Lost Him In the Sun

I'm here again in Indiana, where it is 20 degrees more or less, less if you add wind chill. Which it does: chill. Anyone with half a brain would have moved away from here eons ago.

Some notes: Sadly, one of my favorite singer-songwriters has died. John Stewart passed away during the weekend in his native San Diego at age 68. You may know that he wrote "Daydream Believer" which was famously recorded by the Monkees [they changed the lyric "now you know how funky I can be" to "now you know how happy I can be." Wise change] Did you know that he replaced Dave Guard in the Kingston Trio? His late 60s albums, particularly "California Bloodlines", were my first introduction to him. I grew up in Northern California, Central California really, and I listened to KNBR 68 in the early 1970s. They played the song "Mother Country" by Stewart, and I can safely tell you that it was the first song that really affected me deeply. It's a song about turn of the century San Francisco, about some characters reminiscing about the old days, about E.A. Stuart driving the Old Campaigner stone blind one last time on parade. And it's a song that cuts right through you. He was a master songwriter, on par with anyone. He wrote such great songs as "Armstrong" ["Young girl in Calcutta barely eight years old. Flies that swarm the marketplace will see she don't get old, Don't you know she heard it on that July afternoon, she heard a man named Armstrong had walked upon the moon"], "Lost Her in the Sun", "Kansas Rain" and so many, many others. Never a false note, never a false word. And as Stewart wrote so aptly, "day by day, one by one, we fall like candles in the sun." Sadly.

Additional thoughts. Obama really does have to fight two Clintons. That's not fair. Can he trot out anyone to help? Where's Al Gore on this one [scratching chin].

Good news for Mitt Romney in Indiana: I checked the drawer of the nightstand here at the Marriott. There is a book of Mormon. [If you're reading this, Mitt, please have them remove my name from your rolls. You know what I'm talking about.]

Allan Melvin died last weekend, as did Suzanne Pleshette [whom everyone I know found sexy. Men and women alike adored her.] Melvin must've really had to do some soul searching when his agent called around 1970 and said "Got a part for you. Brady Bunch." Okay, I'll bite, he probably said, and which point his agent had to break it to him that he would be cast as Alice's love interest. That's an ego deflater. "Uh, can't Sam have a brief fling with Florence Henderson? Marcia? Anyone? How about Bobby?"

So, go check out John Stewart on YouTube and enjoy the master. But really, go out and buy some of his music.