A Ponderation

 

"If organized religion is the opium of the masses, then disorganized religion is the marijuana of the lunatic fringe."

 

(Kerry Thornley)

Yes, It's True!

Charlie Manson's wedding to Afton Burton is STILL ON.  Apparently it was just a rumor that they called it off after Afton tipped her hand and said to someone that she only wanted Charlie for his body. 

(To be honest, how many 80-year-olds would consider that to be a BAD thing?) 

Afton and her mother staunchly deny that Afton was planning to set herself up as the proprietor of an American true-crime version of Lenin's Tomb by claiming his body after he died, then displaying it in a glass coffin.  For a fee.

And on the face of it, the rumor was clearly laughable from the start:

>> There's no way a little 24-year-old beauty could fail to REALLY be in love with an 80-year-old convict with a swastika carved between his eyebrows.  This is obviously the real thing.

>> There is no gold-digging or status-seeking potential in marrying America's best-loved terrorist, leader of a globally-renowned murder cult.  These days that kind of thing won't even get you elected dogcatcher.

>> The business model of the display coffin is fatally flawed.  Nobody in the USA is morbid enough to want to pay to see Charlie Manson through a glass coffin lid.  And the overhead for Afton would be brutal.  They'd have to keep closing down the display to touch up the corpse, and that adds up quickly.

>> We have to bear in mind at all times that Charlie is God, Lucifer and Jesus Christ rolled into one.  If Afton didn't really love him, HE would know it long before SHE did.  And according to Charlie, the wedding is still on.

Right on the Tip of my Brain...

Have you ever ALMOST sensed a pattern, really suspected or even knew for sure it was there, only to have it slide away from you when you tried to make a grab at it?  Yesterday was one of those days.

I drive around all the time for work, see, and I have to have the radio on to keep my sanity, especially at this time of the year when it's raining slush and too cold to even have a window open for some fresh air.  And while there are many radio stations all over the dial, there is only one in the area -- the only station in the county where I work -- guaranteed to come in properly.  But it's also a station you have to dial away from quite often, because every DJ on every shift is under orders to play the 3 or 4 longest, dreariest songs on their playlist over and over, suggesting that they all either smoke heavily and need the breaks...or that they are all suffering from some nasty bowel complaint I really don't want to know about it too much detail.

Their favorite song of all?  "The Day The Music Died" by Don McLean.   This is one they play so often that I groan aloud when I catch just a few notes of it.  After living here over 20 years I can recognize even the silent places in the song instantly.  They play it THAT often.  It could be worse...It could be "Freebird" by Skynyrd...But this is pretty pervasive.  It's not as much fun as other long-ass songs they could be playing.  "In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida" by Iron Butterfly or "Time" by the Chambers Brothers would be a wonderful change of pace.  What about "Fire" by The Crazy World of Arthur Brown?  "Fresh Air" by the Quicksilver Messenger Service would be great to hear.  So many long, zany, refreshing songs in the world, so many hours to fill on the airwaves, but what do I hear at least twice a day on that station?  At LEAST?  "The Day The Music Died."  Now that I think of it, this is a song that reviews itself.

But here's the thing:  I realized yesterday, February 3rd -- which is in fact The Day The Music Died -- they didn't play it once.

So I tried to think back.  Did they play it on this day last year?

I checked my diary.  Sure enough, I mentioned it.  Because that's the kind of thing I notice, OK?  So sue me.  They didn't play it once that I heard on the Day the Music Died, February 3rd, 2014.

So the obvious thing to think next is that I just happened to be listening at the wrong times.  Which I could easily believe if I didn't know, as I hit a certain curve on the road on my way to my standing Thursday afternoon meeting in Hooterville, that I'm doomed to hear Don McLean straining to remember if he cried when he heard about the widowed bride.  It's not LIKELY.  It's not USUAL.  It's not HABITUAL.  It's more like...CLOCKWORK.  It's...what's the word you always use, Mickey?...It's FATE.

So what's this about?  We have to hear this song two, three times a day on this station UNTIL February 3rd, when all their turntables observe a seemly silence about the deaths of Ritchie Valens, the Big Bopper and Buddy Holly? 

What do you guys think?  The star attractions of the 1959 Winter Dance Party Tour aren't talking...