it was a more innocent time, but also a more ignorant time... a time when an overload of conformity was reaching it's peak and the instinct for individuality that is as strong as the instinct to herd in humans (which may be the singular distinction between human consciousness and other species) was ready to burst out of the cookie-cutter mold...

the girls next door were starting to look for more than a housekeeping job with Mr. Goody TwoShoes and the boys were tiring of macho posturing and post war rebelling and the love generation was about to emerge from the closets and cupboards of the midstream of society...

and Bye Bye Birdie was one of a few musical productions that epitomized the changing culture in it's earliest stages (as opposed to a show like Hair that came during the hippie dippy heyday almost a decade later)... it was still very much a time of happy endings, in spite of the approach of controversial new perspectives on life, love, and everything else... the music was classic Broadway and Hollywood musical mixed with Sinatra style and a touch of Elvis... the mix of awkward romance, sentimentality, and humor is near perfect, if a bit too staged and chaste, as most productions were at the time, as only a few like Dick Van Dyke can do (and Ann-Margaret, sigh, yes, some parts were way too chaste)...

just consider that Elvis, who looks stiff as a board and hardly into the emotions of even the clean cut songs he sang, was too wild to be shown on television and was considered to have so much more energy than anyone else around at the time that he became an icon...

it's as easy to find amusement and reasons to scoff at or mock the stiffness, plastic sentimentality, and scared-to-touch acting of the old time shows as it is to scoff or mock the hard edged, angry, curse-filled egocentric current pop and rap and violent sex shows of today...

and suddenly, West Side Story comes to mind and memories come flooding back of high school and basement productions and duets sung in my dreams and where have all the flowers gone, long time passing... where have all the old friends gone, long time ago... where has all the music gone, lost in passing, every one... when will we ever learn... when will I ever learn?...

my love for music and theatre and musicals and performance was always a personal and relatively private pleasure... my favorite performances were unplanned walks on the beach, strolls through a forest, dances through parks... sometimes with a stranger or few, sometimes with a best friend...

I think my problem (though I don't consider it a problem until I want to find someone to share all of me) is that I love too much and enjoy too intensely and have too much energy and want to share too many interests... who wants to go from a head-banging mosh pit to a stroll on the beach singing fifty year old sentimental love songs or goofy musical numbers to a benefit concert of protest songs and old folkies to some screaming rock and roll to fall asleep to experimental psychedelic instrumental or the Edward Scissorhands soundtrack or some sweet kids lullabies...

and so much is left out of that musical journey and that is how I enjoy most everything... having too many diverse interests means it's easy to find lots of friends in different places and doing different things, but makes finding one or a few friends who'll share it all a near impossible dream (hasn't happened yet, alas)...

I mention this just in case somebody out there thinks they understand and share a similar diversity and openness in interests and enthusiasm for most everything creative, scientific, natural, and weird... think you can keep up with me?...

and then... a while back smash mentioned hubbyman's entry in which he (hubbyman) defined friend and I said to myself I've got to get over there and maybe I did, briefly, because in reading it again tonight, it felt very familiar and not just because the words reflect my own definition of the word friend well...

three times in the past three days I've opened diaries to catch up and didn't get to them before the browser or computer had to be rebooted... especially smed cuz I never finished cutting and pasting all those albums and reviews and gump cuz it is another playoff weekend, after all... and in between, they amuse me with their writing...

I think I've always been a couch potato in my mind, but it wasn't until the past year that I actually tried it out in the physical world and I've discovered that couch potatoing, like everything else, is not as much fun unless it's shared... I've always dreamed of sharing everything and now, I add the dream of sharing couch potatoing (especially the cuddling) with the one who fits next to me... mostly though, it can wait until we are both so old we are unable to move around much cuz I still prefer to bounce around...

ironically, moments after writing this I see a comment from Smash that relates and I'll include my comment here to expound a bit (or just fill space... shhhh)... Smash was remarking about the lack of reading of diaries over the weekend, especially Saturdays...

I read diaries a lot on the weekends during certain sports seasons because I have ADD when it comes to TV... my brain needs more than just the TV to focus on... but I enjoy the sports or some other TV stuff in the background... I also try to read on weekends because I have so little time to read diaries during the week... that, and I have no life at the moment...

that thought is influenced by recent months, since college football season just came to an end and I spend most Saturdays home munching and watching college football... Saturdays are not as homebound outside of college football season (and before Rasputin moved in, I was not as avid a college football watcher, though I tried to catch a few bowl games)...

speaking of sports, what kind of world is this where a football player is fined $54,000.00 over two years for spitting in an opponent's face and other rule violations, but people who can't even earn that much in two years working more than twice as many hours would be fired and possibly jailed for spitting in someone's face?...

why do we pay so much for sporting events?... or any entertainment, for that matter?... because we're idiots who can't entertain ourselves without spending a week's pay to have a good time for a few hours?...

I think Andrew may be discouraging me from adding entries... maybe this diary has gotten too big and the server can't handle it... or maybe it's the content... but the add an entry link takes 30-60 seconds to open the empty box and that's way longer than it used to take and sucks when I am in a hurry, like when I am rushing out an entry just before work...

the comments have always taken that long for me, sometimes longer... I know at least one of you do not have that DLand comments delay problem, but I do and it is quite annoying because it distracts me from whatever I was going to write in the comment or entry and often I will do something else and come back and wonder what the entry was about and what sort of comment I might have wanted to make...

perhaps some of you have noticed that my comments are sometimes sort of generic or maybe even a little odd... well, it's not just cuz I am odd in the first place, it's DLand too, just so you know and can laugh with me about it cuz it's one of those things I might be laughing at (when I have time and am not annoyed because I can not slip in a quick comment or entry just before rushing out to work) and you'd have no idea why if I didn't mention it here now and then...

anyway, the add an entry box just opened and the real pissy thing is I didn't even want the add an entry box, I wanted to Edit/delete entry feature and clicked the wrong link... now I need to wrack my brain to figure out what I was going to add or do to a previous entry and which entry... actually, it was two entries I had thing to do to...

randomness expands exponentially in these moments...

especially since I click on the Edit/delete entry link and it takes even longer for that feature to come up (and I know that's because I have so many entries because it takes much less time on diaries where I have much fewer entries...

but you are here at DLand and this place has been fun and very good to me, so I stay and allow the randomness and distractions and amusements and occasional frustrations become part of the flow of words...

those are all the random thoughts I have for this entry...

oh, if you really want more babbling, you can find me guest-entrying at Nicim's place for as long as she can stand it (I actually behaved, I think)...

have fun out there J

. o O ( NOTES ARE THE NEW HAPPY PILL ) O o .
(just let me know you were here)