Hunting and pecking this morning. It’s 7 a.m. I’m going to get some coffee and hope the meds kick in before Cat takes me to work..
9 a.m.: Got to work, hands better. I’ve got several things to do but here’s where the Lewy kicks in. I can’t make up my mind on what to get started on and I can’t seem to find my To-Do list. Now that would be funny except I need it. A lot of people ask me about symptoms and I can tell them about deterioration (mild) of fine motor skills. But it is harder to describe the thought processes and how they are changing. It’s like shagging fly balls when I was a Little Leaguer. I wasn’t super in the outfield. The fly balls would keep coming from the coach, faster faster. Run this way, run that way, here comes another one. Well that’s kind of how I feel sometimes that my mind won’t focus one thing. I try for one fly ball but then stop and check out the next one.
It’s funny we switched cable companies last week and had some problems with the transition. After working for while, our signal dropped out. The screen told us to check the input. Sure enough it was the old ‘wrong input’ ploy. Well I feel somebody’s (Lewy) is messing with my input. Like the Cable Guy I am trying to fix what is being processed by my brain using information that comes in through the input. I do this because the output, how I act talk and do what I do, is working like the movie on the telly. I’m feeling confident I have got this thing under control. (I may not be HD however.)
As you can see I missed my 4/28 post. Well to be honest I forgot; I mean I actually remembered about mid afternoon but put it off and then forgot. Actually I was probably distracted by the afternoon lunch/brunch prepared at our house by dear friend Mary Porter. I had two helpings of a delicious dish of quinoa in a coconut milk sauce and chicken. Delicious and healthy. Also Sunday, Cat and I went for a long walk around HP golf course. If you take that walk you might consider strapping on a helmet for that part on Clairmont. We had one golf ball sail over out heads. Few minutes later we heard a golfer shout FORE and I nearly did a barrel roll on the sidewalk. Back when I was driving I remember a ball went over the fence and bounced right in front of my moving vehicle. Survival in the big city. Bye for now,
The Wolves known by their Spanish name Los Lobos kick off this album with a rocking ‘Don’t Worry Baby’ and then follow that with music reflecting their Mexican roots all rolled up in a mix of blues, country, folk and good old barrelhouse rock and roll.
I saw them at the Marin (Calif.) fair from about 12 feet from the stage and I can tell you as good as they sound on records, they are better live. David Hildago can play.
The album kicks off with “Don’t Worry Baby,’ a guitar guided soul/dance track, then the diversity and musicianship is on display the rest of the way.
Rolling Stone ranked this in the Top 500 albums of all time at something like 300-ish.
I have The Neighborhood and Kiko on CD, all excellent and all different. I would recommend this album if you are interested in exploring the Lobos. Kiko is my favorite, a little off the beaten path. And Colossal Head is a steam roller of guitar rock.
I don’t think you can go wrong with any Los Lobos record. I respect their musicality and their ability to bridge diverse groups,
,On this day in 2011 the worst tornado outbreak in memory slammed the Southeast with Alabama taking the brunt of it.
Dozens of tornadoes killed 250 people in this state alone. I spent a year writing about the aftermath with a team of great reporters. We exposed problems that included FEMA evaluations of houses that defied logic. One story I did featured a Joe Songer picture of a family standing in their house with all four walls gone. FEMA in its reports called it insufficient damage to qualify for a FEMA grant. Here’s story and pic.
Another story that I did on an anniversary of the storm I think nicely described how the day unfolded. Must read to the end though it takes a click at the end of the first part.
10 a.m.: It’s Friday, usually a good day, but I have some work to do before I can relax. Check-ins. Sleep Through the night, awesome. Diet. Had good low-carb lemon cilantro chicken last night Catherine made. Cheese stick for breakfast. Mental Health. Like I said today is Friday and that’s always an extra bubble of electricity of the positive kind. People in the newsroom feed off of each other — so when the newsroom is buzzing, everybody picks up the vibe. (And vice versa but won’t explore that right now). I’m currently trying to figure out how to channel my efforts into one big cohesive plan. I’ve got several, no make that many, avenues and ideas. And I’m excited about getting all cohesive. In another post likely today I am going to lay out some ideas, some specific, some broad about my vision for the July 20 Mike Madness event. I’m hoping and planning to make it bigger than ever. And I’ve got a few tricks which I will discuss later today or over the weekend. Happy Friday readers. From a broader standpoint, I will say that I can tell this thing is progressing, however slowly. With doctor consultation, I’ve added a small boost to my dosage of carbidopa levadopa medication which treats Parkinsonian physical symptoms such as tremor and the aforementioned fine motor skills skills such as typing or picking something off the ground.
Now wait, I’m going to do a joke here as I am wont to do.
So, you see one metric I use to determine fine motor skill deficits is the value of a coin that I will actually bend down and pick up.
I noticed this when I walked by a dime the other day. Will stop for quarters though. (This Parkinsonian/Lewy metric is not for everyone. Ask your doctor if you need to stick to dimes for a while, or maybe wait only for dollars.)
ALBUMS: Led Zeppelin IV (Stairway album 1971); Houses of the Holy (1973).
MVC Rating: Stairway 5.0/$$$$; Houses 4.5/$$$$
Robert Plant’s voice is/was a force of nature. No doubt about it.
If you were a parental unit at about the time Led Zeppelin hit maximum frenzy, you would describe that force of nature as the sound of a thousand feral cats f… ,um, fighting.
To a young boy/man feeling spunky and cocky and awkward all at the same time, Plant’s flying screeches were a magic carpet ride at 100 mph going through tunnels of Jimmy Page spun guitar scales and crying runs, halfway tamed by John Bonham’s dinosaur bone skin beating.
From thrash metal to lilting folk it was all featured in this Tolkien fantasy land where if you spark up the right mood you were transported and time flowed until it slowed to a drip.
Some influential critics, outing themselves as not-so-different- from the parental units, bashed Led Zeppelin. They literally made fun of them. What they failed to see was this was the artistic and commercial pinnacle of the electrification of blues absorbed by white British kids. New soul. Clapton Cream Yardbirds (from whom Jimmy Page came) had already turned up Robert Johnson’s amp tenfold but Led Zeppelin kept pushing the excess, no, pushing the word ‘excess’ beyond the bounds of its definition. Albert King and Muddy Waters set up the white boys with high lobs. Paged and brethren smashed it. Ace.
My two LZ albums (I have more on digital) are indeed classics. Critics came around. Like the Beatles, there will likely not be another band that created a sound so distinctly different (despite the plagiarism and blatant lifting of old blues lyrics and riffs.) They took it and made it their own, tho that’s certainly disputed by certain plaintiffs.
On Plant’s voice: The only other one in this era and genre who had a voice that could make thousands of black birds explode from the trees was: Janis Joplin.
The 4th album, Stairway, is the commercial peak and like Free Bird or Hotel California or Bohemian Rhapsody, the song is an epic game changer. Even if no one really knows what they are talking about.
Houses of the Holy was a perfectly executed escape from Stairway overkill. It had playful reggae D’yer Mak’er, a James Brown tribute, the Crunge, and a dance tune, ‘Dancing Days.’
There will not be another Led Zeppelin. (Did somebody mention Greta van Fleet?)
“Many times I’ve wondered how much there is to know.”
9:55 a..m. Typing OK this morning. Left hand a little shaky. I’m just slower. I hope my brain is cooperating with my request to resist at all times the sticky quicksand those rogue proteins create. Check-offs. Sleep. Did well, watched basketball until I couldn’t hold my eyes open. Had a mild calf musclle spasm that I caught and rubbed out before it could start its torture. That addresses the category Pain. I played basketball last night. It’s one of two days of good exercise I get every week. But I’m slow moving in the morning after these. Trying to get one or two days where Catherine and I can go do some gym stuff, weights, possibly Yoga. I have to stop here and describe a play last night in which I delivered a pass to Ramsey Archibald. We had a break going, I was down court running hard after the other team turned it over. Teammate Kevin Storr (who was red-hot shooting BTW) hit me in stride at about the foul line, defender coming on fast. I knew Ramsey, on my team, was coming on fast from behind. I made a little look up feint like I was going to go up for the lay-up setting the defender into leaping stage. Instead of putting it up, I bounced it with two hands — like a football snap — between my legs, Ramsey caught it off the bounce and put it up for a layup. Mental Health. Good.!
Day ahead will include some op-ed reading and Mike Madness planning.
I have obtained three very interesting albums from a nice couple who wanted to donate for the cause.
That cause being raising awareness and funds to fight Lewy body dementia. (Read my story here).
Wow! Here’s what they got me!
Three very interesting records including Birmingham area favorites from the 1970s: Buckingham Nicks. The couple, Stevie and Lindsay, appearing ‘nekkid’ on the cover (top right) seems to be shouting: We are lovers!
Of course,, the irony would come later after becoming famous in Fleetwood Mac, the couple split up and in their misery produced some of the best music of their lives, break-up songs such as, ‘You can go your own way’ and ‘Dreams.’. No more ‘nekkid’ album covers, though. Not exactly groundbreaking, the album is really good however. It sort of flopped initially. It strongly presages the latter Fleetwood Mac sound in style and melody. And of course the rest is history as Fleetwood Mac became one of the biggest selling bands of all time.
Interestingly it sold better in Alabama than just about anywhere.
AL.com rock writer Matt Wake wrote “…the group became an unlikely sensation in Alabama after Birmingham progressive rock station WJLN-FM gave the LP heavy spins, particularly spiraling seven-minute track “Frozen Love.”
So how did these records come to me?
Several weeks ago a man named Jim Stubbs of the Birmingham area, emailed me to ask if I had Buckingham Nicks and, if not, do I was want it?
Long story short we met at John’s Diner, I met his wonderful wife Debbie who used to know me when we both worked at the Birmingham News in 1983 –we overlapped a few months.
The Stubbs said they just wanted to donate for the cause, bringing awareness to Lewy body dementia, which I have and try to do just that — raise awareness — with my blog www..myvinylcountdown.com
The Stubbs are good people, and I want to figure out a way to make their pledge count. One idea is to auction off some collectible records to go to Lewy body dementia research and awareness.
I don’t know how much these albums are worth, maybe $50 altogether? $100? $300? I definitely have some records that would qualify as collectible. If we can get even 25 to 50 albums I’m pretty sure we can raise $1,000 to $3,000 like that with some good effective advertising.
Here’s the skinny on what I know about the other two albums which have bizarre backstories.
Billy Joel “Cold Spring Harbor”
Liner notes says he checked into to a mental hospital around this time. There’s also some who call it his debut because he recorded it in 1971 even though it wasn’t released until 1976 after Joel’s other work became big.
It opens with the original version of ‘She’s got a Way.’ that’s followed by the blistering honky tonk piano and guitar tune called ‘You Can Make Me Free.’
The weirdness of this album is they recorded it 8 percent too fast. I put this on the other night and my wife commented “That sounds like Billy Joel as a child.”
Joel apparently went ballistic over the unfixable error. He called it his chipmunk album.
Thanks Jim and Debbie for turning me on to these records. They may provide the base for a solid charitable drive either part of Mike Madness weekend or separate. That’s July 20 on the hoops and after party, keep alert for details.
Joel explains in this video:
Jimmy Buffet, “High Cumberland Jubilee.”
Buffett had a problem with his album that,like Joel, caused a long delay before it was released.
Here’s what Wikipedia says about this album: Due to its limited appeal, long periods out of general release, and stylistic differences with the rest of Buffett’s work, High Cumberland Jubilee (along with the similar Down to Earth) was often not considered part of the chronology of Buffett albums by fans or even Buffett himself. It was his final album with Barnaby just before his signing with Dunhill and the recording of his 1973 breakout album, A White Sport Coat and a Pink Crustacean.
This was often called his ‘lost’album. ‘
I think it is great. Picking and grinning music that I would choose to listen to over his later overplayed music. I’m not saying his later music is bad, I’ve just heard enough — for now. Until I go to the beach.
So three good records. Value is difficult to place on these as I roam around the Internet. BN for example is selling from between $20 to $100. I see Buffet’s going from $7 to $55 but the median seems to about $10, according to Discogs.. And Joel’s cold harbor ranges on Discogs from about $9,99 to $75. But on FPS 2700 it’s median range is about $15.
9::12 a.m: Typical start of the day spent about 10-20 minutes extra looking for stuff. I ended up forgetting my satchel of record albums. I usually take some records that I am working up reviews on, because sometimes liner notes are useful. The covers and the discs themselves often offer up the date released — although a surprising number do NOT do that which means an Internet search. There are also tidbits about who else joined the band to sit in on a song or whatever. Drummer Jim Keltner (Derek and the Dominos) is on half my records it seems, I swear, even a Peter Himmelman one. He must be in his late 70s?
Check-ins. Sleep. Fell asleep watching NBA so even though I didn’t get to bed until after midnight, part of that was sleeping on the couch. Pain. No spasms. No major tendonitis or arthritis or extraordinary Lewy sumptoms right now. Slow typing. Fine motor skills like typing are my most frequent unwelcomed symptom. I have basketball tonight. Mental Health. Good. No depression. No despair. Just middle of the road right now. Thinking with my brain about my brain, Albert Einstein and black holes. Played Dwight Twilley album before work. Great song: “Outta My Hands.”
It’s nearly 8 a.m. I’m not typing well right now. It is increasingly taking awhile to get my hands working. This is my new Daily Journal. Every day I’m going to write about myself, most specifically healh-wise.. But there are no rules. The rest of my blog will continue as before, counting down my 678 vinyol records to bring awareness to this horrible brain disease I have: Lewy body demenia and I will still be filing longer form essays and ruminations and even news.
I was going to try to do this at night but I fell asleep in my bed with my fingers on the keyboard. NP is Lynyrd Skynyrd’s ‘Cry for the Bad Man.’ I’m in the L’s in my countdown alphabetically. I m also listening to Led Zeppelin. I am usually through three album sides before I get to work.
Wow. Zeppelin and Skynyrd. Two totally different groups but co-equals in virtuosity, popularity and influence. Free Bird vs. Stairway to Heaven. Love em both. (although I barely listen to them any more after hearing those songs 1 (yes) 1 million times each.
Oh and because the journal will be a lot about me and the disease and its erosion of me, I need some health touchstones.: Sleep. Has been good although I had two of those extremely painful rolling muscle spasms this last week in my calves. It happens at night and I usually wake up yelling. Eating: Officially on South Beach low carb diet although I had a chocolate bunny yesterday, solid melt-in-your mouth-chocolate. But constippation is a battle I fight with prunes.. Mental State:. If my mentality was a state it would have a bumper sticker saying ‘Thank God for Mississippi.’ In other words, it could be worse. Pain I’ve had two painful rolling muscle spasms this week. It’s the kind where I feel like the rodents that I sometimes hallucinate are somehow making their way under my skin, into my my calf, and running amuck. Most of the time I am not in pain,however, and feel fortunate about that. The brain itself does not have pain nerve endings — it is my understanding, and I am thankful for that.
Watch for these updates every day.and I’ll keep the music flowing. Thanks to Lori Oliver, my sister-in-law, for suggesting this journal feature, saying it would greatly enhance my regular but sporadic posts on my health. I just look up to the universe and say let me keep words and I’ll make sure that I try to string them together into something that makes sense. (His and Hurricanes is the exception).
