Music

Tenderness and Thyme

Sally13 Comments

This week for Song Lyric Sunday the theme is to find a song that mentions a spice.

Hmm… when I thought about cooking songs, the theme song for Milton the Monster immediately came to mind. This show ran 1965 – 68. It’s about a Frankenstein-like monster created in a spooky looking mansion by a mad professor. At a key moment in the process though, Professor Weirdo’s elbow is bumped and too much “Tincture of Tenderness” goes in. The result — a very goofy monster named Milton. I still can sing every word of the intro song.

Is Tincture of Tenderness a spice? It certainly adds “flavor.” Honestly, a lot of folks these days could use an elbow-bump of it.

Narrator:
On top of old Horror Hill, in a secret laboratory
Professor Weirdo and Count Kook were in their monstrous glory

Professor Weirdo:
Six drops of The Essence of Terror
Five drops of Sinister Sauce

Count Kook:
When the stirring’s done, may I lick the spoon?

Professor Weirdo:
Of course! A-ha! Of course!
Now for the Tincture of Tenderness
But I must use only a touch
For without a touch of tenderness
It might destroy me…

[Kook accidentally knocks Weirdo’s arm]

Professor Weirdo:
…Oops! Too much!
Better hold your breath, it’s starting to tick!

Count Kook:
Better hold my hand, I’m feeling sick!

[the monster arises]

Milton the Monster:
Hello, Daddy!

Professor Weirdo:
What have I done?

Milton the Monster:
I’m Milton, your brand new son!

The other song that came to mind was “Wild Mountain Thyme.” Below is a video of Kate Rusby — whose voice is GORGEOUS — singing this traditional irish/Scottish song. In the 18th century, poet Robert Tannahill wrote “The Braes of Balquhither.” Then, in the 1950s, Belfast musician Francis McPeake adapted these lyrics and melody into the version known today. The song goes by many names — “Wild Mountain Thyme”, “Blooming Heather”, “Purple Heather”, and “Will Ye Go, Lassie, Go.”

I know — thyme is an herb, not a spice. You’ll have to agree, though, that this is a lovely song.

Lyrics:
Oh, the summer time is coming,
And the trees are sweetly blooming,
And the wild mountain thyme
Grows around the blooming heather.

Will you go, lassie, will you go?
And we’ll all go together
To pull wild mountain thyme
All around the blooming heather,
Will you go, lassie, go?

I will build my love a bower
By yon clear and crystal fountain,
And all around the bower,
I’ll pile flowers from the mountain.

I will roam the country o’er
Through that dark land so dreary;
And all the spoils I find,
I’ll bring to my darling dearie.

If my true love, she won’t have me,
I will surely find another
To pull wild mountain thyme
All around the blooming heather.

Oh, the summertime is coming
And thre trees are blooming
And the wild mountain thyme
Grows around the blooming heather.

Life · poetry

A Presidential Weave

Sally23 Comments

At 80 Mom “rested” her eyes
As did Joe Biden — no surprise
Trump “rests” his in many places
Meetings1, funerals2 — sans disguise

Trump weaves a lot (not string or laces)
Mixes lands for US bases3
Iceland? Greenland? Does it matter?
Pinky? PeeWee?4 Meh – same faces

Tic Tac, Tik Tok5 — chitter, chatter
Covfefe6 served on a platter
Would you drive down The Hormuz Street7?
Hormuz Strait all bombs and splatter8

Dumb has a “b”.9 Who knew? How neat!
Dumocrat10 — such a silly tweet
Islamic Republic — Japan11?!?
Defeat him? No! Obvious cheat!

Shithole countries12 we ought to ban
Not Norway, places African
Discuss terms telephonically13
Big nuclear button14. Oh man.

So rest your eyes; the world can see
We’ve become a hostile country
You’re all about making money
This is not who I want to be

Feel free to fact-check me —

1 – One example: at a cabinet meeting on December 2, 2025, Trump was photographed with his eyes closed while various cabinet members spoke. The cabinet members said that he just blinked.

2 – Trump was caught on camera with his eyes closed at Lindsey Graham’s funeral on July 28, 2026

3 – Trump confused Iceland and Greenland at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland in January 2026

4 – At a rally in Marietta, GA on July 24, 2026, Trump compared Jon Osoff to Pinky Herman.

5 – On July 28, 2026, Trump declared himself Number 1 on Tic Tac. I think that’s a pretty small platform. He might have meant Tik Tok.

6 – What exactly is covfefe? He has never told us since he coined the word May 31, 2017.

7 – On July 22, 2026, while addressing students in metro Atlanta, Trump refered to the Hormuz Street.

8 – On February 28, 2026 the Strait of Hormuz was closed by Iran after they were attacked by the USA

9 – On July 16, 2026 (and multiple other times), Trump explained, “Dumb. You take the the B out. Most people don’t know that dumb has a B.” I feel like this is a case of pots, kettles, and the color black.

10 — Trump first used this term in May 2026 at a speech in New York.

11 – Yes, on July 8, 2026, at a NATO summit, Trump refered to Japan in this way. He probably meant Iran.

12- January 11, 2018 in the Oval Office, thus spake the president, who is strongly backed by conservative evangelical Christians, in the beautiful language of noble world leaders.

13 – On April 30, 2026, Trump stated that negotiations regarding Iran were being conducted “telephonically,” noting that this approach eliminated the need for lengthy 18-hour flights for in-person meetings.

14 – On January 3, 2018, Trump tweeted that his “Nuclear Button” was “much bigger & more powerful” than North Korean leader Kim Jong Un’s.

This week, the W3 challenge is to write a funny roast or a strong complaint about a government leader or another person who has power. I don’t know how funny this is. I mostly feel angry.

The poem should use a form called an interlocking rubaiyat.

Here is how the form works:

  • Write between 4 and 8 stanzas.
  • Each stanza has 4 lines.
  • Each line should have 8 syllables.
  • The rhymes link one stanza to the next.

The rhyme pattern looks like this:
AABA / BBCB / CCDC / DDED

Music

Song Lyric Sunday: Richard Shindell

Sally6 Comments

Born August 3, 1960

I cheered when I saw that he was born in August — because that’s the challenge for this week’s Song Lyric Sunday. This week the theme is to find a song that was written or performed by someone who was born in the month of August. It proved not to be an easy task.

Richard Shindell is an American folk singer. He wrote a response song to The Beatles’ song She’s Leaving Home. I’ll put both songs below. If you’re not familiar with The Beatles’ song, skip down and listen to that first. Without it, Shindell’s song, Bye Bye, may not make sense. Somewhere I remember reading that Shindell had written his song as a song-writing exercise, trying to imagine what life would have been like for the parents of the girl who left home and just left a note behind.

Ten years to the day her father’s in the garden
He’s kept it as it was the day she went away
On every life some rain must fall
It doesn’t mean we let the roses go

Ten years to the day her mother’s in the kitchen
She’s standing at the backdoor, “Come, love, have some tea.”
It took a bit of getting used to
Only setting out two places

I could bring her back to them
With a few strokes of this fountain pen
All’s forgiven, start again

I could put her in a taxi idling at the corner
Working up her nerve and wondering what she’ll say
Remembering how she left that morning
Recalling how they both were snoring

I could bring her back to them
With a few strokes of this fountain pen
All’s forgiven, start again

That man from the motor trade
Ran off with a meter maid

Roses, wild, have spilled into the alley
Backdoor off its hinges, the grass grown high
Ten years to the day and counting
That little note she wrote? That’s all she wrote

I could bring her back to them
With a few strokes of this fountain pen
All’s forgiven, start again

But I can’t bring her back to them
That’s not how this story ends
As is written so it ends
Bye-bye

Wednesday morning at five o’clock
As the day begins
Silently closing her bedroom door
Leaving the note that she hoped would say more

She goes down the stairs to the kitchen
Clutching her handkerchief
Quietly turning the backdoor key
Stepping outside, she is free

She, … (we gave her most of our lives)
Is leaving (sacrified most of our lives)
Home (we gave her everything money could buy)

Father snores as his wife gets into her dressing gown
Picks up the letter that’s lying there
Standing alone at the top of the stairs
She breaks down and cries to her husband
Daddy, our baby’s gone.
Why would she treat us so thoughtlessly?
How could she do this to me?

She (we never thought of ourselves)
Is leaving (never a thought for ourselves)
Home (we struggled hard all our lives to get by)
She’s leaving home, after living alone, for so many years

Friday morning, at nine o’clock
She is far away
Waiting to keep the appointment she made
Greeting a man from the Motortrade

She (what did we do that was wrong)
Is Having (we didn’t know it was wrong)
Fun (fun is the one thing that money can’t buy)

Something inside, that was always denied,
for so many years, .
She’s leaving home

Source: Musixmatch
Songwriters: Paul Mccartney / John Lennon
She’s Leaving Home lyrics © Sony/atv Tunes Llc, Mpl Communications Inc

Life · Writing

A Trip to Maine

Sally2 Comments

This is my response to this week’s Writer’s Workshop prompts

12 things I learned and/or grew to appreciate this month week (because I’ve been in Maine for the week):

  1. I now know the difference between a tadpole, polywog, and froglet. This is a polywog:

          A tadpole doesn’t have any legs and a froglet has all four. This polywog, as you can see(maybe), only has two legs.

          2. Maine blueberries grow low to the ground and are tiny, compared to our New York blueberry bushes. They are harvested with special rakes. They have blueberry bushes in Maine, too, but those teeny berries from the ground plants are PACKED with flavor. Who knew?

          3. There is more than one Fort Knox. My dad was stationed in Fort Knox, KY, and it’s known for all the gold there. But before that Fort Knox, there was a Fort Knox in Maine built in the mid-1800s. It’s a massive granite fortress built on the edge of the Penobscot River.

          Fort Knox outside wall
          Fort Knox — the inside compound

          4. Perspective is always important. When you’re looking from the outside, you can’t see in very well (see top Ft. Knox photo). But when you’re looking from the inside out, the world just seems to open up.

          From inside Ft. Knox.

          5. The Penobscot Narrows Bridge is one of only five bridge observatories in the world. The other four are in China, Thailand, Slovakia, and South Korea.

          Looking up at the Penobscot Observatory from our car.

          6. Perspective is always important. (Yes, I already said that.) Looking down and looking up are totally different views.

          Looking down from the Penobscot Observatory at our car.

          7. Beaches hold amazing surprises.

          We found this crab shell on the beach full of… we didn’t know! It turns out they are Marine Springtails, a relative of the snow fleas I’ve seen at times in New York. They’re an important part of the beach ecosystem, part of nature’s clean-up crew.

          8. Museums are fun.

          We stopped at the Penobscot Maritime Museum, mostly because of this guy beckoning us in. I learned more about sardines than I thought possible.

          9. Sometimes kids don’t appreciate museums.

          “Boring who needs fishermen dont prezerve fishing”

          This was in a box of comments that I looked through. It made me laugh — and feel a little sad for the kid who wrote it.

          10. Museums can be very funny for kids (big and small) who engage with them.

          Captioned: Which animal is not stuffed?

          This photograph was hanging in the ladies room at the Penobscot Maritime Museum. It was taken by a turn of the 20th century photographer, Charles Coombs, who was also an undertaker and taxidermist. The picture made me laugh.

          11. Floating classrooms can be massive.

          The big ship in the back is called The State of Maine and recently came into Castine, home to the Maine Maritime Academy. Its primary purpose is for training Maine Maritime cadets while also being available for federal humanitarian assistance and disaster relief mission. We went to see it but couldn’t get any closer than this.

          12. Sunsets are beautiful everywhere.

          Life

          Just A Trip to Walmart

          Sally2 Comments

          This post was originally written August 5, 2017 and has languished in my draft folder since then.

          The father bellowing at the little boy in the Walmart parking lot was a bad start.

          “JOHNNY,” he roared, “GIT YER A$$ OVER HERE.”

          The open tailgate made me think that the father had been putting his purchases into the car. The boy skulking back from the cart corral looked to be about 8 or 9 years old. He was scowling. I would scowl, too, if someone spoke to me like that.

          Walmart. I felt a snobbish “ugh” rising inside me.

          Inside, the store was a disorderly mess.

          “You can always tell when the students start coming back,” commented a woman looking at the same merchandise as me. “They trash the place.”

          “It is a mess in here,” I agreed.

          “I shop here every week,” she said. “Today is the worst I’ve seen it.”

          I gathered my items and found the shortest line to check out.

          The shortest line was not short.  When the elderly couple ahead of me finally got up to the register and the cashier was nearly finished scanning, their package of chicken needed a price-check.

          “I’m sorry,” the man said, turning to me. I could barely see his eyes under the brim of Carhartt cap.

          “No worries,” I said. “I’m not in a hurry.”

          “Me and my wife got a carful of groceries already,” he said, nodding toward a hunched-over woman with blue-gray hair. “Frozen stuff prolly meltin’ in the car… but she forgot a few things so we come back in.”

          A few things meant a cartful.

          “I hope you aren’t far from home,” I said.

          “Blenheim,” he said.

          I knew that was about an hour away. In the middle of nowhere. Near Breakabeen.

          “I’m sorry,” I told him.

          The Walmart supervisor came to check on the chicken. She called on the radio to the meat department. “Anyone there gimme a price on some chicken?” she asked. I couldn’t hear the response because of her earpiece, but I didn’t need to — she announced it. “I gotta walk this over to the chicken department to get a price,” and off she walked.

          I turned to the man behind me. “I’m sorry,” I said, even though I knew I had nothing to be sorry for.

          “No problem,” he said. “I just moved here from Long Island. You should see the lines in their stores.”

          So we waited.

          “You could move over to a different line,” said the Carhartt man.

          I looked at the line next to ours. It was moving faster, but I’m not one to jump ship. A burly man helped unload an elderly woman’s cart on the belt, but when he left with his bag, I realized they weren’t together. It was just a nice move.

          The chicken department was on the far side of the store. I kept watching that direction to see if I saw the supervisor heading back.

          The blue-haired wife mouthed “I’m sorry” to me. I smiled at her.

          I made eye contact again with the man behind me. “I was in Europe this summer,” I told him. “Time doesn’t seem to matter as much there.”

          “I know,” he said. “We could learn a lesson or two from them.”

          The chicken was still MIA.

          In the line next to me, a man holding a plant — his only purchase — was let ahead of a customer with a full cart. “Thank you SO much,” he said, enthusiastically. The woman who had let him pass just smiled.

          I smiled, too.

          There were nice people all around me.

          In Walmart.

          Finally chicken lady returned.

          I told Long Island man, “Here she comes!”

          “Hooray!” he said.

          I felt like we should clap or something.

          By the time I got to the parking lot, I had nearly forgot the unpleasant father-son interaction because I had seen and talked to so many nice people in the store that day.

           I could guess why I never posted this — too wordy. It’s a problem I have.

          But the message to look for the nice people? Yes, I needed that today.

          Be not conformed to the impatience and nastiness of the world, but be transformed by the goodness that’s right in front of you if you look for it. (a bastardization of Romans 12:2, but nonetheless true.)

          poetry

          The Creativity Cure

          Sally12 Comments

          Whatever became of Sir Swellimpedeedoo?
          Though his fingers were swollen, he needed something to do —
          So he crocheted a chicken
          And his thumbs ceased to thicken
          Soon the rest of his hands slimmed down too

          He didn’t change his diet
          Nor did he sit quiet
          This much is true!
          Idle hands lead to riots
          While creativity is so good for you

          This is my response to this week’s W3 challenge.

          POW, Matt Snyder, challenged us to write a nonsense poem with a specific structure:

          The poem must have two stanzas of five lines each.

          ​Stanza 1 (Limerick)
          Whatever became of Sir Swellimpedeedoo? (A)
          ____________________________ (A)
          __________________ (B)
          __________________ (B)
          ____________________________ (A)

          Stanza 2
          He didn’t ______________________
          Nor did he _____________________
          This much is true! (C)
          ____________________________
          ____________________________ (C)

          The italicized words must appear exactly as they are written. The picture is to serve as inspiration.

          Life · poetry

          Tumbleweed

          Sally2 Comments

          Roll that dry weed across an empty road
          Underscore my dry and empty feeling
          So this, this is Wyoming, new abode
          So far from home made this place appealing
          I couldn’t speak about my need for healing
          Although unbidden tears oft spoke for me
          No one could understand my need to flee

          Turning, turning, and running far away
          How do I put this awful thing behind
          I set my mind to one thing: learn to pray
          So as to focus my intents and mind
          To hold the world at arm’s length, yet be kind
          Laudably said, “Wrong number!” when he called
          Even as I hung up, shaking, I bawled

          Tumbleweed, today’s RDP prompt, brings up one very specific memory — 1983 crossing the state border between Nebraska and Wyoming as my (then) husband and I moved there to start a new life.

          This poem is a Rhyme Royal, which uses the scheme ababbcc, the lines having 10 syllables each i.e. (usually) iambic pentameter. Rhyme Royal is also sometimes known as the Troilus stanza.

          The poem is also an acrostic for RUSSIAN THISTLE. Russian thistle (Salsola tragus or Salsola kali): The classic plant seen rolling in Western movies.

          Alzheimer · Alzheimer's · dementia · elderly · family · Leaning In · Life · Writing

          The Feeder’s Table

          Sally2 Comments

          This is a draft written February 6, 2015, pulled from the draft folder because of the RDP prompt word: tame

          From across the room, I heard the man bellow, “NO!”

          I had no clue what this was in reference to — he was across the room, after all, and I was attending to my mother in the midst of her ritual folding and unfolding of her mealtime protector (aka – bib) while waiting for the food to arrive.

          A woman at his table shouted out, “SNOW!” It was snowing out.

          She laughed at her rhyme, a dry cackle-y laugh, not because she was a witch, although it did make me think of one, but because she was very old and shriveled, and even her laugh bore witness to that.

          “He said, ‘NO,’ and I said, ‘SNOW,'” she said gleefully, and it reminded me of the little “jokes” that first- or second-graders make, when the littlest thing sends them into gales of laughter.

          However, the jokesters were across the room, while my mother sat at the feeder’s table, a table set aside for residents who need assistance with eating. She dines with five other ladies with dementia.

          To my mother’s left is a dear lady that reminds me of a sparrow. Her voice is quiet and sing-songy. Sometimes she makes sense and sometimes she doesn’t, but I always have to listen very closely when she speaks. (Professor Trelawny)

          Next to Sparrow is a woman with a chiseled angular face. (Professor McGonigle) She never speaks. She sits erect and stern, like a statue of a school matron staring across her desk at a wayward student.  However, I had met her many years before, when she was an OB nurse. She had come into my room after I had given birth to somebody because she wanted to tell me about my father.

          “I remember your father’s first day at the hospital,” she said. “He came in toting a little black doctor’s bag. A little black bag!” She laughed when she told me the story, and her eyes twinkled with the delight of that memory. My father still has that black bag with its stethoscope, reflex hammer, otoscope, and other doctorly treasures.

          To her left sits a white-haired lady whose dementia has a Dr. Jekyll-Mr. Hyde effect on her.  (Quirinius Quirrell) One minute she is sweet and the next she is spewing venom.

          Next to Mrs. Hyde sits the newest diner at the feeder’s table. I’ll come back to her.

          To Newby’s left is Mrs. Tiggywinkle, so designated because of her hedgehog hairdo.  Teens pay a lot of money and use a lot of product to get hair like hers, sticking straight up all over her head. My father has to repeatedly request that my mother’s hair get combed. Some of us are just stuck with wayward hair that no amount of combing can tame, and I suspect that’s the case with Mrs. Tiggywinkle.

          The draft ended and I never finished it. I don’t remember who the person I called Newby is, so I can’t come back to her now. I don’t even remember the point of this story.

          My mother died 9 months later.

          Reading drafts and posts from that time in my life are interesting to me. I’m glad that I chronicled the journey.

          Advice to anyone going through a stressful time: Write down what you see and hear and feel. It’s a gift to your future self.

          Music

          Coulter’s Candy

          Sally6 Comments

          Today’s Sunday Song Lyrics prompt is to find a song that mentions candy, honey, sugar or sweet.

          I settled on a Scottish children’s song called Coulter’s Candy, mostly because I have wonderful memories of my granddaughter “dancing” to it when she was not quite two years old. Dancing involved running around and around the couch, occasionally stopping to pull other people into the “dance”.

          Poor kid, I inundated her with Scottish songs. I played The Broon Coo, Katie Beardie, Rattlin’ Bog, and Three Craws. But she really loved Coulter’s Candy.

          Coulter’s Candy is an awful song if you think about the lyrics. One verse is about a little girl being a “rickle of bones covered over with skin,” but, feed her some Coulter’s Candy and she’s getting “a wee double chin.”

          How unnutritious of the song. Still, it’s a fun one to dance to.

          Main Chorus:
          Ally bally, ally bally bee,
          Sittin’ on yer mammy’s knee,
          Greetin’ for a wee bawbee, (crying) (a halfpenny)
          Tae buy some Coulter’s candy. (to)

          Poor wee Jeanie’s gettin’ awfy thin, (awfully)
          A rickle o’ banes covered ower wi’ skin, (bones) (over)
          Noo she’s gettin’ a wee double chin, (now)
          Wi’ sookin’ Coulter’s Candy. (sucking)

          Mammy gie’s ma thrifty doon, (give) (money box) (down)
          Here’s auld Coulter comin’ roon’, (old) (around)
          Wi’ a basket on his croon, (with) (crown/head)
          Selling Coulter’s Candy.

          When you grow old, a man to be,
          you’ll work hard and you’ll sail the seas,
          an’ bring hame pennies for your faither and me,
          Tae buy mair Coulter’s Candy. (more)

          Coulter he’s a affa funny man, (very)
          He maks his candy in a pan, (makes)
          Awa an greet to yer ma, (away) (cry) (your)
          Tae buy some Coulter’s candy. (to)

          Little Annie’s greetin’ tae,
          Sae whit can puir wee Mammy dae, (so) (what) (poor) (do)
          But gie them a penny atween them twae, (between) (two)
          Tae buy mair Coulter’s Candy.

          poetry

          Sunscreen

          Sally9 Comments

          Fair and freckled skin have I
          Is sunscreen really necessary?
          Just one more cream that I must buy
          Fair and freckled skin have I
          Forgot the sun block; cloudless sky
          I look like maraschino cherry
          Fair and freckled skin had I
          Sunscreen really is necessary

          This week’s W3 challenge is to write a Triolet.

          In a triolet, the rhyme scheme is ABaAabAB. The first line repeats as lines four and seven, and the second line returns as the final line. We were further challenged to choose a summer moment or a summer theme.

          My first question was “Does triolet rhyme with violet or chalet?” I tried to look it up. Three out of four you-tube pronunciation experts opted for the -et ending instead of -ay. There was one tree-oh-lay. Then then options were tree-oh-let vs. try-oh-let vs. trial-et. Go figure.