New Ones and Old Ones

Bing had to make way for Sinatra just like ol' blue eyes had to vacate the premises for Elvis. Old dogs get moved out for puppies. Yeah, it's a sad fact of life, especially if you're an old dog.

The world doesn't really care what I think about AI. The fact that I find most new cars ugly isn't going to rattle the automobile industry. Wealth inequality? What's new?

My opinions matter. They matter to me. They are as relevant as the ones that I held as a young man.

Turns out, the ones that have stayed the same are the only ones that matter. Play fair, love hard.

Give us peace on earth and end this dreadful, dreadful war.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9yj4FShE6VA

 

The Stars Got In My Eyes

Sometimes I get weary of boasting about my quality of life. I'm guessing that if you're back reading this drivel, you've had a bellyful, yourself.

If I don't run short of my Crest toothpaste stash, I've got enough of everything that I could possibly want or need to last the rest of my days.

While I've never learned to accept the suffering in this world, I have figured out how to embrace the beauty and the love in front of me.

I've always got one eye on the stars above me and the better part of my mind in the gutter. I have figured out that there's nothing to figure out. Loving's not at all like water skiing. You don't have to learn anything or practice. Just love.

Give us peace on earth and end this dreadful, dreadful war.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WsYAd1D0y8Q

 

Don't Let Your Coffee Get Cold

It's hard to take any of it seriously, isn't it? Grownups with nuclear weapons waving their holy books, threatening annihilation of civilisations. If one of these lunatics drops the big one and ends it all, so be it. There really is nothing that I can do about any of it.

None of my worrying, and I've done plenty, has ever prevented anything.

Now, of course, worry and dread and fear don't always get permission before moving in. I just remind myself of my good luck, think about the life I've had, and celebrate the fact that I have my own hair and teeth.

The fact that I'm here in Dorset with Kate and Vera and that they put up with me is one fine dream, and if it is a dream, it's a doozie. I wish this kind of paradise for everyone.

Give us peace on earth and end this dreadful, dreadful war.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XiVEecogOHw

 

Too Old To Cut The Mustard, Young Enough To Lick The Jar

What I haven't seen at this point hardly matters. I haven't been everywhere, boy, and I surely haven't seen everything. Doesn't matter. It's a perfect world when you know it is and you're lucky when you know you are.

I've always shown up in the Key Wests of the world just in time to be told that I should have seen it before. I always wanted to live in Paris, but the Paris of 1930.

Not this time, buddy. Here I am at the centre of the universe, not a developer in sight. I look out my window and there's the English Channel. Sweetest people in the world. Best dogs you can imagine and they're welcome in every establishment. Plenty of cats for you other folks, too, and they're feisty as all get-out.

Oh, I could spend hours and ink telling you about Kate, but I believe I've made that point. I wish for you all the love and all the fortune that I've known. I love you all.

Give us peace on earth and end this dreadful, dreadful war.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XiVEecogOHw

 

"Escape Into The Madness" or "So Long, Suckers"

It's past time to say anything and everything that I've ever wanted to say. There's really no sign that time is running out other than the calendar, the clock.

The concept of Eden or heaven or some utopian fantasy is, more or less, a constant for me. The details bend, stretch and shrink, but the big picture stays pretty much true to form- everybody's kind, everybody's happy. Plenty of four-legged and feathered citizens, too, and they seem to be happy as well. Oh, everybody's naked, too. They know all about the apple and the snake, so everybody's aware that it's naughty. Nobody feels guilty about naughty.

Yeah, there's plenty of banana pudding to go 'round and the idea of someone's net worth is just silly. Of course it's silly here and now, too, but you wouldn't know it.

Politics exist only to help keep us on the same side of the road and any suggestion of spending any of our resources on war is ludicrous. Folks are free, of course, to worship any deity, creature or planet that they choose as long as they respect everyone else's right to do the same. Or not.

Now, I can see that this daydreaming casts me as something of an anarchist. I've been called worse.

Give us peace on earth and end this dreadful, dreadful war. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gqSh77aPSb8

 

Loose Change, Loose Morals

It occurs to me that every breath is different from the one before. Under a microscope each grain of sand is a completely unique, fascinating work of art, exquisite in its originality. Ants enslave aphids and we have no idea of the scale of the universe, this one or any other.

Yet, I met Elvis. I've known all these dogs. I'll have dinner with Kate again.

If this isn't nice, what is?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wO2V1EYAH-g

 

Ambition Has Always Been So Overrated

 

Oh, I live a lazy man's life. Folks back home ask if I've retired. From what? I haven't played since  a house concert in Tampa, next to last visit. I picked up a guitar this morning. Felt about as familiar as if I had fondled an oboe.

Now, for whatever reason, I'm thinking about writing a book. Actually, I've had this story idea for several years- I've just run out of excuses to keep from writing.

Of course I'm aware that selling a book, never a walk in the park, is close to impossible these days. Do you suppose that people read? 

Maybe if I keep right still, this, too, will pass.

Why would anybody mess with paradise?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S_XN27KTnHg