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Hello, Petty Questions readers. I talk to you with no exclamation points today. Because today, we are holding a virtual online memorial service. For whom? John Lennon obviously, that's what it says in the title.
John Lennon was a great man. He made music. He made friends. He lost friends so he could make arguable different music. At one point he was shot and then he died. That day was today minus about a month, thirty years ago. People usually do not celebrate thirtieth birthdays so stop applauding.
Let's have a minute of silence. OK that was a fine minute of silence.
Today's question regards only all of Western music.
Dr. Bates, I have a question. I love vinyls, and it's great that nowadays you pay $20 for the vinyl album and a digital MP3 download all at once. Problem is, once I get that digital download I'm only going to listen to that album on my Zune-it's much more convenient and I can skip songs in a snap. But I would feel like a traitor to audiophiles if I stopped buying vinyls. How can I trick myself into listening to the best sound possible instead of crummy earphones?
-Turn Up The Music
Hello, TUTM and the same Petty Questionnaires. We are still mourning, just keep that in mind.
Your plight is tragic. Maybe the easiest solution is to throw out your Zune for a classic Sandisk MP3 Player QR567V, or even the pocket-sized version of the iPad. That was simple and John Lennon would have liked simple.
By the way John Lennon is alive and here is an article I found in my attic about today's Lennon:
HOW DOES A BEATLE live after faking his death for thirty years? This is how John Lennon lives.
He rises at exactly 6:15 AM each morning. "I mean to wake up at six o'clock on the dot, but it takes me fifteen minutes to check tomorrow's weather before I get under the covers," he considers wistfully. Lennon fiddles idly with an antique witch's box. "Sleep at ten-fifteen, wake at six-fifteen. You need your eight [hours -Ed.], especially at such an advanced age such as me self." The seventy-year-old looks slightly bemused and even lets out a chuckle, in a sad way.
"I don't go out much. There's jails for what I did." Lennon gazes out the window at a lazy pastoral field, cozy in his chair room. "Well, I like to keep all me extra chairs in here, just in case. Trouble is, I never sit in 'em. " He takes a bit of chicken from his pouch and nibbles absentmindedly. "It's a lovely chair room, I guess."
Lennon doesn't keep stock of many things these days. He greets you at the door quizzically. "What month of the year is it? Oh, right. Yes." As you take his barrister's secrecy oath Lennon studies your gait. He then mimics it for you, and you must do likewise, copying the way he slinks. Now he can speak to you in his singing voice if he wants. "I reserve these sounds for friends." He pats me on the back. "I miss George [Harrison, writer of The Beatles-Ed.]."
The chair room is mostly filled with chairs everywhere. You begin to picture the mountains of chairs caving in on him.
Much of his hardwood floor is made out of books. He feels a special attachment to the printed page, books foremost. "I read magazines a bunch. Can't recycle books, though. Got to keep them and smell them."
In a life without The Beatles, would he be a man of letters, an Oxbridge man? "Had the brains alright, but never really liked the idea of all that reading, you know? When you live among thieves and nightfolk for thirty years, you get your own kind of education. Case in point: I don't really watch television anymore."
The outlaw watches a picture of George Harrison burn in the palm of his hand.
Why did he set up David Chapman for his murder? Why hasn't he set the poor man free yet? "Started off just wanting to take a long walk on me own. Started on 8th Avenue and kept going up till I got lost." What was the final straw? The trigger to end life as he knew it? "The cabbie on the way back was very convincing, in a way."
He stares at plants longingly, as if the best days of his life were generations ago, in the Beatles Period or around when "The Imagine Song" came out.
The kitchen leads into a smaller house within his house. "Half-finished," he says to no one in particular, "hobby's only last me 'bout a week. Basement's finished.
"I always wanted to be a clown. Maybe a playwright. I feel like I'm meant to do something in my life, make something of me self. " He drinks so much water.
Lennon pauses, pulling his hair into a bun. "Clowning's a young man's game," sighs the Beatle.
Next time on the PQ, issues: for example, take the death of printed media-please! Don't worry it's just a modified old joke, it's not a new era of comedy! Great.
Please direct all questions to: askpettyquestions@gmail.com
LINK HUB - PREVIOUS "PETTY QUESTIONS"
LINK: PETTY QUESTIONS: Creeping doubt
LINK: PETTY QUESTIONS: Out of time
LINK: PETTY QUESTIONS: Who wants yesterday's paper?
LINK: PETTY QUESTIONS: Around the world
LINK: PETTY QUESTIONS: Wonderful Christmastime (Paul McCartney version)