Tommy Boyce and Bobby Hart

            On Thursday morning I went to bed a little after midnight and woke up at around 3:30. My head was full of erotic thoughts and I couldn’t sleep from then on and so I got up at 4:30. 

            I searched for the chords to “D’où reviens-tu Billy Boy?” by Boris Vian but no one has posted them. I couldn’t even find the chords for the original “Where Have You Been Billy Boy?” by Raymond Scott, so tomorrow I’ll start working them out. 

            I memorized the third verse of “Love Fifteen” by Serge Gainsbourg and revised my translation.

            I played my Martin acoustic guitar during song practice for the first of four sessions. 

            I weighed 86.45 kilos before breakfast, which is the lightest I’ve been in the morning since April 13. 

            I sanded the part of the southern wall of the bathroom that’s directly over the tub. Of the section that requires the stepladder there’s about a square meter left. I think it will take at least a couple of days.

            I weighed 86.65 kilos before lunch. That’s the least I’ve tipped the scales at midday since July 22. 

            In the afternoon I took a bike ride downtown and stopped at Freshco on my way back. I was going to do a price match on the grapes because they were cheaper at Metro but the Freshco grapes were too soft and so I decided I’d just walk over to Metro when I was finished. At Freshco I bought two packs of raspberries, some bananas, an eye of round roast, and a pack of Full City Dark coffee. I forgot to buy skyr, which I’d somehow run out of. I haven’t run out for a long time. I walked over to Metro and bought five bags of red grapes. 

            I weighed 85.7 kilos at 18:12 and that’s the lowest my weight has been for several months. 

            I was caught up on my journal at 18:48.

            I uploaded the video of my acoustic performance of “Dance and Sing to Baby Pop” to You Tube. 

            I opened the Movie Maker project for my August 14, 2023 song practice and saved it as “Dance and Sing to Baby Pop (electric)”. I set the beginning of the video timeline and worked on synchronizing the audio with the video. They were about two seconds apart when I quit for the night. 

            I grilled eight chicken drumsticks in the oven. 

            I digitized the cassette tape of part one of the 1998 Slamnation, my no rules poetry slam at Lees Palace. The last cassette I digitized was part two. The host was Cad Gold Jr. and the musicians were Tricia Postal on hurdy-gurdy and Peter Fruchter on recorders. Simon Orpana and I were the judges and there were supposed to be two winners but in the end Simon couldn’t make a choice and just gave half the money away to the first person who stepped forward. What an asshole! There are two cassettes each also for Slamnations 1999 and 2000. 

            I had a potato with gravy and two drumsticks while watching season 6, episodes 21 and 22 of Bewitched. 

            In the first story Endora doesn’t think her daughter’s husband is ambitious enough and so she casts a spell to make Darrin obsessively driven. He’d been turning down the Braddock sports equipment account because he had too much on his plate but now he takes it. He studies Braddock before a lunch date and wins him over by presenting himself as athletic and sports minded. Darrin comes home and tells Samantha they are going to start inviting important people to dinner who can help him get ahead. He says he wants Larry’s job. He’s going to invite the McManns over for dinner and next he’ll take over the agency. Samantha realizes this is another of her mother’s spells and summons her to remove it. Endora appears in a space suit saying she just came back from Venus where she planted a broom. She says it belongs to the witches now. She can’t stay because she’s due in the decontamination chamber. Samantha tries to tell Darrin he’s under a spell but he doesn’t believe it. The McManns are coming for dinner and Samantha casts a spell to compel Larry and Louise Tate to come over too. Before the Tates arrive Darrin is throwing his friend and boss under the bus by convincing McMann that Larry is too old and behind the times to be the front man for McMann and Tate anymore. Larry and Louise arrive and McMann is about to tell Larry what he’s decided when Samantha compels him to have another drink. She causes him to have three more and then she freezes everybody and calls Endora. She gets her mother to remove the spell. Then Samantha unfreezes Darrin to explain that he has been under the influence of witchcraft. She’s mad at Darrin for not listening to her earlier so she now tells him to get out of the mess under his own power. Darrin says Larry is the young minded person he had in mind to continue leading McMann and Tate. McMann tells Darrin he’s contradicting himself. Darrin says he does it deliberately to shake things up. 

            In the second story Serena pops in and announces that she’s been appointed head of entertainment for the Cosmos Cotillion. Meanwhile Darrin has just closed a deal with Breeze Shampoo to sponsor a television special starring Boyce and Hart. Serena looks at the Boyce and Hart album and thinks they’re cute. She levitates the record and plays it without a phonograph. The song is “I Wonder What She’s Doin Tonight” and Serena and Samantha start dancing. Serena decides she’s going to hire them to play at the Cosmos Cotillion and she’ll let them play the new song she wrote. Next we see Boyce and Hart arriving at their headquarters, being mobbed and having their shirts torn off my screaming teenagers. Serena arrives and easily gets past the guards. She invites Boyce and Hart to play at the cotillion and offers double their normal fee. Their manager says it’s a deal. But then he hears she wants them to sing her song and he throws her out. Serena goes back to Samantha and Darrin and sings them her song “I’ll Blow You A Kiss On the Wind” while dancing and pretending to play guitar. Darrin thinks it stinks but Samantha thinks it’s terrific. She tells Serena she should find a couple of guys less popular than Boyce and Hart. That gives Serena an idea. She casts a spell to cause Boyce and Hart to suddenly become unpopular. But that causes Breeze Shampoo to not only cancel the TV special but also their account with McMann and Tate. Then she comes to Boyce and Hart with her offer again and their manager accepts. Serena transports Boyce and Hart to the Cosmos Club in the dimension where the Cosmos Cotillion is taking place. Boyce and Hart sing Serena’s song for an audience of witches and warlocks. Samantha appears and starts dancing with Serena. The audience loves Boyce and Harts act. Samantha makes Serena send Boyce and Hart back to earth, make them popular again and make them forget where they’ve been. 

            Tommy Boyce and Bobby Hart played themselves and the songs “I Wonder What She’s Doing Tonight” and “I’ll Blow You A Kiss On the Wind” were written by them. They both started out in the 1950s as Brill Building songwriters, Their compositions together and with others have sold more than $85 million. They started working together in 1965 when they wrote the theme song for Days of Our Lives. Together they created the musical sound for The Monkees and wrote over thirty songs for them, including “Theme from the Monkees”, “Last Train to Clarksville”, “Steppin Stone”, “Valleri”. In the 70s they were part of the Monkees revival and had a successful tour with half the Monkees as Dolenz, Jones, Boyce and Hart. They wrote hits for The Animals, Del Shannon, Dean Martin and Andy Williams. Bobby co-wrote “Hurt So Bad” and other songs for Josie and the Pussycats and The Partridge Family. Tommy wrote “Be My Guest” for Fats Domino. He also wrote “Pretty Little Angel Eyes”. In 1968 they spearheaded Let Us Vote (LUV), which helped the voting age in the US get lowered to 18. Boyce and Hart were nominated for an Academy Award for the song “Over You” for the movie Tender Mercies. In the 70s Tommy produced records by Iggy Pop and Meat Loaf. He shot himself to death in 1994.