Bruce Baracks the Lincoln Memorial

 

Pete Seeger Restores “This Land is Your Land”

The “subversive” verses from Woody Guthrie’s This Land is Your Land were sung by the American people today on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial.

 

Bruce Springsteen Events at the Inaugural

From Backstreets.com

Sunday, January 18: Just announced today, Springsteen is officially part of the line-up for We Are One: The Obama Inaugural Celebration at the Lincoln Memorial. Bruce will join a slew of other artists — including Beyonce, Bono, John Legend, John Mellencamp, Stevie Wonder, and Springsteen’s ’92-93 tour guitarist Shane Fontayne! — for this “Opening Celebration” for the 56th Presidential Inaugural. The event, which begins at 2:00 p.m., is free and open to the public; a portion will be televised courtesy of HBO from 7:00 to 9:00 p.m. Eastern. Don’t expect the E Street Band; according to the press release, “Rob Mathes will be the music director and arranger for the backing band, which will support all of the artists.” Producer/director Don Mischer: “This is a great opportunity to capture an historic event in a very meaningful setting. We will have the statue of Abraham Lincoln looking down on our stage and a crowd of hundreds of thousands of people lining the mall — a tableau any director would relish.”

Monday, January 19: Starting this day — also MLK Day and a national day of service — you’ll be able to listen to Working on a Dream in its entirety, streaming online at NPR.org as part of their Exclusive First Listen preview series.

Bruce just picked up a Golden Globe Award for this song:

 

Wednesday’s child is full of woe 12/3/2008

When the alarm went off it was hard to get out of bed. Ophelia was stuck to me like velcro so I spent an extra five minutes snuggling with her and listening to her purr and then I faced the inevitable and got out of bed. By the time I got dressed and was packing up my stuff I noticed there was frost on my car! BRRRRR!

The trick to getting a good seat on the commuter bus

Today I had the perfect conditions needed for a good bus seat. These conditions MUST BE PRESENT in order to achieve the goal.

One bus was pulling out of the parking lot just as I was pulling in. By the time I got to the line (the line and the rules that pertain to it will be addressed in another post) there were only two people in front of me. Either the bus that was leaving when I arrived was late or the bus that pulled up about five minutes later was early because there was only about 10 people in line. When you get on the bus you can ascertain your course of action. If the bus is crowded I take an aisle seat nearest to the front. I do this for several reasons:

-I hate the window seats. I think they are too cold. In the summer you get blasted with air conditioning, in the winter cold from the outside creeps in.

-I like to choose who I sit with

-You aren’t boxed in so its not a brain cramp if the person who is sitting next to you gets off at a later stop than you do.

If the bus isn’t crowded and the line is only about 10-15 people chances are you can get a seat in the back to yourself

Today I had the latter choice!

Of course TWO escalators were out in the mid level of the metro. Grrr. Its not that I mind walking–its just with two not working that only left one down and one up on each side so each time a metro train arrives it floods the escalators and a line forms. If you’re running late that takes away minutes from your time.

One of my favorite Bruce Springsteen songs: land of hope and dreams

 

If this is Tuesday, it must be hell 12/2/2008

Today I took a later bus. I got to the bus stop at about 7:00am and when I got in line I saw Jaunty (she was wearing a dark coat with a perky “Christmassy” pin. She didn’t wear a hat so as to not mar her perfectly coiffed hairdo) so I realized I missed the earlier bus that the “in” crowd won’t take because they don’t like the driver. The bus arrived with the acceptable driver about five minutes later. This bus is usually very crowded but amazingly I got a good seat. We hit traffic so I didn’t get to Metro Center until well after 8:00am. GRRR. My 60 minute bus ride was at least 70-75 minutes today. Almost all the escalators were working except for the MAIN one. There were a bunch of workmen testing it by trying to walk UP the thing. Don’t ask. As I was leaving my Metro stop I heard an announcement that the red line was delayed because of a sick passenger at one of the stations. When that happens they throw everyone off the train and then the now empty train “sits” until the emergency is resolved. They then have to “double track” (use only one side of the track) which clogs the trains and results in delays on both sides. Delays can be anywhere from 10 minutes to hours. I think normally I am a pretty kind person (ok maybe not–depending on who you talk to). But delays on the Metro causes my patience to wear thin and I start to think very un-Christian-like thoughts. When I have these godless pagan reactions to human tragedy I turn to Betty Bowers, America’s Best Christian for spiritual guidance. Whew. Thanks Betty.

So today it was announced on the Internets that we are Officially in a “Recession”. Counting back I realized this was the FOURTH recession in my lifetime. The first one was the recession/matched with inflation and energy crisis in the early ’70s. Then there was the early ’80s recession/inflation/energy crisis, massive unemployment (which happened to be about the time I joined the workforce. FUN!). The next one was in the early ’90s (its the economy stupid). That brings us up to now. This latest recession seems to be on par with the one in the early 80s (that one was severe). I don’t think its near “Great Depression” status—YET. However, this thing hasn’t bottomed out. I think its going to get a lot worse before it starts to get any better. Hopefully I’ll be able to hang onto my job and house. They already put on a hiring freeze where I work.

I have added some links about the Inaugural (look to your right). Be warned! They are expecting up to FOUR million people to descend on DC to attend this thing. There is talk of movie screens being put up in stadiums for people to “view” the Inaugural (Thus, to me, negating the experience) since there is not enough room for them on the streets. They aren’t sure whether they can accommodate parking for buses let alone cars. Lodging will be scarce. Plus you will have to wait hours out of doors even if you have tickets. Its cold here in January. If you plan on attending start making arrangements now and buy some thermal underwear. I plan to watch it at home on the sofa snuggled up with my kitty and a hot cup o’ joe.

In honor of the Inaugural lets take a look at an Inaugural Address that is possibly the best one of the 20th century

Bruce Springsteen is debuting his new single Lucky Day today!

You can see it on his myspace page as well as get information on his new album Working on a Dream

 

Just another manic Monday, 7/28/ 2008

I took a vacation last week so today’s manic Monday was more difficult than most. My cat, Ophelia, was especially cute this morning purring and rolling on her back so it was hard to leave her! I bought some new shoes and clothes over my holiday and actually got up and blow-dried my hair! “Hah!” I thought! “I’ll surely rival Jaunty!”

My ride to the bus stop was uneventful. They were playing some especially beautiful string music on my classical music radio station. However, they’ve started to do this wine tasting thing which annoys me. Two pretentious men report on their wine tasting discoveries. This morning they critqued a “sensual and robust” Spanish wine. Don’t you just hate it when they use these type of adjectives to describe wine? They sound like they are talking about women and I think thats why it annoys me so much–especially on a manic Monday!

There was a flurry of buses at the commuter bus parking lot–three in a row! So I got a good seat. I noticed Jaunty who took a seat up front. Not to be outdone she wore an orange cotton jacket with a black skirt adorned with orange flowers. She’s so Jaunty! The bus driver was one who doesn’t interact with the bus driver groupies–she actually concentrates on her driving!

Since I’m going to see Bruce (Bruuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuce) in mid August I decided to listen to The River album which is on my IPOD. Bruce and me go way back. I had heard of him in the early 70s because he played mainly mid-Atlantic venues when he and the E-Street Band first started out. I didn’t really get into him until the Fall of 1975 when he appeared simultaneously on the covers of Time and Newsweek hailed as the “new Dylan” and the future of rock (I have seen the future of rock and roll and his name is Bruce Springsteen). His Born to Run album had just been released (albums were just $5.00 bucks back then) and I high tailed it down to the record store and bought it. That was a defining moment in my teenage years. Songs like Born to Run appealed to me in a “teenage wasteland” kinda way but the song Thunder Road! SWOON! Bruce perfectly captured in his lyrics what small town life was like in the latter part of the 20th century.

” The screen door slams, Mary ,her dress sways. Like a vision she dances across the porch as the radio plays“.

Of course I played it constantly and annoyed my parents to no end! BTW Bruce has a song about a girl named Mary on every one of his albums. It must have been all that Catholic “schoolin'”! I went to Catholic School too so I totally understood.

There was no traffic so the bus was on time. At the metro all the escalators were working. There was a lovely breeze flowing as I trudged up the hill to “Whatsa Matta U”, where I work.