Oooh, good. My general take on Kenny G has been that my ears don’t like it, and there’s no depth. Brubeck (and Desmond et al) may have played in a lighter, more playful tone than a person cares for, but there’s depth and sophistication in what they did, which demands respect if not appreciation. Therefore those guys are not “smooth jazz”. (And also, as I’ve gotten older I’ve appreciated them more beyond just Take Five, own several albums, and was thrilled when my kid started playing them.)
One of the people I worked with in Vietnam as a civilian had served in Africa and then in the highlands of Vietnam. He did well with the locals, and they came to him with a problem: "We get a lot of USA reporters that want to see our "native dances." We do not have any. So, he taught them some African dances. They worked. But will some person in the future say "space aliens" took people from Africa to Asia? Likely nobody will ever care or even notice.
Funny you ask about belching at work. As I wrote in a column at the start of the pandemic (https://wapo.st/4dMNgFO), unrestrained belching at the office, "whether because of respiratory or gastric conditions, neurological tics or simply an upbringing among warthogs," is inappropriate, as is any other behavior that disrupts your colleagues' work environment.
Fortunately, I work mostly from home. The cats seem cool with it.
We had to specifically train our autistic son not to let out eruptions at the dinner table, no matter how rich and full of vibrato and gravitas they might be.
This reminds me, though, of the time in a previous career when I unleashed hell while alone at the office early one morning. Two seconds later, I got an email: "Was that you??" I hadn't realized the poor guy who sat on the other side of the locked door next to my desk was in, too.
My past as an adorable blonde who got away with things involved colorful swearing, the kind you learn with two parents working at a Navy base. I thought I was alone in the newsroom early one Saturday afternoon. I don't remember what I said, but as soon as I was done I got an email from a reporter saying (almost verbatim): That was the longest, most colorful string of compound swears I've ever heard. My hat is off to you.
I came up in a time when a lot of memorization was required. I was apparently good at it. In second grade, I was chosen to be the narrator of the class play, which was on a health topic, primarily because I could memorize the reams of no-doubt saccharine doggerel required. My mother was immensely relieved that , instead of having to provide a carrot or lettuce or milk carton costume (those who did created some very convincing ones), she could just buy me a frilly dress. I somehow managed to escape memorizing "Friends, Romans, countrymen" or "To be or not to be" (though I do seem to remember much of the latter), but I often console myself with the first stanza (10 verses) of "The Lady of the Lake" (rhyming couplets are always easier). Nowadays, I can't memorize anything. Every morning I have to copy three five-digit numbers from one place to another, and it always takes two looks (and would require three if the second one weren't mostly immutable). And I sometimes have to screenshot Word dialogs in order to relay the exact wording of some option or other. It's very dispiriting.
To Marni in Virginia - I am in the last-Boomer year, and I also loathe talking on the phone. I generally let calls go to voicemail and then send a text later. "Saw you called - did you need something?"
I am rubbish at texting and much prefer email, for which I can use a real keyboard and I also prefer email to phone conversations because I prefer a searchable written record. I finally got this across to my daughter, who is given to extensive texts and interminable phone calls. I told her I found it impossible to remember (or even find) the things she told me that way, and so she did promise (and finally delivered some weeks later) "a long newsy email."
If you have a PC, you can set up something called Phone Link that will let you type phone texts from your computer keyboard. You can't post photos, I don't think, but it's really handy for texts.
Alternatively, you can use the instant messaging apps Google Chat, WhatsApp, or Messenger (Facebook) on both your phone and your computer -- whichever you happen to be using.
You should consider it. Having a back-and-forth conversation in real time is much easier in Google Chat or Messenger than in a series of emails. It's very easy to set up.
When you say "your phone," do you mean an Iphone/smartphone? Because my phone is neither -- it's a plain old flip phone that makes and receives phone calls and texts.
I've actually got that set up, and I did manage to send a long reply to a text ONCE. But if I've already seen the text on my watch or phone, it won't show up in Phone Link for me to answer. And yeah, I also can't see the photos I'm often responding to. It's been less helpful than I had hoped. But I think I've figured out what the issue is: texts from Android phones show up as "notifications" rather than "messages." (At the moment I'm being bombarded by a flurry of texts in a group chat from my writing group board--all of them green.)
What threw me in reading this today - I've never heard the former Yankee third baseman called "Cletis". He was always Clete, including on his baseball card that I had as a kid. In my world as a Cardinals fan he was always Ken's brother (who was my mom's favorite player)..
My life was transformed when I Googled how to put on a duvet cover and got this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c1IzS2oBBN0. You don't need to know how it works. Just follow the directions. It does.
I thought mostly only british people bothered with duvets or their covers. We mer-cans pretty much toss the whole comforter in the washing machine, pre-filled. What is the advantage of a duvet? Easier to wash the cover than a down quilt I guess?
Much easier to wash. You can also change the duvet covers (different colors and fabrics) if that's how you (pun alert) roll. And the down quilt should not be put in a washing machine.
I once saw a video of that. Complicated, but very effective. Of course, I have no idea where I saw it (likely Facebook) nor did I take down any instructions. So folding those sheets is still a mess.
Fact is (at least according to research) whether or not you "like" smooth jazz, it can be good for you. "Good" in terms of lowering stress, improving mood, enhancing concentration (for some) and possibly even lowering blood pressure. Just what the doctor ordered these days.
John Kenneth Galbraith: "When we want the rich to work harder, we pay them more. When we want the poor to work harder, we pay them less." So, about that statement "...when people are being paid, their work habits improve!"
Yes, chances are your brain is feverishly trying to comfort you with (mostly) pleasant memories of times past when you didn't feel threatened. And, as much as I hate to admit it, the 1961 Evil Empire (aka NY Yankees) is worth remembering --- statistically, anyway. Our brains evolved with safety (and survival) primarily "in mind," so yours (even as addled as it well may have become from a life of dissipation) is just doing what comes naturally. Your committing Eliot's "Prufrock" to memory, however, is altogether more troubling --- raising the issue of what, by comparison, you regret: lost opportunities, lack of spiritual progress or missed sexual relationships. Ah, so lack of spiritual progress. Or, was memorizing and regularly reciting it simply an attempt to ensure you would have more quality alone time? Great way to clear a dinner party. My "go to" is "Casablanca" ("The boy stood on the burning deck...").
There is no shame in not liking smooth jazz. I’m not prepared to say the same for liking it.
Agreed. It is elevator music.
I urge all to google “Paul F Thompkins jazz” and watch that section of his standup. I quote it all the time
And do you include Dave Brubeck? Or Ramsey Lewis?
I think of smooth as more Kenny G than Dave Brubeck.
Smooth Jazz is the I Can't Believe It's Not Jazz of genre-substitutes.
Smooth jazz is to jazz as military intelligence is to intelligence.
If you find you dislike smooth jazz, but struggle for the words to express exactly why, let Pat Metheny say it for you: https://ontherecord.co/2020/05/30/pat-metheny-has-a-few-thoughts-about-the-music-of-kenny-g/
Oooh, good. My general take on Kenny G has been that my ears don’t like it, and there’s no depth. Brubeck (and Desmond et al) may have played in a lighter, more playful tone than a person cares for, but there’s depth and sophistication in what they did, which demands respect if not appreciation. Therefore those guys are not “smooth jazz”. (And also, as I’ve gotten older I’ve appreciated them more beyond just Take Five, own several albums, and was thrilled when my kid started playing them.)
One of the people I worked with in Vietnam as a civilian had served in Africa and then in the highlands of Vietnam. He did well with the locals, and they came to him with a problem: "We get a lot of USA reporters that want to see our "native dances." We do not have any. So, he taught them some African dances. They worked. But will some person in the future say "space aliens" took people from Africa to Asia? Likely nobody will ever care or even notice.
Funny you ask about belching at work. As I wrote in a column at the start of the pandemic (https://wapo.st/4dMNgFO), unrestrained belching at the office, "whether because of respiratory or gastric conditions, neurological tics or simply an upbringing among warthogs," is inappropriate, as is any other behavior that disrupts your colleagues' work environment.
Fortunately, I work mostly from home. The cats seem cool with it.
We had to specifically train our autistic son not to let out eruptions at the dinner table, no matter how rich and full of vibrato and gravitas they might be.
He needs to save them for special occasions, like awkward conversational pauses and dramatic musical climaxes.
They would make for excellent bookends of his musical performances.
Or visits to Japan.
This reminds me, though, of the time in a previous career when I unleashed hell while alone at the office early one morning. Two seconds later, I got an email: "Was that you??" I hadn't realized the poor guy who sat on the other side of the locked door next to my desk was in, too.
My past as an adorable blonde who got away with things involved colorful swearing, the kind you learn with two parents working at a Navy base. I thought I was alone in the newsroom early one Saturday afternoon. I don't remember what I said, but as soon as I was done I got an email from a reporter saying (almost verbatim): That was the longest, most colorful string of compound swears I've ever heard. My hat is off to you.
I think you and I would get along swimmingly!
So is Dupuytren Contracture why Viking warriors did not wear bras?
I came up in a time when a lot of memorization was required. I was apparently good at it. In second grade, I was chosen to be the narrator of the class play, which was on a health topic, primarily because I could memorize the reams of no-doubt saccharine doggerel required. My mother was immensely relieved that , instead of having to provide a carrot or lettuce or milk carton costume (those who did created some very convincing ones), she could just buy me a frilly dress. I somehow managed to escape memorizing "Friends, Romans, countrymen" or "To be or not to be" (though I do seem to remember much of the latter), but I often console myself with the first stanza (10 verses) of "The Lady of the Lake" (rhyming couplets are always easier). Nowadays, I can't memorize anything. Every morning I have to copy three five-digit numbers from one place to another, and it always takes two looks (and would require three if the second one weren't mostly immutable). And I sometimes have to screenshot Word dialogs in order to relay the exact wording of some option or other. It's very dispiriting.
To Marni in Virginia - I am in the last-Boomer year, and I also loathe talking on the phone. I generally let calls go to voicemail and then send a text later. "Saw you called - did you need something?"
I am rubbish at texting and much prefer email, for which I can use a real keyboard and I also prefer email to phone conversations because I prefer a searchable written record. I finally got this across to my daughter, who is given to extensive texts and interminable phone calls. I told her I found it impossible to remember (or even find) the things she told me that way, and so she did promise (and finally delivered some weeks later) "a long newsy email."
If you have a PC, you can set up something called Phone Link that will let you type phone texts from your computer keyboard. You can't post photos, I don't think, but it's really handy for texts.
Alternatively, you can use the instant messaging apps Google Chat, WhatsApp, or Messenger (Facebook) on both your phone and your computer -- whichever you happen to be using.
I don't use any of those. I have to keep telling people in Messenger to please email me because I don't do Messenger.
You should consider it. Having a back-and-forth conversation in real time is much easier in Google Chat or Messenger than in a series of emails. It's very easy to set up.
When you say "your phone," do you mean an Iphone/smartphone? Because my phone is neither -- it's a plain old flip phone that makes and receives phone calls and texts.
I've actually got that set up, and I did manage to send a long reply to a text ONCE. But if I've already seen the text on my watch or phone, it won't show up in Phone Link for me to answer. And yeah, I also can't see the photos I'm often responding to. It's been less helpful than I had hoped. But I think I've figured out what the issue is: texts from Android phones show up as "notifications" rather than "messages." (At the moment I'm being bombarded by a flurry of texts in a group chat from my writing group board--all of them green.)
What threw me in reading this today - I've never heard the former Yankee third baseman called "Cletis". He was always Clete, including on his baseball card that I had as a kid. In my world as a Cardinals fan he was always Ken's brother (who was my mom's favorite player)..
My life was transformed when I Googled how to put on a duvet cover and got this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c1IzS2oBBN0. You don't need to know how it works. Just follow the directions. It does.
I thought mostly only british people bothered with duvets or their covers. We mer-cans pretty much toss the whole comforter in the washing machine, pre-filled. What is the advantage of a duvet? Easier to wash the cover than a down quilt I guess?
Much easier to wash. You can also change the duvet covers (different colors and fabrics) if that's how you (pun alert) roll. And the down quilt should not be put in a washing machine.
Does it show how to fold fitted sheets?
I once saw a video of that. Complicated, but very effective. Of course, I have no idea where I saw it (likely Facebook) nor did I take down any instructions. So folding those sheets is still a mess.
Fact is (at least according to research) whether or not you "like" smooth jazz, it can be good for you. "Good" in terms of lowering stress, improving mood, enhancing concentration (for some) and possibly even lowering blood pressure. Just what the doctor ordered these days.
John Kenneth Galbraith: "When we want the rich to work harder, we pay them more. When we want the poor to work harder, we pay them less." So, about that statement "...when people are being paid, their work habits improve!"
Yes, chances are your brain is feverishly trying to comfort you with (mostly) pleasant memories of times past when you didn't feel threatened. And, as much as I hate to admit it, the 1961 Evil Empire (aka NY Yankees) is worth remembering --- statistically, anyway. Our brains evolved with safety (and survival) primarily "in mind," so yours (even as addled as it well may have become from a life of dissipation) is just doing what comes naturally. Your committing Eliot's "Prufrock" to memory, however, is altogether more troubling --- raising the issue of what, by comparison, you regret: lost opportunities, lack of spiritual progress or missed sexual relationships. Ah, so lack of spiritual progress. Or, was memorizing and regularly reciting it simply an attempt to ensure you would have more quality alone time? Great way to clear a dinner party. My "go to" is "Casablanca" ("The boy stood on the burning deck...").