Monday, Monday With Papa John Phillips Sousa

'Tis "Monday, Monday” and you “can’t trust that day,” as the old song posits. Then again, maybe this “Monday, Monday” — the first of the new year — will be “all I hoped it would be.” Who bloody knows? Who can say for certain what the songwriter’s position was on this day? As I think of it, what sort of wanker sits down at the piano and says, “I think I’ll pen a sad elegy to the first day of the working week”? I’ll tell you what sort — a marching band leader from the hills of Lost Angeles named John Phillips Sousa (pictured here marching, naturally). Memorandum to Master Phillips Sousa: "Oh Monday morning?" Is that all you’ve got, young citizen? A writerly rumination on the calendar offering? No pleas to a long departed galfriend or an ode to race relations or the farm closing down? You’re sticking with the "moon day" theme, as the citizenry from Babylonia so called it? It’s clear you have strong emotions about this day, but is it your contention that "every other day of the week is fine," excepting for Monday? Honestly? You’ve never had trouble befall you on a Tuesday. Never lost a job on a Friday or a sporting competition on a Saturday? You never failed to bring the missus to heights of ecstasy on a Wednesday? Never fallen prey to the oldest of practical jokes — stomping out a flaming bag of dog shite on your front stoop — on a Wednesday? Your mum-in-law never showed up on your doorstep on a Sunday with an over-toasted soda bread in one hand and a host of bloody complaints in the other? Really? Your repeated protestations that “every other day…every other day…every other day of the week is fine” sound like wishful thinking to me, sir. Methinks your felt-hatted hippy band associates — the comely blonde, zaftig mama and moustachioed papa — found your claims suspect as well, but they went along with you capably, swaying in their floral gowns and velvetine pants along to the pre-recorded backing track and wasn't that a sight to see? Alrighty almighty then! We've talked ourselves into it and will follow your lead into the week — if not entirety of the year — with positivity unrestrained. Right! (If not, left-right!)