Welcome to Forgotonia

Q. What do all those things in the subject heading have to do with one another?

A: Answer: we’re all linked by a new tune about a train.

Here’s the story:

As some of you already know, I have a new obsession: the Chicago Public Radio show “Sound Opinions,” which is broadcast locally on Tri States Public Radio, but which I tend to save as a podcast so I can listen to it while making the drive up to the Quad Cities to visit C-Nor.

Listening to this show—on which two respected rock critics review new albums, analyze old ones, and interview artists they think are worth your attention—is like my version of following sports. It’s hard to explain, but … I need rock/pop/music industry chatter and following-of-facts-and-analysis in my life the way Cubs and Cards fans seem to need theirs. (I couldn’t tell you who is playing in the World Series if my life depended on it, but ask me who is producing the next Regina Spektor album and well, I will either know or at least want to know.

Yes, this show is rock-nerd heaven.)

Anyway, driving back from Davenport on Sunday and catching up on a podcast, I have to admit I wasn’t overly excited when DiRogatis and Kott started their review of the Jay-Farrar/Benjamin Gibbard collaboration. This album, released in 2009, features music set to lyrics inspired by a Jack Kerouac novel. It’s called One Fast Move or I’m Gone: Music from Kerouac’s Big Sur.

Normally this kind of project would be up my alley; I mean, hello, English major-y enough? Like a lot of Farrar/Gibbard fans probably do, I’ve got both Uncle Tupelo and Death Cab albums in my stack and several Kerouac books on my shelves.

But,

1. I’m kind of so-so on the Jay Farrar front: he’s obviously got an incredibly unique voice, but I’m not sure I like the sound of it enough to listen to whole albums of it.
2. Even though I was obsessed with Kerouac during my late high school/early college days…well, the sincere awe I used to feel over Kerouac and the life he lived and the way he wrote has been tempered by the voice inside me that says, “Ok, how many women are you going to brag about screwing in this section?”
3. And on top of that, do we need another Picking-Up-Where-Dead-Hero-Left-Off Project? (“Hey Jay, ever heard of Mermaid Avenue? The name Jeff Tweedy ring a bell…?”)

However—and even though the critics on Sound Opinions seemed to agree with my issues about Farrar’s voice—they deemed it a “Buy It” record (out of “Burn It, Buy It, or Trash It”), and you can read more about that on the Sound Opinions web site. (You have to scroll down to footnote #7).

And then they played a song from it, and my ears perked up—and now the album is on my Amazon wishlist.

The song, “California Zephyr,” describes, and is named after, a certain country-crossing vessel which has an important local tie and also plays a big role in my life. (It also pays homage to a song by the same name written by Hank Williams, I think.)

The train in the tune:

The real-life California Zephyr route stops in nearby Galesburg and Burlington, Iowa, and of course at Union Station in Chicago, before heading westward to cross the plains and then head for the Rocky Mountains.

I have taken the California Zephyr out west a small handful of times. And while it may be a bit schmaltzy and sentimental, I consider my trips on this train to be some of the most awesome and important moments in my life.

When I was a kid, the summer after sixth grade, my mom planned a trip for us to visit her brother and his family on the west coast. My dad decided that we were going to do things the old-fashioned (i.e. cheaper, and non-up-in-the-air) way.

Please let me stress what this means: my family and I rode a train, sitting next to each other for several days in a row, all the way from Burlington, Iowa to Seattle, Wash.

(And yes, we are still speaking to each other.)

I’ll save the tales of that trip for another day. But allow me to say I remember it vividly and always will. I got to see the world through those train windows, and through watching the actions of so many other train-travelers from all over the map.

Later, when I was in college, I got on the Zephyr in Burlington and rode out to Winter Park, Colo. (And yes, both my mom and my sister thought I was crazy for choosing to take the train again. Apparently I have a higher tolerance for not bathing, and for sleeping upright in a coach seat, then most.)

In 2004 or so, I also took the train from Galesburg to White Fish, Mont., to meet my family at Glacier National Park, only to discover that it was on fire (but yes, that too is another story.)

All of this is to say, I was delighted to find that one of the songs on the Kerouac-inspired album captures the feeling of sitting in a lounge car, watching the fields and lonely towns and cows and streams and pickup trucks go by, taking in something about American life that feels like it might not always be there. (And yeah, really wishing for a shower.)

What about you? Farrar fan? Death Cab lover? Fan of taking the train despite lavatory facilities being a bit lacking? Know any more about the Hank Williams original? Leave me a comment below.

The song features Gibbard alone (without Farrar), and here’s what I found when I Googled the lyrics:

Up the Hudson Valley across New York State to Chicago then the Plains
All so easy and dreamlike crashing the salt flat daybreak
I hear “I’ll Take You Home again Kathleen” sad fog winds out there to blow
Across the rooftops of eerie old hangover San Francisco

Now I’m transcontinental 3000 miles from my home
I’m on the California Zephyr watching America roll by
Now I’m transcontinental 3000 miles from my home
I’m on the California Zephyr watching America roll by

I’ve hit the end of my trail can’t even drag my own body
I’ve been driven mad for three years
Too much fame keeps a body busy and the mind full of tears
Terrified by that sad song across rooftops
mingled with the lachrymose cries of the salvation army meeting
on the corner saying, “Satan is the cause of it all”

Now I’m transcontinental 3000 miles from my home
I’m on the California Zephyr watching America roll by
Now I’m transcontinental 3000 miles from my home
I’m on the California Zephyr watching America roll by

I just learned from picking up the free River Cities Reader during our trip to Hy-Vee that Freedy Johnston is playing in town tonight. The show is sponsored by the amazing Daytrotter outfit, and I don’t think the tickets are too expensive.

(For my imaginary readers-who-are-not-my-friends, it’s my weekend to be in the Quad Cities; my bf, C-Nor, and I have to commute 2 hours one way each weekend to see each other.)

I don’t know much about Freedy Johnston, other than I remember his weird name, and that I seemed to like a song of his at some point in the late-ish 90s. (With help from the article above, I remembered it: the catchy, tuneful “Bad Reputation.”)

Upon reading this information about tonight’s gig, I went through the following mental process, which I thought I would try to describe for you, since I seem to go through it on a weekly basis or more:

“Cool, that’s a somewhat decent event for where we live!”

or

“Hey, here’s an example of the arts that I should go out and support.”

But, this is then followed by,

“If it’s more than 10 bucks, can I really justify it? After all, I already paid for ______ that I haven’t read/watched/listened to yet” (in this case, it’s 500 Days of Summer that’s been sitting in C-Nor’s Netflix queue for weeks now).

Which is then followed by,

“But hey, you always complain about how there’s nothing cool to do around here…”

Which is then followed by:

“But…is it really worth going to? I mean, if I’m gonna purchase tickets to something, shouldn’t it be to some show/band/singer-songwriter/comedian/speaker I really wanna see? I should save up for that.”

Which is then followed by,

“Yeah, but the shows you really wanna see are always in Chicago, and even if the tickets are cheap for the small clubs, they require an overnight stay in a hotel, and a 3-hour drive one-way…”

Which is then followed by,

“Aw, man, you used to be so cool. What about how ‘you were gonna live in a city so you could  go to shows every night of the week,’ huh? Remember that?”

Which is then followed by,

“Aw shut up, teenaged-self-in-my-head. You don’t have to work in the morning.”

Which was, then, in this particular case, was followed by,

“Sorry, Freedy-with-two-e’s, I’d like to support you but I only get 2 days off and 1.5 of those to see my guy. So we’re staying in.”

Yeah.

That goes through my head. A lot. What’s in yours?

–

(P.S. Freedy has a connection to the QCs other than playing here tonight. He was married to a woman from here and lived here in the early 00s, according to the article linked above.

The article above, though, also has him mentioning that he had “a relationship go south,” which contributed to his lack of output in recent years.

Maybe that’s why he didn’t feel too talkative with the reporter from the QCs, eh?)

P.P.S. Just found out/was reminded of the fact that (according to Wikipedia) that “Bad Reputation” was featured in the movie Kicking and Screaming from 1995–one of my favorite movies of all time. Aha! Anyone remember this song yet?)

So I finally got around to watching Public Enemies, the Michael Mann film based on John Dillinger, who robbed banks and became a kind of folk hero during the Great Depression.

I have to say, I don’t like watching violent movies, but I gave in to this one since

1. it’s historical,
2. it took place in the Midwest and Illinois in particular, and
3. …. okay, because it stars Johnny Depp.

And as my esteemed readers may remember, I’ve been interested in this film since I read/posted that story about a guy from nearby Galesburg, IL who is connected to the movie via a 1930s car.

So: I liked it. Three stars out of four, maybe. But the reason I’m blogging about it is this:

I couldn’t believe it, when it was over and the credits rolled, that there were three rather young, rather notable, rather…comely actors in the film who I hadn’t recognized at all. In other words,

1. Billy Crudup played J. Edgar Hoover. I mean, this is the same guy who played the rock star in Almost Famous! That guy played this guy! I was truly shocked when I saw his name listed as the actor playing Hoover. (All this is to say, that guy can act. And the make-up/costume people who made him look like ….well, not a rock star, they were good too, obviously.)
2. One of the main Dillinger cronies was played by Stephen Dorff. I have actually never seen anything with Stephen Dorff in it. But, here’s the deal: I kind of pride myself on recognizing actors in movies, especially the littler-known character actors. In other words, I am really annoying to watch TV and movies with. Because every time a new character comes on the screen, I’ll say to whoever I’m watching it with, “Well, hey, there’s Jane Adams from Happiness. I’m so happy to see her again.” Or, “Say, there’s the guy who used to play Chip on Kate & Ali.”
3. But the real kicker was the fact that one of the gangsters’ names that came up on the credits was Rory Cochran. I was like, “Wha? Where was he?” (The answer is that he had played one of the FBI guys under Melvin Purvis, played by Christian Bale.) For the uninitiated, Rory Cochran would be the guy that my friends and I, in high school, went around imitating for months and months after seeing him play a squinty-eyed, small-town stoner dude in Dazed and Confused. (He of “Are you cool, man?” fame.)

After I finished the movie, instead of thinking about gangsters and violence and history, I was more thinking about my own history and pop culture (and obsessions with the combination). Like, how could it be that this skinny, long-haired kid from Dazed could be this adult, round-faced guy with …wrinkles???

This triple shock of non-recognition makes me think one of two things.

I didn’t recognize any of these actors onscreen because

A) I have a tiny, crappy little TV and the screen was very dark throughout many of the scenes,

or,

B) I and the actors from my generation are getting round-faced and wrinkled and old.
(I like the former rather than the latter. How ’bout you?)

When my Seattle family members were here in Forgotonia this past weekend for my grandmother’s memorial service, we spent some time walking around the courthouse square in Carthage (my hometown).

Among the many, many interesting items we saw in the display windows of the sad, now-empty stores (or the weirdly re-purposed ones),

(a geode display in the old Royalty’s, for one example;

a spooky sleep-apnea-mask display in the old Sherrick’s Drug Store for another,

oh! And the bedpans right up front in the still-functioning McHugh’s Drug Store)

was this rather entertaining sign for…well, g’head, give it a read:

Um, thanks..?

I don’t mean to indicate that he’s like, as bad as Will Ferrell or anything.

But he was wearing flip flops until December.

Today, he sent me this link from the Onion saying “This is what my workplace is like” and I truly had to LOL.

The old school house in McCall, IL

Originally uploaded by Rural Rose

When I was a kid, there was a sign just near here that read “McCall, IL — Population: 8.”

This little old school house is just a mile or two west of my parents’ house (where I grew up).

My dad went to school in a one-room country school house just like it, and just down the road from here. He says he remembers playing in a baseball game against kids from this school.

I wanted to capture it because, even though it’s always been a landmark down the country road I grew up on, I know it won’t be there forever. One of those things you look at a million times and don’t pay much attention to, but then feel surprised and a little saddened when it’s gone.

(There was another one less than a mile from home to the east, and it got torn down a couple of years ago, just a few months after I went to take pictures of it.)

This schoolhouse is located along what is now being called the Mormon Martyrdom Trail. More on that later.

At home from work today trying to write a eulogy for my grandmother. Meanwhile my pipes are frozen and I’m boiling pot after pot of water in my spaghetti-making pot and pouring straight into the toilet.

Do not be jealous of my day home from work.

Getting ready to go step on the Wii Fit and have it tell me something judgemental. “Well, well, well, Alison, I see it’s been two weeks since you’ve graced us with your presence. Why not just go back to the couch, you slothful excuse for a human being?”

Ok, I feel slightly guilty about posting this. (I did, after all, serve on the newsroom staff of a paper that once printed a recipe for Hot Crap Dip. Yes, you read that right.)

And I understand all too well the understaffed, overworked nature of newsrooms these days.

But my sophomoric sense of humor just can’t let this one slide. Tee heee.;)

Ooops!

I feel kinda sorry for this reporter, as well as for the editor(s) who didn’t catch it. (Check out snopes.com for more on the matter.) (Thanks to esteemed reader in Monmouth for pointing this one out to me.)

I also can’t help but wonder if the guy in the story ever calls local bars saying “I need Amanda Hugginkiss” !

1. Catching up on movies.

• Extract — kinda disappointing. I love Jason Bateman, Kristen Wiig and Mike Judge. And Ben Affleck was funny as a cliched stoner dude. But it seemed to kind of fizzle rather than make a bang.
• Julie & Julia — loved it. Don’t see why the critics gave Amy Adams a hard time. Nora Ephron has become one of my new heroes over the last couple of years since I read two of her books, so I was a bit worried this might disappoint (by being too chick-flick-y.) Not the case. It was great.
• Paranormal Activity — points for going with the Blair Witch-style focus on “fear of the unknown” rather than “blood & guts galore.” Minus points for a kinda let-down-y ending. (Either way, C-Nor and I both admitted to being scared to venture into my dark stairway after watching.)
• It’s Complicated (tagged along w/ the p’s to that one). Too chick flick-y, too unrealistic, and too long, but otherwise funny (and kinda cool to see a middle aged woman [Streep] get to play sought-after sex symbol in a Hollywood film.) Alec Baldwin’s performance as a boob makes it worthwhile, too.

2. Reading.
Without a highlighter! And reading fiction! Ah, it felt fantastic. With the cat curled up on my lap, buried under the Snuggie (which, I’m sorry to have to say, since it was a gift from my Little, is kind of annoying rather than comforting– I can never find the damn sleeves and it’s hard to walk around in without tangling yourself up and tripping over your Snuggie’d feet), I managed to get time to finish:

• The Abstinence Teacher by Tom Perrotta. Absolutely loved it. Have been dying to get to it ever since finishing Little Children. I continue to marvel at Perrotta’s ability to write quality, accessible, funny fiction. Literary fiction that comes off as pure entertainment.

• Love is a Mixtape by Rob Sheffield. His writing in Rolling Stone sizzles and crackles and zings with awesomeness. The book doesn’t quite do that, but partly because of its subject matter: it’s a eulogy and love letter to both the wife he lost in the 90′s, and to the 90′s themselves.

3. Wii-ing.
Playing bowling and ski slalom on the Wii, doing yoga and my two fave options on the Wii Fit Plus: the ski jump and the Super Hula Hoop. Man. Never thought I could sweat so much playing a computer.

4. Cooking.
Actually using the burners on the stove. (Okay so I only cooked one night. But still, points, please. Texas Black Bean Soup — zero points on Weight Watchers!)

5. Driving.

To Springfield to have Christmas w/ my sister and her family.

To Carthage to spend Christmas Eve w/ the p’s.

To the QC’s to spend Xmas Day w/ C-Nor and his p’s.

Back to Macomb to take care of my cat.

Back to the QC’s to be with C-Nor.

Back to Macomb to spend NYE w/ friends. (Who, btw, beat my ass at SuperMario Wii. I’m totally uncoordinated to begin w/, and the Miller Lite Lime Cactus was not helping.)

Phew. Thankfully I didn’t have to struggle too much with the winter weather. But there was quite a bit of driving in this.

In Conclusion and In Sum
It was luxurious to get to spend time w/ C-Nor (more than 2 days in a row!); to be with family; to soak in some pop culture; to ring in the New Year with some of my oldest friends; to not have to study or write papers; to be off work.

I tried to consciously be thankful for the time off—in other words to remember having to be right back in the newsroom on Dec. 26 to cover those critical First Baby of the New Year and Shoppers Hit Stores for After Christmas Bargains stories.

News business, I sometimes miss you, but this time of year is not one of those times.