Miscellany

What’s up?

Well, SMiLE is being streamed in its entirety at the Smile the Album website. Sounds good. Not too crazy about Vega-Tables, but it’s still better than the Smiley Smile version. Though, admittedly, inferior to the original boots that are available on the black market. I kinda like “On a Holiday,” which has wonderfully typical Van Dyke Parks lyrics and think “Blue Hawaii” may be my favorite on the disc (I always loved “I Love to Say Da Da” the Smile tracking session on which this song is built). Even the new version of “Wind Chimes” isn’t bad. And “Fire” is damn cool, actually. Scary even. Though when I hear it I wish I had a little plastic fireman’s helmet like Brian’s. I’m looking forward to hearing this sucker in high quality. Only one more week.

Got the new Elvis Costello. Jury still out. There are some songs that rock, which I was happy to hear. It has a nice sound, raw and natural, which is good. I just don’t know how good it is yet. Typical for an Elvis disc. However, Lucinda Williams sticks out like a sore thumb. She sounds like a drunken barfly.

Finally, Miss Gertrude is sick. Again. Poor kid. She’s running a high fever and puked once (which is what she usually does when she’s sick, whether or not it’s the stomach flu). Last night she was sleeping, all feverish and sad, and we heard a sound from her room.

“What was that?”

“A cough, I think.”

“A cough? Or was it a vomicough?”

You know the vomicough. A kid starts coughing, clearing her throat, and then splays the contents of her stomach on the wall in a way that would make Linda Blair scream in fear.

Her fever hasn’t been alarmingly high. But it’s been high enough to have some really weird conversations with her. I mean weirder than normal. For example, she explained to me the reason why she couldn’t eat last night (before it was apparent that she didn’t feel well) was that the black monster with black feet, black legs, black hair and black ears was there. Then she told me a story about how she and Meredith went to the zoo and they held hands on the train so they wouldn’t be scared. She also pointed out that it is very important that when we go to the zoo with Meredith that we do NOT see the lions, because they are both afraid of lions.

I assume she’s talking about MC Pudding (not to be confused with MC Lyte, Hammer or any other MC), but we’ve never gone to the zoo with them.

So she’s home. And so is mom. Mom’s maternals kicked in, despite the fact that I insisted that I could cancel my meeting today and take care of the kid. But to no avail. Her ovaries started a harmonic hum that clouds her brain and makes her need to care for children. It’s the only way to stop the ovaries from humming. I understand that.

Still, she could have worked. I can cuddle a sick baby with the best of them. In fact, it’s what I’d rather be doing.

Especially now that she’s done horking up stuff.

(UPDATE: Elvis is growing on me. I’m digging “Button My Lip” quite a bit right now.)

And, I'd like to wish my wife a belated public happy fifth anniversary last Saturday. We celebrated a month ago, so don't feel sorry for us when we tell you we spent the day cleaning with the kids. It was very romantic. Besides, that's what we do. We like our family. We're goofy that way. But, I'd like to thank her for the best five years of my life. Quite amazing, really.