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Rain Or Shine

Welcome to my regular Friday song/tune day, ladies and gentlemen, where I pick a piece of music that reflects my mood or the times, to share with you.

International readers may not have heard that parts of eastern Australia have copped yet another drenching and houses and businesses have been flooded again less than a month after the last deluge. More lives have been lost. It seems we will soon be a country of environmental migrants (note: environmental refugee is not an officially recognised term). If we can’t adequately look after our own environmental “migrants”, then how on earth will we be able to offer reasonable assistance to the hundreds of millions of environmental refugees (let’s call it what it is) expected in the future under current climate warming projections?

It seems nothing is going to stop Aussie state and federal governments and their so-called independent planning agencies approving more new coal and gas projects.

I could be churlish and note that the former deputy PM in the current national government suggested that Pacific Islanders would survive climate change because they come to Australia to pick our fruit! It is no wonder some Pacific nations are making their own arrangements to secure their future.

Anyway, I couldn’t help wonder whether the Byron Bay BluesFest would be held this Easter given the flooding in that region. Apparently it is going ahead.

Photo by Max Ravier on Pexels.com

I read that some displaced people currently in emergency accommodation will need to move outside the Byron area temporarily due to the influx of tourists to the region over Easter. It never rains, it pours. What’s the forecast? Anyway, a certain video streaming service must have been reading my mind because it presented me with Australian artist, Xavier Rudd, who will be performing at BluesFest. Here is a short film made for his song, Stoney Creek. Let’s have a listen to it.

I hope the sun shines on the festival. It has been very difficult over the last couple of years for musicians and all the ancillary businesses that rely on the show going on for their livelihood.

Take care, everyone. Stay safe.

Kind Regards.
Tracy.

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The Final Frontier

Welcome to my regular Friday song/tune day, ladies and gentlemen, where I pick a piece of music that reflects my mood or the times, to share with you.

Photo by Jaymantri on Pexels.com

It is a game until it isn’t. Let’s listen to Peter Gabriel’s Games Without Frontiers today.

I have been hearing a lot about the hypocrisy of individuals and national governments lately. I imagine that this is distressingly irrelevant to people who find themselves in the middle of a war zone through no fault of their own. Still, it would be nice if those who have engaged in tribal warfare and rhetoric could find it in themselves to put their weapons down for all our sake. That would be true leadership and worthwhile human endeavour.

Stay safe, everyone.

Kind Regards.
Tracy.

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Under Grey Skies

Welcome to my regular Friday song/tune day, ladies and gentlemen, where I pick a piece of music that reflects my mood or the times, to share with you. How about a poem first?

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As It Was And Is

Welcome to my regular Friday song/tune day, ladies and gentlemen, where I pick a piece of music that reflects my mood or the times, to share with you.

You’ll need a while to listen to this one as I’ve chosen a video of the whole symphony.

Kind Regards.
Tracy.

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Charm Offensive

Welcome to my regular Friday song/tune day, ladies and gentlemen, where I pick a piece of music that reflects my mood or the times, to share with you.

It’s an election year here in sunny Australia. Sometime between now and May, we will be lining up at the polls to elect a new national government. Voters don’t choose the Prime Minister. The leader of the winning party normally becomes the PM. Party leaders are elected by sitting government members or other processes determined by the relevant party. Too easy. In the lead up to the election, the current PM has, according to media reports, embarked on a “charm offensive”. Charm is not an attribute I usually associate with the PM. Anyway, he and his fam recently did this big interview with one of the television networks. Anyway, anyway, I’m not sure that the interview achieved the charm objective but we are all talking about him as a result of that interview, so perhaps it was a success?

The most surprising part of the interview was when the PM’s wife, Jenny, took the rap for the PM’s disappearance to Hawaii on a family holiday during the bushfire emergency after Christmas in 2019. I can’t blame her for wanting to get away from Australia at that time because both Canberra and Sydney where they live, were covered in toxic bushfire smoke. Their official residences are old so they were probably full of smoke. Any mother would want to get her kids away from that. I’m not sure Jen should be taking responsibility for the PM’s absence though. Strange decision for the PM to leave the country in the middle of a major emergency affecting half the country.

Anyway, anyway, anyway, I was delighted to see that the PM had taken up the ukelele. Everyone needs an outlet in these stressful times. In his very own Like a Version cover, he strummed a few bars of the old Dragon hit, April Sun in Cuba for us. Strangely he didn’t seem to know any of the words beyond the first line of the chorus. I wonder why he picked that song? Let’s have a look at the words of the first verse:

I’m tired of the city life
Summer’s on the run
People tell me I should stay
But I’ve got to get my fun.

[Songwriters: Paul Hewson / Marc Alexander Hunter / Yaleidys Salazar Fernandez / Dayana Otero Salazar / Mark Richard Edwards]

C’mon, the PM’s taking the piss, isn’t he? The one thing I’ve learnt from my Friday song day is not to offer up a tune until I’ve checked the lyrics.

I look forward to the (soon to be ex?) PM participating in the national uke muster at the National Folk Festival in future. I suspect he may be too busy to attend this April due to family commitments, campaigning and not taking responsibility for anything, except maybe for scaring the hell out of voters or further taking the piss.

Sadly I won’t be attending the Nash this year either. My hearing is going and I need to protect what’s left of it. I guess that comes from attending too many folk festivals. Or maybe it can be attributed to that Dragon concert I went to at the Calamvale pub in the 80s. Gosh, that takes me back. Let’s have a listen to the original version.

I also like that line about snake eyes on the paradise, but I’m easily amused. Despite Jen’s convenient mea culpa on the Hawaii trip, I’ve come to the conclusion that the PM really doesn’t “get it” if he needs his partner to take responsibility for his actions.

Here’s to holding the hose and taking responsibility for your own actions or lack thereof.

Kind Regards.
Tracy.

Photo by alleksana on Pexels.com

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How Long Is Too Long?

Welcome to my regular Friday song/tune day, ladies and gentlemen, where I pick a piece of music that reflects my mood or the times, to share with you.

My True Love (TL) has several standard responses and I am meant to remember what they are as I hear them on a semi-regular basis. I never do. They never make it to long term memory unless I have something interesting to stick them too.

Anyway, I asked my TL why we don’t have a favourite lovey dovey song like other couples, although I probably wouldn’t remember it even if we did. His response to this phenomenon, ie. a couple’s song, was to pretend to gag. Apologies to couples out there with a special song.

Photo by Kampus Production on Pexels.com

Anyway, anyway, the next question I asked him was how long have we been married. Dates don’t stick in my memory either. Anyway, anyway, anyway, his response was “two” or maybe “too”. He gave me an expectant look, thinking I would finish his sentence. In this respect, we are not soul mates. Any guesses? It is really obvious. Not to me, of course.

The answer was “too long”. So what do you reckon? Yep, potential couple’s song popped straight into my head.

Let’s have a listen to it. It is Loving You Too Long, written by Jerry Butler and Otis Redding, and performed by Etta James. If you are partial to lounge room karaoke, I invite you to sing this song off key while your partner has a Zoom meeting. No, I didn’t do that, but I could ….

I think I may have stuck the “too long” response now. Not sure how long we’ve been married though.

In other news, I’ve password protected my posts on my latest mosaic project to protect my copyright. Regular readers that missed out on seeing it, can drop me a line and I will let you know the password. I want to make a T-shirt of the image for my niece. A chance chat with her led to the idea for the project. Back to the T-shirt. It turns out that making one from my own original artwork is more complicated than I anticipated. I have some learning to do.

One last thing, a couple of people pointed out to me that the plural of octopus is octopuses, not octopi, as I wrote in my last post. Fancy that! You can’t trust Google.

Take care, everyone, and thanks for your spelling help.

Kind Regards.
Tracy.

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Surrender Is The Only Option

Welcome to my regular Friday song/tune day, ladies and gentlemen, where I pick a piece of music that reflects my mood or the times, to share with you.

Happy new year to all who celebrate the Chinese New Year. It is the year of the Water Tiger. I feel inspired to write a short poem.

Surrender To The Forest

silence descends
deep are the shadows
birdsong marks its passing
the water laps the lake

Photo by Danne on Pexels.com

Continuing on this cultural journey, I think we should have a listen to Sun Quan, The Emperor, by Moyun. Enjoy.

Kind Regards.
Tracy.

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The Big Event

Welcome to my regular Friday song/tune day, ladies and gentlemen, where I pick a piece of music that reflects my mood or the times, to share with you. This week I am also joining in with the Lens-Artists Photo Challenge – Memorable Events.

I think some of the most memorable events in our personal history are those with which we have an emotional attachment, eg. having a baby, seeing your favourite band, winning a contest, producing something you love, etc. Bringing a new piece of art into the world is like giving birth. The arrival of every piece is a memorable event. The Lens Artists Memorable Event theme seemed a perfect time to reveal my latest work but I have a couple of days work left on it. She is going to be beautiful, that is, as beautiful as a piece of climate change protest art can be. Serious stuff. When I reveal it in a few days, I would like to know whether you would like its back story? Or would you rather I let the artwork do the talking? Let me know in the comments below.

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Healing Together

Welcome to my regular Friday song/tune day, ladies and gentlemen, where I pick a piece of music that reflects my mood or the times, to share with you.

Australia Day is next week. The date is controversial, divisive. The date for Australia Day was chosen mid last century at a time when First Australians were not permitted to vote. This option was specifically granted to First Australians in 1962.

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