rocket man

If it's any comfort to Old Dog I have done penance for carelessly and grievously misquoting him by listening to Frank Sinatra (ringading) and some guy named Tibbet (very stentorian) singing The Road to Mandalay,  Certainly neither of them toe tappers. well Frank's version maybe if you care for his kind of music, blaring horns and crashing drums.  Recessional was by the Mormon Tabernacle Choir, and not surprisingly sounds like one of those hymns we blasted out at Elsdon Methodist Church.  I could google who wrote the tunes but haven't I suffered enough?

Maybe I should further my penance by watching Rocket Man, it did get fair reviews,  Does it explain the process of how Bernie wrote those words without music?  Perhaps he had the shadow of a tune and Elton greatly expanded it?  I just can't get my mind.around it

She packed my bags last night pre-flight
Zero hour nine AM
And I'm gonna be high as a kite by then
I miss the earth so much I miss my wife
It's lonely out in space
On such a timeless flight

And I think it's gonna be a long long time
'Till touch down brings me round again to find
I'm not the man they think I am at home
Oh no no no I'm a rocket man
Rocket man burning out his fuse up here alone

And I think it's gonna be a long long time
'Till touch down brings me round again to find
I'm not the man they think I am at home
Oh no no no I'm a rocket man
Rocket man burning out his fuse up here alone

Mars ain't the kind of place to raise your kids
In fact it's cold as hell
And there's no one there to raise them if you did
And all this science I don't understand
It's just my job five days a week
A rocket man, a rocket man

And I think it's gonna be a long long time
'Till touch down brings me round again to find
I'm not the man they think I am at home
Oh no no no I'm a rocket man
Rocket man burning out his fuse up here alone

And I think it's gonna be a long long time
'Till touch down brings me round again to find
I'm not the man they think I am at home
Oh no no no I'm a rocket man
Rocket man burning out his fuse up here alone

And I think it's gonna be a long long time
And I think it's gonna be a long long time
And I think it's gonna be a long long time
And I think it's gonna be a long long time
And I think it's gonna be a long long time
And I think it's gonna be a long long time
And I think it's gonna be a long long time
And I think it's gonna be a long long time

Who writes that kind of thing without music?  Being familiar with the song it's impossible for me to read the words without Elton singing them.  It's just my opinion, but without music there is not much there at all.  That thing about Taupin being not that good a friend was something I thought I'd read in a review, but it sounds like I was mistaken there too. 


The Marina City complex contains the towers, the office building, now a hotel to the north, the theater, now the House of Blue, to the west, the towers, and the low-slung building from which they rise.  The towers above the twenty story parking garage are a separate entity.  At the time they were built the idea was that it was a crying shame, all this space downtown and nobody there after five or on weekends.  Sometimes Marina City is portrayed as the vanguard of people living downtown, but it is more of an outlier, since it stood alone for thirty-five years until people started moving into downtown.  Nowadays it is surrounded by towers and I would guess that a third of them are residential, more office buildings to the south and more residential buildings to the north.

And almost all those old art deco towers downtown, not open-planned enough for the contemporary office have become residential, hotels, condos, and apartments.  Apartments are the new trend.  When I moved in all the towers going up to the north were condos, now they are mostly apartments,. Most of them are luxury apartments for the very rich who have like one in New York, one in Tokyo, one in London, etc so they are rarely here in Chicago and their apartments sit empty while poor folk can't even find room in an SRO and have to sleep in the street.  Brings out the commie in me.

In fact apartments have become so popular that condos are being deconverted.  Moneybags buy up condos, take over the condo board, vote to deconvert and you are given some cash but you have to move out or stay at a greatly increased rent.  That is what happened to River Cit, Bernard Goldberg's other creation down the river.  I worry about that happening to us, but our apartments are small and not easily converted to luxury apartments. 

I had tropical fish as a teen, but I have never been a fisherman.  It's like golf, if you want to take a walk in the greensward, why bother to take a bag of clubs with you?  If you want to stare blankly ahead and contemplate god's wonders, why do you need a fishing pole in your hands?  But strolling down the river walk one does come across people with a hook in the water.  Now here comes Sweetie walking down the table towards me and wondering why don't I cast out from the balcony and flip a silvery fish out of the river for her delectation.  I hope you are happy for making trouble.


1500 confirmed cases of the virus with 15 deaths does not come out to a 1 percent fatality rate.  Many of those 1500 confirmed cases will end up dying, they just haven't yet.