JAN EDWARDS EMULATES TED NUGENT

A few weeks back dear Jan sent us this:


"These are all pictures of the same bird. It’s a fledgling, as you can see from the beak. It’s kind-of-brown. I know what it is, but do you? "


I was beginning to worry, but because she works in animal rescue, and this is a spectacularly busy time of year I left her to it.


However, yesterday she wrote to me, saying that it was a baby starling, and that she had been ill.


Back in the summer of 1977, the year of the two sevens clash, I was a sophisticated young punk who listened to the artier side of punk rock, a smattering of reggae and Frank Zappa, and was secretly in love with Animals by Pink Floyd. However, some of my other friends were less tasteful, and a chap who I shall not name (bnecause I still see him occasionally) was obsessed with a particularly unlovely album Cat Scratch Fever by the particularly unlovely Ted Nugent.

Now I had just finished typing that paragraph when my lovely wife came in, saw the LP cover and said "Oooh I've got that album!" So its a good job I hadn't typed out that I always thought it was a disingenuous load of sexist tosh (sample lyric:

"Wang Dang Sweet Poontang Wang dang, what a sweet poontanga shakin' my thang as a rang-a-dang-dang in the bell She's so sweet when she yanks on my meat Down on the street you know she can't be beat What the hell Wang Dang Sweet Poontang"

But what is the point of this ramble through (thankfully) largely forgotten guitar noise? Well, basically, until yesterday I never realised that Cat Scratch Fever was a disease, and I only found out about it because Jan told me that she had contracted it.

"Its not just caused by a scratch. You can get it from simply stroking a kitten and rubbing your eyes. Apparently most vets and vet nurses have had it, and they are amazed I haven’t had it before now."

So when Nugent wrote:

"The first time that I got it I was just ten years old I got it from some kitty next foor I went and see the Dr. and He gave me the cure I think I got it some more They give me cat scratch fever Cat scratch fever"

Get better soon honey. I'm going off to listen to something wholesome, probably Throbbing Gristle...