Lorne, Geekdom and “It’s Not Easy Being Green”

On Saturday night at around 11pm I decided to alphabetise my CD collection – Odd timing you may think, but not really for me. After having failed big time on trying to use file-sharing sites I have taken to adding the audio file directly to my posts. All very well but not all the songs I think of writing about are stored digitally on my computer and I end up having to buy tracks I know perfectly well are already on a CD, somewhere in the house…….., if only I could find them…….., but where?

Now I know that all you serious music bloggers out there will have carefully catalogued, alphabetised collections but here at “What’s It All About?” the song is usually just the inspiration to go on and write about other things, so not quite as organised. As hubby had just headed off to bed, I had the living room floor to myself so I raided the cupboards, shelves and drawers where all those flat, square-shaped boxes were sneakily hiding, and duly laid them out on the carpet. Not having had an actual workaday CD player for some time now, having moved onto docking stations and bluetooth speakers, there were some interesting and long-forgotten finds.

The first dilemma however was whether to amalgamate everything I found, which included my daughters childhood CDs (Disney, Pop Party 1 to 7, The Jonas Brothers etc), the CDs my 81-year-old mother disposed of when I got her an iPod (although she hasn’t quite cracked how to use it yet so I tend to just leave it on shuffle for her), hubby’s very “cool” collection (what the heck is he doing being married to me) and the three large crates full of classical music CDs left to us by my late father-in-law (if anyone has any practical suggestion on what we could do with them please feel free to let me know).

A dilemma indeed but in the end I went with amalgamating everything except the classical CDs, the freebies that used to come regularly with the Sunday newspapers, and the karaoke CDs. I’m sure anyone who has ever worked in a record shop would know exactly what to do with the compilations (Jack Black in High Fidelity?) but not I job I’ve ever done, so just had to go with what I thought would work for me. And so, I ended up at 1.30am in the morning with a fully alphabetised collection snaking across the room. Sadly, whilst very quietly carrying them back to their disparate homes in sections, I accidentally turned some of the piles upside down and will have to go back and correct the fact that David Gray now comes right before Shawn Mullins and the aforementioned Jonas Brothers come right after Chick Flicks (The Ultimate Soundtrack).

Whilst happily occupying myself with all of this when most people my age were getting their beauty sleep, it occurred to me that it’s great fun being a geek! You can never, ever be bored as there is always something to catalogue, list or plan. We may walk the earth incognito, as reliable employees and pillars of the local community, but behind that respectable exterior there is a secret life of Eurovision, Buffy Conventions, Pop Quizzes, “Blogging and Cataloguing” (has a nice ring to it). It doesn’t even have to be restricted to music and film, as earlier in the day we specifically had lunch at a restaurant starting with the letter M, all because I decided that it would be fun this year to work our way alphabetically through the restaurants in town – At the moment we know we’re going to get stuck at Q and X but you just never know, something new may open up!

But anyway, whilst working my way through the CDs, I found the Soundtrack to the television show Angel – If like us you became somewhat drawn into the wonderful alternate reality of the Buffyverse, this was the excellent spinoff show starring David Boreanaz. (Anyone who pokes fun at the show, or its premise, obviously hasn’t given it enough attention as it’s creator Joss Whedon received numerous awards and it was lauded for its influential themes and impact on popular culture – Just saying.)

One of my favourite characters from that show was Lorne (played by Andy Hallett), the proprietor of an underground LA karaoke bar. He was a music-loving soul and had arrived from another dimension, specifically Pylea where music didn’t exist, in order to indulge his passion (wouldn’t we all). His name was really Krevlornswath of the Deathwok Clan and the in-joke of course was that because his “clan” had green-coloured skin, he was Lorne Greene (but you have to be of a certain age to get that one I suspect). One of the songs he sang on the show was very appropriately It’s Not Easy Being Green made famous by that very personable frog puppet, Kermit.

It’s Not Easy Being Green by Andy Hallett
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So, “What’s It All About?” – It may not be that easy being green but although initially lamenting his green colouration, by the end of the song, Lorne remembers all the positive associations with the colour, and ends up accepting and embracing his greenness. Likewise, it may not always be easy being a geek but tonight I have decided to embrace my “geekness” – It is turning out to be a fine life and one which I hope will continue for some time!

It’s Not Easy Being Green Lyrics
(Song by Joe Raposo)

It’s not that easy being green,
Having to spend each day the color of the leaves.
When I think it could be nicer being red, or yellow or gold-
or something much more colorful like that.

It’s not easy being green.
It seems you blend in with so many other ordinary things.
And people tend to pass you over ’cause you’re not standing out
like flashy sparkles in the water-or stars in the sky.

But green’s the color of Spring.
And green can be cool and friendly-like.
And green can be big like the ocean, or important like a mountain, or tall like a tree.
When green is all there is to be

It could make you wonder why,
but why wonder?
Why Wonder, I am green and it’ll do fine, it’s beautiful!
And I think it’s what I want to be.

Postscript:

And in case anyone has forgotten it, here is the original performed by Jim Henson as Kermit the Frog. Unbelievably it was covered by Frank Sinatra the following year, 1971. Strange times and a strange post I now realise, so back to business as usual for next time I think!