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Jerusalem Artichoke

Spring’s awakening. Jerusalem artichokes. They look like potatoes. Nubby new potatoes. They don’t look like artichokes. That was my first thought.

Jerusalem. That was my second thought. All the way from Jerusalem. Cool. Land of the Pharaohs. Helianthus tuberosus. Don’t take my word for it.

I love that town. Love the sound of it. How many times a day do you think, “I’ve gotta get to Jerusalem”? None? Zero? Twenty? Five? Very seldom? Almost never? I know. But wouldn’t it be great? Here we are in downtown Jerusalem. And the market stalls are full of Jerusalem artichokes. It’s crazy. No telling what’s gonna happen here.

You can chop ’em up and roast ’em in the oven. That’s one method that works pretty good. They look like roasted potatoes. They taste like artichokes, roasted. Sort of.

It's Tough To Figure It Ouit — It’s Tough To Figure It Out

My camera broke down. It only takes fuzzy pictures now. ‘But not all our power is gone’. This beautiful little camera that basically made me and made my career is now, apparently, going to cost more than it’s worth to fix. How about that? Stay tuned. We’ll sort it out.

That was funny learning that the Jerusalem artichoke isn’t an artichoke, has never been to Jerusalem, and is basically a case of mistaken identity. It’s a member of the darn sunflower family. It’s gotta stop. Now this.

And did those feet in ancient time
Walk upon England’s mountains green?
And was the holy Lamb of God
On England’s pleasant pastures seen?

And did the Countenance Divine
Shine forth upon our clouded hills
And was Jerusalem builded here
Among these dark Satanic Mills?

You know what? There’s no mountains in England so you have to be careful about what you believe. Wales maybe. Prince of Wales. And no. There was no Jerusalem builded there either.

Bring me my Bow of burning gold:
Bring me my Arrows of desire:
Bring me my Spear: O clouds unfold!
Bring me my Chariots of fire.

I will not cease from Mental Fight,
Nor shall my Sword sleep in my hand
Till we have built Jerusalem
In England’s green & pleasant Land.

Bill, it just didn’t happen. Zilch. Mandrake root? Okay. Mandrake root but there’s no Jerusalem artichokes in England unless somebody brought them there. It wasn’t me. Today’s lesson. My old accounting prof was right. Things can get confusing.

Jerusalem artichoke. Sounds lovely.

Apathy

I know. It’s terrible. It’s the scourge of the starving class. Of the leisured class, working class, grocery cart class. It rides with those other gallivanting mysterions of the apocalypse boredom, indifference and the fine old wine of ennui. It’s motto is in English. Do Nothing. Who cares? Why bother? It’s awful. I hope you don’t catch it from me.

I try to keep myself interested by fantasizing about doing something. You know. Taking action. Jumping up and getting on with it. But that doesn’t even always work. Thinking itself can be a bore. Sometimes you just want to be an inert lump of goo because it’s all just too much. Everything. It’s impossible to conceive of the gargantuan effort it must have taken to get this far. You must have made it because you’re here. But you’re certainly not interested in doing anything further. No way! Forget it!

Apathy’s so predictable. You know it can’t last forever but you can hope. But hope isn’t quite the right word because that itself would take some effort and that’s the last thing you want. And it’s not like you might as well be dead because then you’d have no appreciation for the apathy that has you in its grip right now, as you live. You can appreciate something without making any effort at all, so that’s no problem.

The question remains what is the way forward? Or it could be if I wasn’t too lazy to ask it. Nice try. We’re not falling for that one. I’m not budging until I know what’s going on here.

Talk to you soon. Nudge me if I nod off.

Classical Gas In The Rain

What? I don’t even know what you might be intending there. My car takes regular. You know how it is when you feel verklempty and that you’re undoubtedly in some obscure sense shirking some sense of duty you might have to something you half think you should be doing? Remember that?

And you slink off to other things because you just can’t get it together for what you think you should or ought to be doing? Because it’s not working and you feel stressed and you just want to get out of here. That’s it.

Chopin. You’re thinking of Mr. Frederic Chopin and how you don’t have a recording now of his “Nocturnes”. You used to have. But it was on vinyl and the vinyl went away.

So rather than study, or write, because the whole world is waiting for something from you, you concentrate on shopping for other stuff that’s suddenly important in your world. Because, cher amis, it beats work. Correct me if I’m wrong. And you couldn’t find the Nocturnes yesterday. They’re not in the produce section and you looked everywhere you could think of.

States is looking, and has been looking, for Mr. Gustav Mahler’s 9th Symphony. So, in a burst of creativity, in the middle of this afternoon’s rain, we elect to drive downtown to the last and finest emporium of “Classical” in Raincouver. “Sikora’s Classical Records Ltd” 424 West Hastings. Right in the heart of things.

Precision bombing has removed the Imperial Bank building on the corner there of Hastings and Hamilton SW. We noticed that and stopped, in passing, to stare through the construction fence at the crater. “Dark reddish/maroon polished marble or granite or whatever it was,” I was saying. “I remember.” I was talking about the exterior facade of the extinct former CIBC bank site. Poor thing. But something new will grow.

There’s no time for soft feelings about disappeared buildings so in the pelting rain onward to Sikora’s. Made it.

Deutsche Grammophon Daniel Barenboim Chopin’s Nocturnes 1982.

Naxos Polish National Radio Sympony Orchestra 1993.

Once again, dear friends, yours in the rain. 7:00 pm. The rain has stopped! This is crazy.

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