The longer I look at her, the more I think that eyelid is permanently shut. Either by some neurological condition, or supergle. I probably chose this a very long time ago because the hammock suggests "summer," but if there's a different banner tomorrow you won't be upset, will you?

They're already giving me the willies.

The phrase “Van Morrison cover band” does not elicit the joy in my heart it may in others. The music falls on my heart like lead rain. I must make one thing clear: if you like the music, I’m glad it gives you joy, and I judge you not in the least for it. To each his own in such matters. I didn’t know it was a Van Morrison cover band. Perhaps hearing “Moondance” could have been a hint, but then they played something I didn’t recognize. Eventually I thought “every song sounds like the second song on the second side of a Van Morrison album.” Perhaps that was their signature style. They had brass, and I am never heartened to see brass on stage with the usual rock instrument lineup. If I want brass, I will go to swing. It doesn’t belong in rock, sez me, but there’s a whole genre of brass-assisted popular music, so who am I to say.

Someone with taste, but leaving that aside for the moment, perhaps it’s because when I was ten or so the radio had these mean brass-assisted rock songs, like “Vehicle.” It was certainly heavy, in the parlance of the day. Chicago was the band you were supposed to like, because the early stuff was intelligent and well-arranged, and critics loved things that had good arrangements. I felt so obligated to like it I ordered the Carnegie Hall album from the Columbia House record deal that would haunt me for years until I considered running away from home to break the hold they had on my life, and the whole thing left me cold. But it was important! It was a multi-album set with creamy thick sleeves and minimal art!

Eh. MEH, even. I was still interested in soundtracks, which was where the brass belonged.

   
  I did not say any of this as we stood there by the bandshell, because it was, all in all, a nice experience. Daughter has a job working here, at the concession stand.
   

We'd dropped by for a seven-dollar beer and the experience of hanging around with the cohort that appears when a Van Morrison cover band shows up.

MY GOD WE ARE ALL SO OLD

It was cool, though, I have to admit. Temps, I mean. This is the below-average summer, so they say, and it’s lived up to the predictions. Once I would have raged; now I am content. As long as everything is green and lush and the rain comes and the skies rumble in the evening with their theatrical hunger, I’m fine. Bad for the farmers, I know; we always have to sat that to indicate our concerns go beyond the personal and immediate to the state’s economy in general, but deep down no one everyone believes there will be bread whenever they want it and the price won’t move too much, so, good luck and all that but we all have our problems too, and you don’t think the farmers are sitting out there in the tractors wondering whether the pace of fiber-optic adoption in Minneapolis is proceeding at the pace they had promised.

Anyway, it's odd that we say "that was cool" for something that's nifty and hip, but no one ever says "man, that was clammy" for something that's cool, but not in a good sense, and slightly moisty. How was the show? Eh, the band clammed everyone.

That was Saturday. It began with hash browns and ended with a good whiskey and with brackets like that, no bother of any size can ensue betwixt. At least not anything you’ll remember.

It's summer, and the Trolley is running. It's all just fine around these parts.

Sunday:

Best Father's Day ever!

 

 

 

 

Say, is everyone getting a bit tired of fog-bound old London?

Jolly good. So we’re off to . . .

 

It would be amusing to say the people editing the movie . . .

"Hey, you know that's going to be Reagan National some day?"

"Funny."

We’re following a fellow who has secret documents - the usual hugger and/or mugger, and he’s abducted. Quick, stop the presses, and remake the page in an unconvincing fashion:

It’s the other headline stories I love to read. What’s missing?

That’s right: war news. There’s nothing on the front page about the war. But the movie’s quite concerned with it, since the stolen documents have vital Allied secrets, and so on. The microfilmed dox are hidden in a matchbook.

 

   
  It's close to the one I have.
   


Well, we’ve really only two things to talk about in this series, at least here. You can debate the series all you like; I love them. But as everyone’s noted before, they established the bumbling Watson, which annoyed the purists and enthusiasts. So let’s have our moment of Watson humiliation:

The next thing we look for? Holmes’ big speech at the end. Here’s the conclusion:

This was the last war-time pep-talk Holmes gave. It's possible people missed them; it's possible they didn't notice. It's possible they were relieved that we didn't need a pep-talk, because those had come at the absolute grimmest moments, and for all his bravado Sherlock may have been blowing smoke from his elegant pipe.

That'll do; matches await.

 

 

 

 
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