POV Waltz

With apologies to Nilsson fans who saw the title of this post and were expecting something about Harry, I wanted to write about another one of those interesting characters that is part of this planetary theater project in which we all seem to be involved. The character in question calls himself A Pinch of Vermouth or POV.

I should begin by dispelling one misunderstanding. A Pinch of Vermouth has never claimed to be Apollo C. Vermouth, a person I have written about previously. Apollo first appeared on TKIN. Then in 2004, he started posting, usually via personal communication at Nothing Is Real. Apollo actually said that he had been banned from TKIN, but had no idea why. He wondered if it was a case a mistaken identity and then cleverly added, "If they only knew..."

By the time Apollo stopped posting at NIR, he had convinced a committee of group members that he was in fact Neil Aspinall. As far as I know, he did this without actually coming out and saying his identity. Apollo's correspondences ceased not long before the death of Aspinall on March 24, 2008.

One curious thing about NIR member Apollo was that he needed special technical help to be able to participate in the discussion group. In addition, he apparently required an assistant to type his messages. That assistant continued to communicate periodically at NIR under the name A Pinch of Vermouth.

The most recent post by POV was most likely misunderstood by many readers. On top of that, despite some initial "glad to hear from you" comments, the thread jumped the track, jumped the shark and veered completely off course.

That is why I would like to waltz back to where it started and offer my own observations about the post.

On April 26, 2009, NIR member GN posted this picture:


The title of the thread was "Tell Me What You See." It was set up as a poll offering three rather uninteresting choices of what the picture represented. There were not many takers on the poll. "GN," I think refers to Gnik Nus, the backward title from the Beatles "Love" soundtrack and the person formerly known as Sun King. Sun King (GN) is blamed for all kinds of things in the PID/PWR community that preceded my entry. So, this thread is an ironic choice to attract the likes of POV.

With no apparent reference to the picture, POV wrote the following play on the title of the thread utilizing lyrics from Beatles songs:

To see without looking...They don't know. They can't see. Are you one of them?...Never glimpse the truth...What do you see when they turn out the light? I can't tell you...What did you see while you were there? Nothing that doesn't show...Nothing you can see that isn't shown...The more I go inside, the more there is to see...You layed it down for all to see...Take these sunken eyes and learn to see...In their eyes there's something lacking...Take a good look you're bound to see...That you may see the meaning of within...Looking glass ties...Looking through a glass onion...Won't you open up your eyes. Look around round, round, round...He's so hard to see...POV

The post was so nice, he posted it twice. He made two identical consecutive posts, I think. It is curious that the first one is dated May 2, 2009 at 10:39 pm, the second one is dated May 2, 2009 at 10:43, and the first one says "Last Edit: May 2, 2009, 10:49pm by A Pinch of Vermouth." I'm not sure what the edit was, but both posts are now identical, including a lyrical error from "With A Little Help From My Friends" and a misspelling of the word "laid."

A couple of wrong responses followed, including one by me. I wrote: The one you wanted to be is now the one you see. That's a line from the song "Be What You See" on Paul's "Tug of War" album. You see, it has the word "see" in it and seems to relate to the others in terms of content. Nope. Square peg in a round hole I'm afraid. Sometimes wrong answers teach you more than right ones.

But it was 65if2007 who came up with a better wrong answer when he wrote: By the way, Pinch, you forgot "there is still a chance that they may see". Nope. A line from "Let It Be" does not count.

There has always been some ambiguity about the entry points of the Beatles' Mystery. The Beatles "Yesterday and Today" cover with the butchers or the replacement with the trunk, must be part of it, right? Grandfather Aleister had us looking back at "Help" for clues. And the "Let It Be" album with Paul's blood red background and "Two of Us Sunday driving, not arriving" etc. must be a clue-filled album, correct? I don't think so.

I have always felt that Apollo was trying to tell us that the real clues began at "Sgt Pepper" (including the "Strawberry Fields Forever/Penny Lane" single, which did appear on a subsequent album) and ended with "Abbey Road." All things before are either coincidence or preliminary hints and all things after are pointers back. Most of those backward glances go to Sgt. Pepper, but there are many that address the other releases as well. "Sexy Sadie" for example is mentioned in Ringo's "Devil Woman" and George's "Simply Shady."

Therefore, my theory is that POV was telling us that if we want to see, we must focus on the releases from "Sgt. Pepper," to "Abbey Road."



"There is nothing you can see that isn't shown."

In other news....

F spotted a ghost on YouTube.



This channel, which uses the old trick of substituting a lookalike letter, does not appear to be the real grandfatheraleister. However the YouTuber in question is one of the cast of characters that we all know and love. Well, some of you at least know him...

And finally, for those Harry Nilsson fans who made it through the whole post, here is the POV Waltz.