jimsjournal
Gyre and gimble in the wabe -- 06/20/02






Twas brillig and the slythy toves
did gyre and gimble in the wabe
All mimsy were the borogoves
And the mome-wraths outgrabe


Lewis Carroll
"Jabberwocky"








TURNING and turning in the widening gyre
The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;


William Butler Yeats
"The Second Coming"








Big wheel keep on turnin’
Ooh, the Proud Mary keep on burnin’
And we’re rollin’ [Rollin’], rollin’, yeah [Rollin’]
Rollin’ on a river [Roller on the river]
Said we’re rollin’ [Rollin’], rollin’ [Rollin’]
Rollin’ on a river [Roller on the river]


performed by Ike & Tina Turner
written by J.C.Fogerty







And the seasons they go round and round And the painted ponies go up and down We're captive on the carousel of time We can't return we can only look behind From where we came And go round and round and round In the circle game.

Joni Mitchell
1966 Siquomb Publishing Co. BMI







Circles and cycles, 'round and 'round we go...

The Solstice approaches, the world spins, the pagans gather to dance their dance celebrating the earth and the sun. [News article "Here comes the sun" in this morning's Providence Journal describes the activities of a group of pagans who hold their summer solistice ceremony in VFW Post 311 in Seekonk, MA.]

The longest day, the shortest night of the year. (Except, of course, for those of you reading this upside down in places like Australia where you are having your shortest day and longest night.)

I ordered a couple of CDs and some books from amazon.com today. One of the CDs is a Peter, Paul and Mary album that has The Great Mandala on it (one of their songs from back in the sixties, "Take your place on the Great Mandala..." -- the wheel of life and death). A Sunday afternoon folk music program on a Boston public radio station played it a few weeks ago and it's been going round and round in my head ever since and I don't have a copy so I decided to buy a CD that has it. While I was at it I ordered a Brothers Four CD that has their hit Greenfields ("Once there were green fields, kissed by the sun, once there were valleys where rivers used to run..." Don't remember it? Ah, but it was a hit back in 1960.) It's always been one of my favorite songs and for $14.98 I'll now have a copy. I tossed those two albums into my shopping cart and amazon told me that if I spent another twenty bucks or so I could have free shipping... and then I looked in the storage compartment on my shopping card and realized that weeks ago I had put three paperback novels in there but never completed the purchase and had forgotten about them... hey, just right, takes me just over the $49.95 I needed to spend to get free shipping. (Oh, while I was at it, I also ordered a book about Windows 2000 Professional, but I got that from one of their used bookstore partners, so it's not part of the free shipping deal.)

Remember when disk jockeys used to spin platters? Put a record on the turntable?

Oldies... Golden Oldies... Today (Thursday, June 20th) is Brian Wilson's 60th birthday. Yes, a sixty year old Beach Boy.

Lots of Golden Oldies getting ever older... Monday of this week saw Barry Manilow turn 56. (Hmmm, I dunno about that... I could have sworn he was older than me, but maybe...) And on Tuesday Paul McCartney had his 60th birthday. Yesterday Elaine "Spanky" McFarlane (of Spanky & Our Gang) also turned 60. Today, besides sixty year old Brian Wilson, we have Jerry Keller (Here Comes Summer) turning 65, Anne Murray 57 and Lionel Richie 53. (Hmmm, only 53?) Tomorrow Ray Davis will be 58 and on Saturday Peter Asher (of Peter & Gordon) will be 58, Todd Rundgren will be 54, and Kris Kristofferson will be 66.

How do I know this? I learned this from www.oldiesmusic.com during my lunchtime surfing.

I was in my car on my way home when Cruisin' Bruce Palmer's Top Six at Six program came on an FM oldies station -- The program (which airs at 6pm naturally) usually features the top six songs on the equivalent date some number of years in the past, anywhere from the mid-1950's to around 1980, interspersed with quick lists of top television programs, lead news stories, and perhaps a few sale prices from local car dealerships and supermarkets. Some nights, however, he might do a theme-oriented program, graduation songs or summer songs or Christmas songs, etc. and one show each month is organized around the theme of rock and roll stars with birthdays in falling in that month. Tonight he did his June birthday show... and since he noticed a large number of rock idols hitting the big six-oh this month, that was his feature... and, of course, I already knew that about Brian Wilson and Paul McCartney and Spanky McFarlane from the web.

'Round and round...

So when I got home from work, Nancy and I went for a spin on our bicycles.

Doug and his wife Heather are celebrating their fifty-nineth anniversary! I was about eight weeks old when they got married! On Sunday Nancy and I will be married twenty-three years. (Well, actually, this past Sunday and this coming Sunday, if we were to celebrate both our legal wedding and our celebrate with-friends-and-family wedding.)

'Round and 'round in the circle game...



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