4/27/2010
Mike Roe played real good
But he left his mic clip on
My microphone stand.
4/28/2010
Twelve hours of relief
Then twenty-four of regret:
Fear the nasal spray.
4/29/2010
B-1 has many
Benefits. It will give you
That vitamin smell.
4/30/2010
As the weekend nears
The eternal question looms:
“What’s for dinner, dad?”
Friday, April 30, 2010
Thursday, April 29, 2010
Obligatory Garden Post #1
I should be writing a query to find out some information for a manager that I already gave to him once about thirty days ago... but since our e-mail system automatically erases things over thirty days old it's gone. But instead I shall write about...
OUR GARDEN!
Yes, it's back again... bigger and better than ever.
First up is herb row. Last year we found to our surprise out that herb entries in the 4-H fair automatically go to state. So this year each daughter of sowing age has planted FOUR herbs, with the best two of each being submitted. Those devious 4-H rule-writers have caught on to our catching on and are thus making it a requirement to submit a poster with each herb submission. Not to be outdone, I planted a few herbs for home, including spearmint, basil, purple basil, and one other one I forgot. Probably wolfbane. Then, when these slow-germinating seeds are just beginning to sprout, I go to a home center and see well established versions for just a couple bucks each. Grrrrr. Did I buy last year or start from seeds? I'm fairly certain that Brooke submitted a plant that was started from seeds, which I think is a requirement for 4-H, but maybe we started it later in the spring? Since I can't usually remember when I last clipped my toenails I'm not surprised that I can't remember something from a year ago.
Next up in the annual CATBOX GREENS! Yessum, lettuce grows amazingly well in a cat box (with a few holes drilled near the bottom for drainage). We did this last year with mesclun and just one box provided more than two adults could eat. This year we are UPPING THE ANTE by planting half a tray of mesclun, two spinach plants, and one tray of romaine lettuce. And of course it goes without saying that these are brand new cat boxes, never used for their intended purposes.
We're also making another foolish attempt at peas. Last year I tended and cared for two window boxes of peas and after all the work was provided with a very small bowl full of very tasty peas. This year I'm doing the same. Will I ever learn? Does it take a quarter acre of these plants to provide enough for one side dish? I was going to do sugar snap peas but, uh, I forgots.
Also in and growing are carrots. True to my contained gardening mania (thanks, darling, for the inspiration with the Container Gardening for Dummies book... didn't know you created a monster, did you?) I would like to start another batch of carrots in a deep container. And also some potatoes. Down in Princeton the Rural King had seed potatoes but I haven't found them up here yet, not that we'd be so lucky as to have a Rural King.
And let's not forget the GARLIC and the RASPBERRIES!
This year I've decided that the grapes can hang themselves. The last few years I've tended and cared for and birdnetted and watered and just about the time the grapes look ready to eat they mysteriously disappear. Durn birds/squirrels/hobos. Just breaks your heart.
We've also put in a lone strawberry plant and a cherry tomato plant in a container. This way they can get an early start and if we have a frost scare I can bring them in for the night.
Enough boredom for now. Soon I shall dream of a fine patch of tomatoes and green beans.
OUR GARDEN!
Yes, it's back again... bigger and better than ever.
First up is herb row. Last year we found to our surprise out that herb entries in the 4-H fair automatically go to state. So this year each daughter of sowing age has planted FOUR herbs, with the best two of each being submitted. Those devious 4-H rule-writers have caught on to our catching on and are thus making it a requirement to submit a poster with each herb submission. Not to be outdone, I planted a few herbs for home, including spearmint, basil, purple basil, and one other one I forgot. Probably wolfbane. Then, when these slow-germinating seeds are just beginning to sprout, I go to a home center and see well established versions for just a couple bucks each. Grrrrr. Did I buy last year or start from seeds? I'm fairly certain that Brooke submitted a plant that was started from seeds, which I think is a requirement for 4-H, but maybe we started it later in the spring? Since I can't usually remember when I last clipped my toenails I'm not surprised that I can't remember something from a year ago.
Next up in the annual CATBOX GREENS! Yessum, lettuce grows amazingly well in a cat box (with a few holes drilled near the bottom for drainage). We did this last year with mesclun and just one box provided more than two adults could eat. This year we are UPPING THE ANTE by planting half a tray of mesclun, two spinach plants, and one tray of romaine lettuce. And of course it goes without saying that these are brand new cat boxes, never used for their intended purposes.
We're also making another foolish attempt at peas. Last year I tended and cared for two window boxes of peas and after all the work was provided with a very small bowl full of very tasty peas. This year I'm doing the same. Will I ever learn? Does it take a quarter acre of these plants to provide enough for one side dish? I was going to do sugar snap peas but, uh, I forgots.
Also in and growing are carrots. True to my contained gardening mania (thanks, darling, for the inspiration with the Container Gardening for Dummies book... didn't know you created a monster, did you?) I would like to start another batch of carrots in a deep container. And also some potatoes. Down in Princeton the Rural King had seed potatoes but I haven't found them up here yet, not that we'd be so lucky as to have a Rural King.
And let's not forget the GARLIC and the RASPBERRIES!
This year I've decided that the grapes can hang themselves. The last few years I've tended and cared for and birdnetted and watered and just about the time the grapes look ready to eat they mysteriously disappear. Durn birds/squirrels/hobos. Just breaks your heart.
We've also put in a lone strawberry plant and a cherry tomato plant in a container. This way they can get an early start and if we have a frost scare I can bring them in for the night.
Enough boredom for now. Soon I shall dream of a fine patch of tomatoes and green beans.
Tuesday, April 27, 2010
Sets of Four
4/23/2010
Gift Certificates
Had for a bargain from the
4-H auction. Yeah!
4/24/2010
Sporadic raining
No outside projects done but
Lots of snuggle time.
4/25/2010
For some odd reason
This morning church seemed to drag
But now we are home.
4/26/2010
Difficult to sleep.
Do I have it all covered
For the Mike Roe show?
Gift Certificates
Had for a bargain from the
4-H auction. Yeah!
4/24/2010
Sporadic raining
No outside projects done but
Lots of snuggle time.
4/25/2010
For some odd reason
This morning church seemed to drag
But now we are home.
4/26/2010
Difficult to sleep.
Do I have it all covered
For the Mike Roe show?
Friday, April 23, 2010
The Afternoon
First I found this page while looking up the answer to a "debate" my wife and I have over reheating food that's been left out too long and the next thing I know I'm an expert on eating grasshoppers, making waterproof matches, and building a shelter out of twings and debris.
Of course this will all come in plenty helpful when, uh, when, well, just when.
www.survivaltopics.com
Of course this will all come in plenty helpful when, uh, when, well, just when.
www.survivaltopics.com
CD Review - Ravish and Other Tales for the Stage
Another one from last year. Just after I wrote this I was surprised to find that a local dance group was putting on Wonderboy. Coincidence? It is about as close as Sleepytime Gorilla Museum will ever get to playing Fort Wayne and somehow I still managed to miss it.
Music for the stage, classical pieces written to accompany dancers as they do their thing, often runs the risk of being boring background music, second fiddle to the dancers. However the very kinetic nature of dance lends itself to more interesting, music that can stand on its own. Tchaikovsky’s Nutcracker and Stravinsky’s Rite of Spring come to mind as two excellent examples that lose little sans dancers.
So it was with much fear, trepidation, and hope that I approached Ravish and Other Tales for the Stage, music composed for modern dance companies by members of Sleepytime Gorilla Museum, a band that has managed to hold my attention for far longer than is rightly fair. Would these compositions fall flat or would they somehow manage to avoid the pitfalls of “stage music?” I’ll hold off of my answer to build antici…. pation.
The first, longest, and least successful section of songs comes from The Live Billboard Project. “The Good, The Bad and The Beautiful” is atmospheric with a low rumbling buzz of the bass harmonica with occasional shimmering guitar chords and a piano at the end which introduces the apprehensive main theme. Something is coming and it’s not friendly. “Ravish” is a bit more complete with the theme clashing against dissonant crashes of horns and piano and cello, an off-kilter rhythm that leaves no doubt that this was composed for a modern dance group. Two “auction” songs plus two other brief snippets remind me of Dave Thomas Americana projects, more setting a mood than leaving any kind of musical trail, but “A Living Billboard” is a quick favorite with a lumbering steady beat, stuttering violins, and an ominous, pensive melody that deliciously builds as a kind of cross between SGM and Book of Knots. The frightfully spooky “A Private Grace” uses a Tin Hat Trio-like sparseness in the orchestration that leads to many creepy moments in the first section before drunken circus horns enter to start a lilting waltz with affable ghouls and their glockenspiel tones. The Theremin soon adds its ghostly wail, a hollow ache for a life long past, making this dark and amazing song as comforting as it is disconcerting.
“Confession” is the lone track from Ame to Ame, though it definitely leaves one wanting more. Crisp and brittle strummed violin leads to a detuned plucked melody and a trumpet violin, which is a violin with a hearing horn embedded in it (like those old fashioned record players) that truly makes it sound like a cross between a violin and a trumpet. In addition to these instruments the husband and wife team of Carla Kihlstedt and Matthias Bossi round out this lonely song with charango, toy guitar, zither, bass harmonica, musical saw, glass and water.
Five selections from Wonderboy make the most consistent listening. “Portrait of a Lanscape” combines hints of Debussy with a smidgeon of Danny Elfman to create a somber yet light footed solo piano piece that moves into “Sticks and Paper”, a more minimalist composition built around a repeating figure on the piano. “The Aviary” is yet another miniature that packs a big punch. The piano weaves a nostalgic memory with slight violin backing, holding back until halfway through when the floodgates really open for a 1940s themed love song. “Small Wonder” is the chilling two minute childhood fantasy of a troubled child while “Sea of Stars” could be another Tin Hat Trio song with a steady beat led by the bass harmonica.
“Adam’s Misfortune”, from Heaven’s Radio, took awhile to get to me, opening as it does with a monk chorus in a giant cathedral, being soon joined by similar female vocals in a foreign tongue. An ambient sound collage of background noises soon enter, a kind of hazy memory, overcoming the piano to become a squeaking, pulsing white noise before subdued but tribal drums wash over the surf, leading the way back to the forlorn piano melody and choral vocals. If Eraserhead needed a new soundtrack Lynch would need to look no further than “Adam’s Misfortune”.
Ravish is hands down the best new music for stage that I’ve heard in a decade. It’s also the only new music for stage that I’ve heard in a decade. Anyone who likes the quieter, spookier works of Danny Elfman but thinks that the man may be a bit past his prime should give these forlorn melodic memories a welcome home in their collection.
Music for the stage, classical pieces written to accompany dancers as they do their thing, often runs the risk of being boring background music, second fiddle to the dancers. However the very kinetic nature of dance lends itself to more interesting, music that can stand on its own. Tchaikovsky’s Nutcracker and Stravinsky’s Rite of Spring come to mind as two excellent examples that lose little sans dancers.
So it was with much fear, trepidation, and hope that I approached Ravish and Other Tales for the Stage, music composed for modern dance companies by members of Sleepytime Gorilla Museum, a band that has managed to hold my attention for far longer than is rightly fair. Would these compositions fall flat or would they somehow manage to avoid the pitfalls of “stage music?” I’ll hold off of my answer to build antici…. pation.
The first, longest, and least successful section of songs comes from The Live Billboard Project. “The Good, The Bad and The Beautiful” is atmospheric with a low rumbling buzz of the bass harmonica with occasional shimmering guitar chords and a piano at the end which introduces the apprehensive main theme. Something is coming and it’s not friendly. “Ravish” is a bit more complete with the theme clashing against dissonant crashes of horns and piano and cello, an off-kilter rhythm that leaves no doubt that this was composed for a modern dance group. Two “auction” songs plus two other brief snippets remind me of Dave Thomas Americana projects, more setting a mood than leaving any kind of musical trail, but “A Living Billboard” is a quick favorite with a lumbering steady beat, stuttering violins, and an ominous, pensive melody that deliciously builds as a kind of cross between SGM and Book of Knots. The frightfully spooky “A Private Grace” uses a Tin Hat Trio-like sparseness in the orchestration that leads to many creepy moments in the first section before drunken circus horns enter to start a lilting waltz with affable ghouls and their glockenspiel tones. The Theremin soon adds its ghostly wail, a hollow ache for a life long past, making this dark and amazing song as comforting as it is disconcerting.
“Confession” is the lone track from Ame to Ame, though it definitely leaves one wanting more. Crisp and brittle strummed violin leads to a detuned plucked melody and a trumpet violin, which is a violin with a hearing horn embedded in it (like those old fashioned record players) that truly makes it sound like a cross between a violin and a trumpet. In addition to these instruments the husband and wife team of Carla Kihlstedt and Matthias Bossi round out this lonely song with charango, toy guitar, zither, bass harmonica, musical saw, glass and water.
Five selections from Wonderboy make the most consistent listening. “Portrait of a Lanscape” combines hints of Debussy with a smidgeon of Danny Elfman to create a somber yet light footed solo piano piece that moves into “Sticks and Paper”, a more minimalist composition built around a repeating figure on the piano. “The Aviary” is yet another miniature that packs a big punch. The piano weaves a nostalgic memory with slight violin backing, holding back until halfway through when the floodgates really open for a 1940s themed love song. “Small Wonder” is the chilling two minute childhood fantasy of a troubled child while “Sea of Stars” could be another Tin Hat Trio song with a steady beat led by the bass harmonica.
“Adam’s Misfortune”, from Heaven’s Radio, took awhile to get to me, opening as it does with a monk chorus in a giant cathedral, being soon joined by similar female vocals in a foreign tongue. An ambient sound collage of background noises soon enter, a kind of hazy memory, overcoming the piano to become a squeaking, pulsing white noise before subdued but tribal drums wash over the surf, leading the way back to the forlorn piano melody and choral vocals. If Eraserhead needed a new soundtrack Lynch would need to look no further than “Adam’s Misfortune”.
Ravish is hands down the best new music for stage that I’ve heard in a decade. It’s also the only new music for stage that I’ve heard in a decade. Anyone who likes the quieter, spookier works of Danny Elfman but thinks that the man may be a bit past his prime should give these forlorn melodic memories a welcome home in their collection.
Thursday, April 22, 2010
Cookin' With Gas
4/19/2010
PGP encrypt,
FTP, Thresher, server:
Common work phrases.
4/20/2010
I would give to you
This very nice brake hose clamp
But I have lost it
4/21/2010
A bike ride to work:
Deceiving sunshine tricked me
Forty-one degrees
4/22/2010
Took lunch too early
So now I feel it’s home time
But there’s one hour left.
PGP encrypt,
FTP, Thresher, server:
Common work phrases.
4/20/2010
I would give to you
This very nice brake hose clamp
But I have lost it
4/21/2010
A bike ride to work:
Deceiving sunshine tricked me
Forty-one degrees
4/22/2010
Took lunch too early
So now I feel it’s home time
But there’s one hour left.
Wednesday, April 21, 2010
CD Review - The Minor White
Time for another 2009 Best Of Review! Sadly all I had was a digital copy to review and it somehow got erased before I could archive it forever. Time to shell out a few bucks, I suppose.
Pennsylvania’s “The Minor White”, named after a famous photographer, first caught my ear with the song “Go To Hell.” I’ve heard many songs by this unoriginal title and all of them have been angry missives full of thunderous drums and heavy guitars. But not the one by The Minor White. Instead the sound is subdued and mysterious, very much like “Blue Jay Way” by The Beatles but with a “Your Mother Should Know” piano part. The song smolders listlessly for most of its brief life, resigned to its fate before igniting into nearly two minutes of musical majesty led to conclusion by a fiery electric guitar.
Many of the other tracks on Old Theatrics also include a variety of parts that would normally seem jarring in being paired together. While many is the time when just such odd combinations have brought a smile to my face in this case it all fits so well, seamlessly flowing from one style to another, that you barely notice the change has occurred. And the fact that somehow these magicians can conjure these transformations in a brief 3.5 minute song only adds to their mystique. “Fever Scene,” for instance, opens with a landscape of sustained guitar chords and organs before becoming a jaunty happy spring day of a tune with light electric guitar and spritely drums, culminating in an uplifting folksy protest song a mere 3:33 from it’s inception.
Every song sports topnotch songwriting, incorporating to-die-for melodies with succinct instrumentation and lyrics that would make our own Vandolah proud. “Old Fashioned Drinker (In A River Of Gum)” is a nostalgic trip with melancholic vocals and sweet strings with such stream of consciousness lyrics as “I’m a straight-jacket jester in a cellar of gold”. “Money For Puppets” opens with only voice, a lone kick drum, and barely a guitar before bringing in the Everly Brothers and Randy Newman for a lurching, breezy rhythm sure to set your foot a’tapping. Despite obvious influences of Elliot Smith and Bob Dylan these merry melody makers somehow manage to blend in Wilco and Radiohead, even bringing in early Pink Floyd in for “Vaudeville”, sitting nicely beside upright bass, banjo, and violins that evoke a half-time feel of a bygone era.
Old Theatrics by The Minor White is an intoxicating mixture of opposites: folk instruments and electric guitars, vaudeville elements and modern music, a lonely feel couched in comforting warmth, acoustic and electronic living together in tension-filled harmony. Put on your brown derby and check out this collection of impressive songwriting with that new-fangled internets.
Pennsylvania’s “The Minor White”, named after a famous photographer, first caught my ear with the song “Go To Hell.” I’ve heard many songs by this unoriginal title and all of them have been angry missives full of thunderous drums and heavy guitars. But not the one by The Minor White. Instead the sound is subdued and mysterious, very much like “Blue Jay Way” by The Beatles but with a “Your Mother Should Know” piano part. The song smolders listlessly for most of its brief life, resigned to its fate before igniting into nearly two minutes of musical majesty led to conclusion by a fiery electric guitar.
Many of the other tracks on Old Theatrics also include a variety of parts that would normally seem jarring in being paired together. While many is the time when just such odd combinations have brought a smile to my face in this case it all fits so well, seamlessly flowing from one style to another, that you barely notice the change has occurred. And the fact that somehow these magicians can conjure these transformations in a brief 3.5 minute song only adds to their mystique. “Fever Scene,” for instance, opens with a landscape of sustained guitar chords and organs before becoming a jaunty happy spring day of a tune with light electric guitar and spritely drums, culminating in an uplifting folksy protest song a mere 3:33 from it’s inception.
Every song sports topnotch songwriting, incorporating to-die-for melodies with succinct instrumentation and lyrics that would make our own Vandolah proud. “Old Fashioned Drinker (In A River Of Gum)” is a nostalgic trip with melancholic vocals and sweet strings with such stream of consciousness lyrics as “I’m a straight-jacket jester in a cellar of gold”. “Money For Puppets” opens with only voice, a lone kick drum, and barely a guitar before bringing in the Everly Brothers and Randy Newman for a lurching, breezy rhythm sure to set your foot a’tapping. Despite obvious influences of Elliot Smith and Bob Dylan these merry melody makers somehow manage to blend in Wilco and Radiohead, even bringing in early Pink Floyd in for “Vaudeville”, sitting nicely beside upright bass, banjo, and violins that evoke a half-time feel of a bygone era.
Old Theatrics by The Minor White is an intoxicating mixture of opposites: folk instruments and electric guitars, vaudeville elements and modern music, a lonely feel couched in comforting warmth, acoustic and electronic living together in tension-filled harmony. Put on your brown derby and check out this collection of impressive songwriting with that new-fangled internets.
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