Lyrics, Accents, Movies, and Pets

OK, I'm officially going crazy right now. I just bought the CD Gaslight by Thirty Odd Foot of Grunts. That's Russell Crowe's band, by the way, and I'm a huge RC fan, so it necessarily follows that I'd have to go out and get their CDs. Anyway, it's my first TOFOG CD, and I really like it (not quite all of it, but most of it). BUT...as with any new CD, the lyrics and music keep running through my head, over and over and over and over and over again. It's because my mind is trying to learn and absorb all the new stuff that has been introduced.

I keep hearing Russell Crowe's husky baritone singing "You treat me like chocolate..." and "How many people have the same name? How many Davids do you know?" and "What's in L.A. for a Southern girl like you?" and "The strong man was dancin' in the clothes that he borrowed from the girl in the chorus line..." and...OK, I'll stop there. I'm torturing myself. It's not that I don't like all these songs; in fact, just the opposite. But they WON'T STOP! Sometimes having a mind that grabs everything and holds tight is not a good thing. It's great for schoolwork, but not when I'm trying to sleep at night and all this music keeps rolling over and over in my head...

The same with accents! There's a a song on Gaslight entitled The Legend of Barry Kable. I don't care for the song all that much yet, but I love the beginning because RC is telling a story that explains the song. It's being done live, and the crowd is screaming when he begins.

He starts out, "This is kind of a long story, so you'll have to have a listen. You'll have to calm down, and have a listen. This is the story -- can you hear me?"

The crowd yells again in affirmation, and he goes on. "This is the story of Barry [I'm not sure what he says here] Kable. Not the legendary Australian football player, but the legendary Sydney painter and docker. One day when Barry was nine years old..."

The story is actually quite gruesome, but I keep hitting repeat just so I can hear him talking. That man has a lovely voice. The bad thing about all this is, I'm tempted to talk in a phony Australian accent all the time. British I can do just fine, and Southern, but it's a bit of bother for me to try to "speak Australian." It's tough! Practising helps...but unfortunately everybody around thinks I'm crazy and/or makes fun of me while I'm trying to improve my language skills. So I just blather on and on to myself when no one's here! :-)

What was next on my list of stuff to talk about? Oh yes, movies. That will be a frequent topic, I'm afraid; I love movies. *giggle* Anyway, another reason I'm going crazy is because I still haven't seen Gladiator and I really, really, really, really, really want to! I've made a bit of a promise to myself that I'll rent it on my parents' anniversary and have myself a movie night. Neither of them would be interested in seeing it, so I'll just indulge myself when they're not here. Unfortunately...their anniversary isn't until April. Waaaahh! How shall I survive until then?

But you don't want to read just a litany of complaints, do you? No, of course not. I've realised that I forgot to give you very important information in my first entry. How could I have neglected to mention two of my babies? No, not actual babies. One's a cat, and one's a horse. We have five cats, but only one of them's my little girl. She's adorable. She's grey and white, with long "opera-glove" markings on her front legs and a white half-diamond on her forehead. She's tiny -- and she's a polydactyl, which means she has extra toes. Squee! She's so cute!

And the other "baby" is a 15-hands-high black Morgan/Quarter mix. He's gorgeous -- really, he is. He's about 30, but you'd never know it; he acts like a two-year-old. I love riding, and he's a great horse. Just don't get in back of him or you might get flattened by the Flying Hooves of Doom! Kidding, kidding. He'd never intentionally hurt a human, but he has no qualms about knocking other horses around a bit.

I can't wait for spring so I can take a long ride again and improve my horsemanship. Or would that be horsewomanship? Ah well. Either way, I've got a long way to go. My two horseback-riding idols are Charles Bronson and...drum roll please...Russell Crowe. (Gee, bet you never saw that one coming, eh? LOL!) Both of them look as if they were born to ride horseback. For examples of what I'm talking about, please check out two great films: Breakheart Pass and The Silver Stallion, King of the Wild Brumbies. I'll let you figure out who's in which one. ;-)

OK, time for me to wrap it up for now. I've got a lot of schoolwork, and the warm woodstove is calling me to come into the living room and curl up in a chair. Besides, JAG will be on in a few...hours. It's not my favourite show, but it's tolerably interesting. David James Elliott and Catherine Bell have great chemistry.

More later!