My Aunt Mary died today. I just sent her a letter the other day, it can’t have arrived yet. I hope that my cousins read it, and know how much I loved their mom. I just got her Christmas card today! Today! One hour before the tragic e-mail! With a twenty-dollar bill taped in it! Have a treat on me! And me, sixty-one years old! Still her little nephew!
No offense to the living, but she was by far and away my favorite relative, one of only two whose blood I was proud to have coursing in my veins. And she was a symbol to me as well, proof that adversity could be triumphed over, proof that fate could be defeated, not only defeated, by smashed utterly, trampled in the dust of a world of one’s own making. She was a God.
There are heroes among us, and today one fewer in their number. When some people die, it can be said: good riddance. When some people die, it can be said: their suffering is over. When some people die, it can be said: maybe they can be happy now. When some people die, like my (redacted, but it rhymes with “smother my jaw”), their own sister can stand at the casket and say: maybe now you won’t have to be mad at everybody all the time anymore. But when some people die, everybody who knew them is shattered, and wonders how it will be possible to go on, and a light goes out in the world, an un-replaceable calculus is removed from the board, and the entire game is poorer for it, forever.
And as if to mock me, the setting sun, a rare display in my environs, the vast copper disk, fading into cloud cover, carrying away the souls of the faithful departed, replaced by the pathetic moon, a sad reminder of what we have lost.
Would that I had more to offer her memory than the tear stained blog post of a moron. She was everything to me.
Wednesday, December 9, 2009
Tuesday, December 8, 2009
Happy Birthday To Thailand's Beloved King
Thai's really love the King, and his birthday is a big deal over here. Every government building, most shops and restaurants, and lots of houses are decorated with flags and lights and big pictures of the King. The TV and newspapers are full of tributes, like for instance in the newspapers big companies take out full page ads of birthday wishes and testimonials.
The King is a ubiquitous presence for the rest of the year too, but it is more festive and showey at his birthday. Everyday, all year, the King's picture is in every classroom, every government building, and every domicile, including mine. It's like a benign personality cult, based in love of the guy. I admire the King myself. He has had only the one wife and family, with no hint of scandal, and he has always worked hard and supported research on water usage and food production, and other good causes. Those were virtuous choices.
So Happy Birthday to the King, and many happy returns!
December 5th
Light And Sound Show At The Bridge On The River Kwai
The show started off with a birthday salute to the King, it was his birthday, December 5th. There were thousands of people on both sides of the river and we all sang two "King" songs. Then the show, with the theme of the years of Japanese occupation and the building of the bridge and the associated railway.
The show culminated with a huge mock air-raid, complete with searchlights in the sky, a Japanese patrol boat in the river, and squibs all around to show bomb blasts in the river. One poor "stunt-man" was set on fire, ran half way across the bridge, then jumped into the river. A couple of sound clips from the movie "Bridge on the River Kwai" were played, and then a silent moment with the playing of taps accompanied by the release of twelve Thai "fire balloons." The Japanese wished to keep the Thai's happy, so they tried to make the whole experience easy for the local population, prefering to import slave labor from neighboring Burma, Malaysia and Indonesia, but it was still a hardship for the Thai's, as was the entire experience of the war.
The steam locomotive may have been a surviving Japanese vehicle, along with a few period rail cars.
I was pretty lucky to catch this show, it's only put on ten days every year. Thanks again to my university, Ramkhamhaeng. This trip was a seminar weekend for the Faculty of Law. I have the best job in Thailand, and I know it.
Detroit Garage Punk Napster Treasures
This is the Gories, and they don’t take no mess. When they jump on you baby, they’ll stay in your dress. A Detroit band, try and find a copy of “Queenie,” that’s the first cut I heard, and I was sold, baby, sold.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3qpJAKg7g6U
Another fine cut:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7GJDcZefFOE&feature=related
The White Stripes get all of the play, but the Gories and Bantam Rooster were the Rock Gods of this Detroit genre. I didn’t see a really good Bantam Rooster cut on You Tube, look for “Deal Me In.”
The Detroit Cobras weren’t bad either. I found ALL of these bands, the White Stripes included, on the late, much lamented Napster, right before it was shut down by the “adults.” Napster, the real, OG Napster, was the greatest technological advance in music since the invention of the piano forte, and you can quote me on that. Its destruction was the greatest tragedy of the modern era of corporate usurpation.
And stupidly counter-productive it was, too. Anybody who couldn’t figure out a way to make money from a site that had fourteen million declared members, with several million on line at any given time, was among the stupidest sons-of-bitches in the history of the human race, and that’s saying something.
I owe a great debt of gratitude to Soulphisticate, whose Napster list was an inspiration to me.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3qpJAKg7g6U
Another fine cut:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7GJDcZefFOE&feature=related
The White Stripes get all of the play, but the Gories and Bantam Rooster were the Rock Gods of this Detroit genre. I didn’t see a really good Bantam Rooster cut on You Tube, look for “Deal Me In.”
The Detroit Cobras weren’t bad either. I found ALL of these bands, the White Stripes included, on the late, much lamented Napster, right before it was shut down by the “adults.” Napster, the real, OG Napster, was the greatest technological advance in music since the invention of the piano forte, and you can quote me on that. Its destruction was the greatest tragedy of the modern era of corporate usurpation.
And stupidly counter-productive it was, too. Anybody who couldn’t figure out a way to make money from a site that had fourteen million declared members, with several million on line at any given time, was among the stupidest sons-of-bitches in the history of the human race, and that’s saying something.
I owe a great debt of gratitude to Soulphisticate, whose Napster list was an inspiration to me.
My Crosses To Bear
On my recent seminar weekend in Kanchanaburi, I was forced to endure the company of lots of beautiful Thai women, and required to consume large quantities of delicious Thai food. This is my life, these are my crosses to bear.
Have A Christmas Poem, Please
The Second Coming
Jesus would be arrested.
Jesus would represent himself, but he would be convicted, even though the jury loved him, because he would be charged with a strict-liability, status crime.
Jesus would be pardoned by politicians who wanted to get on his good side.
Jesus would whip the skin off of certain fat, sleek-pelted preachers.
Jesus would live to a ripe old age because nobody cared.
Jesus wouldn’t drive cars, but he would operate boats with great enthusiasm.
Jesus would enjoy flying, with and without aircraft.
Jesus would love modern alcoholic inventions like Limoncello, also, the cinema.
Jesus would do stand up comedy, and he would kill.
Jesus would vote for Barak Obama, and after Barry was elected Jesus would clear a good deal of dead wood out of the Supreme Court the old fashioned way, by sending angels to see them with bad news involving pillars of salt.
Jesus would shake his head bemusedly and retire to a developing country where he would teach without salary every language that ever was.
Response to something in Literary Kicks, about November, 2008
Jesus would be arrested.
Jesus would represent himself, but he would be convicted, even though the jury loved him, because he would be charged with a strict-liability, status crime.
Jesus would be pardoned by politicians who wanted to get on his good side.
Jesus would whip the skin off of certain fat, sleek-pelted preachers.
Jesus would live to a ripe old age because nobody cared.
Jesus wouldn’t drive cars, but he would operate boats with great enthusiasm.
Jesus would enjoy flying, with and without aircraft.
Jesus would love modern alcoholic inventions like Limoncello, also, the cinema.
Jesus would do stand up comedy, and he would kill.
Jesus would vote for Barak Obama, and after Barry was elected Jesus would clear a good deal of dead wood out of the Supreme Court the old fashioned way, by sending angels to see them with bad news involving pillars of salt.
Jesus would shake his head bemusedly and retire to a developing country where he would teach without salary every language that ever was.
Response to something in Literary Kicks, about November, 2008
“You’ve Got To Lose.”
Women are trouble, it’s been true for a long time. Way before Tina, Ike knew it, and we all find out sooner or later.
This partial quote is from “You’ve Got to Lose,” a Jackie Brentsen song, produced and with the band of the great innovator, Ike Turner:
“When God made a woman,
He made her from a man,
He gave her five senses,
That man can’t understand.
You’ve got to lose,
You can’t win all the time,
You know there’s trouble up the road,
Further on down the line.”
This partial quote is from “You’ve Got to Lose,” a Jackie Brentsen song, produced and with the band of the great innovator, Ike Turner:
“When God made a woman,
He made her from a man,
He gave her five senses,
That man can’t understand.
You’ve got to lose,
You can’t win all the time,
You know there’s trouble up the road,
Further on down the line.”
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