Don't forget to visit Jack And Misty's Important Links!
(Go on... you know you want to...)
Our CD catalog:www.elvinsystems.com/jm/catalog.htm
CD BABY:www.cdbaby.com/cd/jackmisty
YOUTUBE:www.youtube.com/jackandmisty
FACEBOOK:www.facebook.com/jackblanchard.mistymorgan
And now, here's our very own Soundclick™ player to while away the days of catching up
with over 100 Jack and Misty songs and productions (and one essay):
Neat, huh?
Misty welcoming friends to our motorhome.
And now... the news...
NEW JACK AND MISTY LOGO UPDATE!
Thanks to Ann Collins for smoothing the edges! :)
--Jack and Misty.
(P.S.: Click on logo to see it at full size! -- Jerry.)
December 26th, 2016...
NOTHING IS OVER LIKE CHRISTMAS.
Nothing is over like Christmas.
Months of anticipation, and then it's gone.
Try to hold on to it and it slides away like a morning dream.
It's Christmas Day and there are no holiday programs on TV.
Not even football in the snow.
It's hard to work up the spirit here in Florida,
but we give it a shot every year.
Misty decorates a tree, and puts Christmas stuff all over the place.
We listen to Christmas music with the air conditioning on
and with palm trees lurking in the front yard.
I get very sentimental about Christmas,
probably because I had real Christmasy holidays years ago,
with folks who are no longer with us,
and my immature subconscious thinks it will happen again.
I toss up futile prayers for snow here in the subtropics,
but this is the time of year
when we just get a cheap imitation of autumn.
A couple of trees around here have a touch of red,
and I go look at them.
Television doesn't help with reports of all night sales,
talking heads urging us to be good consumers,
stranded travelers sleeping in airports,
and carolers singing "Happy Honda Days".
The people who tell us that it's a pagan holiday,
just because it's near the winter solstice,
may not realize what an intrusion that is upon our enjoyment.
I think we can each bring our own spirituality and memories
to the season,
and make it our personal non-pagan celebration.
It's in the spirit of the beholder.
Misty is saving the day
by making an old fashioned Christmas dinner.
I'm setting our bathroom scales back ten pounds.
I think I'll write a letter to Santa,
and ask him for one more snowy Christmas in Buffalo,
where the night is silent,
the homes are warm,
and the feeling is strong in the air.
Coypright © December 25, 2016 by Jack Blanchard. All rights reserved.
Reprinted by kind permission of the author.
December 25th, 2016...
December 16th, 2016...
THE CHRISTMAS TOWN.
It was the day before Christmas.
We were road tired,
and traveling westward through Illinois or Iowa...
on our way to another show somewhere.
We tried to cheer each other up,
and said we'd celebrate our Christmas at a later date.
The countryside looked like a Christmas card
through the windshield of our motor home.
Fine dusty snow was starting to whirl around.
and the Interstate Highway was just about deserted.
It began snowing harder.
We needed a place to pull in for the night,
but we hadn't seen anything open for miles.
We started to get worried.
It was getting dark,
and the wind was blowing the snow into drifts.
We pulled off at the next exit,
but there was no sign of life except an old barn.
The barn had a sign over the door,
and Christmas lights were on inside.
It turned out to be a little store
with a few groceries,
and some antiques for sale in the back.
The owner took us to a little room
where they kept boots and snow shovels.
That's where we plugged in our electric line.
Misty made a good deal...
One night, two dollars.
We dragged our small artificial Christmas tree out of the trunk
and into the bus.
She had it trimmed and lit in about ten minutes.
We'd been on a long hard tour
and we didn't have any presents for each other,
so we looked around at the antiques and things in the store.
We picked out a few gifts,
but we didn't have any way to gift wrap 'em.
Two or three at a time
some people from the town came into the store,
stomping the snow off their shoes
and saying "Merry Christmas" to each other.
They were smiling and friendly
and offered to take our gifts back to their homes
and wrap 'em for us.
When they came back a while later,
our presents looked beautiful.
They brought along some cookies and eggnog,
and we had a little party with these unusual strangers.
We wanted to cancel all our future bookings
and live here.
In the morning we woke up to snow covered cornfields
and a sparkling forest of winter trees.
An old rusty plow and a wagon
were half buried in the snow outside our window..
It was a perfect Christmas.
We don't even know the name of the town,
or which state it's in.
And we haven't been able to find it on any map.
We just think of it as our Christmas Town.
Maybe it's in the twilight zone.
Copyright © December 15, 2016 by Jack Blanchard. All rights reserved.
Reprinted by kind permission of the author.
December 10th, 2016...
And a hush falls over the website as our peerless fearless leader relays the story of...
well... the hush. Pull up a rejoinder and sit down, won't you?
THE HUSH.
I know a lot of folks will always picture me as the guy
with the long hair and weird clothes
who wrote that bird song. Misty Morgan's husband. That's it.
But, we set it up that way to attract attention to our music.
We did our best to stand out from the crowd.
I've been onstage in motorcycle cop boots,
big chrome sunglasses, and a leather cape.
So, if that's all they remember, I can't complain.
We were leaving our Milwaukee hotel,
on the way to do an all-star show
for an audience of almost 50,000 young people.
We were the only country act,
up against a bunch of pop and rock legends.
The elevator doors opened at the lobby, and we stepped off.
Misty wore red sequins from head to toe,
and a black top hat with red sequins.
I wore my Captain America suit.
There was a very dignified elderly couple in the group
waiting to get on the elevator.
I heard him say this: "Somebody wants to be noticed".
Well, DUH!
At the stadium there were almost as many cops as kids.
About a dozen famous acts like Chicago and The Mamas and Papas
were being ignored.
The teens jumped around, screamed at each other,
and threw toilet paper.
It was like singing into a bucket of live bait.
When Misty and I walked onstage there was a hush.
The first and only hush of the day.
We were as unexpected as an auto accident,
and the hyperactive teens just had to stop and stare at us.
They were confused. They'd never hushed before.
Copyright © December 9, 2016 by Jack Blanchard. All rights reserved.
Reprinted by kind permission of the author.
November 29th, 2016...
A WINTER MORNING.
By the time you read this it will not be current,
but I'm writing at the kitchen table on Christmas morning.
It's a little chilly and the steam is swirling up from my coffee cup.
Carolers are singing softly and there are church bells.
I haven't opened the curtains yet
but judging by the grayish light seeping through,
it's a winter day. I haven't heard any snow shovels,
but it's still a little early.
I think I'll plug in the tree lights.
Even through the closed curtains
snow is visible in the corners of the windows.
Holly and candles add color to the room
and the silhouette of a Christmas wreath
can be seen at the front window.
As little as a couple of inches of overnight snowfall
can blow into deep white drifts,
so I feel around under the bed for my high top boots.
The ones with the knife pocket.
And I'd better get out my blue flannel shirt.
The checkered one.
That always feels good and warm on a winter's morning
when the snow is squeaky cold.
We'd better hurry.
We're due at Alan and Vivian's house for Christmas dinner.
Funny, I can't seem to find my high-top boots,
or the flannel shirt,
or even my sheepskin mittens and earmuffs.
Grandma probably put them away somewhere.
I'll ask her.
No, that's right, I can't ask her.
She's not here. She's been gone for some years now.
Sometimes, especially on Christmas, I forget that.
I wonder what ever happened to those old winter clothes?.
Seems like I had 'em just the other day.
Or was it 30 years ago?
Got to go now, we're late for dinner.
Let's not forget to turn off the tree lights
and the air conditioner.
And, oh yes, the stereo Christmas tape.
As I step out the door,
Christmas presents under each arm,
the white glare makes my eyes water.
It could be snow. It really could!
But I feel the Key West coral rock under my feet
as I step down from our motor home
and I hear the waves slapping against the shore
a few feet to my left.
I wonder if they're having snow up home.
Copyright © November 29, 2016 by Jack Blanchard. All rights reserved.
Reprinted by kind permission of the author.
November 24th, 2016...
Or, as we call it around these parts...
HAPPY THANKSGIVING!!!
Now, having said that, let's hear from the one and only. Take it away, Jack...
THE SUNSET TRAIN. (2016 version.)
He headed for the cashier's counter,
hoping that the curtain rods he was carrying were the ones she wanted,
when he saw it for the first time.
Funny! He'd been in this store dozens of times,
but he had never noticed those wall pictures before.
He wasn't much of an art critic,
but he did know he'd never seen anything quite like that train picture.
The surface of the picture was textured to look like a genuine oil painting,
and somehow that scene looked more real than life!
The silver steam from the old engine glowing in the sunset,
billowing against the yellow-blue-orange-pink sky,
the brightly colored, but weather worn railroad cars,
the red caboose so real you could almost step right into it.
Each piece of gravel along the track,
each clump of vegetation on the prairie
was clearly defined and casting a long late afternoon shadow.
The mountains were a bluish haze against the distant horizon.
It was a painting you could stare at for a long time,
finding details previously overlooked.
A bell rang. The store was closing.
On impulse he hurried to the customer service desk
and put the picture on layaway with five dollars
that should have gone toward overdue bills.
He didn't know when he'd be able to manage the eleven-ninety-five balance.
He paid for the curtain rods and went home, feeling a little guilty.
She stood back and looked critically at the curtains she'd hung.
He told her that they made a big difference in the little apartment.
She smiled and said that at least the curtains looked better
than the view of the trash cans in the alley.
He held her and said he wished he could provide her with a better home
with enough furnishings,
and she said that they weren't doing too badly for newlyweds,
and that she believed in him.
He didn't mention the money he'd foolishly spent on a picture of a train.
Payday again, and another losing battle with arithmetic.
If only a tree or a patch of grass could be seen from their window,
it might raise their spirits by interrupting the drabness of their low rent apartment.
He felt sorry for her, being stuck there all day.
At least taking the bus to the factory everyday gave him a change of scene.
These were his thoughts as he paid the cashier
and waited for the large picture to be wrapped.
He centered it carefully on the wall over the chair with the broken spring,
and called her to come in from the kitchenette and take a look at the surprise.
Wiping her hands on her apron,
she glanced around the room until her eyes stopped at the explosion of color.
She almost cried!
It was like having a window to a lovely valley locked in sunset.
They held hands and stared at the painting until dinner almost burned.
Years struggled by,
and the broken spring chair was replaced by a new living room suite,
complete with payment book.
They moved several times in the course of their lives,
first to a couple of larger apartments,
then to a house in a suburban development
and finally back to another cheap apartment,
where they were to spend their autumn years.
The infirmities of old age often require a tightening of purse strings,
but they weren't complaining.
They'd been through rough times before.
Through the years they'd managed to hang on to two treasures:
the Sunset Train painting and their love for each other.
Maybe they weren't so poor after all.
It hit him hard when she passed away.
Somehow, he'd always imagined he'd be the first to go.
He wasn't prepared for the emptiness. Nobody ever is.
He took the habit of talking to her, even though she was gone.
He'd stare at the painting and go over old times.
Sometimes he'd sit for hours in front of the television
but his eyes would wander back to the Sunset Train.
He'd imagine that they were together in that valley,
or riding on the train itself.
The neighbors, aware of his condition since her death,
often dropped in to check on him.
Conversations always gravitated to the unusual painting.
Several days had passed
before anyone noticed the junk mail and newspapers
accumulated outside his front door.
Fearing the old man had died,
and after receiving no answer to their knocking and calling,
the neighbors set their shoulders to the door and the old wood gave way.
Finding no one in the apartment, all clothes intact in the closets,
and the television left on,
the neighbors notified the police of the old man's disappearance.
They arrived shortly after.
While the premises were being inspected,
an officer casually commented to a neighbor,
"Unusual painting in there! So real, I mean!"
"Yeah," replied the other, "everybody remarks about that train picture."
"No," said the policeman,
"I'm talkin' about that picture of the valley and the sunset.
There's a track runnin' through it, but no train."
And he was right. The train was gone.
Copyright © Nevember 23, 2016 by Jack Blanchard. All rights reserved.
Reprinted by kind permission of the author.
October 31st, 2016...
Happy Halloween, folks! And since we up here at The Best Nest In The West™ are celebrating
our beloved Cubbies' Game 5 win (Just two more to go!), we might as well go back in time to 2009,
when Jack wrote about a different kind of bear...
THE BEAR IN OUR YARD.
There is a big black bear living in our back yard.
He moved in some time ago and seems to like it here.
I know he doesn't belong in our neighborhood
because he isn't wearing a baseball cap,
or white socks and sandals..
Everybody around here is afraid of it,
but nobody is doing anything about it.
MY RULES TO AVOID BEAR ATTACKS:
Don’t carry porridge in your pocket.
Don’t walk around with a pic-a-nic basket.
Be extra careful if he has a little bear behind.
Carry a 12 gauge shotgun or a rolled-up newspaper.
Play grind-organ music and see if he can dance.
If he does dance, let him lead.
If it’s bear mating season, wear armored shorts.
If you don’t have armored shorts, ask him to buy you dinner first.
Don’t wear a fur coat.
Throw a jar of honey as far as you can.
While he’s trying to get the cap off, run away.
Yell for help.
If a neighbor comes out, the bear may like him better.
Don’t sleep in a dumpster.
Wave your arms, scream uggabuggabugga, and run at him.
He may think you’re nuts and give up.
Unfortunately, bears don’t give up as often as you would think.
Caution: Bears can run 30 miles per hour.
Even faster if they're in a car.
Copyright © 2009, 2016 by Jack Blanchard. All rights reserved.
Reprinted by kind permission of the author.
October 10th, 2016...
Happy Columbus Day! (Or as it's known these days, Happy "Let's move into someone else's house
and take over on a ridiculously grand scale" Day. [Oooooh, I'm gonna get letters...]
While I'm at it, Happy Belated Anniversary wishes to our favorite couple, Jack and Misty!
(What is it now, 20 years? ;D )
And speaking of living in the past, here's Jack with a new column called... wait for it...
LIVING IN THE PAST.
I spend a lot of time in the past.
Some say you shouldn't do that, but I disagree.
I draw my songs and stories from the past.
In the 60's we put a lot of stuff on our own little label, Zodiac,
and shopped the them around to radio stations and labels.
In 1967, a country DJ named Hoss Moss
heard our "Bethlehem Steel" recording, played it,
and called Wayside Records, a label with national distribution.
They signed us for the four songs
from our first Nashville indie session,
and that led to an album.
Wayside made a deal for distribution
and that's how we wound up on Mercury Records.
When I write a new song I sing it to Misty first.
If she says, "That's really nice" I know it isn't.
I have work on the song until she gives the right reaction.
It's sort of an excitement in her eyes...
sometimes even a tear.
She's my final editor.
We played a lot of Cavalcade of Stars country shows,
and were often asked to be the closing act,
because we did some other stuff the audience liked.
At The Garden State Art Center
there were ten big names on the show.
Every act went overtime
and they made us cut our show to 10 minutes.
That's what the union demanded.
We were mad and so was the audience.
I'd do it all again.
Our life is so strange!
I wonder who is going to play me in the movie.
We're either way up or way down,
and nothing ever happens the way we plan.
Everything seems to happen by random accident,
or by prank.
I seem to be unrealistically happy, though,
and only contemplate suicide on Wednesdays.
My grammar school was pretty strict,
but they gave us education on par with today's
In seventh and eighth grades all us boys had to wear ties.
The result was grotesque but funny.
The most popular style was this:
A blue flannel checkered lumberjack shirt
and a bright red rayon clip-on tie,
with a picture of Popeye on it.
I said, "I always wanted to be a brownie hunter."
Misty said,
"If you say things like that how will I know when you get senile?"
I just said, "A song title: My Pants are Falling Down Over You".
Misty said, "That's an old joke."
I said, "Not to me. I don't remember anything."
I said, "Sometimes I find myself counting my steps when I walk."
Misty said, "So do I."
I said, "Why do we do that?"
She said, "Entertainment."
Misty made cinnamon streusel bread this evening.
There goes my diet.
Copyright October 10, 2016 by Jack Blanchard. All rights reserved.
Reprinted by kind permission of the author.
August 29th, 2016...
Well, another month is winding down (Good riddance, I say. Bring on Autumn already!).
And speaking of odds and ends, here's Jack...
MORE ODDS AND ENDINGS.
We'd been on the road
racing from show to show for a long time.
We were about to drive under an overpass.
Above on the crossing road
an Amish man was driving his horse and buggy at a leisurely pace.
I said to Misty, "I wonder if he's happier that I am?"
Two of our best Key West friends were Mel Fisher and his wife Deo.
He was the treasure hunter
who found millions in Spanish gold and artifacts off the Florida coast.
Mel and I often played chess in a little French bakery and coffee house.
Charlie McCoy plays everything.
Besides harmonica, he's played organ, vibes, trumpet, tuba, and saw
on our recording sessions.
We had a smart toy poodle named Wolf.
On the road in our motor home,
Misty was trying to play fetch with him, throwing a toy.
He humored her a couple of times, and then he did this:
He nudged the toy off the seat with his nose,
and then looked up at her for help.
Misty reached down to the floor and put the toy back up on the seat.
Wolf waited a few minutes and then knocked it off again.
After I watched this a while I realized Wolf had taught Misty to fetch.
If owls were finger lickin' good we'd all be eatin' KFO.
I went to bed kinda happy about last night's column,
and then I woke up today and read it.
It could have been done by a monkey with a typewriter.
I've told that monkey not to do that.
IN THE FUTURE... There will be no more rest rooms.
There will be an app on your cell phone for that.
One of the side effects of my new medicine:
Involuntary tap dancing.
It was a bright sunny day...
I was up early doing my hallucinations before breakfast.
I did a complete workout...
deltoids, adenoids, Altoids, and factoids.
biceps, triceps, and forceps.
If I were forced at gunpoint
to name the best musician we've ever recorded with,
I would probably say Hargus "Pig" Robbins.
If it was really at gunpoint I'd say whatever they wanted to hear.
ONE REASON I LIKE THE CRACKER BARREL...
It's a big place full of people actually talking to each other.
When the horse dies, get off.
Copyright © August 29, 2016 by Jack Blanchard. All rights reserved.
Reprinted by kind permission of the author.
August 21st, 2016...
An observation from YFNW™:
If these are the dog days of summer, the dog can have them.
(Of course, I wouldn't do that do a dog ;) ) And with that less-than-sterling
announcement out of the way... here's Jack!
THIS IS TOM T. HALL.
"This is Tom T. Hall", he said.
I think I'd have recognized the voice on the phone
even if he hadn't said his name.
I almost hadn't answered because I couldn't find the phone.
I don't keep my music room too neat.
Once we returned from a tour and found the cops at our house.
They said our front door was open and my studio had been ransacked.
I told them: "No. That's just the way I usually keep it".
Tom T. and I had talked a few times at parties, etc., around Nashville.
We had the same manager, Bob Neal, and the same label, Mercury,
but we didn't exactly "hang out".
In Nashville we were all too busy to really get to know each other.
I was surprised by the call.
He said he'd been reading a book of mine on a plane.
I asked where he'd gotten it. It wasn't exactly a best seller.
He told me somebody on the plane gave it to him.
I think he said it was Loretta Lynn.
The point of the call was this:
He wanted me to write the liner notes for his upcoming album.
I said, "What do you want me to write?"
He said, "Just write that kind of stuff that you write.
That's what I want on there".
The album was "We All Got Together And..." (Mercury SR61362.)
I'd never heard the songs, and had no idea what the theme was.
The most popular song from the LP was "Me and Jesus",
I learned that later.
I worried about it for about ten minutes,
And then wrote this:
“WARNING:
DO NOT hold this album under the hot water faucet,
as the people living inside the record might pop out into living 3-D,
right there in your kitchen... or even worse, your bathroom.
The crowd might be hard to explain to the landlord.
“This same warning applies to any Tom T. Hall record
because of his secret recipe for canning REAL people
like you and me and Luther Short into plastic discs,
without losing the original flavor.
“The characters in his songs act completely on their own,
sticking up their noses at Mr. Hall.
They couldn't care less if he is stuck without a romantic ending,
or an earthshaking moral.
They've got their own troubles, and they work them out in their own way.
Thanks to the miracles of science, we can eavesdrop in living stereo.
“Heroes and beautiful people are the usual favorites of storytellers,
but Tom T. finds poetry in us ordinary hairy-legged mortals,
with our petty selfishness, hypocrisy, and intolerance...
our weaknesses, and our occasional goodness.
“So, step inside.
You're likely to run into yourself somewhere in this record.
“And, oh yeah, like I said at the beginning,
Keep this record dry, and out of the reach of children.
And please keep Tom T. Hall's picture off the floor if you have pets."
Copyright © August 21, 2016 by Jack Blanchard. All rights reserved.
Reprinted by kind permission of the author.
August 1st, 2016...
Well, days may come, and days may go, but a day without some words from Jack
would just be as dull as dishwater. So... drink up! :D
MORE TRUE STORIES AND A FEW LIES.
TRUE STORIES.
Around 1970 Misty Morgan and I were in a Nashville eatery,
about like a Steak & Shake,
when a young guy came over, stood in front of our table and said,
"My name is Kinky Friedman and I'd like to show you something."
He took off his hat and his hair was exactly the shape of the hat.
Like a Jello mold.
One day in the 1970s,
Misty was driving down the Orange Blossom Trail in the Corvette
with a U-Haul trailer hooked on the back.
She saw something orange pass her on the right.
The trailer had come unhitched
and rolled up onto a lawn with a Fortune Teller sign on it.
A big woman came out and yelled at Misty.
Misty said, "If she's a psychic she should have expected it."
In a store a lady looked at me and said,
"Didn't you used to be somebody famous?"
I said, "No, I used to be Jack Blanchard."
I read this on a men's room wall in a Key West saloon:
Somebody wrote, "I LIKE GRILS".
Then somebody else crossed out "GRILS" and wrote "GIRLS".
Then a third party wrote, "WHAT ABOUT US GRILS?"
***************************************************************
A FEW LIES.
When we crossed the Florida state line,
they had a livestock inspection and we lost our whole band.
In the hospital I said to a guy,
"I'd hate to be hooked up to that machine!"
He said, "So would I. It's a floor scrubber."
WRITING ON A RESTROOM HAND BLOWER...
1. Press button;
2. Rub hands under dryer;
3. Wipe hands on pants.
I don't hear high frequency sound as well as I used to,
so when birds are singing I just stand under the tree
and watch them flap their beaks.
In public restrooms I flush with my foot,
turn the faucet with my elbows,
and when I leave I open the door with my teeth.
Copyright © July 31, 2016 by Jack Blanchard. All rights reserved.
Reprinted by kind permission of the author.
July 3rd/4th, 2016...
A VERY unexpected surprise! Usually, WHPSLP Records sends two Jack & Misty songs
in their promo discs. Well, look what happened to the second track, "The Lonely Sentry":
This was a Starday release by Rusty Diamond with "Maryanne Mail" (Misty Morgan).
And here's its own dedicated player, in case you want to hear it
(Just make sure to turn the OTHER player off first!):
Oh, click HERE for the lyrics.
And congratulations to Jack and Misty (and Rusty, of course!) for another chart-topper!
Misty's been finding things in an old trunk.
I don't remember where we got this cartoon.
It's dated 1984.
(P.S.: Click on picture to see... well... a bigger picture!)
June 18th, 2016...
Hi again, gang. YFNW™ Jerry here. As you can see, we've been away for a
few days, but now we're back. Yay!
To commemorate this oddball occasion, Jack dug into his Dusty Scrapbook
files (Dusty Scrapbook... that was an unsuccessful country singer in Bend,
Oregon.) and... well... let Jack tell you the rest...
THE DISNEY WORLD GROUNDBREAKING.
I just found an old newspaper article I wrote
back when I was a cub reporter.
It's about The Walt Disney World groundbreaking,
The truth can be funny.
* * *
It was a Rolaids morning.
At 8:37 AM I remembered why I stopped getting up early,
when stomachs growl,
and the breath of man strikes fear into the hearts of moose.
The Parkwood Plaza Cinema was packed with press people,
snapping pictures and interviewing the crap out of each other.
At the Disney Groundbreaking Press Conference
I thought there would be mice and ducks,
but not an animal spoke, and not a magic wand waved.
The affair proceeded with the hilarity of a colonoscopy in the rain.
One by one, executives confessed to excitement,
undetectable to the human eye.
The audience reacted with a burst of apathy.
There were speeches
about hydro-pneumatic modular electromagnetic prefabrication,
followed, two or three days later by a spirited race to the rest rooms.
I think Scrooge McDuck is running the company.
We stood in awe of cardboard models
hovered over by cardboard dignitaries,
while cameramen kneeled and stretched in their native dance.
News people rattled off reporter lingo into phones,
scooping each other.
I was amazed to see many of them typing.
I do all my writing with a brown crayon.
Buses carried us to a two-hour presentation of mud,
where holes were being dug on Disney swampland.
Balloons represented future hotels
which were the project's main theme.
I awoke with a start when the bus door opened,
thinking we had reached Cincinnati,
only to find us at a Ramada Inn.
I checked my watch.
It had rusted to a stop.
A nice lunch of Chicken Formica awaited us poolside.
There was no shade,
so we ate, glowered, and watched each other burn,
to the music of a sweating Latin band.
I was in such pitiful shape
that when I got home my dog tried to bite me.
The family asked me how it went.
"Disney magic was all around", I said.
"The entire day was one of beauty and song."
Copyright © June 17, 2016 by Jack Blanchard. All rights reserved.
Reprinted by kind permission of the author.
May 25th, 2016...
Who's in the mood for a shaggy dog story?
Sorry, all we've got is a basset hound. Tell 'em, Jack...
CECIL.
Back in the Dark Ages we bought a Basset Hound puppy.
and named him Cecil.
He was the cutest dog we'd ever seen
and could have had his own TV show.
He would climb up on a table to look out the window,
knocking over a lamp and a vase.
If one of us would try to get him down from the table he'd bite.
He bit the kids and he bit Misty.
Misty said, "You don't bite the hand that feeds you."
When we moved from Miami to Key West Cecil went with us.
He wasn't satisfied with the accommodations
and tried to destroy the trailer one bite at a time,
so when we went to work each night
we tried putting him in the bathroom with food, water, and toys.
Cecil didn't like toys and never played.
He also didn't like the bathroom and systematically took it apart.
First he chewed up the bottom of the door,
but the hole wasn't big enough so he climbed up on the sink
and turned the water on.
He thought the mirror was a window.
He pooped in the sink, walked around in it
and used it to decorate the mirror.
When we got home he looked at us with disdain
and started coughing just to punish us.
The next day we took him to a vet.
He told us the coughing was from howling all night
while we were gone.
An employee at the club where we were playing
said that she knew the mayor and that he would take the dog.
She came and got Cecil the next day.
He walked away with her and never looked back.
She later said that the mayor had to let the dog sleep with him
to stop the howling.
So Cecil slept with the mayor and took a social step up.
I think that all the time he lived with us he wondered who we were.
Copyright © May 25, 2016 by Jack Blanchard. All rights reserved.
Reprinted by kind permission of the author.
May 24th, 2016...
THE JUNCTION.
A seldom used railroad track crossed Payne Avenue, North Tonawanda.
There was a tiny one room station that had once been a whistle-stop,
but had later become a small store, a diner,
and then an abandoned oddity,
leaving the area it's name, The Junction.
The corner was now a bus stop, and at it's busy time of the afternoon,
when workers were getting off buses after a day at the factories.
I was with my then girlfriend and another couple,
and there were maybe thirty or forty people moving around
when the golden UFOs soared to exactly over our heads and stopped.
The didn't slow down, they just stopped.
They didn't make a sound.
Everybody stared up at them, stunned.
Nobody was going to believe this, and yet, there they damn were.
The were three of them,
glowing chrome orange as if reflecting a sunset,
but there was no sunset.
They were not like any UFO pictures I've ever seen,
because they weren't horizontal like Frisbees.
They were vertical... upright on their edges.
They hung motionless for a couple of minutes.
Not a sound in the air.
Then they suddenly resumed their thousand mile per hour speed
till they were above the line of trees to the north,
then took a sharp right turn
and disappeared over the roofs and trees to the east.
People were excited about it for a week or two,
and then a strange human thing happened.
The ones who actually saw the phenomenon
began to doubt their own accounts,
and in time the talk stopped and it all just faded out of most memories.
Not mine.
I was determined to not forget.
Not ever.
I don't talk about it much
because people only believe in socially acceptable fantasies.
Almost two decades later
Misty and I were driving home from a gig at two in the morning.
It was a new road,
a by-pass that had just opened a day or two before,
and we we the only car on it.
As we approaches the western fence of the Opa Locka Air Field,
we saw a huge old plane coming in with no landing lights
and no runway lights.
Just the moon.
It seemed to be flying low over the road, facing us...
too low for comfort.
As we got closer the plane seemed to be standing still,
and we drove right up under it.
I said "What the hell?" and we got out and looked up.
It appeared to be a rusty Douglas DC-3 cargo plane
from World War Two,
just hanging there a hundred and fifty feet above us.
There was no sound whatsoever, not even crickets.
We took off fast.
Later I mentioned it at a family dinner.
My mother remarked
that The Opa Lock Air Field was where planes took off
that were lost in the Bermuda Triangle.
Copyright © May 24, 2016 by Jack Blanchard. All rights reserved.
Reprinted by kind permission of the author.
May 22nd, 2016...
Okay, this is a day early, but it still bears mentioning...
HAPPY BIRTHDAY, MISTY!!!
And many more. :)
May 9th, 2016...
THE TEAR.
For Mothers' Day.
There's something about a photograph.
Many people believe
that having your picture taken steals some of your soul.
I look at pictures of friends and relatives who have died,
and I can see that soul, especially in the eyes, the expression,
and even the body language.
I have a picture of my mother
taken at a holiday gathering during her later years.
She was smiling, and seemed to be in the Christmas spirit.
I've looked at that picture many times,
but a few weeks ago, I enlarged it,
and thought I saw something.
I hit the 200% button, made it really big,
and zoomed in on her face.
The smile was still there,
but in her eye I saw something unexpected:
A tear.
I sat back in shock and took a deep breath.
What could she have been thinking?
Was it a tear of joy or sadness?
Did she know that it may be one of her last family moments?
I asked her that question aloud,
but the photograph didn't answer.
I'm sure we were all enjoying the moment together,
but at the same time, taking it for granted.
You always think there will be many more.
Now I realize my mother was not taking that moment for granted.
I keep going back to look at the photo,
even though it's burned into my mind,
and my heart.
When I discovered the tear behind her smile,
I had tears to match hers.
We spoke to each other beyond the limits of time and space.
There is soul in a photograph.
Copyright © 2016 by Jack Blanchard. All rights reserved.
Reprinted by kind permission of the author.
May 8th, 2016...
Just so you know...
Happy Mother's Day!
And of equal import...
HAPPY BIRTHDAY, JACK!
Just something we thought should be said. :)
YFNW™, Jerry.
May 2nd, 2016...
In case you missed Jack and Misty's interview yesterday on WKCR 89.9 FM,
New York... or if you just want to hear it again... we've got you covered!
Just click here:
https://www.dropbox.com/.../01%20JackBlanchard_Interview...
Find and click the "DOWNLOAD" button.
Then you can play it on any music player in your computer.
Enjoy!
April 28th, 2016...
INTERVIEW...
We did an interview today on radio station WKCR-FM 89.9, New York City.
The show is called Tennessee Border Show.
It will air this Sunday at noon, if you're in that area.
April 24th, 2016...
Well, the year's almost a third over with (and some say it can't end soon enough,
but they're just poopyheads). Time to put a little optimism back in our lives, and
who better to do that than our favorite composer of peerless lieders, namely...
Jack.
So here he is...
OH, TO BE YOUNG AGAIN AND FULL OF FALSE HOPE!
I was riding on a bus early one hangover morning,
going into Buffalo from Tonawanda to look for a job.
I saw a peaceful little chapel in a graveyard across the road.
I asked the driver to stop
and I went across and into the unlocked chapel.
There were just three or four pews on each side of the aisle.
The colored light rays coming through the stained glass windows
gave it the mood I needed at that point in my life, serenity.
I got a job at the cemetery just so I could eat lunch in the chapel.
Misty Morgan and I were never Nashville insiders,
and we never got paid for most of our efforts,
but for some reason we still love our work,
and will never retire.
We're waiting for some excitement... a tour...
the Big Break.
HOW WE GOT TOGETHER...
Misty and I were aware of each other
because we both played piano in Hollywood FL
and our pictures were often in the paper.
I went to a club where she had her band, and checked her out.
I made a date with her, and she stood me up
because her friends had told her I was a gangster, which wasn't true.
I just worked for them.
A few months later we were both playing piano bars
in downtown Hollywood, on US #1, about a block apart.
I dropped in on my club on my night off
to see how they were doing, and Misty was talking to my boss,
trying to get my job.
We began seeing a lot of each other.
The boss told Misty that he was happy with me on piano,
but he invited her to stay and have dinner.
It was a first class Italian restaurant called The Copa.
Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, Jimmy Durante all dropped in when in town.
I met Joe DiMaggio there and had dinner with him.
Misty and I tried working together
and wound up homeless on the street for a while.
Then we lived happily ever after.
I was playing at a piano bar in Hollywood.
On a break, a woman at a table alone, called me over.
She motioned to me to lean down
so she could whisper something to me.
She said softly "You think you're so hot playing up there
being the center of attention.
Well, I think your music stinks and I don't like your hair."
I jumped back and shouted "FIFTY DOLLARS?!"
Then SHE was the center of attention.
IN ONE YEAR AND OUT THE OTHER.
I'm blessed... to have Misty as a life partner.
I’m hopeful... that we make our music together for many more years.
I'm lucky...to have so many helpful friends,
many of whom I've never met face to face.
This may or may not be the best year of my life,
but I'm glad to be in it.
Copyright © April 24, 2016 by Jack Blanchard. All rights reserved.
Reprinted by kind permission of the author.
April 7th, 2016...
'Nuff said. :)
April 6th, 2016...
MILESTONES...
Forty-six years ago this week our Tennessee Bird Walk reached Number One
on The Billboard Country Chart. It was our second charted single.
It was Number One for two weeks, and spent 16 weeks on the chart.
It was also #23 on the top 40 POP chart.
April 1st, 2016...
Well, here we are, a quarter of the year's officially in the books, and
it's time for another classic from Jack. So here it is...
POTSO.
Potso lived in the gray shingle house
two doors up the street from me.
His real name was Robert Stanley.
I don't know how he got the nickname "Potso".
He was Potso when I got there.
He was a couple of years younger than the rest of us neighborhood kids,
and not very good at sports,
but he tried.
His cheeks were red, and his nose ran a lot,
especially in the winter.
It's hard to be cool when your nose is running.
I don't know who tagged him with "Potso",
but I don't think any of us meant it in a mean way.
Mr. Pennell, a neighborhood dad, made a rock garden in his backyard,
and decorated it with cement imitation stones.
Each stone was engraved with the name of one of us kids.
"Potso" was there in a place of honor.
I can tell you this: If anybody picked on our "Potso",
they'd have to deal with us.
As a couple of years went by,
Potso began suggesting that we call him Robert.
I think it was his mother's idea.
She was a pretty and intelligent lady, but I didn't realize that until later.
We tried to remember to call him Robert,
but habits are hard to break.
Robert's father was everybody's handyman,
doing simple chores up and down the street.
My parents said he was "shell-shocked".
He was a sweet, childlike man, who smiled, but never talked much.
He walked with a slightly unsure gait.
The Stanley's were the object of quiet sympathy.
Sympathy can hurt.
One day we were all shocked to hear that Mr. Stanley had died.
Kids aren't used to death.
I don't remember when Robert and his mother moved away.
A few years later,
I got a Christmas season job jumping on and off a delivery truck
while the driver sat in the warm cab,
smoking cigars and drinking something
from a bottle he carried in a paper bag.
One cold afternoon, we were delivering in a section of town
that was a step or two classier than where I lived.
I went up the porch steps of the two-story brick house,
and rang the upstairs doorbell.
Robert Stanley answered the door.
He looked different.
I think he was on his way out
because he was wearing expensive looking clothes,
with a camel hair fingertip length topcoat.
He still had the rosy cheeks, but his nose wasn't running.
I was happy to see him, and started a conversation.
His mother came down the stairs behind him
and told him he'd better hurry.
She was polite, but I could feel she wasn't really glad to see me.
I felt a little slighted, but after I thought it over I realized this:
They had their new life where nobody felt sorry for them.
She didn't want him to be Potso anymore.
Copyright © 2002, 2016 by Jack Blanchard. All Rights Reserved.
Reprinted by kind permission of the author.
March 20th, 2016...
(Thanks to Gary Punch for this picture!)
February 29th, 2016...
YOU HAVE TO LAUGH.
Misty and I once bought a raggedy old limousine for $90.
We needed transportation and would rather look eccentric than poor.
To add to the effect,
we colored it powder blue with house paint and a brush.
At a gas station two tough guys said they knew the car
and we owed big money there.
We'd never been there before in our life!
I floored it and sped away at four miles an hour.
Nashville, 1970's...
We played a couple of weeks at The Four Guys' Harmony House.
All our friends from Nashville packed the place to see us.
Bob Neal had been our manager for two years
and had never seen our show.
He came in on our last night and said,
"Wow! I didn't know you folks could do all that! I'm impressed!"
I said, "Bob, don't you think it's a little late?"
We left Neal and went with Bill Hall.
Miami, early 1960's...
Misty and I were just coming off being homeless and on the street,
when a couple of musicians who had always snubbed us
asked us to fill in on their gig
because they had to do something else to do for two nights.
It was in Hialeah near the race track and a winner came in
and tipped us $100.
We almost passed out!
We never told those guys about the tip. Why make them cry?
A former associate of ours once kept our new Corvette
locked in his garage in New Mexico, and wouldn't let us have it.
We called a friend in Massachusetts and he flew out there,
broke into the garage, and stole it back for us.
We have always gotten by with help from our friends.
When I left Buffalo they had just started building the beltway.
The next time I got back the beltway was worn out.
I never got to enjoy it in its prime.
And it never got to enjoy me in mine.
While I'm here doing stuff, The Golden Girls is on in the background.
Eddie Bracken is the guest star.
He was a famous comedic movie star and then on a lot of TV shows.
Misty and I met him in a pizza bar in Juneau, Alaska.
I've been barred from Friday night Bingo,
just because I like to stand in the back of the room
and yell out random numbers.
We have neighbors from New England.
They drive golf cats.
Nick next door has an herb garden.
Misty says they give her energy.
I don't know if that's true, but she's out chasing cars.
They say that in case of severe storms
you should go into an interior room.
In a mobile home that's the refrigerator.
Misty just came from Publix.
She told me a guy said this to her:
"I saw you over there giving the bananas a dirty look."
She said to the guy, "They started it."
I like to go to quilting on Monday night
and wait for the fights to break out.
I said, "What are we having for supper?"
Misty said, "A pile of debris."
I said, "A French dish."
I'd better go now. The nurses are stealing my shoes.
Copyright © February 28, 2016 by Jack Blanchard. All rights reserved.
Reprinted by kind permission of the author.
February 21st, 2016...
A stylized picture of Jack and Misty singing. Wow!
(P.S.: Click on picture to see it at full size! -- Jerry.)
February 14th, 2016...
February 9th, 2016...
So THAT'S how it's done! Here's Jack to explain...
52,000 intelligent, good-looking readers.
HOW TO BECOME PRESIDENT.
“You rang”, said the Devil? “That was fast”, said Herk Carlson.
“We aim to please”, said Satan. “What’s up?’
“I might be interested in selling my soul”, said Herk,
“or maybe just renting it out.”
“Make me an offer”, said the Devil.
“Well, I’ve had my eye on being a celebrity”.
“What field”, asked the Devil. “Show business?”
“Sort of”, said Herk. “I’d like to be pope.”
“Sorry. We don’t do popes”, said the Devil.
“Could you make an exception”, asked Herk?
"My soul is in showroom condition. Hardly used.”
“You’d have to throw in something besides just your soul”, said the Devil.
“I’m up to my tail in souls. I may have to have a yard sale.”
“Hmmm”, said Herk.
“I could get you into Congress”, said the Devil. “I have connections there.”
“If I only wanted to be a politician I wouldn’t need your help. No offense.”
“None taken”, said the Devil,
“but you’d be surprised how many politicians use our services.”
“I’ll think it over”, said Herk.
“How about Governor of California, or even President?” asked the Devil.
“Very tempting” said Herk.
“Hey, tempting is what I do”, said the Devil.
“I have your number”, said Herk.
“And I have yours”, smiled the Devil.
"There’s no hurry”, said Herk, pretending he didn’t care about being president.
“We have all the time in the world. At least I do”, said the Devil,
vanishing in a burst of flame.
The Devil reappeared a moment later and said,
“Sorry about the fireworks. Old habits, you know.”
Satan picked up his briefcase, walked to the elevator,
and pushed the “Down” button.
Herk stood there thinking about who he would like to invade first.
Copyright © February 8, 2016 by Jack Blanchard. All rights reserved.
Reprinted by kind permission of the author.
February 4th, 2016...
And you think YOU'VE had one of those tours...
A NOTE FROM WILL CAMPBELL:
Jack, Yesterday I worked at the Villages, near Leesburg. I played as if I knew what's what.
After I'd finished performing the first set, I noticed an old man sitting up close to the stage.
He didn't look well, so I walked over and said: "I hope you get better." He looked up and said:
"I hope you do, too." Then I asked if he'd heard my last song, and he quickly said, "Lord, I hope so."
52,000 intelligent, good-looking readers.
MISTY’S FIRST PARTY.
It was Misty’s first party and she really wanted it to go well. It did for an hour or so.
During the earliest years that Misty and I were together we played in some small nightclubs
in Hialeah, Florida. These jobs were always five or six nights a week, long hours, and short pay.
We got by. We had never lived in a place where we could have guests over.
We finally moved into a cluster of bungalows off Flamingo Way,
Hialeah’s main drag.
The white cabins looked like an old-fashioned motor court,
but each contained a little efficiency apartment.
It was just before Christmas,
and Misty was anxious to have our first party. I guess I was too.
She went to a lot of effort to fix the place up
and get the food and drinks just right.
(I wrote “food” in the previous sentence
because I don’t know how to spell hors d'oeuvres.)
We had only invited a few musician friends,
but we felt like real people for a change,
instead of rooming house rats.
The little tree was lit, and tastefully, though cheaply, decorated.
She had carols playing softly behind the conversation,
which was mostly about how rotten night club owners were,
and why the bad musicians got better gigs than we did.
The usual musician stuff.
Then the police car lights came swirling
like a winter snowstorm, only blue and red.
People were running by our place in all directions.
There was loud pounding, and the crash of a door being broken down.
Then the ambulances and fire trucks screamed in
and more hurried scuffling around.
To our horror, they started running by our window,
carrying people or bodies out on stretchers.
We started to go out to see what the matter was,
but the cops told us to stay inside.
We did see that the cabin in question was right next door.
Two people had died in their beds,
and one was found on the kitchen floor.
It was a chilly night and they had the gas heater on.
But there was no gas smell.
Later investigation raised the theory
that the flame in the gas heater had burned up the oxygen in the air
and they had suffocated.
Jalousie windows may have been the cause.
They are made of horizontal glass slats
that crank shut and seal more tightly than most windows.
Our guests left. We were depressed.
In later years, with some distance and time between us and that night,
the terrible event slipped into our cluttered past.
I felt sorry for Misty. It was her first party.
Copyright © Jack Blanchard 2004, 2016. All rights reserved.
Reprinted by kind permission of the author.
January 29th, 2016...
52,000 intelligent, good-looking readers.
NOT A LIVING SOUL.
The back country road led to Cassadaga, the Spiritualist center.
We turned right at the old hotel and threaded through the little lane
that winds past the church and around Spirit Lake.
Not a living soul was out in the afternoon heat.
I'd been here before to do a series of articles,
and was well past the stage of being spooked.
But I was nervous today.
I was here for my first "reading" with a medium.
It wasn't ghost fear I had, but fear of letdown.
I had tried to be open-minded.
I just didn't believe in talking spirits.
As our tires brushed to a stop against the high curb
under the Spanish moss,
I was preparing myself for disillusionment.
I looked at the small countrified house
and was already pre-hearing
the vague, but tricky generalizations
that fortunetellers are known for.
I was going to have none of it!
No table thumping either.
First of all, I thought,
if the medium does actually contact dead people,
my dad, John, and my grandparents, Clair and Ethel,
would surely try to reach me.
I tried not to look suspicious
as Mae Graves Ward led me into her pleasant little reading room,
and invited me to sit in the old rocker in front of her desk.
Before I sat down she said this:
"John is here"
"I know it's a common name", she apologized,
"but there's a man named John here.
Do you know him?"
John then proceeded to recap our lives together,
making comments on things I'd done since his departure.
He joked around a little, in his way,
and sent greetings to my mother,
although he knew she wouldn't believe it.
The sun came through the white lacy curtains
as Mrs. Ward continued to doodle with a pencil on scrap paper,
and cheerfully relay messages from the other side.
"Did your father have a younger sister
who passed away very young", she asked?
I said no, a little embarrassed at her mistake.
"Well", she smiled, "We can't win 'em all.
This young girl is here anyway.
She seems to be about twelve years old,
and her name starts with an 'Ro'.
Maybe Roberta".
"I don't know who she is", I said.
She came a little too close for comfort with my grandparents.
Right on the money.
And she introduced a lot of other people.
Most I recognized, a few I didn't.
I left the five-dollar donation, said goodbye,
and returned to the car in a daze.
Misty asked how it went.
I said, "I can't talk about it just yet.
I have to try and digest all that just happened."
The sun was setting
and the fishing boats were coming in
as we crossed the St. Johns River bridge,
and I began to talk.
And I went over it again later for my mother's benefit,
as we sat around the dining table.
"But the medium missed a couple of things", I said.
"For instance,
she asked if Dad had a sister named Roberta who died young."
"Her name was Rosie", my mother told me.
"She died at twelve years old."
Copyright © 2003, 2016 by Jack Blanchard. All rights reserved.
Reprinted by kind permission of the author.
January 25th, 2016...
52,000 intelligent, good-looking readers.
HARD TIMES IN HOUSTON.
Just a short time before this true story starts
Misty and I were performing concerts with major stars,
such as Merle Haggard, Jerry Reed, B.J. Thomas, Tom T. Hall,
Faron Young, Charlie Pride, Boots Randolph,
George Jones and Tammy Wynette, and others.
We were never anybody's opening act,
but either "stars" or "special guest stars".
The agents' contracts called it "100% billing".
We also did television with Jackie Gleason, Dick Clark,
Carol Channing, Mama Cass Elliot, and on and on.
This was in the 1970s.
Then things changed.
UPSTATE NEW YORK:
In the 1980s we were doing a few country shows,
booking our trio in jazz lounges in the North East,
and just about breaking even.
When we were playing at a Hyatt hotel in New York
a man approached us with an offer of sixteen weeks in Houston.
We were relatively happy where we were,
but a sixteen week contract is more security, we thought.
HOUSTON:
First of all, two thirds of the audience hated us
because we weren't a cover band, as they were used to.
One woman yelled out at the end of our set,
"They didn't play ONE SONG I know!"
We had our handful of fans so we worked to them,
but it was a rough start
and turned out to be a bad omen.
The temperature was 105 and humid.
We were living in our motor home on a gravel site
behind an RV parts store, the T-pipe on our sewer broke
and there was nobody to fix it but me.
It had to be done. so I slid under the rig on the gravel
and some weeds I didn't recognize as poison ivy.
It was a Sunday and the parts store was closed,
but Misty saw a couple of guys in there and banged on the door.
They refused to sell her anything,
but she found the part, threw the money on the counter and left.
That evening I wound up in the hospital
with the worst case of Poison Ivy they'd ever seen.
Then I got a phone call from my sister Val
that our mother had just died.
I went to work the next night anyway.
We had a drummer that was an 18 year old spoiled brat,
but was a passable jazz player for our New York State gigs.
He was also a jazz snob and hated country.
He said things like "Jack, you can't pay me enough to play that."
He was rude to us, and I started to drink from all the pressure.
Before then I had never used alcohol while working.
We'd rented a junk heap from the Rent-a-Wreck Company...
On a Sunday we decided to get away
by taking a drive to Galveston.
First we got arrested.
The cop said that if we worked in Texas for more than a few weeks
we had to have a Texas driver's license.
Also we were charged with having an outdated license tag.
We had assumed that a good license plate came with the rental.
We finally got to Galveston and the car died forever.
There were no cell phones then,
so I found a pay phone and called Rent-a-Wreck.
No answer. It was Sunday.
We somehow got a bus back to Houston,
and called them the next day
to pick up the car and give us a replacement.
Then the floods came.
It rained continuously for many days
and people were driving under railroad overpasses,
getting into deep water, and drowning.
Misty couldn't get to our jalopy from the Walmart door,
and asked a nice elderly lady to take her to our car.
Misty felt guilty when the high water ruined the lady's carpeting.
Time ground on.
Every night on stage was torture,
and the finance company was looking for our motor home.
We were several months behind on payments.
and trying to catch up.
They knew we were in Texas from a check we'd sent.
One night I drank too much
and said some insulting things about the house band.
They were a really fine group that played opposite us,
and I was wrong.
Everybody liked them, and I'd made our situation worse,
if possible.
When we finished our contract there,
we sent the drummer home to annoy his parents,
and headed for the Louisiana border
to throw GE Finance off our trail.
VINTON, LOUISIANA:
Just across the line there was a KOA campground at Vinton
where we were stranded for over a month.
From the campground,
Misty would ride her fold-up bicycle into town to get groceries.
Our only company there was a big family of Gypsies
that we seemed to meet all over the country.
A job in Arkansas and a stop at a pawn shop got us out of there,
but trouble came with us.
HOME:
It got better in the 1990s, and much better after that.
I never had a drinking problem again.
I think it was just an ordeal we had to go through.
If there's an afterlife, somebody owes us an explanation.
We're still doing our music, and life is looking okay.
Copyright © January 25, 2016 by Jack Blanchard. All rights reserved.
Reprinted by kind permission of the author.
January 11th, 2016...
David Bowie has died. A real loss to those who love his music.
His beautiful song "Space Oddity"
will always be a favorite of ours. -- Jack and Misty.
52,000 intelligent, good-looking readers.
LOOKING BACK.
We made some new friends in 2015,
and made up with some old ones.
We mourn those who died,
and celebrate those who were born.
Misty and I are still together, and we have a chance at 2016.
I can't believe it's 2016. Last year I couldn't believe it was 2015.
In the year 4 they said "I can't believe it's 4.
Just four years ago it was nothing."
In the year 4 B.C.
they said "I can't believe how the years are subtracting.
I found a bunch of songs I wrote recorded by other people.
One was Billy Joe Burnette singing “Don’t It Look Like Georgia”.
Another was Englebert Humperdink”
doing “Second Tuesday in December”,
and The Ventures playing our “Gemini”.
Excitement in a Florida Retiree Community...
The unexpected pregnancy.
My uncle is 96 years old and walks three miles a day.
We have no idea where he is.
I'm getting rid of my walk-in tub.
People keep dropping in
because they don't need an appointment.
I ate healthy foods today...
Breakfast: 2 cups of coffee, a cinnabon, and a protein bar.
Supper: Cole slaw, potato salad, ice cream, and cake.
Late snack: 3 cookies.
Misty says, "Have what makes you happy. You'll live longer."
I don't like to take too many pills,
although I admit I walked around for many years
with an illegal smile.
When our son Donn was killed,
I went through an odd kind of mourning.
I guess we all cope with grief in different ways,
but my way was to go crazy for a few years.
This attacked a place so deep in my consciousness,
that I never saw it coming.
A half dozen therapists and a variety of pills helped some,
but time was the only cure.
I'm probably as sane now as I'll ever get.
OLD SONGS.
Mrs. Miller is singing the Old Songs
With the nurses at afternoon games.
She remembers the words to the Old Songs,
But forgotten her family's names.
The past is just over her shoulder
And music can turn back the years.
Old times flicker by, in the corner of her eye
When the Old Songs ring in her ears.
So bring up the band and give them a hand.
While we can, let's all sing along
And maybe we'll find lost love in the memories
That live in the heart of Old Songs.
(Lyrics by Jack Blanchard.)
LOOKING BACK,
if our song "Big Black Bird" had not gotten everybody excited,
Tennessee Birdwalk would not have been on a major label.
We got a phone call one day.
The voice on the other end said this:
"You'd better get ready to travel.
We're selling 50,000 a day, and just getting started!"
ON PAST NEW YEARS EVES...
I was the designated drunk.
Copyright © January 11, 2016 by Jack Blanchard. All rights reserved.
Reprinted by kind permission of the author.
"Old Songs" © Jack Blanchard Songs (BMI).
January 7th, 2016...
And now, a slight pause and a stiff drink in the proceedings as
we remember a composer who wrote neither wisely, nor too well...
52,000 intelligent, good-looking readers.
EULOGY FOR WARREN FINGERBIRD.
"Ahem. Thank you, both of you, for joining me at the gravesite
for this final service.
"Our dear departed friend, Warren Fingerbird,
retired from his government career as a Chicken Interrogator,
and decided to become a famous songwriter.
He had a minuscule talent, a generous ego,
and enough first-class ignorance to be a success.
"He flooded the market with his music.
He was the world's fastest songwriter
writing over a dozen songs a day.
They weren't bad songs...just not good songs.
Warren had mediocrity down to a fine art.
"With about five hundred songs a month being recorded,
the odds were in his favor that somebody would buy one,
listen to it once, and then re-gift it to a friend at Christmas.
"He took other people's old hits
and cleverly changed them around,
like 'Just a Kosher Waltz with Thee', and 'Crab Diver'.
"Although his songs weren't very good
they began making him a profit,
which he enjoyed boasting about to other songwriters,
just to make them cry.
"He hired young singers and musicians
to try to make his music modern,
but even with all the new technology,
it still sounded like The Lawrence Welk Show blew up.
Warren loved that sound.
"He had not the slightest doubt of his musical genius,
and maybe that was his secret of happiness.
"Warren was not crazy
except for occasionally thinking he was a penguin,
and he was not a bad person,
but there were musicians
who dreamed of the sweetest ways to kill him.
One of those was to take him down to the river
and baptize him to death.
They called this "Holy Boarding".
"Warren received insults
with as much manic glee as he dished them out,
and that is why we are grateful to him
for making this evening possible.
Thank you."
Copyright © January 7, 2016 by Jack Blanchard. All rights reserved.
Reprinted by kind permission of the author.
HAPPY NEW YEAR! KEY WEST, 1972.
January 4th, 2016...
Last week's chart placement:
This week's chart placement:
(Sigh...) Every week it's the same darn thing... ;)
Congratulations to Jack & Misty for their first #1 of 2016, two weeks running,
"SEA OF HEARTBREAK"!
January 1st, 2016...
This might not be the smartest time to start a year, but...
HAPPY DAMN NEW YEAR ANYWAY!!!!
_____Jack & Misty.
Well, here we go again, folks. If you get the feeling you just missed last year
(what was it called, anyway?), you can now find it here!
(And also on the Old News page, of course.) Here's to a safe and happy 2016!
Happy New Year, everybody!
Jerry D. Withers, Your Friendly Neighborhood Webmeister™
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