Every Century

And now: a song for you!

Thanks for the inspiration, Karen! I'll do a better audio recording of this some time so I can get to saving the world in highest quality possible. (It also doubles as - what am I up to now? - January's song.) Hoorah!

I walked, I left a footprint

Heavy in the sand

I felt the lapping water

Gripping at the land

I sensed the air was thicker

And prickly on my skin

I peered into the volcano

As my breath was getting thin

As your energy recedes

We forget just what we need

Small movements make a big stand

Tiny actions become a large demand

Little changes felt in giant ways

Every century still breaks down into days

I saw the heavens spinning

Clouds go rushing by

Amazed at all the colours

Ignited in the sky

I felt foundations slipping

Underneath my feet

But heard the people singing

To one determined beat

As your energy recedes

We forget just what we need

Small movements make a big stand

Tiny actions become a large demand

Little changes felt in giant ways

Every century still breaks down into days.

Zebrotamus

I sat down to try and write a song yesterday, and dogged as my pursuit was, it turns out I'd run out of things to say. Odd, because I seem to have too much to say (of little interest) most of the time. I guess it's a collaborative thing - when provided with a something to build on (ie. music), part of your job is to slot together something that fits (ie. melody and lyrics). Otherwise it's like we're doing two different jigsaw puzzles, except Jacob's is of a zebra and mine is of a hippopotamus. It doesn't work. Unless they were made in the same factory with the exact same shapes cut out of it. Then I suppose they'd fit together ok. You'd just get a weird animal at the end.

Spending two hours aimlessly noodling didn't feel very productive, so I decided to make a start on Karen's climate change piece. I also signed up with 1 Million Women. You should too, provided you have the necessary genitalia. They run a campaign for inspiring women to take small, personal steps towards reducing carbon emissions, and give you hints on things you can change in your life towards making this happen. Each woman needs a minimum goal of reducing 1 tonne of CO2 and the site calculates your tally for you as you tick things off. While filling out my profile I realise that we are already running a fairly good household for emissions - we ride our bikes and use public transport, we recycle everything, switch stuff off at powerpoints, avoid using plastic bags, cut out one day a week of meat consumption. I suppose like everyone, it's about making those extra changes. Taking shorter showers. That kind of thing.

Anyway so I'm about halfway through a song about it. It's an effort to stay on the right side of preachy or naff and still be relevant. I don't want to make it too abstract but I don't want to be all "yeeeah so save the forests, pandas are dying wooooo" either. It's called 'Every Century' and hopefully I'll get some audio of it up soon. 1 Million Women already have a theme song but I think I'll 'donate' my song to them anyways and see if they're into it.

Oh, and the fundraising ball. Totally. Happening. Watch this space.

Musicophilia

The Briscoe bandwagon is rolling with gusto, although it is less of a wagon and more like Bart’s lounge room, and less like rolling and more like rocking. Bam! I didn’t even plan that sentence. I just come up with this stuff. Did some awesomely fun gang vocals on Sunday, and whoever wasn’t at the mic was engaged in a game of tag team scrabble. Playing “pixies” over a triple word score for 54 points still wasn’t enough to win it for me, but something about board games makes me gleefully happy. I think it is to do with my sibling-less childhood and the fact I never had anyone to play them with. Insert pity. Yes, I am that pathetic.

Anyway, it is great being in someone else’s band and not having any pressure to really do anything but turn up and play your bit.

I’m reading Musicophilia by Oliver Sacks just now, and it is fascinating. The kind of fascination I experience when I’m trying to eat dinner and watch a David Attenborough documentary at the same time – it just ends up being a fork hovering in the air with my mouth partially opened, eyes glued to the mating dance of the Birds of Paradise. That’s what this book is like. Thinking about the weirdness of the brain makes my brain fry. I mentioned earlier my intrigue at the juxtaposition of a perfect melodic singer having seemingly little sense of natural rhythm. Apparently it is not so uncommon. Another thing that tickled my fancy was the creation of music from silence – to write, I often have to spend a long period of time untouched by sound. It’s as if it gives the music a chance to crawl in. I thought that was pretty weird, since surely sitting at an actual instrument or at least humming a tune would be the most sensible way to birth a song, but it turns out I’m not too much of a freak after all. Which is not to say that I don’t occasionally pick up a guitar and noodle out the start of something. Because I did yesterday. It was very exciting.

There’s a free seminar on climate change supposed to be happening on campus here at lunch time, so I’m going to go sit in on it and take some notes. Of course, that’s providing that any of our students show up to it. Which they probably won’t.

Tomorrow is Blood Bank day. It’s a bit annoying actually because we’re going out to see The Fall tonight and it means I won’t be able to drink anything. All for the greater good. If you’re a B+ in need, then boy do I have a Christmas gift for you.

Saltwater wells in my eyes...

I am a few days behind on my blogging. I made my first schnitzel on Monday night and it was good. I took a photo which I’ll post when I make the quantum leap to plugging my camera in.

Secondly, a new postcard arrived. Even though the deadline has passed, this is actually a good thing – I don’t think anyone else noticed, but I totally miscalculated the number of challenges on my List page. I counted 4 of Jacob’s challenges, and there should only have been 3. So I only had 28. But now I have 29 again. So it’s ok.

Yay! A happy face in the mail, upside down in an envelope as a reflection of her journey from right-way-up-London to wrong-side-down-Sydney, and a lovely letter to boot. There really is nothing to brighten the soul like a handwritten letter. Thank you, Karen.

The new challenge: “Create a protest song, warning of the dangers of climate change. Once completed, give the song to an environmental charity and get them to put it on their website. We need you to help save the planet!”

I puffed my chest out. Saving the planet has a nice ring to it. My 25th song for the year. This will be my most prolific period, like, ever.