Promised land

I have been singing “The Promised Land” song in my head for a couple of days now. I sing in my head because I’m considerate. I rarely sing out loud, except when hitting my finger with a hammer or while drinking wine in the shower. It occurred to me that all the American songs I was bombarded with in my youth (and that’s some time ago) were gradually gaining some sort of relevance. Framing places to lyrics of songs recorded over decades has been quite a thrill. Really!

As we have a friend who is an Elvis fan, that is to say full-blown ,”nutso”, can’t get enough, type fan we decided that as we had….

“Stopped in Charlotte and bypassed Rock Hill,
And we never was a minute late.
We was ninety miles out of Atlanta by sundown,
Rollin’ ‘cross the Georgia state.”

…..that we might as well (god forbid, sorry bible belt) call into Graceland.

We pulled into the parking lot and I had the immediate feeling that Elvis was still with us, the smell of fried chicken and burgers was everywhere like a ghostly fog of Elvis past. Turned out it was just a takeaway franchise at “Elvis Central”.

John Lennon’s famous words “before Elvis there was nothing” may have been true, however John also wrote “I am the Walrus” so lets take John with a grain of salt (or Lysergic acid diethylamide as your taste dictates).

I am unhappy to report that “Elvis has definitely left the building” and at the same time happy to inform you that his legacy lives on providing employment for hundreds of people and joy to the aged. Elvis is bigger than ever. Gift shop, movies, tee shirts, tours, Elvis in every shape and form 2D, 3D and if they can manage it 4D. D stands for dollar by the way. It’s $10 to $15 to park according to vehicle size (the clever people park at the gift shop next door, nice one Jen). It’s $42 to god knows what for the tour (the clever people look over the fence, nice one Les). Photos in front of the photo of the entrance gates to Graceland are extra (photos in front of the real gates are free), the car museum is extra, the plane museum is extra, the Elvis movie experience is extra. In short it’s all extra.

Enough with the Elvis. We still have to find Lonely Street, book in to the “Heartbreak hotel”, which is somewhere near “the ghetto”. Might even have a drink or two to “help me make it through the night”.

Tomorrow……

“Ridin’ cross Mississippi clean

And on that midnight flier out of Birmingham

Smoking into New Orleans”……………

Woo Hoo!