The Daily News
1 Wow.
2 Last night around 8 p.m. I fell into a mild slumber when Helene told me of Glen Frey's passing.
3 I entered a sink-hole.
4 If you are a musician, you know.
5 If you are a guitarist, you know that his music MUST be played at nearly any outside gig where you may find yourself: barbecues, campsites, picnics, beaches, those sorts of things. Someone will request Hotel California. Happens a lot.
6 Utterly brilliant artist and friend to all.
7 You know when you hear someone passed, how you get into the he-will-be-missed mode?
8 This guy.
9 Crosses all generations, and, to be honest, conceivably taken for granted. Frey was the sort of guy you figured would live forever.
10 I got home early last night.
11 I cooked an earlier dinner, watched some Veronica Mars, cleaned everything up, tossed down a glass of wine, and got slammed by this news.
12 Is it truly a stop-the-presses thing?
13 Well yes, it is.
14 Never saw it coming.
15 I'm not going to go into how he passed, and all the hospital rigmarole, but it hit me in the gut.
16 I remember each time I would prepare songs for Tahoe, there would inevitably be six or seven songs that WAY lifted the party to a grand sing-along.
17 So many were written by Glen Frey.
18 If I may: When you break out the guitars during cocktail hour,Take it Easy, Hotel California, and Desperado
become perfect songs for people who had a bit of wine and a few hors d'oeuvres.
19 Those are mainstream requests.
20 From a live guitarist's perspective, I enjoyed playing Take it Easy with a crowd. Musically, I LOVED Desperado, but it was difficult to learn both lyrics and guitar, and honestly, I always felt that Hotel California was up there with the greatest songs in the history of Rock 'N' Roll. It is also a bit of a scary song to learn.
21 Gosh darn.
22 And here is how it felt, playing Take it Easy live, and always Tahoe: It's a girl my Lord in a flatbed Ford slowin' down to take a look at me...what a fun time with rhythm and rhyme!
23 And those are the mainstream tunes.
24 What can I say? Interestingly, I had just finished writing today's DN when I heard the news.
25 I was almost mad at the guy.
26 This stuff takes a lot of time to unbox each day, and I often begin it in the morning, fine-tune it in mid-afternoon, and finish it at night. I consider that a rough draft, for you writers out there.
27 And when I awaken every few hours during the night, I edit it item-per-item just so I won't sound too much like the village idiot.
28 I spend epic time in the morning editing, omitting needless words, tossing adverbs into the recycling, putting the active voice to work, and on and on.
29 And then I still see two thens. After publishing.
30 Ah, well. I can't blame Glen Frey.
31 I always mixed up his first name with Don Henley, so if you see me call him Don Frey, don't get butt hurt.
32 Moving On, Part One: Here's where it gets a tad tricky. My items become too many, and they begin to resemble the boats coming in on the Pirates of the Caribbean attraction in Disneyland. They don't crash, they instead calmly bump into one another in a gentle fashion.
33 Nice image if you've been there, and most have.
34 Okay, I'm going in. I have to bring up the DN I had already written and do a "mash-up."
35 I love new terms. Let's see how this goes, shall we? Welcome to my workshop.
36 Too random. I had a little on Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and spent a good deal of time with Letter From a Birmingham Jail (it does have several titles, as I posted yesterday on Facebook) but I didn't want to post a history lesson; rather, I wanted people to see just how difficult it must have been to fight for peace, as well as for civil rights.
37 Dr. King was an amazing figure, as well as eloquent, intelligent, and brave one, far and away among the strongest leaders in history. I wanted to point out that everybody should read Letter, because it reflects just how scary those marches must have been. So thank you Dr. Martin Luther King, for doing so much for so many.
38 Moving On, Part Two: I also had a bit going in this morning's DN about how I've written only two complete songs in my life. It was to be a Things You Don't Know About Me, Dept. short piece.
39 That's an astoundingly low output for a guitarist.
40 The thing is, I'm not really a good guitarist, nor do I consider myself remotely a musician.
41 I do know show biz, and I'm from a family that sings. And I have written a bazillion first-halves of songs. Perhaps more about that one later in the week?
42 And I am also aware of the history of rock; it's an awesome history, and were it not for its black roots, would never have existed.
43 Moving On, Part the Thoid: And finally, I had a bit about this psycho lady at our Ross store, a lady who deliberately crashed her shopping cart into mine on Friday. She wore purple. She said, "Sorry," but she clearly was annoyed that I was somehow blocking the aisle. I wasn't, and in fact, we had been shopping for baby clothes. We had the twins in their stroller, and we had walked for almost two hours, just for the fun of shopping and exercise. Here is the stroller:
44 Fierce, right? This lady, who was old, short, and thin, came around the bend and slammed her shopping cart into mine.
45 She was clearly annoyed that we had babies AND were in the middle of the store chatting. I know enough that if I am in a store chatting, to leave a lot of room for other shoppers to get by. There were at least six to seven feet for the lady to move through. Instead, she put her head down and slammed her cart into mine.
46 We didn't say anything, and stayed there a bit longer. Not our issue. Several people came up and looked in at the girls and gave compliments. The babies charmed with their inherent cuteness, and those smiles grabbed at people.
47 I couldn't help looking across the store for the Purple Lady, however, sort of like I wanted to see what a psycho looked like more closely. Do you ever do that on the freeways? Some tailgater finally passes you, and then you look over to see what a complete moron looks like?
48 We eventually worked our way to the front of the store, but I wasn't thinking of the lady anymore.
49 Ross department stores don't allow the carts to leave the premises, so I was thinking, "How do we bag all this stuff with a stroller, and get it out to Caitlin's van?" The carts stood right next to the front doors, and were lined up similar to those aforementioned Pirates' boats.
50 We got in line, and guess who was right in front of us?
51 Go to the head of the class.
52 She had a sour look on her face, but I stayed out of whatever business she was having with the clerk.
53 Suddenly, she burst forward with her cart, and slammed it into all the other carts, and stormed out of the store.
54 Time stopped, at least for a second. It was like one of those slow-motion shots they have on teevee series' shows.
55 I finally had to say something. I've got that in me.
56 As the doors were closing behind her I said, "Enjoy your cats."
57 Cringe benefits, I tellya.
58 I guess I mashed this stuff up enough.
59 I gottago.
60 See you again.
61 Enjoy the wind and rain.
62 Peace.
23 And those are the mainstream tunes.
24 What can I say? Interestingly, I had just finished writing today's DN when I heard the news.
25 I was almost mad at the guy.
26 This stuff takes a lot of time to unbox each day, and I often begin it in the morning, fine-tune it in mid-afternoon, and finish it at night. I consider that a rough draft, for you writers out there.
27 And when I awaken every few hours during the night, I edit it item-per-item just so I won't sound too much like the village idiot.
28 I spend epic time in the morning editing, omitting needless words, tossing adverbs into the recycling, putting the active voice to work, and on and on.
29 And then I still see two thens. After publishing.
30 Ah, well. I can't blame Glen Frey.
31 I always mixed up his first name with Don Henley, so if you see me call him Don Frey, don't get butt hurt.
32 Moving On, Part One: Here's where it gets a tad tricky. My items become too many, and they begin to resemble the boats coming in on the Pirates of the Caribbean attraction in Disneyland. They don't crash, they instead calmly bump into one another in a gentle fashion.
33 Nice image if you've been there, and most have.
34 Okay, I'm going in. I have to bring up the DN I had already written and do a "mash-up."
35 I love new terms. Let's see how this goes, shall we? Welcome to my workshop.
36 Too random. I had a little on Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and spent a good deal of time with Letter From a Birmingham Jail (it does have several titles, as I posted yesterday on Facebook) but I didn't want to post a history lesson; rather, I wanted people to see just how difficult it must have been to fight for peace, as well as for civil rights.
37 Dr. King was an amazing figure, as well as eloquent, intelligent, and brave one, far and away among the strongest leaders in history. I wanted to point out that everybody should read Letter, because it reflects just how scary those marches must have been. So thank you Dr. Martin Luther King, for doing so much for so many.
38 Moving On, Part Two: I also had a bit going in this morning's DN about how I've written only two complete songs in my life. It was to be a Things You Don't Know About Me, Dept. short piece.
39 That's an astoundingly low output for a guitarist.
40 The thing is, I'm not really a good guitarist, nor do I consider myself remotely a musician.
41 I do know show biz, and I'm from a family that sings. And I have written a bazillion first-halves of songs. Perhaps more about that one later in the week?
42 And I am also aware of the history of rock; it's an awesome history, and were it not for its black roots, would never have existed.
43 Moving On, Part the Thoid: And finally, I had a bit about this psycho lady at our Ross store, a lady who deliberately crashed her shopping cart into mine on Friday. She wore purple. She said, "Sorry," but she clearly was annoyed that I was somehow blocking the aisle. I wasn't, and in fact, we had been shopping for baby clothes. We had the twins in their stroller, and we had walked for almost two hours, just for the fun of shopping and exercise. Here is the stroller:
45 She was clearly annoyed that we had babies AND were in the middle of the store chatting. I know enough that if I am in a store chatting, to leave a lot of room for other shoppers to get by. There were at least six to seven feet for the lady to move through. Instead, she put her head down and slammed her cart into mine.
46 We didn't say anything, and stayed there a bit longer. Not our issue. Several people came up and looked in at the girls and gave compliments. The babies charmed with their inherent cuteness, and those smiles grabbed at people.
47 I couldn't help looking across the store for the Purple Lady, however, sort of like I wanted to see what a psycho looked like more closely. Do you ever do that on the freeways? Some tailgater finally passes you, and then you look over to see what a complete moron looks like?
48 We eventually worked our way to the front of the store, but I wasn't thinking of the lady anymore.
49 Ross department stores don't allow the carts to leave the premises, so I was thinking, "How do we bag all this stuff with a stroller, and get it out to Caitlin's van?" The carts stood right next to the front doors, and were lined up similar to those aforementioned Pirates' boats.
50 We got in line, and guess who was right in front of us?
51 Go to the head of the class.
52 She had a sour look on her face, but I stayed out of whatever business she was having with the clerk.
53 Suddenly, she burst forward with her cart, and slammed it into all the other carts, and stormed out of the store.
54 Time stopped, at least for a second. It was like one of those slow-motion shots they have on teevee series' shows.
55 I finally had to say something. I've got that in me.
56 As the doors were closing behind her I said, "Enjoy your cats."
57 Cringe benefits, I tellya.
58 I guess I mashed this stuff up enough.
59 I gottago.
60 See you again.
61 Enjoy the wind and rain.
62 Peace.
~H~
fin.
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