Posted by: David Harley | August 25, 2014

bootup blues

Words (and music, such as it is) by David Harley. Copyright 1986.

When I woke up this morning
My laptop wouldn’t boot at all
I said I woke up this morning
And tossed my Tosh against the wall
My baby took the mains adapter and the battery’s screwed beyond recall

Well she left me for some guy
With a 99GHz overclocked PC
And now she’s interfacing
With his RS232C
(he’s a serial womanizer)
She said my hard disk was too small
To satisfy
Her new spreadsheet

I wouldn’t treat an iPad
The way that woman treated me
She fragmented my hard disk
And ran off with my Angry Birds DVD
Left me nothing but this boot sector virus
And a copy of Wordstar version 3.3

Dah-diddy-dah-diddy-dah-diddy-dah….

You can get some idea of how old this thing is from the fact that the iPad was originally an Amstrad, and the Angry Birds DVD was originally a 7th Guest Cd. It’s hard keeping up with technology. Hopefully, I’m still ahead of the curve on PC CPU specs, Moore’s Law (or House’s variant) and overclocking notwithstanding. The reference to RS232C is slightly disingenuous: RS-232-C is the 1969 version of the standard, not hardware. I wouldn’t have mentioned any of this if it weren’t for a ludicrous conversation in a pub with someone who apparently thought I was setting PC for Dummies to music rather than writing a mildly amusing blues parody. And to the guy who recommended that I use Sophos to deal with my boot sector virus, thanks for the suggestion, but I do actually work – or, strictly speaking, consult – for a(nother) anti-virus company, and I think I’ve got it covered.

David Harley 
Small Blue-Green World
ESET Senior Research Fellow

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Posted in David Harley, Parodies

Posted by: David Harley | August 24, 2014

Close the door lightly when you go [Demo]

A song by Eric Anderson. I originally learned it from a version by Ian Matthews, back in the 70s, so I don’t always do it like this. And I have yet to double track my vocals live. :)

David Harley
Small Blue-Green World

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Posted in David Harley

Posted by: David Harley | August 24, 2014

New Ends and Sad Beginnings

One of my earliest songs, written in the late 60s (though it’s been through a few changes since then: haven’t we all?)

backup:

There’ll never be a better time for starting something new
I’m spending too much time alone, brooding over you
But nothing comes that easy, and I’ve got so insecure
Since the angel I was slowly learning how to trust is surely finding
Strange ways of turning long-time dreams into nightmares after all

The sun will rise and fall and the night will win again
So I’m promised with no guarantee of stars
And in my street-lit room I will sing some different tune
To the futile rusting chords of my guitar

The beggar-clown will weep as he tiptoes through my sleep
If he knows, he will not tell me where you are
In his hand he holds a candle I reach out to pluck its blossom
And it lies between the strings of my guitar

This may well be the first song I ever wrote that I can still remember all through, though it’s changed a lot since 1969. It contains some of the original lines, but the tune has changed completely.

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Posted in David Harley, Songs

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