What's the matter? Didn't everybody's spouse or significant other get them tickets to the April 14th Lucinda Williams show for Valentine's Day like my bride did? No? Didn't think so. Not that I'd gloat or anything.
I've been waiting for you to come back
Since you left Minneapolis
Snow covers the streetlamps and the windowsills
The buildings and the brittle crooked trees
Dead leaves of December
Thin skinned and splintered
Never gotten used to this bitter winter
I've been wasted, angry and sad
Since you left Minneapolis
I wish my thoughts were pure like the driven snow
Like the heavens and the spring's virgin buds
But they strangle me with their sin
Fill me up with poison
Black clouds have covered up the sun again
I can always trace it back
To that night in Minneapolis
Here on the seventh floor in a room I can't call mine
Deadbolt on the door, do not disturb sign
Shaking and trembling
On the clean white linen
Slivers of starlight across the ceiling
A dozen yellow roses
All that's left in Minneapolis
I wish I'd never seen your face or heard your voice
You're a bad pain in my gut
I wanna spit you out
Open up this wound again
Let my blood flow red and thin
Into the glistening
Into the whiteness
Into the melting snow of Minneapolis
--Minneapolis, Lucinda Williams
12 comments:
uh, excuse me I recieved the entire boxed set to freaks and geeks (me freak, Z the geek) and husby received Thomas Pychon's New NOvel which weighed about $80 pounds and was very $$$$$$. Lusinda better drop that weird twang she's been sporting.
jesus, the pinot grigio has really kicked in...
Palette
She's from Louisiana. The twang is her birthright, but I think she's got more of a Texas accent-- Lake Charles is close to Mississipi, not Texas, but I think she's lived in Texas for a long time.
It scares me that I can tell the difference between a North Texas accent and an Oklahoma accent. I don't know why.
Both very cool gifts. Though not as cool as Lucinda Williams tickets.
Is Thomas Pynchon paid by the word these days? That's the only explanation.
I still haven't read Gravity's Rainbow, though I own a copy. My friend Andreas, who you haven't met, did his master's dissertation about the need for a little madness in even the most civilized society. He cited Pynchon and Camile Paglia heavily. Yeah, I didn't fully understand it either. I read the entire thing because I edited it him before he submitted it-- he speaks 7 or 8 languages, but can't spell in any of them.
Sounds like the pinot has done its job. I think "husby" is a new term you've coined.
Sweet! You've got a great wife. I got chocolates, which I need like a hole in the head, and I'm eating them all.
Lake Charles is closer to Texas.
I like Lucinda's voice, but I've never got any of her records. Go figure.
I've started reading Gravity's Rainbow three times, and really liked it each time. I lost my copy once, and had to return the copies I borrowed the other times. One of these days, though...
Barbara-
Well, you know about chocolate and anti-oxidants. Anti-oxidants are the only reason I drink red wine.
Bubs-
I stand corrected. The map I looked at last night erroneously showed Lake Charles in eastern Louisiana, when it is in fact in the Calcasieu Parish, right up against Texas in the western part of the state. I found a better map.
As a frequent visitor to the great state of Louisiana, I'm certain that you were already aware of the fact that Louisiana is the only state in the union that has parishes instead of counties, and that it is the only state that has laws based on Napoleaonic code, rather than English-style common law. Learned that in my state and local government class a couple of decades ago. The class was good for something.
One of the things that is fading in Chicago is the old tendency to indicate one's residence by their parish. Worse, the neighborhoods are increasingly creations of real estate dealers, or just out and out inaccurate. A couple of years ago, a real estate development went up near my home at Montrose and Campbell, which is firmly in the North Center neighborhood. The sign in front of it read "The Fine Art of Living in Ravenswood." I had to stifle the urge to add "First, walk ten blocks east, past Lincoln Square..." Ravenswood is two neighborhoods over.
It's amazing how "Lincoln Park" gets bigger and bigger. I thought Diversy was the northern border, but I have seen condos at Belmont and north labeled as such.
Brian,
Be honest to your fan base. . .anti-oxidants are NOT the only reason you drink red wine. Tell the truth!
Wife.
Oh, I love Lucinda -saw her in Boulder once.
A friend of mine who works at Trader Joe's said that Lucinda came in the store in Toluca Lake right before closing, and they couldn't get her to leave. After multiple announcements, they gradually started shutting of the lights, but she just kept sloooooowly shopping. He said she wasn't an asshole, she just seemed unaware of what was going on.
I haven't heard her new album yet, but I really love Car Wheels and World Without Tears.
Hate both Pynchon AND Paglia. Grrrr.....
Mr Yen:
I know she is southern. But her twang deepened considerably between say Gravel Road and Tears. The way she sings the word leg in Righteously is not a birthright; it is an affront.
Lu-
Yeah, and how Uptown keeps getting smaller and smaller. Sheridan Park, Buena Park, North Graceland, South Andersonville-- I'm sorry, it's Uptown. Deal with it.
Kim-
Okay, I confess-- sometimes I just need to slake a thirst, and don't have any water around.
Kristi-
Kim and I discovered early on that we both loved Lucinda Williams. In fact, on the set of canned questions on the Matches thing, one of the questions was about five guests you'd have for dinner. Lucinda was one of my guests. She struck me as someone who'd be fun to party with. Or maybe not, according to your sister...
Vikki-
You know those zany artists...
At my second job, as a waiter, once in a while we'll get a "camper" table. We've had situations where two waiters, a bartender and a busperson are sitting there. We've shut a bunch of the lights out, brought the sign in... and they stay.
I haven't read enough Pynchon to form an opinion. While reading "Positively 4th Street" a couple of years ago, I found out that he and Richard Farina (folk guy, was married to Joan Baez' sister Mimi) were close friends.
A few years ago, someone referred to Cammile Paglia sounding "more and more like Ayn Rand on acid." I thought that this was a pretty fair description.
Palette-
Yeah, she did have a little strange diction going on there, didn't she? Still, she was my back-up plan in case Kim and I hadn't met...
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