Emails, we get emails, we get stacks and stacks of emails, or If you want cash, go to Helen

Back in the dear, dead days beyond recall 1950s, singer Perry Como would put us all to sleep with his laid-back singing style always end his weekly television programs with a medley of songs introduced by a catchy little ditty that went "Letters, we get letters, we get stacks and stacks of letters" and here is a clip from his December 10, 1955, show to prove it. It includes "Love and Marriage", "Rudolph, the Red-Nosed Reindeer", and "Embraceable You" (6:13). If you're not asleep by the end of it, it isn't Perry's fault.

Now that that's out of the way, I just want to say that I get emails, I get emails, I get stacks and stacks of emails, most of which are trying to sell me something. Just this morning I received one that shouted, "BIBLE BASED BELLYFAT BREAKTHROUGH". Leaving aside for a moment the question of whether BELLYFAT is one word or two words, I am wondering whether it is the BELLYFAT or the BREAKTHROUGH that is BIBLE BASED. Any help you can provide in solving my dilemma will be greatly appreciated.

And, wouldn't you just know it, I continue to be the target of obvious scammers. Here's one from a "Mrs.Helen Sheppard" who I'm fairly certain is either an unscrupulous man in Nigeria or a robot in Russia:

Greetings,Respond Immediately

My name is Helen Sheppard a widow from United States Married to late Victor Sheppard; I am in a hospital at the moment undergoing treatment for Esophagi Cancer in Switzerland. I write to you in good faith and hoping that you will understand the importance of my email.My decision to contact you is because I have been recently diagnosed with Cancer and the doctor said that I have less than 7 weeks to live.

My late husband worked with SOLHAM OIL COMPANY Benin before his death. I have been reflecting over my life in the past. It is painful that after over 21 years of peaceful marriage with my late husband, we had no child of our own that will inherit our numerous wealth. Based on this my present health condition I have decided to donate US$4.5 Million Dollars for the Less Privileged orphanage/motherless babies before I die due to advise according to my late Husband in my last dream.

Beloved i wish to see this project completed and 40% will be set-aside for your humble Assistance and 60% will be for the project. I sincerely believe you are a GOD-fearing person who can help me out and maintain my last wishes without betray.

I want you to contact me back through (email address) so i can give you the information to contact the bank where the money is deposited.

My regards,
Mrs.Helen Sheppard.


Even though I (a) appreciate that Mrs.Sheppard wrote in good faith, (b) certainly do understand the importance of her email, and (c) am definitely a GOD-fearing person, I will not be helping her out or maintaining her last wishes without betray.

The moral of this story is simple: If you want cash, go to Helen, at least for the next 7 weeks.

The Oliver Bit Song, or I feel another bad spell coming on

A, you're ad horrible,
B, you're (sob) dutiful,
C, you're recruiting full itch arms,
D, you're ad doll link and
E, you're egg sight ink and
F, Europe furthering my harms.

G, you'll a god to me,
H, you're so Avonlea,
I, you're divan eye eye dough lies,
J, we're lack chalk and chill,
K, you're soak hiss a bull,
L, you're the lob lye tin my highs.

M, N, O P,
I could go on all day,
Q, R, S, T,
Half a medic lease peeking
You're "O.K!"

U maid moll icon pleat,
V, you're soap berries wheat,
W, X, Y, Z

Hits Fonda wonder shrew
Duh half abet witch ewe
Too tall ewe wet chew me tomb he.

If you made it this far, you are a truly loyal reader of this blog, having gone the second mile with moi. Accordingly, you deserve to hear the original version from 1948 sung by Perry Como and the Fontaine Sisters and see some beautifully crafted letters at the same time (2:24).

Here they are in the early 1950s on Perry's television show:

I have always thought the sister on the right looks like both Kathryn Murray (the ballroom dancer and Arthur Murray's wife) and Kitty Carlisle (panelist on the TV game show To Tell the Truth and wife of playwright and theater director Moss Hart). Better than mere doppelgängers. Dreiergängers!.

Well, that's enough wandering down memory lane for one post, I think.

I'm sure you agree.

Lunar landing, January 2017

I was standing at my kitchen door a couple of days ago enjoying what was left of the snow, took this picture with my phone, and captured the moon approaching the branches of our neighbor's poplar tree.

It reminded me of something.

Was it Perry Como singing "Catch A Falling Star And Put It In Your Pocket" from 1957 (2:30)?

No.

Was it Kate Smith singing "When the Moon Comes Over The Mountain" from 1931 (3:21)?

No.

Ah, now I remember.

It reminded me, sort of, of my poem "An Afternoon Encounter" except that my poem was about the sun and an oak tree, not the moon and a poplar.


An Afternoon Encounter
by Robert Henry Brague (1941-)

The winter sun is tangled in an oak
And, white with rage, she struggles to break free.
His icy boughs clutch tightly, try to choke
This one who strayed too near, this enemy.
How fortunate the oak to trap this prize!
What luck just now to catch so rare a prey!
How unexpectedly his victim lies
Imprisoned in his snare at close of day!
But blushing now, embarrassed at her plight,
And fighting on, the sun at last is freed.
Disheveled, she limps homeward for the night
To nurse her wounds. One wound begins to bleed.
The sun, retreating, leaves a crimson stain
And wraps herself in clouds to ease the pain.


Close, but no cigar. They say close only counts in horseshoes.

If you'd like to try your hand at a 14-line sonnet about the moon and a poplar in the style invented by Henry Howard, Earl of Surrey, a first cousin of both Anne Boleyn and Catherine Howard, the second and fifth wives of King Henry VIII (remembering to use the rhyme scheme abab cdcd efef gg and iambic pentameter), be my guest.

The comment section awaits.

From the archives: After experiencing both Darlene Edwards and Anna Russell...

...one is well-advised to return to sanity and the normal world gradually to prevent damage to one’s cerebral cortex. Therefore, since today is New Year’s Eve and 2008 will soon be replaced by 2009, we have just the thing. We shall accomplish our return, our decompression, as it were, by way of our very own A Festival Of Auld Lang Syne Performances.

The first performance will be on the musical saw with accordion accompaniment (I said we must do this gradually), plus there is a bit of the human voice. Experiencing this particular performance is eerily reminiscent of listening to Darlene Edwards herself, but it will begin to accomplish our ends. When the voice enters (which I believe is female, but I may be wrong), we are actually able to forget Darlene for a time by concentrating instead on what seems to be a very poor imitation of the young Bob Dylan from a time when Bob’s lyrics were still comprehensible. Here, then, from 2006, is the androgynous Nicki Jaine on both the saw and the vocal, accompanied by Roy Ashley on accordion, with Auld Lang Syne #1.

Next, class, we travel through both time and space to Detroit in the year 1987 to hear the young Aretha Franklin and Billy Preston sing a Motown version of our festival theme, Auld Lang Syne #2. Inexplicably, there is a brief appearance by comedian David Brenner at the end of the performance.

As we continue to mellow and chill and let the old year slip away, who better than saxophonist Kenny G to put us in the proper mood? Here is the third rung on our decompression ladder, Auld Lang Syne #3. You may skip this step only if you majored in jazz saxophone in college and consider Kenny G as having sold out for commercial success.

Last year, I searched for a fitting Auld Lang Syne #4 with which to close the Festival. After listening to dozens of possibilities, I decided against subjecting you to Barbra Streisand’s turn-of-the-millenium Las Vegas concert rendition and settled instead upon the Alexandria Harmonizers, the 2003 medal winners of the International Chorus Singing Contest at the SPEBSQSA Convention in Montreal, Canada (SPEBSQSA is the Society for the Preservation and Encouragement of Barber Shop Quartet Singing in America), singing one of the best renditions of Auld Lang Syne I have ever encountered. This year, unfortunately, that video is no longer posted in cyberspace because of some squabbling over copyright issues, so I am forced to take a different tack. This year, instead of listening to a fourth version of Auld Lang Syne, let us take a little stroll down memory lane and enter the land of Auld Lang Syne itself.

Help yourself to one or more of the following musical stars of yesteryear:

Doris Day,

Vic Damone,

Lena Horne,

Perry Como and Eddie Fisher,

or the great Nat King Cole!

In Gloria Swanson’s role as silent-film star Norma Desmond in Sunset Boulevard, she had one of the great lines of all time: “They didn’t need dialogue. They had faces then!” When I listen to these singers, I feel like saying, “They had voices then!” I shudder to think what fans of today’s music will be thinking are “golden oldies” thirty or forty years
from now.

Our Festival has now come to an end. It has done its work and our decompression is complete. You may now return to your normal lives, where you are free to choose any kind of music that helps you get through your day.

[A slightly different version of this post was first published on December 30, 2007. --RWP]