Love notes and housekeeping

I wanted to update the last post, but didn’t want people to miss it so I am heading today with that.  It’s an example of the nightly love notes I mentioned.  Isn’t it just the most 5 year old love thing you’ve ever seen?  She’s such a Kiddo!!!!!!

Other than that, they did some work with Clay this week at school.  Building things and making little things.  So, clay shaping and hardening and the like have been a topic of the week.

Last weekend, we did some cleaning and tidied up some of the clutter.  A Kindergartener generates a TON of art and paper and waste and the like.  So, in the declutter, we had to show off the “space helmet” that was constructed for the space expo that was last month.  After that, it was some Jenga.  Kiddo going full kiddo on it.  

The bad news was that Poley got sick.  There was even a whiteboard X-ray.  This is SERIOUS Stuff!!!!!  Look at all the bleeding.  Even the juicy toots have bleeding.  OH NO!!!!!!!  Then, well, the doc was in.  Poley even had an nurse ambulance crew to get him to Dr. Fix-It-Up.  Leg and body surgery.  Heart surgery.  Back Surgery.  And lastly, Brain surgery, followed up by a math cognitive test. Poley didn’t pass the test, so he will be in hospital all weekend.  Needless to say, we have been keeping a close eye on Poley.  Touch and go, as they say.  I hope the stuffed bear doesn’t die from all these vast injuries.  How will any of us sleep this weekend.  LOL

Also, I missed posting them, but J got some good pics of Kiddo waiting on us after the COVID Shots we got two weeks ago.  I just love her sitting there totally in KiddoLand.

Speaking of J- We may have news and updates on her in the weeks to come.  I can’t say much at this time, but we may have news by the end of April.  We may not.  However, I do want to say publicly, that I think she is amazing as a teacher and wife, mumma and friend, etc etc.  She has handled a transition year (going to Kinder and school leadership transitioning) wonderfully and with grace, even though under the surface she’s been paddling like a duck in rapids.  

The rest of this is my vanity.

After a week of the new Depeche Mode album, I’ve got more than a few cursory thoughts and broad impressions. I still stand by what I said, I see Memento Mori as an album.  Track by track, there is a lot there, but I’ve not really found anything to separate it on a track by track level.  In that, I keep going back to it and just listening.  

I found a review (sorry, no link to it, it’s lost somewhere in my history at this point) that summed up my thoughts pretty well.  Since no link, I do need to paraphrase from memory a bit.

It’s very much a Depeche Mode album; synthy, moody, strangely melodic, and perfectly fitting into the band’s catalog.  It feels like 1986/87 Depeche and would fit well in the Black Celebration era  of the band, but modern and speaking to the world of now.  It feels, front to back, like a love letter to the last 40 years- For the band, the fans, and the music.  

That last line is what got me.  Yes.  A love letter to everything of the last 40 years.  Listening to Memento and then going to Black Celebration, Ultra, and even Sounds of the Universe it fits those points in the bands catalog.  

I’d give a track by track breakdown, but again… It’s an album.  I’ve listened enough to give a track by track breakdown, but I don’t think it’s warranted here.  It will be something I listen to, not something I pull tracks off of.  And that is a higher compliment than it sounds.  Music is my muse, my peace, my daily life blood.  It is something that moves me and is in my everyday.  I have cooking playlists, chilling out playlists, rap, rock, Kiddo, date night, pancake, morning, etc etc playlists.  For albums that I’d put on where it will just be that album; that’s a shorter list, by far.  Seeing my and our numbers for music, it is a huge number.  Music is constant.  In that, however, I’d say that I could really only give you 30-35 albums that I’d play regularly front to back, with another 30-35 that would make the occasionally listen to in full list.  That excludes any trance or electronic albums.  Oh, and a quick check of iTunes, we own over 144,000 tracks and if I go to the alt folder on the hard drive we have, we have approx 450GB of music set aside there.  All told, we have enough music that we could play iTunes and not repeat a track over 4 and a half years of constant play.  Plus Spotify.

Think about the above for a moment.  We have enough music that we could literally go a half decade without listening to the same song or album twice and in that, I can still only name you 50-70 albums that are (imho) worth a front to back listen…. Putting Memento on that list is like making the Hall of Fame.  Yes, I stand by that.  In fact, I stand by that to the point that if I could only have one DM album on that list, Memento might usurp Songs of Faith and Devotion as that album.  The SoFaD album is great and probably my top listened to album of all time, but I could pick 3ish track off of that and be ok with it, but Memento stands above, as no three songs encapsulate this album.  It’s a completed work, even as the last track, Speak to Me flows perfectly to the end and then restarts with My Cosmos is Mine like it was meant to flow back into itself, a perfect circle of sound, voice, emotion, and a 40 year career together.  

Let’s go, Kiddo… Mumma’s got plans tonight with her friend Ash to go to Green Day, but we get to have a Dada Kiddo dinner and maybe an ice cream treat.  Tomorrow is a family day.  Then, next weekend, SONGKRAN!!!!!!!