I Love This Little Thing About Me

+ Child's Christmas in Wales (John Cale cover)

Chit-Chat Check-In #103 • Transcript

Thanksgiving is a weird holiday. There are a lot of things that are problematic about it, obviously. So I tend to focus on the nice concept of having a day set aside where gratitude is the featured emotion. There's so much to be thankful for. I try to be thankful most of the time, and grateful most of the time. I think 365 days would be good, Thanksgiving every day in that regard. But I don't know... humans tend to want dates to focus on. And who can say all of human history is wrong?

Aside from all the people I love and am grateful for, and thankful I have in my life, I have a funny thing I want to share about something I'm thankful for in my own makeup, a personal trait that I love. I love this little thing about me. And that's OK.

This is what it is. Whenever I'm watching anybody play music—it doesn't matter where, or when—I always have a pick with me, and I always involuntarily find my pick and hold it, as if I'm going to be called into action. Like “Oh, they might need me to step on stage at some point, so I'd better be ready, and have my pick out.” I don't think about it at all. I noticed it the first time watching The Who at an arena. Most recently, I looked down at the United Center while I was watching Billie Eilish play, and I had my pick in my hand. I think that there's something kind of pure about it, and I just wanted to share it. I think it's deep in my nature to want to be part of anything going on with anything that's music, I guess.

All right. You can share some of the things that you think might fit in with that category of blessings in the comments, if you want. I also have a cover of “Child's Christmas in Wales” that I did recently to share. For me, personally, the Velvet Underground are kind of a miracle.

OxO—Jeffy

View from inside my car the day after all of the leaves let go.

P.S. For the music nerds—I apologize for “sort of” honoring the bars of 6/8 and 5/8 inconsistently. And for thumbing my nose at the bar of 7/8 at the top of the outro. Measures of 4/4 should be fairly consistent though. So that’s nice.

This Week in Wilco, Etc.

1967 / November 26: Happy Birthday John Stirratt!

2024 / November 29: The physical LP and CD configurations of Hot Sun Cool Shroud are released.

2018 / November 30: Jeff’s solo album Warm is released on dBpm Records.

1992 / December 1: Uncle Tupelo opens for Sugar at Batschkapp in Frankfurt, Germany. Their 12-song set includes a cover of the Soft Boys “I Wanna Destroy You.”

Child’s Christmas in Wales (John Cale cover)