Sunday, February 04, 2007

In My Room

It's the waiting that's the hard part, isn't it...

The time before my hip-replacement surgery has been passing with a weird combination of glacial slowness and the inexorability of a supertanker. Just a week ago, I had a whole week to wait, and now I have a whole thirteen hours to kill. It feels like both an eternity and an instant.

Narcotics add immeasurably to the strangeness. Yesterday I was reading in bed, and closed my eyes for a few minutes, and began to have incredibly vivid and bizarre imaginings, dreamlike but not a dream. Since I was completely awake, I could control the images that were roiling in my head: Now think about sex, I told myself, and zoom up came these hyper-real pornographic eyelid movies. Now think about flying. Now think about going to work but forgetting to get dressed.

I really understand junkies.

In order to make the time pass this weekend, I whipped up this little number in the studio. I think it sums up my emotional state pretty nicely.

Play "In My Room" (pops).

For no particularly good reason, I wanted to use every electric guitar I own in this piece. Maybe I just wanted to feel them all in my hands one last time, I don't know. I'm playing the lead part on my beautiful blonde Epiphone Sheraton (my favorite guitar, I think, when all is said and done -- it looks a lot like the guitar John Lennon played during the rooftop concert in "Let It Be"). The second lead (the Carl Wilson voice, if you like) is my Epiphone Les Paul, a sunburst-finish beast. I don't know why I don't use this axe more often; it's just that the Sheraton is such a playable, seductive thing that I always reach for it when starting a recording. The tremelo doo-wop arpeggios are supplied by my Japanese Stratocaster, which I've given Fender Noiseless pickups and a much better pickup switch than the piece of junk it came with. I don't play this one much because the Floyd Rose whammy bar it came with makes it a major pain in the ass to tune, and my picking style often pulls it sharp.

I'm particularly fond of the double-stop bends in the second phrase of each verse ("I can go and..."). That's one guitar, no overdubs, man. I bend the A string a whole step, and the D string only a half-step. Your astonished applause humbles me. Thank you. Thank you very much.

All right. Twelve hours, now, before I depart for the hospital. Needless to say, no bloggage will be forthcoming until at least Wednesday, but I'll be taking copious notes when I'm not being flensed or hammered at or stretched or lectured to. Morphine drip. Morphine drip. Morphine drip....

Now think about walking without a cane...

17 comments:

Anonymous said...

good luck, and go Colts.

we'll keep the light on for you.

The Viscount LaCarte said...

Checked you after the Bears punted first time first quarter, so I haven't had the chance to hear the tune.


You are in my thoughts. I'm sure they are going to fix you up right. I wish you an easy and speedy recovery.

Let me know if there is anything I can do.

Robert Z. said...

I'm sure I speak for all the Chumps of Choice when I wish you a smooth and uneventful procedure, followed by a speedy and restful recovery. I for one am really looking forward to your Percocet-addled contributions in the coming weeks!

Donna said...

Oh I hate those morphine pumps, but I had a bad habit of getting enough to ease the pain and falling into a DEEP sleep. Which means I woke up after 4 or 5 hours with no pain meds in my system feeling the full agony. Hopefully you are a lighter sleeper so that you'll wake enough every hour or so to nudge the pump and doze some more. Otherwise ask your doctor to forget the pump and just have a nurse come in with your meds every 3 hours or so. My sister had her husband stay as much with her as possible and push the pump for her while she slept. LOL

Good luck on the surgery and I'm saying a little prayer for a speedy recovery!

Wren said...

Wow, Neddie -- you wrote that beautiful melody, played and mixed it all yourself on DRUGS?

I can't wait to hear the next installment. You're gonna ROCK, baby!

Honestly, the music was so lovely, and so melancholy and so yearning, you about made me cry. Thanks for sharing it with us. And the lights are on for you here at the Wren's Nest, too.

Be nice to the docs and don't hurt the nurses, OK?

Neddie said...

Wren:

Well, you know what they say about musicians and dope....

I'd love to be able to say I composed that, but Brian Wilson might object.

Donna:

No worries about the pump. Click, click, click, click....

DJ:

Say howdy to the Chumps for me. I'm not bringing AtD with me to the hospital; something tells me morphine and Vector Analysis don't mix. I'm bringing instead audiobook versions of Patrick O'Brian's Treason's Harbour and Julia Sweeney's Letting Go of God. Jack Aubrey and light atheist humor seem to be called for...

Bobby Lightfoot said...

Dude you're getting flensed!

Hooo is that nice. Especially the "...tell my sorrows to..." sections and the bends and the outro. It's flenserific. It has that casual, "Telstar" futurism.

Don't go into th' polesmoking light, man.

Anonymous said...

You don't be goin' down slow.

You be gettin' bettah, mon.

Word.

joel hanes

Jeremy said...

Yo, Ned. Get well soon.That's an order.

Anonymous said...

Good luck, Jeddie! I'll be thinking of you -- sending positive vibes over your way.

roxtar said...

I'm sure you've heard this before, but everyone I know who has had a hip replacement has only one regret: that they didn't have it sooner.

I'm going to be in Frederick in April. I'll buy you a beer if you DON'T show me your scar.....

robin andrea said...

Just followed a link from Blue Wren's site, and I'm glad I did. Your guitar work is really gorgeous. I had the speakers turned up on the computer, and my husband looked over and said, "That's great, who is it?" I said, I don't know, someone named Neddie Jingo.

Hope your surgery goes well today. Best wishes from two people you don't know in the Pacific Northwest, who like your music immensely!

Ol' Pal D said...

(crosses fingers) oh... please be photos, please be photos...

Hope things went well, we want details (and photos). Song's beautiful.

Anonymous said...

Good luck, man!

Kevin Wolf said...

I'm late to the party, as usual. I assume all is moving ahead supertankishly.

Get well soon so we can see you here again, tripping the light fantastic. Or just tripping.

The Viscount LaCarte said...

Tuesday - 1:32 PM EST...

From Bobby:

"Ned's resting peacefully. Everything went great. It's a good, good thing."

Anonymous said...

Thanks so much for posting that, Viscount.