Odd, I Know

...that I haven't written about the Dead in this blog. One of the poles of my musical universe. And now this strange song comes along to change that. The writing part, that is.

I was watching Truckin' Up To Buffalo tonight, and they went into Stagger Lee. A song I never really knew, never really liked, always tolerated until it was over. But tonight, for some unknown reason I had the lyrics playing on the screen. And so I read. And for the first time ever, I 'got it' about this song. A mystery and a toleration no more. Listen here.

"Stagger Lee"
Words by Robert Hunter; music by Jerry Garcia

1940 Xmas evening with a full moon over town
Staggerlee met Billy DeLyon
and he blew that poor boy down
Do you know what he shot him for?
What do you make of that?
'Cause Billy DeLyon threw lucky dice,
won Staggelee's Stetson hat

Baio, Baio, tell me how can this be?
You arrest the girls for turning tricks
but you're scared of Staggerlee
Staggerlee is a madman and he shot my Billy dead
Baio you go get him or give the job to me

Delia DeLyon, dear sweet Delia-D
How the hell can I arrest him when he's twice as big as me?
Don't ask me to go downtown - I wouldn't come back alive
Not only is that mother big but he packs a .45

Baio Delia said just give me a gun
He shot my Billy dead now I'm gonna see him hung
She waded to DeLyon's Club through Billy DeLyon's blood
Stepped up to Staggerlee at the bar
Said Buy me a gin fizz, love

As Staggerlee lit a cigarette she shot him in the balls
Blew the smoke off her revolver, had him dragged to city hall
Baio, Baio, see you hang him high
He shot my Billy dead and now he's got to die

Delia went a walking down on Singapore Street
A three-piece band on the corner played "Nearer, My God, to Thee"
but Delia whistled a different tune...what tune could it be?

The song that woman sung was Look out Staggerlee
The song that Delia sung was Look out Staggerlee
The song that woman sung was Look out Staggerlee
The song that Delia sung was Look out Staggerlee

Don't Know The Words

We're thick into hummingbird time around here, and they're back at their deep-sipping ways. It's rare that there's not at least one little guy (or huge insect, depending on how you look at them) feeding at the red plastic font of sugary goodness. At least once we did see four feeding at once, and three at once is not that rare. More than once I've been buzzed while taking down the feeder to refill it.

The 'secret formula' is a cup and a half of sugar to four cups of water. Boiled a couple of minutes, then cooled, of course. We wouldn't want to scald those little tongues, would we?

It's Carrie's goal to become 'Fatima of the Hummingbirds', having them light on her fingers while she sings to them. We're still working on that.

It Is Full Summer Now

IT is full summer now, the heart of June,
Not yet the sun-burnt reapers are a-stir
Upon the upland meadow where too soon
Rich autumn time, the season’s usurer,
Will lend his hoarded gold to all the trees,
And see his treasure scattered by the wild and spendthrift breeze.

Too soon indeed! yet here the daffodil,
That love-child of the Spring, has lingered on
To vex the rose with jealousy, and still
The harebell spreads her azure pavilion,
And like a strayed and wandering reveller
Abandoned of its brothers, whom long since June’s messenger

The missel-thrush has frighted from the glade,
One pale narcissus loiters fearfully
Close to a shadowy nook, where half afraid
Of their own loveliness some violets lie
That will not look the gold sun in the face
For fear of too much splendour,—ah! methinks it is a place

Which should be trodden by Persephone
When wearied of the flowerless fields of Dis!
Or danced on by the lads of Arcady!
The hidden secret of eternal bliss
Known to the Grecian here a man might find,
Ah! you and I may find it now if Love and Sleep be kind.

Oscar Wilde (1854-1900)
–from The Garden of Eros

Northrop

Here's Northrop Auditorium in October of 1972. This was early in my brief, unsuccessful foray into University life. It was also right around the time I heard George McGovern speak on these steps. It was a campaign stop during his run for the presidency in '72 against Nixon. The whole Watergate tidal wave had yet to break, but of course McGovern was doomed from the start.

The thing I remember most about his appearance was when he played a tape over the PA of a soldier (a pilot, I think) describing the effects of the 'daisy cutter' bombs we were dropping at the time. Back then there was such a thing as an anti-war movement. Before we all became complacent and brainwashed. It was powerful, moving stuff. It seems impossible that any candidate would present anything so starkly and vigorously opinionated in these lowest-common-denominator times.

It was the first election I was old enough to vote in and I voted for McGovern.

May Is Up

Some big gaps in May without any photos; a trying month, photographically, but back on track now. Delilah and Molly here didn't make it into May, but I wanted to show you this nice photo of them anyway.

Kelly's Incredible Best-Ever Brownies

Hey, good news! Kelly's decided to share her awesome brownie recipe with us! Prepare to be transported to gooey goodness nirvana. Many thanks, Kelly!

Caramel Brownies
1 14-oz. pkg. caramels (unwrapping caramels is the most time-consuming part of this recipe!)
2/3 cup evaporated milk
1 pkg. German chocolate cake
3/4 cup butter (melted)
1 tsp. vanilla
1 cup semisweet chocolate chips

• Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease 9x13 pan.
• Melt caramels and 1/3 cup evaporated milk over very low heat; stir occasionally.
• Combine cake mix, melted butter, 1/3 cup evaporated milk, and vanilla. Mix well and spread 1/2 of batter in pan.
• Bake at 350 degrees for 8 minutes.
• Sprinkle chocolate chips evenly over cooked brownies (it calls for 1 cup, but I use enough to cover the top of the brownies fairly well)
• Pour melted caramel mixture over top.
• With a teaspoon, drop the remaining half of the batter evenly over the top.
• Bake at 350 degrees for 20 minutes.

Carrie the Awesome Bargain Finder

On Saturday as we were putting out items for the Arnell garage sale, Carrie came across this little item:



I couldn't believe it when I saw it! A Nikon F, a 50mm f1.4 lens, a 2x teleconverter, two other unrelated lenses (for what I don't know), a 'fresh' roll of film (dated 2000), and best of all, a partially shot roll in the camera. All in a (admittedly rather lame) carrying case. And the price for this flash of 60s photographic nostalgia? $2. Yes, two USD. Un-freaking-believable. Now admittedly, whoever was doing the pricing didn't have the least idea what this was. And we did make a nice donation to the Humane Society that more than covered the things we bought. But still...

I've always had this kind of fantasy relationship with Nikons. Just the very fact of owning such an incredible and storied camera has always seemed too good to be true, too good for me. It seems to work, (although it needs new batteries of course), the shutter trips. I mean that 50mm alone is just awesome, even if the camera doesn't work.

The film inside, of course is the most intriguing part. Even though it's probably at least seven years old, I can't wait to have it developed and see what, if anything is on there. Thank you, thank you Carrie and bless your eyes!

Poor Rose

Pretty Rose has been sick since the middle of last week. Without going into the disgusting details, apparently she ate something that "didn't agree with her". She's been very lethargic since last Thursday, and has pretty much zero appetite. She's been to the vet twice, and thankfully today we learned that it most likely isn't something causing a 'blockage'. Very good news since that means she won't have to have surgery. And the past couple of days her appetite seems to be returning somewhat, and she's keeping things down, as it were. She really likes boiled hamburger and rice, it turns out! It seems like she may be on her way to recovery!

Weekend Roundup

We had a very busy and fun weekend, this past. Saturday we volunteered at the Humane Society garage sale, which was actually a lot of fun. We got there at 7 to help set up, and stayed until mid afternoon. They had a ton of stuff, lots more than the past couple of years, and we think they took in a lot more cash than in the past.



We found some cool stuff, another folding aluminum lawn chair (which we seem to be collecting now), a quilt, a kid's book for Jen & Kelly's kids, some stuff for Matthew and an incredible find by Carrie which will get its own entry.

We got home, cleaned up and relaxed a little, and then Chris and Jeannie came over for dinner and fun. We had chili and cornbread and they brought a yummy carrot cake. Chris tried to resurrect my GPS (to no avail), but I appreciate his trying. We caught up on what's happening with their jobs and lives. Chris is really assuming some awesome responsibilities at Gillette and I'm so proud of him in every way!




We played lots of Molly 13 and even though it was Jeannie's first time she caught on right away and was pretty much pasting us by the time we quit. I'm sure next time we play she'll nail us to the wall. It was so nice to see them both, and very relaxing and fun as usual.

Sunday morning we pretty much hung around, I did some gardening. In the afternoon Molly came over to spend the night. Another great time as always with Molly. We just hung out, made shrimp on the grill for dinner (turns out we'd made that before for her, but she was very gracious and said she liked it).



We also played Molly 13 with Molly (of course), watched the finale of The Sopranos and then played more cards. This morning we went out to breakfast at Ava's in New Richmond, and then I had to scoot to St Paul as I had an appointment at the Red Cross. Time with Molly always seems to go too fast. Oh, she got a new car, a Mitsubishi Lancer, and it's quite cool. Molly rocks!

The Dog's Blog

Quick note: check out the link to John's blog down below in the column on the right. Very cool, and there's music of his there too!