I wonder how it happens that when I am work, work, working here, all alone in the summer-time, I smell flowers (Jenny Wren in Our Mutual Friend)

Jenny Wren and her father (Mr. Dolls)

Wie gehts? 

What's that syndrome called when amputees still feel their limb as if it's still there? Phantom Limb Syndrome maybe? [Ha! I just searched it up and that's exactly what it's called!]

Having finally finished Our Mutual Friend yesterday, I am experiencing a hybrid condition called Phantom Dickens Syndrome.

I've been living with John Rokesmith, Bella, Lizzie...and Jenny Wren (to name four of the book's many characters) for some weeks now (I started it October 6) and suddenly - they've gone!

Over the last couple of days, I've reached for the phantom book and it ain't there. Phantom Dickens Syndrome.

Speaking of Jenny Wren: McCartney's song is a cousin of Blackbird (it's done in a similar style). The wren is a small bird in England and Jenny Wren is a character from Our Mutual Friend - so it's a nice play on words.

I think I now understand why Macca was fascinated by this character. Jenny is a young innocent girl but is also quite worldly (she has layers - is mature and self-assured). She creates a way of tolerating her father's alcoholism by reducing him to a child and treating him as such, and although she is physically challenged (John and Paul would have called her 'crippled') she manages to find love right at the end of the novel with Sloppy.

Her resilience and optimism are traits that I admire. She's sometimes not seen and so is often on the periphery looking on - again - things I can relate to (I like sitting at the back - in the outer rim, observing).

I'm with Macca; I like Jenny Wren.

Love and peace - Wozza

But the day will come, Jenny Wren will sing, when this broken world, mends its foolish ways (Macca)

Five dollars from the
Little Red Bookshop - bargain!

Wie geht's?

I continue to persevere with Our Mutual Friend. At the time of writing, I'm on page 354 (of 1,000). So, not even halfway.

The struggle comes from a lack of a strong plot. Little has happened in those 354 pages aside from various characters making appearances in a series of interwoven minor plots. That equals a certain amount of confusion. I had to consult my Dickens Encyclopedia a lot in the first few hundred pages - now, does that sound like a fun thing to do?

Clearly the novel (his final completed one) is about wealth and power amid the social classes in London of the 1860s. There is plenty of satire and biting commentary but by 354 pages I have found myself agreeing with E.S. Dallas who wrote in an 1865 edition of The Times that:

"On the whole... at that early stage the reader was more perplexed than pleased. There was an appearance of great effort without corresponding result. We were introduced to a set of people in whom it is impossible to take an interest, and were made familiar with transactions that suggested horror. The great master of fiction exhibited all his skill, performed the most wonderful feats of language, loaded his page with wit and many a fine touch peculiar to himself. The agility of his pen was amazing, but still at first we were not much amused."

Yes, some of the writing is extraordinary, and I continue enjoying Dicken's stylistic flourishes with the English language, but I wish there was a character I could root for and embrace.

Why do I persevere with what is quickly becoming my least favourite book of his? The same reason I started reading it.

Paul McCartney.

Specifically, I wanted to know why Jenny Wren (a character in Our Mutual Friend) fascinated Macca so much that he wrote a song about her. 

I don't know the answer to that yet, so I'll keep reading.

Love and peace - Wozza

Well my heart went 'boom' when I crossed that room (The Beatles)

 

Wie geht's?

Me? Slowly getting there - better each day. Thanks for asking.

The upside of living in Covid-ville is that the reading pile has been considerably reduced. Three books so far and halfway through the fourth.

This may come as something of a shock - but I quite like books about The Beatles. I have a few (some are pictured above) and I'm always keen on finding new ones.

Craig Brown's One Two Three Four is my latest acquisition and it's great! Mainly because he flits around with time - jumping into lovely anecdotes and offering some alternative realities (just like me and G Knowles esq - what if Paul hadn't failed Latin and therefore hadn't become friendly with the younger George Harrison at school?).

His research is top notch - I loved the background material on Jane Asher's family for instance. And his list of 1957's (a key year) neologisms include long playing records now being called 'albums'!

He turns the distance from the Beatles' evolution - some sixty to sixty-five years on now, into an advantage, so that he can forensically analyse the different witness statements from those who were there at key events. It's remarkable how different they all are, and how much the events morph over the years in people's heads.

Plus, and this is especially important, he interjects some excitement and personality into his musings, and I'll even forgive him this beast of a sentence and the non-use of a semi-colon after the colon.

If I could be any Beatle, at any time, I would be Paul in his Wimpole Street years, living with Jane, cossetted by her family, blessed by luck, happy with life, alive to culture, adored by the world, and with wonderful songs flowing, as if by magic, from my brain and out through the piano: 'I Want To Hold Your Hand', 'I'm Looking Through You', 'The Things We Said Today', 'And I Love Her', 'We Can Work It Out', 'Here, There and Everywhere', 'Yesterday'.

He makes a great point here. 

By the way, Paul McCartney was aged 21 to 23 during this time (1963 to 1965). Extraordinary!

Love and peace - Wozza

Summer, Buddy Holly, the working folly, Good golly, Miss Molly and boats, Hammersmith Palais, the Bolshoi Ballet, Jump back in the alley and nanny goats (Ian Dury)

Photo by Erick Tang on Unsplash

50 Reasons to be cheerful in 2017:

• Looking forward, each week, to James Whatley's Five Things on a Friday 
• Christmas visits from the family (Jade, Adam, Samantha)
• Blacklist binges on Netflix
• Reading my newspaper The Walrus Gumboot - courtesy of Paper.li
• Medium.com stories - usually a few gems with each edition, although the message that I'd exceeded my monthly quota was annoying
• Seeing Jerry Seinfeld with Jade
• Morning feel good quotes for/from the staff at morning briefings
• Vox sentences
• Watching Dunkirk with Jacky
• Thomas Oppong's articles via Medium.com
• Star Wars: The Last Jedi 
• Austin Kleon's newsletter that comes into my inbox regularly
• Lunchtime walks with my coach, Liz
• Paul McCartney on December 16 at Mt Smart Stadium, Auckland
• Lindsay Hope's CD collection will be giving pleasure for a long time to come
• Seth Godin's blog, which comes every day, regularly provides food for thought 
• November trip to Keri Keri for a weekend thanks to the kids
• Dan Rockwell's advice, again every day, has pearls of regular wisdom
• Whatsapp - the vehicle for hilarious fandamily interactions
• Netflix has provided great viewing throughout the year
• The Arsenal victory over Spurs was a tonic in an otherwise forgettable season, again
• Greg Knowles' Seventies Music blog provides a shedload of memories
• Daily writing on my blogs
• Visiting Universal Studios at the start of the year with Samantha
• Regular visits to Real Groovy in Auckland for vinyl 
• Marbeck's Records and JB Hi-Fi are still providing CD fixes
• Messages and videos from Noel Forth via Messenger
• Facebook hilarity from mates Greg Knowles and Kevin Simms
• Driving with Samantha and Jacky from San Francisco to LA along the Pacific coast
• Disneyland with Jacky - the happiest place on earth for us
• IHOP Anaheim and blueberry pancakes
• The view from the top of the Brynderwyn Hills looking towards Whangarei
• Autumn, every year
• Card for my 60th birthday from my staff
• Playing backyard cricket with the kids again
• 366 Days With Wisdom by Venerable Master Hsing Yun
• The Hard Rock Cafes in London and San Francisco
• Finding the new copy of West Bruce and Laing's Whatever Turns You On
• Reading 50 books in the year and fulfilling a goal
• Our new Border Collie, Jerry, and his surviving Parvo
• Seeing Jeanette Thomas at the Macca concert
• The organic Whole Life Cafe in Maungaturoto is a life saver
• Taking the ferry to Russell
• The drive from Russell to Whangarei that takes in the Helena Bay Hill Gallery and Cafe (great, great gardens)
• The spectacular tree outside my ART room
• Seeing Keegan happy and purposeful in China
• The view from our lounge towards the Bryderwyns
• Building the horse yards for Grace and Beetlebaum
• Playing ball chase games with Jerry
• Browsing in Amoeba Records, San Francisco
• Mocha at the Beach Cafe Ruakaka (my cup runneth over - this being #51)

Love and peace and into 2018 we go...Wozza

If there's a rock show at The Concertgebow...we'll be there...Oo Yeah (Wings)

December 16!! Oo Yeah! SWMBO and I'll be there!!

Maybe (whisper it) the final ever opportunity to see Macca in the flesh so, you know, it has to be done, no matter what the cost, no matter what the sacrifice.

Oo Yeah!!

Love and peace and two thumbs up - Warren Ono Purdy

Therapy through hell (Macca)

Book 3 - Man on the Run (Tom Doyle) 

Again, this one came from that great little discount bookshop in Upper Street, North London town.

I'm about half way through it. Grrrr.

Which means, I'm behind schedule.

That's not Tom's fault, or Macca's for that matter. It's nobody's fault but mine, and two days away at a conference, oh, and a day away for school athletics.

Means I need to go hard out this week and read TWO books. Eek.

Love and peace - Wozza.

P.S. blackberry sequel: SWMBO made a pie!! It was yummy!

P.S. 2 - This edition is late - sorry. Blame it on the painting of my newest music room- Abbey Road Three. Builders came last week and sub-divided the garage - I have spent the weekend painting inside and out, ready for some carpet to go down during the week. Pictures at 11.

Adolf builts a bonfire, Enrico plays with it (Peter Gabriel)

I think of weird things while pootlin' along in the Tiida, on the way to work. I was struck by the thought, the other day, that somewhere in the world Paul McCartney is doing something - present tense. Then I thought about Ringo also out and about - doing stuff. I wonder what? The UAE is three hours ahead of UK time so it's coming up breakfast time there as I write this. Maybe they are about to get a bite to eat somewhere in Britain.Macca has just announced his engagement to Nancy so his kippers should be extra delish today.

Amazing eh. What a privilege to be alive and safe to day dream such things.

When I think like this I get a glimpse of my own existence and also my luck. I'm alive in a world that holds two former Beatles (and for my first 23 years all four walked the earth with me, well - not with me but it was comforting to know they existed somewhere). 

I thought about this again when Osama bin Laden's death was announced this week (Jacky rang me at work to tell me); we also share the planet with unspeakably evil people.

My initial thought was a selfish one I'm afraid. What does this mean for me and Jacky?

A thought crossed my mind briefly and was quickly dismissed: to all intents and purposes if locals see us in downtown Abu Dhabi we could be mistaken for Americans (not that there's anything wrong with that).

Some of my best friends are Americans but America has done us Kiwis and Aussies no favours by killing bin Laden and then dancing around in the streets of America a-hoopin' and a-hollerin'. What's that about? Yes, like Adolf, he was an evil, twisted, mass murderer and perhaps his death gave closure and a sense of justice to the families of his many victims but to see people celebrating a death like their team had just won the Superbowl was unsettling to me and I would say a whole heap of moderate arabs.

The reaction at school has been quite muted by contrast. As the westerners have kept their thoughts to themselves (hard to get a water cooler conversation going on this with an Emirati - "So - how about that bin Laden eh?" doesn't quite work) - so too have the middle easterners.

Now, a few days later, and it's almost like it never happened. It's largely vanished from the news as an event. On to the next thing I spose. I wonder what karma has in store for him.

For me the tragedy of bin Laden is also the way he subverted Islam to cause havoc and war. His legacy is really the hate that a lot of people in the west feel towards muslims since 9/11. By becoming a mass murderer and using Islam as a pretext, he has done no favours to the people he was trying to support.

Salaam alaykum - Wozza