Handle With Care (1988) – The Traveling Wilburys

It’s fascinating watching the making of the Wilburys and the process by which they realised a track. Jeff Lynn recalled, ‘Just sitting around in a circle, like 5 of us just strumming acoustic guitars and coming up with a song in a couple of hours. It was almost ready to record. It was unbelievable stuffThe whole thing took six weeks from the first chord to the finished mix of the last song.
Petty said, ‘The whole experience was just some of the best days of my life and I think it was probably for us all. The thing that might be hard to understand is what good friends we were..it was a bunch of friends that just happened to be really good at making music….None of this would have happened without him (George Harrison). It was George’s band and it was a dream he had for a long time.’

Handle With Care is the 4th song to feature here from The Traveling Wilburys, but it was the debut hit single as the opening track of their album Traveling Wilburys Vol. 1. I think it’s one of the most significant songs of the last 50 years. It peaked at number 45 on the Billboard Hot 100 in the United States, number 2 on the Billboard Album Rock Tracks chart and was a top-five hit in Australia and New Zealand.

According to wikipedia: The song was the first recording made by the group, although it was originally intended as a bonus track on a European single by George Harrison. When he and Jeff Lynne presented the song to Harrison’s record company, the executives insisted it was too good for that purpose, a decision that resulted in the formation of the Wilburys.  With no professional studios available at such short notice, Harrison phoned Bob Dylan, who agreed to let them use his garage studio in Malibu (see image left – wikipedia). Tom Petty, who had also been working with Lynne in Los Angeles, was invited the following day, when Harrison went to retrieve his guitar from Petty’s house. George said, I have the first lines, ‘Been beat up and battered around‘, and Dylan asked: ‘So what will we call it‘? George saw a box laying there with the sticker and responded ‘Handle With Care‘ and Dylan responded ‘Oh yeh. Good.’  

Been beat up and battered around
Been sent up, and I’ve been shot down
You’re the best thing that I’ve ever found
Handle me with care


Reputation’s changeable
Situation’s tolerable
But, baby, you’re adorable
Handle me with care


I’m so tired of being lonely
I still have some love to give
Won’t you show me that you really care?

Coupled with a fantastic lyric, this song has a stupendous acoustic and vocal harmony. I was in awe from first listen. I don’t know how many times I have heard this song over the years, but it’s a lot and I still find it a very pleasureable listening experience. It was an exceptional launching pad for the group. Petty and his band the Heartbreakers often performed Handle with Care in concert. Lynne sang it with them at the Concert for George, a year after Harrison’s death in November 2001. The music video below for Handle with Care was filmed at an abandoned brewery near Union Station in Los Angeles.

References:
1. Hand With Care (song) – The Traveling Wilburies

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The AnkiDroid Collection (Part 17) – Extraneous, Pluralism & Missive

Ankidroid additions related to Science, History and Philosophy. More information about Anki can be found in this article.

Extraneous (adj.)

“Not belonging or proper to a thing; not intrinsic or essential, though attached; foreign,” 1630s, from Latin extraneus “external, strange,” literally “that is without, from without” (as a noun, “a stranger”), from extra “outside of” (see extra-). A doublet of strange. Related: Extraneously.

Pluralism

Pluralism is a condition or system in which two or more states, groups, sources of authority coexist. The political philosophy of pluralism suggests that we really can and should “all just get along.” First recognized as an essential element of democracy by the philosophers of Ancient Greece, pluralism permits and even encourages a diversity of political opinion and participation.

Pluralism assumes that its practice will lead decision-makers to negotiate solutions that contribute to the “common good” of the entire society. It recognizes that in some cases, the acceptance and integration of minority groups should be achieved and protected by legislation, such as civil rights laws. The theory and mechanics of pluralism are also applied in the areas of culture and religion.

Missive

A letter, especially long or official. “yet another missive from the Foreign Office“. [From Middle English (letter) missive, (letter) sent (by superior authority), from Medieval Latin (litterae) missīvae, feminine pl. of missīvus, sent, from Latin missus, past participle of mittere, to send .]

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Posted in Reading

Hand in my Pocket (1995) – Alanis Morissette

Alanis Morissette MTV interview 1995

I wonder what talented so and so Alanis Morissette is up to these days and if she is still making great music? The last time I saw her was in a Curb Your Enthusiasm episode seen here where she sabotages her own set. I suppose it was to meet Larry’s storyline, which is self effacing on her part.

Hand in my Pocket is the first song to feature here from the Canadian singer-songwriter. It was the second single from the enormously successful album Jagged Little Pill which I once had in my humble music collection. This song received significant radio airplay and reached No1 on the US billboards. I still feel it holds up solid after all these years and I fondly rewatched her well-received music video. It’s great songwriting:

I’m broke, but I’m happy
I’m poor, but I’m kind
I’m short, but I’m healthy, yeah
I’m high, but I’m grounded
I’m sane, but I’m overwhelmed
I’m lost, but I’m hopeful, baby

And what it all comes down to
Is that everything’s gonna be fine, fine, fine
‘Cause I’ve got one hand in my pocket
And the other one is givin’ a high five

After graduating from high school, Morissette moved from Ottawa to Toronto. Her publisher funded part of her development and when she met producer and songwriter Glen Ballard, he believed in her talent enough to let her use his studio. The two wrote and recorded Morissette’s first internationally released album, Jagged Little Pill, and by the spring of 1995, she had signed a deal with Maverick Records. Every other label turned her down. Ouch!

Ballard said to Rolling Stone: “I just connected with her as a person, and, almost parenthetically, it was like ‘Wow, you’re 19?’ She was so intelligent and ready to take a chance on doing something that might have no commercial application. Although there was some question about what she wanted to do musically, she knew what she didn’t want to do, which was anything that wasn’t authentic and from her heart.

References:
1. Wikipedia – Hand in my Pocket

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16/05/22 – 22/05/22 The Great Schism, Getting Old & Woody Allen

news on the march

Welcome to Monday’s News on the March – The week that was in my digital world.

The Great Schism 1054
Video at Ryan Reeves

Why did Eastern Orthodox and Roman Catholic churches split in 1054 A.D.? This video explores the political, cultural and theological issues between Eastern and Catholic faiths. For example, what is filioque and why was it important? What caused the Eastern Patriarch and the Pope to fight? All of this is covered in this video in the Great Schism of 1054.

Ryan M. Reeves (PhD Cambridge) is Assistant Professor of Historical Theology at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary. (View entire presentation here)

Funny Prayer About Getting Old
Speech at Home Instead

This funny prayer about getting old was the addendum of a short story – A hearty speech by my esteemed blog enthusiast Bruce Goodman. Bruce described the speech as a delightful grace before meals.

With the timing of a professional comedian, this diminutive “little old lady” shines a very funny light on the foibles of aging, to the delight of an audience filled with senior-care experts. A friend of the couple who founded Home Instead Senior Care, Mary Maxwell was asked to give the invocation at the company’s 2009 Convention. Initially it seemed like a normal prayer, but it soon took a very funny turn. Her deadpan delivery and lines like …This is the first time I’ve ever been old… and it just sort of crept up on me … had everyone rolling in the aisles.  (Watch the speech here)

How did Woody Allen become Woody Allen?
Documentary at Sebastian Pereanu

‘I would never want to belong to any club that would have someone like me as a member’

This is the first documentary I have seen about the Writer-Director Woody Allen and I was impressed by its scope, editing and video archive footage and that it achieves a good dynamic. At times the narration leaves a bit to be desired, but in a nutshell this is Woody from his stand-up career through his love life, beliefs, and into becoming the unique filmmaker he is today. (Watch documentary here)

news on the march the end

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Posted in Movies and TV, News, Reflections

Happiness is a Warm Gun (1968) – The Beatles

I was approaching to writing this article like I had a warm gun held to my head. Happiness is a Warm Gun is the first song to appear here at my music library project from The Beatles. What entails the ‘Music Library Project’?
I write this with some trepidation because my library contains few Beatles tracks. I wrote in my scrappy post – Meanderng Thoughts about the Beatles Anthology why I never took so heartily to them unlike most of my contemporary music enthusiasts. Below is a part of that article:

In Australia, my first recollection of hearing The Beatles was at the tender age of six.  In primary school we danced incessantly to Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da and Yellow Submarine. It was a daily exercise ritual and I became increasingly disheartened and uninspired and nothing has really changed for me since about the Beatles. 36 years after the Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da drilling, I decided to watch the eight episode Anthology of the Beatles, to confirm if indeed I had missed something.

Yours truly on right

It’s not as though I didn’t try to absorb the Beatles. I will always relisten to a Beatles track when it is relayed by someone I follow. There are very few songs I haven’t already heard from them. I think I ingrained ‘Hey Jude‘ and ‘Yesterday‘ after first listen even singing the latter at my Year 12 farewell (see image left). I like relistening to some of the Beatles early hits including: ‘We Can Work It Out‘, ‘Twist and Shout‘ & ‘She Loves You‘. I could understand why they were tremendously popular and I don’t underestimate their influence on contemporary music, but I didn’t find them irrepressable like most others. I preferred each Beatle’s solo contribution ‘post- Beatles’ much more.

Today’s featured song ‘Happiness is a Warm Gun‘ is one of their later-experimental hits and if it were not for the phenomenal Chorus which starts from 1:35 and ends the track, it’s unlikely I would have included this song based on the merits of the proceeding verses. All four 4 Beatles identified it as their favourite song on the album and it was banned by the BBC due to its sexually suggestive lyrics; so it had all that going for it:

She’s not a girl who misses much
Do do do do do do, oh yeah
She’s well-acquainted with the touch of the velvet hand
Like a lizard on a window pane
The man in the crowd with the multicoloured mirrors
On his hobnail boots

Lying with his eyes while his hands are busy
Working overtime
A soap impression of his wife which he ate
And donated to the National Trust

According to wikpedia: Lennon derived the title of “Happiness Is a Warm Gun” from that of an article in the May 1968 issue of American Rifleman, the magazine of the National Rifle Association (NRA). The magazine belonged to George Martin, the Beatles’ producer, who had brought it with him to the recording studio. Lennon recalled his reaction to the phrase: “I just thought it was a fantastic, insane thing to say. A warm gun means you just shot something.”

I’m sure more of you, including my good friend – Max at Powerpop can add intrigue and contextualising to this song which I failed to do here today.

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Hand in Glove (1983) – The Smiths

I was umming and erring whether to include today’s song here since I just released an article about The Smith’s Half a Person. I consider Half a Person the superior track and I am still deliberating whether I rate Hand in Glove highly. Hand in Glove was the debut hit by the English rock band and they were united in their belief that it was a song of real quality and it’s now revered as one of the best Smiths songs. I’d intrigued to know what your opinion is of this song.

It was to be our first record and it was important to me that there’d be something searingly poetic in it, in a lyrical sense, and yet jubilant at the same time,” Morrissey explained in an interview with Star Hits in 1985. “Being searingly poetic and jubilant was, I always thought, quite difficult because they’re two extreme emotions and I wanted to blend them together.

Hand in glove
The sun shines out of our behinds
No, it’s not like any other love
This one is different, because it’s us

Hand in glove
We can go wherever we please
And everything depends upon
How near you stand to me

And if the people stare, then the people stare
Oh, I really don’t know and I really don’t care

Hand in Glove written by singer Morrissey and guitarist Johnny Marr was released as the band’s first single in May 1983 on independent record label Rough Trade.  The group booked a one-day recording session at Strawberry Studios in Stockport at the cost of £250, which they produced themselves. It peaked at No. 3 on the UK Indie Chart but did not make the top 75 of the UK Singles Chart, settling outside at No. 124.

Guitarrist Johnny Marr recalled the origins of the song in an interview in 2018 tracing it back to an evening late in 1982, when Marr decided to mess around with an old toy guitar at his parents’ house. “I was playing this riff that I thought was a Chic hitI thought, I really like that, but I had no means to record it.” Their usual composition method was for Marr to add music to Morrissey’s lyrics, though for “Hand in Glove“, Marr had the music first.

Determined not to forget his new riff, the guitarist played it over and over during a journey to Morrissey’s house, though Angie (now Marr’s wife)– an avowed Iggy Pop fan – also threw in a suggestion which inspired Marr to make a crucial refinement to his promising new idea.

She said, ‘Make it sound like Iggy!” Marr recalled. “So I just took that Nile Rodgers thing and just played Iggy Pop chords“. She said, ‘Yeah that’s cool!’ And I was like, ‘Oh really!’” Fortunately for Marr, Morrissey was at home and able to produce his tape recorder. Indeed, the singer was so impressed by Marr’s melody that he reputedly wrote the song’s entire lyric in just two hours. By the time the band got hold of it and further honed the arrangement, The Smiths’ four members were convinced Hand In Glove was their strongest song to date.

References:
1. Dig!- Hand in Glove: How the Smiths’ debut single Made for a Perfect Fit
2. Wikipedia – Hand in Glove

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Hallelujah (1984) – Leonard Cohen (Rufus Wainwright version)

Adam (Leonard Cohen’s son) tells the story of an amusing moment between Cohen and perhaps his closest creative peer, Bob Dylan.

“A lot of people have made the comparison between Bob Dylan and Leonard Cohen over the years and there’s some hilarious stories.”

“Like the two of them are sitting in a cafe in Paris and Dylan says to him, ‘How long did it take you to write Hallelujah?”

“And my father completely lied to Dylan and said, ‘Oh you know couple of years.’ “

“I think it was [actually] seven years”, says Adam.

“And then my father returned the favour and said, you know, ‘How long did it take you to write Just Like a Woman?’ and Dylan said ‘Fifteen minutes’.

“And that’s very much about process I think. Dylan had this quality where he would ‘from the hip’, you know spit and polish, spit and vinegar and then this old man of mine was much more like chiseling marble.

BBC Scotland

Hallelujah is a spiritual masterpiece in contemporary music. Hallelujah is a Hebrew word meaning ‘Praise the Lord‘. The song was released in 1984 on the album Various Positions, but achieved little success initially. Not until it was covered by the likes of Jeff Buckley, Bob Dylan and Rufus Wainwright did it start to garner wider attention. After being featured in the film Shrek (2001), many other arrangements have been performed in recordings and in concert, with over 300 versions known. The song has been used in religious ceremonies, film and television soundtracks and televised talent contests.

Your faith was strong but you needed proof
You saw her bathing on the roof
Her beauty in the moonlight overthrew ya
She tied you to a kitchen chair
She broke your throne, and she cut your hair
And from your lips she drew the Hallelujah

Hallelujah, Hallelujah
Hallelujah, Hallelujah

I find each listen as I try to absorb the lyrics an ineffable experience. I made a family DVD many moons ago for my eldest son’s 3rd Birthday which included his Baptism set to Cohen’s Hallelujah. It is the first song I remember my son being enamoured with – so Hallelujah will always be ‘his’ song. We dedicated another Cohen song to our daughter after she was born called You Got Me Singing.

Written in the key of C major, the chord progression in Hallelujah matches the lyrics from the song: “goes like this, the fourth, the fifth, the minor fall, the major lift“: C, F, G, A minor, F. Cohen wrote around 80 draft verses for Hallelujah, with one writing session at the Royalton Hotel in New York where he was reduced to sitting on the floor in his underwear, banging his head on the floor. His original version contains several biblical references, most notably evoking the stories of Samson and Delilah from the Book of Judges (“she cut your hair”) as well as King David and Bathsheba (“you saw her bathing on the roof, her beauty and the moonlight overthrew you”).

Cohen’s lyrical poetry and his view that “many different hallelujahs exist” is reflected in wide-ranging covers with very different intents or tones, allowing the song to be “melancholic, fragile, uplifting [or] joyous” depending on the performer. Rufus Wainwright’s version below offers a “purifying and almost liturgical” interpretation.

References:
1. Hallelujah (Leonard Cohen song) – wikipedia

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The AnkiDroid Collection (Part 16) – Epistemology, Abuse of Language & Heresy

Ankidroid additions related to Science, History and Philosophy. More information about Anki can be found in this article.

Epistemology

I heard the words Epistemology or Epistemic discussed in Intellectual debates and philosopher discussions, but I didn’t inculcate their meaning. The image above goes a long way towards enabling a better grasp of its inclusivity. Epistemology is the branch of philosophy concerned with knowledge. Epistemologists study the nature, origin, and scope of knowledge, epistemic justification, the rationality of belief, and various related issues. Epistemology is considered a major subfield of philosophy, along with other major subfields such as ethics, logic, and metaphysics.

One could suggest that epistemologically there has been a stark move away from objectivism and behaviourism in education towards subjectivism and a synthetic philosophy which will be expanded in the vocabulary entry below.

The Abuse of Language

I heard the concept ‘The abuse of language‘ in an interview with James Lindsay, but I am unable to locate it at the moment. I did take the following notes from it:
The concept of ‘abuse of language‘ is related to a hyper reality and super syncretic future where people prefer to live in the hyper-real world (pseudo reality) as opposed to the pre-digital analogue one. We are creating a synthetic philosophy and moving to a way of living out of deconstruction by banging the thesis and antithesis together.
Josef Pieper, a German Catholic Philosopher wrote an essay Abuse of Language – Abuse of Power (see image above) about synthetic discourses creating counter-hegemonies; a fake concensus which everyone will be compelled to hold up. Where true communication stops and propaganda begins the moment that words are chosen to influence people rather than to accurately represent reality. For example, ‘If you don’t believe us, you must be a racist’.

Heresy

A belief or opinion contrary to orthodox religious doctrine (especially Christian). Heresy is mainly derived from the Inquisition which started in the 12th century Kingdom of France. A group of institutions in the Catholic Church whose aim was to combat heresy, by conducting trials of suspected heretics.

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Posted in politics, Reading

Half a Person (1987) – The Smiths


Half a Person is another Smithian treasure tucked away on a B-Side. Their songs can be an acquired taste and I find that especially true of this track. The more I hear it, the more I like it. The Smiths guitarist Johnny Marr is famous in his own right (listen to what he does on William It Was Really Nothing at the top of this blog which contains some of the best guitar licks I have heard in any one song), but I love also what he does miniscule on this one. His guitar sound with The Smiths is really rustic and expansive. After Morrissey sings the line ‘I went to London and died‘ Marr jangles with a rudimentary metallic sound like this and after other lines too.
They are just a tight-sounding pub group and Morrissey’s melancholic-black humour trickery is always fun to listen to.

Call me morbid, call me pale
I’ve spent six years on your trail
Six long years on your trail
Call me morbid, call me pale
I’ve spent six years on your trail
Six full years of my life on your trail

And if you have five seconds to spare
Then I’ll tell you the story of my life

Sixteen, clumsy and shy
I went to London and I
I booked myself in at the Y.W.C.A
I said “I like it here, can I stay?
I like it here, can I stay?
Do you have a vacancy for a back-scrubber?”

The lyrics above seem mostly taken from a fan-letter to Morrissey. Speaking to The Face in 1990, Morrissey said that the song was autobiographical. About the woman who writes the letter, he said, “Yes, that is all absolutely true. She does exist.” However, years later, when introducing the songs during a concert in New York, he said, “This is about someone who’s not really a full person.” Then added sarcastically, “Who could that be? I’ve no idea.

This song to me signifies that no matter how famous and rich Morrissey is; it’s not actually going to change his life. He’ll always be 16, clumsy and shy. He even repeats, ‘It’s the story of my life‘ – like his fan who reached out. The song, written in 1986 by Johnny Marr and Morrissey – allegedly on the stairs of Mayfair Studios, London – is one of the lesser known songs by the group. It has remained a fan favourite, although rarely played live by Morrissey.

In case you were wondering, like I was when he referred to the Y.W.C.A and to work there as a ‘backscrubber’: The Y.W.C.A is the Young Women’s Christian Association; a welfare movement with branches in many countries that began in Britain in 1855.
Half a Person was released in 1987 on their compilation album The World Won’t Listen and reached No. 2 on the UK Albums Chart, staying there for 15 weeks. The album was conceived as a collection of the band’s singles and their B-sides from 1985 to 1987.

References:
1. Fashion Music Style – Random Obscurities: The Smiths – Half a Person

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9/05/22 – 15/05/22 Bivol shocks Canelo, Teaching a future PM & If all Humans Die

news on the march

Welcome to Monday’s News on the March – The week that was in my digital world.

Dmitry Bivol Shocks Canelo Alvarez, Wins Dominant Decision

Sports article by Boxing Scene

Last Saturday night Connie and I sat astounded watching one of the greatest recent underdog boxing victories in recent times.  Mexican Canelo Alvarez – the undisputed greatest Pound for Pound boxers of this current age was bizarrely presented in Las Vegas like Apollo Creed in Rocky IV as he confronted the looming Russian boxer Ivan Drago. And we all know how that went down and I remarked to Connie at the time, ‘Don’t you think that’s an ominous sign that they show-biz Canelo up like that before meeting a Russian fighter?‘.

The prefight entertainment and the fight itself on Saturday played out not in dissimilar fashion to the movie. Canelo was moving up in weight to fight a bigger opponent (A Russian no-less) and he was draped by laudits and a huge legion of Mexican supporters at the event and was 5-1 favorite. Understandably Russia is not held in the best regards in the West currently; so while Russian Bivol waited humbly a good portion of time in his corner (like Ivan) as the entertainment rained down on Canelo at the Las Vegas venue; something felt always a bit-off.

The article relayed here is an excellent summary of the fight. Canelo has a contract and brings lots of money to the sport and I knew (and commented to Connie) that Bivol would just about have to knock Canelo out to win the scorecards from the judges (See his Golovkin fight 1) – such is the prevalence of ‘fightfixing’ in the sport. Oh and here is an excellent video of legendary trainer Teddy Atlas talking about ‘How Judges Tried to Rob Dmitry Bivol in Canelo Alvarez Fight‘.

Below are the Bivol – Canelo fight statistics as published in Boxing Scene:

According to CompuBox’s unofficial statistics, Bivol beat Alvarez even more definitively than the scorecards indicated.

CompuBox credited Bivol for landing 68 more punches than Alvarez (152-of-710 to 84-of-495). He landed more power punches (106-of-292 to 74-of-266) and more jabs (46-of-418 to 10-of-229).

Nevertheless, Bivol needed to win the 12th round on two of the three scorecards to avoid a draw. Cheatham, Moretti and Weisfeld all had Bivol in front by only one point, 105-104, entering the final round.

Alvarez should’ve needed a knockout to win when the final round began, but he couldn’t muster much offense against an opponent that simply was better than him on this night. (Read entire article here)

Parliamentary Sub-committee Meeting
Blog article by Bruce Goodman at Weave a Web

This blog story/utterance by a friend I follow daily on WordPress is very short; even by his standards, but he reveals a lot more about it in the comments.
First, the story:

I can understand you wanting a pay rise.

At the end of the day the bottom line is on a go-forward basis. To be honest the reality at this moment in time, if you really think about it, is that it all boils down to it being what it is. The fact of the matter, with all due respect, is that it all adds up to the one thing that matters.

To make a long story short, that really is it in a nutshell.

Have a nice day.

In the comments section Bruce from the ‘actual’ shire reveals the following:

At one stage in New Zealand I had taught 5 members of Parliament – including the Prime Minister! In fact the Prime Minister remembered me saying to him in class: Sit down and shut up. You’ll be Prime Minister one day so learn to shut up now!’ 
And after Bruce wrote: The Prime Minister one was probably the brightest kid I’ve ever taught!

Thanks be to Bruce for changing the course of political history in that little country across the Tasman beside the huge Australia (Read entire article here)

What Will Happen If All Humans Die
Video excerpt at Lex Clips

This is a sober, but eyeopening little inspirational video about the limited-realisation of our individual legacies in the big-picture due to inherent ‘Entropy’ (2nd law of Thermodynamics). I like how the interviewee connects Entropy with his argument, specifically how ants create order through their home-building and how we homo-sapiens also release ‘our heat signature’ through energy to offset Entropy with individual merit and effective collaboration.

Upon reflection of this subject matter, it seems to me that living and truly savouring the moment is the most satisfying aspect of our lives, especially how it affects the people most important to you. Legacy, houses, podcasts, money and statues will be lost to entropy. The only thing we can do is leave our offspring, other family and friends with the moments that hopefully make them better for our existence. (See full Lex clip here)

news on the march the end

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Posted in politics, Science, Sport and Adventure

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