Your Most Disturbing Realizations

[Edward]

Learned 'em on my grandfather's lap! And I finally- in my late 50's- actually made it to Tipperary Ireland.... to be greeted by a sign reading, "You've come a long way.."

Interesting thing is that the song doesn't refer to County Tipperary in Ireland at all (I'd be very careful where you sing it there - it's very much perceived as a Tan song in those parts!), butg the Tipperary district of London, hence the mentions of Picadilly and Leicester Square. Also of note is that the story of the British Tommy's of a specific regiment organised singing it as they left for the Western Front is pure fabrication, but it sold an awful lot of sheet music...

 

[Inkstainedwretch]

A while ago I realized that I'd reached the age at which, if I should drop dead suddenly, while some might be saddened nobody would be surprised.

 

[Trenchfriend]

Are we all getting older, for real, or is it just getting later and later?

 

[kaiser]

A while ago I realized that I'd reached the age at which, if I should drop dead suddenly, while some might be saddened nobody would be surprised.

I was just speaking with a friend of mine about that. A guy we both knew fell over dead of a massive heart attack and one of the comments made about his passing was that it was a shocker, but no surprise. He was 58, and a workaohlic.

 

[GHT]

To misquote Joan Collins: "Everyday above ground, is a good one." In a little over a month's time I shall be three score years & ten. This year I'm 68 plus one. "Surely that's 69?" said my rather lovely, but rather dim, lady barber. "69? Too much of a mouthful for me." I replied. At least she laughed, but only because everyone else did.

 

[LizzieMaine]

I was just speaking with a friend of mine about that. A guy we both knew fell over dead of a massive heart attack and one of the comments made about his passing was that it was a shocker, but no surprise. He was 58, and a workaohlic.

What's disturbing is when you starting making conscious arrangements against the possibility of just that happening. I keep a set of keys to my house in my desk at work, and all the kids know that if I'm ever inexplicably late that they're to take the keys and come check on me, just in case.

I also keep a long dowel with a hook on the end of it at the base of my stairs, in case I fall and break something. I can use the stick to pull the telephone off the stand and drag it towards me to call for help.

 

[Trenchfriend]

Since I'm living in my own rental-flat, I avoid to suck bonbons with the classic potential danger of smothering.

 

[Trenchfriend]

In August 2011, at my whisdom-tooth-removal, the dental assistant-girl, probably around 18, didn't know The Dire Straits.

And the middle-aged (female) dentist was wondering and very pleased very , that a 27 years old-boy knows and likes Dire Straits. "Dire Straits!? But, that was our youth ."

 

[Fading Fast]

I'm in my grandmother's camp on dying (more in a moment).

I have a few people who are financial dependent on me and I have done my best to ensure they'll be okay if I die suddenly, but beyond that, I couldn't care less what happens to me, my body, when, how, they find me, etc. I prefer to be cremated because it seems the easiest, but whatever.

My very pragmatic and had-a-hard-life grandmother said to a man trying to sell her insurance to make sure she'd "have a nice funeral," "I've never seen them let a body rot in the gutter yet." No sale, she was tough as nails (and one of the most decent, caring people I've ever known).

 

[Trenchfriend]

Would be nice, if anyone invents anyhing, that brings you back the great feeling of childhood, when you got that bombastic anticipation on a visit to one of your favorite open air-baths, when you could not wait to overrun their box-office-girl and to breath the original "Cool-(Chlor)Water", again. ;-)

Feel it, smell it...

 

[William G.]

Interesting thing is that the song doesn't refer to County Tipperary in Ireland at all (I'd be very careful where you sing it there - it's very much perceived as a Tan song in those parts!), butg the Tipperary district of London, hence the mentions of Picadilly and Leicester Square. Also of note is that the story of the British Tommy's of a specific regiment organised singing it as they left for the Western Front is pure fabrication, but it sold an awful lot of sheet music...

That reminds me of a sermon I heard once, the preacher played the song "Mack the Knife", took a show of hands as to how many people had ever heard and liked the song, how many had it stuck in their heads at some point, maybe even whistled along to it in the car—then he read and explained the lyrics. Apparently it's about a serial killer with some mob ties, even describes a murder quite poetically. I remember him saying none of us would ever sit around and make murder sound pleasant in daily conversation, but because it has a catchy tune, we totally gloss over what it's really about. I've been a little more careful about what I listen to ever since.

 

[tonyb]

Nothing new in glamorizing violence. Any sentient person could cite numerous examples, contemporary and historical.

 

[Panadora]

 

[Inkstainedwretch]

That song has an interesting history. John Gay wrote "The Beggar's Opera" in 1728 as a satire on the then-new Italian grand opera coming into fashion in England. Instead of princes and kings, it relates the misadventures of England's rogues, whores and lowlifes. Chief among them is the notorious highwayman MacHeath. In 1928 Berthold Brecht and Kurt Weill adapted the play into their musical "Die Dreigroschen Oper," set in Victorian England but in German language. MacHeath becomes "Mackie Messer,"(Mack the Knife) an underworld assassin. A 1954 revival of the play (as "The Threepenny Opera"in an off-Broadway English translation introduced the song as we know it, using Kurt Weill's catchy tune. It's interesting that a play by a couple of avowed European communists produced a hit song in the middle of the McCarthy era.

 

[LizzieMaine]

Nothing new in glamorizing violence. Any sentient person could cite numerous examples, contemporary and historical.

Frankie and Johnny were lovers....

(To say nothing of the Bible story of Jael and Sisera.)

 

[kaiser]

What's disturbing is when you starting making conscious arrangements against the possibility of just that happening. I keep a set of keys to my house in my desk at work, and all the kids know that if I'm ever inexplicably late that they're to take the keys and come check on me, just in case.

I also keep a long dowel with a hook on the end of it at the base of my stairs, in case I fall and break something. I can use the stick to pull the telephone off the stand and drag it towards me to call for help.

Liz, you are right about that, we have put a camera system in part of our house inorder to keep an eye on my wife's mother who lives with us. She is 86 and had a fall a couple of years ago and broke her shoulder and could not get to the phone to call us ( we were not home at the time ) or to call EMS. I thought it was a bit of an invasion of privacy when my wife first brought up the idea, but when she asked her mother what she tought about it she was all for it. Laying on ghe floor for a couple of hours with no way to seek help was not something she wanted to go through again.

 

[Zombie_61]

...I have a few people who are financial dependent on me and I have done my best to ensure they'll be okay if I die suddenly, but beyond that, I couldn't care less what happens to me, my body, when, how, they find me, etc. I prefer to be cremated because it seems the easiest, but whatever...

I've told my wife (and anyone else who might be responsible when the time comes; we don't have children) to dispose of my dead carcass in the least expensive and least problematic method possible. This body has served me pretty well over the years, but once I'm gone I won't care what happens to it.

 

[MisterCairo]

I'm old enough to have found this, my first cell phone from 1995:

 

[GHT]

I've still got mine too. An Alcatel something or other, it was the model that followed 'The Brick.' The digital technology rendered it redundant, but a couple of years ago, a smart geeky kid, came up with a clever piece of wizardry that he fitted and, hey presto, it was working again. The looks you get when it goes off in public. It's only got one type of bell ring, sounds like a landline, and the jawdrop when I get the phone out, pull out the aerial and say: "Hello."

 

[MisterCairo]

That's brilliant!