Ice, Ice Baby

That snow storm that I talked about in my last entry? Guess what. Not so much snow as monumental amounts of ice. More damage than hurricane Hugo (and that was bad here in NC) and it left 1.2 million people in the state without power. In my town, there were 12,000 without power. Unfortunately, that's the population. Only the Servco beside the hospital and the hospital had power. I kid not.

I have discovered one of the most eerie sounds imaginable. Deathly quiet, because no one's moving about (as it's much warmer under the covers), and you stand in the near dark hearing...cracks, snaps and crashes. Because trees are falling apart. The top limbs and sometimes the entire trees just couldn't handle the weight of the ice.

And if that wasn't fun enough, try this one. 7:15 am, all cuddled up in bed with no power, and there's this monstrous snap, crack crash right outside my bedroom window. I peak out, and there's a portion of tree dangling right in front of the window. But I'm on the second floor. So there's this 30-foot section of tree (I think the entire top went) dangling about 10 feet above the ground. And it hasn't fallen yet. The thing is bigger than the building! I'm just hoping it doesn't hit my apartment.

Add to all of this the fact that while my dog loves the snow, he hates ice. I had a ton of trouble getting him to go to the bathroom, which culminated with him whining incessantly, because puppy needs to go number 2 and refuses to go on anything that isn't leaves. Like I'm gonna stand out there with a blow torch and defrost him a bathroom area.

Puppy got over it.

Don't get me wrong, I love my Chester, he's a little heating pad that kept me warm until my parents called and said they had their generator up and running. But he just needed to accept that ice was bad, but ice was a bathroom too.

I also came to the conclusion that he would be a good sled dog. Cause all I had to do was plant my feet and he pulled me along. Hee dawgies! *g*

Ugh. I hate ice. Want the weather to be gone! At least I have power now (and don't have to sleep at my parents' house).


Who's your fantasy TV boyfriend?
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Your fantasy TV boyfriend is Clark Kent from Smallville. He's mysterious, shy and kind. He's loved you forever, but is afraid to tell you. It's just another one of his many secrets.

Of course. Yeesh. Like this one is a surprise. Funny thing is, the guys that I attract are the guys who are shy and afraid to tell me. Which is exactly how I am too. So it's a major stalemate. Major.

Pondery Music Thoughts

musesfool has me doing pondering of the musical variety. She mentioned Elvis in her diary, and during typing comments, I got to thinking about why it is that I'm drawn to Elvis and violently opposed to the Beatles.

I think musically, people have accepted to Beatles vs. Elvis argument, and yet it's an argument that never made sense to me. Granted, there's this larger than life view of both. They're bigger than music. They defined music and changed it in their way. But they really don't have much in common musically. They were from different decades, different backgrounds - and the world as a whole was different. Elvis was World War II. The Beatles were Vietnam. The country reacted violently differently to those two wars. Comparing Elvis to the Beatles is like comparing the country during WWII to during Vietnam - there's just a completely different mindset involved. The Beatles' music is darker, reflecting the times.

Personally, I don't like the Beatles' music, but that's a personal style choice. The style, the sound - it doesn't speak to me. With Elvis, a good deal of it does. But here's the thing, it's not so much the words of the song, it's his voice, the inflection and the musical arrangement of the song.

You can tell sound is a big thing for me. I think it's because we very rarely get a song that the words truly are something wonderful, so when a great song comes along and fits with the music, it's fabulous. But most of the time we get okay words and maybe great music (or more often than not, okay words and okay music, which is booooorring).

Anyway. It hit me that for me, the Elvis love stems from the fact that I love country. I hear a lot of country, or the current incarnation of country, in his music. It's especially in his voice. And Elvis also had a profound love of music. He did a ton of things wrong in his career (after all, look how he ended up - Vegas musician), but you could tell that just singing was a spiritual event for him. It put him in another place. I think that that rarely happens for singers. A lot of them get into the image, the lifestyle, the money - they don't care as much about the song as they do about how they appear. And you can tell when someone sings whether they're in it for the song or the fame. Listen to John Lennon sing "Imagine." Listen to Bruce Springsteen sing almost anything. Listen to Elvis singing "Amazing Grace." Alan Jackson and George Strait. Dixie Chicks. Aretha Franklin. Josh Groban. India Arie. There's a certain mentality that comes through in the music of those who sing what they love, who play what they love and not what everyone else loves.

You hear the passion, the joy, the emotion. The songs may be upbeat or they may be mornful. Serious or silly. But it's genuine.

Of course Elvis did make mistakes, as he was the first superstar (and boy did everyone learn from him), and he did lose sight of the music at times, but in the end, he got back to that love. And really, if half of these kids today had a bit of love for the music instead of seeing how many runs they can make or how many high notes they can hit (or how little clothing they can wear - and yes, I'm looking at you Christina Aguilera), then we'd have a great set of musicians.

Eva Cassidy - never been marketed at all, ever (she refused to try to get a record deal and never tried to hawk her music saying the people that liked her would find her), she has a fan base that grows every time someone hear's a rendition of any song by her. Literally. Look at what happened after "Time After Time" was played on Smallville. She didn't write the songs, but she understood them and loved them - and it's evident in her music and has built her a strong audience based on her passion alone.

Great music and great artists do shine through, even in a massive sea of mediocrity.

And ugh. I've overthought this. And probably left tons out that I meant to say. But I'm tired and done with writing for the moment. So comment. Discuss.

(no subject)

What classic sitcom character are you?
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*Hits the floor laughing*

The funniest part? The coolness. Hee.