Obscure musical Lyric for the week of November 24, 2008

Good morning music fans. What a beautiful day it is out there, at least it was earlier this morning. I trust you had a good weekend. Mine was busy with many different opportunities. I attended the funeral for the brother of my best friend yesterday. His brother died too young and left a family that dearly loved him. Their faith assures them of where he is and at the same time they miss him greatly. Funerals usually bring me to a place of review, where I think about all that is important in my life and what is unnecessary.

The song this week is an old song, released in 1970 and apparently re-released in 2008 on itunes. The song is the title song from the album. The band is Canadian and delivered a mixed bag of instruments, but no bag pipes. One of the former (although some of them still tour and play together) band members wrote the music for the Lord of the Rings (LOTR) movies.

and everywhere we go we'll laugh and sing

I'll kiss you morning, noon and night

and all the universe will smile on us

cause they know that our love is finally right

I want to know the following:

The name of the band:
The name of the lead singer:
The name of the song (and album):
Who created the art work for the album cover:
The instrument played by the writer of the LOTR music:

Have a great week. In one month it will be Christmas eve. Next week I will begin my Christmas music trivia and will continue up to the week before Christmas, oh what fun it is to ride....................

Angry Dad

This might be the safest place to spew my anger at some of my daughters so called "friends". None of them read this and I doubt their parents do, however they shall still remain anonymous.

I have spent much time listening to my daughter speak and cry late saturday night about her "friends" who treated her with indignation most of the weekend while they were away at a Drama festival with her school drama class. She told me of them lying to her, so they would not have to drive her to the classes and giving rides to others. What hurt me the most was the fact that they kicked her while they thought she was asleep. One of them kicked her when they left the room and the other when they returned and then joked about kicking her while she could still hear them. 

Never mind that they carelessly spoke inaccuracies about her while in the bathroom and she just happened to be in one of the stalls crying. What amazes me most about this is the depth of my anger. To make matters worse, the parents of one of the girls are friends of ours and we all attend the same church. 

So what do I do? Do I speak with the girls? Do I speak with the parents? Do I treat them the way they treated my daughter?

I have more recently written about being a Christian. I have learned that you can't be just a little bit Christian. Kinda like being a "little bit pregnant". I need to either believe what I believe and be sold out, or not believe at all. I can't just take the parts I like and apply them and leave out the parts that don't fit right now. I can't accept that "God is Love" and not accept that God requires me to forgive. I also have to accept that He will judge the living and the dead. It's all in, or fold. I can't fold I have to be all in.

That means that I have to turn the other cheek, I have to forgive these girls and I have to be an example for my daughter. So to B. and S. I forgive you. I will hold no grudge against you. I trust the loving, forgiving and judging God to assess your behaviour and to deal with you as He would deal with me if I did not forgive you.

I will sleep well tonight.

The big reveal for the week of Nov.17/08

It's Friday and it's cold out there. It was cold in the car this morning and I park it in the garage. Oh well, I can't change the weather, so might as well revel in the fact that it's not permanent, global cooling would certainly rock some self appointed experts, wouldn't it? I am also going to Cuba in less than two months, so I think lovingly and often of those white sandy beaches and the warm sunshine and that keeps me warm and toasty.

Quite a few of you got the "clues" from the original post this week. I'll measure my "words with an eyedropper" (that's for burger boy) next week. The more I listened to the music, the more I enjoyed it. I might even buy the album. The nice thing is you can listen to it from the album's website, a nice touch I say.

Here are your answers for this week:

The song: Killing the Blues.

The album: Raising Sand.

The singers: Alison Krauss and Robert Plant.

The writer: Rowland Salley

I hope you enjoyed this weeks venture into some mixed music. I continue to really appreciate some different styles of music and the skills of the professionals who write, play, sing and perform these tunes. The winners this week were Lori S. and Gary D. who both had most of the correct info.

Have an awesome weekend, find a way to stay warm, cosy up somewhere with a book, a fire and something warm or cool to sip. Don't forget to play some wonderful music that will take you away to places unknown except to you and make a pilgrimage to that special place that only you go to.

"Music has charms to soothe the savage beast, to soften rocks or bend a knotted oak"

Sleepless in Elmira

No Meg Ryan and no Tom Hanks here. "I'll have what she's having", I know it's a different movie, but what a great line. 

The last two nights have had me waking up at around 1:00 a.m. only to fall back asleep between 3:30 and 4:00. I then get up at 5:30 a.m. to start my day, so the last two nights have been a little rough. I have been laying there thinking, singing(to myself), praying and doing who knows what to try and determine why I am awake and have no idea. There's a lot going on these days, but I'm not worried about anything. 

I unfortunately have also woken up my beloved on both occasions and that doesn't help her accomplish much during the day. Oh she gets everything done., she's just as done in at 5:oo p.m. as I am. I'll have to do some serious analyzing to figure out what is going on here. Rest is a weapon in the battle that we are participating in and I need some extra weapons these days. 

Tuesday Musings (#11)

It's Tuesday, time for a dose of what is keeping me awake and won't leave my mind. I was literally kept awake last night from 12:55 a.m. until about 4:00 or so and I am really struggling with some things.

One of them is death. I made a glib comment last Friday night(Date Night) to my beloved about a song that was playing on the ipod as one of the songs that I want played at my funeral. I watched as tears flowed down her cheeks at my lack of sensitivity to what would be a great loss for her. We are currently watching and waiting as the brother of our closest friends (the carpenter and the bonnet babe) moves closer to eternity. It really upset my beloved that I was talking about my own eventual promotion. Death really sucks. It is usually associated with some tragic accident happening or the eventual loss of ones parents who we have been with us all our life. From a corporeal perspective, death is the end. It means goodbye, or maybe even no chance for goodbye as was the circumstance 7 1/2 months ago. It leaves us with a bad taste, tears and gut wrenching loss. It leaves us many questions, rarely answered.

Death from a Christian perspective leaves us with some joy. Paul writes in his letter to the Thessalonians, "we sorrow not like those who have no hope". That is the lot of the Christian, we have hope. And the hope referred to here is not like hoping for a particular birthday gift that may or may not come, hope here refers to the knowledge that something will happen and an assurance that it will occur.

Death sucks that's for sure, it separates us from those we love. The cause and/or reason for death also sucks, but, there is hope. The hope that we will be reunited one day in a far better place where there will be no dying, no death, no tears and no pain. If that's what kept me up last night, then I will enjoy the waking hours today because it really is a happy Tuesday, no matter what.

Happy Tuesday everyone.

obscure Musical Lyric for the week of Nov.17/08

Good Monday morning music fans (talk about 3M). Well the snow came and I don't think it's leaving for a while. It sure was pretty on Saturday night just watching the flakes fall. On Sunday morning, my beloved made breakfast before church and used the Christmas dishes, just for fun. Ya gotta have fun, I say.

The song I have chosen this week was one of the top one hundred (100) songs from 2007 as chosen by Rolling Stone. Yep, this is a relatively current song. It is sung by quite a contrasting pair of individuals, one of whom is considerably older than the other. I have rarely listened to one of them and have listened to the other one much more back in the day.

Now I'm guilty of something

I hope you never do

because there is nothing

any sadder than losing yourself in love

The hints are pretty tough this week. They are a "new duo" and have been touring and singing together for the last year. They came from significantly different musical roots, are from different places and have a large age gap.

I would like to know the following:

The name of the song:
The name of the album:
The singers:
The writer of the song:

Have an awesome week, I have a very busy week but will try to get some additional hints to you on Wednesday. Enjoy the snow, at least it looks pretty and most people who suffer from allergies, don't have to suffer right now. There's a silver lining to every snow cloud.

Community

I have the privilege to participate in multiple communities. I like to think of my grouping of activities as communities. Most of us have them and maybe we don't call them different communities,  but from my side of the keyboard, that's what I call them.

One of the communities that I really enjoy is the small group that I meet with every Thursday evening. It is a faith based community and was created by several returning members and some new members. It's a great mix of young (early 20's all the way up to me, early 50's) and not so young. I think I am the oldest. Some of us have children and there are some who have not yet had the pleasure of children in their lives. We come from diverse backgrounds, most are Canadian born, although two of us are imports. We are in different stages of life based on age, occupation and age of children(or none).

We are working through a study aptly entitled; "Community: your path to progress". We have one more week to go on the study and then we'll celebrate our "progress" on American Thanksgiving. Why do we do all this? The assumption is that we all wish to make spiritual progress, that's why we chose to participate in this type of community. The book proposes that in order to do that we need other people in our lives walking beside us.

I have grown to really appreciate each and every member of our community. I appreciate that every member makes the community a priority and we all share in the hosting and of course the snacks.  Next week is our last "study" and then the celebration. I am planning on something different for next week to encourage the community.

We have suggested that we would like to lead another group in the new year and are looking at a book entitled "Love and Respect" as the basis for the study. We'll see who wants to stay with us come January 2009. 

The big reveal for the week of Nov.10/08

Friday is here. Enjoy this last day of work before the weekend arrives. Of course, then enjoy the weekend. I'm looking forward to Friday evening. I'm hoping to cook something special for "my beloved" and myself and enjoy a glass or two of some fruit of the vine. It's been quite an interesting week for me. We have had multiple birthday celebrations as well as some "accidental" moments. Not much more than some spasms to show for it, I'll get through it.

I had only one reply to this weeks song and that person got some of the information correct. I even stumped all of the regular guessers. I suppose that this was tough, maybe the mixing of the verses together helped, or maybe you are bored. Anyway, the trivia will continue, I'll bring it into the '90's or closer for the next few weeks and then wait 'til you see what's planned for the Christmas season.

Here are the answers(Lori S. got #2 and #3):

1. who released the song in 1972? The Chi Lites.
2. who released the song in 1990? Paul Young.
3. the name of the song? Oh Girl.
4. the writer of the song? Eugene Record.
5. the name of the 1972 album? A Lonely Man.



Have a great weekend, enjoy whatever weather arrives. Spend some time with family and friends. Take some time to thank someone for just being themselves. Perform an act of random kindness and if someone is kind to you, pass it on.

" As long as we live, there is never enough singing"

Trying to learn patience

I asked for the gift of patience, it is a gift right? I would dare not say it is a curse, so it must be a gift. As noted previously, we are having some renovations completed in our house. Almost all are cosmetic and almost all require the room or rooms to be unavailable for some time.

What this means to me as I try to exist here and never mind try to work is that there is very little space to do stuff and the space that is available is full of stuff from other rooms that are unavailable. This is not a complaint, I am not being negative, I just have a hard time seeing into the future(my crystal ball broke yesterday). I think I can imagine what it's all going to look like at the end, at this time it's the journey to that point that I'm having some trouble with.

And that's where the patience comes in. The lack of privacy and the inability to use the little room that I have is teaching me patience. How many times have I used the analogy (it is an analogy right?) of the journey being more important that the destination? I suppose that the request that God gives me patience really does give Him the opportunity to teach me patience, doesn't it? Thanks Alan for that kernel of wisdom.

Oh well, I've just had a sermon from the carpenter (not That one, the one named Steve) about looking to the finished product and not the pieces of the journey. I think I get it, I just hate it when the words I use so glibly to placate the concerns of others come back to bite me in the end. That'll learn me, won't it?

Thanks for reading and listening and more importantly for praying, I need all of them right now.

 

I want to dream again

I like to listen to my ipod often (ok pretty much all the time). It's usually on at my desk and in the car and whenever I am on the computer at home something is playing. I love music and almost all kinds, but don't tell my kids, I have even begun to enjoy some contemporary country music.

I'm currently listening to "Once Chance" by Paul Potts. He won the "Britain's got Talent" competition a year or so ago. His life story was one of being bullied because he liked to sing and for other reasons. He's almost like a Mr. Tanner of sorts, except the critics liked him and he kept singing. What strikes me most is that he doesn't meet the pretty boy image that most people want and yet he won and he's good. Watch the following from one of his performances from "BGT". In the midst of all that is wrong with the world, someone like Paul comes out and blesses and encourages just by being himself.




Every time I watch this, I get tears in my eyes Even the normally caustic Simon Cowell is taken aback by the sheer joy of this man when he is singing.

This is not new, it is however a reminder that we need to dream and go for it. It is also the answer to bullies out there and there are lots: physical, emotional, verbal, spiritual and other kinds. The answer is this, you bullies will never win. Because inside the heart of a bully is a scared person afraid to show their own weaknesses for fear of being observed for your reality. Inside the heart of the one being bullied remains a tiny fire that when given enough oxygen will flame into brightness and expose the wrong for what it is.

Congratulations to Paul Potts for persevering. We are all called to persevere no matter what kind of pressure is placed upon us. Some day we will stand in triumph over the "bullies" of this world.

I will dream again.