This is a thing I’ve been doing at the beginning of the year: pick a post for each month of the previous year, using a random number generator. See how well it reflected that year just passed. Pretty sure I got this from Gordon, who lives in Chicago, who remains the only non-local blogger I ever met.
But I was always disappointed that certain seemingly simple songs often had ONE note (or more) that wasn’t in the standard scale.
A second ABC Wednesday post, which, considering I wrote one 52 times last year, is not surprising. X is for Xylophone.) *** An animated portrait of my 2013 on Twitter, which isn’t terribly interesting as it might be because I don’t use Twitter very much; the one for Arthur is more interesting, but each is less than 50 seconds long.
One of those year-in-review quizzes from Jaquandor.
Did you keep your New Year’s resolutions, and will you make more for next year?
Didn’t really make any, so didn’t have to worry about failing to keep them. But then I read Richie’s post and wondered if I’ve been doing it all wrong.
What would you like to have in 2014 that you lacked in 2013?
More optimism.
What was your biggest achievement of the year?
Despite my complaints about it, a solo in the church play. Also, a reading of Langston Hughes poems.
What was your biggest failure?
Easily distracted. I’m sorry, what did you ask?
What was the best thing you bought?
There are some Kickstarter items that arrived that I liked such as MURDERVILLE Comic Book #1: “A Farewell to Armories”; The Werewolf of New York; and especially a retrospective collection of Kal cartoons from The Economist.
Whose behavior merited celebration?
My friend Lynne Jackson, who attempted to walk to Binghamton for a good cause.
Whose behavior made you appalled and depressed?
Congress, last I checked, had a 12% approval rate, which I assume includes their immediate families, plus the lobbyists who own them.
Where did most of your money go?
The house. Specifically, a new front porch, desperately needed, but very expensive.
What did you get really excited about?
Blogging. Got a second (or ninth) wind.
What song will always remind you of 2013?
Has to be New, by Sir Paul McCartney, the ONLY song my wife, my daughter and I could ALL identify.
Compared to this time last year, are you happier or sadder?
Sadder. The body politic has worn me down.
Thinner or fatter?
About the same.
Richer or poorer?
Poorer. I put aside more money for the health reimbursement program for the daughter’s braces.
What do you wish you’d done more of?
Traveled, but that was a function of money, in no small part.
Our office to move downtown from Corporate (frickin) Woods.
What were your favorite films of this year?
The Sound of Music and Singin’ in the Rain, neither of which I had ever seen in its entirety before.
What did you do on your birthday?
As little as possible.
How would you describe your personal fashion concept in 2013?
As usual, “fashion” is silly. Function over form.
What kept you sane?
Writing; singing; listening to music; learning new stuff; and then I suddenly realized that the question ASSUMES that I AM sane, which may or may not be the case.
Which celebrity/public figure did you fancy the most?
Wendy Davis.
What political issue stirred you the most?
The damn snooping on Americans, and apparently, everyone else, by the NSA.
Who did you miss?
I miss my parents, still.
Who was the best new person you met?
New woman in the office. Her cat’s name is Roger.
Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2013:
I actually went through a period of melancholy caused by some specific circumstances. The situation didn’t change, but my attitude towards it did, and it made it a whole lot more palatable.
Quote a song lyric that sums up your year:
So you think that you’ve got troubles? Well, trouble’s a bubble, So tell old Mr. Trouble to “Get lost!”.
Why not hold your head up high and, Stop cryin’, start tryin’, And don’t forget to keep your fingers crossed.
When you find the joy of livin’ Is lovin’ and givin’ You’ll be there when the winning dice are tossed.
A smile is just a frown that’s turned upside down, So smile, and that frown will defrost. And don’t forget to keep your fingers crossed!
(Who can identify the lyrics? It is one of these.)
People who are wealthy and think they did it all by themselves tend to annoy me.
Stolen from normblog
A couple of months back, Dustbury wrote about Norm Geras, who died in October of prostate cancer, again belying the narrative that no one dies from it; my father did.
Chaz wrote: “In the online community, however, he may be best remembered for the normblog profile, in which he sent four dozen or so questions to leading bloggers and asked them to answer any thirty of their choice.” Here is a list of all the hundreds of bloggers who answered the call.
“Please NB that you should not answer all 50 questions, but (as requested on the document itself) just 30 of them — enabling you to select those questions most congenial to you and leave out any that aren’t.”
Chaz added: “The wisdom of this practice really didn’t dawn on me until I’d submitted my answers when I realized that this was how Norm knew what you really valued above all else.” Which means I’m going to chuck *Which English Premiership football team do you support? since it is NOT in my area of expertise.
But I will add some questions answered by John Green, but NOT by Dustbury, just because.
*Why do you blog?
Therapy is too expense.
*What has been your best blogging experience?
Getting comments about my grandfather, who died in 1980, years after I wrote about him.
*What has been your worst blogging experience?
Some haranguing guy at my Times Union blog who was complaining every day about something I wrote.
*What would be your main blogging advice to a novice blogger?
Find a schedule and try to stick with it. Once a week or twice a day, but be consistent. Three posts in a day, then nothing for three days isn’t as good as once a day.
*What are you reading at the moment?
Xerox Ferox, which is a thick book of essays.
*Who are your cultural heroes?
Ben Franklin and Paul Simon? John Lennon and Thomas Jefferson? Actually, my first thought was Mohandas K. Gandhi and Martin Luther King, Jr.
*What is the best novel you’ve ever read?
11/22/63 by Stephen King has supplanted A Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood
*What is your favourite poem?
Ever since I learned it was parody, it’s probably The Road Not Taken by Robert Frost.
*Who is your favourite composer?
Mozart, though I am quite fond of Beethoven.
*Can you name a major moral, political or intellectual issue on which you’ve ever changed your mind?
When I was 14, I supported the Vietnam War; when I was 15, I opposed it. I’ve gone through lots of changes involving religion, from fundamentalist fervor to rejection of religion to my current, always evolving beliefs.
*What philosophical thesis do you think is most important to disseminate?
Being civil and decent does not mean weakness.
*What philosophical thesis do you think is most important to combat?
Yelling the loudest does not make you correct. I think people confuse clever retorts with sound policy, which scares the heck out of me.
*If you could effect one major policy change in the governing of your country, what would it be?
There needs to be a chance for third parties, and given the way the Republicans and Democrats rig the rules, we need another way to cast the ballot, such as Instant Runoff Voting.
*What would you do with the UN?
The problem with the UN is that the things it does well, in health care, e.g., is largely invisible. It probably should not put out the presumption that it can do peacekeeping.
*What do you consider to be the main threat to the future peace and security of the world?
Global warming, which will affect the availability of water (too much or too little, it appears), cost of fighting natural disasters, from mudslides to fire.
*Do you think the world (human civilization) has already passed its best point, or is that yet to come?
I’d like to be positive; not sure that I am.
*What would be your most important piece of advice about life?
Don’t be a schmuck.
*Do you think you could ever be married to, or in a long-term relationship with, someone with radically different political views from your own?
Probably not, because she would keep saying stuff that would inevitably tick me off.
*What do you consider the most important personal quality?
The pursuit of honesty.
*What personal fault do you most dislike?
Self-absorption.
*In what circumstances would you be willing to lie?
Interesting question. As I’ve noted here before, I’ve been hugely influenced by the book Lying by Sissela Bok. Would I lie to protect someone? Maybe. But what if I lied and said someone was in the closet when I thought he was in the kitchen, in order to protect him, but he had actually moved to the closet?
*Do you have any prejudices you’re willing to acknowledge?
People who are wealthy and think they did it all by themselves tend to annoy me.
*What is your favourite proverb?
“A stitch in time saves nine.” I’m lazy by nature.
*What would you call your autobiography?
Rambling with Roger. Actually, I have no idea.
*What would your ideal holiday be?
A rail pass to places where they play Major League Baseball.
*What talent would you most like to have?
Play the piano. THAT’S not going to happen.
*What would be your ideal choice of alternative profession or job?
Teaching remedial math to adults, but not using that ugly Core Curriculum stuff they’re using in New York State.
*How, if at all, would you change your life were you suddenly to win or inherit an enormously large sum of money?
I’d spend some time working on genealogy, working more with the Friends of the Library, and maybe volunteering for the Red Cross.
*What animal would you most like to be?
Golden retriever. I’m not a dog person, but I do like them. ** Who would play you in the movie about your life?
Forest Whitaker. As a child, I have no idea.
*What is your most treasured possession?
A copy of Abbey Road allegedly signed by four Beatles.
*If you had to change your first name, what would you change it to?
Labyrinth.
*Who is your favourite comedian or humorist?
Bill Cosby. Or Bob Newhart.
*Who are your sporting heroes?
Muhammad Ali, Willie Mays, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar
*If you could have one (more or less realistic) wish come true, what would you wish for?
Truth serum in the Washington, DC water supply, so we’d know for sure that Lobbyist A owns Congressman B, et al.
*If you could have any three guests, past or present, to dinner who would they be?
I must have answered this a half dozen times and never tire of it: John Lennon, René Magritte, and Jack Kirby, for no particular reason, except to see if Magritte would complain about the appropriation of his apple for the Beatles’ Apple Records; I suspect he would not care. They could talk about art from different perspectives.
Certainly, I want to have a good jumping-off point, so I’ll see if there’s a natural section break.
2. Use specific bookmarks.
Oh, goodness, no. Whatever I find that’s thin enough I’ll use. A ruler, a bus schedule, the envelope from a bill, a Post-It note. It’s not that I don’t OWN bookmarks; it’s that I’m not organized enough to FIND them when I want them.
2a. No dog-earing, bending, or folding of pages.
I HATE dog-eared books; I find them inherently ugly. As a page (clerk) at the Binghamton Public Library many years ago, I noticed how people would do that, and it rather ticked me off.
2b. Weirdly enough, spine-breaking is fine, just don’t get too crazy with it.
And I REALLY hate that! I’ve had books come apart in my hand in two or three sections, held together by some strands. It was not just aesthetically unpleasing, it made the reading experience too much work. Not to mention a cost to the taxpayers.
Re: a comment on someone’s blog, no, I can’t use a book as a drink coaster, either!
3. Always read two books at once.
Depends. Generally, I get so engrossed in one book that I’ll just finish that one, then forget where I left off with the other, not physically, but emotionally.
4. No (or minimal) writing in books.
I tend to agree with this, except for some used textbooks I once had to buy back in my college days. Sometimes the previous owner even used a highlighter, and that was sometimes OK too. But in general, for most purposes, no.
5. Rereads must be earned because there are too many great books out there to read an okay one twice.
It’s been so long since I reread a book, can’t really speak to it. In my teens and twenties, I did all the time, and they weren’t necessarily “great” books, but ones that resonated with me. It’s more that I don’t have time to get through all the books I want to read, but that “earned” stuff seems like elitist snobbery to me.
Now, there are sections of books I’ll read. A Grimm fairy tale or a Shakespeare sonnet or a particularly nice passage But most of the books I have are comic books in hardcover form – Mr. Frog has been reviewing the early Marvels, BTW – or reference books on movies, TV, music, sports, and general knowledge, some of which I have NEVER read (though some histories of programs such as The Twilight Zone and The Dick Van Dyke Show, I have). In some ways, the vast majority of books I have I consider reference books, even if you would not.
6. Not finishing a book is OK.
I had a REALLY hard time with this for a LONG, LONG time. But after I passed 50, I got less driven about that. Too many books to worry about THAT one, even if I’M “supposed” to have read it to prove how well-rounded I am. Partly it’s that I don’t care to meet that amorphous expectation.
7. It is always better to take more books on a trip than you think you’ll possibly have time to read.
Seriously, it’s only in the last two years that I took ANY books on trips. It was usually periodicals I took because if they get lost/damaged, I don’t care as much. I once left a book at a motel, and to get it back, it cost more than it would have I just purchased it again. That said, I don’t get much reading of any type done on a trip, except in the car, and that HAS to be a magazine, where I can navigate and read at the same time.
8. Having a favorite genre is fine. Getting stuck in that genre is bad.
Meh. Several times I’ve tried to read fantasy, and most of the time, it just didn’t take. Indeed, most of what I read is non-fiction, and the only fiction I read last year, 11/22/63, was based on a real event. Yet, I read comic-related material for years. Maybe I like my fiction with pictures and my non-fiction without?
I just listened to the Bat Segundo Show podcast with author Norman Rush. About 45 minutes in, Rush noted that what he likes to do when he visits people’s houses is to look at what’s on their bookshelves. That would be lost with the adoption of the tablet, though I suppose Good Reads, or other online reading lists, can be inadequate substitutes.
Books on tape are also reading, I decided. I mean, how else, save for braille, can the blind read? There’s REAL snobbery in this arena. If one is actively listening, as opposed to having on the background the way some people play music, then it’s reading. Love this short but sweet story.
I have the Beatles’ song ‘Happiness is a Warm Gun’ stuck in my head, specifically the lyric, “The soap impression of his wife Which he ate and donated to the National Trust.”
The fine blogger Shooting Parrots, from across the pond, did this quiz: “Do you feel like you’re getting old? Take our 50 signs of ageing test to find out.” They – the quiz writer and SP – are from England, so obviously they can’t spell “aging.”
Feeling stiff Yes – especially the left knee
Groaning when you bend down Well, no. Not yet, anyway.
Saying: “It wasn’t like that when I was young.” Occasionally. Usually it was to suggest that Republicans, such as Jacob Javits, Everett Dirksen and William Scranton were quite all right fellows, unlike most of their recent counterparts.
Saying: “In my day.” No, because I would sound like my maternal grandmother.
Losing hair Yes, but I’ve been losing it since I was about 18, so it’s hardly a function of getting old.
Not knowing any songs in the top 10
No. This is the advantage of having younger colleagues: I actually own 3 of them the week I checked, two by Macklemore & Ryan Lewis, and one by P!nk
Getting hairier ears, eyebrows, nose, face etc Not that I’ve noticed.
Hating noisy pubs Yes, but I hated noisy bars when I was in my 20s. Found it too difficult to have a conversation.
Talking a lot about joints/ailments Yes, the aforementioned knee. Plus an elbow.
Forgetting people’s names Yes, but I’ve been doing that for decades. When I was in New Paltz in 1974, I was backing this Congressional candidate named Matt McHugh. He was GREAT at remembering not only names of people across this wide swath of state (Ithaca to Woodstock, for you upstaters), he remembered details of their lives. “Hi, John, how’s your wife Mary?” or “Hello, Karen. How did your husband Bill’s operation go?” He won and served 18 years in Congress.
Choosing clothes and shoes for comfort rather than style Yes, but anyone who knows I wear red sneakers often will suss out that 1) I don’t care about style and 2) form over function irritates me. That’s been true for decades.
Thinking policemen/teachers/doctors look young Yes, especially my daughter’s elementary school teachers, who ARE in their 20s and 30s.
Falling asleep in front of the TV Seldom, and this was more likely in my 20s than now.
Needing an afternoon nap Only when I’m ill or injured.
Finding you have no idea what young people are talking about Occasionally true, though that was also the case when I was a young person.
Struggling to use technology Sometimes, but that has long been true.
Losing touch with everyday technology such as tablets and televisions I don’t have a tablet, but I know how the TV works.
You start complaining about things more Yes, and this I WILL attribute to getting older. Pretty much a “Why not?” It’s also why I have a blog.
Wearing your glasses around your neck No, because that DOES look old.
Not remembering the names of any modern bands I know a few, even own a few albums.
You avoid lifting heavy things due to back concerns Not really.
Complaining about the rubbish on TV these days Yes, but there IS rubbish on TV.
Misplacing your bag/keys etc Keys, yes, afraid so, but was true three decades ago.
Switching from Radio 1 to Radio 2 Well, I don’t listen to Top 40 (1), but not much middle-of-the-road stuff (2), either. Probably leave them both off.
You start driving very slowly The few times I’ve driven, it was slow.
Preferring a night in with a board game than a night on the town True for decades.
Taking a keen interest in The Antiques Roadshow No. The show irritates me with its “maybe I’ll be rich” mentality.
You talk to colleagues who are so young they don’t know what an Opal Fruit is I had never heard of this.
You start you taking slippers to a friend’s house Yes, many of my friends like us to take off our shoes when we go to their houses. In the winter, slippers are a great choice.
Listening to The Archers Not following US soap operas, so I’ll say no.
Falling asleep after a glass of wine Funny thing about wine and me; it’ll put me to sleep if I drink it in the midday, but not at night. That’s been true since my mid-20s.
Never going out without your coat No
Getting bed socks for Christmas and being very grateful No, though I’ve gotten better in general about getting clothes as gifts than I was when I first got married.
You can’t lose 6lb in two days anymore Never could, except in preparation for a colonoscopy, and it comes right back.
Gasping for a cup of tea No. (I do not understand the context for this.)
Taking a flask of tea or coffee on a day out No
Joining the WI Don’t know what the US equivalent to this would be.
Taking a keen interest in the garden No, but I don’t see what the problem with that is. My wife and daughter have a plot in the community garden.
Spending more money on face creams/antiageing products Zero dollars.
Spending money on the home/furniture rather than a night on the town True, but it’s an old home, though in fact I’d rather spend it going to a movie or play.
Taking a keen interest in dressing for the weather. Yes, especially in winter. Once one’s had frostbite – to the feet, when I was 16 – one tries not to repeat it. So I cover well the head, the ears, the hands, the feet.
Putting everyday items in the wrong place Not yet.
Obsessive gardening or bird feeding No
Really enjoying puzzles and crosswords No, though I used to do crosswords when I was younger.
Always driving in the slow lane or below 70 in the middle lane N/A
Consider going on a ‘no-children’ cruise for a holiday Actually, when my wife was first pregnant, we went to ‘no children’ resort in Maine.
Your ears are getting bigger I was told I have tiny ears.
Joining the National Trust Based on what I’ve read, if I lived there, I probably would. (I have the Beatles’ song ‘Happiness is a Warm Gun’ stuck in my head, specifically the lyric, “The soap impression of his wife Which he ate and donated to the National Trust.”)
Drinking sherry No, it gives me a headache, and last I checked, did not like the taste.
Feeling you have the right to tell people exactly what you are thinking even if it isn’t polite Nah, I’m still stuck with that politeness flaw.
So my takeaway from this is that I’m getting old, but was probably old 35 years ago. The only things that are appreciably different from then are the younger teachers and the achier joints.
