| Author |
 Topic  |
|
|
andrew p
Firefly
USA
3936 Posts |
 Posted - 04/18/2008 : 07:00:38
|
been there...done that...flashback often!!! LOL
take a trip and never even leave the farm.
andrew
Those who danced were thought to be quite insane by those who could not hear the music. ~John Milton
|
 |
|
|
Roy
Firefly
USA
2627 Posts |
Posted - 04/18/2008 : 21:18:56
|
It was the spring of 1993, driving to work I looked up and saw a blimp...painted in crazy colors and looking like a pig from the rear...this was nothing from Goodyear or Snoopy...there just wasn't a lot of blimps working that year. This flying pig swooped low over highway 287 in Arlington and as it turned again I read "Pink Floyd" on the side...Pigs can fly!
Later that morning I learned that the band was going to appear at Texas Stadium, home of the Dallas Cowboys, in June. Tickets were to go on sale in a couple of weeks.
As ticket time rolled around, my son and his buddies made plans to camp out at the ticket agency in order to have a crack at good seats.
I couldn't imagine that they could produce decent sound or lights in a venue that big, but I gave the kid a hundred dollar bill and told him to count me in on the tickets. Around ten the next morning my phone rang with the news of two front row center tickets were in hand for me and my lady.
The day of the concert I had searched for something a little stronger than Willie Weed to help me enjoy the show...my acid days were behind me, "X" was nowhere to be found, so we truged off to Irving resigned to have a toke or two and kick back. Was I ever wrong. The front row was a magic place...mushrooms were passed back and forth...joints were everywhere...I was in fine shape when the first notes were played and the lazers made strange patterns across the sky...the sound was fantastic...the clocks ticking, the cash register ringing, the stage lights flashing and rolling over and over, then from the center of the football field rose a huge mirrored ball, it must have been fifty feet across...the lazer lights hit it and millions of lights went turning across the venue...then it slowed and reversed and my head, along with every other head in the place went with it.
Then it ended...two hours and ten minutes of some of the best music ever...the best light show ever...the best high ever! The crowd stood and cheered for 30 minutes...but no David Gilmore was to return, it was done...never to come again...
I now have the experience to relate to my grandkids...that this old man saw Pink Floyd the last time they toured...and loved it. Am I cool or what? |
|
|
|
BarbraG
Windchimer
1825 Posts |
Posted - 04/18/2008 : 22:33:53
|
You're cool, Roy !! You're cool !! However, I would have had to
be totally "out" to "enjoy" the "organized noise". Now, the light
show might have been a horse of a different . . .
BGee |
|
|
|
aussiedave
Swinger
Australia
509 Posts |
Posted - 04/19/2008 : 02:58:03
|
his unconditional love
for her
made it easier
for her
to love him conditionally
|
|
|
|
Ailinn
Windchimer
2217 Posts |
Posted - 04/20/2008 : 17:58:23
|
| "I used to snitch his cigarettes," Robber says, (Chloe's great-granddaughter, Roberta Barron, permanent part-time caregiver at Sunrise Retirement now.) "Yep. Three or four times week. I remember the day Granny switched him to Spuds..." (Robber sticks her fingers down her throat and gags.) 'Like smokin' a Mae West,' Grampa said when he stopped at the newsstand by the train station and picked up a pack of Lucky Strikes. 'Hold on to these for me, girl,' he said later, and from that day on I couldn't steal from him. I got caught with them cigs in my backpack once. Said I found them on the counter at Laundrorama. Double trouble. Laundrorama wasn't allowed 'cause some guys used to drag the folding chairs together and sleep in the street window while their camouflage clothes got clean. 'Vets catchin' some z's,' Grampa told me, 'no big deal.' Later, we'd sit on the bench at the edge of the park with a brown paper sack full of peanuts in the shell. How those squirrels chattered and performed for him! He had names for the regulars based on their 'personalities'. George Jones and Al Capone and Pocahontas, I remember. Groucho Marx and Miss Scarlett NoHaira. Roaring engines on the other side of Iron Aisle. The racket and perpetual motion he loved. The hustle and bustle as the crowds rushed to catch the Express." |
|
|
|
Ailinn
Windchimer
2217 Posts |
Posted - 04/20/2008 : 18:05:29
|
| His mouth of invention invented a house so high there were clouds outside the windows. Glitter-bright air and a small copse of trees leaning perilously over an ocean. Rock-rooted and enduring the perpetual wind. He placed an aquarelle view in the kitchen window and a sun-blistered sill to rest their elbows on. He carpentered the sideboard and refectory table. Hung copper kettles from the cross-beams to catch each season's contagious candlelight. He secured the rope hammock between two eucalyptus and on hot nights he interpreted the sky. Then the dream ran ahead of them, laughing and alive, turning back now and then to wave over resolute shoulders. |
|
|
|
Joe Z
Windchimer
USA
1819 Posts |
Posted - 04/20/2008 : 18:08:44
|
| I believe it's time to re-sing Alice's Restaurant Massacree in four-part harmony... |
|
|
|
andrew p
Firefly
USA
3936 Posts |
Posted - 04/20/2008 : 20:45:06
|
gee whiz Mr Joe...all 18 minutes & 20 seconds?
well...alrighty then!
andrew
Those who danced were thought to be quite insane by those who could not hear the music. ~John Milton
|
|
|
|
buckman
Firefly
USA
2829 Posts |
Posted - 04/21/2008 : 12:56:40
|
The catfish was dead three or four days before he threw it out.
Took a little time.
It was the last living thing in the house that reminded him of their
time together.
The big fish tank with the eight brilliantly colored fish
and the two sharks and the two suckers.
One nite when they first got the tank,
in the place on the Hudson,
he woke her up, upset that one of the fish had swallowed
a suction cup and was stuck to the glass.
She must have laughed for ten minutes and coughed for five more.
Then she explained that the suckers kept the tank clean.
They also eat the other fish, apparently, because over the
last couple years they've disappeared one by one.
He got the long handled net and carried the fish to
the woods behind the house.
Then he went back to reading his Hammett book and waited for the
neighborhood cat.
Pity, Seems like it should have ended better....
Hank Beukema - 2008
|
|
|
|
Craig
Firefly
Kyrgyzstan
3793 Posts |
Posted - 04/23/2008 : 16:13:18
|
This is the violet hour,
the hour of flush and wonder,
when affections glow and valor is reborn,
when the shadows deepen magically
along the edge of the forest and we believe that,
if we watch carefully, at any moment we may see a unicorn.
The Hour
~ Bernard DeVoto
|
|
|
|
BarbraG
Windchimer
1825 Posts |
Posted - 04/23/2008 : 20:05:38
|
Billy Bob, Bobby Bill, and Bill Bobby were on their way to
town for their Saturday night "cousins' on the town" party. No one
saw it comin'. The boys had grown up almost together with their
farms just a few miles apart. Not one word of disagreement had
ever passed between them. Just gettin' to town was part of the
fun in itself, since none of them had a truck. They had been
stickin' their thumbs out all their life to get around. They had
been walkin' quite a while when . . . suddenly . . . . and, I do
mean suddenly --- out of nowhere - - -
BGee |
|
|
|
buckman
Firefly
USA
2829 Posts |
Posted - 04/23/2008 : 21:07:07
|
Scotty got ambushed the first time heading into the Junior High...
It was 1965 and some of the guys liked to play soldier and they
would hide in the bushes and wing kids with their bb guns
as they walked to school.
Sounds bad, but most of the time it was in fun and they
hit em in the legs.
Scotty was one of their friends but he was there and
he was fresh meat that morning.
They hit him right next to his left eye and that
little groove was there all thru high school.
He wore it like a badge of courage.
I was in between trips out west when I heard
that Scotty was killed in Vietnam.
Scotty got ambushed the second time heading
into a tunnel mined by another troop.
One time was boys playing men
the other was boys becoming men...
Both times were considered "friendly fire"
Hank
|
|
|
|
buckman
Firefly
USA
2829 Posts |
Posted - 04/25/2008 : 14:17:08
|
They've all left me now except for Mick...
We go to that dark place with dancing shadows
that is so familiar to us both...
The darkness takes on a different color now,
Talking about my memories of a future with her...
Mick has lots to say.
What to leave in
what to leave out,
Rewrite, boy, rewrite or
sometimes
Hell, just leave it alone...
I hold him to me,
as a man,
as a friend
And feel his frailness and his strength,
both...
I ask him to stay and
He says,
Didn't you know?
It's forever for those like us,
Always
forever.............
For Ever, Sir, Thank you....
~*~
|
|
|
|
Roy
Firefly
USA
2627 Posts |
Posted - 04/25/2008 : 16:18:29
|
He's always there....
Pushing you to be better....
That voice in your ear, or maybe your heart...
Sometimes it weaves itself into a song the windchimes play...
Sometimes it booms with the spring thunderstorms....
The lighting flashes point the way....
To Austin....
Listen, Hank...Mickey calling...this is the year to answer....
Listen to the song...no more excuses....
You are a brother....God made time....now it's your time...
|
|
|
|
Joey L.
Swinger
USA
1383 Posts |
Posted - 04/25/2008 : 18:28:24
|
All I can say, Hank, is ...
AMEN.
Would LOVE to see you in Austin in June.
The "Chi Chi Awards" would like to see you, too.
Joey L., cuz
The Future's Not ... |
|
|
|
buckman
Firefly
USA
2829 Posts |
Posted - 04/26/2008 : 08:49:47
|
As the music man moved on
His sons and daughters
rose to fill his place...
The music of the silver moon
written on the west wind...
Sailors and cowboys
Teachers and singers and poets...
Left on this side of the river
to carry on the sound
Of one man clapping...
Family goes on...
Rev B
|
|
|
|
Ailinn
Windchimer
2217 Posts |
Posted - 04/26/2008 : 17:40:14
|
Suppose I say summer,
write the word "hummingbird,"
put it in an envelope,
take it down the hill
to the box. When you open
my letter you will recall
those days and how much,
just how much, I love you.
~Raymond Carver~
|
|
|
|
buckman
Firefly
USA
2829 Posts |
Posted - 04/27/2008 : 06:20:07
|
As we go we
do not know
where we go,
Only that we
Must go...
The faith and the light of
that one star from the East
that has driven
so many to follow it for
so long leads us...
The Father has
said that the piper
Has been paid,
But
We must still
each of us
come to terms with our debts
Ourselves...
We are the ones that have
to live the day to day
life that the Music man
sings of...
May we do it with Grace and Mercy...
|
|
|
|
buckman
Firefly
USA
2829 Posts |
Posted - 04/29/2008 : 18:58:52
|
Crackiln Rosie Saved My Life...
It wasn't that I really wanted to die,
It was just that I didn't care a whole lot about living anymore.
It was February in San Francisco and it seemed
like it had been raining for weeks.
I'd cut my foot jumping off a cliff at Big Sur,
had a fight with a girl, couldn't get rides
and by the time I got back to the City
I was wet, cold, hurt and feeling
sorry for myself and alone.
I didn't even go back to McAllister Street,
I just got a big bottle of Gallo Rose
and laid down on the beach next to
the Pacific Coast Highway.
When I was thinking at all, there was a stray
notion that if I just got drunk enough and
laid there long enough, the tide would come in
and I wouldn't have to decide anything,
just kinda drift on out to sea...
Somebody had parked a VW Bug just behind me and
they were playing the radio loud;
it was Neil Diamond singing Cracklin Rosie.
I remembered a friend telling me that
it was a song about some Eskimos getting drunk on
cheap rose wine and pretending they had a woman
and I looked at my Gallo and
just started laughing
then crying
then laughing
some more until I was doing both at once...
I figured it was the Old Man trying to tell me something,
so
I got up, brushed myself off, walked by the Bug,
yelled Thanks to the couple somewhere inside the smoke
and I walked back home to McAllister and the rest of my life...
Hell, I still don't know if the story about the song was true...
But this one is...
|
|
|
|
BarbraG
Windchimer
1825 Posts |
Posted - 04/29/2008 : 19:48:36
|
Dear Hank,
Go ahead and tell Roy you'll be there at the Gathering this
year. A'right? A'right, then. If you just go ahead and TELL
him, then you might get a hungerin' notion to go, and you just
might end up there. Sounds like lots and lots of folks would be
so happy to see that happen, most of all -- you....? Just
think of all the hugs waitin' for ya !!! (Love your words !! )
BGee |
|
|
|
Topic |
|
|
The Nightly Vigil