Oh, it all makes work for the working man to do

[sovay]

So the first half of yesterday was quite lovely, involving as it did lunch with lesser_celery at the Squealing Pig, hanging out at the Harvard School of Public Health, and a book about smallpox. After which things disintegrated rapidly into endless bureaucratic airline fail and health crash. I am nonetheless going tonight to see Opera Boston's Fidelio with fleurdelis28, but if I spend another hour on hold-for-the-next-representative, I'll found a railway.

Discovered this afternoon while bagging leaves: it is not quite possible to filk Rosemary Sutcliff's "The Girl I Kissed at Clusium" to Sydney Carter's "Take Me Back to Byker," but I wish it were. The latter reminded me instantly of the former the first time I heard it.

The army sent me to the east, it sent me to the west
I've left one lass in Trinidad, another in Trieste
And the flaxen-headed lasses of Cologne were kind to me
But the lass I left in Byker is the lass I long to see

Another sign of growing up in books: they should both have reminded me of "The Girl I Left Behind Me."

The girls of Spain were honey-sweet,
And the golden girls of Gaul:
And the Thracian maids were soft as birds
To hold the heart in thrall.

But the girl I kissed at Clusium
Kissed and left at Clusium,
The girl I kissed at Clusium
I remember best of all.

Comments

[asakiyume.livejournal.com]

The tall one will be very happy if you found a railway.

[sovay]

The tall one will be very happy if you found a railway.

I'll let you know if it comes to pass . . .

[cucumberseed.livejournal.com]

I spend another hour on hold-for-the-next-representative, I'll found a railway.

Far more constructive than my plans when in that situation yesterday.

[sovay]

Far more constructive than my plans when in that situation yesterday.

Who have you been wrangling with?

[cucumberseed.livejournal.com]

Doctor's office. They discovered a charge from '06 that my insurance turned down and decided that I needed to pay it RIGHT NOW or get disenrolled and sent to collections. It was exciting. Fortunately, I had enough to cover it.

[ap-aelfwine.livejournal.com]

I'm glad to hear of the lovely parts, but sorry for the health and airline fail.

I hope you've enjoyed the opera! I just got home from a concert by Caoimhín Ó Raghallaigh and Brendan Begley, who were incredible.

Pity that the filking isn't possible. "The Girl I kissed at Clusium" ought to be singable to something.

[sovay]

Pity that the filking isn't possible. "The Girl I kissed at Clusium" ought to be singable to something.

The tune used by the 1957 radio adaptation seems to have been memorable enough that anyone who heard it as a child can still sing it half a century later; unfortunately, it doesn't look like any recordings of the production survived. That no one has yet made up this deficit seems a great failing of the folk and filk communities.