Lipstick on the Mic: Madonna

Chilling with Madge 

With someone larger than life, how do you gain a new perspective? Take one slice and look at that.  

I often joked in the past that Madonna was the patron saint of repressed Catholic school girls everywhere. And like her, I'm a Michigan-born Catholic who had to deal with a stern father. I reacted to her self-confessional songs on True Blue and Like a Prayer exactly because of that. While she rebelled against the patriarchal rigidity of Catholicism and questioned its teachings, she still longed to embrace what the Church had to offer. 

And yet, by following the teachings of the Catholic church and marrying Sean Penn, she did not get that love and protection in return, as she confessed in Til Death Do Us Part. Family conflict in the song Oh Father. At the time Like a Prayer was released, I was with someone who wanted to wait until marriage to consummate our relationship. I was surprised to realize I didn't, ready to express myself with someone whom I trusted with my body, heart, and soul, feeling it was not a sin. 

Sexual freedom came late, but it still came for me in 1989. 

Madonna went on to explore other avenues in the 90s, playing a 40s-era baseball player, a dominatrix, Evita, and embracing new age electronica. She's recently released Confessions II, her most celebrated album in nearly 30 years. But it's still her self-confessional period of the late 80s and early 90s that I loved her best. 

Happy birthday.

YA Book Club: The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants

 

Another girl-bonding novel turned major motion picture. 

The bonds in the story are so strong that the actresses portraying Lena, Bridget, Tibby, and Carmen have their own group chat that has been going strong for nearly 20 years. (I'm still trying to figure out what Blake Lively did that cancel culture zeroed in on her. Maybe I'm not reading enough Entertainment Weekly. I do know that she wasn't invited to Taylor's wedding.)

In the story, the four girls have been friends for life, having been born within days of each other, their mothers meeting at a birthing class. Before going their separate ways for the summer, they went shopping and found The Pants, a pair of jeans that somehow fit all four of them perfectly, even though they are all different sizes and shapes. The novel tells the tale of their summer and how the pants tie it all together. 

Lena spends the summer in Greece with her grandparents and falls in love with Kostos, a neighbor boy who brings her out of her shell. 

Bridget goes to California for soccer camp, falls in love with, and aggressively pursues a coach. He rebuffs her, and Lena comes to her rescue. 

Carmen goes to North Carolina to stay with her divorced father and is shocked to see he is engaged, and she will have new step-siblings. Feeling like she's been replaced, she returns home, only to be encouraged to mend the rift and celebrate her family's expansion. 

Tibby, left behind in their hometown, befriends young Bailey, who frequents the drugstore where she works. Bailey has leukemia, and Tibby, an aspiring filmmaker, chronicles Bailey's spirit for life as her days are ebbing away. 

The jeans are the item drawing the stories together; each time they are worn, the girl discovers something new about themselves - be it love, courage, compassion, or healing. 

Raised on Country Sunshine: Kickin' It Old School

Ol' timey bluegrass

Another aspect of country music I appreciate is that it incorporates old traditionals that go further back into the 40s, 30s, 20s, and even back to the 1800s: 

Sons of the Pioneers, Cool Water

Jimmie Davis, You Are My Sunshine

Tony Joe White, Polk Salad Annie

Soggy Bottom Boys, Man of Constant Sorrow

Bill Monroe, Blue Moon of Kentucky

Hank Williams, Your Cheating Heart

Flatt and Scruggs, Foggy Mountain Breakdown

Patsy Montana, I Want to Be a Cowboy's Sweetheart

Jimmie Rogers, Blue Yodel No.1

The Carter Family, Can The Circle Be Unbroken

That's It, Just One Line: Rosalita

 "Rosalita, jump a little lighter, senorita, come sit by my fire." 

LHOTR 2.0: And the Walls Come Tumbling Down

 

D-day at the cottage

The cottage, as we know it, will cease to exist as of August 3. The insurance company has made an initial payout to us to cover personal property, which, instead of going toward buying new furniture, went to pay off the remediation company that tore the house up and made the decision that we had to tear it down. It's essentially $25K down the drain, or river. 

Fun memories part 1

When it's ok to watch TV at LHOTR

So what's a girl to do? Browse Facebook Marketplace for replacements at pennies on the dollar. All told, I've spent $50 on four bedside tables, four lamps, and the coffee table. 

Cool. Comes with a USB port to plug in your phone. 

The best things in life are free, and kind people even help you load them in your car. 

This, only in reverse. 

So what's it going to look like up there once the walls come down, other than a big hole?

We are going up in the air by about 4 feet. It may not feel significant, but there's peace of mind knowing we are protecting our asset. That means the crawl space will legit be a basement, although smaller than the typical basement. Dave the Builder is going to clean the space up, square it off with concrete, build up the foundation, and then apply a thick liner that will protect the space from future flooding. Our plan for the space is to have everything neatly stored in totes so that when it happens again, it's a matter of hauling the totes out and simply putting them on higher ground. That means snowmobile suits, the Christmas tree, even extra blankets, have their place. 

And, DtB is going to salvage what he can from the house, like the pine boards, so we can have an accent wall to remember the old place by. He's even going to try to salvage the windows, esp. the large picture window in the kitchen area. 

We are moving the entrance to the house to the east side, so we can build a wrap-around deck. The doors facing the river will be French or center swing. The great room will stay more or less the same in dimensions, but the kitchen is going on the east wall in an L shape, and the living room is going on the west wall. The bathroom will be in the center between the two bedrooms, where we will get closets that are easily accessible. And a laundry room! So little improvements all around, including a bathtub that isn't in the dark. 

Currently, 90% of the contents of the cottage are in the basement. Not knowing what the interior is going to look like, I'm going to say that honestly, only 60 - 75% of it will go back up north; some of it just won't have a home up there anymore. Due to mold and mildew, we already discarded some items like the plastic storage containers. Dave the Husband is already voicing his desire to restrict the amount of stuff that goes back into the cottage based on how much we had to haul out of there. I'm feeling defensive about some of it since he wanted me to discard my books, but I get his point. I was so adamant about tablecloths and napkins, but we didn't use them past the first year. I could cut back on my serving bowls and platters too. Maybe decide to go all new - or newish - on the pots and pans, get a nice set instead of the garage sale mishmash I currently have. 

I remember typing six years ago, "such a lovely problem to have." I'm not feeling those exact feelings this time. My old roommate Missy acknowledged the melancholy of the situation in saying, "You put a lot of love into that cottage," but acknowledged a new place wouldn't be so bad, maybe I won't have to work as hard this time. 

The Fifth Beatle: Klaus Voorman

Oh Klaus, you're so pretty

Imagine getting into a fight with your unrequited love and pissed off, you go out for a drink and discover the Beatles instead.  

Klaus with his Beatle art

Klaus Voorman was an art student who hung out with Astrid and their friend Jürgen Vollmer around the clubs in Hamburg and was into jazz and French existentialism, while sporting a distinct bohemian look. 

He was immediately entranced with the energy of the Beatles and, forgetting his fight with Astrid, insisted she come see the band herself. 

What Klaus lost in a girlfriend, he gained in artistic fellowship. Soon after the Beatles moved back to England, he followed and lived with George for a short time. 

He designed the album cover for Revolver - he won a Grammy for this - and the first run of the Anthology series. He even updated his Revolver style for George's hit single When We Was Fab in 1988. But why not Volume 4 in 2025, Apple Records!?

But he's about more than just art. Did you know he could play bass? 

He joined the band Manfred Mann and did session work individually for John, George, and Ringo. Not only that, he's played for Carly Simon, Lou Reed, and many others. 

He has semi-retired, putting away his bass, but continues to design and draw album covers, most recently for the band The Dirty Knobs. 

Lipstick on the Mic: Debora Iyall, Romeo Void

 

Native American punk poet. 

New wave lead singer and art teacher. 

Museum docent and animation voice actress.

Lifetime achievement award winner.

A girl in trouble may be a temporary thing, but an artist is forever.