Grateful Dead

The sun
with all those planets revolving around it and dependent upon it
can still ripen a bunch of grapes
as if it had nothing else in the universe to do.

-Galileo Galilei

Just another dopeless hope fiend

I have high friends in places

I’m not as think as you stoned I am

Lost Dog

Has one eye

Three legs

Broken tail

Recently castrated

Answers by the name Lucky

Aren't y'all just chatty today.

I've been reading a good bit of Wilde lately and, as with Twain and Rogers, I'm simply amazed at the timelessness of the occasional Transcendent Mind among our species: "The soul is born old but grows young. That is the comedy of life. And the body is born young and grows old. That is life's tragedy."

Strider88! Next thing you know CosmicBadger will be revived from reported extinction...Gosh I miss you guys.

...."Remember, Hope is a good thing, maybe the best of things, and no good thing ever dies." - Stephen King
I 💖 King

This is relatively lengthy but I love it. It's a passage from Wright Morris' novel, The Huge Season. A truncated version precedes the novel Bang the Drum Slowly and that's how I discovered this book.

"What's your novel about?" I said and glanced at the yellow sheets on the desk. A small pile of typed sheets were in the case for his typewriter. A big photograph of Lawrence, smashing one away, was under the jelly glass full of sharpened pencils. "It wouldn't be about a tennis player?" I said.
He wiped his face with the towel again. "Old man, a book can have Chicago in it, and not be about Chicago. It can have a tennis player in it without being about a tennis player."
I didn't get it. I probably looked it, for he went on, "Take this book here, old man--" and held up one of the books he had swiped from some library. Along with the numbers I could see Hemingway's name on the spine. "There's a prizefighter in it, old man, but it's not about a prizefighter."
"Is it about the sun rising?" I said. I knew that was part of the title.
"Goddam if I know what it's about," he said and opened it up, as if he might have overlooked it.

Jean - Paul Sartre walks into a café, and the waiter asks what he'd like to order. Sartre replies, " I'd like a cup of coffee with sugar, but no cream." The waiter goes off, but comes back apologising. "I'm sorry Monsieur Sartre, we are all out of cream. How about with no milk?"

Quoted from the film Ninotchka, in the excellent "At The Existentialist Café. Freedom, Being and Apricot Cocktails" by Sarah Bakewell

It's been 20 + years, but I have been overwhelmed with sadness lately over the loss of JG and what was essentially the end of the band. I know some permutations have cropped up and many members have carried on, but for some reason I cannot explain, I have been overwhelmed with the absence of the Grateful Dead. Maybe it is due to some big changes that have happened in my own life, and others that are scheduled to occur soon. I have realized that one of the most steady and permanent companions I have had throughout my entire life has been the music of the Grateful Dead. Anyone else running into this?

I hope I am not being insensitive, but to me, Jerry lives on through the vast amount of wonderful live recordings we have. I only saw him 5 times, and that over a period of 9 years, so he wasn't a physical presence as such for me, like he must have been for people who were lucky enough to see and hear him play in person many times.

I was listening to "Eyes of the World" from 8/1/73 yesterday-his 30th birthday show. The music and message comes across as strongly now as it ever did, and reaches more people than could ever have been anticipated when they first started. Almost every day, the magic weaves out of my stereo, here in a town in England he had possibly never even heard of.

Thank you for the kind words and afirmation, daverock. There is always an upside to any situation, even a bad one, from the perspective of gathering strength and wisdom.

Dear Marye - in response to your question, one of the many lyric lines that always nailed it for me is one we have all heard and sung a hundred times: Now the die is shaken, now the die must fall. My knowledge of artistic expression would fit in a thimble, but that always seemed to be such a strong statement of us being little more than a cork bobbing in the stream and being pushed along. Your thoughts?

....that word can be found on dry river beds and on trails long overgrown by weeds. What's more important are the paths we follow now.

-Jessup

If ifs and buts were fruits and nuts, every day would be Christmas.

-Boehner

A Pink Floyd song.

If I were a swan, I'd be gone
If I were a train, I'd be late
And if I were a good man
I'd talk with you
More often than I do
If I were to sleep, I could dream
If I were afraid, I could hide
If I go insane, please don't put
Your wires in my brain
If I were the moon, I'd be cool
If I were a rule, I would bend for you
If I were a good man, I'd understand
The spaces between friends
If I were alone, I would cry
And if I were with you, I'd be home and dry
And if I go insane
Will you still let me join in with the game?
If I were a swan, I'd be gone
If I were a train, I'd be late again
If I were a good man
I'd talk with you
More often than I do

A healthy person has a thousand wishes. A sick person has but one.

- Indian proverb

We didn't realize we were making memories. We just knew we were having fun.

- Winnie the Pooh

.....they'll take my thoughts away - Megadeth- Holy Wars.