September 2017 – Keith Robertson

Week in Review – September 24, 2017

I dropped Diana at the airport on Friday morning for her trip to San Francisco for her High School reunion. At the time of her graduation San Domenico was an all-girls school and so husbands are not invited to the reunion luncheons. The school is located in San Anselmo, Marin county and looks beautiful from the pictures that I’ve seen.

Alicia agreed to accompany me to the Lettuce concert at the Granada on Friday night in McD’s absence and invited a friend to join us. We enjoyed dinner on the patio at the Sundown restaurant next to the theater and I learned more than I ever wanted to know about ways that high school girls go about getting the right boys to invite them to the dance.

All three of us really enjoyed the concert. It was obvious that Alicia was particularly enjoying the music from my seat upstairs – Alicia and her friend wanted to be downstairs in the standing room section in the middle of all the excitement. Alicia had been listening to the band for several days in preparation for the concert and listed off her top 5 favourite songs – she knew more about the band than I did going into the show – I had heard them on the radio and really liked the song so I took a chance on the show.

Lettuce is a funk band that was formed in Boston when its members were attending a program at the Berklee College of Music as teenagers. They would visit local jazz clubs and ask, “Would you let us play?”, let us becoming lettuce. I really like the mix of an excellent brass section, funky bass, and great guitar. They clearly have a very loyal following – I’ve been to many shows at the Granada and this had by far the loudest crowd.

We got home from the show a little before 1am and as I checked my phone I found that there was a work issue that needed attention. Around 3:30am I thought it was under control and went to sleep, only to find when I awoke around 6am that it was still a big issue. We ultimately had everything fixed around 10pm on Saturday night. Ugh!

Double Ugh when I heard from Diana on Saturday morning that the maneuver she had performed with her foot while walking back on the gravel at Adamo’s home with her nephew Luciano from watching the sunset was causing her enormous pain now. Apparently the most pain she’s felt since childbirth. All family members had important plans on Saturday morning and my boys were busy with Will’s knee surgery (more on that in a minute) so poor Diana had to call an Uber to get to the clinic to have her foot looked at. To add insult to injury (clever, no?), the clinic didn’t have an x-ray technician on Saturday and so had to send her to a sister clinic for that. She finished up with a diagnosis of no obvious fractures, a stiff boot and a pair of crutches. Adamo came to the rescue and picked McD up from the clinic and drove the 90 minutes to catch the tail end of the reunion luncheon. Diana had let the girls know that she might not make the lunch due to her injury and so received a big round of applause when she approached the group just in time to have a nice visit before everyone disbanded. The good news is that the foot seems to be healing rapidly now and we hope she’ll be back to normal sometime next week. I found it exceptionally frustrating to be so far away and to have no control over the situation while my wife was in so much pain.

While these two situations were developing, Will was getting surgery to repair and reattach the meniscus in his knee. He injured it again last weekend playing “ultimate Frisbee” and wasn’t able to be scheduled for surgery until Saturday morning. A few years ago he had a nasty skateboard accident at Cal Poly and had a similar surgery to recover. It seems the surgery went well – Will was in a lot of pain and looking for a pastrami sandwich because he hadn’t eaten all day.

I had planned on attending a tribute concert for Leonard Cohen at Dan’s Silverleaf in Denton on Saturday night but was way too tired to consider it.

I gave Alicia the choice of several places for Sunday brunch and she selected Sugar Bacon in downtown McKinney. She asked if she could drive Penelope down there and I had a moment of weakness. P found Alicia to be an excellent driver – even when we encountered the Oktoberfest traffic and parking challenges in downtown that I’d forgotten about. Alicia had the pulled pork Benedict which I think gets close to my becoming famous version. On the drive home, after punching the accelerator, Alicia remarked, “I’ve got to get me one of these”.

I picked Diana up at the airport on Sunday night and had the pleasant surprise of finding her accompanied by Patty and Brent (while she hobbled around on her crutches)– they had been on a trip to Paso Robles and Carmel and Diana ran into them on the airport concourse. It took forever for D’s checked back to come out on to the carousel (close to an hour) because a car seat had caused a jam up somewhere in the system.

Diana had “won” an iPad mini at a band silent auction and gave it to her Mom during the visit. We’ve been enjoying her experiments with Facetime and she seems to be really enjoying the visual communication. I did make the mistake last night of asking her what she thought of the NFL teams kneeling during the playing of the national anthem – she did have an opinion on that one for sure.

We watched a documentary/comedy performance movie this week called “Becoming Seinfeld” that shows Jerry Seinfeld talking about how he got into comedy and also performing a comedy set at the club where he first started in New York. I really enjoyed the history and his comedy. The final credits were accompanied by the song “Grazing in the Grass” by Hugh Masekela. I hadn’t heard him or the song before and it really caught my attention. I read that he is best known for his flugelhorn work and left South Africa in 1961 with the help of a few New York based musicians like Dizzie Gillespie and Harry Belafonte. Grazing in the Grass was released in 1968 and topped the charts, selling more than 4 million copies – seems it caught the attention of a lot of people when first released as well.

Another song I heard this week that I enjoyed very much was Leon Russell’s version of “Georgia on my mind” from his 2014 album “Life Journey”. The big band arrangement that joins after the quiet solo vocal and piano first verse is excellent and totally unexpected. One of my regrets is not going to the Elton John and Leon Russell show in Dallas when Diana suggested it. Leon passed away a few months later and I would have enjoyed hearing him live.

Week in Review – September 17, 2017

“Music makes a house into a home”, Ivor Tiefenbrun, M.B.E.. More about that later.

Things are improving with our work teams in Houston – one of the five campus buildings is open and we’re moving folks out of it so that critical teams can start to occupy it – this means a lot of technology updates and is keeping me quite busy. While Houston recovers, I was shocked to see videos of the devastation in the Virgin Islands. All the leaves and limbs have been completely stripped bare from what used to be jungle like vegetation and many buildings are completely destroyed. I really worry about the future of these islands as they are so dependent on the tourist economy and it looks like it will be many years before they recover. We count ourselves lucky that we were able to enjoy such a wonderful vacation on St. John a few years ago (see post from February 28, 2016 – https://www.keithjrobertson.com/?m=201602).

My boss was visiting for the week so on Monday evening I took him to the Cowboys Club for dinner. He’s a diehard Eagles fan but really enjoyed the club and a lovely sunset from the terrace. I collected another “small world” story – my boss was a chef in Bucks County, Pennsylvania before getting into IT. He ran the back of the house operation at several restaurants and on occasional nights was a guest chef at the Ottsville Inn which my Uncle Scott and Aunt Evelyn ran for several years.

Ivor Tiefenbrun delivered one of the best presentations I’ve heard at my local audio store on Wednesday evening. He’s the chairman of Linn Products in Eaglesham, Scotland and was on a speaking tour of the United States. My friend Raj was in town from California and was able to attend with me – he’s a much bigger audio nut than I am and understands a lot of the technical details. Ivor grew up in the Gorbals in Glasgow and started Linn in the 1970s. Their famous and ground breaking product is the Linn Sondek LP 12 turntable and I was lucky enough to receive one from Diana as a gift a few years ago – hence the invite to the event. I’ve enjoyed countless hours of listening pleasure from my Linn system in my home office.

Ivor’s wit and humour reminded me of my Uncle Scott (he gets two mentions in the same week) and he obviously has a huge intellect and is very well read. He engaged the audience in about an hour of stories from growing up and starting Linn and verged off into all kinds of topics. I enjoyed one about his Dad who created special purpose machines – some for the Singer sewing factory in Clydebank. He had the audience touch someone we didn’t know and posited that touch conveys many emotions – love, hate, indifference, curiosity. He believes that music is the equivalent of “touching at a distance” and that an audio system of sufficient quality allows the listener to be touched by the emotions conveyed by the artist. He mentioned that hearing is the first sense to develop and usually the last to be lost and told a story of his mother conducting her favorite piece of music, which he was playing on one of his systems in her hospital room, while in a coma. One of my favourite quotes from Ivor that night is, “Music transcends race, class, religion, education and time”.

The last 30 minutes was a lesson in “active listening” and a demonstration of Linn’s top of the line system using the 2^nd movement from Beethoven’s Emperor concerto (one of my Mum’s favourites) performed by Artur Pizzaro. It was a rare treat to hear such an expensive system which costs almost as much as a small house (in Texas at least). It turns out that Linn’s Chief Technology Officer is also a Keith Robertson. This led to an interesting conversation and an invitation from Ivor to tour his factory with him the next time I’m in Scotland.

Raj’s research before the event taught us that Linn in Scotland describes where a watercourse has cut through a shelf of hard rock creating a narrow, steep-sided cut through which the watercourse runs. Now the name and logo make sense – the needle in the record grooves.

The annual Americana Music awards were held on Wednesday night and I was pleased to see several of my favourites winning. Sturgill Simpson won Album of the Year for “A Sailor’s Guide to Earth” (see my May 10, 2016 post – https://www.keithjrobertson.com/?

m=20160510). One of my favourite songwriters, John Prine, won Artist of the Year. His most famous song is “Angel from Montgomery”. Charlie Sexton, who we saw a couple of weeks ago at the Kessler (see my August 28^th post – https://www.keithjrobertson.com/?m=20170828), won Instrumentalist of the Year. Iris Dement, Robert Cray, and Van Morrison also won awards.

I had bought tickets to see David Gilmour’s new concert film from Pompeii on Wednesday night at the iPic theater but unfortunately had to pass that up to attend the Linn event – I’ll see it on DVD soon I’m sure. It’s amazing to read that no audience had seen a show in that amphitheater in over 1,000 years until the Gilmour shows.

Saturday started with a workout at Cowboy’s Fit followed by a delicious lunch at Neighborhood Services Grill across the way from the gym. This location of NHS opened about a month ago and proved to be just as delicious as the original that we enjoy so much on Lovers Lane in Dallas.

After lunch we went to see the movie “California Typewriter” at the Angelika Cinema. I had asked McD if she’d like to go to a movie and only told her the name of it and that Tom Hanks and Sam Sheppard were both in it. She asked if it was a documentary and if she could see the preview video – I declined on both because I didn’t think she’d approve the choice if she saw it, and because I suspected her reaction to the movie would be quite funny. My prediction was correct – she was doubled over in laughter at the end of the movie because it was so strange, dry, and geeky – including an attendee behind us in the theater asking at the end of the movie if anybody else was a typewriter collector.

The movie centers around a repair shop in Berkeley, California and various avid typewriter collectors and historians. Tom Hanks excitedly demonstrates his collection of over 200 machines and explains why he prefers some over others. I enjoyed the documentary but think it probably appeals to a very niche audience. Here’s the preview that McD didn’t get to see:

My sister-in-law, Amy, sent us this Jack Johnson video from a new song that I think perfectly captures the current sentiment about dividing walls.

I’m currently making slow progress (combination of being busy at work and the density of the prose) on Paul Auster’s book “4 3 2 1”. The book tells the life story of Ferguson in four different variations. The first couple of chapters show how small variations in the story line can start to have dramatically different impacts on Ferguson’s life. I think I’m going to enjoy getting into the meat of this one.

The Cowboys are playing Denver in Denver right now. There was about an hour long weather delay as a thunderstorm with heavy lightning moved through. The game is tied at 7-7 and looks like it might be quite exciting.

Week in review – September 10, 2017

Tuesday through Thursday of this week was spent in New York in meetings with Microsoft. Their offices are next to Times Square which is filled with hustle and bustle at all hours of the day and night. The view from the conference room included the New York Times building and huge TV screens with advertisements and breaking news – quite distracting. I stayed at a hotel called The Sanctuary which is at 47^th Street and 8^th Avenue – half a block off Times Square but a quiet and modern boutique hotel which was a nice find.

On Tuesday night I made a repeat visit to Birdland jazz club having enjoyed it so much a few weeks ago. I enjoyed the NYT crossword before the show and a nice dinner during.

The music was by the Steve Kuhn trio which featured Steve Kuhn on piano, Steve Swallow on bass, and Joey Baron on drums. Steve Kuhn made his initial name playing piano with jazz legends like John Coltrane, Stan Getz, and Chet Baker. Steve Swallow is a wizard on the bass and a very well respected jazz composer. He has played in the Stan Getz and John Scofield bands. Joey Baron is one of my favorite jazz drummers – he brings a huge positive energy and excitement to his nuanced playing and is always completely in tune with the other personnel in the ensemble. I saw him play with Bill Frisell at the Blue Note a couple of years ago for the first time and was very impressed.

Here are a couple of videos of the show that highlight Steve Swallow and Joey Baron’s skills.

Wednesday was a full day of meetings and then a family style Italian dinner at Tony di Napoli’s restaurant on 43^rd Street. The food was good and we got to share a number of Italian classics – veal Saltimbocca, penne pasta a la vodka, eggplant parmigiana and the like. After dinner I took my boss and a colleague from California to the Stinger bar in the Intercontinental hotel that Mc D and I discovered on our last trip for the excellent “Smoking Sipper” cocktail.

Thursday was another full day of meetings and then travel back home. Thankfully all travel both ways was smooth and uneventful. I even had the seat next to me vacant on the flight home which is quite unusual for a Thursday night when all the consultants are usually traveling home.

Much of Friday was spent working from AutoHans while Penelope was attended to. She needed an oil change and new brakes. I did find a very nice neighborhood bistro only a five minute walk from the garage called Astoria. I was able to sit outside in the nice summer transitioning to autumn weather and enjoy lunch, the newspaper, and good coffee.

On Friday night we watched a documentary about the Chinese-American artist Tyrus Wong who created the sketches that were the original inspiration for Bambi. Tyrus lived to be 106 and endured all kinds of discrimination during his lifetime but never stopped creating excellent art. Late in life he studied library books about Chinese kite making and created some amazing flying machines. A recommended documentary for sure.

Saturday was a very pleasant day – not too hot and no humidity. So I sat outside and finished the book “Bruno, Chief of Police” by Martin Walker. This was a light, quick and thoroughly enjoyable read. Martin Walker was born in Scotland and moved to the Perigord region of France in 2006. He published the first Bruno novel in 2007 and has been pumping out a new one each year since. I enjoyed the local village characters and the food and wine descriptions – life in St Denis sounds perfect.

Here’s how Martin Walker describes Bruno:

“Bruno cooks, he hunts, he builds his own house and grows his own food. He organizes the parades and festivities and fireworks displays and keeps order in his fictional home town of St Denis. A pillar of the local tennis and rugby clubs, he teaches sports to the local schoolchildren.

Bruno finds lost dogs, fights fires, registers births and deaths, and enforces the parking regulations. But he maintains a sophisticated intelligence network to outwit the interfering bureaucrats of the European Union in far-off Brussels. The country folk of the Perigord have been making their foie gras and their cheeses and sausages for centuries before the EU was ever heard of, and see no reason to bow to its rules and regulations now.”

An article in the newspaper this week had the phrase “topsy turvy” in it. I had a flashback of about 50 years and a book called “Topsy Turvy Land” that I loved – all about a world that was upside down for the people who lived in it. I tried to find some pictures of the pages online but didn’t find anything that looked like that book – maybe it’s still in the attic in Stewarton.

For dinner on Saturday night we were joined at the Cowboys Club by Patty and Brent. With the cooler weather we were able to enjoy coffee and dessert on the lovely patio. Everyone was excited for the start of the football season on Sunday and the Cowboys versus Giants game on Sunday night.

The Cowboys had a nice 19-3 victory over the New York Giants on Sunday night to open the season. Highlights were an amazing one-handed behind the shoulder circus catch by Cole Beasley and Jason Witten setting the franchise all-time receiving record by passing Michael Irvin’s 11,904 yard total and scoring a touchdown doing it.

Jason Witten sets all time Cowboys receiving record

“Southern Blood” by Greg Allman got a posthumous release on Friday. I’ve listened to it a couple of times now and it is my favorite release of this year by far. Greg’s voice has a frail, less gravelly quality to it that lends even more poignancy to songs like “Going, Going, Gone”. The arrangements and musicianship are excellent throughout.

I heard the song “Jealous Moon” by Hayes Carll and it really caught my attention. I’ve seen him listed on the schedule at several of our local music clubs – Dan’s Silverleaf, the Kessler, and Poor David’s Pub – but hadn’t heard any of his music. We’ll have to give him a try next time.

Week in Review – September 4, 2017

This was the busiest work week in a long time due to Hurricane Harvey recovery efforts. The campus buildings that house 3,500 colleagues were (and still are) offline due to significant basement flooding. Here are before and after pictures – the tall building is one end of the campus. To see the roads that I’ve driven so many times to work in Houston completely submerged really made an impact.

Some staggering statistics about the Hurricane – 51 inches of rain fell in Houston over 6 days, 37,000 displaced people are currently in shelters, 84,000 homes were damaged and 6,400 totally destroyed. The estimated economic impact is over $40 Billion. Most of my friends and colleagues in Houston have homes that remained dry throughout the storm – only one family had to evacuate to San Antonio.

The weekend was spent catching up on some exercise, relaxing by the pool, finalizing the wedding albums, and pulling together information for our estate plan – nothing very exciting. I did watch most of the movie “Gentlemen prefer blondes” starring Marilyn Monroe and Jane Mansfield (a native of Dallas). I’d never watched more than a few minutes of this before and McD was entertained by my constant chuckling at what is a very silly but quite funny movie. It’s maybe best known for the song “Diamonds are a girl’s best friend”.

So far the Labor Day holiday has been spent on a troubleshooting bridge since 6am for an outage. It’s after noon now and so hoping the 6 hour marathon ends soon.

I finished “Bel Canto” by Ann Patchett this week. Given how much I enjoyed her most recent novel, “Commonwealth”, this was a disappointing read to me. The first section of the story where a world-renowned soprano sings at a birthday party in honor of a visiting Japanese CEO in an unnamed South American country and is then taken hostage, along with 58 other visiting dignitaries, in the vice-presidential mansion was quite engaging. The middle section where the hostage situation drags on for weeks and then months becomes slow moving and struggled to keep my attention. Interest peaks again in the last few pages as the hostage situation is resolved but it was too late for me to give this read anything above an average rating. On a positive note, the descriptions of the operatic aria performances and piano accompaniment are very well done.

I’m looking forward to receiving the new John Le Carre book this week. The New York Times review of this book by Dwight Garner is very well done:

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/08/28/books/review-john-le-carre-legacy-of-spies.html?_r=0

“Among this book’s pleasures is a reminder that adults were once in charge of the destiny of the free world.”

“Le Carré’s prose remains brisk and lapidary. His wit is intact and rolls as if on casters. He is as profitably interested as ever in values, especially the places where loyalty, patriotism and affection rub together and fray. He wears his gravitas lightly.”

“Le Carré hauls out his greatest creation, the Yoda-like spymaster George Smiley, for a cameo appearance, as if he were taking a ’60s-era Lamborghini long kept in the garage — Smiley’s last appearance was 27 years ago, in “The Secret Pilgrim” — for a jaunty Sunday spin.”

Another excellent article in the NYT the week is “Charlie Parker and the Meaning of Freedom” – it discusses that even highly improvisational jazz has to live within a set of well-established musical rules.

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/08/29/opinion/charlie-parker-freedom.html

On the music front I heard “Maybe Your Baby” by Stevie Wonder on the radio and don’t think I’ve ever heard it before. The funky bass and piano immediately grabbed my attention. This is from the excellent 1972 album “Talking Book” which also includes “Superstition” and “Tuesday Heartbreak”. The challenge of this album is the alternating schmaltzy ballads (“You are the Sunshine of my Life”, “I Believe”) with excellent funky soul.

I also heard the song “This is where I get off” from Robbie Robertson’s 2011 album “How to Become Clairvoyant”. It reminded me a lot of the song “Somewhere Down the Crazy River” from his eponymous 1987 album that was so amazingly produced by Daniel Lanois.