Ok, two things. First, I've updated my "Songs I Never Tire Of" list. Every time I turn the radio on in the car, I hear something else. Secondly, Blogger has changed things up again - and I'm hating it. I see no improvements, only negative change. I can't understand the thought that goes on behind this sort of thing. I had to figure out how to add the new songs to my list. Boo Blogger!

Somebody help me.

I was going to try to keep this new blog fairly positive and light, but I gotta tell ya - I'm down. I'm bewildered. I'm tormented.
WHAT DOES IT ALL MEAN?!
I'm a nobody. I've never done anything and I'm never going to do anything. I'm taking up space. I'm old and in the way. But I feel horrible when I see extremely talented people - artists - die. It doesn't seem fair. They have a few years, they're amazing and innovative, they give it all they've got - then they're gone. Ashes. Dust. What difference does it make that Chet Atkins could really play that guitar? Or that Ella sure could sing? Kurt Vonnegut was some kind of writer, wasn't he? Leonardo painted some nice pictures, didn't he? When it came time for them to die, they died.
But they left a "legacy," you may say. Is that what it's all about - leaving something behind? Me? I'm nothing. I'll leave nothing.
WHAT ARE WE SUPPOSED TO DO? THINK? BELIEVE IN? DOES ANYTHING MATTER AT ALL?!
Toward the end, Dick Clark told someone that he would trade all of his wealth and fame just to be able to walk again.
WHAT DOES IT ALL MEAN?!
Everything saddens me.
People, the world over, create and perpetuate fairy tales to make themselves feel better about their mortality. Even that saddens me.

Songs I never tire of.

These are songs that excite me as much today as they did the first time I heard them - some more than 35 years ago. Isn't that something?
I left out some of the more obscure stuff. These are mostly radio friendly tunes.

"Jungle Love" by The Steve Miller Band.
"Bungle in the Jungle" by Jethro Tull.
"Cars" by Gary Numan.
"Brown Sugar" by The Rolling Stones.
"La Grange" by Z.Z.Top
"Maggie May" by Rod Stewart.
"Rock-n-Roll Part 2" by Gary Glitter.
"Bang a Gong" by T.Rex.
"I Can't Wait" by Nu Shooz.
"Do Fries Go With That Shake?" by George Clinton.
"Don't Fear the Reaper" by Blue Oyster Cult.
"Get Down Tonight" by K.C. and the Sunshine Band.
"Dancing Barefoot" by Patti Smith.
"American Band" by Grand Funk Railroad.
"Hello, It's Me" by Todd Rundgren.
"Private Idaho" by the B52's.
"Use Me" by Bill Withers.
"Fire" by the Ohio Players.
"Free Ride" by the Edgar Winter Group.
"The Joker" by the Steve Miller Band.
"It Takes Two" by Rob Base and DJ EZ Rock.
"Black Dog" by Led Zeppelin.
"Low Rider" by War.
"White Wedding" by Billy Idol.
"She Sells Sanctuary" by The Cult.
"Free Man in Paris" by Joni Mitchell.
"Let It Ride" by Bachman Turner Overdrive.
"Land of a Thousand Dances" by Wilson Pickett.
"Groove is in the Heart" by Deee-lite.
"Electric Avenue" by Eddie Grant.
"Lady Marmalade" by LaBelle.
"We've Only Just Begun" by The Carpenters.
"More Than a Feeling" by Boston.
"Saturday Night's Alright for Fighting" by Sir Elton John.
"Who's That Lady?" by the Isley Brothers.
"Werewolves of London" by Warren Zevon.
"Hold Your Head Up" by Argent.

The Punk Rock Rack is Back, Jack!!

This is its 3rd incarnation. I had to modify it a bit, this time. I figure my hoopty is wrecked and ugly, so I might as well make it useful. I've already hauled a stack of plywood and 3 doors.

 

Smith-Douglass fertilizer plant.

This is where my dad worked when I was a kid. As he died when I was 14, it's the only place I ever remember him working - although he told me about other jobs. He used to plow fields, with a mule, 10 hours a day, for one dollar a day. He also worked with a mule, pulling logs out of the woods. That job was called "Mule Skinner." There's an old song called "Mule Skinner Blues." My dad's name was Blue. He was "Mule Skinner Blue." He worked in the installation and repair department at Sears Roebuck. And he worked at another fertilizer plant, in a nearby town.
This photo must have been taken early on, as I remember things a bit differently. There was another building beside the washroom (the small white structure on the right) and the sign out front seemed much larger than the one pictured here.
I grew up in that plant. I knew it inside and out. I can still remember the dust and the smells. I recall feeding the German Shepherd that guarded the back door of the office. I can remember walking across the platform at the front of the building with my dad. He was singing "May the Bird of Paradise Fly up Your Nose." Sometimes, when he shaved in the wash house, he'd let me "shave" at the sink next to him. (He'd give me a hand full of shaving cream and a razor with no blade.) At the back of the building, where the railroad tracks ran off into the woods, there was a trestle. We sometimes walked across it. It seemed magical - and scary. I saw my first fox by the trestle.
My sister thinks that may be my dad's car at the center of the photo. Could be.