon. We really have done so much that it seems longer than that. So far: British Museum, Kensington Palace, Tower of London, National Gallery. I walked early Monday morning and saw Westminster Abbey, Houses of Parliament, Big Ben, Scotland Yard, Waterloo Bridge, Waterloo Station, then stumbled into Drury Lane/Strand and some of the historic theatres there including the Lyceum. Just writing this makes me feel a bit guilty just sitting here at 7:44 AM and not seeing something right now, but I need a little recovery time.  I just wish we had more time here, but I suppose not enough time is better than no time at all.

The journey from Leipzig to London was an adventure, so much so that at times we weren't sure if we'd make our connecting flight from Munich to London, and even if we did, would we be able to get from Heathrow to our airbnb in Westminster. Well thankfully, it all worked out. It got a little hairy at times (we briefly thought we'd lost Calder in customs at Heathrow and I wondered how we'd explain that to his parents) but we DID find him and made it to our place. Our wonderful driver navigated the streets of London with aplomb. I ate my first British fish & chips last night at a place called the Barley Mow just a stone's throw from our flat. It at least "looked" like a "real pub" to this hayseed from the Midwest (though I must assume it gets its fair share of tourists, and being in Westminster likely lacks the grit of a genuine English pub). That said, it was good enough for me. I also had my first mushy peas (I liked them) and my first beer in...

Favorite t-shirts seen:  "Fuckstar" (worn by a teen girl on a school field trip at the Kunstmuseum). "Do I Look Like a Bitch?" with picture of Samuel L. Jackson from Pulp Fiction (worn by middle-aged dude at Leipzig airport). "Still Dedicated to Hardcore" (worn by musclebound, heavily tatted-up shaved head 30-something dude at Leipzig airport). Rolling Stones (?) t-shirt with just the word ROLLING with tongue and lips 💋 that loosely resembled Rolling Stones logo. (Worn by attractive* 20-something woman on train from Halle to Leipzig airport). *I hope it's not pervy or "male-gazey" of me to note she was attractive. The t-shirt intrigued me the most. We made it through security at the Leipzig "flughafen" and now await our "flugzeug" to "flug" to Munich, where we must quickly walk to our next "flugzeug" to London. Oh, Avery fashioned a necklace out of a spent WW2 shell that he found in Halle. He stuffed ...

[Sipping espresso in the hotel room]. We took a day trip to a hot, humid, sunsplashed Dresden yesterday to meet up with Nora, who was our "tour guide." We took a short little train ride to Leipzig, and the transferred to another train for the last hour or so to Dresden. Aside from being mesmerized by a fellow passenger who looked like a cross between 2023 versions of musician Paul Weller and actor Scott Glenn (silverhaired and wiry) it was a rather uneventful train trip. Nora met us at the Dresden hauptbahnhof and we ambled from the neustadt to the altstadt. (We really were not in the neustadt much at all in 2021). We came across an eccentric middle-aged German "herren" on a bicycle (this was on a pedestrian-only thoroughfare in the neustadt with shops and restaurants on either side. I will need to "google" it later. EDIT: Hauptstraße of the Neustadter Markthalle). The gentleman engaged me in conversation, raving about the greatness of the United States an...

There's a fellow on the train to Leipzig who looks like a combination of these two. (You just need to take my word for it).

(In the Halle train station [hauptbahnhof, I think that should permanently be part of my German lexicon]). Wednesday was a essentially a "recovery day" from Berlin. Avery and Calder seemed to want to spend time together, which was fine.  Lynda and I went out for a walk through sunny and humid Halle in the early afternoon. We sat down in Joliot-Currie-Platz where we saw a guy pick up a bottle, dip it in the fountain, and drink it. Almost made us physically ill watching it. Maybe he's immune to dirty fountain "wasser." We wandered a bit more and stumbled to B12 Musics again. (No, it was not planned, I swear). I found a CD compilation of the 1980s East German punk band Namenlos and the shop clerk--about my age--lit up. In his halting English (hey, better than my non-German-speaking ass) talked about the lead singer and how (if we got it right) someone he knew had been her "loverboy" (in his words). I couldn't catch everything he said, but he was excit...

Berlin was yesterday, and I don't know where to start with this one. I may need to scribble down some ideas and get back to it later. 

(On the train to Berlin). We got off to a late start yesterday, since Avery had to show a room in his apartment to a prospective renter. So after breakfast--I should mention how much I have enjoyed the buffet in our hotel, as it seems a perfect combination of what an American (or Brit) might enjoy as well as what I remember from eating at the Winge's house in Radebeul--we went back to our rooms where I promptly fell asleep for about an hour. Avery and Calder arrived at the hotel around 1:30 (or should I say 13:30) and headed out to too some shopping. (Though in truth it was more watching L.'s mom and a patient L. poke around shops while the rest of us stood around watching the crowds of people walking up Leipzigerstraße). I did find an oddball shop that sold a bit of everything: computer games, old magazines, and most pivotal: DDR relics. I bought a "7-year plan aktivist 1966" medal for a whopping 5€. I was happy with that find. We eventually made it to th...

Yesterday, all my troubles seemed so far away...because we went to the Beatles Museum right here in Halle! Yes, who'd have figured Halle, of all places, would have a museum dedicated to the Fab Four, but they do, and it's quite a place. Three floors of an unassuming former residence on Alter Markt, filled to the brim with every sort of Beatle memorabilia one could imagine, (and many one could NOT). The Beatles vinyl records on the East German Amigo label were my favorite items. They were apparently issued until 1965, when the GDR (DDR) government decided the Fabs were too subversive and had a bad influence on East German youth. After the Beatles Museum, the "kids" (Avery and his friend Calder, also visiting from Michigan) took all of us to the Handel Museum. Yes, that is Handel of "Handel's Messiah" fame. The museum is in the residence where the great composer and son of Halle lived as a youth. Now it is dedicated to his life and accomplishme...

I'm coming to you from my phone, so I apologize in advance for any typos. We just completed Day 1 of our European vacation.  We landed in Leipzig at about 8 AM Germany time, Friday morning. After a little trouble finding each other, we and Avery finally connected and traveled from the airport to Halle via a short bus trip to the train stop, then the train to the Halle train station. Literally as we disembarked from the train, we encountered a massive group of singing, beer-swilling, blue-and-white clad Hertha BSC football supporters as they were about to head in the opposite direction to their football match in Berlin. Welcome to Germany! We made our way, via tram, to our hotel (Dorint Charlottenhof) and checked into the one room that was ready at that early time. After fighting off sleep as much as possible but feeling quite groggy from being up for 24 hours straight, we finally headed out and walked around a quite toasty Halle. My immediate reaction was I liked the grit of Halle....

I recently watched Netflix's excellent documentary about Wham! (entitled simple Wham! ) and it had me reminiscing about my own relationship with George Michael and Wham! This is the part of the blog post where, as if I am at an Alcoholics Anonymous meeting, I bravely stand up and say, "My name is Mark, and I am a Wham! fan." This is also the part of the blog post where you might say, "Any hipster credibility this guy had is completely shot to hell. I'm done." If that is how you feel, I completely understand. But I must speak my truth, as the saying goes. My name is Mark, and I am a Wham! fan. It was probably the summer or early fall of 1984 that I first became aware of Wham! The song was "Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go," and, at first, I didn't like it at all. (I still wouldn't rank it near the top of my favorite Wham! songs, but it is an undeniable earworm). My mother, however, really liked the song. I suppose it reminded her of the 1960s Mot...

I saw two concerts in two days, which is a first for me. There was Sloan at Saint Andrew's Hall (Detroit) on June 22 and Yo La Tengo at Bell's Brewery on June 23. It was a live music marathon that truly tested my middle-aged stamina. As I may have mentioned in here already, my Sloan fandom was a slow burn until fairly recently, when I finally made the deep dive and wondered what the hell took me so long. I'd considered seeing Sloan on a few of their previous tours, but for whatever reason it never seemed to happen. This time, however, I was determined that I'd see them, and wanted to see them more than ever before. I've seen more concerts at venerable old Saint Andrew's Hall than any other venue, yet every time I drive down there, it always seems to be more of an "adventure" than it should be. After some glitchy Google maps navigation, and a few wrong turns, we pulled into our pre-paid parking garage a block over from Saint Andrew's. L. and I then ...