The Band - Atlantic City - 1994

Posting a link to a great one for Friday...
and the people of Atlantic City

For Levon, if you are anywhere near Woodstock, NY
go buy tickets to some great concerts coming up.
Click below...
Buy Levon tickets and merchandise in time for your favorite holiday of darkness and hope

Stick Season & Still Art

Stick Season, Vermont



&

Still Art

Who are you? The Gator, The Frog, the Cat or the Tractor?

King Crimson - I Talk to the Wind (1969) (HD)

Great video-music link on you tube...

Grandma’s Idol

 

Wallace Reid,

Famous actor of the ?20’s?

This is a tin my Grandma Fanny had.

It holds old sewing notions, needles, thread.

I have used this tin since “appropriating” it from Mom’s stuff.

Later she smiled as she told me of her Mother’s crush on Wallace Reid.

Privacy Matters

 

Privacy Matters

to you and to me,

and

not between you and me

and

the government.

 

It is natural for the

Government

to want to make it easier

to eavesdrop

innocently,

when it is just

for your own good?

 

Wait,

no, I told you,

it is wrong for a government

or other entity

to violate your

Privacy.

It matters.

Subroutine Girly Girl

Our "new" old cat is settling in,
though I am observing
Subroutines are not easy to create or re-create.

Girly Girl, as we now call her,
Is implacable at times, briefly inconsolable,
then it passes.
I remember that is how she was when she was Whitney,
When she lived here as a fledgling kitten.

I watch as she circles the edge of a room,
scanning,
eyes open,
taking it all in,
where are the things, other cats,
circle again.

We pet her as much as we can
and reassure her,
still she is not to be reassured except by herself.
She is all cat.

The subroutine, the new routine of Girly Girl
Is evolving as we speak.
She develops new areas of tolerance, daring to go a little farther each day.
Tommy is jealous and yet he too, is adjusting,
(having known her once as Whitney, his sister, 12 years ago)
now he is never quite accepting
of Girly Girl.

Les Paul's Trio featuring Nicki Parrott - Autumn Leaves - IridiumLive! 9...

Very Nice version from The Iridium Live...

Psalm Challenge 81

Psalm Challenge 81


We revelled in the sound of song, tambourine, harp, drums, lyre and horn.
A song we had never heard before, angelic, a celebration, satiety for our souls.

We searched for reasons, was it our fate, or a blind gift, a random act?
The song sang out an end to slavery, hunger, hatred, and sins against others.

There were those in the audience, inattentive, impertinent, downright rude,
I could not understand their alien language. What planet did they come from?

They worshipped things, and stuff, and weird animal shapes.
They thumbed their noses at songs of hope being practised by our choir.

We learned a lesson from being out in the cold.
We should have, would have, could have had the faith.

Learning now the moral of an ancient song from long ago,
Your faith is rewarded, tested, abandoned, returned to,
bringing us back to
Must we never stop learning?

 

When will we eat honey from the rock?









Psalm Challenger host: Psalm Challenge Host Link

 

Transparency

Transparency

I was looking for the invisible transparent thing,
Harder to see than a needle in a haystack,
It was like looking for a hay blade in a haystack,
Everything blended as one.

Open Transparent meetings would be the law of the land.
Did you see through that one too?
They would pay your lawyer, if you win,
Guess that means the lawyer gets paid either way,
Hey, why do we need a lawyer anyway, if it is so
Transparent?

Do you remember school before I pads and DVD's,
We had Transparencies, They still use them.
Transparencies were an interesting concept too,
You put words and images in a transparent film.
What gets through makes the image. It is not 100 percent transparent.

I want the 100 percent transparent government.
Not the one where I have to go haystack to haystack
wondering what I am even looking for,
its bewilderment obscuring any
transparency.

 

Sonny Terry & Brownie McGhee: Two More Songs

I was looking for music for Friday night
and was looking for who Sonny Terry really was,
then I found this on you tube
Red River and Crow Jane...Masterful Sonny Terry & Brownie McGee...

November Light

November Light,
Sun Rays low and long,
Stretching to reach us.
Clouds the norm in November.
We have actually had a lot of sunny days,
Black Friday an odd phenomenon,
Selling stuff to ready consumers
willpower weakened by the
November Light.

Shine the Divine: Creativity IS a Spiritual Practice: Mega Mobius Gratitude Quilt 2012

Shine the Divine: Creativity IS a Spiritual Practice: Mega Mobius Gratitude Quilt 2012


Visit Laura's site where an amzing thing happened.
We are grateful for this opportunity to say what we are really grateful for.

Wow...

Thanksgiving (U.S.)

Thanksgiving

I will never forget
The grade school images, crayon smells as we colored images of Thanksgiving
turkeys, pilgrims, native americans, leaves, corn stalks, pumpkins,
then we pasted them up on the giant windows of Columbus school.
we were told they all sat down at one table, long ago
peacefully,
coexisting.
The pilgrims in our school stories never got sick, or died, nor did their
native american guides. Nobody fought or struggled, or was really real.
Those story pilgrims were as 2 dimensional as the colored construction paper.
I want the real story,
the sickness, death, the struggles extreme, the interpersonal struggles
over power, property, money or love.
How quickly did the native americans contract deadly illnesses because they had no natural immunity?
Were there pilgrims who secretly prayed for return to European civilization of the day?
How many did they bury of the pilgrims before they had the Thanksgiving harvest?


Fast forward to today:
I give thanks for all we have and hope you have a wonderful feast per the tradition in the U.S.
mary

 

Joe Bonamassa - Mountain Time LIVE at Carre Amsterdam

Rounding out the short work week with Joe
and
Mountain Time

Happy Thanksgiving to all who celebrate
Here is a link for free Joe music in case you wondered,
He is a Blues Titan, gifted guitarist, singer, collaborator, historian, all around nice guy who loves music and he really knows those blues...

Free Music link by Joe

Photo from NASA History twitpics...

Love the NASA History Twit-pics...
like this one.

 

X-15 mounted on B-52
Photo by NASA


last night is NCIS x 2 night
CBS has options to watch online too
well we still watch the shows a second time to get
the whole plot figured out...mostly.
Then Vegas is on which once again we will watch re runs later online.
abc cancelled Last Resort for which I am deeply disappointed
We will finish watching all 13 shows. It is a masterful
political science military civilian thriller.
other than that, after cancelling our satellite tv, we watch pbs cooking shows,
you tubes and the cats and blogging
Twitter has been fun for me, randomly landing on photos like this one.
 

31 Days

31Days

until heaven knows what

might happen on Earth,

according to some

the calendar ends.

 

 Do you believe

in Santa Claus, Tooth Fairies,

Easter Bunnies,

God or an equivalent Deity,

or

can you accept those who do?

 

Can you accept that humans have

differences

and yet some traits are similar?

Would they all look alike

and flawed

as they face

Judgement Day?

 

31 days

until the day light hours gain again,

that alone is worth

celebrating,

with or without

the end of the world,

heaven only knows.

 

 

 

 

 

Monday

Monday

back to work.
cats revert to all day naps,
after a can of this and can of that, scoop of this, petting, treats.

Yesterday we were encouraged seeing Tommy tearing out at full speed,
behind him, on his heels, was Meridien aka Whitney aka Girly Girl.
She apparently impressed Tommy so much he pretty much stopped stalking her yesterday
(these are cats i am talking about).
I unconsciously called the "new" cat Girly Girl.
She always was, well, Girly-like. Pretty white and black cat. Soft fur, affectionate.
I really started to think about cats having subroutines in their brains,
like Whitney had one subroutine when she lived with us, then Meridien had another for the majority of her life. She responded more to calling her Whitney here, but still not as strong as Girly-Girl. She likes this new name, to go with this new subroutine.

Fred dug a few more carrots last night and pronounced the garden closed for the winter.
Thursday is Thanksgiving (U.S.) and time for feasting and celebrating,
giving thanks to the harvest, to God, and the forces that give us our bounty.
The cats will give thanks for scraps of turkey.
For now we go to work to earn the bread,
it is
Monday
 

Interview with a Clone, Chapter 17

Interview with a Clone

by mary e. gerdt

All rights reserved 2012

Chapter 17

The Humdrum of a New Day

Alice woke up that day a little late. She missed the breakfast that Georgia served. Now Alice was on her own.

She rummaged through the food storage unit, nibbling, grazing on loose fruits and a bag of nuts she found. She had to hurry to get ready for the live interplanetary radio show with Gigi. She washed it all down with a swig of Japanese beer. ‘Whoa!”, Alice shook her head as the bitter powerful brew bit her all the way through. She took another drink, this time, immune to the bite.

The interviews had become more routine now, a masterful choreography by Gigi and brilliant follow through by Alice. From the beginning they both added details from life: life’s lessons, heartaches, triumphs, and sharing their Normalcy.

“Normal is good,” Last interview started with Gigi setting the subject. Ok, thought Alice, normalcy is the subject, I can do this.

“Absolutely,” Said Alice, and she proceeded to do a dissertation on Normalcy, Humdrum, Routine-isms, Boring lifestyles that lead to long and fulfilling +/- boring lives, “There can come a day, Gigi, when your life returns to normalcy, and you will be grateful.”

Gigi replied, “Affirmative.”

Even though Gigi felt she really wanted more challenges, like being the first long term woman occupant of Mars.

They broke for commercials.

Alice had been fondling an envelope all day. It was the one with the letter from her mother, written long ago, perhaps meant to be not so public?

She peered in the ripped corner of the envelope…the..unknown..fortune teller…she could see no more…Alice pried a little more.

"The unknown fortune teller has a name,"

Alice read in the letter.

"Her name is

Margo."

Psalm Challenge 80

am thinking of the people of Israel hoping for peace,
as I read this Psalm,
about hoping God will come soon,
with only tears for food,
I thought of this poem I wrote awhile ago.

Link to Psalm Challenge


After Awhile
first draft
by Mary E. Gerdt
After Awhile

After Awhile,
Things will be better,

Time will have passed,
Regrets will have faded,

Sorrows will dry after
The crying,

You will feel better,
Not like your dying.

After while,
When your back home

And safe in your place
Where you can roam,

And be one with nature,
Feel carefree again,

After awhile,
When we are older,

And we are settled,
And we are bolder,

We’ll reach for the sky,
Like we did before,

We’ll lose all our fear,
That closes the door.

After awhile,
The sorrow will fade,

That tugs at our heart strings,
That God alone made,

To keep us as humans, not a machine,
Who is hurt by a word, or an unkind deed.

Who heals when times get better and then,
Who bleeds and cries when losing a friend.

No mechanical device, we are flesh and blood,
And tears that we cry,
Rain down from above,
And fall from our faces down to the ground,
And wash off the fairies who watch us and frown,
Sad at all of our earthly emotions,
They stay close at hand when you’re feeling so lonely.

Never think you are alone in the middle of the night,
Or think your small world is causing a fright,
Open up and see the rest of the world
Is on your doorstep and ready to right,

All the bad ills and bad feelings you have,
May you see a world not so bad.
When you are feeling fear and evil intentions,
Look at a flower and its simple invention,

It is not so simple after all,
The flower can lift spirits after a fall,
The scent takes us to places long gone,
With the passing of time,
After while,
Sorrow will be done.
 

Bonamassa performs at the Home of Hail! Hail! Rock 'n' Roll!

very cool video...history of rock and roll
and
the blues
@The Fabulous Fox...
always good music to be had in and around st. louis
here is an important part of the history, the source of rock and roll

click here for free music download from joe bonamassa



meanwhile, in 1967, my mom painted this pic of downtown edwardsville,
20 miles east of st. louis
i just imagine a blues piano man playing at the blue note lounge

 

Joe Bonamassa Woke Up Dreaming Live From Royal Albert Hall

Joe Bonamassa...link for a free song

Happy Friday!

Random Friday Post

 

as i looked for random photos to post,

i kept coming back to this panoramic of

a covered bridge in addison county

 

then it would not load :<

 

just as i gave up on the covered bridge loading,

i decided instead on the empty chair

 

 

 

 

then they both came up and

voila :->

random friday posting

 

for your self directed homework,

what would you say to the chair?

 

happy friday

Legacy

Legacy

is a powerful concept.
Ideally must be
simple,
condensed,
to the point,
and yet
it takes a
Lifetime
to
create.

Judging by the
bad boys in the news
(you know who-why waste ink on their
creepy name/image),
a
Legacy
can be ruined
by
one or more bad acts,
or deeds and or
a scandal,
that becomes public.
(ethics ? does that mean if no one knows, legacy unscathed?)

Also certain,
If one at first hears
Scandal
and it is later
retracted...
The impact of the Scandal
sears a pathway in the observer's head,
never to be undone by
retraction....

Is that powerful?
 

Joe Bonamassa - Slow Train LIVE at Beacon Theatre

Link to Joe's channel...

Steve Stevens - Rebel Yell - with Shawn Pelton & Les Paul Trio - Iridium...

Link to what's happenin'
in
NYC

Winter's Horizon

winter's horizon

Arlo Guthrie & The Dillards

Fred got 2 free tickets to see Arlo Guthrie in Rutland, VT last night
at the Paramount,
a stately old friendly venue
where we got to see the son of Woody Guthrie do a tribute
to his Father and life in general,
a rambling fantastic journey,
I started 37 years ago when I saw him and Pete Seeger at the Mississippi River Festival.
I was 17.
Tonight seat #17.
He was great tonight, his music disciplined, precise and loose at the same time,
His dad's tunes, tunes of his dad's era, tunes of Arlo's era,
stories intermingled, a biography,
and understated, perhaps as a shield,
he lost his wife a few weeks ago,
and they were so infinitely close,
so rarely perfectly matched,
it would seem he would be paralyzed by this,
and yet, he performed as I am sure she would want,
the music that they shared.
This video link is one she filmed and I found on you tube.
So if you get a chance to see Arlo's show, you will be truly enthralled
with his music and musing.
Thanks to Seven Days Newspaper for 2 tickets to this great show!

Psalm Challenge 79

Psalm Challenge 79

Thanks to Daily Athens for hosting the Psalm Challenge
Am attempting to be more disciplined about participating and posting according to
Mediterranean time

Daily Athens...Psalm Challenge

Psalm 79

Again I find myself at the graveyard of my ancestors,
Only a generation away
Still a forever lost opportunity,
They died at about the time I was born
My Grandfather died 28 Years before I was born.
I wanted to sit them all down,
What was life like then?
What did you sacrifice?
How was your faith tested?
I knew my Mother's sacrifices,
although,
even her,
Sometimes mysterious,
what did she give up?
How was her faith tested?
I remember a book she wrote in during WW 2. It held men's names,
Later I realized, they were boy's names, boys whose names she met at the USO
in St. Louis., the big city just north of Fort Leonard Wood.
Many of the boys names were crossed off.
I knew that meant they died,
Who of them might have died clutching a photo of
sweet Betsy?
I read Psalm 79.
My mother's words again to me,
Do not die without faith,
Trust me she said.
Her mother, Fanny, died without faith, she said.
The band song, The Weight, in my head again,
"Take a load off Fanny."

Mom said Fanny was having a heart attack, dying.
She was terrified without faith.
So take it from my ancestors, even if your days look dim,
Have Faith,
Mom always knew best.
 

Joe Bonamassa Supports Breast Cancer Awareness Month - Asking Around for...

Another great version on Joe's channel,
This download helps support Breast Cancer Awareness.


Posting late, slept late,
hate the time change,
love the new old cat,
Savoring Joe's music,
Hoping you do Too
Free song
How can U go Wrong?

Free Song by Joe Bonamassa, Did U Say U Luv The Blues?

Joe Bonamassa - Asking Around For You

Above:  Link to a live version of my favorite Joe Bonamassa tune.


Joe is into keeping blues alive, using the styles of many vintage blues guys.
Joe also help students keep their enthusiasm for music.


Below: link to free Joe tune for signing up for his newsletter.
Joe Bonamassa Free Song
 

Consciousness

Friday

is probably a good day to talk about
Consciousness,
although Today,
being the end of the traditional work week,
I am running out of
Proverbial steam.
thought I would post a link to interesting
research and discovery about

Noetics,

http://noetic.org

read the website and give if you can,
you will see it come back,
10 fold??

it all started with a man flying to the moon,
                         walking around,
                                  then flying home, without tether, Free, yet
                                           Connected and he felt that tug at his heart strings,
                                                                          pulling him, pulling him along.

 

She is back...

 

These photos are from circa Y2k

Meredian

alias

Whitney

has moved back home where she was born.

She is still shy and not ready for photoshoot

so thought I would post these

She is as delightful and soft as I remember

she and I are reaquainting ourselves

in small doses

she is scared of Tommy

who stalks her even though

she is bigger than he is

I have been picking her up and then she needs a break

 

Joe Bonamassa Live - If Heartaches Were Nickels

link to Joe's music....

day after election...when Billions $ spent on elections
who wins? loses?
who profits?
who suffers heartache?

 

Election Day (U.S.)

Election Day U.S. style,

"The public"
who is us,

"gets to vote"
which mysteriously transforms to an electoral college representative,

"they are given every opportunity"
some more than once or even posthumously,

"to show their freedom"
to be taxed silly,

"their patriotism"
can you believe there are people so disillusioned,
they do not vote at all? I do.

"In One Nation"
still is one,

"Under God"
hold on, someone is offended already,
modify to:
"Under your all powerful one, multiple ones, or non entity of empty nothingness"

"So we may elect a chosen one to lead us from despair
and deliver us to Blissful Utopian Synergistic Splendiforousity."
(I added that last line...now go vote, it does make a difference!)




 

Fall Memories 2012

more pic's of fall 2012

 

sugar maples, vermont
 

Psalm Challenge 78

always had a little trouble with deadlines,
just finished psalm challenge 78

Finally, for the first time from the inside, I stared at the walls of my grandfather and grandmother’s house, a mystery to me since I was too young to live here, the ownership lost to still fuzzy details, unknown to me circumstances.

Hoping for clarity, or perhaps a sign, information, a lesson, was it there, in the walls? Thinking I might develop a feeling, see something that sparked a connection. There was nothing shown to me, no sign.

At the graveside, when my mother’s ashes joined her parents and her brother, it was her feeling that I felt, her desire to return to the loving arms of her family, especially her father who she lost abruptly when she was 5 on the eve of the Great depression of 1930. Mom finally found the answers she had been looking for on the material plane.

Her faith shaken again and again, she emerged stronger at every trial. Teaching us the lesson we were looking for in the beginning, now with no Mom to share the story with, or

is she here,

giving me the foundation and encouragement to write this down,

when she declared to me,

“I hope you are taking notes.”

'The Weight' | Levon Helm and the Midnight Ramblers | Sound Tracks Quick...

Saturday nights in Woodstock, NY
Link to the ramble...awesome video.

Richard Manuel-Across the Great Divide (live)

saturday night....music link

Yes Vermont Yankee: Fear and Facts about Nuclear Plants and Hurricanes

Yes Vermont Yankee: Fear and Facts about Nuclear Plants and Hurricanes

link to blog by meredith angwin,
my nuclear go to woman.
it does deserve to be in the news that the nuclear plants along
the devastated atlantic coastline
fared ok.


 

Up On Cripple Creek - Levon Helm Ft. Ringo Starr - Live `89

Friday Music Link.

sometimes i think, what will the music of the baby boomer adult day programs?
no doubt, up on cripple creek is right on up there.
this version, so rare now. so many of these men are in heaven's band
we are grateful for links like this one, to the past

Stick Season

Stick Season

 

 

The leaves have fallen, some blown down by the outer bands of Sandy,

She devastated neighbors 100's of miles from here

and we pray for their recovery.

She is not done spinning and blowing around

and around.

Vermonters a little silent, they were ready this time for the terrible thing that was Irene

only a year ago.

Me watching the news as news idiots wade in fetid salt water,

telling everyone,

don't do as I do. Duh.

The news idiot tweets "the interstate is open", the night of the storm, not "Stay at home"

like she should have.

Then they take pictures of poor sick wet cold people.

I finally found a BBC report saying "Stay at Home". It was the most sensible message I could offer. I re-Tweeted and hit the hay.

In the morn, relieved we were OK, Vermont was OK, we were sad to hear of the human loss and losses from the storms.

I reflected again today on several news idiots before and after Sandy, saying Irene was nothing to them in NY. I remember John Gill's Farm where Levon et al did a free concert every year.

Gill's farm produces a lot of food for NYC people. They also had devastation from Irene, like Vermont did. Bet those news people don't even know where their food comes from, are those news idiots really just stick people? They do look a little stiff and they clearly do not look around and see farther than their tiny world.

The sticks shine in the dark gray days of November.