My first reactions were:

First was WTF?. I couldn't see either option at first.

Second was skull. Probably reflects my rather dark side (read some of my horror if you don't know what I mean)

Third was woman's face nicely outlined in by the flowers and butterfly.

Good day!!

Been busy with meetings this morning so just getting in. Putting on some Tobermory Flowerpot island coffee and some Green and Red Rose teas.

My flailing writing seems to be extending to this comp. Got either a beginning or an ending written but not sure I want to use it. Still, we shall see.

Eastern Promises

Jeff Lynne was in The Move for a few years, but later became famous for Electric Light Orchestra.

Two H's folks. You're getting sloppy. 😋

In the Still Of The Night - The Five Satins

And what the heck, probably The Ventures' most famous track and a spotlight tune for their drummer.

Quote by AnnaMayZing

The Shadows - Wonderful Land

I love this style of instrumental rock and The Shadows are the best. Amazing guitar work. The Ventures are pretty good at it, too.

A young Dick Clark introduces them here in a performance from 1960.

Also on that memorable double album was Phil Lynott of Thin Lizzy.

Not a chance. I don't even like looking over the edge of cliffs. As U2 put it, "Hello, hello, I'm at a place called Vertigo."

WYE bodysurf at rock concert/festival?

Neither is really an activity suited to me, but probably scuba dive (assuming I learn to swim better). I do have a fascination with sea life while I certainly do not with falling from the heavens (even with a chute, it's technically still falling, just controlled).

WYR dine out with a group or eat in with someone close?

Battle Beyond the Stars

Jackrabbit

(And that's a chameleon, not an iguana, isn't it? I've seen plenty of iguanas on my travels.)

Tuesday Afternoon... well not quite yet, but I did mentioned the Moody Blues in another thread so it came to mind. 😋

How's about some Kicking Horse Grizzly Claw for the coffee du jour?

And some Darjeeling and Raspberry Royale teas as well.

Quote by WriterGirl
I’m excited about the comp. And in typical form, I wrote something, then hated it and deleted. Ha! On to idea #2 now.

I have a small window to get it written and published because come May, work gets crazy again, and I’m working in some time off.

Nice to see you, WG. I am not far enough along to have deleted anything yet so you're ahead of me. 😀 Unfortunately, my vacation isn't until after the comp deadline so have to work it in in other ways.

Today is the second day.

The late Denny Laine played guitar and co-wrote with Paul and Linda McCartney in Wings and was also the original guitarist and vocalist for the Moody Blues.

Haven't listened to Ghost in a while so had Meliora, my favourite Ghost album, on in the car.

Howler Monkey

Zardoz

Get Back - The Beatles

Quote by Ping

🤔

Hi, Ping!! How's things out West? Nice to see you.

Got ideas for kids' books? Need a market? Here's 55 publishers of children's literature from picture books for the wee ones to fiction for the pre-teen and teen set.

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I mentioned the Vietnam TV series "Tour of Duty" in another thread. It gets the credit for hooking me on this Rolling Stones classic, which it used as its theme song.

Quote by Cora
I'm fairly certain I've seen "Platoon" long ago, in college I think, Mendalla. However, if I'm thinking of the right movie I think I liked it. Oh wait, am I getting that movie confused with "Metal Jacket?" I'm not sure. I did like that movie.

There was a wave of Vietnam movies around that time. Platoon was Oliver Stone, Full Metal Jacket was Stanley Kubrick. The TV series "Tour of Duty" was kind of part of it, too. I think there was another TV show about nurses at a base there. More like MASH than a combat show like Tour.

I bailed on Twitter/X after Musk took over. Until he shuts the eff up and restores both proper blue check verification and serious moderation, I am not giving him my presence. I am also not touching anything from Meta with a 10' pole these days, so Facebook, , , and now Threads. Zuck's cavalier attitude to data privacy and, again, moderation has to go.

Quote by verbal
Writing about NYC today, and the next few weeks. I’ve been taking notes.

So is this something completely new or a followup to Continental Divide after you arrive?

Well, we are old enough to have been around for the original (it came out in 1985). I'm just loving the fact that we are in an era where Kate has become a "big star" finally. She was always a bit of a fringe artist in North America compared to the UK. "Running Up The Hill" was probably her biggest NA hit.

A little surprised I haven't seen this before, but someone posted a performance from Laufey's run on Iceland's Got Talent last month. She's only fifteen in this performance and already pretty solid on both vocals and piano. I remain a bit skeptical of the whole talent show boom but it has given us a few good, interesting artists like her.

I think Platoon kind of killed my taste for war movies. At least for real world ones. A Vietnam movie by a Vietnam vet (Oliver Stone) that kind of showed war in all its ugliness. Do still watch some s-f and fantasy fare that fits the war movie tag but even there, I lean more to smaller scale works nowadays. Princess Bride, Labyrinth type stories moreso than Lord of the Rings.

Good morning, y'all. Sunny and nice in my part of the world.

For coffee, we got Kicking Horse Three Sisters medium.

In the teapots, we have Assam and Darjeeling (going all Indian today).

Cold beverages are refreshed and soda stocked.

Hot water is on standby for other teas, hot chocolate.

No progress on a comp entry yet but definitely on my radar. Probably just going to grab a stray thought and start writing in hopes it goes somewhere.

Later, alligators.

And the song that first twigged me to the movie was the powerful "This is Me" performed by Keala Settle.

Throwing in a song from a musical might be cheating a bit, but someone mentioned Les Miz already and The Greatest Showman was actually a movie musical, not an adapted stage musical. And it has some amazing music in it from the songwriting team of Pasek and Paul, who also wrote the songs for the stage musical Dear Evan Hansen.

In the story, the song "Never Enough" is sung by the legendary 19th century Swedish soprano Jenny Lind, the "Swedish Nightingale". The character was played by Rebecca Ferguson but the singing was by Loren Allred. Here Allred gives a live performance accompanied by David Foster.

Learned today that Sir Andrew Davis, a brilliant conductor who led the Toronto Symphony Orchestra from 1975-88, has died after 2 year struggle with leukemia. I saw him conduct the orchestra on two occasions. They used the Centre in the Square in Kitchener, Ontario, my birthplace and home from 1965-1989, to record some of their albums and usually also did a public concert of whatever they were recording. One was Holst's The Planets. Forget what the other was. Besides Toronto, his position included chief conductor of the BBC Symphony, music director and principal conductor of the Lyric Opera of Chicago, music director of the Glyndebourne Festival (where he met his wife, the late soprano Gianna Rolandi), and chief conductor of the Melbourne Symphony in Australia. His son Edward Davis is a composer. I mean, with a conductor for a father and a singer for a mother, it was almost impossible for him to not be musical.

Here Davis conducts the lovely Meditation from the opera Thais. This album with the Toronto Symphony won a Juno award (Canada's counterpart to the US Grammy).

Quote by verbal
I plan to watch baseball and then watch Rebel Moon. It’s supposed to be awful, but I’m in the mood for big dumb sci-fi.

Interested to hear your reaction. The consensus I'm hearing on another site for both parts comes down to looks beautiful but otherwise seriously terrible.

Cleaning day. And I've been nursing a headache with associated back and neck tension. Feeling a bit better now so going for a walk. It's gorgeous out right now. Well, maybe a bit on the cool side but I prefer things a bit cool. Heat bothers me more than cold.

Gettiing late but I'll do a half pot of Las Chicas Don Rey's Private Reserve Medium Dark. There's Japanese green tea and Lime Fizz herbal in the teapots.

Later, alligators...

My list of favourite singers is pretty long nowadays but they pretty much all have one thing in common: They are, by and large, women. Yeah, there's some guys in there, but I would guess that if I listed them, the top five, maybe even top ten, would be ladies. Floor Jansen, Violet Orlandi, Laufey, Marcela Bovio. Heck, even my favourite metal "growler" is Alissa White-Gluz.

Anyhow, here's one of them. I've posted about Violet Orlandi before. She gets the credit/blame for introducing me to Swedish rock band Ghost and her latest is a cover of their "Mary on a Cross".