Saturday 9

Saturday 9: I'm Looking Over a Four Leaf Clover (2001)

Selected in honor of St. Patrick's Day. Unfamiliar with this week's song? Hear it here.

On Saturdays I take a break from the heavy stuff and have some fun… 

1) This is one of the songs included in Willie Nelson's Rainbow Connection album. He named it after his daughter Amy's favorite song when she was a little girl. She'd been asking him to record "The Rainbow Connection" for 20 years and finally, in 2001, he came through for her. Think of something you had to wait for. Was it worth the wait?

Me.

I let you figure it out.

2) Willie can trace his family tree back to the Revolutionary War. Are you interested in genealogy?

Naw.

But few comments from my grandmother kind of raised my curiosity. She said he father gambled away apartment they owned in New York City and that we are related to Benedict Arnold.

3) Today Willie is legendary performer, but as a child, he was very uncomfortable in front of crowds. He recalled that during his school days, reciting in front of his class made him so uncomfortable he suffered nose bleeds. When did you most recently have a bloody nose?

I don’t even know if I ever had a bloody nose.

4) During the 1990s, Willie had problems with the IRS. His management team set up illegal tax shelters and he ended up owing millions in back taxes and penalties. This year's IRS filing deadline is Wednesday, April 15. Will you be early, on time, or will you need an extension?

No, I will file around the beginning of April.

I had a nightmare last year! I go to a national chain, and the idiot filed that I had to pay monthly even though I said I’ll pay it in a lump sum. So every month I got a letter from the IRS said that I hadn’t paid the monthly payment of $0.00. And every month I got that letter!!!!!

5) In "I'm Looking Over a Four Leaf Clover," Willie sings about appreciating something he has previously overlooked. Is there anything positive in your life you feel you may take for granted?

Not pushing up daisies!

I could be looking for four leaf clovers in a clover patch and not find one in an hour, my mother would walk out lot at the patch and pick a four-leaf clover.

6) Four leaf clovers and shamrocks are considered good luck. Do you have a lucky charm? 

Nope.

7) "The wearing o' the green" is one way to celebrate St. Patrick's Day. Will you wear something green in honor of the day?

Naw… I’ll cause trouble and wear orange. (JK)

8) According to Irish folklore, if you catch a leprechaun he must either give you his pot o' gold or grant you three wishes. Would you choose the gold or the wishes?

Golden wishes? I’ll take the wishes, more choices.

9) Traditional Irish stew is made with mutton or lamb, though here in the US beef is also very popular. What's your favorite soup/stew?

Soupy stew?

Actually, both. When I buy a rotisserie chicken it end up in a pot and then I freeze the leftover soup. And when stew meat goes on sale I do the same, freeze the leftovers.

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Updated @ 9:20AM

I hated reading! Books like Great Expectations, The Scarlet Letter, and Wuthering Heights... I hated them. Boring! Those were the books we were forced to read in school, and I hated every second of it. I couldn't put them down fast enough; it was like they were made of acid or on fire.

But then, in junior college, we read Heart of Darkness... hmm... not bad.

Then in college, my roommate said, "Here, read this: Stranger in a Strange Land by Robert Heinlein."

"Naw."

"Go ahead, try it!"

Whoa! The floodgates opened! 

Starship Troopers! 

The Martian Chronicles! 

Ursula K. Le Guin’s The Left Hand of Darkness! 

And Kurt Vonnegut’s The Sirens of Titan, Cat’s Cradle, and Player Piano.

He wrote Player Piano in 1952, and now, with AI, it’s actually coming true!

The floodgates were open! It wasn't the reading I hated; it was what we were told to read back then. Dull, boring books. Books that offended no one; books that didn’t make you think! Books that didn't make you want to expand your horizons.

Is that where we are going again? Back to dull, boring books that limit your horizons?

Do you grok?