Is there a happier town name than Fair Haven, VT. (Intercourse PA, perhaps?) It is out in the middle of nowhere, on the New York border.
I was driving through there on Monday and came around a corner and saw this display on the roof of this A-frame. I couldn’t quite figure out how they did it; a roof rake perhaps? Maybe some sort of ironic settling of the roof insulation.
Nice to see that there are shiny happy people in Vermont!
I got to thinking about all the things I spend (waste) my money on; things that are here today and gone tomorrow. Money spent on “stuff” that doesn’t last. Then there are those things that you spend money on that give you pleasure and joy and memories for a long time.
I thought that my best expenditure this Summer was the $300.00 sailboat. I have had a blast with it for several weekends. My shipmates have included Kaeleigh, who screamed every time we tacked, and then said “do it again”, Dawn who sunned herself in the bow and managed to snap a picture of me as I fell out of the boat near the launch, and Ben, who handled the rudder while I trimmed the sails. Even Matilda the Sailor Dog went for a sail with her happy little PFD on.
The SS Minnow has to take second place to the trip to Boston on 9-11-2009 with my dad. He had his 79th birthday this August, the last one he plans to acknowledge. He doesn’t want people to know when he is 80.
While considering what to get him for his birthday (which gift card would most utilitarian) Dawn suggested, “Why don’t you take him to a Sox game?”
That turne
d out to be a great idea. A trip to Ace ticket online and I had two grandstand seats off of the third base line.
Luck being what it is, the forecast was for rain for the first time in four weeks. We got to the game in time for the first pitch and watched Tampa Bay load the bases before the gane was called on account of monsoons. We sat under the grandstands for 3 hours before they finally called it.
That is the short story. The longer story involves driving HIM into Boston like he used to drive me when I was 10 years old. He doesn’t do so well with directions these days and was surprised that I got him to Haymarket Square without the GPS.
I got to show him the Zakum Bridge for the first time, comparing it to the Bunker Hill Monument across the city. Then through the Big Dig tunnel (“your mother would hate this”) and to the parking garage.
He took his first ride on the T’s Green Line where we saw all sorts of people, including a woman that I knew from Bennington, NH (“You can’t get away with anything; you know people everywhere.”)
At the park, the seats were great, the beer was cold, and the mens room was clean (“Nice. They got rid of the troughs.”) Two outs in the top of the first and they delayed the game. The next three hours were spent make small and big talk. The strangest stuff he has seen rolling through the toll booths. How hard it was to spend his birthday without his twin brother and how his class reunion has more people not attending than attending, for obvious reasons. How he misses the people he met RVing, but not repairing the RV.
We ate Fenway Franks and the saltiest popcorn ever. We tried to schmooze the rain date tickets from the people we sat next to get to take mom, but they came up with a plan to be able to attend and still make their flight back to Idaho. We walked down to the nearly empty box seats to get picture with the Citgo sign but had to settle for the Monstah.
When they announced that the game would resume on Sunday, his eyes lit up. “I have Sunday off. I can go!” We got to experience the crush of after-game-subways and the 110% humidity in the trains. His biggest laugh was from a panhandler who said: “Hey buddy, how about giving just me some cash; I have run out of lame excuses.”
When we got home at midnight he told me it was a really great time and he looked forward to Sunday to do it again.
Sure beats a gift card to Wal-Mart.
I have been an avid motorcyclist since I was 16 years old. My father, much to my mother chagrin, allowed me to get my bike licence at a young age, and I was able to take his Kawasaki street 90 to work during the summers between school years. I like having complete control of the machine and experiencing the stimulation of all of my senses that just can’t be achieved behind a windshield.
I have had so many bikes, I can barely count them all. 5 Triumphs, including a chopper, two full dressers, a dirt bike, a couple of sport bikes and several UJMs (Universal Japanese Motorcycle).
I have not ridden on the back of a motorcycle since I was 15 years old, and can’t imagine doing so. I don’t know how my various passengers do it. Kaeleigh absolutely refuses; why, I am not sure.
Dawn did ride on the back for a while but was not comfortable with it. I think, for her, it was a feeling of not being in control. She rode dirt bikes as a kid. She always wanted to have one as an adult and now she does. The Purple Shadow. She immediately went to the Motorcycle Safety Course and accelerated her process for getting her license. In the few short weeks she has had the bike she has got more riding in than most people get all summer.
I love having a riding partner. Downside: I can’t talk with her much except at stoplights or cruising Ocean Blvd at Hampton. Upside: She can’t tug my ear and jiggle my love handles as I am doing 55 mph.
Las Vegas has set the over/under for her upgrading to a larger bike at July 4, 2010.
The helmet belongs to her brother, from his wilder days as a youth (he bought it from a collection belonging to a guy who went to the Gray Bar Motel). I told her that is she wore it she would have to ride through Haverhill by herself.
Last one graduated. What a milestone. Pictures HERE.
Once again I am involved with the cast recording of a Jon R. O’Brien’s original play. This year it is Pendragon being presented by Branch River Theatre.
This is a very talented cast, every one of whom has put in long hours and suffered through various maladies to get this production on stage. Jon will be the first to admit his songs are not the easiest in the world to learn and memorize and they cast, and the band has done a fantastic job.
Wednesday we all got together at the theater in Marlborough and recorded the songs, mostly in one take. Everyone was professional and took direction really well. It was a simple recording done primarily through one channel; having to record 15 songs in one night would have been a logistical nightmare if done in a more complex way. Dave Teubner of Keene Online also did a recording at the same time. Between the two of us, we should have something that is serviceable.
At every recording there is one song that gets to me. In Merlin it was Cindy Linnell singing All of My Days .
This year it was Rochelle Gandour singing Verily Verily. It is very much from the heart. I let Rochelle listen to her track during a break. I eyes flew open wide and she said “I sound like that?? That is not the voice I hear in my head!!”
I don’t know what she is listening to, but her voice sounded great to the rest of us who are not in her head.
To the Cast: more songs are coming. It takes almost an hour to master one song, so patience is a virtue. Besides, I am of the school that we are most critical of ourselves when listening to recordings of our voice or playing, so I don’t want to prejudice any of you before the show is over. Trust me, you will ultimately be happy with what you have accomplished.
Rochelle, on the other hand, will just have to deal! I think the song came out nicely. Listen to it HERE.
Kaeleigh had her final prom this past Saturday. She looked beautiful and she and Joe made a handsome couple. I don’t know how much more of this little-girl-growing-up stuff I can take…
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| ConVal Prom 2009 |
Kaeleigh turned me on to this song, from the movie Once, called Falling Slowly . I concocted it using my Kurzweil , my MR 8 recorder and Dawn’s Xmas gift, the harmonizer to add unison voice. I am just getting over a bit of a cold so I am not thrilled with the vocals, but it did allow me to get down to a low Cat Stevens baritone. A better version is coming soon.
Greatest American Former-Idol and Greatest American Hero
High school classmate Jeff and Dirty Road-houser, Patrick
(click on the photos to make them bigger)
Ski being interviewed on WCAP. Nice shut out to Dawn and and me! HERE