From Mom to Kid Koala

Today I went over to the Berkshires to visit my mom as she had cataract surgery this AM. It seems to have gone very well.



Afterwards, I met Baird & Jess in NoHo to hear Kid Koala. I only knew a little bit of his DJ work but man, I was amazed by the live performance. He is really incredible. The most effective piece for me, because I knew the music so well, was when he used 3 turntables and 3 separate copies of the 33 rpm album version of Moon River. He had different things going on with all three turntables could switch between them and use his mixer to vary them and mix between them. He could also use his amazing fast fingers to go from one album to another without missing a beat or a word of the lyrics. Hard to explain but trust me, it was astounding. He said he did it for his mom, "so she could better understand what he does. Now she thinks I am weird and that it is 'just a phase'." He was joking. I bet she thinks it is amazing, too. It was also cool that he was there with his wife, who was taking photos. This is their "honeymoon tour." She is a set designer and after this tour he said they are going to do a graphic novel and video (3D, poor man's claymation style) about a mosquito who goes to the city to be a clarinet player. He played some of his mosquito clarinet music for us :-) For real! You heard it hear!

Other trivia: Baird got his signature on a BeDe card. His real name is Eric. He was born in Vancouver but lives in Montreal. He was quite interested in B's Electronica student's rotary phone project.

We missed Shnitzle who was home sick... BooHoo!
Get better soon!

( pic above from- http://www.discorder.ca/oldsite/features/03octkidkoala.html)

Presidents' Day Weekend: French Connection - Breach - Borneo - and Mom

Friday eve we stayed warm at home with a fire and watched The French Connection. B hadn't seen it before and I had many years ago but remembered none of it. Great classic.
Then, Saturday, Breach: worth seeing...yes! Disturbing but not in an overwhelming sort of way. Utterly fascinating too. I really "enjoyed" seeing this flick with P, P & P.

and tonight.....
Expedition Borneo on Discovery Channel. Saw places no human has been known to traverse -- in modern times, anyway. Unbelievable footage of the rare, the previoulys unknown, the beautiful and the weird. Shocking, breathtaking and totally amazing. I have decided I want to spend one day (not a night - just a day - thank you very much) of my life as a gibbon, swinging thru the huge trees in this tropical rain-forest.

Exploring the amazing cathedral like caves...well.. I'll leave those for the dreams of the "Jet."
It's awesome to know that the work of this scientific / photographic team in documenting this rain-forest helped to result in the creation of the Heart of Borneo signed into being just last week (2/12/07)! One third of Borneo will now be preserved, as it well deserves to be.
Curious?? This 2 hour presentation will be repeated once more: Thursday night, 2/22 at 9PM on The Science Channel.

Today also included a visit to Mom and Connie over in the Berkshires. It was great to see them. Connie says he doesn't have as much get up and go as he did. Well, at 93, after all he's been thru in the past 2 years, and after pneumonia in the Fall, that's not surprising. We hope the Spring will provide him with some of his 'ole spunk.
Tomorrow: it's off to collect a few FreeCycle treasures and then B and I will walk up to the Amherst Cinema with Pete and Pam to see a new 35 mm print of the 1939 French film: The Rules of the Game (Renoir)

Then it's back to the "real world" on Tuesday.
Hope you've had a good weekend.

Christmas 2006

A few shots of our Christmas this year.

Merry Christmas to All!

Here is our family Christmas photo, taken this Fall at Dunrobin Castle in Scotland, where we did not travel this year. Have a wonderful Christmas all! Click on image to enlarge.

Jess's Furniture in Vermont Gallery!

Today Baird and I went to Brattleboro to see something cool with our own eyes. Yes, we ate great food and went to cool shops but we went ot see Jess's art work in a gallery! As of yesterday, Dec 1, 2006 three pieces of Jess's recycled art furniture are now in an awesome gallery in the very artsy town of Brattleboro VT.

To get an idea of her work check out the web page, BandJGreene, that she designed for her and Ben's work. The little table pictured here is similar to 2 of the pieces in the gallery. The third piece there is a recycled, painted and decorated stereo speaker tuned into a cabinet.

The gallery is called Gallery in the Words. It has 3 floors of awesome work and was featured in the Boston Globe. Woohoo! Congrats to Jess!

Shnitzle

Here is Shnitzle at semester's end (with a surrogate professor enactment).
Disclaimer: You must read Overspray to fully understand this post.

Mi Momma

Mi Momma came today, as did my sister and brother, and sister-in-law. We, all eight of us, had lunch. That would be Mom, Linda, Hank, Lynn, Jess, Aaron, Baird and myself. Ben came later on. What did we eat? Home made clam chowder, zucchini pie, and Jess made apple crisp which we devoured with ice cream. mmmm......

Sweetside Thanksgiving 2006

What a wonderful day. Warm house with fire (rain outside), delicious food prepared by many hands and many friends who joined the family. All combined to make it fabulous day.

Happy Birthday Bairdissimo

Today is Baird's day....

What A Weekend

The past few days have seemed like a big weekend. Shelley & Dieter arrived Weds eve and stayed until Fri AM. Baird and I worked on house stuff Saturday and Sunday getting the dishwasher and disposal hooked back up (yipee!) and getting more tile work done on the stove back splash. It should be done for Thanksgiving. Then, Sunday eve Shelley, Dieter returned and joined Jess, Ben, Aaron, Baird and me to celebrate Baird's BD (2 days early). We grilled steaks and had other yummy food, topped off with a very special gingerbread cake called Aunt Lizzy's Dark Cake. Now the gang's gone and it is time to nestle into that warm bed.

Escape to Sanity?

In response to Shnitzle's blog, Overspray and my comment there. Mmmmm.....

sniffling & snuffling

that's me... thank goodness for a low key day.

Roof, Cats and Old Friends

That about sums up today. It started with Ben and Brett working some more on the roof while Baird and I loaded refuse from a few different house projects into his van for 3 dump runs.

Later, as the sun poured through the living-room bay window, the cats sunbathed and had a friendly sibling spat over who was going to get the biggest sunny spot. King Arthur won, over the young upstart, Merci while Surely looked on, too cool for such silliness.

Mid-afternoon, Baird and I headed over to Stephentown, NY to visit my childhood friend Nancy and her husband Tim at their get-away cabin in the woods. Back home at 10:30...ahhhh...what a good day it was. Now for a warm bed........

Arrival of the Hood

It's here and is in process of being installed -- our Sirius professional stainless steel range hood, as required by the inspector for our awesome Craig's List deal professional grade 5 burner Miele gas range. That's one "interesting" thing about some of the great deals on Craig's List... something like the required hood costs 2X the item you originally got the deal on. Oh well... I love it... it's superbly awesome.

Anyway, Ben and Brett have been working on installing it and will complete their part of the install tomorrow. Once they are done I will install slate on the cement board/walls, under and around hood like the rest of the back splash and counters. Yipee!!
Only the built-in refrigerator installation is left to go on the kitchen project.

My sista got married....

Saturday was a wonderful day. The weather was just beautiful (this is true) but even more wonderful is the fact that my sister Linda and Jim Johnston were married in Weathersfield, Ct. I'm so happy for them! I was the matron-of-honor. A special privilege. The flower girls were Alison (Linda's grand-daughter; age 4) and Alexia (Jim's grand-daughter, age 2). Aren't they adorable?

Jess's School

Baird and I went to Jess's school today. We went to their walk-a-thon, met several of her colleagues and visited her classroom "after hours." It looks fantastic!!