BS: oh bugger!

Subject: RE: BS: oh bugger!
From: WyoWoman
Date: 20 Oct 00 - 10:08 PM

Relaxed as a newt? I shall steal this instantly.

Hang in, Morti.

ww

Subject: RE: BS: oh bugger!
From: Noreen
Date: 20 Oct 00 - 11:08 PM

ww- I liked your phrase on HearMe about preferring to eat a bucket of hair than get married again- did I hear correctly? (Sorry for the thread side-step, Mortee, thought you might like the expression too!)

Noreen

Subject: RE: BS: oh bugger!
From: katlaughing
Date: 20 Oct 00 - 11:43 PM

This is Micca's "Fin," then whose joined us?!! Welcome to the Mudcat, Fin!!

Mark, you brought tears to my eyes, as you often do when you share one of your songs. My girlfriend who is a paralegal just got done with a case of a little girl being kicked to death by her mother and social services missing it. They found her 8 months after, in the garage in a bag.

"Some days are diamonds, some days are rust"

Dearest Mortee, you've a heart like a lotus blossum, wide open and full of the perfume of love and compassion; remember to savour some for yourself, too, darlin'....

luvyakat

Subject: RE: BS: oh bugger!
From: Mark Cohen
Date: 21 Oct 00 - 08:32 AM

Another Hawaiian Mudcatter? Where? (Hilo here. I seem to recall Micca had a relative in Pahoa...)

Morticia, glad the song was/is helpful. I will try some time to post the tune, but it will take more time on Noteworthy Composer than I have at the moment. Thanks, Terry, I suppose the tune is a bit in his style, but that wasn't in my mind when I wrote it. No relation, by the way.

Aloha,
Mark

Subject: RE: BS: oh bugger!
From: Morticia
Date: 21 Oct 00 - 10:39 AM

Fin is in Pearl City, Mark and I would love the tune when you get time.

Subject: RE: BS: oh bugger!
From: catspaw49
Date: 21 Oct 00 - 11:00 AM

Yeah, y'all need to check out the nice thread that "Lotus Blossom" started for Aunt Fin.....Its called, "BS:Fin, I'm so Proud." I think it started out well enough but, uh........well.......You know how Mudcat is..............

Spaw

Subject: RE: BS: oh bugger!
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 21 Oct 00 - 12:12 PM

That's a good song Mark. Here something I did a few years back, from the same kind of feelings:

Ballade of Moderate Compassion

Poor Mrs Brown is sick and tired and old,
And Mr Jones is muddled in his brain,
And Mary's child is crying in the cold,
and John is sleeping in the wind and rain;
they look for rescue, but they look in vain.
No lifebelt comes, instead these words are hurled:
"Your case is hard, but no good to complain -
we are not living in A Perfect World."

You longed for sea and sands of shining gold,
you booked your holiday in Sunny Spain -
you should have gone by train, but you were told
"It's quicker and more pleasant on the plane".
A slight diversiion took you to Bahrein,
with blackened sands, where stinking oilslicks swirled,
you watch the seagulls down, and you explain
"We are not living in aA Perfect World."

The sky grows dark, the world is bought and sold.
Christ on his cross dies for his own again;
the shepherd falls, the wolf is in the fold,
and all around are cries of grief and pain.
You measure out your pity grain by grain,
your neat umbrella is so tightly furled.
In face of agony, your tired refrain -
"We are not living in A Perfect World."

Prince of a thousand forms that measure pain,
your comfortable lips in judgement curled,
God knows you'd not be here, that much is plain
if we were living in A Perfect World.

17th April 1993

Here is a note I wrote about this at the time:A ballade about complacent bureaucracy in "the caring professions" and elsewhere. I was a Social Worker for 20 years, and the phrase that always made my gorge rise was when colleagues (especially "senior colleagues") started saying things like "in an ideal world".

A phrase like that should of course indicate someone is going to explore the deep mysteries of life and death and tragedy. But in practice all it meant is that once again some poor "client" was going to get screwed by the system, and noone was going to make waves about it.

Rule of thumb - if a social worker or a politician says "in an ideal world" they aren't going to help. If they say "in a decent society" there's a chance they might. But what you really want is someone who believes that "No" is not an answer, it's just a negotiating position.

Subject: RE: BS: oh bugger!
From: catspaw49
Date: 21 Oct 00 - 12:17 PM

Mark and Mac..........I am consistently impressed with the talent around here, but also pleasantly surprised when folks like you write songs like these about things that aren't commonly topics. Great job guys......and Thanks.

Spaw

Subject: RE: BS: oh bugger!
From: Hollowfox
Date: 24 Oct 00 - 05:42 PM

On a lighter note, re-reading this, and the question about the worst job brought back a memoryI remembered that time in my childhood that my (non-blood relative) Uncle Paul the Dragon opined that the worst job in the world was a sulky driver with a diarrheic horse. After all these years, I think I disagree.

Subject: RE: BS: oh bugger!
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 25 Oct 00 - 08:09 AM

I'd reckon following such a horse with a hand plough would be the real limit. "This is too much - I'm going to run away and become a social worker..."

As the old army song goes:

We are the shit-shovellers,
shovelling shit on the shit parade
V (And then it breaks into They say that Hitler has only got one ball, but the DT misses out that prelude.

Subject: RE: BS: oh bugger!
From: Ebbie
Date: 25 Oct 00 - 04:47 PM

Wow. Great songs.

Ebbie

Subject: RE: BS: oh bugger!
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 25 Oct 00 - 06:24 PM

I respectfully suggest the real killer for UK social workers is that mostly they want to do their jobs right - but the heirarchy doesn't want the job done that well. It costs too much. So the shit rises to the top.

Subject: RE: BS: oh bugger!
From: harpgirl
Date: 25 Oct 00 - 06:46 PM

...oh by the way Mort, I have been a social worker in mental health for twenty seven years. I know exactly what the kind of day you described is like. My AIDS patients are the ones I agonize the most over. Such a horrible way to die...It does make me feel better when I can support their self-determination by helping them meet goals like seeing their kids into adulthood. Let's hear it for the human spirit!!! Hip hip hooray!!!

Subject: RE: BS: oh bugger!
From: Morticia
Date: 26 Oct 00 - 12:50 PM

Harpgirl, I also work 18 hours a week with HIV and Aids sufferers,and yes, I know what you mean. It's been an interesting contrast to cancer patients, the last great taboo illness perhaps?

Subject: RE: BS: oh bugger!
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 26 Oct 00 - 03:23 PM

No. There will be others. AIDS and HiV is becomming passe, CJD will soon be swept under the carpet, and another will come along more horrible than the last.

Sorry.

LTS, whose views are not necessarily those as projected above. An illness like HiV can never be passe, but it has lost a lot of its momentum in the press, so interest just gets pushed elsewhere.

Subject: RE: BS: oh bugger!
From: GUEST,f/k/a Midchuck
Date: 26 Oct 00 - 04:27 PM

And I suppose that if I pointed out the irony of the topic of this thread coming around to this particular problem, in light of the original title of the thread, I'd get yet another surge of flames from them who take their greatest pleasure in wallowing in political correctness and righteous indignation.

Peter.

Subject: RE: BS: oh bugger!
From: harpgirl
Date: 26 Oct 00 - 04:45 PM

Not sure I understand your point Midchuck. Could you explain it more simply for me? (serious request) Oh wait I got it!!
However, the fastest growing segment of HIV infected individuals around (Florida) here is minority female heterosexuals. The rate of new infections for men has gone down fairly consistently because of education and protective behaviors.
I am not the PC type, even though I am a vocal feminist, but I have seen too many wonderful people die from this scourge to eak out a smile over your joke. No flames here, just sadness.
On one of the last days of his life, my last AIDS patient to die and I went to a local city lake to feed the big catfish. He was a gentle soul who loved figure skating and animals. He lovingly cared for his rats and kitties until his death! I salute him!

Subject: RE: BS: oh bugger!
From: Morticia
Date: 26 Oct 00 - 04:52 PM

I see the irony Midchuck and yep, got to grin.Most of the people I work with would smile too, believe me.Although Harp's right, highest rate of infection here in the UK is heterosexual people, but it's still climbing in all sectors.LIz, your point is well taken, the Government came in hard on PR that turned out to be alarmist and non-substantiated about 20 years ago. Since then , nary a peep and people think it's gone away.......it hasn't..... or it can be cured......it can't....or it doesn't affect young, middle class people living in the heart of Englands stockbroker belt........guess again.

Subject: RE: BS: oh bugger!
From: Morticia
Date: 26 Oct 00 - 04:56 PM

I see the irony Midchuck and yep, got to grin.Most of the people I work with would smile too, believe me.Although Harp's right, highest rate of infection here in the UK is heterosexual people, but it's still climbing in all sectors.LIz, your point is well taken, the Government came in hard on PR that turned out to be alarmist and non-substantiated about 20 years ago. Since then , nary a peep and people think it's gone away.......it hasn't..... or it can be cured......it can't....or it doesn't affect young, middle class people living in the heart of Englands stockbroker belt........guess again.