Or beyond the last...

After tracking J. D. Souther's  You're Only Lonely LP again this morning, I was reminded of what a great song The Last in Love was.  I went looking for the Linda Ronstadt version, believing it to be a better interpretation of the work, but could not find it on Youtube, but did find that George Strait had done a nice recording of the song - I had no idea.  So I decided I'd go with that.

Maybe he was just Prince George back then?

Then, a couple of my brain cells finally rolled out of bed, and I remembered it wasn't Linda, but the late Nicolette Larson, frequent collaborator with Neil Young and Commander Cody's Lost Planet Airmen, who'd recorded the JD song on her eponymous debut album:

Blues outside my door

I don't even know if it's raining

But I've been here before

and I don't wanna be here again

Every now and then

Voices in the wind

Call me back to the first time

Far away and clear

you can hear the teardrops

Falling for the last in love

Excerpted music & lyrics by John David Souther 1979

Black Roses

Wouldn't we all like to have someone who cares when you lose?

This song was playing in my mind when I got home, so I [first] dug out Linda Ronstadt's 1978 Livin' in the USA LP, and tracked three cuts, including White Rhythm & Blues. Don Grolnick's electric piano on the song is mesmerizing.  Nonetheless, I felt obliged to spin J.D.'s version as well, on account of he wrote it and such.  It doesn't hurt that he enlisted Phil Everly for harmony vocals, and that Henley, Frey, Felder & Browne also contributed.

Just in case you're interested, here's Linda's version:

I don't think a diamond elliptical stylus had touched either of these sweet black disks since, oh, about 1979 or 1980.  I had to go to my archived liners for information on the Ronstadt version, as it was my custom back in the day to play a disk once or twice and record it to CD cassette, and to preserve it in a special inner liner.  For a while in high school, I even recorded some stuff on Scotch/Maxell/BASF reel-to-reel tapes, though not that much, since they wouldn't fit the Radio Shack or Sanyo player in my car...

As a bonus, here's JD performing with Jackson (in the early '70s, JD and Glenn lived upstairs from Browne).  Apart from his music, JD was a pretty busy guy in those days, dating both Linda and Stevie.

Tottering Tuesday

An old friend emailed me the following:

Here's a man-in-the-street interview where Watters gets a little bit better response on Independence Day questions than Mark Dice, but not much.  Most people today apparently are not so smart as a 1950s 5th grader.

With the current news from Athens and Beijing, and world oil markets, I'm going to re-read the first few chapters of  this book:

While Vickers' diagnosis of the problem seems to be sound, he falls way short on suggesting a post-crash strategy.  The wild card, of course, is when the crash will occur.

Better Late Than Never

So, while I was at Kroger last night, I bought myself a belated Father's Day gift:

Super-cool die cast "Poison Arrow" - looks like a Merlin-powered

single-engine fighter version of a Beech Starship.

Obviously, I splurged a bit...

Would've bought myself a card, too, but they're not sold two weeks after the fact.

This morning after church, I noticed the Bloodmobile in the parking lot of the local hardware store.  Since I've ignored about a dozen requests to give in the past 3-4 years (following a bad experience where the technician seemed to be using me for a voodoo doll trying to find the vein), I figured I'd do my part.  I explained to my lobotomist¹ ;-)  about the prior bad experience - after checking my left arm, she asked if she could check the right, and said it was like night and day.  With only one stick, she got a good flow from the right, and hopefully restored my confidence in the process.

Although instructed to avoid exertion, I did go for a bike ride this evening, mainly because I haven't for quite some time and really need the exercise. I expect to sleep soundly tonight.

¹ I may be my own lobotomist - while helping someone move this last week, I raised up in the 6x12 U-Haul trailer while exiting with a box in my hands, gashing my head on the top edge of the roll-up door, about 2" back from my forehead/hairline.  If I'm lucky, it'll knock some sense into me...

Summer's Here!

Everyone has their share of quirks, or idiosyncracies, and clearly, I've been blessed (or cursed) with as many as anyone.

Probably the one song that always conjures up summertime more than any other for me is this one.  I don't think it's ever failed to transport me back to warm summer evenings, evoking colored lights illuminating the trees of the courtyard at the Inn of Six Flags, or maybe one of the elevated patio decks at Cardinal Puff's.

Classic Harry Chapin

Even though I mailed an actual card earlier in the week, I called my Dad this afternoon to be sure to wish him a Happy Father's Day.

Wednesday's Winks

• Probably a sure sign of getting old, but the amount of TV I watch (not that much) is about 50% reruns.
• I've become a fan of Rules of Engagement.  I guess it's probably been out of production for a couple of years or so?  Some of the episodes are pre-Tamir (Timmy), but more are post.  He provided a good counterpoint to David Spade's character.  Audrey and Jeff are the backbone of the show, though.
• Sometimes, I'll view part of How I Met Your Mother, but it just hasn't caught with me.  If I channel surf, will occasionally watch a few minutes of Big Bang Theory, but likewise, it doesn't hold my attention.
• The rest of my TV repertoire is mostly PBS - documentaries or Nightly Business Review.  I dig Antiques Roadshow - a recent episode had an original iron frame Henry repeater, serial #64, valued at around $100K.  Not sure what happened to the History Detectives program; I enjoyed that one (and Elyse Luray is pretty easy on the eyes...).

• There was a cool program on the other night about historical restorations.  That episode had an old steam locomotive and its tender rebuilt.  Others in the series are supposed to include old aircraft and ships.

• Even watched a bit of Jesse James' Monster Garage, and [possibly spinoff] Monster House - both pretty much bread and circus fare.
• I never can remember when M.A.S.H. airs, but managed to catch an episode where Col. Potter resists the temptation to have an affair.  It was an extremely well written installment within probably the best sit-com ever.

• If you grew up in the '50s or '60s with the last name Potter, Harry Bratsberg redeemed it from Lionel Blythe in the '70s.  Both fine actors.  Not sure what Mr. Radcliffe's character bodes for the name.
• Recently read that if you're willing to hike a bit, you can access the site in the California hills where the outdoor scenes were filmed, though it's scarcely recognizable with the tents and buildings gone.  There's a website that features such stuff.
• While doing a Rob Schneider routine at work, I accidentally embarrassed a kid (20-ish) the other day.  I was in the break room near the end of the day, and as he came in, I did the Richard Laymer bit, first saying his name normally, then with an -o after.  He, probably too young to remember the SNL character, but being a good sport, tried to play along by saying "I'm going home-o."
• Fail.
• He turned about three shades of red when I asked "How's that again?"

• Not sure if it's a sign of the times or of the culture: At a 'big box' retailer the other day a guy carried in a large piece of unused merchandise requesting a refund.  Apparently he didn't have his receipt, and didn't have the credit/debit card on which it was purchased, so it couldn't be looked up.  The item was no longer stocked, so the store's inventory system showed a nominal value of just pennies.  He said he'd bought it for $40-50 just 2-3 weeks earlier, but the store's records indicated it'd been clearanced a couple of months ago at about $15.
• He became insistent that he wasn't going to accept pennies, and didn't want to keep the merchandise.  A manager was summoned, who apparently approved a store credit refund of about $50.
• A couple of days later, I was there again, and so was the guy - this time with a half-cart of stuff.  From what I could tell, he got hold of a different manager, not so accommodating as the earlier one, as the store only accepted a few of his items for return.
• Apparently an example of 'retail clearance arbitrage', in which the grifter¹ purchases steep markdown merchandise, then returns it to the same or another retailer for full (or at least a greater) value.  The scam involves knowing the price points for various lines of merchandise, as well as the retailers' typical thresholds or guidelines regarding 'customer satisfaction'.  
• It wouldn't be dishonest if he were simply selling it at a flea market or on Ebay.
• My local weather watcher reported .81" of rain from midnight to 8:00a in my town.

¹ I had never used this word in a sentence before, and despite being a John Cusack fan, have not seen the similarly named movie.