Week in Review – December 20, 2020

“1,950 miles later”

The drive from Las Vegas to Pacifica was pleasantly uneventful.  The border checkpoint from Nevada into California wasn’t even manned as we made the crossing.  I continue to turn into a “grumpy old man” – night driving with oncoming traffic not separated by a median is getting pretty difficult.  I struggle to see where I’m going with the oncoming glare.  So, the Pacheco Pass at night wasn’t really much fun.  It’s very twisty and ill lit.  That whining aside, we arrived at the hotel in Pacifica around 9pm.  1,950 miles in the books.  I should have about 10 days now with no lengthy drives.

Once in our hotel room, Diana went on a mission to install the Amazon Firestick so that we could watch all our normal TV and streaming shows.  She was so tired that it was easy to see her brain working but not easy to interpret what was (or wasn’t) being said.  Problem one was that in order to connect to the hotel WiFi one needed to check the “Accept Terms and Conditions” box, but the remote wouldn’t go to the box.  An hour later Diana noticed the “cursor mode” option and that problem was solved.  Problem two – the firestick was installed and working fine but the remote wouldn’t control the TV volume and power, even after a bunch of fancy settings updates by McD.  I looked at some YouTube videos of how to fix the issue and tried a number of things.  An hour later, Diana finally gave up and sat down at her computer.  I decided to try the regular TV remote that we had thought only controlled the Dish satellite system.  Whaddaya know?  Controlled volume perfectly.  Two hours lost, but all TV and streaming options fully installed for our hotel stay.  I wish I had some of that escapade on video.  Funnily enough the firestick remote started controlling the volume just fine the next day with no changes.

We decided to be very safe and get a COVID test before visiting with Diana’s Mom.  Another late hour of work showed that “Project Baseline” was the best option.  After 30 minutes of data entry the site told us that we could make appointments for the Half Moon Bay location on Wednesday morning.  We assumed we could walk in on Tuesday morning and planned that as our early morning activity.

The drive down to Half Moon Bay was quick and pleasant but there was no evidence of any testing activity at the church, other than a couple of tents set up in the parking lot.  I tried to search for related testing locations and came up with a county run drive through site in Daly city – just south of San Francisco.  We finally found the location and 30 minutes later had completed our tests with a 1 to 3 day waiting period for results.

After that interesting activity we were ready for some lunch.  I spotted the City Kebabs and Gyros shop as we approached a traffic light and we decided to give it a try.  The Mediterranean food was delicious with all my favourites – humus, falafels, dolmas, chicken and lamb.  We were able to eat at the little table outside – one day before even patio dining was shut down.

We met Will and Christine for dinner at Town in San Carlos on Tuesday evening.  The street was closed off and the restaurants had made some big investments in building outdoor dining.  We were warm with the heaters and shades even though the temperature was in the forties.  It was funny to listen to Diana and Will deciding on which steak and preparation they were going to share.  I loved my sea bass and had some leftovers for lunch on Wednesday.  It was a real treat to hang out and have a meal with Will and Christine.  We had debated which night to meet and it was fortuitous that we chose Tuesday as all onsite dining shut down in California on Wednesday.

Wednesday began with a walk from Rockaway beach over to Lindamar Beach.  This involves zig-zagging up a decent sized hill.

Lindamar beach

 

Rockaway Beach

I enjoyed a good macchiato at Soul Grind at the mid-point of the walk while Diana ran back for a work call.

The surf was the biggest that I’ve seen in Pacifica – the waves cresting at 15 to 20 feet.  There were a few brave surfers at Rockaway and you could tell they certainly knew what they were doing.  I really enjoyed sitting on the balcony and watching the sea and surfers.  Listening to the surfers in the Soul Grind parking lot sharing their experiences was hilarious – they really do have that whole special slang that you see in movies.

The sunsets in Pacifica are equally impressive:

We still didn’t have our test results on Wednesday evening and so stayed at the hotel for dinner with Diana picking up food at the Moonraker restaurant across the street.  This is one of the nicer places in Pacifica (not really a high bar) and has a great view of the surf when the restaurant is open.  I enjoyed my lobster BLT sandwich and clam chowder.

Thursday started the same way as Wednesday with a pleasant walk between the two beaches and a coffee at Soul Grind.  We worked most of the day from the hotel room and then joined our respective work happy hours.  Diana’s was quite entertaining with one of her colleagues playing a Christmas carol on the tuba.  We finally received our negative COVID test results on Thursday evening and were cleared to head up on Gypsy Hill and visit the family.

Diana chose to start her birthday with a run – and conquered the zig-zag path up the hill – most impressive.  She had texted a picture to Marco (the ultra-marathoner) and asked if he thought she could do it.  He coached her to stand up straight and take little strides – seemed to work.  After her run we did another walk over for coffee and then enjoyed a sandwich from Dinosaur’s – such great Vietnamese sandwiches on yummy bread.

Birthday dinner was hosted by Adamo and family at their home.  I enjoyed looking over the kid’s task lists for the day.

Massimo’s tree in his room is certainly right up there with the Charlie Brown version:

Luciano is quite proud of his ability to count to one hundred.  I liked Diana’s bobbing head encouragement:

McD likes to have surf and turf for her birthday meal and Adamo made sure she was fully taken care of:

Those are lobsters that he caught diving and they were delicious.  While the cooking was underway, Diana was reviewing her hand made cards from the boys.

After dinner Grammie and Massimo relaxed and watched Rudolph.

 

 

One other thing that I came across that I thought was worth sharing.  Look at this 4th birthday card that Andy made for Massimo – he’s so creative with his cards.  He had seen Massimo in that jacket and thought he looked like a zebra.

Saturday was a pleasant and quiet day.  We ordered dinner from Mezza Luna in Princeton (just down Highway 1 from Pacifica) and ate with Adamo and the noise making crew.  The pizza and calamari were both very good.

Sunday started with another walk across the hill for coffee and a breakfast burrito at Soul Grind.  Then we packed up and moved from the hotel to Clorinda’s house just in time to watch the Cowboys defeat the San Francisco 49ers.  The Saints played really well against the Chiefs in Drew Brees first   game back from injury but were edged out in the end.  Adamo and I are in the midst of a project to install a TV at Clorinda’s.  Our small helpers are being exceptionally helpful.

We listened to the Ann Cleeves book “Raven Black” on the second section of our drive.  This is the first in the Shetland series – I read the 4th “Blue Lighting” a year or two ago, a gift from Mum and Dad and enjoyed it.  This one was a tad formulaic with the introduction and exploration of all potential guilty parties and Diana and I enjoyed trying to figure out who we thought were the leading contenders.  Neither one of us was close.

The story is set against the local Shetland festival of Up Helly Aa which celebrates the Viking history of the island, and culminates in the burning of a long boat.  The Guizer Jarl is the leader of the squad that builds and ultimately burns the boat, and one of the characters in the book was the Guizer for that year.

I was introduced to the “Nutcracker Suite” by Duke Ellington this week and really like it a lot – terrific arrangements and playing.

This led me to Ellington’s “New Orleans Suite” which might be even better.

I came across this performance of Led Zeppelin covers by Government Mule with Jason Bonham (son of Zeppelin drummer John Bonham) on drums.  What a great job Warren Haynes does on guitar and vocals – he really is one of the most under-appreciated guitarists working today.

I’ll finish with another Christmas related song that I heard for the first time this week – “Christmas Must Be Tonight” by The Band.  Great stuff:

Stay safe and patient- there’s an end in sight.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Week in Review – December 13, 2020

“Road Trip – Again”

The reprise of the road trip to California was scheduled to begin early on Friday morning and so we exchanged some gifts from under the tree on Thursday evening.  I’m always so impressed with Diana’s wrapping skills.  She got a special edition book of Winnie the Pooh stories and is looking forward to me reading bedtime stories from it.  I’m working on the voices – it seems like everyone sounds a bit like Eeyore.

The car was 90% packed up on Thursday night (including the fancy new Yeti champagne transporter) so that we could get a quick start on Friday morning.  We were underway by 9am and arrived in Albuquerque around 10 hours later.   The 645 miles in one day was just about as much as I can handle.  We did stop for a late lunch at the Drunken Oyster in Amarillo, and I couldn’t help but order the Cajun fondue that we enjoyed so much on the last road trip.  We made just one navigational error – a wrong turn just before arriving at the hotel – same one I almost missed last time.  Bit of a slow learner.

Saturday began with a walk across the hotel parking lot to the Marigold Café, a new place since our last trip.  It combines Indian and American foods with New Mexico influences in creative ways.  For example, my breakfast taco was served in fresh naan bread rather than a tortilla and included some delicious green chilis.  Diana’s avocado toast was also excellent and she raved about the bacon.  I’d like to return and sample the tikka mac ‘n cheese.

Our tummies pleasantly full, we made the short drive to Santa Fe.  We drove past downtown to the gorgeous and impressive Santa Fe Opera house just north of town.  The gate was closed and so we couldn’t get too close but the setting is really unique, with open air views of the high desert and mountains.  We were glad the snow came a few days prior to our visit so that we didn’t have that driving challenge.

After checking into the lovely, historic La Fonda hotel, we walked over to Canyon Road and had a ramble past all the art galleries and sculpture gardens that line the street.  I really enjoyed these wind machines – so creative and attention grabbing.

We walked back to the square and then enjoyed coffee and a slice of quiche at the hotel.  I was interested to see the red chilis hung as ornaments on the square.  Here’s the view from our hotel room balcony.  The cathedral bells are quite loud.  Fortunately the Trump rally (no masks in sight) in front of the cathedral cleared out quickly.

Why did we take the time to detour up to Santa Fe on an already long road trip you ask?  Very solid question.  Our friends Amy and Ray were getting married on Saturday evening at the La Fonda hotel.  We hadn’t planned on attending but couldn’t say no after Amy heard we were just going to be an hour away in Albuquerque.  Here’s Diana dressed up for the wedding with the favour that Amy left at the front desk – red chili peppers.

I hadn’t realized the ceremony was to be on the balcony of the bridal suite, in the evening, during a snow storm.  I was not dressed properly.  And certainly not for the extended event that the “celebrant” (artsy name for the lady presiding over the ceremony) insisted on presenting.  I swear that as the snow increased, she spoke slower.  There were several elongated descriptions of special parts – mixing sand together, the water ceremony etc.  My toes were quite iced up by the end.  The setting was lovely, and when we finally reached the exchange of vows, Amy and Ray were clearly very happy and did a great job.

Diana had the right idea when we made it back inside – thaw your hands on the chimney.

Here are a couple of other inside pictures.  I did have a jacket and tie on for the ceremony – first time in at least 10 months.

I particularly enjoyed meeting and chatting with Amy’s Dad Bob – what a fun character.  That and learning a new game, “Cheers to the Governor”, that the kids introduced.  I highly recommend it – you can find the rules online.  Diana and BP enjoyed getting their pictures taken on the snowy balcony when we went back downstairs.

We loaded up and headed out early on Sunday morning – destination Las Vegas – a mere 8 hours of driving away.  On the road by 8am and we should be relaxing at the lovely Aria hotel on the Vegas strip by 6pm or so.  All was smooth with some slow initial going on the snow in Santa Fe and the pace picking up when we merged onto the interstate down to Albuquerque.  And then everything changed – and not for the better.  There were multiple semi-truck accidents on I40 – we sat stopped on the highway amidst all the trucks for 2 hours straight at one point.

Thirteen very long and tedious hours later, we rolled up to Aria.  Vegas is so quiet that the restaurants have very reduced hours – we were lucky to grab a quick drink and bite at the Aria Pub.  The juxtaposition of the old, classic Santa Fe La Fonda with the huge, glitzy and modern Aria was quite dramatic.  The scale of the place comes through in this picture where the super cars out front look like models.

After our quick dinner, we walked down the strip to Bellagio and watched the fountain show with Christmas music.  Always such an impressive sight.  On the way we passed through a new and extremely upscale mall called “Crystals” something or other.  We were amazed at this tree where each ornament was one of the Swarovski crystal special editions – I hate to think how much it cost to decorate that tree.

Passing the smaller Eiffel tower at Paris hotel reminded us of a wonderful dinner we enjoyed there and of the very special 50th birthday dinner that we enjoyed with Mum and Dad at the real version in the real Paris.

Back at Aria, we relaxed with a cocktail at the “Lift Bar” and enjoyed a talented musician covering all kinds of music from different eras.  What a treat.

 

Upstairs BP was marveling at all the neon sights.  I hate to think about how much money these Vegas hotels are losing every hour with so few people around.

 

 

We finished listening to the Michael Connelly audio book of “The Law of Innocence” on the drive to Albuquerque.  It’s amazing how a good story, well read, can help the time pass.  There were just enough twists to keep our interest and not so many that it gets ridiculous – which seems to be the trend these days.  D kept picturing Matthew McConaughey in his role as the original “Lincoln Lawyer” as the story unfolded.

I didn’t make too much progress on “Utopia Avenue” this week, but am happy to report that my interest was held much better again.  I suspect I’ll finish the book off quickly on arrival in Pacifica as I get plenty of quiet reading time with Clorinda.

 

 

 

I heard the John Fogerty song “Broken Down Cowboy” on the Sirius Deep Tracks station on the drive.  I liked it a lot and was surprised that I hadn’t heard it before.  It’s not on Spotify but I did find this live version from the Royal Albert Hall:

“If I was a gambling man
Never would’a let you play that hand
With a broken down cowboy like me”

This Chuck Berry song came on while we were eating lunch at the Drunken Oyster in Amarillo – they played great music.  Quite different than his normal stuff:

An early Tom Waits song that Jesse covered on the Tuesday Night Supper Club show:

And finally, to recognize the 40th anniversary of John Lennon’s passing, one of my favourites.  I can remember pretty vividly walking to school with Drew Kirkland and David Smith the morning after the assassination and talking about how important Lennon’s contributions to music were.

Stay patient and safe.

 

Fortnight in Review – December 6, 2020

“Feast and Famine”

After a busy Thanksgiving weekend, this week was very quiet with our only real outing to downtown McKinney for coffee today.  Diana took my picture with the Xmas display outside the coffee shop.  Not quite a Christmas card since Diana and BP didn’t make it in.

Rewinding a fortnight (remember when we used to have to rewind VHS and audio cassettes?), we experienced a quite unexpected and very boisterous rain storm on Monday night:

Thanksgiving was a much more pleasant weather day.  We passed on cooking a turkey feast for two at home and headed to Perry’s steakhouse for a late lunch/early dinner.  Champagne and lobster tails make my McD very happy.

She said several times that the grilled lobsters were perfectly cooked.  A nicely cooked sea bass makes me happy.  So we were both very happy with our meals – and had plenty of leftovers for a late dinner.  I laughed when we checked in on the chaos at Amy and Adamo’s home and heard that Adamo had said, “maybe we can go out for lobster on Thanksgiving twenty years from now.”

We drove to Austin for the weekend on Friday morning, checked into the Intercontinental downtown (changing names to a Royal Sonesta the following week), and got ready for an early dinner at Peche – why not start out at one of our favourite Austin eateries.  We started with some very decadent escargots (no lack of butter or garlic) and then I had a delicious redfish on a bed of the barley risotto that I enjoy so much.  Diana had an equally decadent foie gras on grits.

After Peche, we walked across the street to the Parker Jazz Club (capacity reduced from over 100 to 30) and enjoyed our first live music in 9 months with 12 other folks.  Kris and the team are trying really hard to keep the place going with very limited seating weekend shows and live-streaming.  The house band was excellent as always – although the new drummer over plays too much for my liking.  Kris might have played almost all of his 8 or 9 instruments – going from bass flute to multiple saxophones and a flugelhorn.

Saturday was a rain day – light drizzle all day long.  That meant we couldn’t do our walk/run along the river and had to settle for the ellipticals in the hotel gym – surprised to find it open and we had it to ourselves.  We did walk down Congress Avenue for coffee and a TacoDeli treat before the workout.

Brunch was at the Odd Duck – one of my top three Austin brunch spots.  The shrimp and grits with a perfectly cooked deep fried egg were fabulous, as was the ceviche with green curry sauce.  It’s always so hard to choose from all the options – and the menu is new every time we go.  Diana loved their take on the Paloma cocktail.  I’m now expected to try and replicate that – oops, maybe she’d forgotten already and I just reminded her.

After lunch we made a visit to the office to drop off an old laptop that I’d been hanging on to for a while and then visited the Yeti flagship store next to our old apartment.  Diana was determined to purchase one of the ludicrously priced coolers that keep ice solid for several days.  Then a trip to Warby Parker to get our glasses adjusted.  What a productive afternoon.

I hadn’t made any plans for Saturday night and we decided we should revisit the Parker jazz club and make another donation towards trying to keep the joint open.  This time we had dinner as well, splitting a yummy burger.  There was a slightly larger audience but still nowhere near the reduced capacity.  Kris was in a New Orleans mood – which suited me just fine.  I was interested to hear him share that he and Ryan Davis (piano) had been playing together for over 20 years, including 14 as the house band at Eddie V’s steakhouse.

Sunday was a dry day and so we were able to execute a 4 mile circuit around the river trail, culminating with another snack at TacoDeli.  Then another excellent brunch at Suerte – my top ranked Mexican restaurant.  The masa that they make all the corn tortillas and tostadas from is ridiculously good.  Diana had a smoked salmon tostada and I tried the bacon and sweet potato tetela (like a corn based pie with bacon and sweet potato puree inside).  They were both perfect – particularly the mornay sauce, which I learned is a classic béchamel sauce enriched with a blend of Gruyère and Parmesan cheeses.  We have really missed the creative food that is so readily available in Austin.  And the great live music.

Diana was still a bit hungry after her tostada and so we had an excuse to get an order of the best tacos ever – the suaderos, and a side of sweet kolache.  Yum yum yum.  My tummy is wishing it was living back in Austin after revisiting all these food pictures.

After brunch we met our friend Neffie at Fixe – a new place she introduced us to that specializes in southern comfort food – supposedly the best biscuits (scones) in Austin.

 

 

We passed this sign on the walk to Fixe – so nice to be able to walk everywhere again.  My Mum had just been telling us the story of the Battle of Bannockburn where the English tried to sneak up on the Scots at night, taking their boots off for stealth, but were foiled by the thistles that made them yelp and awake the sleeping Scots.  And like a responsible Scotsman who payed attention in History class, I do indeed remember that happened in 1314.

Neffie kept us laughing until it was time for our concert at the Austin City Limits Moody theater.  It’s always fun to browse the pictures of the musical greats that have played there – from Edie Brickell to Ray Charles and everything in between.

Nicki Bluhm opened the show for the Band of Heathens (BoH) and had a much more impressive voice in person than we hear her on the Tuesday night livestreams.  She was able to effectively fill the theater with just her voice and acoustic guitar.  Here she is with her husband Jesse, the bass player for the BoH, performing the first song that Sonny and Cher ever did together:

This was the BoH 15th anniversary show in their hometown and they didn’t disappoint at all, with a great mixture of songs from their new album and classics.  “Miss Ohio” was an early favourite:

“Call Me Gilded” is a highlight from the new album and the harmonies are on good display:

And I’ll finish the reprise of this outstanding show with “Hurricane” transitioning into “LA County Blues”:

Three nights of fantastic live music.  What a long overdue treat.

We started Monday with another workout at the hotel and then made the drive back to boring old McKinney.  The rest of this week was our normal work from home routine, culminating with the aforementioned trip for coffee.  Our only other excitement was a trip to “Run-On” after coffee to get runner D fitted for some new shoes.  She’s been complaining of cold and numb toes and we’re trying to fix that with some new shoes and socks.  45 minutes later and I think she’s all fixed up – it’s nice that the store encourage you to go outside and run in the shoes they recommend.

I’ve been enjoying “Utopia Avenue” by David Mitchell (best known for “Cloud Atlas”).  The book is about a group of musicians who form a band in the late 60s and early 70s.  It started really well and is dragging a bit in the middle.  At almost 500 pages with 200 or so to go, I’m hoping it grabs my interest a bit more soon.  Although a work of fiction, famous musicians and other characters from real life make appearances in the book – sometimes entertaining and other times feeling pretty contrived – particularly in their dialogue.

I’ve come across a decent amount of music that is new to me over the last couple of weeks and I’ll save some for the upcoming posts.

I’ve always loved the song “Gypsy Blood” by Mason Ruffner and was interested to sample a more laid back recent offering.  Here’s what a review said: “If you were waiting for Mark Knopfler to score a Sundance entry set in Grand Isle, this is your lucky day.”  That caught my interest as I love Knopfler’s scores and Grand Isle is an area where Denny and the crew go fishing annually.

Some more reading provided this update on Ruffner’s activities since “Gypsy Blood” in the 80s:  “In the mid-’80s, after Sea-Saint and before The Big Easy, transplanted Fort Worth native Mason Ruffner was a welcome national focal point for the New Orleans scene, a guitar slinger equally adept at blues, country, Tex-Mex and jazz who fell in love with the Crescent City and, somewhat oddly, folded the town’s rich piano tradition into his music. He was a critic’s darling, but perhaps taking a cue from so many of his local heroes, he soon disappeared into the wilds south of Austin.”

The dobro sound on this one is perfect:

A Colin Lake song popped up on a playlist and I did some research on him also.  We saw him at the Telluride Blues Festival but I didn’t know much about him.  He’s spent the last few years sailing around Latin America.  Interesting to read this piece about Antigua – a beautiful and artsy town surrounded by volcanoes in Guatemala, where I enjoyed an afternoon right before COVID arrived to shut down travel.  “Once in Antigua, Guatemala, Colin found the change in atmosphere inspiring and picked up a few gigs around town.  While dusting off his catalog, he gleaned new and deeper meaning in the lines and melodies of his own songs, rediscovering them as though they were not his own.”

Stay safe and kind.

Week in Review – November 22, 2020

“Puzzle Time”

Monday started typically with an early morning New York Times crossword.  I had a pretty slow time (just over 10 minutes when my Monday goal is under 10 minutes) but did learn something from the clue “Sirius…or Lassie, for example?”  I got the answer “Dog Star” from the across clues and understood the Lassie part – but what about Sirius – why is that a Dog star?  Turns out that Sirius gets this nickname because it is part of the constellation Canis Major, Latin for the “greater dog”.  And interestingly, the expression “the dog days of summer” refers to the period from July 3rd to August 11th, when Sirius rises in conjunction with the sun.  There’s usually some relatively useless information to be learned form the puzzle.

Monday continued with the Board audit committee meeting.  My update was well received, and over quickly – the secret to success with this group is to share only what’s really necessary, keep it minimal, and emphasize the good news.  This was maybe the third or fourth time since March that I’ve worn a dress shirt – albeit for less than an hour and with shorts.

After the meeting concluded I enjoyed a relaxing swim.  First time I’d been in a few weeks and my arms and shoulders ached a bit afterwards – but, as Diana would say, “in a good way”.  Post swim I stopped by the Run-On specialized running store in search of some socks to keep McD’s toes warm on cold morning expeditions.  We’ll see how the merino wool ones that were recommended by the experts work out for her.

Massimo and Luciano enjoyed the pretty sunset view from Gypsy Hill in Pacifica on Monday evening:

We finished up Monday watching “The Undoing” on HBO.  This is a murder mystery starring Hugh Grant and Nicole Kidman and set around an exclusive school in New York.  The suspense is building and Hugh Grant may not be guilty.  I’m guessing Donald Sutherland (Nicole’s character’s father and looking like he hasn’t aged in 20 years) was involved along with the sycophantic blonde mother.

The twenty bags of leaves were hauled out for garbage collection on Tuesday morning.  You can see there is probably one more bag still on the massive oak tree.  Evergreen trees are a great idea.

The crew showed up to repair the arbor on Tuesday morning.  They had to build a structure to hold the top part up before replacing the thirty foot beam.  The special jack they had is just the tool we needed last week.

Diana came in laughing as they asked her to turn off Stanley (the pool cleaner) – he was busy showing off his party trick of spraying water on the crew.  The new beam was nicely in place by the end of the day.  Just need to get Santos out to stain it now.  We momentarily considered trying to get up on ladders and stain it ourselves  – that passed pretty quickly.

We passed on Tuesday music livestream night and decided to dive into the new season of “The Queen”.   We were a good way into an episode from a previous series – one centered around the moon landing – before realizing it.  In retrospect it seemed vaguely familiar, but we enjoyed it nonetheless.  Prince Philip’s commentary on the sermon at the local church – “not a sermon but more a general anesthetic.”  And then the kids bouncing around on space hoppers – I think that’s what we called those orange inflatable balls with the kangaroo ears.  Diana says they were “hippity hops” in the US.  I can picture Elspeth bouncing around on one on the back patio.

We adjusted to the new season and got part way through episode 1.  Is Gillian Anderson’s accent a little too much?  Or is that really what Margaret Thatcher sounded like – I’ll have to look at some videos.  I did enjoy the election quote from Thatcher – “Don’t count your chickens before they’re hatched, and don’t count 10 Downing Street until it’s Thatched.”

The New York Times crossword seems to be featuring more music trivia related clues recently.  Here’s one that I enjoyed on Wednesday:

I had a decent Wednesday time – likely from doing it 3 hours later than the Monday puzzle.  Here’s a great song from Bowie’s “Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars” album:

I was racking my brain to think who the guy on the left of this work video call reminded me of:

Finally figured it out just before the meeting ended.  Uncanny, don’t you think?

I still love the Tintin books.

We watched another episode of the Queen on Thursday evening that had a scene with Princess Anne competing in a horse jumping event.  My mind drifted back to watching Harvey Smith and David Broome challenging each other in show jumping contests with Mum and Dad.  What a great rivalry that was.  Harvey Smith always on the edge of disaster and David Broome so much more composed, but no less competitive.

The Friday crossword and Rex Parker’s blog about it reminded me of a conversation with Clorinda on our last visit.  I know, I know – a lot of crossword talk this week – but I have to find news and interest where I can these days.

Apparently Buckminster Fuller (inventor of the geodesic dome) and his wife were good friends with Clorinda and Sebastian back in the day.  Diana seemed to remember going to visit them in San Francisco.  Clorinda has a few pieces of art by Fuller – they are a bit akin to Jackson Pollock paintings.  He was best known as an architect.

Buckminster fuller designs

Saturday started with the crossword.  I had filled in the whole of the East but couldn’t get any kind of toe-hold in the West.  Diana to the recue with “Hakuna Matata” – the clue was something about an Elton John and Tim Rice composition.  It still took me a woeful forty-seven minutes to finish.

After the puzzle we had a pleasant morning walk and then endeavored to troubleshoot the aromatherapy unit associated with the steam shower.  It once worked but had stopped producing the eucalyptus scent that Diana enjoys.  I couldn’t find the manual but the online version gave clear instructions on tow to “bleed” the system of any air.  About 20 minutes later we were back in business.

I received these old pictures of Zumie out by the pool.  Not sure what the black plastic thing he has in his mouth is and it looks like he got in trouble for digging on the far side of the pool.  Also looks like he’s just back from his fortnightly trip to the groomer.

We watched a sappy Hallmark Christmas style movie on Saturday night.  A country music star comes back home and helps his old girlfriend save the family farm.  Harmless entertainment.

Sunday was very typical – which I think is a good thing.  New York Times puzzle (no help necessary), reading, coffee downtown after McD’s run (tried a new place called “Wattage” which didn’t have any atmosphere at all – we’ll be back to Filtered next week), piano practice, chat with Vince in Phillie, FaceTime with Mum and Dad,  elliptical with early football game, relaxing steam shower, and now watching the Cowboys play the Minnesota Vikings.  Currently winning 16-14 after a one handed circus catch by Lamb.

I dipped back into the excellent “Cool Gray City of Love” by Gary Kamiya (long time San Francisco Chronicle writer) and particularly the chapter “The Front Door”.  This book covers 49 different views and associated stories of the city, and this chapter is about the Ferry Building.  I read that it is modeled after the Giralda, Seville Cathedral’s minaret turned well tower.  The change in the area over the years is fascinating:

“Until 1936, when the Bay Bridge opened, San Francisco could be reached only by water or from the peninsula.  The overwhelming majority of people came across the bay by ferry.  Which meant that the Ferry Building was the city’s front door.”

“In 1913, 60,000 consumers crossed the bay by water twice each workday.  They walked off the boat and up the Y-shaped gangways into the Ferry Building, strolled across its marble mosaic floors, and exited through its massive arches onto the Ferry Plaza.  What greeted them was controlled chaos – and a city planner’s dream.  Streetcars, horses, cable cars, railroads – there was more transportation running around than in a Richard Scarry book.”

I love the Richard Scarry reference and can’t help thinking that mass transit was much more effective in 1913 than it is today.

“The coup de grace was announced in 1958, the same year the last ferry ran.  That was when the first containerized freighter sailed through the Golden Gate.  Container shipping requires space and facilities, and San Francisco could not compete with Oakland.  Just 24 years after Bloody Thursday, one of the world’s great working ports was nearing the end.

And behind the City Front, the brawny man’s-man city that had existed since the Gold Rush was dying too.  Heavy industry was leaving San Francisco.  Factory workers were being replaced by secretaries and clerks.  Skyscrapers for the new financial district were replacing docks and cranes.  The great postindustrial transformation that was to change all American society had begun in San Francisco.  Over the next two decades, it would result in a completely different city.”

This book is highly recommended for anyone visiting San Francisco – great ideas on off the beaten path areas to explore and from where to enjoy different views of one of the beautiful cities.  The chapter on earthquakes that juxtaposes accounts of the 1906 quake and fire with the 1989 quake is also excellent reading

I completed “Goodbye to a River” this week.  As I mentioned, this is part canoeing adventure down the Brazos river, part history of the early settlers and the Comanche tribe, and part commentary on man-made lakes and dams and the changes they foist on nature.

The word drouth appears often in Graves writing.  It is defined as “a period of dry weather, especially a long one that is injurious to crops.”  Initially I suspected it meant something similar to the Scottish word dreich, but that’s quite different.  Dreich means bleak, miserable, dismal, cheerless, or dreary, and I usually associate it with rain or mist, not drought.  Mum agreed that the weather in Scotland on Sunday was quite dreich.

Here Graves talks about the Possum Kingdom dam and other plans to put man-made controls on the river:

“But if you are built like me, neither the certainty of change, nor the need for it, nor any wry philosophy will keep you from feeling a certain enraged awe when you hear that a river that you’ve known always, and that all men of that place have known always back into the red dawn of men, will shortly not exist.  A piece of river, anyhow, my piece…”

Some of the excellent descriptions of the natural landscape:

“That afternoon I got only to Eagle Creek, still probing uncourageously against weather’s ire.  Rounded grey-stone cliffs stand beside the creek mouth; in the river itself massive, split-away, rhombic blocks twist and slow the green current of a long pool.  Big oaks gone red, and yellowed ashes rose precariously from slanted alluvial soil beneath the cliffs, piles of drift against their boles in prophecy of their own fate; it is on the outside tip of a bend, and in those places the river lays down rich sediment for maybe centuries and then in a fit of angry spate cuts under it and carries it away, trees and all…”

A description of the joy (or suffering) of camping.  I love the “alligator-skin corrugations”:

“On top of the food box alligator-skin corrugations of frost had formed, and with the first touch of the sun the willows began to whisper as frozen leaves loosed their hold and fell side-slipping down through the others that were still green.  Titmice called, and flickers and a redbird, and for a moment, on a twig four feet from my face, a chittering kinglet jumped around alternately hiding and flashing the scarlet of its crown…I sat and listened and watched while the world woke up, and drank three cups of the syrupy coffee, better I thought than any I’d ever tasted, and smoked two pipes.”

I had thought “ken” was a Scottish word for “know”, but maybe not after reading this section:

“The trouble was, I was ignorant.  Even in that country  where I belonged, my ken of natural things didn’t include a little bird that went heap-heap, and a few moronic holes in the sand.  Or a million other matters worth the kenning.”

Here’s what I found about the origin on the internet:

Here’s a fascinating paragraph on how one can tell the origin of cabin builders by the techniques used, based on the type of timber available in home states:

“They left the marks of their origins in the way they built, mainly in their notches.  Deep Southerners from the big-pine states cut simple, vulnerable half-notches and quarter-notches of the kind they’d used with the long, straight, expendable timber of home.  Those flat notches rot out fast, and the examples that are left are mostly on houses that were boarded over a few years after building.  Hill Southerners – Tennesseans and Kentuckians and Carolinians – had the tradition of the peaked saddle-notch, a tight joint suited to quick-tapering mountain hardwoods and good with post oaks, too, since a number of such cabins are still around.  Pennsylvania Germans, apparently, shoved the use of the dovetail and the miter dovetail on into the Midwest, and when you find a house with those corners in Texas, you know that an ancient Ohioan or Illinoisan had his hand in it, or someone who learned from him.”

All that nature writing put me in the mood to watch the documentary film “My Octopus Teacher”.  What an excellent experience – the underwater photography is amazing and the bond formed between the filmmaker and a small octopus is quite unexpected.  Craig Foster went free diving in the South African kelp forest by his home every day at the same time.  This allowed the octopus to become familiar with him and ultimately results in what really does seem like a friendship – with the octopus wrapped around his hand and resting on his chest.  A highly recommended film.

I read a New Yorker article on Adrienne Lenker of the band Big Thief that mentioned this song, “Paul”, as one of their best.  Lenker attended Berklee College of Music on a full scholarship made possible by the awesome Susan Tedeschi.  She studied guitar as a result of an audition that she performed on a Martin acoustic guitar.  Completely self taught and without an understanding of music theory, her first year at Berklee must have been quite a challenging experience.

I read that the legendary jazz pianist Keith Jarrett has permanently lost the use of his left hand.  Reminds me of the book “Every Note Played” by Lisa Genova that I reviewed a year or so ago.  Here’s a tune from Jarrett’s most recent (and perhaps final) release:

I wrote about the music of Philip Glass last week.  This week I found interpretations of his work by the amazing classical guitarist, Gerard Cousins.  Hope you like this one as much as I do:

Here’s your weekly dose of John Prine.  This time a collaboration with Kurt Vile – just beautiful:

I worked on “The River” by Joni Mitchell for the piano this week – one of the hauntingly sad Christmas songs – “I wish I had a river that I could skate away on.”  So many people view this as a classic, happy holiday tune – they clearly haven’t listened to the lyrics.  Here’s a version by Herbie Hancock with Corinne Bailey Rae from his excellent “The Joni Letters” album:

Week in Review – November 15, 2020

“Timber!”

The week started with another home maintenance issue.  Do we ever get a solid break from those?  Maybe six months between major issues?  This time it’s the arbor over the back deck.  I suppose we can’t get too mad at it since it’s been solid over the seven and a half years we’ve lived here.  I noticed a crack in the middle of the seam and then Diana reported hearing creaking and breaking.  We called a repair company and were hoping they would arrive before the whole thing came down, pulling gutters and whatever else with it.  They made it in time – whew! – and we rigged up a very temporary support with our ladder and a jack.  A sturdier support was applied the next morning and the new beam materials (30 feet wide) should be delivered tomorrow.

By the way, that tree in the background is our sworn mortal enemy.  She’s the one (I’m sure it’s a female) that dumps mountains of small leaves in the pool for several weeks every autumn.  If “we” (99% D) don’t keep the skimmers cleaned out multiple times a day, then the whole pool mechanism gets blocked up and puts stress on the pump.

El Capitan in Yosemite National Park

Are you familiar with Emily Harrington?  No?  That’s disappointing as she’s one of the fiercest women I’ve heard of.  Don’t feel too badly – I hadn’t heard of her prior to this week either.  Harrington made news as the first woman to free climb El Capitan in Yosemite in less than 24 hours.  Truly an amazing accomplishment.  She topped the 3,000 foot mountain in 21 hours and 13 minutes.

Look at these amazing pictures:

Those beds clipped into the cliff face give me the heebie jeebies and almost make me start to feel the dizziness of vertigo.  Just crazy that someone could be comfortable enough to fall asleep in one of those.

Here’s what Harrington has to say about hat nasty gash on her forehead:

“A nasty slip on the 13a Golden Desert pitch almost took my resolve – a deep gash on my forehead left me bloody and defeated. I pulled on again, part of me not really wanting to stay on the wall, the other part gathering courage and flow. I kept thinking “why am I still hanging on?

The next pitch was the A5 traverse, where I failed last year. This time it was not my limit. I fought hard but with flawless movements in the dark. I cried at the belay – it could happen this time….The final 5 pitches felt scary in my current state but I pulled over the final lip at 10:30pm in disbelief.”

If you’re interested in seeing more of El Capitan and free climbing, I highly recommend the movie “Free Solo” that I reviewed a couple of years ago.  I saw it on my month off between jobs and loved it.

A new TV for the master bedroom was delivered on Thursday afternoon.  I had heard comments about maybe getting a bigger screen in there and decided to go big and not have to deal with it again for years.

It’s bigger than me!

McD did an excellent job of helping me hoist the behemoth up onto the TV mount – fortunately we were able to reuse the one that was already secured into the wall.  Going to bed is almost like a trip to the cinema now – except that I’m forbidden from eating popcorn in bed.

Sunday started as normal with the New York Times crossword puzzle – 21 by 21 squares as compared to the normal 15 by 15.  I finished in record time – almost half my normal time.  The crossword blogs revealed that most puzzlers also had record times – so must have been a very easy puzzle.  If you’re confused by the picture below – it took me 27 minutes and 12 seconds to finish the puzzle and I finished at 6:37 am – way too early to be up and around on a Sunday morning.

My favourite clue: He was told to “take a sad song and make it better”.  Do you know the answer to that one?  Would you like a clue?  Ok – it relates to a Beatles song that wasn’t originally on an album but was recorded during the sessions for the White album.  Still stuck?  The answer is “Jude” as in “Hey Jude, don’t make it bad, take a sad song and make it better”.

The TV box was too large to fit through the hole up into the attic – part of our “Team Robertson” activities on Sunday morning.  A small bit of cutting and folding and we were able to make it through.  The family room curtains joined the box up there and some Christmas garlands came down.

After all that strenuous work, it was on to the seemingly never-ending task of cleaning up the leaves from our massive front yard oak tree.  Eighteen bags in all over the last couple of weekends.  That should just about do it – there are very few leaves left on the branches and McD used her new blower to eject most of the stragglers from the flower beds.

I was amazed at the size and number of acorns among the leaves.  Almost three inches in diameter.  Is that normal?  They seem about ten times bigger than the acorns that I’m used to.

Some googling taught me about “mast” years for acorns.  Who knew?  Here’s what I read:

“Like many trees, oaks have irregular cycles of boom and bust. Boom times, called “mast years,” occur every 2-5 years, with smaller acorn crops in between. But the why and how of these cycles are still a mystery.

Scientific research can tell us what a mast year is not. A mast year is not a predictor of a severe winter. Unfortunately, plants and animals are no better at predicting the future than we are.

Strangely, mast years are not simply resource-driven. Sure, a wet, cool spring can affect pollination and a hot, dry summer can affect acorn maturation. But annual rainfall and temperature fluctuations are much smaller in magnitude than acorn crop sizes. In other words, weather variables cannot account for the excessive nutty production of acorns in a mast year.

So what does trigger a mast year? Scientists have proposed a range of explanations—from environmental triggers to chemical signaling to pollen availability—but our understanding is not clear. The fact is, we simply don’t know yet.”

After all that, I still can’t find out if 2020 is a “mast” year or not.  Maybe the reduced pollution from everyone staying home – wait, very few people are doing that here now – had a positive impact on acorn production.

So there you have the excitement and activity for our week – picking up leaves and studying up on acorns.

I watched a very interesting documentary about Philip Glass, “A Portrait of Philip in 12 parts”, while suffering through the torture that is known as the elliptical machine.

The film follows Glass as he travels the world both composing and performing with various ensembles.  I know that his music is a bit of an acquired taste – you have to love rhythmic triplets and somewhat monotonous themes that morph slowly.  Here’s one of the more accessible pieces:

I enjoyed the variety of musicians that Glass collaborates with and the insights into his creative process.  He does have a very impressive body of work with many operas, symphonies, solo piano pieces and others in his catalog.

I didn’t learn a completely new piano piece this week but did record this short video of “Happy Birthday”.  My boss had a milestone birthday on Friday and one of our marketing folks was putting together a video for him.  I spiced it up as best I could and was proud of finishing even though the iPad with the music died part way through leaving me to play by ear and memory – thankfully it’s a very simple song.

We’re looking forward to the new season of “The Queen” this evening.  I’m interested to see Gillian Anderson (Fox Mulder of the X-Files) as Margaret Thatcher.  This series is always so well done.

I finished up “Anxious People” on Saturday morning.  You’ll remember that I loved the beginning two weeks ago and then was slightly less enthused with the middle section last week.  I’m pleased to report that the ending was excellent.  A lot of unexpected conclusions with a heavy dose of kindness and compassion that I didn’t see coming.

As Backman writes a little over half way through:

“The truth?  It’s hardly ever as complicated as we think.  We just hope it is, because then we feel smarter if we can work it out in advance.  This is a story about a bridge, and idiots, and a hostage drama, and an apartment viewing.  But it’s also a love story.  Several in fact.”

I’m pondering whether to add this book to the small section of my bookshelves reserved for my very favourite reads.  Based on the originality of the writing and the excellent ending the chances are pretty good.

I made a solid start on “Goodbye to a River” by John Graves today.  This is a book from 1959 about a section of the Brazos river east of Fort Worth.  But, from what I’ve read so far, it’s about much more than that – there are lots of anecdotes about the Comanche tribe who inhabited the area until the mid 1800s, history about the settlers who first farmed there, and thoughts about how man made lakes and dams forever alter the natural way of things.  I’m looking forward to continuing to learn about the Brazos and the history of the area.

Switching now to new music and discoveries.  The super talented songwriter and musician Chris Stapleton released a new album this week.  I’ve only listened through once and here are a couple of initial favourites:

Here’s a very simple but effective song about man’s best friend:

If you’re feeling a bit tense and stressed, here’s a piece to make you totally calm and mellow:

I continue working my way through the “Long Way Up” series about Ewan McGregor and crew riding electric motorcycles from the southern tip of South America to Los Angeles.  Things are not going well with being able to charge the bikes regularly.  This great song popped up on the most recent episode that I watched from the master bedroom cinema:

And finally another soothing song from an Icelandic artist that I read about this week.  The whole album is very good:

Week in Review – November 8, 2020

“Whew!  Glad that’s all over.”

I drove down to Lower Greenville Avenue (just north of downtown Dallas) for lunch with my boss on Monday.  It was a beautiful day and we enjoyed the Blue Goose patio.  The sour-cream chicken enchiladas were just how I remembered them – best in Dallas for sure.  It was very sad to see the empty building that used to house the fantastic Grape restaurant across the street.  The Lushers sold it just prior to COVID.  Diana and I (and many others with us) have enjoyed so many fabulous meals at this French bistro, including our first dinner together in Dallas.  The chicken liver pate, homemade Boursin cheese, charcuterie, lamb tartines, mushroom soup, best burger in Dallas at Sunday brunch, steak frites, mussels, and so many more delicious flavours are no more.

There was a loud blowing noise overhead as I sat on the patio on Tuesday that had me a bit spooked.  Then I realized there was a hot-air balloon trying to land in the back yard.

We were warned that election results could take a while (maybe weeks) and things were certainly too close to call in many states when we went to bed on election day (Tuesday).  On Saturday I went out for a walk with Diana in the morning, then we worked in the front garden, gathering leaves from our massive oak tree.  By the time we headed back inside the result had been declared with Joe Biden as President-elect.  This is certainly not a political blog at all but I can’t help sharing a few artifacts from this week.  First, here’s James Corden recapping the four years of Trump in 3 minutes.  I think this is exceptionally well done:

This poem by Lawrence Ferlinghetti, San Francisco beat poet, owner of the excellent City Lights Bookstore in North Beach, and father-in-law to an interesting character that worked for me at AIG, has a direct and timely message:

And finally a cartoon that I couldn’t resist posting:

That’s the last of the political content.  My only other comment is that I’m relieved that Diana isn’t moving us off to the Virgin Islands for a few months to avoid the fall out from a different result.

Saturday continued with the removal of the family room curtains and rods.  We’ve never really liked them and decided to see what the room looks like without them – very bright and open but lacking something at the top of the windows.  The sconces look even more ornate and outdated without the curtains – that’ll be the next project.  I was just informed about the best website to shop for replacements.

Meanwhile, in California, Will was celebrating his 32nd birthday.  Is it even possible that he could be that age?  What would you guess would be his chosen way to celebrate?  If you’ve listened to him wax on about his racing BMW then you’ll have a good idea.  Yes, he took the race car to the racetrack.  Seems to know what he’s doing as he posted the fastest laps of the group he was with.  Of course if you’re going to the track you have to look the part – including a custom made helmet that matches the colour scheme of your car (shown here in a photo shoot in some fancy video recording studio).

Sunday started with hanging all the art and pictures that we brought back from the Austin apartment.  You are correct – it has taken us just over 3 months to get around to this project – we had ruminate on all the possible locations for the pictures.  We found a good home for all the pieces and they are all perfectly level.  Diana had some excellent mounting tools that made the task quiet pleasant.

The wind picked up in the afternoon, blowing mountains of leaves from the tree in our neighbours’ yard into the pool .  Not to worry – pool girl D has been busy scooping out leaves and emptying the skimmer baskets all day.

As I post this, the Cowboys (2-6) are beating the undefeated Pittsburg Steelers (7-0) with their fourth string quarterback who is playing his first NFL game.  Hard to believe and likely won’t last – but one can dream.

I watched a BBC documentary on the original Tubular Bells by Mike Oldfield.  This was really enjoyable with Oldfield demonstrating various bass, guitar and keyboard parts.  Tubular Bells was the album that started Richard Branson on his way to creating the Virgin empire.

The commentary on how the initial theme changes from 7 beats to 8 beats per bar in alternating bars, capturing our brains as they work to figure out the difference versus a constant 7 or 8 beats per bar which would become monotonous, was quite interesting.  I can remember listening to this album in high school and being sucked in right away – something completely different and original.

I haven’t quite finished “Anxious People” by Fredrik Backman yet.  Last week I raved about how much I was enjoying this creative book.  This week I’m not quite as enthusiastic – still really enjoying the writing and the development of the crazy cast of characters, but things are starting to drag a tiny bit.  I’m looking forward to the ending and will have more to say about this next week.

 

In the music department here’s a tune from Tubular Bells III that I enjoyed revisiting this week – really good guitar that sounds great in the new shower:

I watched the first episode of “Long Way Up”, a new documentary where Ewan McGregor plans an electric motorcycle expedition from the southern tip of South America to Los Angeles.  The trip is expected to take 3 months and I’m interested to see how things unfold with brand new model electric Harley Davidson motorcycles and all that could wrong with that.  The show started with this song from the Stereophonics – a very underappreciated band:

And finally, a Dylan song from the “Infidels” album, produced by Mark Knopfler in 1983 (apparently one of Joni Mitchell’s top 15 songs):

 

 

 

Week in Review – November 1, 2020

“Same Old Routine”

Another week in the books and nothing very exciting to report – working from home on Teams video calls from my office most of the day every day.  Auntie D did get invited to join Luciano’s Zoom school call before we left Pacifica.  The forty degree temperatures on arrival in Dallas were a bit of a shock after the gorgeous California weather.  The puffer jackets are out again.

Our major non-work activity was swapping out internet providers and ditching cable television.  We made the switch to all internet with YouTube TV and should have done it a while ago – much better speed and quality at a lower price, and available on any device anywhere there’s internet.  I know I sound like a commercial but we have a great picture on our outside television for the first time.  Diana wrestled with getting the new internet service set up and I handled switching the older televisions over to Amazon firesticks.  The thing that irritated her most was the $10 fee that Spectrum tried to charge us for doing a “self-installation”.  That is a bit nuts.

Our only outing was to downtown McKinney for coffee on Saturday morning.  Filtered coffee shop has a new outdoor seating area that’s set up to look like a beer garden – I think they plan to serve beer outside from a new counter area.  There’s a new Cuban restaurant next door that we’re looking forward to trying – I’m hoping they have good empanadas.  Diana commented that she doesn’t expect to see the kiddie seesaws that were set up on the concrete next time we visit.  They’re just waiting for a kid to tumble off and bump their head on the unforgiving concrete.

Our friends Wash and Zoe, the Irish wolfhounds, made a trip to Colorado for Wash to have some specialized surgery.  Here they are seeing snow for the first time:

And here’s Zoe bouncing through the snow at high speed:

Wash’s surgery went well and he should be back home to Austin soon.

Halloween was a non-event and we didn’t see any kids out at all.  Coal Porter did make an appearance in New Orleans.

 

 

 

 

I started reading “Anxious People” by Fredrik Backman and am loving it so far.  Such creative story telling and a unique approach to language.  Backman became famous a few years ago with “A Man Called Ove” and I think I’m enjoying this book even more.  The humour and clever language are all the more impressive when you consider that everything is translated from Swedish.

The story starts with a bank robbery gone awry and police interviews with each of the witnesses.  Jim and Jack are father and son on the local police force who get frustrated when a special hostage negotiator from Stockholm is engaged:

“After talking to the negotiator Jack was even angrier than he’d been the last time he’d had to speak to a customer service representative at his Internet provider.”

I think Diana and most of you can probably relate to that feeling.

Two icons of the Texas music scene passed away this week – Jerry Jeff Walker and Billy Joe Shaver.  Born Ronald Clyde Crosby and raised in Oneonta, New York, Walker cut his teeth busking and hitchhiking through the American South after going AWOL from the National Guard. He took the stage name Jerry Jeff Walker in 1966, and released 36 albums through his career, including his best known, “Mr. Bojangles”.

Jerry Jeff is considered a Texas musician although he originally hailed from New York and was a big part of the Austin music scene that centered around the Armadillo World Headquarters.  Here’s one of my favourites:

Billy Joe Shaver is known as the grandfather of “outlaw country music” and his songs were covered by the Allman Brothers, Bobby Bare, Johnny Cash, Kris Kristofferson, Jerry Lee Lewis, Willie Nelson, Elvis Presley and, of course, Waylon Jennings.

Here’s the late great Bugs Henderson singing “Why Can’t I Write Like Billy Joe” – I remember him playing that at Dan’s Silverleaf many years ago.

And here’s my favourite Shaver cover – Joe Ely doing “Live Forever”.

I discovered a new band that I like very much – The Greyboy Allstars.  What a great rhythmic feel – similar to The Meters.  I read that they were formed in San Diego and include the amazing Karl Denson on saxophone – once saw him in the tiny back room of Le Bons Temps bar in New Orleans.  I’m looking forward to listening to much more of their music.

Stay calm and patient whatever this crazy week ahead brings us.

Week in Review – October 25, 2020

“Happy Birthday Clorinda”

When I left you last Sunday, we were sporting our “Flu Fighter” band-aids.  Diana added her “I Voted” sticker in the afternoon and reported that the line to vote at the fire station was short when she arrived a few minutes before the early voting opened.

On Monday I managed to work a haircut and swim into a relatively busy day of work, then settled into watch the Cowboys in the evening.  Even Campbell turned the game off at half time because they played so poorly.  I got all set up to watch the game in California today and was again treated to a very disappointing performance.

We boarded our first plane in eight months on Thursday – making the flight from Dallas to San Francisco to help Clorinda celebrate her 89th birthday.  We didn’t get off to a good start with an hour delay to change a tire, but after that the flight was fine, albeit a bit stressful to be around so many people after living mostly at home for so many months.

I met Will for Chinese food at Yat Sing in Redwood city – home of the best pot stickers in town on Friday.  They were very tasty – particularly when dipped in the special combination of sauces that Will recommended.

We sat outside and caught up on what’s going on in Will and Christine’s lives.  Pending new puppy, looking at engagement rings, researching houses to buy, and a special photo shoot of his BMW in a music video production studio were among the various interesting topics.  And he even paid for lunch.  It’s lovely to see him doing so well and enjoying life.  We got so involved in the conversation that I completely forgot to take a selfie of ourselves rather than just the dumplings.

The weather in Pacifica was terrific for our visit as you can see from these outdoor pictures of Clorinda and family enjoying her birthday on Saturday.

Was it Andy or Jude who said something funny?
Still funny?

Andy and Jude (Clorinda’s wonderful neighbours) won the most creative card award.  This is a picture of Clorinda and accompanist from around 60 years ago.  Andy made a mask for the accompanist from the same material as her dress – very nice detailed work.

I think Clorinda enjoyed sitting talking to and watching her newest grand-daughter, Francesca, more than anything else.  She’s such a good and happy baby – Amy certainly deserved that third time around.

 

 

 

I watched the movie “Parasite” by Korean director Bong Joon-ho during my elliptical sessions this week.  The film won the Cannes Palme D’Or and the Academy Award for Best Picture in 2019.  It’s described as a “black comedy thriller” and I really enjoyed the creativity and cleverness of the first half, before it got a bit silly and violent.

“Remember My Name”, Cameron Crowe’s documentary about David Crosby was my companion for part of the flight to San Francisco.  Incredibly well done and very sad as Crosby recounts his struggles with demons that caused him to spend time in jail and destroy wonderful friendships with Graham Nash, Stephen Stills, and Neil Young.  His enduring love for creating music is the big redeeming factor.

Kenny (New Orleans Fire Department Station Chief) recommended “The Cooperating Witness” by Mike Avery, a friend of his who now lives in New Orleans.  Interestingly Kenny is currently working on a memoir of his 30 years on the NOFD.  I suspect there are going to be some very compelling stories in there, including the months when he lived at the fire house during Hurricane Katrina.  Here’s a little bit about Michael Avery from his website:

“Beginning in 1970, Michael enjoyed a career as a civil rights and criminal defense attorney over four decades, representing clients in jury trials and arguing cases in federal and state appellate courts, including the United States Supreme Court. His principal specialty was law enforcement misconduct. Michael and a team of lawyers obtained the largest award ever against the FBI for wrongful convictions, securing damages of $102 million for the families of four innocent men who were framed on murder charges by the Bureau. In 1998, he joined the faculty of Suffolk Law School in Boston, where he was a tenured professor, teaching Constitutional Law, Evidence, and related courses. In 2014 Suffolk awarded him the status of professor emeritus.”

Back to the story.  Suffolk Law student Susan Sorella is tending tables at her father’s restaurant in Boston’s North End when the head of the local mob pays her a surprise visit. What he tells her sends her on a mission to save an innocent man accused of gunning down the mob’s accountant.

Susan’s an intern for Bobby Coughlin, a burned-out defense attorney who pleas his clients out faster than they can sign his retainer agreement. The judge, having dropped the accused trigger man in Bobby’s lap, is pushing for a quick guilty plea. Bobby wants to supply it before he has a nervous breakdown.

Susan has to battle Bobby’s fear of failure, his sexism, the State’s Attorney, crooked FBI agents, their homicidal informants, and a cooperating witness to get to the truth. She’s not a lawyer yet, but with her knack for digging up evidence and the wise guys on her side, she’s racing to get to the truth before an innocent man goes to jail.

I didn’t see the twist in the tail of this book coming at all – always a nice surprise.  The descriptions of the Italian restaurants and food in the North End of Boston were some of my favourite parts of this book.

“Bostonians come from all over the city to the North End to eat.  Walking down Hanover Street, one finds a restaurant every hundred feet.  There’s always a line of people waiting to buy cannoli outside Mike’s Pastry.  Those who want to buy Italian specialties to enjoy at home step into Salumeria Italiana for prepared meats, olives and olive oil, salted anchovies, fresh sun-dried tomato pesto, and similar delicacies.  Several times a year the streets are taken over by people celebrating the feast of one or another Catholic Saint”

Susan describes strolling the North End with Romano, the mob boss:

“Romano took her elbow and they walked out to Hanover Street.  The North End was his domain.  It was like walking through medieval Florence with one of the Medici.  Romano was a prince of this city, a modern student of Machiavelli.  All the familiar coffee shops and neighborhood restaurants looked different with him at her side – smaller, less independent.”

I recommend this fast paced criminal mystery, made all the more believable by Avery’s first hand experiences.

The other book that I enjoyed this week was “Chinaberry Sidewalks” by Rodney Crowell, a singer songwriter raised in dirt poor conditions in Houston in the 1950s and 60s.  I’ve enjoyed his music and the albums he produced for Rosanne Cash and others for several years, and enjoyed his memoir a lot.

In the first chapter, Crowell describes Hurricane Carla and his father’s disdain for preparations:

“My father’s admiring his newly resuscitated television when a news bulletin announces the impending arrival of Hurricane Carla.

This sends Jacinto City residents into a frenzy of preparation.  Masking-tape crosses appear in windows, sheets of plywood seal up screened porches, new batteries make old transistor radios work just fine.  Everybody stocks up on food and water, blows cobwebs off kerosene lanterns, and replenishes liquor supplies.  So many people scurrying around in a frenzy reminds me of the Ant Farm Mrs. Cain keeps in the back of her fifth-grade classroom.

Such fastidiousness offends my father’s sensibilities and is as unlike him as being a bird-watcher.  He dismisses his conscientious neighbors as a nervous pack of limp-wristed do-gooders.  Lighting up a Pall Mall and spitting tobacco strands from the tip of his tongue, he scoffs, “Aw, hell, I ain’t afraid of no hurricane.  It can blow the dang roof off for all I care.”

A similar disdain for preparation will become the hallmark of my adult life, winging it at all costs my Achilles’ heel and “damn the torpedoes” my battle cry.”

Talking about his father’s immense inventory of memorized songs:

“The Saturday night Grand Old Opry on a neighbor’s dry-cell radio, local barn dances, his own father’s front-porch performances – that was the extent of his access to popular music.  But lack of exposure to the outside world did nothing to hamper his ability to accrue words and music.  He possessed an ability to absorb songs from the atmosphere.  If he heard a song once, he new it forever.  Such was his gift.”

Alicia appears to have a very similar gift of memorizing lyrics and music on a first listen.

Kenny had just texted me a report on his fishing trip with Denny, letting me know he was now “Mr. Exotic” because of the large alligator gar he had caught, when I read this passage:

“As a river fisherman, Sherman Buck was unrivaled.  He could drag alligator gar and catfish as long as your leg out of a dry creek bed.”

alligator gar example

The memoir is mainly about Crowell’s early life – up to finishing high school – but does include a fast forward to the deaths of his mother and father.  A very sweet portion at the very end of the book:

“The impulse to try to sculpt a narrative out of my family’s history started when I remembered introducing my mother to Roy Acuff backstage at the Grand Ole Opry in 1991.  Identifying herself as a lifelong fan, she told the most popular country musician of her generation that she’d met the love of her life at his concert in the Buchanan High School gymnasium, obliging everyone present, myself included, to imagine this had taken place only a night or two before.  The courtly superstar paid rapt attention and then said his most treasured memory from that evening was of two young lovebirds whose faces shone from the audience with the light of love everlasting.  The meeting lasted no more than three minutes, but I wish it could’ve gone on forever.  My mother floated out of Mer. Acuff’s dressing room, an eighteen-year-old girl again.”

Let’s start out the musical section with something from Rodney Crowell.  You can’t go wrong with any of his albums but I prefer those from the last 10 years or so:

Some Puccini for Clorinda.  She was translating the story for me as we listened to this:

I read about Hall Willner and his tribute albums, which led me to these great T. Rex covers on his “Angelheaded Hipster” album:

Willner also produced Lucinda Williams’ “West” album that includes Bill Frisell (of surprise C-Boys jazz guitar performance) and Jim Keltner on drums:

Stay safe and calm – it’s likely to get a bit crazy in the next few weeks.

 

 

 

 

Fortnight in Review – October 18, 2020

“Vacation’s over”

It’s been a while since we took as many consecutive days off and completely unplugged from work.  What a pleasant vacation with good friends and a beach for Diana.  After a 1700 mile round trip we’re back at work again.

When I last left you this is what I reported:

“We’re currently debating where to go for brunch and Saints game watching.  No firm conclusions have been reached.  It’s a process with Anne involved.”

We ended up deciding on a new restaurant, Treps, from the owners of Cafe Amelie.  On arrival, the wait was going to be a long one.  No worries, Clesi’s next door was serving delicious gulf oysters for the ladies (Denny was on soccer duty).  Look at the size of some of those oysters.

Laura met us at Trep’s for the second course – I enjoyed a really good beet salad (so good I ate a good portion before taking a picture) and some of a cochon du lait sandwich.  We had plenty of leftovers.

We started off Monday in New Orleans with a nice walk in Audobon park.  The trail round the park is 1.8 miles long and we managed two laps, enjoying the very old live oak trees along the way.  The trail was busy but most folks were consciously keeping their distance.

Having worked up a good appetite, I thought we’d try some tapas for lunch at Baru on Magazine street.   Although their website confirmed they were open, Baru was fully closed.  Plan B – the Rum House just down the street for some salad and Caribbean tacos.  Foiled again – under a complete remodel but offering counter service next door.  Diana suggested The Vintage champagne and coffee bar across the street and we enjoyed a good lunch on the sidewalk.

We took advantage of New Orleans restaurant week, where many places offer reduced prix fixe meals, for dinner at La Petite Grocery – one of our favourites with consistently good food.    I enjoyed crab bisque, Parisian gnocchi, and butterscotch pudding.  The pudding has been on their menu for over 10 years for good reason – served like a pot du creme with excellent flavour.  Diana ordered from the regular menu and loved her steak tartare and scallops.  Such a nice treat to enjoy a fabulous meal with Denny and Anne.

On Tuesday we enjoyed an impromptu visit from Kenny (Fire Chief for one of the nearby stations) and then started our drive to the Florida panhandle in the afternoon.  We drove through Mississippi and Alabama – two states that we don’t think either of us has spent any time in previously – stopping for dinner in Mobile, Alabama.  Arrival at the house in Florida was around 7pm.

Denny, as usual, selected a very comfortable house for us, with spacious front and rear patios and modern kitchen and bathrooms.  The master bathroom reminded us quite a bit of our remodel – I’m sure it wasn’t anywhere near as complex to accomplish.

 

Wednesday began with breakfast tacos with chorizo and a trip to the local beach in the morning.  On the way back from the beach we all rented bikes at Big Daddy’s for easy transportation to and from the beach (parking was very limited) and then Diana and I made a run to Publix (local grocery store chain) for dinner supplies.  We cooked up chicken fajitas on the grills at the expansive common area by the community pool.

Thursday was very much a repeat of Wednesday but we ventured further down the beach for even better privacy and spacing and stayed longer.  The ocean was starting to get quite choppy from the impact of Hurricane Delta further east in the gulf.  The undertow was getting pretty severe.

On Friday we drove to Grayton Beach state park – this is where the New Orleans krewe typically stays in cabins (not available this year).  The beach here was lovely and extended for miles in both directions.

After Grayton Beach we drove into Seaside for lunch at a taco stand.  This is an interesting town that was built as a master planned community in 1981.  All the houses are very similar and the place has a kind of Stepford Wives feel to it – all very perfect.

The Truman show movie was filmed here, taking advantage of the sameness.

Friday dinner was steaks on the community area grill – perfectly cooked by Thom and Alex.

Saturday was a rain day and so we were treated to lots of loud poker and other card games at the house.

The weather cleared up on Sunday and we spent the morning at Goat Feathers beach – I’m not sure that’s the official name but the access is beside the Goat Feathers seafood shop and so that’s what it’s called by the krewe.  The sea continued to be very choppy with double red flags indicating nobody should even think about going on.  Denny picked up some lovely fresh shrimp there and made an excellent pasta to go with them.  He’s such a great cook and makes it look so easy.

Monday was a driving day – from Florida back to New Orleans.  We arrived around 3pm and were able to meet up with Kenny and Kara, and later Denny and Anne, for a snack at Val’s, a new Mexican restaurant that is very similar to Suerte in Austin.  They server street tacos and other authentic Mexican fare. The elotes (corn on the cob with “fixin’s”) are delicious.

After that snack, I picked up some pizza from Midway just down Freret Street and we settled into the Webster Street couches to watch the Saints on Monday Night Football.

The 1725 mile round trip concluded on Tuesday with an uneventful drive from New Orleans back to McKinney.  I was pretty tired by lunch time on Wednesday.

I took Diana on a very exciting date this morning.  We got our annual flu shots.  I heard something about “placating me and Alicia”.

You might remember that I shared a video of Damon’s cousin’s parrot performing Stairway to Heaven with him a few months ago.  Well, that parrot and cousin made it on to the Kelly Clarkson show last week.  Quite funny.

https://www.facebook.com/515208202285132/posts/1030026964136584/?vh=e&extid=RGFSc82AYcG1CzCn

I was very optimistic about my reading on vacation – I packed five books, thinking that a book every two days seemed about right with all that free time.  I only finished one book – “The Yellow House” by Sarah M. Broom.

This is a memoir of Broom’s life so far, she’s 36 and spent her childhood and much of her adulthood in New Orleans.  The story starts with her grandmother and continues on through her 11 siblings and their time in New Orleans East, growing up in the “Yellow House” – a much touted new part of the city that never really took off and has become very rundown over the years.

I enjoyed some portions of this book much more than others.  The multi-generational first portion about Broom’s grandmother, mother and siblings dragged a bit.  When she shifts to her early adulthood, world travels, and ultimately her family’s experience with Hurricane Katrina, my interest was much bettered captured.

Here are some of the portions that stood out to me and were “dog eared”:

The quote on the first page of this book does a great job of summing up the driving force of this enlightening memoir:

The things we have forgotten are housed.

Our soul is an abode and by remembering houses and rooms,

we learn to abide within ourselves.”    Gaston Bachelard.

Broom describes her maternal grandfather while at the same time skillfully sharing much of the Louisiana history:

“Lionel Soule was descended from free people of color; his antecedents included a French slave-owner, Valentin Saulet, who served as a lieutenant in the colonial French administration during the city’s founding days.  Having a French or Spanish ancestor confirmed your nativeness in a city colonized by the French for forty-five years, ruled by the Spanish for another forty, then owned again by the French for twenty days before they sold it to America in 1803, a city where existed as early as 1722 a buffer class, neither African and slave nor white and free, but people of color who often owned property – houses, yes, but sometimes also slaves, at a time in America when the combination of “free” and “person of color” was a less-than-rare concept.”

Describing New Orleans East and the NASA factory – something I hadn’t heard about until reading here.  Interestingly we drove through New Orleans East for the first time on our way to the Florida panhandle – nothing much to see there for sure.

“It was called a “Model City…taking from within an old and glamorous one” that if successful would have made New Orleans “the brightest spot in the South, the envy of every land-shy community in America.”   And then, too, it was the space age.  Men were blasting off; the country electrified by the Apollo missions and the thought of explorations to come.  Few Americans knew that the rocket boosters for the first stage of the Saturn launch from Cape Canaveral, Florida, were constructed in NASA’s New Orleans East facilities, in the Michoud neighborhood, where my father, Simon Broom, worked and his son Carl would later work.”

An interesting musical tidbit:

“That September of the move, in 1964, the Beatles came to town.  The Congress Inn was nothing special.  But it was a place where fewer fans might converge and it if was damaged, no one would care.  This motel would not suffer as might the Roosevelt Hotel downtown, which had begged Beatles management to cancel the group’s reservation there.”

Describing the start of the torrent of bad decision making that would ultimately result in the devastation of Hurricane Katrina:

“Soon after it was built in 1956, the environmental catastrophe that the Mississippi River Gulf Outlet (MR-GO) wrought would become evident.  Ghost cypress tree trunks stood up everywhere in the water like witnesses, evidence of vanquished cypress forests.  The now unrestrained salt water that flowed in from the Gulf would damage surrounding wetlands and lagoons, and erode the natural storm surge barrier protecting low-lying places like New Orleans East.  This is what happened during Hurricane Betsy: one-hundred-plus-mile-per-hour winds blew in from the east.”

A horrifying detail of class war during the Hurricanes:

“People in the deluged areas recalled hearing dynamite, an eruption in the middle of their scrambling.  “The levees were blown on purpose,” my brother Michael says.  Levees had been below before by the federal government, during the Great Mississippi Flood of 1927 to divert water away from more “valuable” neighborhoods.”

A much more extreme version of my experience on getting my first eyeglasses at the age of 20:

“When I am then, my mother discovers that I cannot see beyond a hand in front of my eyes.  I have been acting a clown in school to distract form this  nonsight.  The children sitting all around me are annoying blurs, the chalkboard black waters with scratches of white.

“Trees have leaves.”

According to Mom this is the first thing I say the moment I can see.”

As the “Yellow House” falls more and more into disrepair:

“To describe the house fully in its coming apart feels maddening, like trying to pinpoint the one thing that ruins a person’s personality.

It seems to me now that as the house became more and more unwieldy, my mother became more emphatic about cleaning.  Mom’s cleanings were exorcisms.  At the core of her scrubbings was her belief in meritocratic tropes.  That hard work paid off, for instance.”

A reminder that the city of New Orleans has never been a particularly safe place:

“One of 424 murders in 1994.  Tourism rose.”

A detail that made me smile.  Denny’s high school prom was held at the Court of Two Sisters and he can’t remember the name of his date:

“Just at the moment when Lynette was hired at the Court of Two Sisters restaurant on Royal Street, she was accepted into Parsons School of Design and left for New York City.”

A harsh description of her brothers trying in the only way they know to bring some discipline to another brother who is struggling with addiction and stealing from the family:

“It is a terrible thing to see love misfire in a million different directions: we are beating you because you did a wrong thing as a grown man, because you hurt our mother who we love more than anything, because we can beat sense into you and addictions out of you even though of course we cannot, because if we do not beat you someone else will beat you to death and this will destroy us, too.”

More on the addicted brother, Darryl:

“I was afraid to look at Darryl in his possession, which is how I thought of his addiction.  I did not look at him, had never truly seen is eyes.  When I did, many years later, his was a face I had never seen before.

For the longest time, I couldn’t bear to hear his voice.  This is such a difficult thing to write, to be that close to someone who you cannot bear to look at, who you are afraid of, who you are worried will hurt you, even inadvertently, especially because you are his family and you will allow him to get away with it.”

Katrina strikes and two of the brothers have stayed behind and are camped out on the roof of the “Yellow House”.  Can you believe they sat on that roof for 7 days before rescue?:

“CARL

We new they was coming but you go to getting mad anyway.

From the roof where he sat, Carl could see the staging area on the interstate where the rescued were dropped off.  The airboats came straight through the area where before you could see a fence, where before you could see a car dealership and the train depot where freights docked for loading.

This new Old World seemed boundless.

They finally come get us, some white guys from Texas.  They pulled up in an airboat to the pitch of the roof.

Seven days had gone by.”

Having survived the storm, the next blow to the family  – the city deemed the “Yellow House” in “imminent danger of collapse” and bulldozed it:

“My mother, Ivory Mae, called me one day in Harlem and told me the story in three lines:

Carl said those people then came and tore our house down.

That land clean as a whistle now.

Look like nothing was ever there.

Broom take s a volunteer job in Burundi and is amazed at the local popularity of Phil Collins:

“At first I thought the driver played him to make me feel comfortable hearing a language I new, but Phil blared from rolled-down car windows everywhere and would be sung on karaoke nights from stages where live bands performed covers.  The men who worked for Alexis were singing along now, too.  People here loved Phil Collins.  By the end, I would like him, too.”

Broom takes a job in communications for Major Ray Nagin after Katrina.  I once bumped into Nagin at a pizza restaurant on St Charles avenue:

“Nagin had survived the Water.  He could say, I stayed.  I was here.  his not leaving meant: I am one of you.  That was a Purple Heart in a city where outsiderness is never quite trusted.  Before the storm, New Orleans had the highest proportion of native-born residents of an American city – seventy-seven percent in 2000, which meant that only a small fraction of New Orleanians every left for elsewhere.  This was why the mass displacement meant so much.”

An anecdote about sitting on the balcony of her St. Louis street apartment and watching the goings on below:

“They told the story of how, in 2006, during the Tennessee Williams Festival screaming contest when Stanleys compete to yell “Stella” best and loudest, the winner that year yelled “FEMA!” instead.”

As Broom is deep into research on the father she never knew:

“My father is six pictures.  There is my father playing the banjo, with Lynette in the frame; my father at a social and pleasure club ball with grandmother Lolo; my mother sitting on my father’s lap; my father walking Deborah down the aisle; my father in a leather coat and black fedora, sitting at a bar with uncle Joe, raising a beer, mouth open, saying something to the picture taker; and my youngish father standing in front of an old Ford, pointing his finger at the camera’s eye.”

Road Home is the organization that compensated residents when they acquired their land and bulldozed their houses.  It took 11 years for Broom’s mother to receive any of the money:

“Eleven years after the Water, Road Home finally settled our case.  Too much time had passed to claim victory.”

On the music front, I’ve had time to listen to a lot of new music but won’t go overboard all at once in this post.  I’m listening to “Africaine” by Art Blakey and the Jazz Messengers as I write this – such a great album that I forget about.

Here’s a new artist that I discovered on the trip – Tim Laughlin is Kenny’s cousin and performs a regular show from his balcony in the French Quarter.  I really enjoy a good clarinet performance:

Here’s a piece by Alice Coltrane, John Coltrane’s wife, that I found in a book called “One Last Song” by Mike Ayers.  The premise is asking a bunch of artists what the last song they would like to hear would be.  This one was chosen by Julia Holter.  I love the soothing repetition:

Lastly, I’ve been enjoying listening to some of the thousands of Grateful Dead archive concerts.  Here’s my favourite version of “Sugaree” so far.  Quite different than most of the others:

Stay safe and kind.  This is not nearly over yet.

Fortnight in Review – October 4, 2020

Sunday was a bad day for football with both the Cowboys and Saints losing pretty close games.  I had anticipated a more severe Cowboys beating by the Seattle Seahawks, and as usual us battered fans were treated to moments of brilliance amidst the overall error prone performance.  This was the first football Sunday with the new TV unit and all the audio components fully installed and functional.  I’m really happy with Diana’s design and how it all turned out.

While I was enjoying football, McD was hacking away at bushes with her new power tool – please keep a safe distance!  That’s actually the neighbours’ side yard beside our driveway that’s she’s attacking.

I watched the movie “Youth” during elliptical exercise time.  Starring Michael Caine and Harvey Keitel, the movie tells the story of two friends on the verge of turning eighty, vacationing at a resort in the Alps, and looking to each other for support as they face momentous career landmarks, realizing that time is no longer on their side.  Directed by Paolo Sorrentino, to say this is a quirky movie would be quite an understatement – just flat out weird in some places.  It was a pleasant distraction from the boredom of aerobic exercise.

On Friday we loaded up and made the all day drive from McKinney to New Orleans to visit the Ogans for a few days, prior to all caravanning over to the Florida panhandle for a week by the beach.  The drive was relatively leisurely with a stop at Athena in Shreveport for some fantastic Mediterranean cuisine.  We were amazed at the quality of everything we ordered in this unassuming restaurant.  The hummus was some of the best we’ve had.  Our second stop was in Opelousas for coffee prior to arrival on Webster Street around 7pm.

Saturday began with two laps around Audobon Park for Diana and me – the weather was gorgeous and perfect for a nice long walk.  This is the least humidity I remember experiencing in New Orleans.  In the afternoon we made a short visit to the French Quarter with a stop into Cuban Creations for a cigar and a drink.  Bourbon Street was very quiet with the majority of bars and clubs shut down and all boarded up.

Dinner on Saturday was at Patois – a short walk from Chez Ogan.  We’ve been here several times over the years and always loved the food and ambience.  This is the restaurant that was featured on the Treme HBO series with the female chef inspired by Susan Spicer.  Even with very few tables, due to density restrictions, the menu was still pretty extensive.  We started with pumpkin and crabmeat soup (bursting with flavour) and chicken liver mousse.  I couldn’t resist a fancy meat pie as well.  Denny and Anne shared some of the crabmeat gnocchi and crab claws they chose with us as well.  It would be easy to have a good meal of a couple of appetizers.

Denny and I both had the beef short rib special – so much amazing flavour again.  I made an omelet with my leftovers this morning.

We’re currently debating where to go for brunch and Saints game watching.  No firm conclusions have been reached.  It’s a process with Anne involved.

I finished “The Beekeeper of Aleppo” by Christy Lefteri this week – a recommendation from my Mum.

Lefteri was brought up in London and is the child of Cypriot refugees.  The Beekeeper of Aleppo was born out of her time working as a volunteer at a UNICEF supported refugee center in Athens.

The book begins with the violence of the Syrian war starting to ramp up and destroy normal life  in Aleppo:

“Things will get bad.  We all know it, don’t we?  But we’re trying to continue living like we did before.  He stuffed a dough ball in his mouth as if to prove his point.  It was late June, and in March of that year the civil war had just begun with protests in Damascus, bringing unrest and violence to Syria.  I must have looked down at this point, and maybe he saw the worry on my face, for, when I glanced up again, he was smiling.”

Nuri and his wife Afra resist leaving Syria when it would have been dramatically easier than their escape ended up being:

“When the trouble first started, Dahab and Aya left.  Mustafa convinced them to go without him.  As his fears began to be confirmed, he very quickly made plans, but he needed to stay a while longer to see the bees.  At the time I thought he was being too hasty.”

A description of a simple act of kindness that says so much more about the horror than any description of conflict could:

“A middle-aged woman knelt on the floor next to another bucket, full of water.  She was going to clean the faces of the dead men, she said, so that the women who loved them would recognize them when they came searching.  If I had been one of the dead men in the river, Afra  would have climbed mountains to find me.  She would have swum to the bottom of that river, but that was before they blinded her.”

Both main couples in the book lose children through the conflict and much of the story is dedicated to showing their differing reactions to the loss:

“sitting down at his desk, he opened the black book and wrote:

Name – My beautiful boy.

Cause of death – This broken world.

And that was the very last time Mustafa recorded the names of the dead.”

Finally, and almost too late, Afra agrees to leave Syria with Nuri:

“‘Nuri,’ Afra said, breaking the silence, ‘I’m done.  Please.  Take me away from here.’  And she stood there with her eyes moving about the room as if she could see it all.”

In an email from Mustafa to Nuri:

“Spend your money wisely – the smugglers will try to get as much out of you as they can, but keep in mind that there is a longer journey ahead.  You must learn to haggle.  People are not like bees.  We do not work together, we have no real sense of a greater good – I’ve come to realize this now.”

Mustafa adjusting to British behaviours:

“Apparently queuing is important here.  People actually form a single line in a shop.  It’s advisable to take your place in the queue and not try to push your way to the front, as this usually pisses people off!  This is what the woman in Tesco told me last week.”

Nuri enjoying the simple pleasure of a cup of coffee during his journey to England:

“and when my coffee was brought out I savored it, sip by sip.  I never thought I would be sitting down somewhere, next to other families, drinking coffee, without the sound of bombs, without the fear of snipers.  It was as this time, when the chaos stopped, that I thought of Sami.  Then there was guilt, for being able to taste the coffee.”

“‘You’re lucky you’re rich,’ he said.  His eyes in the mirror were smiling now.  ‘Most people have to make a terrible journey through the whole of Europe to reach England.  Money gets you everywhere.  This is what I always say.  Without it you live your entire life traveling, trying to get to where you think you need to go.”

As I was reading a passage where Nuri finds a bee in the English boarding house garden that has a genetic defect and no wings, my Spotify playlist was serving up “Beeswing” by Richard Thompson with the lyric:

She was a rare thing
Fine as a beeswing
So fine a breath of wind might blow her away

Weird how coincidences like that happen – or are they really coincidental and not something more?

“I know that Mohammed will not be coming – I understand that I created him, but the wind picks up and leaves rustle and there is a chill in the air that gets beneath my skin, and I imagine his tiny figure in the shadows of the garden.  The memory of him lives on, as if somehow, in some dark corner of my heart, he had a life of his own.  When I come to this realization, it is Sami who fills my mind.”

Mustafa and Nuri finally reunite in England:

“In my pajamas and with bare feet, I go down the stairs, and standing there, with the full light of the morning sun behind him, is Mustafa.  And the memories flash before my eyes – Yuanfen, the mysterious force that causes two lives to cross paths – and our apiaries, the open field full of light, thousands of bees, employees smoking the colonies, the meals beneath the canopies.  It all flashes before my eyes as if I am about to take my last breath.”

“And there we both stand, battered by life, two men, brothers, finally reunited in a world that is not our home.”

In the Author’s Note at the end of the book:

“I met Dr. Ryad Alsous, a refugee living in the north of England, who had once been a beekeeper in Syria.  He taught me a lot about the life of bees and how they are a symbol of vulnerability and life and hope.”

“The Beekeeper of Aleppo is a piece of fiction.  But Nuri and Afra developed as a result of every step I had taken beside the children and the families who made it to Greece.  I wanted to explore the internal conflicts, the way memory is affected, the way were are with the people we care about most in the world when we have suffered so much loss that we are broken.  I wanted to set forth the idea that among profound, unspeakable loss, humans can still find love and light  – and see one another.”

Yusuf/Cat Stevens has just re-recorded his classic 70s album “Tea For the Tillerman”.  I’m not really sure why – the original is wonderful and I don’t hear anything meaningfully better in the new version.  Take a listen on this video of  “Where Do the Children Play”.

I got a bit optimistic in my piano piece  for this week.  Always having enjoyed the chromatic sound and triplet rhythm of “Firth of Fifth” by Genesis, from the 1973 album “Selling England by the Pound”, I thought I could tackle the introduction.

I don’t even have the first page really down yet, so will spare you my performance.  Here is an amazing performance of what it could sound like:

In other music news this week, the Band of Heathens were all together in Austin for the first time in months and broadcast a great sounding show: