42 Replies to “Reader Tips”

  4. Wacky Greens At It Again!
    Trying to sail through the NW Passage, currently in route to Tuktyuktuk to wait for the Mid-August break up…
    http://www.theclimateheretic.com
    I will be posting Canadian Ice Service Maps each week on the Passage and commenting on their blogs.
    I invite SDA to follow along on yet a anothr Great AGW Supporter Paid for Epic Journey into the Land of NO ICE.

  5. Thanks Vitruvius. I always considered the song to be in class of its own, which opinion I can see from some of the Utube comments some important pop personages also hold. Some day I must look at the lyrics. I suffer from a life long affliction of being deaf to lyrics. Actually, I’ll give it another listen and see if they register.

  7. I remember that number and the Group, but listening to it now, it’s obvious that the words are just so much nonsense, like a lot of the lyrics during the period, Maybe it meant something if you were high on LSD, but I, never was.

  9. Ironically, Larry, the lyrics are about the inherent nonsense of that dissipated lifestyle of that period you refer to. In other words, your comment has more in common with the song than it has with…your own comment…or something like that.
    /:>)>

  10. It’s been said that John Lennon listened to that album non-stop, for an entire day, when it was first released.
    Did you know, “Conquistador” was adapted from a tune by Bach? It was performed with the Edmonton Symphany Orchestra. I’m not sure if they were all high on LSD, but it was a pretty good tune.
    It’s a funny thing, Larry, but a lot of the stuff I listened to on acid, stills sounds pretty good after 35 years back on earth.

  12. Knacker: Matt Lauer didn’t look very happy, did he — or respectful towards his guest.

  13. Somewhere – possibly wikipedia that authoritative source, I read that the words were just made up to follow the tune and had no meaning whatsoever.
    But its a great song and brings back memories…although they say if you can remember the 60’s you weren’t really there 🙂

  14. ‘Dan Rather Wants Obama To Help Save The News’
    Worth a click for the shi! kicking he takes in the comments.

  15. my politicisation began around this time. musical interests varied from the trailing edge of duane eddy (found a discarded lp in the house trash) to rare tunes from don messers jubilee, to bob dylan.
    then I got a gander at led zeppelin’s 1st release and everything changed.
    I was NEVER into the beatles or anything involving a moog synthesizer or obvious just-for-the-money radio payola.
    I still think Beggar’s Banquet was inspiring for its diversity of themes.
    on the topic of unintelligible lyrics? I saw Johnny Winter’s VERY FIRST show in Canada stoned on grass under an open sky at 11 oclock at night.
    I also saw him live in a much smaller venue in april of last year.
    I gots a real, real real good recollection of that time in my life. mostly a lot of disgust at the way the world was being run. the more things change . . .

  16. A friend of mine – a talented organist, about 33 yrs. old now – has corresponded with one of the dudes from Procol Harum for years now. They talk about organ stuff definitely, and maybe their personal lives – I dunno – really though, I’m not making it up.
    I’ll always think of “Withnail and I” when I hear “A Lighter Shade of Pale”. Is there any non-Limey familiar with this great, weird film?

  17. re the cash for clunkers:
    well, like I said in another post, the world is gone nuts. totally whacko. the average condition of the average vehicle I have ever owned (7 in total) was less than some of these models.
    nutso.
    jeeeeeeezuz murphy.
    crush and destroy everything. smash all structures and systems and start over completely if it must be. because that’s where it’s heading.

  19. Other Procol Harum tunes worth checking out: Homburg, Quite Rightly So, Wreck of the Hesperus, Luskus Delph, As Strong As Samson …

  20. I’ve always loved this song, as much for the weird lyrics as the organ and the contrapuntal drumming. But I recall one critic referring to Eric Clapton’s guitar as “CofE blues”, and I have to wonder how much this particular song inspired him.
    When I look at the clip, and in particular, the way the couples are dancing, I believe I’ve seen livelier funerals. Does anyone else remember that our parents were scandalized by these suit-and-tie wearing “shaggy haired” radicals?
    I do dispute the idea that the lyrics are complete nonsense. Clearly, they are drunk/high at the beginning, with the room spinning round and the ceiling flying away, and, as young people do everywhere, calling for more drinks and getting a new tray.
    But the reference to the miller and his tale is quite clearly a reference to Chaucer, which doubtless these young men had read in their education before DWEM literature was banned. And the miller’s tale is quite bawdy, about a young wife married to an old landlord, planning a complicated liason with her would-be lover. So, while hearing the story, the singer plays with his cards (solitaire? oh, Lord, there are so many ways to go on that..), while his girlfriend/wife/lover denies any and everything. But, as he vaguely realizes what has happened, he notes “And although my eyes were open, They might have just as well’ve been closed”, but his wiser lady sees the true import, hence the blanching referred to in the title.
    It’s a song of loss, of opportunity frittered away, which is why the funereal overtones are so appropriate. To dismiss the lyrics as “meaningless” is to miss the entire point.

  21. ‘Dan Rather Wants Obama To Help Save The News’
    ron in kelowna
    Ron,
    The issue is bigger than Rather…Its all about technology, and the Supreme Court tore off the band-aid that enabled the Networks to control Programming by selective herding.
    When you have unlimited choice to do your own programming, what will you watch?..

  22. Nice tune Vit. Thank you, I like that song.
    KevinB: But I recall one critic referring to Eric Clapton’s guitar as “CofE blues”, and I have to wonder how much this particular song inspired him.
    What does CofE mean?
    Thanks
    arrdale

  23. ron in kelowna, great link. The comments were hilarious and bang on.
    I especially liked kraftyse on Thu, 07/30/2009 – 10:54am. Some great stuff there.

  24. “Islamist death ‘good for Nigeria’
    A Nigerian government minister has expressed relief at the death of an Islamic sect leader whose capture police announced on Thursday.
    But Information Minister Dora Akunyili told the BBC the government “does not condone extra-judicial killings”.
    Human rights campaigners have voiced concern at Mohammed Yusuf’s death.”
    http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/8177681.stm

  25. Goreacle Report: Summer? What summer?
    The Year Without Summer: 2009.
    …-
    “A Summer Weather Rerun: Environment Canada
    Canada’s top weather forecaster predicts the Civic Holiday long weekend could be the “best weekend” of summer.
    As the rainiest month on record comes to an end, Environment Canada warns the “bummer of a summer” will continue into August.
    Environment Canada senior climatologist David Phillips says Saturday and Sunday look “pretty good”, but August is shaping up to be a rerun of July.
    Phillips tells CFRA’s Afternoon Edition with Rob Snow that the preliminary models for August show “cooler and wetter” than normal.
    July 2009 will go into the record books as the rainiest month on record in Ottawa’s history. The Ottawa International Airport has recorded 243 mm of rain this month, beating the old mark of 224 mm.
    Phillips says Ottawa’s sunshine totals are down two hours a day this summer, and the average afternoon temperature for Ottawa is the second coldest on record.”
    http://www.cfra.com/

  27. Funny, maz2, how Phillips was claiming in the spring of this year how this summer was going to be hot and dry…you know, further proof of the validity of global warming.
    What fools!

  28. Global Cooling HitsAl Gore’s Home
    [ .. It was delightfully appropriate that, as large parts of Argentina were swept by severe blizzards last week, on a scale never experienced before, the city of Nashville, Tennessee, should have enjoyed the coolest July 21 in its history, breaking a record established in 1877. Appropriate, because Nashville is the home of Al Gore, the man who for 20 years has been predicting that we should all by now be in the grip of runaway global warming.
    His predictions have proved so wildly wrong – along with those of the Met Office’s ÂŁ33 million computer model which forecast that we should now be enjoying a “barbecue summer” and that 2009 would be one of “the five warmest years ever” – that the propaganda machine has had to work overtime to maintain what is threatening to become the most expensive fiction in history.]
    [ .. In the past few years, Dr Hansen’s temperature record has become ever more eccentric, often wildly at odds with the other three officially recognised data sources]
    [ .. Carbon dioxide levels continue to rise, but temperatures – apart from those revealed by Dr Hansen – have seriously parted company with them. ]
    [ .. “no one is able to point to a single piece of evidence that man-made carbon dioxide has a significant effect on global climate”.
    Are we all missing something – apart from all that money, of course? ]
    Yes. Carbon Dioxide is life. The more,the better

  30. Eeyore, it’s a hoot to follow Phillips and his gobblegobble blurbs from EnviroCan.
    What does Phillips know about turkeys?
    “Young turkeys aren’t smart enough to come in out of the rain, and will stand outside in a downpour, with beaks open and eyes skyward, until they drown.”
    …-
    “The Omnivore’s Delusion: Against the Agri-intellectuals
    Farming has always been messy and painful, and bloody and dirty. It still is. This is something the critics of industrial farming never seem to understand.
    I’m dozing, as I often do on airplanes, but the guy behind me has been broadcasting nonstop for nearly three hours. I finally admit defeat and start some serious eavesdropping. He’s talking about food, damning farming, particularly livestock farming, compensating for his lack of knowledge with volume.
    I’m so tired of people who wouldn’t visit a doctor who used a stethoscope instead of an MRI demanding that farmers like me use 1930s technology to raise food. Farming has always been messy and painful, and bloody and dirty. It still is.
    But now we have to listen to self-appointed experts on airplanes frightening their seatmates about the profession I have practiced for more than 30 years. I’d had enough. I turned around and politely told the lecturer that he ought not believe everything he reads. He quieted and asked me what kind of farming I do. I told him, and when he asked if I used organic farming, I said no, and left it at that. I didn’t answer with the first thought that came to mind, which is simply this: I deal in the real world, not superstitions, and unless the consumer absolutely forces my hand, I am about as likely to adopt organic methods as the Wall Street Journal is to publish their next edition by setting the type by hand.”
    http://www.american.com/archive/2009/july/the-omnivore2019s-delusion-against-the-agri-intellectuals

  31. Michael Savage banned from Britain, while Canada is hosting Al Qaeda recruitment event. Good stuff!

  32. that’s funny maz2. I know it’s not meant to be, but it is… 🙂

  33. O’narcissist Report: O’Narcissist.
    “His speech is peppered with “I”, “my”, “myself”, and “mine”.”
    O’narcissism is all here* in black and white.
    …-
    ““I don’t spend a lot of time looking at my polls. I do look at the polling on health care, partly because I think that there is a terrific case to be made to the American public. But it is — this is complicated, it’s difficult,” the president said. “And I will say that this has been the most difficult test for me so far in public life, trying to describe in clear, simple terms how important it is that we reform this system. The case is so clear to me.””
    “Obama stumped by dumb Americans opposing ObamaCare”
    http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2305447/posts
    …-
    *”Bragging and false autobiography – The narcissist brags incessantly.
    His speech is peppered with “I”, “my”, “myself”, and “mine”.”
    http://www.globalpolitician.com/25109-barack-obama-elections

  35. arrdale:
    Sorry for the obscure reference. “C of E” is crossword puzzle addicts’ shorthand for “Church of England”. And, although you probably know, “DWEM” is “dead white english males”. I have to stop being so cryptic!

  38. Global Cooling Report.
    “Then they ran into June and July.”
    “”The unseasonably cold and torrentially wet weather”.
    …-
    “The missing monarchs
    Will it really be a summer without butterflies?”
    “The unseasonably cold and torrentially wet weather looks to have halted the journey north and probably drowned millions of the orange-winged migrator. At the very least, it is being blamed for creating the ideal conditions for the fungi and other pathogens that feed on monarch larvae.
    “I’m quite concerned,” says Don Davis, the Canadian representative on a Canada-U.S.-Mexico monarch monitoring group. “The reports of sightings are considerably reduced all over. Even Quebec is asking: Where are the monarchs?”
    It hasn’t been a great summer for most butterfly species, Davis says. “You are hardly seeing any red admirals” either.
    The mighty monarchs have survived adversity before, notably in fall 2005, when they flew south in the teeth of Hurricane Katrina and its sister storms.”
    http://www.cbc.ca/canada/story/2009/07/29/f-monarch-butterflies.html

  39. O’Race: “try to pull America with them”.
    …-
    “Obama hosts ‘beer summit’ on race
    With mugs of beer and calming words, President Barack Obama and the professor and policeman engulfed in a national uproar over race pledged Thursday to move on and try to pull America with them.”
    …-
    “Skeleton wearing a suit found in cemetery
    Skeletal remains of a man wearing a suit and tie was found sitting in a burial vault with no casket in site at a historic black Illinois cemetery where workers allegedly dug up bodies and dumped them in a scheme to resell plots, officials said Friday.”
    (canoenews)

  40. I posted over at http://burningourmoney.blogspot.com/, a British conservative web site of some insight, the following, in response to the question of “What would you do?”
    It applies also to Canada. BTW, a QUANGO is s Quasi Autonomous National Government Organisation. Through this avenue, the British socialists get to sneak their politics, and provide themselves with jobs, under the RADAR of Parliament.
    All these things you mention are politically painful – cutting child benefits, you evil bastard!!
    No, eliminate the Met office [Environement Canada]; contract out weather forecasting to Piers Corbyn at Weatheraction.
    End subsidies for “green schemes to save the planet”. No more windmills or ethanol.
    Encourage cheap energy – coal and nuclear. Cheap energy will boost the economy.
    Adopt harsher social service regimes: drug addicts MUST go to rehab, no choice. Campaign against single motherhood.
    Close down the quangos. This may at first appear unpleasant politically, but if you trasnfer the quangos’ powers to existing state bureaucracies, then you have an ally in shutting down other bureaucracies.
    Sell every business (bank or motor company, etc.) you own.
    Reduce taxes, especially the VAT. It is very difficult for future governments to raise it again.
    The strategy must be, for political reasons:
    1)Reduce costs indirectly.
    2) Do not remove government payments to individuals, just do not index link them. Eventually; they become worthless.
    3)Forget “anthropogenic global warming”. It does not exist. Stop funding and subsidising the green religious groups.
    4)Remove charity status from all green organisations, many of whom are multi-national corporations. They are engaged in politics; they must put up or pay up.

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