Ain't No Drag . . .

Bassist Larry Ridley recalls . . .


(from Straight No Chaser; The Life and Genius of Thelonious Monk by Leslie Gourse)
". . . He was cool with me.  We'd talk about a lot of things. He would always have interesting kinds of ways of being very succinct and candid about his insights. One time someone made a comment to us-during the civil rights days, and things were pretty touchy, black power and all.  I had a big Afro and dashikis. We were very conscious of this whole movement. This white guy said something about "you boys" this and "you boys" that to me. I turned to Thelonious and said, "I'm tired of these motherfuckers calling us boys. They don't have to go through all that. We're men." Thelonious said to me, "Ain't no drag, Larry, because everybody wants to be young." I said, "Okay, I'll think on that one." So he could really turn things into nothing with a few words. And there I was, upset, with my fist up in the air about respect. It was interesting. . . "

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Glaciers and Music . . .

(from http://www.priweb.org/ed/finger_lakes/nystate_geo3.html)
". . . The Finger Lakes consist of 11 long, narrow, roughly parallel lakes, oriented north-south as fingers of a pair of outstretched hands. The southern ends have high walls, cut by steep gorges. Two of the lakes (Seneca and Cayuga) are among the deepest in North America and have bottoms below sea level. These lakes all formed over the last two million years by glacial carving of old stream valleys. Ithaca is located at the south end of Cayuga Lake, the longest and the second deepest of the Finger Lakes. Cayuga is 38.1 miles long and 435 feet deep (53 feet below sea level) at its deepest spot. The actual depth of carved rock is well over twice as deep, but it has been filled with sediments; there may be as much as 1000 feet of glacial sediment in the deep rock trough below the lakebed.

The Finger Lakes originated as a series of northward-flowing rivers that existed in what is now central New York State. Around two million years ago the first of numerous continental glaciers moved southward from the Hudson Bay area, initiating the Pleistocene glaciation, commonly known as the "Ice age."

The "Ice age" was really a series of many advances and retreats of glaciers. The Finger Lakes were probably carved by several of these episodes. Ice sheets more than two miles thick flowed southward, parallel but opposite to the flow of the rivers, gouging deep trenches into these river valleys. Traces of most of the earlier glacial events have vanished, but much evidence remains of the last one or two glaciers that covered New York.

The latest glacial episode was most extensive around 21,000 years ago, when glaciers covered almost the entire state. Around 19,000 years ago, the climate warmed, and the glacier began to retreat, disappearing entirely from New York for the last time around 11,000 years ago. . ."

There MUST be music involved here somewhere. Yes, Keuka Lake is one of the finger lakes. . . and yet another iteration of my composition 'Keuka' demanded my attention this weekend. . .


Keuka
©2013 Raymond M. Jozwiak 





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Tull or Till? . . .

(from https://www.blogger.com/blogger.g?blogID=9036126688324230916#editor/target=post;postID=5685428847922011660;onPublishedMenu=allposts;onClosedMenu=allposts;postNum=1;src=link)
Jethro Tull,  (born 1674, Basildon, Berkshire, Eng.—died Feb. 21, 1741, Prosperous Farm, near Hungerford, Berkshire), English agronomist, agriculturist, writer, and inventor whose ideas helped form the basis of modern British agriculture. Tull trained for the bar, to which he was called in 1699. But for the next 10 years he chose to operate his father’s farm in Oxfordshire, on which about 1701 he perfected a horse-drawn seed drill that economically sowed the seeds in neat rows. This was a notable advance over the usual practice of scattering the seeds by hand. In 1709 Tull bought a farm of his own in Berkshire. While later traveling in France and Italy, he was impressed by the cultivation methods in use in the vineyards, wherein the rows of earth between the vines had been pulverized. This reduced the need for manure and increased aeration and the access of water to and from plant roots, though Tull mistakenly believed that earth was the food of plants and that pulverization made it easier for plants to absorb it. He developed a horse-drawn hoe and successfully adopted the vineyard method to his farm. His success led to the publication of his The New Horse Houghing Husbandry: Or an Essay on the Principles of Tillage and Vegetation (1731). Tull’s methods were initially subjected to violent attack, but they were eventually adopted by the large landowners and laid the basis for more modern and efficient British farming.

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Ginger or Mary Ann . . .

. . . and YOU thought the current pop culture's preoccupations were ridiculous!!  The recent passing of actor Russel Johnson brought that age-old party game, barroom discussion to mind.  Methinks it won't be too long before we realize how silly our current pop culture obsessions truly are, but by then, there will be new ones to savor.

Current ones like:
Miley Cyrus
Zombies
Beyonce
Downton Abbey
Breaking Bad
Carbs and Lycopenes
The NSA

. . . enough to make you WANT to be stranded on a desert island.

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Let's Take Him Up. . .

. . . on his offer . . .

TOTALLY!!



(from http://worldnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2014/01/14/22298718-israeli-minister-apologizes-to-kerry-for-messianic-remarks?lite)
(Moshe) Yaalon was quoted by the Yediot Aharonot newspaper on Tuesday as saying that the only thing that could "save" Israel was for Kerry to receive the Nobel Peace Prize and "leave us alone."

"Secretary of State John Kerry came here very determined and operates based upon an unfathomable obsession and a messianic feeling," Yaalon was quoted as saying. "Throughout the recent months, there is no negotiation between us and the Palestinians, but rather, between us and the Americans. The only thing that can 'save' us is that John Kerry will get a Nobel Peace Prize and leave us alone."

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Linked . . .

. . . in


What is going on with Linkedin???  (or is it just me?)

Seems within the past nine months or so (maybe more), there are all these attractive young ladies inviting me to connect on the Linkedin website, who are (of ALL things!) 'Consultants at Self Employed'.

CONSULTANTS AT SELF-EMPLOYED!!

For what it's worth, they also seem to be from anywhere but the U.S. 

Something about this seems to be a bit fishy to me.

What exactly is a "Consultant at Self Employed" and shouldn't a self-employed consultant be required to add the specific business in which they are qualified to consult?  Maybe I'm skeptical or possibly just naive, but their photos would indicate their commonality to coincidentally be either:  1. they are all simply nice looking young ladies with a desire and talent for consulting;  they are each operating an escort (or some other less conventionally acceptable business) service.

Looks like spam to me.  Has anyone else had this happen?

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Is This Draggin' You, Man? . . .

(from Straight, No Chaser; The Life and Genius of Thelonious Monk by Leslie Gourse)
". . . Invited to witness a rehearsal with Monk and Charlie Rouse, (Robert) Kotlowitz (for Harper's) wrote:

Monk feeds . . . Rouse . . . a note or phrase at a time, a mouthful to be digested to bewildered shakings of the head. It can take the entire two hours to get one full minute of music set between the two. Monk and Rouse say their notes, as though music were the simplest, most direct language available to man, and even more, as though B-C sharp, played on an instrument, means something as precise and unmistakable as C-A-T. Throughout the rehearsal, Monk directs with short comments. "You're not making it," he says placidly after the seventh repetition of an octave jump. "Dig it" Well into the next phrase, Monk says, "Don't tough the note, hit it.  And when you it it, augment it."

When he was satisfied, Monk said slowly, "Solid"  To Kotlowitz, who was listening to the repetitions, he said, "This dragging you?" . . . "

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