On Goodreads there are always people who will talk about the books they DNF (did not finish). I have had a few that I have wanted to stop reading, but never have. Some of them I finish and think, “Well, that was crap!” Most of the time I stick with it, a book will end up ok. The book I feature today is one that I almost stopped because I’ve never really believed in some of the stuff mentioned.
The book is The Little Venice Bookshop by Rebecca Raisin.
Before I go on, let’s look at the brief Goodreads Synopsis:
When Luna loses her beloved mother, she’s bereft: her mother was her only family, and without her Luna feels rootless. Then the chance discovery of a collection of letters in her mother’s belongings sends her on an unexpected journey.
Following a clue in the letters, Luna packs her bags and heads to Venice, to a gorgeous but faded bookshop overlooking the canals, hoping to uncover the truth about her mother’s mysterious past.
Will Luna find the answers she’s looking for – and finally find the place she belongs?
The story starts with a flashback of Luna and her mother. Her mom is a hippy wanderer. She travels the world going from place to place. Luna has that same free spirit, so naturally, she is also a wanderer. While on a trip with her best friend, her aunt calls with news that her mother has passed away and she needs to come home.
I’ve never been one who would put faith into tarot cards telling the future. I don’t believe in that kind of thing. I’m not going to make decisions by using a magic 8 ball. Luna’s character does. She speaks of that stuff, feeling the earth move, hearing a voice, etc… It’s very prominent in the beginning of the story. It was almost too much for me, and I almost topped reading the book because of it.
However, I stuck with it, and found the story to be very good. It read like a movie. It may have been made into a movie, I don’t know. I won’t go as far as saying it is like a Hallmark movie, because there is a bit more than that. It has a little romance (It’s Venice, of course it does), and mystery and a few surprises. It also is a story that answers the biggest question at the very end.
The author paints some really amazing pictures of Venice. It talks about the book shop being on a canal where a gondola drops you off at the door. I did a search and found that there is a bookshop like this in Venice and by the looks of it, it may be the inspiration for the shop in the story.
I got a call this week from my oldest son. He was so excited to tell me that he is getting his own place. He is ready to move into his own apartment. I’m very proud of him. He has been working a lot and getting himself in a place where he can do this.
As a parent, you truly hope that they have learned how to budget and keep all the bills in mind. He has always been pretty good with his earnings, so I think he will be fine. I hope that this means we’ll be able to get together for lunch or dinner more.
We’ve had some very special father/son moments. The one that stick out the most is our trip to Louisville Kentucky. He got onto the robotics team at his high school. That year they won their division and also went on to the state competition. While there, us parents cheered them on and they qualified to go to the national competition in Kentucky.
On our trip down, we stopped at a place for an amazing breakfast. On the way down, we hit a spot where there was a huge traffic jam. While we waited in traffic, I decided to see what we could do on the evenings after each round of competition. I found out that there was a minor league baseball team and their park was about 10 minutes from where we were staying.
I hoped that there was a home game during our stretch, and there was! I ordered tickets in the traffic jam and planned our outing. We had great seats and enjoyed all the things you enjoy at the ball park – hot dogs, pop (beer for me), nachos, etc.
We got their early enough to be able to swing into the team store. We were sure to get something (a bat I think) for his brother. We each got team baseball hats. That night at Louisville Slugger Field was a a fantastic father and son trip. We got the see the Louisville Bats win the game and walked away with memory neither of us will forget.
The robotics team did pretty good for their first time at the national competition, but there were other teams that had been there many times. I guess this is where you say, “It is not about winning or losing. It’s about the experience.” It certainly was a great experience.!
When I was on Weight Watchers many years ago, one of the coaches suggested that chewing gum throughout the day might help with cravings. A new study, however, suggests that you may be ingesting tens of thousands of microplastics each year by doing so.
Microplastics are tiny pieces of plastic that are less than five millimeters long. That’s smaller than a pencil eraser. They can apparently be found in almost everything, including our air, water, food and apparently, chewing gum.
Recent studies suggest that when these plastic particles work their way into our bodies, they can damage cells and DNA, cause changes in gene activity. By doing that, it increases the risk of developing cancer.
Researchers have now found that chewing gum releases microplastics into saliva which can then be then swallowed, allowing the particles to infiltrate the digestive system. This means that the average gum-chewer may be ingesting the equivalent of 15 credit cards per year.
The recent study found that an average of 100 microplastics were released per gram of gum, although some pieces released as many as 600 microplastics per gram. These results came after they tested six different brands of gum.
Researchers say that the average person chews 160 to 180 small sticks of gum per year. That means people ingest around 30,000 microplastics each year from gum alone(on top of the tens of thousands they consume from other foods and beverages). The researchers found that a piece of gum releases the most microplastics within the first two minutes of chewing, as the coating of the gum is broken down. By eight minutes in, 94 percent of the plastic particles collected during testing had been released.
They suggest that to cut down on the amount of plastics you ingest from gum, chew a piece longer instead of chewing one piece after another. (What will people who chew Fruit Stripes do?!)
On the bright side, a spokesperson for the National Confectioners Association says, “The authors of this small pilot study readily admit in their press release that there is no cause for alarm. Gum is safe to enjoy as it has been for more than 100 years. Food safety is the number one priority for US confectionery companies, and our member companies use only FDA-permitted ingredients.”
Welcome back to The Music of My Life, where I feature ten songs from each year of my life. In most cases, the ten songs I choose will be ones I like personally (unless I explain otherwise). The songs will be selected from Billboard’s Year-end Hot 100 Chart, Acclaimed Music, and will all be released in the featured year. Much of the information presented with the help of Songfacts.com.
I would turn 45 in 2015. I was still DJing school dances and proms, which helped me become familiar with some of the new music. I was still getting music sent to me monthly via a service. I would just download everything and play songs that were requested (if it was clean) or songs I was playing on the Adult Contemporary Station.
Maroon 5’s Sugar was one I played on the radio. When I first heard it, I thought of Michael Jackson’s “Beat It.” I thought I was weird, but apparantly I wasn’t the only one. Songfacts even said “both songs have a similar chorus structure with an almost-identical syllable count.”
The song always got folks on the dance floor. The kids loved it, probably because of the amount of sexual innuendo in the lyrics.
The music video was directed by filmmaker David Dobkin and shot in Los Angeles during December 2014. The clip follows the plot story of Dobkin’s 2005 romantic comedy film Wedding Crashers as we witness the band drive across Los Angeles, surprising a handful of newlyweds on their big day. “Adam and I are old friends and have been talking about doing something together for over a decade,” said Dobkin. “Plus, it’s very meaningful because the band was in New York ten years ago and attended the original Wedding Crashers première.”
Sugar
I first heard Ellie Goulding’s Love Me Like You Do when it played on my radio show. Whether it was the instrumentation of the song, or her unique voice, something stuck out to me. I really liked this song. Honestly, I had no idea she recorded it for that 50 Shades of Grey movie.
Songfacts says:
This song was the first time that Ellie Goulding worked with producer Max Martin. She subsequently teamed up with the Swedish hitmaker for several Delirium tracks. Goulding explained to Billboard magazine how he unlocked her voice. “He directed me on a couple of songs and he’d be like, ‘Can you do this? And I’d be like, ‘Do you mean this?'” she said. “and he’d be like, “Where did that come from? Never heard that before. Never heard you sing low on any of your records before.” And yeah, it was great. It just came out of nowhere. He was good at bringing that confidence out of me.”
That confidence is evident in the song and its powerful chorus.
Love Me Like You Do
In 2015, there were many things happening in my life which I couldn’t control. I became a “yes man” and began to let people walk over me. I seemed to cave every time there was conflict. I just tried to make everyone, but me, happy.
I can still remember hearing the line, “I’ve still got a lot of fight left in me” In Rachel Platten’s Fight Song. It slapped me in the face. It was instrumental in me trying to take back things in my life. Unfortunately, it was that change that only led to more conflict.
Rachel had been playing music for a long time, but nothing ever really came from it. This song changed everything. She said,
“I grinded and worked so hard for so long and got to the point of… I didn’t think it was going to happen. I thought I might need to figure something else out. That moment bred ‘Fight Song.’ So that song came because I had to make a decision, ‘Am I going to keep going or am I going to give up on myself?'”
“I came up with the answer to the decision, I guess through writing the song,” she added. “I didn’t even realize it was happening, but through writing the song I made the decision to not give up on myself. Even if it’s only getting to play to a handful of people a night, that’s enough. At least I get to spread this message. Then funnily enough, by releasing the song, I got this amazing opportunity.”
Fight Song
What drew me to Dear Future Husband by Meghan Trainor was the sound. It sounded like a 50’s song and I liked it. This baffled me because I hated her debut song, “All About That Bass.”
Meghan revealed to The Miami Herald that the song’s subject matter was inspired by an ongoing joke between her and her father that Meghan’s future husband is out there somewhere, “chilling.”
The lyrics list the various things she expects from her future “groom-to-be.” They include “flowers every anniversary.” “open doors for me” and, “don’t have a dirty mind.” She says, “Girls need to be treated better. I never got that growing up.”
Hopefully, there are still men who do those things for their woman. Society tends to make those things old fashioned, but I disagree.
Dear Future Husband
Long before Sam and I were married, we were friends. We both work in sleep medicine. We would chat on the phone and talk about work. She knew I worked in music and told me that her new favorite song was Stressed Out by Twenty One Pilots. I hadn’t heard that one yet.
What has the guys stressed out these days? Tyler Joseph explains:
“I think one of the toughest things is that balances act of trying to maintain relationships while being on the road. It’s been a crazy few years. Josh and I are both very close with our families. It’s one of our favorite moments in our careers is being able to have our families in that video at the end. With that being said, it has been tough trying to maintain those relationships. The other stress is trying to outdo ourselves we either write a song or we play a show. Josh and I, we come from a local scene where every time you played your hometown you had to do something new. You can’t just play the same set. So we kind of apply it to the way that we approach every show, always trying to outdo ourselves.”
Fun Fact: Much of the video was filmed at Josh Dun’s childhood home. Because the home number is listed, Dun’s parents had to cancel the landline to put an end to the calls that were coming in all day and all night!
The song always reminds me of the early days of our friendship.
Stressed Out
Remember earlier in this series when I said “Gangnam Style” was the worst dance song ever? Well, I forgot about the annoying craze started by Silento. I didn’t know what the “Whip” or the “Nae Nae” were! Oh, the requests that I got for their piece of garbage! I would often have to play this two or three times at school dances. URGH!!!
According to songfacts:
“Watch Me (Whip/Nae Nae)” was the soundtrack to the biggest dance craze of 2015. It’s actually two dances. For The Whip, just keep your arm straight and swing it in front of your face like you’re driving a car. The Nae Nae is similar, but with an open hand. They combine very well.
The Nae Nae is based on the character Sheneneh, played by Martin Lawrence in his ’90s TV series Martin. Sheneneh is a very brash woman who is extremely confrontational but gets offended easily. When she gets excited or upset, she makes an exaggerated “talk to the hand” gesture, which is the dance move here.
This song launched his career, but his success didn’t last long. A few years later, in 2021, he was indicted for murder after killing his cousin.
Watch Me
Another song that stuck out to me on the radio was 7 Years by Lukas Graham. The song has some really powerful lyrics.
Lukas Graham explained the song’s message to radio.com:
“The song’s basically just about becoming a good father, and being such a good father that your children would want to come and visit you when you’re an old, boring man,” he said. “I had a really, really cool father, so that’s what I wanna be too.”
“A lot of older people are actually very, very young,” he continued. “And they look at their age as some stamp that now they can point fingers at all the people that are younger than them; in reality I am probably a lot smarter than some of them anyway, at least. I’ve read more books; I’ve tried more stuff; I’ve seen more things.”
“And I think that’s why I can write a song like ‘Seven Years,’ because I might only be 27, but I know what my dreams are,” Graham concluded. “I knew when I was a young man that I wanted to be a father, and I knew I was gonna be a good father at that.”
I can totally relate to that. I have really tried to be a good father to all of my children.
If you listen closely, the sound of a film projector comes in during the quite parts of this song, including the intro. This gives it a nostalgic feel as if watching home movies.
7 Years
I also think of my wife when I hear the next song. I was unaware of her love of country music early in our relationship. Then she started to talk about Thomas Rhett. Die A Happy Man happened to be the first Rhett song I played when I was working at the country station.
He wrote the song for his wife, who’d been asking him to write her a love song. When he played it for her, he said watching her listen to it for the first time was very rewarding. He said:
“I’ve written love songs but never to the extent of that personal,” he said. “We strictly wrote that song about me and my wife’s relationship. I just think this song shows how me and Lauren love each other, and I hope this song is an encouragement to other married couples or people that are dating.”
It certainly was an encouragement to me!
Die A Happy Man
There was a student at one of the schools that would always ask for the group Panic! At The Disco. I’d see him walk up the me and I knew exactly what he wanted to hear. He’d come up multiple times with different songs. It is because of him that I became familiar with Death of a Bachelor.
In 2015, Frank Sinatra would have turned 100. The band used this song as a tribute to him. Brendon Urie posted on his Instagram in reference to the song’s release.
“I attach his music to so many memories: opening presents on Christmas day, my grandparents teaching the rest of the family to swing dance, watching Who Framed Roger Rabbit with my siblings (Sinatra makes a cameo in the form of a cartoon sword singing ‘Witchcraft’).”
“His music has been a major player in the soundtrack of my life. So it’s only right that I return the favor and/or pay it forward. I wrote a new album this year and even in the few songs that don’t sound remotely similar to any of his music I still felt his influence in the writing and the need to relate so personally to each song.”
He said of the song, “It’s like if Sinatra and Beyoncé made a song together. It’s like some Beyoncé beats with some Sinatra vocals. It’s really crazy.”
You even get a Sinatra vibe from the video
Death of a Bachelor
The next song is one that didn’t mean much to me until my divorce – Love Yourself by Justin Bieber. After a break up, the singer is still dealing with an ex. He tells her he’s not crying about things and she should really just go lover herself. It’s a great “blow off” song.
It was written by Ed Sheeran. Out of the many songs he has co-written for other artists, he considers this his favorite.
“I feel like the one that is the slam dunk, whenever I’m at a gig, to play someone else’s song that I had written is “Love Yourself” by Justin Bieber because it was so massive for him. I think it’s his biggest song… anywhere in the world, if I picked up a guitar and played that, they’d be like ‘oh my god, you wrote that!'”
“People always say, ‘Why didn’t you keep it?’ And to be honest, he was on such a roll at that point that I think it wouldn’t have been as big if I’d sung it,” he continued. “He had his whole period of his life that was a bit… you know what I mean. And America loves a comeback story.”
Love Yourself
As a bonus song, here is one that I really like because of its soulful sound. It is the debut single for Charlie Puth – Marvin Gaye. He wrote the chorus the first day he came to Los Angeles. Puth says he was at a coffee shop when the melody struck – he found himself tapping his foot and clapping out the beat.
The song is a duet with Meghan Trainor. Charlie explains how it all came about:
“Meghan and I were at a party one night, and we were exchanging the new music, and she heard ‘Marvin Gaye; and asked, ‘Who else is singing on this? It should be a duet. Let me sing on it!’ So I’m like… OK, Meghan Trainor just asked me to sing on my song, absolutely! In one day, she knew the whole thing. We did it all in one take.”
Asked if Marvin Gaye inspires his music, Puth replied:
“I listened to a lot of Marvin Gaye and Motown records. When I was making my record, I just wanted to make this soulful sound. When Marvin Gaye made his music, he evoked this feeling that would reach everybody.”
The video takes place at a school dance. There is plenty of sexual innuendo, but the music is so smooth and soulful that the people can’t help but dance.
Bonus: Marvin Gaye
So that wraps up 2015. Did I miss one of your favorites? Tell me in the comments. Next week, will be a little different. You may recall me mentioning that the further I got into the 2000’s, the less I connected with the music. I may have been familiar with a song or two, but if I couldn’t connect with it personally or call it a favorite – I didn’t add it.
Because of that, next week will feature the years 2016 & 2017. My list will feature a song with a life lesson, a suggestion for “our” song from my wife, movie music, a song that has a bit of a 60’s sound, and a song that pushes blame. I hope you’ll come back next week.
The Queen of Soul, Aretha Franklin was born on this day in 1942. She was a musical force! Rolling Stone magazine named her “the greatest singer of all time” twice.
Her songs are soul staples. The list of hits is a long one that includes “Chain of Fools,” “The House That Jack Built,” “Until You Come Back to Me,” and “Think.” I could have chosen any one of those songs, but someone would call me out for not picking her best known hit – Respect. So that’s our tune for today.
Otis Redding wrote Respect and originally recorded it in 1965, with his version hitting #35 in the US. It was Aretha’s idea to cover this song. She came up with the arrangement, added the “sock it to me” lines, and played piano on the track. After Redding heard Aretha’s rendition for the first time, he said: “This girl has taken that song from me. Ain’t no longer my song. From now on, it belongs to her.”
“Sock it to me,” became a catch phrase on the TV show Laugh In. This line is often heard as a sexual reference, but Aretha denies this. “There was nothing sexual about that,” she told Rolling Stone in 2014.
The “ree, ree, ree, ree…” refrain is a nod to Franklin’s nickname, Ree (as in A-Ree-tha). In the second verse, Franklin proclaims to her man that she is about to give him all her money, and that all she’s asking is for him to give her “her propers,” when he gets home. This term would evolve into “props,” commonly used in hip-hop in the context of proper respect.
Songfacts.com says: Sax player Charlie Chalmers played in the horn section alongside King Curtis and Willie Bridges. Chalmers intended to take on the famous solo until Curtis started wailing away. He explained to Cleveland’s The Plain Dealer in 2011: “When the horn solo came up, which I was ready to play because I’d been playing it on the other takes, Curtis jumped in there and took that solo, man. He was so good. Even though he pushed me out of the way… it was the right thing to do.”
In 2017, the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra rearranged the track just a tad and gave it a new, yet familiar sound that does not take away from the original.
The thing I love about Aretha is she can perform a song 40 times and each time it will have a unique sound. An example is how she performed the song in the movie Blues Brothers 2000. It still holds the basic framework of the original, but it is just different enough to make it sound phenomenal.
This week’s Movie Music Monday features a classic theme from a classic movie – The Great Escape. The film was released on July 4, 1963. It starred an amazing line up of stars. They include James Garner, Richard Attenborough, Charles Bronson, Donald Pleasence, James Coburn, and the legendary Steve McQueen.
The film is based on the 1950 book of the same name, which is based on an historical even that began on this day in 1944. On March 24, 1944, 76 Allied Prisoners of War began to break out of the German camp Stalag Luft III. The film accurately represented many details of the escape, including the layout of the camp, the different escape plans employed, and the fact that only three escapees successfully made it to freedom. The characters are fictitious, but are based on real men.
It was the amazing Elmer Bernstein who composed the music for the film. In composing the score, he gave each major character his own musical motif based on the Great Escape‘s main theme. The theme was so popular that Elmer lived off the royalties for the rest of his life!
Critics have said the film score succeeds because it uses rousing militaristic motifs with interludes of warmer softer themes that humanizes the prisoners and endears them to audiences; the music also captures the bravery and defiance of the POWs.
The movie is also known for Steve McQueen’s motorcycle chase scenes.
Yesterday was busy. The day started with us taking the kids to get Spring pictures. Our photographer has known us for some time now. The kids always looked forward to going because they loved her dog Roxie.
Upon arrival, the kids began to look for her. The photographer whispered to us that Roxie had passed away that Monday. They were heartbroken.
We then went to Menard’s to pick up a few things. I have needed to change out our kitchen lights for a bit. We picked up one for the main kitchen area. We also picked up one to go above the sink.
We couldn’t remember if the light above the sink mounted to the wall or the ceiling. We talked ourselves into the wall. When we got home, it was mounted on the ceiling. Luckily, when I took it back, I found one on clearance for less money.
The one in the main area went up without a problem. It’s LED, so it shines much brighter than the one we had before. The front room’s light is going to be fun, as I will have to make sure the breaker is off. There is no switch for that one.
After swapping lights I came back home and worked on the light. No issues at all with it! I truly hope that the others go in as easy as the one from today.
Sam and I will be doing some shopping/browsing at a new second hand book store. After that, our plan is to grab lunch or dinner together. The kids will be at Nana’s.
This book has been on my “To read” list for a bit. A co-worker read it before me and said how much she loved it. So as soon as I had finished the book I was reading, I got ahold of this one – The Demon of Unrest.
As someone who loves history, I truly found this book fascinating. It takes place during the time leading up to the Civil War. Here is the Goodreads synopsis:
On November 6, 1860, Abraham Lincoln became the fluky victor in a tight race for president. The country was bitterly at odds; Southern extremists were moving ever closer to destroying the Union, with one state after another seceding and Lincoln powerless to stop them. Slavery fueled the conflict, but somehow the passions of North and South came to focus on a lonely federal fortress in Charleston: Fort Sumter.
Master storyteller Erik Larson offers a gripping account of the chaotic months between Lincoln’s election and the Confederacy’s shelling of Sumter—a period marked by tragic errors and miscommunications, enflamed egos and craven ambitions, personal tragedies and betrayals. Lincoln himself wrote that the trials of these five months were “so great that, could I have anticipated them, I would not have believed it possible to survive them.”
At the heart of this suspense-filled narrative are Major Robert Anderson, Sumter’s commander and a former slave owner sympathetic to the South but loyal to the Union; Edmund Ruffin, a vain and bloodthirsty radical who stirs secessionist ardor at every opportunity; and Mary Boykin Chesnut, wife of a prominent planter, conflicted over both marriage and slavery and seeing parallels between both. In the middle of it all is the overwhelmed Lincoln, battling with his duplicitous Secretary of State, William Seward, as he tries desperately to avert a war that he fears is inevitable—one that will eventually kill 750,000 Americans.
Drawing on diaries, secret communiques, slave ledgers, and plantation records, Larson gives us a political horror story that captures the forces that led America to the brink—a dark reminder that we often don’t see a cataclysm coming until it’s too late.
I had learned about Fort Sumter in school history classes, but this book went so much deeper. There were things I had never heard before. The events that led up to the Civil War were much more complicated that I was aware of.
Mary Chesnut compiled a diary full of information and insight. That diary would be published in a few forms. “Mary Chesnut’s Civil War,” “Mary Chesnut’s Diary,” and “A Diary From Dixie,” just to name a few. Many entries from the diary are quoted in this book giving you a first hand account of some key events.
Throughout the book, you are treated to things Lincoln wrote, military communications, and diaries from other key people. These things go deep into the personal conflicts each of these people were dealing with.
The book is a long one, but I rarely felt that it was dragging. If you are a history buff, I cannot recommend this book more highly.
Back in the early 2000’s I was the Afternoon Drive guy on B-95. My shift was from 2pm to 7pm. I got to “kickoff” the weekend every Friday at 5pm. They were calling the 5pm hour “The Drive at Five.” It was far from an original name.
When the clock hit 5PM, I had a factory whistle that I would play followed by the voice guy saying, “Welcome to the weekend!” This was immediately followed by 4 or 5 weekend oriented country songs. Since it is now officially the weekend here in Michigan, I thought I’d showcase some of those songs.
I’d usually start with one of these two classics –
Finally Friday – George Jones
Take This Job and Shove It
Then I would rotate from the following:
Working for the Weekend – Ken Mellons
Redneck Rhythm and Blues – Brooks and Dunn
It’s Five O’clock Somewhere – Alan Jackson and Jimmy Buffett
Come Friday – Aaron Tippin
Wrong Five O’clock – Eric Heatherly
Yee Haw – Jake Owen
That got me thinking about other formats. What might I play if I was working at an oldies station? Maybe:
Rip It Up – Little Richard
Friday on my Mind – The Easybeats
Five O’clock World – The Vogues
If I was at a classic rock station? Maybe:
Saturday Night – Bay City Rollers
Working For The Weekend – Loverboy
Saturday Night’s Alright for Fighting – Elton John
What song is YOUR weekend song? Drop it in the comments!
This week my wife and I celebrated our 7th wedding anniversary. If you are unfamiliar with the story of how it happened, I have blogged about it before. You can read about it here:
As a matter of fact, this week’s photo for the Flashback appears in that blog.
This photo is one of my favorites from our trip. We both are very happy. Because the ceremony was done at the county courthouse, there was no official photographer. If I had to pick one selfie that I love, it would be this one. (Ok, I’m sure there are other selfies of the two of us that are just as good or better. But for this blog, it’s this one.)
Sam asked me yesterday, “Did you ever think we’d make it seven years?” Without hesitation, I said, “Well, yes!” I went on to say that I had never felt more sure about anything. As the years have gone by, my love continues to grow for her. Through ups and downs, we’ve done it together. I am so very grateful to have the relationship that we do.
I love my wife beyond anything I could write. Seven years down, and forever to go!
Various Ramblings of a Nostalgic Italian 