Archive for the ‘Encouragement’ Category
The Warrior – by Chuck Girard
I mentioned Chuck Girard’s album Written on the Wind recently as part of my eclectic musical ‘heritage’. My pal Graeme and I remembered Girard (who always struck me as a lost Beach Boy) and a few of his fellow inspirers like Barry McGuire and Larry Norman at lunch today… so I pulled this track up, […]
Untangling from emotional habits
Reviving memories of Edie Brickell got me thinking about her, how happy she seemed, and how she seemed to disappear after marrying Paul Simon. Here’s a line from a Jan 2011 AP interview ‘Edie Brickell releases records full of joy‘ talking about how her long-awaited 2011 CDs, the eponymous “Edie Brickell” and “The Gaddabouts”. Both […]
What am is what I am. Are you what you are, or what?
I had this Edie Brickell and the New Bohemians album Shooting Rubberbands at the Stars virtually on permanent rotate in my car’s cassette player (!!) when it came out. Along with Chuck Girard’s Written on the Wind, Paul Clark’s Hand to the Plow and Vangelis’ Chariots of Fire. Good times. Fantastic music. Dedicated to Cally. […]
Depression is real stuff
From an excellent profile of the awesomely good Rachel Maddow ‘Rachel Maddow’s Quiet War’ in the June Rolling Stone magazine: “Yesterday was like a four-star show, I was totally into it,” she says. “Today and Monday – like, blaagh. Like, doesn’t get any worse. I’ve been doing this for four years! Why do I still […]
When friends try to ‘help’
I was at a book launch with my pal and fellow publisher Roger on Sunday afternoon at the excellent Women’s Bookshop in Ponsonby, and saw this saying in a book of reflections on quotations by Elizabeth Smither. 1 It’s a sentiment which I have expressed many times over the years, usually in bewildered exasperation — […]
Guest post: Andrew King responds to Dean Letfus feature
You may recall my post The trajectory of property spruiker Dean Letfus which was the blog equivalent of a sharp intake of breath at the positioning of Dean Letfus‘s smiling face on the cover of the NZ Property Investor magazine. I wasn’t the only one surprised at that placement, or the soft ride he was […]
Lady Gaga – what a trooper. (Ouch!)
Ouch! This is footage from last night’s Lady Gaga concert at Auckland. Watch and you will wince when the star of the show gets banged on the head with a steel pole! Nasty. She doesn’t miss a beat. Respec’ Gaga. She’s tough. (Hope she’s OK.) – P via NZ Herald
Catchy, Carly Rae. Really catchy.
Ha! Carly Rae Jepsen’s smash hit ‘Call Me Maybe’ … performed in a make-up room with Jimmy Fallon and The Roots. A month or so ago, I saw her official music video (click image below) wherein she affects to lust after her buff, hunky neighbour who [SPOILER:] turns out to fancy other men … and […]
Nicky Hager – The Hollow Men under the covers
By coincidence, I saw this brief interview between Nicky Hager and Finlay Macdonald on TVNZ7’s The Good Word today. Having just referred to the book (see Hollow Man Matthew Hooton recites his creed), I found it interesting, as well as the revelation that defensive PR tactics (‘leaked material’ vs ‘stolen material’) were quite effective, judging […]
A joke for geeks
{Chortle} At least the font isn’t Comic sans! – P via Terry Burton
Gaga
From Lydia Jenkns’ review (NZ Herald) of tonight’slast night’s Lady Gaga concert in Auckland … It was like an avante-garde opera for the modern age, which occasionally got confusing in it’s direction – Gaga began the show as an escaping prisoner, a warrior who will take over the earth for us, not alien yet not […]
Ambition, self-selection and brainless tribalism. Bleurgh!
I’ve been thinking about the subject of deceit in politics and the sad idea that the voting public ‘expects’ a certain amount of spin and marketing (BS) in its political diet. I posted this comment in discussion about my musings about tribalism ‘National’s desperados get perfervid about Peters‘ before last year’s election: I usually enjoy […]
‘Earning’ your enemies
Earlier, I quoted from Margaret Pope’s elegant book At The Turning Point: My political life with David Lange. I heard the author interviewed by Radio NZ National’s erudite Kathyrn Ryan when the book was published 1 where Ms Pope answered (beautifully) a query about the enmity she’d attracted from Michael Bassett: …There are some things […]
‘Look it up’ as a put-down. I approve.
There’s apparently a little controversy about Madonna (the singer-songwriter) feeling that Lady Gaga (the singer-songwriter) has strayed a little too close imitation with respect to Madonna’s ‘Express Yourself’ worldwide hit and Gaga’s ‘Born This Way’. The last one of these I paid attention to was a fairly plausible Joe Satriani allegation that Cold Play had […]
