Womansplaining

I posted this song years ago, but I've come across a much cleaner, clearer copy, and more information about it. 

In the intro, included in the better defined edition posted below, Michael Nesmith mentions in passing that Martin Mull is performing with "Mrs Mull". 

She is, in fact, Wendy Haas, Martin Mull's third wife, and had some street cred in the music field, as a vocalist and keyboardist. 

HBO is currently running a documentary about Fanny, a rock group considered at the time to be a novelty, because all the members were women. (I believe the late George Harrison suggested the name, perhaps mischievously, knowing that Americans are not familiar with English slang.) 

Anyway, Wendy Haas was in the band before it morphed into Fanny, and has also performed with the likes of Santana and Melissa Manchester. 

This song appears in Martin Mull's 1977 album I'm Everyone I Ever Loved, where the backup vocals for "They Never Met" were supplied by Melissa Manchester. The following version appeared on Television Parts in the summer of 1985:     The boy was almost forty-eight years old. 

All he'd ever gone to bed with, was a cold. 

And he said to his mama, "Mama, I'm afraid it's true; 

Th'only woman that could love me is you." 

The girl could almost drink her age in beer-- 

Couple cases, give or take a year. 

She worked at the hospital -  hey, lots of people do. 

That's where they fell in love 

(Oh God, I wish that that was true).

 

But they never met, 

Not even briefly. 

I know what you thought, 

You thought that they might. 

Now, what was the problem? 

The problem was, chiefly, 

She worked the day shift 

And he worked the night. 

They never met, not even inform'ly-- 

I know you thought things like this work out right. 

No, no, they never met, not even abnorm'ly. 

She worked the day shift 

And he worked the night. 

Now the boy is almost fifty-nine. 

You ask him, "How's it goin', Frank?" and he says, "Fine." 

"And what's become of Mama?" "Well, Mama's in a better place." 

And he points his finger right straight out in space. 

The girl is finally chief admitting nurse; 

Considering what she had for brains, it could be worse. 

She could have been a victim of the dreaded Asian Flu; 

She could have had to live with you-know-who-- 

Now the boy's gone to meet his mom-- 

Natural causes: the bottle, not the bomb. 

They found him in the dining room; his face was in a stew. 

They dressed him in a suit of shiny blue. 

That same year, the girl gave up the ghost. 

The minister said she'd be missed the most. 

Her patients cried a tear, recalling how she signed their casts. 

The nurses said she'd find a man at last.  

They never met, 

Not even in spirit-- 

I know you thought things like this work out right! 

No, no, she went to Heaven... 

But he's nowhere near it. 

She works the day shift 

And he works the night.

The cage it called

This is another song sent to me by Spotify. 

 I don't remember hearing it eight years ago, when it first came out, and the original rock version probably would not have caught my attention. 

 However, this stripped-down piano version had me listening. 

 And the final line stops me cold.

"Have a nice life."

Some years ago, I ran into my ex-boyfriend.  We'd been having a friendly chat, so I was startled when, as he walked off, he said, "Have a nice life."  I realized I would never see him again.

On Saturday evening, I joined eleven million other Canadians - that's roughly a third of the country, folks - in watching a dying man's final concert. As massively morbid as that sounds, there were many moments of joy, of poignancy and even awkwardness.

 Of course, that was a Tragically Hip concert at the best of times.

This wasn't the best of times. Gordon Downie, the Hip's lead singer, was diagnosed with terminal brain cancer not long ago. This follows hard on the heels of the farewell concert for John Mann, the lead singer of The Spirit of the West, who is heading down the long road of early onset Alzheimer's. The Hip are huge in Canada, so they too decided to embark on a 15-concert farewell tour, starting in Victoria on July 22nd, passing through Hades on August 18th, and finishing in their hometown of Kingston, Ontario on Saturday night.

Demand for tickets was so high that the CBC actually put aside three hours of prime Olympic Games broadcast time - on the last full day of competition, if you please - and broadcast the concert via television, radio and the Internet.

I'm not even a "Hip-head", but you can't live in Canada and be unaware of their music.  I first heard them through Much Music, of course, back in the late eighties when they played driving rock and mostly appealed to adolescent and post-adolescent boys.  As Downie himself commented between songs Saturday night, the "girls" finally started following the Hip in the mid-nineties and, indeed, the first Hip song I recall even liking was the wistful and regretful "Ahead by a Century".  This is also the one song the Resident Fan Boy recognizes -- and he thought it was by some English group because of the cricket reference.

With illusions of some day
Casting a golden light
No dress rehearsal
This is our life.

The Tragically Hip have been described, maybe several times too often, as the quintessential Canadian band, especially over the past few weeks as CBC Radio has been playing hours of Hip music and Hip-related interviews.  Rush fans might contest the "most Canadian band" thing, but frankly, the appeal of Rush has always eluded me.  Geddy Lee, Rush's lead singer, said on yet another CBC Hip-related interview that most people might argue that Bobcaygeon is the most Canadian song (it isn't - that's so Ontario), but he thought that "Fifty Mission Cap" was.  An odd choice, considering that Canadians never had a fifty mission cap, to the best of my knowledge.  When the song opened the concert, the RFB and I looked at each other in bemusement.  Like most of Gordon Downie's songs, the lyrics are a bit obscure and you have to look them up on some web site like A Museum After Dark to know what the hell he's going on about.

You won't be surprised to learn that I disagree with Geddy Lee.  I think the most Canadian song ever is indeed a Hip Song:
Like "Fifty Mission Cap", "Fireworks" also references hockey, in this case, the hockey moment that every Canadian above the age of thirty-five remembers - Paul Henderson's goal at the 1972 Summit Series. However, it also features a girl who doesn't "give a f*&% about hockey" (sister!), and mentions the dreaded Canadian Fitness Programme that made P.E. a hell on earth for kids attending school between 1970 and 1990.

So, I, the non-Hip-head, remained entranced in my chair throughout three sets and three encores, with the growing realization that these songs were being performed for the last time.

Among other things, Downie sang about a cholera epidemic, Hugh MacLennan, the mysterious disappearance of a member of the Group of Seven, the sinking of the Bismarck, and the wrongful conviction and imprisonment of David Milgaard.  He even cornered the Prime Minister of Canada about Attawapiskat and the continuing crisis with the First Nations.

Each song sounded like a finale, but I looked at the Resident Fan Boy and shook my head.  "He hasn't sung 'Locked in the Trunk of a Car' or 'Ahead by a Century' yet."

Finally, Rob Barker started an unfamiliar acoustic solo with a familiar rhythm that segued into the unmistakeable opening chords.

Here's how it sounded in Edmonton, about three weeks before that.

However, Kingston is the hometown of the Hip and with this song, as with all songs that last evening, the crowd sang along, and as the instruments took over, Downie had a last communion with the crowd, who eagerly and almost desperately reached out to him. The sound quality in the video below, taken near the stage in Kingston, is not as clear as the CBC broadcast, but this gives you some indication of the atmosphere, and why so many people across Canada were crying.


Not long before this, Gordon Downie told the audience to "have a nice life".

When a Canadian says that, you know it's goodbye for good.

Moving music

As the bus made its way down Rideau Street into downtown Hades, I watched the reflection of the sun flash by, ricocheting off windows and walls, seemingly in time to the Bach piano concerto playing on my ear buds.

Yesterday, I was talking about how statues and sculptures change with the surrounding environment and our perception of them. I suppose this is true of all art. When I was in a youth theatre at age 17, I was amazed how we could perform the same play three nights running and each performance was distinctly different, according to the audience reaction and the moods of the actors.

Music seems to be the most dependent on environment and mood of all, especially now we can take it anywhere. Last summer, I was (again) riding the bus and saw three boys walking along the sidewalk and imagined their adventures. It then occurred to me that they could be doleful or up to no good, but the upbeat song on my iPod gave me the illusion that they were walking with youthful and light-hearted energy. I was superimposing a soundtrack on whatever they were getting up to on that sunny July afternoon, and watching them like a movie.

Just a couple of weeks ago, I was listening to Tempo on CBC Radio Two and because Henryk Górecki had just died, they played the first movement of his Symphony of Sorrowful Songs. No, I don't mean the famous second movement; I mean the first movement that begins with an interminable grating of the lower string instruments as they overlap each other in steadily mounting grief. Listen to the first few moments of it. If you can bear it:

I gazed up and down the street and everybody looked miserable, bogged down, staring at the ground as they waited for the bus or dragged their shopping in their listless hands. Of course, had I been listening to a lively jazz piece, they would have appeared busy, energetic and probably kind of hip.

A few days ago, I was stuck outside a Grand and Toy stationery store, waiting for it to open. Having nothing else to do for five minutes, I strolled over to the railing and looked directly down two levels to the food court below where I could see people strolling diagonally across the red tiles. Every now and then someone would approach the trash bins and deposit stuff in them, pivoting gracefully away to dance across the floor. Well, that's what it looked like. This was blaring on my iPod:
As I listened, I noticed strings of white Christmas lights dangling into the court like tropical jellyfish. The bulbs blinked rapidly along with the notes, as the shoppers -- well -- tripped the light fantastic.

I was almost sorry when the store opened.

All the old dudes

I nearly missed this item buried in the "More from Entertainment" section of the BBC news web site. I was amused by two things: first the wry comment that the two sold-out Mott the Hoople reunion gigs (of a total of seven) are at "the rather less well known Blake Theatre in Monmouth", and secondly, that none of the pictures of the band members are current. I remember seeing a documentary of the Rolling Stones done to support one of their more recent world tours and thinking how they all looked like aging shop-keepers. As Mott themselves declared in two of their songs ("All the Way from Memphis" and "The Golden Age of Rock 'n' Roll"): Ya gotta stay young, man; you can never get old...

Still, would I were there. I went scrolling through YouTube for some of my favourites, thinking of mornings when I would put on the headphones and blast Mott into my ears, searching for the courage to leave the house. First, here's a 1973 (or 1974?) Top of the Pop lip-sync of "Roll Away the Stone", although Ian Hunter is singing over his recorded vocal:Next, in a video that screams "Eighties" is a non-Mott song from Ian Hunter, "All of the Good Ones Are Taken." The sync is a bit out here, but the other versions of the video are not as clear. This is back when many music videos actually had some sort of story-line. I like the humour in it; although the posing sex-bombs kinda date it (or do they?):Finally, one of my very favourite Mott the Hoople ditties, "I Wish I Was Your Mother". This is a gorgeous recent version Hunter recorded in Oslo for a DVD/CD entitled Strings Attached which is going right on my Christmas wish list:Sigh. Would I were there...

Continuing my Launchcast Lament

In keeping with my whinge over losing Launchcast as of April 15th, I made a note of each song that played on my Launchcast station last night and how I rated each one. Roughly half were new to me and a third were from Canadian artists. (Yes, I know that Rufus Wainwright was born in the US; he was raised in Montreal by his Canadian mother, okay?) I used the rate out of 100 option because the five stars aren't exacting enough for me. Anything below 50 means I don't care for it (the degree of dislike increases with the smallness of the number, obviously). 50-59 means I don't mind hearing it again; 60-69 means I'd like to hear it again; 70-79 means I care about hearing it again; 80-89 means I must hear it again, and 90 and above means I stop what I'm doing to listen and sometimes even shove back my chair and sing and dance in front of the computer. (Luckily, you will be spared this.) Yesterday evening was a good evening, only one song below fifty percent. I've provided some YouTube links to some of them in case you'd like to listen along to what was playing on Lily Father's Joy's Station:
Water's Edge - 79 - Cyndi Lauper, The Body Acoustic 2005
Sleepwalker - 74 - Wallflowers, Breach 2000
You Stole the Sun from My Heart - 65 - Manic Street Preachers, Forever Delayed: Greatest Hits
My Baby Loves a Bunch of Authors - 83 - Moxy Fruvous, Bargainville 1993 (Can/Con) I'd just like to point out at this juncture that one of the members of Moxy Fruvous is my younger daughter's speech therapist's nephew. No, I don't know which one.
Awkward Game - 59 - The Cash Brothers, How Was Tomorrow? 2001 (Can/Con)
Willie's Fatal Visit - 50 - Jeannie Robertson, Classic Ballads of the British Isles
God and Country - 68 - Blue Rodeo, Diamond Mine 1989 (Can/Con)
Everybody Loves Me, Baby - 98 - Don Mclean, American Pie 1971
You Are Everyone - 60 - Dar Williams, Promised Land 2008
Drinkin' Days - 63 - Slaid Cleaves, Wishbones 2004
Land of Canaan - 54 - Indigo Girls, Strange Fire 1987
Going to a Town - 50 - Rufus Wainwright, Release the Stars 2007 (Can/Con)
The Night Pat Murphy Died - 70 - Great Big Sea, Great Big DVD and CD
2004 (Can/Con)
Needle in the Hay - 50 - Elliott Smith, Elliott Smith 1995
Andy, You're A Star - 61 - The Killers, Hot Fuss 2004
If I Should Fall From Grace with God - 80 - The Pogues, If I Should Fall From Grace With God 1988
Walk Around Downtown - 83 - Cheryl Wheeler, Different Stripe 2002

Sigh. I suppose I can go back to listening to The Q online, but I will miss having somewhere to list what I like and dislike. You may want to steer clear of this blog for the next three weeks; I'll probably be doing a number of moanfests like this one. (Beats facing what really going on...)

Anticipatory Grief for Launchcast, Part Two (with some double-dipping)

Shrove Tuesday, so the fridge is stocked with sausages and bacon to go with the pancakes this evening. I want to continue my elegy for Launchcast (which is still playing for me and letting me rate songs here in Canada). Here are some more songs and/or artists that I only came across when Launchcast sent them to my player:

6. - from the 1994 album The Snake, Shane MacGowan and the Popes. Love the song; the video is pretty, but makes me feel quite chilly, watching Sinéad tramp through waterlogged sets in her bare feet (and golly, she's heavily made-up for such a pretty girl). Purists undoubtedly prefer the 1986 Cait O 'Riordan/Pogues version: which is a bit meatier, but I think one usually prefers the version one hears first.

7. From Shane MacGowan without The Pogues, we go to The Pogues without Shane MacGowan: There was a rather splendid Doctor Who fan-vid of the second season set to this song, but it seems to have disappeared from YouTube.

8. Here's another double-dip: That's the version I first heard on Launchcast, but I can't resist this earlier 1989 version with a very Eighties video: Bit Proclaimer-ish, isn't it?

9. - from the 1981 album Face Dances. Don't know how I missed this Who gem the first time around which actually sounds very un-Who-like, although it sounds a lot like Pete Townsend.

10. - from the 1981 album Making Movies. Yes, I know. Perhaps it's because I'm not that crazy about Dire Straits (I don't mind them, but I don't turn up the radio when they come on), but I never heard this one until it turned up on Launchcast. Heartbreaking and beautiful.

11. - from the 1988 album Modern Lovers 88 A song that expresses exactly how I feel about Harpo Marx:
Well when Harpo played his harp, it was a mystery
All the laughing stopped back to the balcony
Chico, Chico, sure to please
Now let's watch him shoot the keys
When Harpo would play his harp, all was still

When Harpo played his harp, it was a dream, it was
Well if someone else can do it, how come nobody does?
Groucho, Groucho, fast as light
Some talk like him but not quite
When Harpo would play his harp, all was still, still

Well Harpo Harpo
This is the angels and
where did you get that sound so fine?
Harpo Harpo
We gotta hear it
One more time

Harpo Harpo
We're in the galaxies and
where did you get that sound so fine?
Harpo Harpo
We gotta hear it
One more time

Do you remember what he would do sometimes before he played?
Well he'd look up to the sky and he'd look the angels' way
Harpo Harpo, when you start
Tears of joy inside my heart
Harpo would play his harp and all was still

I gotta hear it one more time. Here's Harpo in Horse Feathers, the first Marx Brothers film I ever saw. I was seventeen and instantly smitten; all Harpo's mania disappears, and the real man appears before our eyes: The lovely lady is Thelma Todd who also appeared in my very favourite Marx Brothers flick Monkey Business. She was brutally murdered a short time later.

12. Finally (there's more, but I'll only do them if I run out of post ideas before my last day of NaBloPoMo on Saturday), Dar Williams: There's a fan-vid featuring the original recording from the 2000 album The Green World, but it focuses on a Big Brother participant for some reason, so I'm sticking with this live version. Dar Williams was someone I was almost completely unaware of before Launchcast sent her along to me, but I just love her songs with their marvelous lyrics:
I wonder if Yoko Ono
Ever thought of staying solo
If she thought of other men and
If she doubted John Lennon
Worrying that he'd distract her art

Sitting in the Apple sessions
Giving John her music lessons
Challenging the warring nations
With her paper installations
Did she guard her Yoko human heart

Well, they could talk about me
Yeah, they could talk about me
Throw me to the velvet dogs of pop star history
But I won't be your Yoko Ono
If you're not good enough for me

Some will give their love for fashion
Others trade their gold for passion
I don't have the goods to start with
Never had the reins to part with
Still, I hope you take me seriously

'Cause I think I could go
Deep as the sea of Yoko
You don't know a person like me
I could sell your songs to Nike
And for all you know
I could save your soul
As only true love can change your mind
Make you leave your screaming fans behind

When John called the wind an opera
Making love with every chakra
When he said her voice would carry
And when he whispered old Chuck Berry
Only then would Yoko set him free

Fame will come and vanish later
Transcendental love is greater
I think if we had this somehow
We'd be feeling famous right now
We'd be saying love is all you need

Sounds a bit like a riposte to The Barenaked Ladies, doesn't it? Good. Managed my Can/Con for today...

Anticipatory Grief for Launchcast, Part One

In a recent post I mentioned my Launchcast Station, and a fellow from Minnesota calling himself CPL Poker Podcast and League wrote in to tell me that Launchcast is no more. This was a surprise as I was listening to my Launchcast station at the time, but I checked the internet and it seems Yahoo has sold Launchcast to CBS stations and they've merrily dismantled all the US personalized stations. Although this news appears on the Yahoo.ca financial news page, there's no word yet about whether the Canadian Launchcast stations will be dismantled.

I have to assume that they eventually will, which would mean my five years of rating 961 artists, 634 albums and over 15,000 songs will disappear in a poof, so I've been listening to my station as never before. My station has a mix of rock, folk, and classical with a some hints of jazz and show tunes. I'm not likely to find anything like it anywhere, am I? Furthermore, the Launchcast system sends music it thinks you will like based on your ratings. Often, they're horribly wrong (ever had books recommended to you by Amazon?), but often they send gems. I hear music I might not have heard otherwise, and songs from established artist that I've managed to miss. Damn.

Anyway, I thought this morning, I'd post some songs I first heard on my Launchcast station, provided they are available on YouTube. I think it makes up about a baker's dozen, so I'll do roughly half this morning:

1. -- from the album Yankee Hotel Foxtrot. I find the fan-made video provided with this song a bit distracting and not much to do with the song. I imagine it being more about street people, but I'm probably wrong too. This song came up on the Billy Bragg fan station at Launchcast, and eventually led me to purchasing both the CDs Billy Bragg did with Wilco covering Woody Guthrie songs.

2. I completely missed The Stone Roses and their psychedelic sound the first time around, possibly because I was having babies. "Waterfall" is merely representative; I like a whole bunch of their songs.

3. I can't embed this next one which is "Dark Eyes" sung by Judy Collins and written by Bob Dylan. His version appeared in his 1985 album Empire Burlesque, and according to Wikipedia, he needed to write a simple track to close the album:
He returned to his hotel in Manhattan after midnight, and Dylan apparently said later:

"As I stepped out of the elevator, Sarah Bernstein was coming toward me in the hallway - pale yellow hair wearing a fox coat - high heeled shoes that could pierce your heart. She had blue circles around her eyes, black eyeliner, dark eyes. She looked like she'd been beaten up and was afraid that she'd get beat up again. In her hand, crimson purple wine in a glass. 'I'm just dying for a drink,' she said as she passed me in the hall. She had a beautifulness, but not for this kind of world."

The brief, chance encounter inspired Dylan to write "Dark Eyes," which was quickly recorded without any studio embellishment. Structured like a children's song, with very rudimentary guitar work and very simple notes, it's often quoted for its last chorus: "A million faces at my feet, but all I see are dark eyes."

Once again, this fan-vid doesn't seem to have much to do with the song, but when I first heard it, with Judy Collins' vocals, I imagined Europe just after the First World War. So there yer go; we hear what we hear.

4. -- from the 1980 album Bad Luck Streak in Dancing School (Zevon also had just the best album titles). I was vaguely aware of the song "Werewolves of London", but Warren Zevon, rest his soul, is another singer/songwriter I managed to miss. I just love his stuff, and it's all because Launchcast kept sending it to me on my radio station. I've not the only one who loves Warren Zevon, this next offering is a tribute:

5. -- from the album Bark. I bought this CD based on two songs that appeared on my Launchcast station: this one and "I've Had Enough of You Today". Blackie and the Rodeo Kings is a kind of super-group comprised of Canadian alternative rock/folk/country artistsThe quality of this weird and rare video is highly dependent on whether you click the "watch in high quality" option, so you may want to click on this video and go do that.

That'll do for now. I'm sure I'll be scrabbling for post topics later as I head into the final week of marathon posting for NaBloPoMo, so I'll post the rest later.

Synchronicity

Every now and then in my life, when the time is so often out of joint (probably due to my less-than-steller organizational skills and self-discipline), I get a little gift of synchronicity. Some time ago, I blogged a bit on William Shatner and his musings on parenthood. This morning, while waiting on the kindness of internet strangers for more internet goodies related to the penultimate Doctor Who cliff-hanger, I checked my "recommended" page at YouTube and found this surreal rendition of Pulp's Common People featuring William Shatner reciting the lyrics with vocal back-up by Joe Jackson, plus Ben Folds on the keyboards:
Good Lord.

And what do I find in the video response section for this? A Doctor Who fan-vid set to the original Pulp recording of Common People. It's a competent effort (I much prefer the original video which was one of the last music videos I clearly recall enjoying), but it's rather fun to see Rose smiling smugly to the line "Everybody hates a tourist, especially when he thinks it's all such a laugh", so in honour of those excited over Rose's return over the final three episodes of this season (which doesn't include me -- although I'm perfectly pleased to see her back), I include it here:

Memed again...

Rob of the madly eclectic blog Eine Kleine Nichtmusik has "memed" me with an interesting one: List seven songs you are into right now. No matter what the genre, whether they have words, or even if they’re not any good, but they must be songs you’re really enjoying now, shaping your spring. Post these instructions in your blog along with your 7 songs. Then tag 7 other people to see what they’re listening to.

Shaping my spring? Hmmmn. Well number 1 is easy; I just blogged about it --- You'd Think by Now by Carrie Newcomer, one of those songs that get into the sore spots of your life, then presses down. Lovely song, tough situation to be in...

2. Well, as I blogged yesterday, we've just seen The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee, and while the music isn't the strongest point of the show (songs are pleasant enough, but the overall humour is what makes the show entertaining), I have had the theme song stuck on the brain (watch for special guest Al Sharpton in this excerpt performed at the Tony Awards):

3. I'm been turning to The Proclaimers for comfort quite a bit this spring, but I really have a soft spot for "When You're In Love" from their Perseverance album: "Romantic love rots your brain, no doubt about it/ You're out of your mind..." Oh darlin', no truer words spoken (or sung):

4. For some Can/Con, I've been singing Had Enough of You Today, my favourite song from Bark by Blackie and the Rodeo Kings (a sort of folk/rock/country super-group comprised of Stephen Fearing, Tom Wilson, and Colin Linden - okay, they're reasonably well-known as solo artists in Canada). Can't find a decent You Tube performance of this rocker so the 30 seconds at Amazon.ca will have to do. I think this is Tom Wilson's song (ooh, just checked and he co-wrote it with Davor Valuma [a record producer in Vancouver] and Bryan Potvin of The Northern Pikes -- no wonder I love it!) and he wrote it after a road trip with his mother and his ex-wife, but we've all had days like this. Love the grrrrind...

5. I was listening to Colin Murray's "In the Company of" on BBC radio with guest star David Tennant, and right afterwards they played this amazing song, "Oxford Comma" by Vampire Weekend: Just to give the illusion that I'm in the know...

6. I've loved "Face the Face" by Pete Townsend for years, but lately have been attempting to find a clean version of the original video, which features, among other things, a turn by Pete's daughter. All I can find is this posting with the first verse missing: Oh hell, let's jive!

7. Another one I loved for years is the Rankin Family's version of Ho Ro Mo Nighean Donn Bhoidheach. I just heard a version in English yesterday "Ho Ro My Nut-Brown Maiden" which was all testosterone, lust, and thrusting. Maybe that's how it's supposed to be sung, but I adore this dreamy wistful interpretation with its lovely harmonies and round-like ending:


So there, I guess, is my musical spring this year. It's actually not the meme that's tough; it's the tagging. I tend to "lurk" at most blogs, and those where I actually speak up are darned busy blogs. Darnit, I'm only going to tag three people. (Does this mean I'll die at midnight, or lose a million dollars or something?) I tag Vanessa of Stopping to Eat the Roses for her no doubt interesting perspective from her perch in the Philippines, Jonas of Poetry in Motion who has recently rejoined us in blogger-land, and Jane Henry of Maniac Mum who, as a writer and mother of four, clearly doesn't have enough to do. Now I suppose I have to go tell these lucky people that they're "it"....