The Hammock Papers: John

Showing posts with label John. Show all posts

25 March 2025

Happy Birthday, Elton

Elton John was born on this day in 1947.

Debut album. Side One. Track One ...

18 September 2024

There are goods so opposed that we cannot seize both, but, by too much prudence, may pass between them at too great a distance to reach either. This is often the fate of long consideration; he does nothing who endeavors to do more than is allowed to humanity. Flatter not yourself with contrarieties of pleasure. Of the blessings set before you make your choice, and be content. No man can taste the fruits of autumn while he is delighting his scent with the flowers of spring: no man can, at the same time, fill his cup from the source and from the mouth of the Nile.

Samuel Johnson, born on this day in 1709, from Rasselas

25 March 2024

Happy Birthday, John

Elton John was born on this day in 1947.

"Rotten Peaches" ...

27 May 2023

Elton John, "Philadelphia Freedom"

The salad bar is open (the plates chilled), the soup is French Onion, and schooners of Weidemann are two-for-one. Try the chicken nachos with an extra side of ranch ...

19 February 2022

Five.

Chicken nachos are on special and it's always five plays for a dollar on the jukebox.

Elton John, "Grow Some Funk of Your Own"

Styx, "Lorelei"

Sweet, "Action"

Linda Ronstadt, "Tracks of My Tears"

Earth Wind & Fire, "Sing a Song"

22 January 2022

Elton John, "Come Down in Time"

With a worthy stand-in ...

25 March 2020

Elton John, "Harmony"

Happy Birthday, John.

Elton John was born on this date in 1947.

"Mona Lisas and Mad Hatters" ...

Thank you, Sally.

30 January 2020

Elton John, "Grow Some Funk of Your Own"

30 May 2019

Elton John, "Island Girl"

Reverse skate. Reverse skate.

04 April 2019

Elton John, "Burn Down the Mission"

21 February 2019

Elton John, "Funeral for a Friend/Love Lies Bleeding"

More chicken nachos, please.

01 December 2018

Leon Redbone, "Frosty the Snowman"

With Dr. John ...

30 August 2018

Elton John, "Burn Down the Mission"

17 August 2017

Red.

Elvis Costello ...

David Bowie ...

Elton John ...

06 April 2017

Elton John, "Burn Down the Mission"

05 November 2016

Today.

1971.

"Rotten Peaches"

Thanks, Sally.

BARRY HINES

"That's why it makes me mad when I take her out and I'll hear somebody say, 'Look, there's Billy Casper there wi' his pet hawk. I could shout at 'em; it's not a pet, Sir, hawks are not pets. Or when folks stop me and say, 'Is it tame?' Is it heck tame, it's trained that's all. It's fierce, and it's wild, an' it's not bothered about anybody, not even about me, right. And that's why it's great.Look, there's Billy Casper there wi' his pet hawk.' I could shout at 'em. It's not a pet, Sir. Hawks are not pets. Or when folks stop me and say, 'Is it tame?' Is it heck tame, it's trained, that's all. It's fierce, and it's wild, an' it's not bothered about anybody, not even about me right. And that's why it's great." (A Kestrel for a Knave)

WOLFGANG AMADEUS MOZART

"When I am, as it were, completely myself, entirely alone and of good cheer – say travelling in a carriage or walking after a good meal, or during the night when I cannot sleep – it is on such occasions that my ideas flow best and most abundantly. Whence, and how, they come I know not ; nor can I force them. Those ideas that please me I retain in memory and am accustomed, as I have been told, to hum them to myself. If I continue in this way, it soon occurs to me how I may turn this dainty morsel to account, so as to make a good dish of it. That is to say, agreeable to the rules of counterpoint, to the peculiarities of various instruments etc. All this fires my soul, and, provided I am not disturbed, my subject enlarges itself, becomes methodised, and defined, and the whole, though it be long, stands almost complete and finished in my mind, so that I can survey it like a fine picture or a beautiful statue at a glance. Nor do I hear in my imagination the parts successively, but I hear them, as it were, all at once. What a delight this is, I cannot tell."

WALT WHITMAN

The spotted hawk swoops by and accuses me, he complains of my gab and my loitering. I too am not a bit tamed, I too am untranslatable, I sound my barbaric yawp over the roofs of the world. The last scud of day holds back for me, It flings my likeness after the rest and true as any on the shadow’d wilds, It coaxes me to the vapor and the dusk. I depart as air, I shake my white locks at the runaway sun, I effuse my flesh in eddies, and drift it in lacy jags. I bequeath myself to the dirt to grow from the grass I love, If you want me again look for me under your boot-soles. You will hardly know who I am or what I mean, But I shall be good health to you nevertheless, And filter and fibre your blood. Failing to fetch me at first keep encouraged, Missing me one place search another, I stop somewhere waiting for you.

MARCUS AURELIUS

"Is your cucumber bitter? Throw it away. Are there briars in your path? Turn aside. That is enough. Do not go on and say, 'Why were things of this sort ever brought into this world?' neither intolerable nor everlasting - if thou bearest in mind that it has its limits, and if thou addest nothing to it in imagination. Pain is either an evil to the body (then let the body say what it thinks of it!)-or to the soul. But it is in the power of the soul to maintain its own serenity and tranquility."

VINCENT van GOGH

"What am I in the eyes of most people? A nonentity or an oddity or a disagreeable person — someone who has and will have no position in society, in short a little lower than the lowest. Very well — assuming that everything is indeed like that, then through my work I’d like to show what there is in the heart of such an oddity, such a nobody. This is my ambition, which is based less on resentment than on love in spite of everything, based more on a feeling of serenity than on passion. Even though I’m often in a mess, inside me there’s still a calm, pure harmony and music. In the poorest little house, in the filthiest corner, I see paintings or drawings. And my mind turns in that direction as if with an irresistible urge. As time passes, other things are increasingly excluded, and the more they are the faster my eyes see the picturesque. Art demands persistent work, work in spite of everything, and unceasing observation."