Ode to the Ukulele

Sorry for not blogging yesterday. I was going to post some photos of the Shakespeare folio we saw and some more pages I have colored in my adult coloring book, so that is all you missed anyway. I went to a ukulele newbie jam at a community room in a grocery store, and one of the employees, who is a semi-professional banjo player, kept bringing us pitchers of water so that she would have an excuse to listen to us for a few minutes. I did reasonably well, except on the song “Closing Time,” which I really don’t like anyway. For some reason I find the chord progression (C-G-Dm-F) incredibly difficult, even though none of those chords is that hard on its own, and the whole song is just that progression, over and over. The older songs from the 50’s and 60’s are much easier to play and fun to sing. The woman I was sitting next to was teasing me for being so young that I probably didn’t know half the songs we did, although honestly I did know most of them. There was one by Dean Martin called “Sway,” sort of a tango, that didn’t seem that familiar, but it was a great song. Anyway, after that I came home and ran in place forever to music, so I didn’t really have time to blog. Today I feel very good for having exercised so much, but the pictorial blog post would probably have been more interesting than this one, so sorry about that. To make it up to you, I will write a little poem about the ukulele:

I like to play the ukulele,

There’s just no need to doubt it.

I sign my diary entries with “Haley”

And write to “Mariah” about it.

The other ukulele players

Are a super friendly bunch

Without any complex layers,

The types you’d want to join for brunch.

I like to think of the island breezes

And playing in front of the surf,

Instead of being in this place that freezes.

How I wish Hawaii were my turf!

The ukulele always sounds so bright,

Even when you’re not in tune,

And when you hit the chord that’s right,

It’s better than flying to the moon!

Famous Hat