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Wednesday 26 June 2019

State of the Union - New Hampshire


George writes
New Hampshire. This is a fascinating place: for example, it was the first state in the whole of the USA to instal a green LED traffic light. What more? Well, In 1933, the League of New Hampshire Craftsmen held the first ever crafts fair in the entire nation. That would be the whole of the USA. Wait, there’s more. The very first state lottery in the whole of the USA was established in New Hampshire. Man Alive, after all that excitement time for a lie down….


Here’s a relevant song. I checked the online encyclopedia for this lot, and I think the band are not fans of this source, for a group that made records for 30 years there is only one page, it has six lines of basic information, and a list of albums, none of which have hyperlinks.




The man who played a golf shot on the moon was born in New Hampshire. Alan Shepard. And he was the first American in space.


Writer of tedious novels Dan Brown comes from New Hampshire.
Writer of great novels (A Prayer for Owen Meany, The World According to Garp) John Irving was born in New Hampshire.

But New Hampshire should really be best known as the home of Betty and Barney Hill. This remarkable couple were the first people ever abducted by aliens in the whole of the USA. In 1961. And let me tell you this, it did Betty the world of good, she lived to be 85. Barney suffered from his experience, dying at the age 47. There’s a big sign to mark the exact location of this occurrence (the alien abduction, that is, not the location of Barney’s demise).


And finally, leaving the best ‘til last. The very first potato planted in the USA was planted in Derry. New Hampshire.

Nest tune will definitely not be New Hampshire Three by Etat, it frightened Shaggy. And no way are you getting New Hampshire by Flan, they want $1 for a 39 second track. And if you’ve got a spare 7 minutes you can listen to this nonsense


I don’t recommend it, but it did not frighten my dog so it had that going for it.
Quite surprisingly, Shaggy nearly slept through this cacophony, but he did give me a “what the hell is that?” look, so I turned it off.
He remained unperturbed throughout the electronica of New Hampshire by Gold God, completely ignored New Hampshire by Joan Sullivan (so you can as well), although a rather noxious smell did fill the room while it was playing……
I’ve done three pages of New Hampshire on Bandcamp now, it’s really really tedious.
But finally, finally, something decent. Shades of Sufjan Stevens, approval of Shaggy, what is not to like?


That’s the last track on the album of the same name.


And that is New Hampshire, where you must, MUST, look down when having a pee on a sunday, it being illegal look up whilst doing so.


(I hope he’s not breaking the law….)

Half way through the states.

CC writes:
Bon Jovi time - we're half way there.
Sorry to disappoint you but no Bon Jovi today. Found this instead which is not bad

Matt Pond PA - New Hampshire

8 comments:

  1. Not enough alien abduction stories on these pages!

    ReplyDelete
  2. I question a lot of what gets written in this series (I still bear the scars from what George said about my favourite movie a couple of weeks back), but never more so than the idea that Betty & Barney were the first alien abductees. Aliens were abducting people long before 1961, George, and you know it!

    In the spirit of charity, I will offer the following, both of which reference New Hampshire in the lyrics...

    Nick Cave - Albert Goes West

    Okkervil River - Listening To Otis Redding at Home During Christmas

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. The Aliens disagree! And the plaque proves it.

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  3. Live Free or Die is the best of the 50 state mottos. Always gets my attention when I see a N.H. license plate.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Brian, I have been very remiss in ignoring state mottos. Something that could be rectified later in the series.

      Delete
  4. Yeah Aliens. They abducted Alan Shepard and a set of golf clubs. Then they flew him quarter of a million miles to the Moon and made him play golf.Then they flew him back - all in three days. Then the aliens left but they let Alan keep the golf clubs. Now NASA and astronauts can only get a bit less than 200 miles above the Earth and remain in Low Earth Orbit. No further and nothing else. Tha Aliens havent taken anyone else to the Moon golfing for half a century now. Luckily they took some slightly unconvincing photographs. So at least we have the memories and the photos.

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  5. Lovely music reviews from Shaggy there, George.

    ReplyDelete