Hey, Look at That Moon It's Shining so Pretty....

It's Shining Up There for Me and for You....(from King Pleasure's "Moody's Mood for Love")
I am a little warped today; I just slow-trailed the immigrantes Mexicanos for a bit down 6th Avenue, the old avenue that used to sport an el roaming and rocking and rolling over it for many a moon. Dead Man's Curve used to be right around 6th and 30th, right where I was standing just 20 minutes ago. Mayor Lindsay tried to change the name of 6th Avenue to The Avenue of the Americas. It is lined with statues of famous Latin American leaders like Bolivar, et. al.; and, too, it used to have the flags of all the Americas on the light poles but Mayor Rudi "the Nobody's Godfather" Guiliani found out he could sell advertising on the light poles, so hell, he put these tacky plastic gonfolons all over town trying to sell the city to the highest bidder. What a cheap-shit asshole Rudi is; and now the silly stooge wants to run for president. How crass. Go back to screwin' your secretary, Rude Man--even though I don't blame you for dumping Donna Hanover and that three-ply goofy son she bore you.

I'm in a howling mood today, so how about some Moon information. Isn't that what the Internet is for? Or is it a superhighway for only those who can afford it as soon as AT&T and Verizon get permission to rape the hell out of it from our screwball Congress--Democrats will be voting for making a toll road out of the Internet, too; those assholes are nothing but Repugnicans in sheeps's clothing. Except for crazy old Robert Byrd. He's as gutsy as hell these days, standing up in Congress and telling these cheesy bastards they better stop this stupid war and start the business of impeaching this loser "president." Also, I am proud to tell you, Merle Haggard, yep, the old Okie from Muskogee, though he's actually an Okie from Tulare, California, I think, has a antiwar song out now; it was just released this week--Merle says end the war and let's put this country back together again. Amen, Brother Merle. Merle is one Country-Western musician I love; fuck the hillbilly ones like the guy in the big black hat, Tug McGraw's son, and all those pretty boy lispers like Travis Twit. I grew up in Lefty Frizzell country and, by God, I know someone who has Lefty's guitar right this minute. They're gonna offer it at Southeby's for $300,000. You heard me right, 300 grand. This guy told me Mother Maybelle Carter's guitar sold for half a mil. Wonder what my Jimmy Reed model Silvertone is worth? Hey, Southeby's, I've got Jimmy Reed's guitar here in my house; I'm Jimmy Reed the Third, by the way. I did once record as Jimmy Reed III playing my Jimmy Reed twin-tone. But anyway, back to the MOON.

"Moon." I'm told it comes from the Sanskrit root me- meaning "to measure." Did they measure time in me-? I'll have to pose that one to l. hat at www.languagehat.com Anyway, in Gothic its mena (there's a Mena, Arkansas, did ya know that?). In Olde Frisian its mona (Henry Miller's name for June in the Rosy Crucifixion). In Olde Norman its mane. My source says the Moon in these olde languages is always masculine. In most languages it's masculine: in German still it's Frau Sonne and Herr Mond.

The MOON has five phases: 1) New 2) Full 3) Crescent 4) Half and 5) Gibbous (a little more than Half). It's that No. 2 phase that always gets me to singing my Moon Songs--Yeowwwww, ooooo, whooooooo. I had a Malamute Husky one time, you know half-wolf, and man could that dude sing Moon Songs. He never barked, but let that Moon get full or gibbous and that sucker thought he was all wolf again. I lived on the side of the Rockies, way up close to the Moon in those days. My Malamute, named Skigor, loved that big ole high Rocky Mountain Moon and sung to it every night whether it was full or gibbous.

In Western mythology, the Moon is called Hecate, the daughter of Perses. She got so special, they called her a triple goddess and imaged her with three heads, a horse's head (Zeus might have called her a horse's ass in the throes of supernatural fornication), a boar's head (yep, she made a lot of baloney), and a dog's head. You sacrificed dogs and black lambs to her when you were down at her crossroads (that's where you sell your soul to the Devil). It's a lot more complicated than this, according to the Greeks, but, hell, I don't have time to be complicated.

The Moon at one time in our superstitious ignorant world was believed to house everything wasted on earth such as "misspent time and wealth, broken vows, unanswered prayers, fruitless tears, unfulfilled desires and intentions, etc." In Brother Lodovico Ariosto's Orlando Furioso, the main character, Astalpho, goes to the moon and finds "bribes were hung on gold and silver hooks; princes' favours were kept in bellows; wasted talent was kept in vases..." [see Alexander Pope's Rape of the Lock, Canto V].

The "Island of the Moon" is Madagascar, at least that's what the natives call it.

There has always been a Man in the Moon--I saw him just the other night when I was yowling like a lone wolf at the Moon; he turned and told me to "Sing it, Brother!" Some spiritually minded folks say the Man in the Moon is the hated Cain from the biblical fable of Adam and Eve, that he is that man with his dog and thorn bush. Some folks say the Man in the Moon is Endymion and he was put on the Moon by the huntress Diana. [The sexiest Diana I've ever seen in my life is standing at the entrance to Chapultepec Park in Mexico City. What a dish. I hope she's still there; I haven't been in Mexico City since I was snappy and peppy and full of glee; in other words, "the good ole days."

The Moon's Men (not Moon Miliken's band) are thieves and highwaymen who work at their art at night.

The Arabs say the Mountains of the Moon are the White Mountains. A white horse to the Arabs is "moon colored."

My mother used to say, "Well, if you believe that, you believe the moon is made out of green cheese."

A Moon Calf is an inanimate, shapeless abortion. The old superstitious ilk believed such an abortion was due to the Moon. Reverend Moon could become an abortionist after he finds out he's not Jesus in a cheap Korean suit. Sitting in moonlight might cause you to become a dolt or a dunderhead--don't ya just know it!

So, I'm rubbin' me Moonstone, waitin' for some Moonraker friends'a mine at the Moonstruck Diner. We're goin' Moonrakin', that is, after we're well-soused on a little Moonshine I found under the front seat of my pickup.

See, I gave you some interesting info about the Moon, something I'm rather prone to do once in a Blue Moon.

I once liked a baseball player named Wally Moon, and "Moon Over Miami" is a hell of a good tune to do in a updated version. Oh well, I guess I'll just have to settle for a little Bilboa Moon and a little sixpence to go with it.

thegrowlingwolf
for The Daily Growler
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The Daily Growler Quote of the Day
"His hands and feet are so fast they move quicker than his mind," Tim McCarver while announcing a New York Mets game in L.A. back in May of '96

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