I'm truly sorry this review is so nasty, but...

I have been itching to write this blog since 07 December 2010 when I started really reading this book, "Two Of Us" by Peter Smith. Before I say anymore, I'm going to give my disclaimer. I do not like it when people judge others, though I don't mind people saying how they feel. That is what I'll be doing. I especially would like to make clear that it's especially wrong to say mean things about children. I'm not trying to get personal or attack anyone AT ALL, but I have been bursting with passion about my need to write my feelings on this book since I delved into it. If anyone in this book comes across this review, I do not want them to get hurt. I want to make that clear...but I have GOT to be honest. This is just my humble little blog. I'm not writing to a huge audience. This is my place to say things and, if people are reading my entries, I'm glad. If they're not, I'm still writing what I want to say, even if I'm the only one reading it. I am glad the Smith family all are fans, at least on some level, and hope you'll have great memories that will last a lifetime.

First, here's a bit that I wrote before I had finished the book:

12 DEC 2010: I've only read about four chapters of "Two Of Us" by Peter Smith. Well, first let me say...I picked up the book a couple of years ago and something on the first page made me so furious, I threw the book and never picked it up again until about a week ago. Okay...so I thought this book would be the best book of all-time for me. It's a story about a father and son who bonded through The Beatles. This sounded exactly like my mother and I. She's the reason that I was able to officially and verbally profess my love for them at the age of 2.5! She's the reason I grew up in a Beatles museum! She's the reason I am so passionate, obsessive, and just plain blessed to have had so many Beatley opportunities. She's the reason for it all, even though I kind of discovered them on my own, but that's a LONG [and very cool] story I will share some other time.

I have decided to read this book all the way through this time no matter what, but I will tell you that I have had to write some nasty comments in the margins with my mechanical pencil, hahaha! It's a very weird book for me. Some things in the book are PRICELESS! They reflect my experience, my feelings, and are just plain wonderful...and then, out of nowhere, you'll read something completely ludicrous. I've never had something make me feel so fantastic AND so miserably angry! I just don't get it! I'm writing this ahead of time right now because I REALLY want to post this blog now, but I've got other entries that need to be posted first and also, I want to finish this book first. I'm just saying...UGH.

Here's what I wrote 21 December 2010 immediately after finishing off the last chapter:

There are other blogs I need to post first, but that's too bad. I can't wait. I've got to share this. I'm sorry if I repeat myself, but I won't do it much, I hope. Stay with me!

I first picked this book up probably more than two years ago. The very first page made me SO mad, I threw the book [HARD, so much that there's still a dent in it] and never wanted to touch it again. Half of me was mad because of what I read and the other half of me was mad because I realized the book wasn't going to be what I expected. I thought it was going to be a great story about a father-son duo and their great passion for The Beatles, like my mom and I, but there was only a little of that sprinkled over a very rude and condescending story.

Those two didn't match my own mother-daughter experience at all, for the most part. There were glimpses of that which made me smile, but all of the happy moments were soon after slaughtered by something STUPID. For example, what made me so mad on the very first page was when he described their love for the lads, saying that it wasn't as creepy as an obsession. I'm not ashamed of my obsession, but a "fan" of my obsession just called me creepy. Wonderful. I thought you'd be on MY team. He also talks about when his son was seemingly obsessed with the lads. There's that ugly word again, obsessed...and he proceeds to question if it was his fault or if it was okay that his son felt this way. I hate to tell him, but I'll be pushing the boys onto my kids before they're even born! Some of my friends joke that it'll be brainwashing, but my kids will be REAL fanatics...and it won't be a two-year phase they go through either...but now I'm getting ahead of myself.

He describes the first time Sam hears The Beatles and how he reacts. He talks about how he reenacted the Abbey Road album cover with his siblings. He talks about how he constantly wanted to be quizzed about his knowledge. THAT sounds like me! That sounds like me as a kid and that sounds like me NOW! There were many moments I felt like I could really relate to this kid, and these were the moments. They changed his life as they had changed mine. I could especially relate as well to the bits where Peter describes how Sam was too young to really understand it all, like when the visual in his mind of the lads was actually a foursome of bugs. I never thought that because I knew what they looked like since I was at least two years old, but there are definitely things in my childhood where I was trying to piece things together and just wasn't old enough to grasp it fully until I was maybe seven years old. I liked that Sam was so passionate so young.

I liked the part where Sam got a letter back from Paul. I liked the part where Peter trashes kid music like I did here in my blog 01 January 2010. I liked when Peter called music "coded communication," meaning you can tell a lot by a person's musical preferences. I liked that Sam studied images well enough to spot the train conductor, hahaha. I loved how Sam carried Beatley possessions everywhere with him, even to his bathroom counter to brush his teeth...but then there were the outrageous moments that canceled out the good! How could he not like certain songs? How could he say they couldn't produce a good song every time? How could he abandon his LPs? How could anyone not like John? If you're a fan, you should love all four of them. Why in the world did they have to RENT "A Hard Day's Night" that evening when my household owned multiple copies on VHS, one purchased and one recorded from television? [We eventually got the DVD too, of course.] Even if they didn't own it for some reason at that point, why didn't they then go and buy it. RENT!? REALLY?

I liked how Sam ignored his video games for LPs. I like how they inspired him so much, he enjoyed learning their music on piano. [The 1st song I ever learned on guitar was "In My Life."] I liked reading about how Sam couldn't get enough information about them, always reading about them and studying them. He appreciated who they were as people, not just liking the songs he heard. However, the dreaded nonsense would creep in again. They had to buy him all the CDs they didn't already have, which meant they didn't even own all their stuff! I've got multiples upon multiples on vinyl, shoe-boxes full of cassettes, stacks of 8-tracks, and of course multiples on CD. At one point, Sam requests Raffi over the boys and his dad remarks about how he understood that because he'd hate to only hear The Beatles every day. Are you kidding me? If that's all I ever heard for the rest of my life, it would be great! There's other fantastic music out there, but at the end of the day, what more do you really NEED other than The Beatles? Why would anyone need a BREAK from them? "Did you seriously just say that?," I kept wondering.

If you're a real fanatic, attending a Beatlefest is reaching Nirvana. [Yes, I know the name of the Fest has changed, but I still call it "Beatlefest" and plus, it's shorter to type.] If I could spend every day of my life in a hotel for Beatlefest, I'd be content never to step outside again in my life! What more could anyone possibly want from life, really? So...they go to a Beatlefest and proceed to call people like me "insane." Don't they know these are the kind of people who will buy this book? I don't find humor in this at all...sorry. You're not above us. We have REAL passion and you're just a phony. That's the problem. YOU were the problem with the Fest. WE are not insane. WE are actual fans. What are YOU? Why does your kid who loves them so darn much beg you to leave the Beatley version of Heaven? Stop trying to make yourself out to be a fan, for goodness sake. You're embarrassing me.

They didn't appreciate it at all and there's people like me who can't afford to attend the Fest whenever I want, and would give their world to have been there...and you are bored, looking at your watch, and just want to go eat something? That kid could have bought anything besides the jukebox, his father said, and he wanted to LEAVE the marketplace? In fact, you mocked some of the merchandise as you happily escaped to the hallway. What's wrong with you people? Why did you want to go home? What's so great about your home? Beatlefest is not something you can go back to any day of your life like your boring home is and you paid good money for those tickets to get in. Why can't you enjoy yourself? Your kid even used the word "hate" to describe how he felt about Beatlefest. I give you some credit for at least trying to attend, but your kid who is obsessed with them hates being engulfed in them. Explain that to me. Why did he beg to never go to anything like that again? Why was he rewarded with a steak for "surviving" Beatlefest? Really? You're saying that WE are "weird?"

He goes on about websites he liked, but then mocks the really enthusiastic ones. He talks about how his son's love for the boys was growing and growing only pages after he talks about how horrible it was to have attended a Fest. Are you sure about all that, pal? You went out of your way to buy this kid bootlegs? Why does it get you all choked up? People who actually love them [rather than pretending to] are "insane," remember?

Okay...this book even mentions that Paul's birthday was 22 June. NEED I REALLY SAY MORE!? Paul was born on the 18th, you ridiculous twit! Are you seriously kidding me? He even misspelled/misnamed a lot of things, such as song titles. He doesn't even know the titles. Even if you didn't know for whatever reason, you would think that since he's writing a book, it might occur to him to look things up to avoid proving his foolishness. One minute loving them makes people like me "weird" and the next minute he talks about how he used to lose sleep over the "Paul Is Dead" controversy. Why would you lose sleep? You don't even know his birthday, for goodness sake! What's it to you? Then, your kid that you refer to as an expert can't even get a birthday right. I am by no means calling Sam stupid or anything, but it just doesn't make sense. There were other details too, like how "Here Today" was written seven years after John's death. That album came out in 1982 and John was murdered in 1980. I'm no math genius, but I'm pretty sure 1982 minus 1980 equals TWO. Stop acting like you're a fan, an expert, or even remotely interested for that matter! Why the contradictions?

Overall, they seemed interested in their visit to the Dakota, I guess you could say. That's another place I can't afford to visit, but imposters like this pair get to go. It's so unfair. It would have changed my life if I could have taken those wasted Fest tickets from them...and now this. He even admits that at one point it had been a long time since the boys had even played a role in his life. Why? Where did they go? Why would you put them aside for anything else? Why did they suddenly come back like some cheap trend? Why would your wife's admiration for Linda be such a puzzlement? I could go on and on forever with my complaints, as you all probably are thinking I already have, hahaha! They seemed to react to George's death somewhat like a true fanatic would. A lot of what they said related exactly to my thought process at the time...except for when they complained about how he was sometimes moody, how Peter mentioned he never listened to "All Things Must Pass" when it came out, or how they decided to put on Paul's music to dance and cheer themselves up rather than paying tribute to the man that had died that day. Why did you choose on the day of his passing to critique the way in which you believe his voice had "come a long ways" since the beginning of his music career. Are you really serious? WOW...

He said that an obsession with the boys is an obsession "with an idea." Oh, is that so? Please tell me how my obsession of well over twenty years is something I've been mistaken about all this time. Please, tell me! I would just LOVE for you to explain that to me! Why does one's love and devotion have to have its limits? I've never come across any limits, so by all means please show them to me. Maybe then I won't be so INSANE!

Why would you arrive in England and go to SLEEP. Can't you do that at home? Can't you get sleep later? That's the first thing you want to do when you arrive there? When I was lucky enough to go to England through a school program, I didn't sleep for probably the equivalent of three days before I decided to recharge. Sleep was nothing more than a waste of time, until it became necessary, as far as I was concerned. I'd rather walk around and experience England sleepy than to feel rested and see half of what I did. What an idiot...sorry...and this is where it gets really ugly...

You already wasted your Fest experience, but now you go on for two chapters about how uninspiring your visit to London and Liverpool was. Your obsessive kid didn't want to even talk about The Beatles the whole time you were there. He chose to play with his toy soldiers for most of the trip...and why did Peter say that reaching a "Beatles plateau" was something you "couldn't avoid." Hearing their songs over and over again sure satisfies MY desires! Don't you tell me that this is normal because I haven't hit a plateau, a break, or any voluntary bumps in the road in more than two decades. Face it...you just don't know what you're talking about. He complains about "Beatles Rarities," which to him was a bunch of boring conversations. He calls his son's new interests "boy stuff." Does that mean The Beatles aren't "boy stuff?" Are they just for girls? You're going to have to explain that to a lot of men out there. They're everyone's "stuff!"

If you're truly a Beatles lover, your interests don't change like Sam's interests did. Peter asks if it even matters if Sam takes a vacation from The Beatles. THE ANSWER IS YES. Duh! He says there's no way to keep up such an obsessive "preoccupation," so perhaps he needs to come and interview my family and friends. YOU'RE WRONG! Your kid didn't care one bit about England and all of the priceless landmarks he was lucky enough to see, so just face it and admit it. Your kid got to live so many of my dreams that I'll never be able to afford and he didn't even care. Great! He couldn't even hold onto his knowledge he once had because he didn't care long enough to keep it up. Your stories about where you went, what you saw, and how he didn't care just taunt people like me. I don't appreciate it. Even Peter called it "kind of" fun. Sam was miserable and you're a fool.

They decided not to go see Paul's house, just like Sam had decided not to write to George. They didn't want to be a bother. If you didn't write George, that's your loss, but why didn't you go see Paul's house? It's no bother. You didn't have to get right up to it if you didn't want to. You could have gone to see it, kept your distance, and he would have never known you were there. What a SAD excuse. Your son didn't even want to go on the second Beatles tour in London. Are you even serious? Sam said he hates London. Are you even serious? What's wrong with him for not being excited if he's such a huge fanatic? At least Peter acted a little excited every once in a while, though he skipped an opportunity to see Abbey Road again in favor of going back to his party-pooping son. He didn't even want photographs of these landmarks? Why was Peter so shocked that Sam was indifferent when he had once taken a Beatles break in favor of RAFFI? Then, Peter expresses his disappointment in Liverpool. What did he expect? Anyone who knows anything about JPG&R should know exactly what to expect from Liverpool! I would LOVE to go there and my expectations are actually reasonable. I actually know what it would be like because I'm actually a fan of The Beatles.

Why would Peter say that poor Sam couldn't keep up in England because he was only nine. That's another SAD excuse. He should be better at keeping up at his age, but also any age should be able to go on forever with the amount of adrenalin something that spectacular should create! The kid didn't want anything from a Liverpool souvenir shop, just like he was unimpressed with the marketplace at Beatlefest...and facts continued to be wrong, though I haven't the time or patience to name them ALL. An example would be when Peter mentions that "I'll Follow The Sun" was written in Paul's bedroom at 20 Forthlin Road. No. It was written in the parlour. Close...but no.

Why did you find "The Beatles Story" to be so torturous? Why did you even write this book!? You say this trip to England "wasn't a complete bust." That's like saying natural childbirth doesn't feel too good and/or hurts a bit. Really? Was the trip so bad that you have to struggle to say that it wasn't a COMPLETE waste of time, but it pretty much was useless? Why did you write this book, anyway? Was it your goal to piss off your entire target audience? Let me just say...I'm glad I only paid $1 at a used bookstore for this nonsense! You and your son were able to just move on from your love of the lads. Apparently, there were better things to move onto. Beatlemania doesn't just die off or pass. I'm glad Peter admits that, even if you do move on, you always come back to them...but why would anyone be stupid enough to move on? I DON'T GET IT! Why do you just not need them anymore one day? At the end when he lists all of their songs, supposedly in order, he makes SO many mistakes and forgets approximately twenty songs on the list, though I'm too mad to count right now!

I'm not upset that you're not extreme fanatics, but I'm upset that you pretend that you are and aren't even close in actuality. I'm sorry if this blog entry is mean...but I don't understand the point of this book. You're not a real fan at all. Neither one of you ever were. You mock your target audience. You put them down. You insult their importance. You insult other people's ability to be dedicated simply because you're incapable of it. It's just a huge waste of paper, probably just to get attention and make money off of REAL fans like me that thought the book looked good. You did a good job of fooling us all into thinking this book was written by a fan. You made us think your kid actually loved them when it was just a stupid little phase. What a JOKE. I've perhaps never been this mad in all my life.

Gleetles

There was some recent controversy about how the television show "Glee" had somehow surpassed the music accomplishments of The Beatles. Pft.

I think it was that they topped their record for most hit singles. Okay...are they serious? I don't care how many hits this television show has had. A fictional show cannot be better than the guys that changed the entire world. No one considers the Partridge Family to be an actual band, so may I ask what the difference is with THIS fictional television program? Next, how many of these Glee hits did the actual singers of these songs compose themselves? Oh wait...they imitate people like Madonna and Britney Spears. It's not any of their own material at all, is it?

Did all of these Glee hits become hits because people got into their cars, onto their bikes, or caught a bus down to the local record shop? Did they drop a fairly significant amount of cash once they were done waiting in line and then leave the store with a physical product? No. They most likely hit "download" on iTunes in the comfort their own home for only $0.99! It's easy to make that kind of decision. It's really easy to click on a button and have a song that you may or may not care too deeply about owning stored onto your computer. [Of course, this iTunes method has now been applied to the Beatles themselves, but that's another two-sided rant for another day...]

I love that there is a television show promoting music [good or bad, there's no escaping that] and that has even embraced their "rivals," The Beatles. I am glad that these kids have talent and are having fun. I am NOT knocking on the show or its fans at all. I'm knocking on the people who love to see the best get "dethroned" by trying to compare bubblegum to a steak dinner. I like bubblegum and steak, and I have a lot more bubblegum than steak in my life, but when you compare them...c'mon! Everybody wants the steak...unless you're a vegetarian, but you know what I mean! :]