Friday, August 29, 2008

Song of the Week: The Motorcycle Song

At lunch today, Bede brought out the jar of kosher dill pickles, and asked, "Who wants a pickle?"

Lucia and I started singing, "I don't want a pickle-- I just want to ride on my motor-sickle."

"Fine," Bede said. "I'll eat them all myself."

Lucia and I hastily reconsidered and decided we did want pickles after all.

You will find lyrics and chords to Arlo Guthrie's "The Motorcycle Song" (a.ka. The Pickle Song) here.

You may watch and listen to Arlo Guthrie singing the song and explaining the origins of the song with his distinctive storytelling style:



Also, don't miss Randy Kaplan's interpretation of the song on his album Five Cent Piece. In Kaplan's version, he's just trying to comfort his sister on a rainy day, but guess what-- she doesn't want a pickle, or a tickle, for that matter.

Those of you who check in regularly (and I appreciate you very much!) have noticed a bit of a lull lately on the blog. That's just the way it goes sometimes. I had a good gig today, and plan to do some research for more stories and songs in the upcoming months. October and November will be busy with the Pierce County Library gigs. Lucia starts school the week after Labor Day. On September 13, we're going to see Elizabeth Mitchell in concert (Finally! Hurrah!), and the weekend of September 27 is the Second Annual Kidlitosphere Conference in Portland, Oregon.

4 comments:

Lone Star Ma said...

Sounds like a lot of happy busy-ness!

tanita✿davis said...

Surely not first grade already!?

Saints and Spinners said...

LSM: We're certainly on our toes!

TadMack: Nope, Lucia has one more year of kindergarten at least. A lot of Waldorf kids do two (sometimes three) years of kindergarten.

Lone Star Ma said...

Her school is really a Waldorf school? Wow. Already reading as she is is sort of verboten in Waldorf, isn't it? I've only read about such things, but I've heard that you're supposed to be able to cross the mid-line first at least, and that hard-core Waldorf schools don't want you reading until past 8, sometimes 11. I don't have a problem with that, mind you. Montessori embraces the whole early reading thing, but I kind of think whatever. As long as they learn to love reading, they'll do it when they need to. Waldorf seems so fascinating.