April 25
The Beach Boys vs James Watt; also, it's a great life
1965
Not bad for the first day. We didn't do much in school. Mostly we started new chapters.
We went to Caldor and I still can't find Othello for English. I've only looked everywhere. Bob got another album - Beach Boys this time. It's cruddy, but if I told him I'd hurt his feelings.
2006 Comment
It's embarrassing that I felt that way about the Beach Boys. At the time, the Beach Boys reminded me too much musically of the Ventures, by then considered an "oldies band". The British groups were reworking oldies with a new sound, which I preferred (though I was beginning to follow Motown more). Besides, the Beach Boys weren't even remotely cute and their appearance was more hoody (old meaning) than mod.
2023 Comment
By 1980, I had learned to love the Beach Boys and even attended their July 4th concert on the National Mall. There are pictures somewhere, if I haven’t destroyed them. This was before Interior Secretary James Watt banned them for attracting “the wrong element” (guilty as charged!). And that was before Beach Boys superfans Ronald and Nancy Reagan slapped Watts down, bring the band back for July 4th , 1984.
1973
Back home again, how nice! Time is flying by again. I am happy to be here. Jim has been so attentive and loving…partly because (I think) I was away so long and partly (I’m sure) because the production pressure was off, at last. It’s a great life.
2023 Comment
I met my husband in 1967 - freshman year of college - when we were both eighteen. We married senior year, and by the time I took the California trip we had hit our first rough patch. He was in graduate school, working on his master’s degree in theatre design and production. I was waitressing at a big hotel. We were both working nights, but he was also on campus during the day quite a bit. It doesn’t sound like a stressful situation, I know. But we had been coasting along in the same place for a while, and change was in the air. The production he was working on was part of his thesis - sets and lighting for Brecht’s “Galileo”. The other part was an actual written thesis, which he was putting off. By April, it was obvious that it would not be done in time for spring graduation. We had already committed to summer theater jobs elsewhere. I had given notice at the hotel. We had let our landlord know we were moving out, but we had no idea where. But “It’s a great life”, anyway.
No spoilers for now; you’ll see what happens over the next few months. You know we are still together, you just don’t know how we did it.
1985
Yesterday was a real good day, in that I got a balance of my work done. This year I spent too much time on service activities and that’s the truth. But I do enjoy some of them,
I have 15 minutes more to work before it’s time to go to day care. This was a short entry. Yesterday I kept seeing pregnant women and being envious.
I guess I am envious.
Comment 2023
“Service” activities = academic speak for committee stuff. I was super involved with professional organizations, which earned me a warning from my chair. Kid #1 was not quite 3, we had just bought a house, and the clock was going tick tock.
2020 (Bullet Journal)
WriteKnit
Jennie
Scott
Fitness
Lily
VacuumSet up TGIF Zoom for 5/1
Comment 2023
Scott who? Who or what is Lily? Still a mystery.
Current status 2023
I had tentative plans to watch “Pathaan” for the fourth time with a friend this evening, but need to postpone. Three of my four works in progress are now finished, so I am snuffling through my yarn stash looking for my next project. Last night I dreamed a brilliant plan for what to do with my writing - both this thing and the book that must not be named. Gone in a *poof* when I woke up, of course.
