Are You Still Crazy (Alanis Morrisette)

Language: Italian

I didn't mean to take such a long break, there, but things have been weird. I'm not sleeping well, for the past few weeks, and my unemployment is about to run out (one more full check, on Friday, and maybe a partial check in two weeks, but that's it otherwise), and there's always something more important than Babelpop! to be done, so there you go. Today, the exciting thing was that the ceiling started to pour water, out of nowhere, around 9 or 10 this morning: the upstairs neighbors recently moved out, and apparently left the place utterly trashed, because there's been construction / maintenance noises from up there for a couple weeks now. Until today, the noise was the only real inconvenience, but this morning, I heard dripping noises, and upon investigation, found water dripping from the doorframe of the bathroom door. Then water started coming from the air conditioning vent, the room vent, and the light fixture in the hall. Took a while to mop up, and I had to call maintenance to get it to stop -- which leaves me wondering whether it's maybe going to happen again. I'm a little afraid to leave the building.

Anyway. The above picture is something I found with Galaxy Zoo, which is an effort to catalog hundreds of thousands of pictures of galaxies from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey using human volunteer eyeballs, like my own. The picture is easily the coolest one I've found so far, but there are others:



The second picture is a galaxy that was previously known, and the first one might be, for all I know, but considering the magnitude of the project, there's a good chance that you might be seeing pictures of galaxies that nobody has seen, and so there is much potential coolness. If you're interested, go to the Galaxy Zoo site and sign up: there's a quick and pretty simple test, to make sure that you can tell the difference between spiral and elliptical galaxies, and that you know clockwise from counterclockwise, and then you're on your own. Some of the pictures are quite pretty.

Anyway. There are still a couple more songs in the Strawberry Trilogy to come, so be watching for that. I just thought, after all this time, that I needed to put something up, and I'd been meaning to post about Galaxy Zoo for a while, so there you go.

This song turned out okay, I think. The original is, of course, "Are You Still Mad?", and the whole mad-to-crazy joke gets pretty tired pretty quickly, but even so, I think it did nicely for itself.

-Jessi

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Are you still crazy? You've given yourselves to the soccer base.
Are you still crazy? I've given you ultimatums.
Are you still crazy? I had all my forty-year-old male friends confront you.
Are you still crazy? I've communicated our problems with you to everyone.

Are you still crazy? Impressionable, I had a transaction without you.
Are you still crazy? Have you tried to model who you wish I could be?
Are you still crazy? I don't trust you there, your intentions.
Naturally you are,
naturally you are.

Are you still crazy? Who flirted wildly?
Are you still crazy? You have had a tendency to generate one of them.
Are you still crazy? The outside hatch is a foot towards that.
Are you still crazy? After we slept, that concluded it. Also, we had that in its entirety.
Naturally you are,
naturally you are.

Are you still crazy? I carried the pants more of the time than you did.
Are you still crazy? I seemed to put yours on fire only to upgrade them. Have that.
Are you still crazy? I've thrown that in the napkin.
Are you still crazy? I gave in much before that.
Naturally you are,
naturally you are.

Energy is on Your Mind (That Which is Pure) (Information Society)

Language: Italian

My parents were fans of Christian rock music when I was a kid, though they, like many other Christians of the time (and probably many Christians now, for all I know), considered ordinary secular pop music a tool of the devil which would lead to abortions and homosexuality and devil worship (or atheism, which was plausibly worse), all things they were afraid of.¹ This led to certain in-retrospect funny moments, like when I was traumatized in grade school by a classmate playing a single of Toni Basil's "Mickey" at 45 rpm.²

This wasn't the first secular song to be interesting to the 16-year-old me, but it's pretty close. It wasn't even the song I liked best on this album (that was "Tomorrow," which apparently Insoc and/or Tommy Boy Records never cared for enough to try to market it as a single, though that probably wasn't a bad call -- I'm not sure what I liked about it so). But it was still a song that happened to be in the right place at the right time, I guess, and sparked many years' appreciation for tinkly-boop electronic dance music (e.g. Depeche Mode and the Pet Shop Boys³).

I don't necessarily still like the song, though it still sounds to me like an improvement over the band it's clearly trying to rip off, the Human League.

Decide for yourself. Here is the video:

¹Some of these did subsequently happen, though I'm not sure that Mom and Dad were right to be afraid of them. My life hasn't really turned out how I'd envisioned it, but I hardly consider it ruined.

²If I remember right, I cried and everything. Very scary stuff, to have the devil attempting to brainwash you when you're nine years old and there's nothing you can do about it.

³Pet Shop Boys songs are, in general, Paula-Abdul-like in difficulty, though I did manage to do one, once.

-Jessi

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

(spoken:) It's worked up now, but we're still not outside.

[a]
I desire to know what that's been thinking.
There are some things that you cannot hide.
I wish to know what that's been thinking.
What that says to me is, it's on your mind.

(spoken:) The pure energy. The pure energy.

An indication is around here in the hush: without observing,
I still find myself all alone. Is it the same with you?
I can see your things; I don't know that, behind the eyes,
our love can be developed. You hide from me, as if . . . .

[a]

So I could break it off in order to drain it,
but would that make it good?
I couldn't know for sure
what you align. That is to say,
they're here in the hush;
I must play that game. It's
you in the hush, and
the others, with nothing to say.

[a]

(spoken:) The pure energy. The pure energy.

Destruction. The pure energy.
Destruction. The pure energy.
Destruction. The pure energy.

[a][a]

You and Your Hand Control (Pink)

Language: Italian

This is the 200th Babelpop! post that's a reworking of song lyrics¹, so I wanted to do something special. And this is special, to the extent that it's a song that's even kind of contemporary -- unlike some of these, they actually play this on the radio sometimes -- and it's one I really like. Which I couldn't even tell you what the last song I heard on the radio that I actually liked was. It's pretty few and far, these days. You might disagree that this is a good song, and that's fine. I don't blog for your entertainment², muppetfucker.

How did it turn out? Well, I like the idea of being "sweeping drunk." I'm picturing the kind of drunk where you decide to start cleaning the house and rearranging the furniture and shit. This has actually happened to me before, so I'm pleased to have a term for it now.

I also kind of like "you turned your drinks upside down to me," which seems like one of those obscure cultural signals that get American tourists accidentally committed to duels and stuff. In the movies. ("But it was an accident! How was I supposed to know what it meant?")

The video:



-Jessi

¹The awkward phrasing is because two of the posts are for the same song, "American Cake (Don McLean)," parts I and II. So I can't actually say that this is the 200th song, though for all practical purposes it is. There's also one post that doesn't count, because it's just an index.

²(Mostly, it seems, I blog for my own entertainment. For other people to be entertained, other people would have to visit the blog, and almost everyone who does so, sad to say, is a non-English speaker who's hoping to find a translation of either "I'm Too Sexy," by Right Said Fred, or "Comfortably Numb," by Pink Floyd. Seriously. Those two get a completely unreasonable number of hits. The rest, not so much. Which for the record -- I do feel a little guilty about all the non-English speakers I'm confusing. It's mostly accidental.)

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

To indent it, towards the outside,
to exit the late night, that
tight sensibility seems pleasant.
I can fight it, tap that area.
This evening, as soon as I know that he's going,
we go down to the hatch. They don't attend because we know
the bar blows. Hardly six of them had begun,
when the dickhead put its hands on me. It's that,
but you see --

[a]
Your entertainment's not here.
The disorder this evening isn't with me; I really wished to
arrest the just, and be necessary a second.
I walked very well before you were in my life.
Knowing that before that ended,
the conservation began.
Your drink just gave me money! It's
you and your hand this evening, right?

Midnight: I'm sweeping drunk.
I do not wish to dance.
Fotune touched the support; the conjectures are from me.
Not to happen, not to listen -- is it just "bye-bye?"
You can say that that's hardly what your boyfriends wished to have;
you want to have my diversion this evening?

[a]

The breach of the breach
of the breach of the --
it's down.

In the angle with your boys, five bucks bet on
the girl: they sucked, but in order to obtain. She's walked in, hardly thinks that
you see -- you've hardly obtained the entire order. You're not that dressed up,
so who renounces you? You turned your drinks upside down to me, yeah --

You're high fiving, know shit,
not talking, but you've been going to the house alone.

Because it's not for your entertainment.
(no)
I'd really not wished for disorder this evening:
take a second to arrest the just, and
(just to arrest and be necessary a second)
walk here. My life's cause was very well before you were in that;
you know you're surplus.
(knows that ended)
Before the conservation began, that
drink of yours just gave money to me.
Are you and yours "of the right hand" this evening?
(are you and your right hand)

I'm not for your entertainment,
(No, no, not here)
I really wished to disorder this evening with myself, not
to arrest the just and take it to a second
(just return for a second)
life. You walked in very well, that was my thing.
Because, you know, that ends
before that begins.
Your drink just gave me money to conserve!
Are you and your hand right this evening?
Oh, yeah.

The Sky is a Place on the Earth (Belinda Carlisle)

Language: Italian

This song has absolutely nothing to do with what's going on. They don't actually write very many songs about dealing with the Iowa unemployment office, it turns out.

So here's the sitch: I'm still unemployed. That might change soonish, because, like I've mentioned, I have an interview tomorrow¹. But nevertheless. And part of collecting unemployment in the state of Iowa is that one has to call a 1-800 number every week and report how many potential employers one has contacted, and whether or not one turned down any offers, and etc.

So about a week ago, I got a semi-threatening letter in the mail telling me that I had reported, a few weeks ago, that I was not "able and available for work," and that someone would be calling me on June 6 between the hours of 10 and 11 AM to discuss this. This is a sort of serious issue, because, apparently, they don't have to give me money if I in fact wasn't available to work.²

So, long story slightly less long, I was here this morning, and they didn't call on-time. Nor did they call late, either. The actual notice they sent doesn't have a phone number on it for contacting them (there was a letter that came with the notice, but I had apparently thrown that part away last weekend, because I can't find it anymore). So I called the local office. The guy I spoke with wasn't even sure that there was supposed to have been a call in the first place; he said that there was nothing in the computer that he could find that indicated anything was going on. He was then going to give me the number of the person at the State office who was dealing specifically with my case, but his computer cut off the last two digits of the phone number, so he gave me a different number, of someone who is in the general dealing-with-problems department, at which point I thanked him and called that number. Which is how I found out that said person is on vacation until next Monday.

So, to summarize: I didn't get the call they said I'd get. I couldn't do anything about this by calling someone at the local office directly, but that's okay because I may or may not have a problem in the first place. Furthermore, the local office can't give me the number of someone who actually has anything to do with my case, but they can give me a different number, for someone who may or may not be able to help, who isn't there, and who may or may not call me back on Monday.

And round and round we go.

-Jessi

¹I remain almost incapacitatingly nervous about this.

²For what it's worth, I was available that week. I suspect computer error or typo.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

When the night falls down,
you and an aspect of them come around,
and the world is alive
with the sound of kidskin
on the way outside.

When the room walks in,
and the pulled ones begin to move that close,
and they're spinning with stars here,
and a wave of love is rising --

[a]
Ooh, child, you know what the value of that one is?
Ooh, the sky is a place on earth
that says, "in the sky, love comes in the first place."
We'll make the sky a place of the earth,
Ooh, the sky is a place on earth

When I think alone, it
centers my capacities, and catches up to you.
When they're lost in that sea,
I feel your voice, and transport it [to them].

This world was just the beginning!
In understanding the miracle of the child,
I was frightened: living before that
frightened me, but not that pit.

[a]

Geniuses in a Bottle (Christina Aguilera)

Language: Italian

There's no news at all: I just finished this, and, at least in the middle of the night, it tickles me, so I'm posting it. The actual reworked lyrics are semi-gibberishy ("I just have to polish the sense."), but how can you not love a title like that?

I'm not entirely happy with the picture, though I'm a little bit alarmed that there's a whole industry devoted to trying to make babies incrementally smarter in the future. Not because I object to smart babies. (I'd be a little concerned about smart babies banding together and taking over the country, but one, they don't have the fine motor control, and two, I don't know if I'd notice a difference.) I think all babies, across the board, should be either just as smart as they are, or else smarter. I object to the industry because I don't really believe that any of these videos and toys and mobiles and what have you have been demonstrated to do anything at all.

But I suppose parental anxiety will keep the business booming. Everybody wants to have an edge over that damn Pfeiffer kid down the block. And anxiety sells. Still.

I miss Mr. Rogers.

-Jessi

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Oh, that --

I think they've been blocked strongly,
for a century of sunny nights,
waiting for someone to free them.
Been licking your lips and jumping, it kisses my sense,
but that doesn't mean that I'm going to give it one.
Child, child, child
(child, child, child.).

[a]
Oh, whoa,
my body has a saying: "You go to their leaves."
Oh, whoa,
but my heart isn't saying it.

[b]
If you wish to be with me, child, a price has to be paid.
They're geniuses in a bottle; I just have to polish the sense. (You got it!)
Come to: I can make your desire align with me, if you wish.
You have to make a large impression; you have to like what I obtained.

[c]
Child, they are geniuses in one bottle.
It has just got to polish the sense, honey.
They are geniuses in a bottle, child,
come, come, I come to leave it outside.

The game of music and the level of the down-low,
a dance, and then we are good.
Someone has that need, of waiting for it.
My heart is beating to the speed of the light,
but that doesn't mean that this evening; it has one being.
Child, child, child
(child, child, child)

[a]

[b]

[c]

[a]

[b]

If you wish to be with me, child, a price has to be paid.
They're geniuses in a bottle; I just have to polish the sense. (You got it!)
Come to: I can make your desire align with me, if you wish.
Child, I am free and regulated. You come with me, and

They are geniuses in a bottle, child.
I come, I come, I come to leave it outside.

The Goddess of Venus (Bananarama)

Language: Italian

No real progress yet on the employment thing. This has me, actually, kind of depressed, as in clinically. Also I've been kind of fevery and headachy for the last few days and haven't been sleeping well. So maybe I'm catching a cold or something too. Hard to tell.

Doesn't really matter, I suppose, but even so, I'm feeling pretty low. Also bored, and cranky.

On the plus side, a fern I've had since like October, which had been losing frond after frond after frond during the winter, has just begun to sprout new ones. This is very exciting, in a weird way. I've never had a fern before, and was under the impression that this was kind of a long shot. So it was nice to see it growing.

Also, the husband and I went to Cedar Rapids last Friday, because he had a thing to go to up there and I had nothing better to do, so we made a day of it and visited garden centers. I found a Chamaedorea metallica at Pierson's Flower Shop and Greenhouses (1800 Ellis Rd. NW, Cedar Rapids), which I had given up on seeing any in Iowa and figured I was going to have to order seeds from somewhere. So that was pretty cool. They also had a few Fatsia japonica, which I also haven't been able to find anywhere else and kind of wanted, but I didn't buy one of those, mostly because they'd let their smaller, cheaper specimens dry out to death. But even so, we're totally going back sometime.

This means that I now have two plants whose botanical names overlap with a band name: Chamaedorea metallica / Metallica and Ficus elastica / Elastica. That might actually be all there are, unless some scientist somewhere has just classified a Dieffenbachia bonjovi or a Dracaena devo or a Cissus bjorkiana or something. Which, by the way, some scientist should totally do.

The song has no connection to any of that (again). I just thought it was a nice idea. I hate the disposable razor ads that use this song, mostly for being omnipresent some time back (have they stopped those, or am I just not seeing them anymore?). Nothing wrong with the song in and of itself, though. Anyway.

-Jessi

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Advanced on the mountain,
burning as a silver flame,
the top of beauty and love,
and Venus was her name.

She has it!
Yeah, child, she has it.
I'm your Venus; they're the fire
to that desire of yours.

Its crystal eyes were its crews,
that render blackness to every man,
like a dark night
that obtained what no others have been.

She has it!
Yeah, child, she has it, that
fire. They are yours, Venus; I'm the
well of your desire.

Fire your Venus. I'm
your desire.

Advanced on the mountain,
burning as a silver flame,
the top of beauty and love,
and Venus was her name.

She has it!
Yeah, child, she has it, that
fire. They're yours, Venus; I'm the
well of your desire.

Fire your Venus. I'm
your desire.

And She Was (Talking Heads)

Language: Italian

I don't know what it is about Talking Heads lyrics, but for some reason, like Aerosmith, they always seem to work really well when Babelpopped.

I am very nearly the last employee of the store now who isn't related to the owner. It's hard to tell if this is a good thing or not: I have, at least theoretically, money coming in for another couple of weeks that the rest of the employees don't have. On the other hand, they're all ahead of me in the finding-new-work department, having had lots more time to try to find something. So possibly I'm not better off but not worse off either, just a couple weeks later in time.

The wind-down of the store is kind of emotionally difficult. Former employees are angry about various things. Some of the few remaining part-time people are taking the opportunity to unleash varying amounts of abuse on the customers (which really is a temptation, though so far I'm pretty nice, if occasionally blunt). The customers themselves either want to tell me how sorry they are that the store is closing (which I've heard hundreds of times now and can no longer respond to with any kind of sincerity: I've never known what to say in the first place, and having to come up with something twenty times an hour is pushing me to some kind of edge or another), or they are completely oblivious about what's going on. Some of the better customer questions lately:

Are you guys hiring?
Soooooo, do you know when you'll be getting more bananas in?
Are you guys having some kind of a sale?
What do the ["Going Out of Business: Everything 20% Off"] signs mean?
How come you're out of so much stuff?
Is [item] included in the [Everything 20% Off] sale?
Are you guys really going out of business?
So, why's the store going out of business?
Do you know if you have any [item] in stock?¹

And you just want to grab them by the shoulders and shake them. And shake them. Until something important ruptures, and they collapse on the floor and start twitching and drooling. Some of them are, obviously, pretty close to the twitching-and-drooling thing already.

And you get angry with the customers who say "Maybe I should have shopped here more." And you get angry with the customers who say "Maybe if your prices hadn't been so expensive." And you get angry with the customers who want you to explain what went wrong, why the store didn't work out. And you feel kind of sorry for the owner and his wife, because you're well aware that they did try to make the place work, and they're no more happy about having to close the place than you are². And you're kind of pissed at the owner and his wife, because the owner, at least, was always kind of an ass to everybody -- disrespectful, dismissive, superficial, overbearing, secretive -- and it's difficult not to get pissed at people who are like that. And you're anxious whenever somebody asks you where you're going next, because you don't know, while simultaneously being pissed whenever people ask how the owners are doing and don't even seem to realize that you, also, are affected by the closing, and it's like by not asking they're telling you that you don't really count, that whatever happens to you is of no consequence compared to the OWNERS, who are actual people, worth caring about.

And so, ultimately, you wind up in a state of being nowhere in particular all day. The world is moving, and you're right there with it, and you are. Too many emotions from too many directions to deal with, so you just kind of push them off to one side somewhere and focus on giving the right change and shrugging in what you hope is a pleasant manner. And then when you get home and find out that the husband has dumped over a tray of plant cuttings that you were trying to start, everything comes up all at once in such overwhelming intensity that you literally find yourself unable to speak for half an hour.

Really not going to be able to take much more of this.

¹The answers, by the way, are:
No.
Never.
Yes.
That we're going out of business, and everything is 20% off.
Because we're going out of business.
Unless it's beer or wine, yes.
Yes.
Because it wasn't making money.
No, because I can't keep up with what we're sold-out of. Learn to fucking read.

²Though, muting your sympathy is the awareness that they have a much more substantial financial cushion than you do. They might be hit harder emotionally than you are, but they're not in any particular danger of having their electricity turned off, either.

-Jessi

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

And they found themselves in the grass,
and she could feel the respiration,
and the factory could see nearly to the main road.
She's making sure it's not dreaming,
sees that the lights of the neighboring house
are beginning to increase. The hour
to return to the concentrated one: a minute,
and the world opens its eyes.

Chorus:
It was moving, and it was right here, (and it was) with
the world; she was moving, was floating over it (and was).

And she was going to drift through the courtyard,
and dressed. Removing her
lot slowly, and moving, she was
to increase in and over the earth.
The universe enters, in that
sense: this all goes to that drift.
I'm not moving that earth on and over the yard.

(Chorus)

She was happy to doubt this purpose: without this purpose,
she isn't sure where the time has gone. No,
to think what not to say to them, that next
time they think.
That is approximately what was made.

And she was watching,
and things were similar to the film.
She has had a pleasant height, and is
moving, in all the "outside" senses.

(Chorus)

They were joining the dispersed world:
missing enough to think that's in order, all right.

I Will be Domestic, for They Have Been Born (Bing Crosby)

Language: Italian

There's considerably more to this song, but I figured I didn't have to do all the lyrics if I didn't want to, especially if I was pretty sure I had never heard most of them.

I don't know if this was really written by Bing Crosby. Doubtful. But I'm a little pressed for time, and don't, frankly, really care all that much either.

The last couple days at work have been pretty miserable. People are mean, impatient, whiny, exceptionally stupid, rude, oblivious, demanding, short-fused, and just all-around miserable to be anywhere near, at this time of year, and I hate all of you. Yes, all of you.

Christmas can bite me.

-Jessi

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

I will be domestic, for they've been born;
You can count on me.
I pray it has snow and mistletoe,
and that the tree is present.

The will finds its eve: they've been born
where the love-light is tipsy.
I will be domestic, for they've been born,
if only in my dreams.

I Felt a Voice (Bananarama)

Language: Italian

Well, first off, I'd like to thank everybody for your thoughts and prayers yesterday: yesterday was so slow at work it was actually somewhat painful. This wouldn't be a slow day at any other grocery store in the area: before Thanksgiving, people buy food. The week after is the slow one. But my store is different. This had a number of people somewhat depressed.

The other thing is that the rumors I've been hearing for a couple weeks about various department heads leaving their departments turn out to be true. This doesn't affect me directly, but it means that for a while, I'm going to have to look like a moron whenever somebody asks me a question pertaining to one of those departments, because there will be nobody to refer the question to.

But, I guess, if this keeps up, there will soon be no customers around to ask questions anyway.

-Jessi

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Who has need of friends who never show? I don't
wish to know what you'll say to that.
A broken heart could conserve
the wish, if you'd discovered it in order.

[a]
He hardly thinks, next to me. Those nights that
I waited for your call, when the sun had
uncovered all my friends, until I had rights --
I haven't known. Ooh, ooh: that's all.

[b]
Ooh, I felt a voice; ooh, they felt a voice.
They say that you have obtained a broken heart.
Ooh, I've felt a voice; ooh, yes, boy,
I've felt a voice, ooh.

The hour seems to be telling me
that you can sense the bad changes.
According to probability, you'd have given me a child, but
I was much too frightened.

Therefore, realize that what you have made has been damaged,
and the love you've thrown
can be forgotten soon, like I will.
It's never going to be the same one.

[b][b]

[a]

[b][b][b]

Where the Ways Don't Have Names (U2)

Language: Italian

Let's talk about gerrymandering.

What with the recent election, and the national attention being given to individual House races (at least by people blogging about the races in their own districts), I've become curious about where all these other districts are and what they're like. The districts in the Upper Midwest -- Iowa, Minnesota, Wisconsin -- are pretty sensibly drawn (Iowa, in fact, has a redistricting process which is often pointed to as the way all states should do theirs; see here.), and the states in the Rockies are generally not populous enough to need many districts, so they wind up having sensible plans whether they like it or not.

But I found this web site, which contains maps for each of the 538 House districts currently operational, and spent a while looking at the individual districts. And there are some doozies in there.

The best five examples I could find are here in this post, but if you find this sort of thing interesting, click on a few random examples from California, Florida, Georgia, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, or Texas. They're not all insane, but often enough. My hall-of-famers here are, from top to bottom, GA-13, which I think looks like an ant¹; IL-04, which is known for it's "earmuff" design; IL-17, which has a certain pornographic-Smurf quality to it; PA-18, which makes me think of pictures of turbulence, from wind tunnels; and NC-12, which evokes snakes and genies leaving bottles and women-crawling-through-deserts.

These sample districts are presently occupied by Rep. David Scott, Democrat (GA-13); Rep. Luis V. Gutierrez, Democrat (IL-04); Rep. Philip G. Hare, Democrat (IL-17); Rep. Tim Murphy, Republican (PA-18); and Rep. Melvin L. Watt, Democrat (NC-12).

There's not necessarily anything wrong with having oddly-drawn districts, to my mind: in some cases (IL-04 being an example), the district links up scattered members of a group which might otherwise go unrepresented (in IL-04's case, the ears of the earmuff are two mainly Hispanic neighborhoods). But it's certainly not in the spirit of things -- ideally one would have relatively compact districts, if for no other reason than to make it clear to people moving in what races they were voting in. In the aforementioned NC-12, Guilford County, North Carolina is part of three different Congressional Districts, NC-06, NC-12, and NC-13. This seems excessive.² There's also the matter of people, by and large, having similar interests as their neighbors. It's not clear to me, for example, what interests Sterling, IL, in the north central part of Illinois, has in common with Quincy, IL, on the Mississippi River, or Macoupin County in Southern Illinois, which suggests to me that perhaps the intent of the district lines was to work against the interests of some of the people included in the district, at the expense of others.

But anyway. Enough of that. This song was as close as I could get to map/place/lines issues, of the songs I had started already. So it's not hugely appropriate to the discussion, but these things happen. Sometimes the song's more important, sometimes the discussion is.

-Jessi

¹Maybe a scorpion, or a spider, or something. Definitely an arthropod of some kind, though.

²On the other hand, Guilford County, NC, is one of very few in the country with dual courthouses, effectively having two county seats, so maybe a little confusion is customary there. I don't know; I've never been.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

I desire to make it work,
wish to hide,
wish them to tear down the inner walls
that hold it.
I wish to catch up that part outside,
and touch the flame, to
name the ways they don't have.

I want the solar light to think on my face.
To cloud the powder, I disappear. (See that?)
Without a trace,
I wish to take the poison. Shelter the rain from the
ways in which they do not have names.

[a]
Where the ways don't have names,
where the ways don't have names.
The constructions are calm,
then love burnt them down.
The love burns that down,
and I go here (when
I go here with you).
That's all he can make.

The city aflood,
and our love turns towards rust:
we are struck, and jump to you from the wind.
On powder, tracked in,
I will show you that a
high place on a desert plain
doesn't have a name in that way.

[a]

Our love turns, in order to rust.
We are battered, and we
jumped from the wind,
jumped from the wind.
Oh, and I see that the love
turned in order to rust. I'd love to see ours
jump from the wind. We're battered, and
jumped from the wind.
(Oh, and the love turns towards rust.)
We are struck, and jump to you from the wind,
treading on powder that is
here. When I go (and
I go here with you),
I'm all I can make of myself.

Heart-Box of Forms (Nirvana)

Language: Italian

(See the video, if you like.)

I do miss Nirvana occasionally.

-Jessi

- - - - - - - - - - - - -

It eyes me like pisces when I'm a weak person.
I've been blocked for a week in your heart-box of form; part it.
I've been designed in your sink; I've taken the magnet tar.
I wish I could eat behind your cancer, when it turns.

Hey
Attended
I've always got a new claim in order,
in the debt of your priceless
aversion.
Haight
I've always got a new claim in order,
in debt to your priceless counsel.
Hey
Wait
I've always got a new claim in order,
in debt to your priceless counsel.

The orchids' meat-consumption is not of the pardoned, no;
however, I just cut angel hats out of child breath.
Highness, your hymen is left shooting black,
therefore I can scramble (up / down / behind / to the right of) your umbilical noose.

All in the Place of the Relative (Radiohead)

Language: Italian

My evil grandmother (I also had a good grandmother, but she died in 1998) died last Friday, or possibly Thursday night, in her home, following several years of emphysema, which she never admitted that she had. The funeral was yesterday, August 29, so that's where I was yesterday, and what I was doing.

I'm not hugely experienced with funerals. I've been to basically three, all of which were for grandparents, and all of which were also sort of just as well: in this particular case, Evil Grandma had been more or less unable to do anything for a few years, as far as taking care of herself. Also her brain was maybe starting to go, towards the end: she forgot, a couple times, that my mom had changed her name when she got married. Which wouldn't have been a big deal if this had been a recent wedding, but my parents have been married since 1971.

Speaking of 1971 -- when my mom, and the other kids, were going through her house, they found a bottle of whiskey with that date on it. The speculation is that Grandma kept a bottle from my parents' wedding. Since there was no detail about how it tasted, I'm guessing that it was unopened. If the story stopped there, then you'd think, oh, that's kind of cute, or sentimental, or whatever, but Grandma also had several bottles of blackened, dry, eight-year-old ketchup: she just saved everything.

I was never really a big fan of Grandma, as you can probably guess from the fact that I call her evil. There's a certain oddness to that, since she's the grandparent I take most strongly after (neurotic, conceited, slightly OCD), but then, she also tended to be really pushy and bossy and only ever heard things that she wanted to hear, which meant that you couldn't ever really have a conversation with her about anything, and most of the conversations I did have with her were awkward and strained because she always seemed to be trying to manipulate me into doing or not doing stuff. So about every conversation I ever had with the woman went like:

GRANDMA: Don't you want a tomato for your hamburger, Jessi?
ME: No, Grandma, I don't like tomatoes.
GRANDMA: You don't like tomatoes?! Have you even tried one?
ME: Not lately, no, but I don't like them.
GRANDMA: Oh, well you should have a slice or two of these; they're really good. Put some salt and pepper on top, and --
ME: No, I don't want any.
GRANDMA: Come on, one slice of tomato isn't going to kill you.
ME: I don't like tomatoes.
GRANDMA: But you like ketchup, don't you? And ketchup is tomatoes.
ME: But it's different.
GRANDMA: How about I just put this slice of tomato on your plate, and I'll leave the salt here for you --
ME: I'm not going to eat it.
GRANDMA: Well why not?
ME: Because I don't like tomatoes, Grandma, I just said.
GRANDMA: You could at least try a bite or two of this one. It came out of my garden.
ME: Fine. Leave a slice on my plate, then.

And then I'd give the slice of tomato to Dad, eventually.

R. I. P.
L--- I. S------- (1928-2006)

-Jessi

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

To the right of kidskin, to kidskin, to kidskin, to kidskin,
of the all, all, all, all.
A relative in just the place,
a relative in just the place,
a relative in just the place,
the right of the place.

Yesterday I woke up sucking a lemon
yesterday I woke up sucking that lemon
yesterday I woke up sucking a lemon
yesterday I woke up sucking a lemon

All, all, all.
A relative in the just place,
a relative in the just place,
the right of the place.

There are two colors in my head,
are two colors in my head.
That's what you are, here. It tries to say that to you.
Which thing was it that you tried to say?
Tried to say, tried to say,
tried to say, tried to say.

All the relatives, just in the place.

Wished It (Human League)

Language: Italian

And I'm employed again. Mostly. Nothing official yet, but it looks like I'm going to be working for my previous boss, in a different location. Not cocktail waitressing (cocktail waitresses make better money), but a job nevertheless, so I can maybe slow down the skid into debt and abject poverty I've been doing.

I've seen someone on-line say that they think "You were working as a waitress in a cocktail bar / When I met you" is possibly the best opening lyrics of any pop song ever. I agree sometimes.

-Jessi

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Like a waitress in a cocktail bar, you weren't working
when I came to contact
you. I've selected you from outside.
I've churned them to, in, and on you, and turned you around to
transform you into someone new. The hour
I'll get the world to your feet happens five years later.
Therefore, it's been easy for you,
but he's forgotten that hour. Where is that? That's not me.
He puts them behind, and can drain them also.

Not, not wished for it?
You know I can't believe it when I see that you won't feel it.
Not, you don't wish it?
You know that when you say that, you don't have a lot of needs.
Much of the creed is delayed, too.
In order to find it, in order to think, an idea would improve them.
The changes behind it have not changed, or else you want both.

The child's not to wish it? Oh, it's not to be wished.
The child's not to wish it? Oh, it's not to be wished.

I was working like a waitress in a cocktail bar:
that's a lot to align.
I knew I'd find the best place, but then I'd have a uniform.
With or without you, five years of periods.
We have had to be so good and calm, but my task to love.
You've lived your life on my time; the fortune teller was right.
Who must own me in that hour?

The child's not to wish it? Oh, it's not to be wished.
The child's not to wish it? Oh, it's not to be wished.

The child's not to wish it? Oh, it's not to be wished.
The child's not to wish it? Oh, it's not to be wished.

The child's not to wish it? Oh, it's not to be wished.
The child's not to wish it? Oh, it's not to be wished.

The child's not to wish it? Oh, it's not to be wished.
The child's not to wish it? Oh, it's not to be wished.

The child's not to wish it? Oh, it's not to be wished.
The child's not to wish it? Oh, it's not to be wished.

The Sky Knows They are Poor in That Hour (Smiths)

Language: Italian

The diagnosis, with which I'm not sure I agree, was: canker sore in an unusual and unlikely place. The alternatives (herpes, HIV, yeast infection) were all much worse, so it's not a bad diagnosis, particularly. On the other hand, I'm told I have to just let it run its course, which means no instant gratification from antibiotics, and if the doctors are wrong, I'll be dealing with this for several more days, until I can get back for another option. Even letting it run its course could mean several more days of trouble swallowing.

The treatment recommended to me was alum, which I already had, from the prior canker sore a few weeks ago.¹ It's painful, but less painful than a salt-water gargle, which was also proposed.

So, kids: remember to be careful when brushing your teeth. One hard bang into the wrong spot, and you're jabbing open sores in the back of your throat with alum-soaked Q-Tips for a week. This has been your Babelpop Learning Moment™ for the day.

Meanwhile, varying degrees of miserable. Hence the song. Though I was expecting the title to stay a little closer to the original ("Heaven Knows I'm Miserable Now"), this works for me too. I will try to refrain from further throat-related updates unless they're a lot more interesting than this one.

-Jessi

¹Alum is also increasingly difficult to find in stores, by the way. It seems to have fallen out of favor as a canker sore treatment, though I haven't seen anything to explain why. Maybe worries about Alzheimer's? Or maybe it's just that people don't like the taste (sweet / sour / metallic)?

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

I was happy in a drunken hour of opacity,
but the sky knows they are poor in that hour.

I was trying out a job, and then I've found a job,
but the sky knows they are poor in that hour.

In my life
why give the important, popular time:
if I die, who are alive but not taken care of?

It passes near two lovers entwined,
but the sky knows they are poor in that hour.

I was trying out a job, and then I've found a job,
but the sky knows they are poor in that hour.

In my life
oh, why do I damage the important, popular time?
Who dies, if not taken care of?

For me, the conclusion has asked: which thing
would have the day? (Caligula blushed.)

"The house is much too long -- have you been in it?" she has said,
and naturally, I escaped it.

In my life,
why care for
people that you would rather give an eye to, in soccer?

I was happy in a drunken hour of opacity,
but the sky knows they are poor in that hour.

"The house is much too long -- have you been in it?" she has said,
and naturally, I escaped it.

In my life
why give the important, popular time?
Who is alive, if not taken care of?

Losing My Religion (R.E.M.)

Language: Italian

I worried, as anyone would, about whether R.E.M. would make suitable Babelpop subjects. Their lyrics do often sound like they've already been run through Babelfish. I mean, what would you expect to happen to a line like "Mister Fred Blassie in a breakfast mess?"¹

I think I was right to worry, now that I've done it. A word here, a word there, but it's still really really easy to see the original song through the changes. Oh well.

-Jessi

(¹What happens in German is, "They blow Mr. Fred in confusion at breakfast." I'm sure we've all had mornings like that. It seems plausible that German is the only language that results in interesting R.E.M. lyrics.)

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

The life is greater:
it's larger than you, and you aren't me.
The lengths that I will go to,
the distance in your eyes –
oh, no, I have dictated too much of that;
I have installed it.

That one in the angle is me;
that is me in the reflector,
that loses my religion,
that tries to continue with you,
and I don't know if I can make it.
Oh, no, I have I dictated too much,
I haven't said enough.
You felt the thought that (to me) is the laughing;
thought that they have to feel to sing.
I've thought that they've seen tasks to try.

Every whisper,
awakening every hour, I am choosing confessions of mine,
that they try to maintain. An eye to you,
a hurt, lost, foolish and blinded –
Oh, no, I have said that too much;
I have installed it.

Consider this
the suggestion of the century;
consider this
the sliding that's carried me,
that has come to lack knees.
What if all these fantasies come flailing around?
Has said too much –
the thought, that is; you felt my laughing.
They have to sing, that thought is felt,
I have thought them up tasks that they have to try. I saw.

But that one was a dream, right?
That was a dream, right?

The Rabbet is in the Heart (Dee-Lite)

Language: Italian

The whole one-hit wonder phenomenon is odd to me. I mean, I never had their album, so I can't say for sure, but I doesn't seem to me like Dee-Lite were any worse at what they do than, say, the Bee Gees, who did something similar, and yet the Bee Gees racked up lots of hits and Dee-Lite didn't. Even if your point of comparison is the B-52s (also similar, though in a different way), there's no real rhyme or reason to who gets famous and who languishes in semi-obscurity.

Which I think there's something in Ecclesiastes about one-hit wonders. (Eccl. 9:11, specifically, though the whole book works pretty well if you're, like, Toni Basil, and you're wanting to put things into perspective.)

In any case, they all seemed personable enough. Maybe there was some heavy Ecstasy use or something. Bands often blame drug abuse when something goes awry. Or maybe Lady Miss Kier blew all their money on wigs: stranger things have happened.

In any event: fare well, Dee-Lite. I wish we'd had more time together.

-Jessi

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

[sample:]It's going to dance,
it's going to dance,
it's going to dance,
and possess a sure diversion.

A cold one turned upside down on my rear end,
I maintain it with satisfaction. It filled up when we were made.
What satisfaction will come of that? (I) I could not ask the other one.
(I, I, I)
No, I couldn't ask another:
I'm not digging your rabbet that deeply.
Walls? Only the bridge.
My plate from supper, my succotash desire. (sing the child)
I couldn't ask another. (Uh-huh, for uh-huh)
(I, I, I)
No, I couldn't ask another.

The rabbet is in the rabbet,
the heart is in the heart.

The rabbet is in the rabbet
of the heart.
(ah-ah-ah-ah)
Their rabbet is in hula.
The rabbet of the heart
(ah-ah-ah-ah)
is in the rabbet.
The heart is in the (ah-ah-ah) heart.

We move towards the nth circle, going through the depth
to Horton. I feel that.
(Oh,) I couldn't ask another,
(I, I, I,) no, I couldn't ask another spirit to DJ. (spirit)
He said to me, "It was on a seam that cannot be sold."
He's exquisite, not incorrect: I'm just catty, and vanquished.
(I) They could not ask another one to you. ***

(Sing)

The rabbet is in the rabbet of the heart
(Ah-ah-ah-ah, ne-na-na-na-na)
is in the rabbet of the heart,
(Ne-na-na-na-na)
is in the rabbet of the heart,
the rabbet of the
(Ah-ah-ah-ah)
heart is in the rabbet of the heart: is in the heart.
(Ah-ah-ah)

The rabbet is in the rabbet of the –
(Ah-ah-ah-ah, yeah)
heart is in the rabbet of the –
(Ah-ah-ah)
heart is in the rabbet of the heart is in the –
(Ah-ah-ah)
heart.

We Have Constructed this City (Starship)

Which bridge did the peculiar and intrusive air traffic reporter reference in your city? Here in Brooklyn, it was the George Washington, but if one were to buy the album in 1985, and if one were my age at the time, one would perhaps be surprised that it was a different city that was built of rock and roll by the creaking, gasping, calculating band members.

And maybe one would have felt a bit hurt by this cynicism. Why did they do it? Don’t they need somebody to love? Wouldn’t they love somebody to love?

This is from the Italian, just like radio itself.

-- Samantha

We have constructed this city.
We have constructed this city on the cliff and the seam.

It has constructed this city.
We have constructed this city on the cliff and the seam.

Opinion: you do not know it, or you do not recognize my face.
Opinion: taken care who is not gone to that kind one of the place.
Knee in depth in the hoopla, having sunk in your fight.
Too many instabilities that eat on the night.

Marconi played the mamba, listened to the radio.
Not if remembered: of you have constructed them this city,
Has constructed this city on the cliff and the seam?

We have constructed this city. We have constructed this city on the cliff and the seam.
It has constructed this city. We have constructed this city on the cliff and the seam.

Someone that plays always the parlor games.
Who takes care itself? They are always changing the society names.
We wish as soon as to dance here. Someone has stolen the phase.
They call them irresponsible. It writes them outside of the page.

Marconi plays the mamba, listens to the radio.
You if it remembers of has constructed them this city,
Has not constructed this city on the cliff and on the seam

We have constructed this city. We have constructed this city on the cliff and the seam.
It has constructed this city. We have constructed this city on the cliff and the seam.

Other Sunday is right,
In the old police tired with the way
Has obtained the grip of the coil of arrest.
The OH, then, we have lost hardly the beat.

Who counts the monies under the bar?
Who guide the sphere of destruction in two guitars of the cliff?

She does not say to us that you have them need of,
Because we are the ship of shocks
that they try the America,
coming through your schools

(I am observing outside the surplus that bridge of the stringed instrument of the gate gilded outside the other full Saturday of sun gorgeous, not seeing those rejecting to the traffic bumper)

not remembered of (member)(member)

(Than what is your favorite wireless station, in your favorite wireless city? The city from the bay, the city that oscillates, the city that never sleeps)

Marconi played the mamba, listened to the radio,
Not if remembered of you have constructed them this city,
Has constructed this city on the cliff and the seam?

We have constructed this city. We have constructed this city on the cliff and the seam.
It has constructed this city. We have constructed this city on the cliff and the seam.

It has constructed this city, we have constructed this city on the cliff and the seam.
It has constructed this city, we have constructed this city on the cliff and the seam

(we have constructed, we we have constructed this city) has constructed this city
(we have constructed, we we have constructed to this city)

(repeats and fades)