The All-New Bunrab

I was discussing the phrase "ye gods and little fishes" with boyfriend the other day, and I swear I remember reading a book as a kid, in which a little girl used that phrase frequently to express her impatience with other people. I cannot remember what book it was - this odd notion comes to me that perhaps it was Cheaper By The Dozen??? Could that be right? If not, does anyone else remember such a little girl using that phrase, possibly in connection with walking to get ice cream? It's very odd what scraps the mind remembers.

I am too lazy to go to the library and find Cheaper By The Dozen just to see if that's it.

This year, our anniversary and Mother's Day came on exactly the same dates it did the year we got married, 1985. It would have been our 28th anniversary. I kept busy and didn't think about it too hard, because who wants to ruin someone else's nice Mother's Day dinner by bursting into tears?

My stepmother lost her first husband when she was considerably younger than I was when Steve died - and she had several small children to take care of as well. (If I recall, her youngest at the time was an infant.) I can only imagine how difficult it must have been for her - and I can see why she would have been happy to meet my dad, even though it wasn't that long afterwards, because she must have been so lonely, surrounded by children who were a constant reminder of what she had lost, without being old enough to be useful in helping her cope with his loss. My stepbrothers and stepsisters never talked about their father very much, though I gather he was rather strict, and chronically ill.

Saturday was our condo community's annual group yard sale. Six boxes of books and two boxes of crafts magazines out the door, along with a few miscellaneous items. Steve's three torque wrenches were the first thing to be sold - lots of guys want those, apparently. The crowd, and what they're looking for, is rather different than Austin; fewer books sold than I had hoped (the leftovers went to the charity donation truck that came at the end, not back into my condo) and a lot more people were looking for clothing, which I hadn't even considered bringing because in Austin, it never sold well - only baby/little kids clothing ever sold at all. Here; people who had women's dresses and suits and shoes were doing a brisk business. I did get a few people who each took an armload of crafts magazines, though, and a few science fiction geeks who picked up 10-20 books apiece. Did a bit of electioneering for the condo board elections this summer - I'm serving as an appointed member, right now, filling in a vacant spot, but I need to get elected to a regular term, and, quite oddly for such things, we have 5 people running for the three open spots (usually it's hard to get anybody to run at all) - so I used this as an opportunity to talk to a bunch of neighbors I hadn't met before, and do a few good deeds - things I would have done anyway, of course, but now I mentioned that I was running, after helping people.

I had my quarterly device check today, and it looks like the battery is holding up enough that we don't have to schedule replacement for July - the power level is still a bit above even the "elective replacement" level, let alone the "mandatory replacement within 3 months" level. So we've scheduled the next quarterly check for August, 3 months from now, with the assumption that at that time, the power will have just dropped into elective replacement then, and since replacement is outpatient surgery, it can be scheduled fairly quickly, probably for later that week. The question will be whether I've healed enough to play in rehearsals that start up around Labor Day - I believe the first concert any of my bands have scheduled for next season is something like September 15. By now, my cardiologist is used to hearing that his schedule comes in somewhere less important than my concert schedule :D

Hey, anyone in Maryland: Maryland Community Band Day is June 9, noon to 8 pm, at the Lurman Woodland Theater in Catonsville. Montgomery Village Community Band is playing at 3 pm, and Baltimore Symphonic Band, as the host band, is playing last, at 7 pm. C'mon out and listen!

Although there were a couple band concerts in the past couple weeks, which were fun and which I did my part in reasonably well, other than that, I can't say I've made any progress on stuff I should be doing. I did mail off my 1040 - since I owed them a whopping check because of the lump sum Social Security amount in November, I had to make the payment earlier rather than waiting for April 15, to support my case for not charging me penalties for not making estimated tax payments during 2012, which I couldn't have because I didn't KNOW I was going to get money until it was already the 4th quarter, but nonetheless needed a bit of CYA-ing. I haven't done my state taxes, though. Or the extension for the condo association's taxes, or found an auditor for the condo association. I ordered some DIY CPE for my CPA license, because I want to keep it active (there's this vague "just in case" thing in my head, plus an equally vague fear that I will somehow forget the license and let it lapse, if I keep it on inactive status, and a CPA license is NOT something one wants to have lapse) but I haven't started in on any of it yet.

And I have several pieces of music in my head that I need to get written down. And, more short-term, about ten tea reviews to write, including one of some wonderful Sri Lankan tea that Barbara and Jim gave me, that turns out to taste a great deal like an Assam.

I did order a sofa today, finally. My niece is going to take my little loveseat for her first apartment - that'll be several months yet, but I've been wanting a real sofa, and it was part of what I planned to do with the SS money after taxes, and there was a sale over at Home Decorators Collection. And, knowing that there's going to be a sofa delivered in a week or so will FORCE me to clean up one last pile in the living room of stuff that's been: waiting to be mailed; waiting to be taken to Goodwill; waiting to be properly stored in the crafts room; waiting to be moved to my bedroom. So I have those chores cut out for me, and a deadline, which always inspires me more than just knowing that something /should/ be done. The little loveseat will also go in my bedroom for a while, once the sofa comes. The living room here is tiny-ish, and I don't want to block the patio door the way the previous residents did; I /use/ the patio door a lot.

The heating bills have been pretty reasonable - that was, after all, one of the major reasons for moving. They haven't been quite as low as I'd like, partly because this is the first floor so I'm not getting the benefit of anybody else's heat, and partly because when I have guests I do turn the heat up to a comfy temp for them, and I've had several guests in January and February, and partly because there's still a cold-air leak somewhere in my bedroom that I haven't managed to eliminate with the weather-stripping of the windows; I think it may actually be right at floor level under the window (I'd have to draw you a picture for you to be able to tell that that spot is a clear weak point in the overall design of these places) and the solution to that will be a runner rug and/or a door-type draft stopper - I don't think it would look right to run caulk and weatherstripping along the laminate floor and quarter-round baseboard molding. And maybe also next year I'll do that whole plastic-liner-with-the-hair-dryer thing to that window, too, since that would help with the spots I can't weather-strip such as the latches and locks for the sliding parts.

So, goals. Now to attempt to achieve some. In between more books (currently reading Nebula Awards 2012).

Reading: Liquid Jade (about tea); Beyond Red and Blue (about politics); Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell (interminably long fantasy, which I am about 1/3 of the way through after 2 weeks of hacking away at the underbrush.)

Music: Went to BSO concert last Friday, going to another one this Friday - that would be today! - last one of this season. Baltimore Symphonic Band played at Charlestown Retirement, here in Catonsville, on Tuesday. Bel Air Community Band will be playing at Shamrock Park in Bel Air on Sunday evening at 7. Next Montgomery Village concert is June 28.

Knitting:


Started June 1, finished June 12! No pattern, just two rectangles, with a V-neck worked into one of them. It's knitted, not crocheted. Has baby cables in it. Craft cotton in the big cheap skeins, one skein.

And before that, there was this one, in May, same deal except I hadn't figured out as much about the shaping yet:



That, and cleaning bunny litter boxes, and cleaning up the old house, packing a bit more at a time each day - almost completely empty now, and it's already being shown!

Seaside resort town of Opatija is where we are staying. Pardon any odd typing - the keyboard is not set for English, so the y is in an odd spot and there are odd letters. Anyway, narrow twisty old roads, and motorscooters seem to be the main method of transportation. Currently visiting another resort town, Pula, and although it is somewhat flatter than Opatija and has some wider roads, still scooters are at least as common as cars. Western Croatia seems to like to think of itself as Eastern Italy - everything is ˝the Venice of Croatia (now I cant find the way to do quotes again) or the Riviera of Croatia - in fact our tour guide refers to the town as Opatija Riviera.

Our little OLPC XO computer isnt working; Steve thinks that repeated trips through Frankfurt security may have damaged its pseudo-memory. Right now the group is touring some very hilly area and it is very hot outside, so they have parked me at this internet cafe. My travel scooter is doing quite well, but with the heat, I just cant do everything outdoors. As you can tell, I havent found the apostrophe yet on this keyboard. And the z is where I expect the y to be.

Remind me to post later about:

Ethiopian airline helper in Dulles airport; vegan meal on plane; 5 hours in Frankfurt airport, including having to go through weird places due to being in wheelchair; 10 year old seatmate on hop from Frankfurt to Zagreb; little security at Zagreb airport. Then, bus and bus driver Toby, drive to Opatija (O PAT ee ya) lovely town, buffet suppers, hotel, first world, bathtub, key card electricity, rehearsal in hotel, concert in open air amphitheater, reception afterwards. Next day trip to Punat and monastery and winery, fig brandy, scenery, former Yugoslavian motorczcle racing. Chuck Berry concert in amphitheater, with fireworks. Today, bus to other seaside town Pula, then Poreč, where we will play a concert.

The bus driver and tour director have finally gotten the hang of dealing with me and mz scooter, and the tour guide for these day trips, too. Tomorrow we head for Slovenia, so we will acquire a new local tour guide. The bus driver is from Austria, so we are heading slowly back toward home for him.

OK, enough of dealing with this keyboard.

Whew. Band Day was fun but exhausting. All went well. The bands all did great programs. The ice cream vendor sold out of all flavors. After we got home, I slept till 4:30 Monday afternoon.

The house is almost ready for us to move in - the painters were doing the final touch-ups today; the new windows are installed and the sunroom shades re-loaded; the washer-dryer vent and power are up and running; the electrician just has to do one more electrical outlet in the kitchen. We have started carrying all sorts of loose stuff over there, but I need to call a mover and get a firm date in order to push me into getting really moving. I have finished crocheting one cotton throw rug for the floor, but I have to get a non-skid backing for it yet; I will take a pic once the rug is all smooth and flat.

Cindythelibrarian has brought us an armful of flattened boxes so I have no excuse not to start packing!!

Recent reading:
Lisa Scottoline, Daddy's Girl - plucky law professor up for tenure gets caught up in giant prison plot. OK, if not great.
G.M. Ford, Nameless Night - amnesia, the NSA and NASA - it's a thriller. Not my usual cup of tea but this was good, and the beginning, with the amnesia patient, tied in interestingly with that book about traumatic head injury I read a couple weeks ago.
Justin Scott, Mausoleum - latest in his Ben Abbott series; as usual, real estate developers are the bad guys. I have a quibble with this series, which is that its protagonist supposedly has a felony conviction and multiple-year jail term in his past and yet somehow had no trouble getting both a PI license and a Realtor license?

Well, I had briefly reported that we had been in Texas and were back again. While we were there we got to see a few people we hadn't seen the time before, and we also accomplished what we set out to accomplish with respect to my FIL's estate - inventorying some of the collections, and gathering up the rest of the personal papers, so the estate sale people will have a clear field to start pricing stuff, which will take them weeks - they will start this month, and then the estate sale will be in April sometime. If you're near Austin, ask me and I'll provide details, as there will be some cool stuff in the sale. While we were going through stuff, we found a few more items for other people - for the_curmudgn and for Jerry and for Cindy and for Connie... (hi y'all!)

Note to those in South Austin: don't bother with Cannoli Joe's down near 71 and Brodie. It's buffet-only, one price, food nothing special, confusing layout, and the cannoli are *too sweet* - you can hardly taste that it's ricotta cheese in there, tastes more like buttercream cake frosting.

Back home, we had the usual rehearsals Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday. I have some catty comments I'll manage not to commit to print about several things that happened at each rehearsal. Some good stuff: Monday night's rehearsal in Bel Air included having middle and high school students, who are going to perform a few numbers with us at the next concert. I got to oversee three middle school tenor saxes, who weren't bad; as there wasn't much one of me could do about listening closely to all three, I concentrated my advice on the judicious use of the pencil - "A musician without a pencil is almost as bad off as a musician without a mouthpiece."

Wednesday's rehearsal in Montgomery Village was preceded by a meeting about Maryland Community Band Day, which MV is sponsoring this year. The meeting was pretty productive, and we're actually on top of most of what needs to be done! Which is good, given that it's only 70 days out. We're getting down to the gritty details of forcing each band to decide on its program so that we can get the program books printed.

Also on Wednesday: looking at houses! And we found one we are making an offer on! We have been wanting for a while now to get a house with more square footage on the main floor, since I don't do stairs very well, and the third house we looked at was as if it had been built to our list of needs and wants - all on one floor, huge sunporch for the critters, level ground in both front and back yards, *garage!!!* (if squirrel_magnet were to ever do anything so undignified as squee!, having a real garage instead of a carport would make him go squee!) Huge rooms, lots of light, neighborhood eerily similar to what we're in now - it's about a mile away, equally convenient to the same highways and all, a dead-end street just like the current one. And, the price on it was recently dropped to something within our range - the silver lining to the current troubles in the real estate market. So we've made an offer, and are waiting to hear. As soon as we hear that they've definitely accepted our offer, I'll do pictures and stuff. The goal would be to settle/close around mid-May.

Thursday was sax lesson. And today was doctors' appointments - getting some forms signed by my cardiologist, and getting my quarterly device check; the pacemaker is still working, and the defibrillator's batteries are still hale and hearty.

I want to say more about the house but I have a bit of totally irrational superstition about jinxing it in my head.

So, Cindy got here yesterday evening, with her cats, and they are settled into our basement. She's got 4 job interviews already set up for the next couple of weeks, so I'm confident that she'll find a job and her own apartment quickly. Which is good, because there's already stuff turning up not-where-I-left-it, which would be likely to drive me to outright anger after too long. (As in, dish soap. Have to hunt all over kitchen counter for dish soap - not returned to the spot it was initially picked up at. Coffee mugs getting hung up backward. Cans of stuff on the bottle shelf of the fridge and vice versa. Little things that add up to stress.)

Other than that, things are quiet. Rode over to CCBC Essex this morning to help the Balto. Symphonic Band librarian put music in folders for Tuesday's 1st rehearsal of the season. I'll always volunteer for stuff that I can do sitting down in air conditioned comfort; by volunteering for it *rapidly* and before even being asked, I get all kinds of good karma that helps make up for the fact that I'm a fairly mediocre musician. On the ride over there, saw a serious accident on the other side of the highway - rental truck, the 24-foot moving van kind, turned over completely on its side, the driver's side, on the roadway (not on a shoulder or the landscaping past the shoulder). There were ambulances there, but they weren't in any hurry; I suspect that's one of the Labor Day weekend statistics. First of the month, beginning of the school year - lots of people who aren't that experienced in driving are renting large vehicles and taking them out on the highways. Of course, my Biker Skum friends up in Boston are undoubtedly seeing even more of that than I am; I remember what September 1 was like in Boston, with the entire damn city playing Musical U-Hauls. Well, anyway, it was lovely riding weather. And the bike got 65 mpg this tank of gas - not the astonishing 75 mpg of one tank earlier this year - still don't know how that happened - but nonetheless lots better than the 50 mpg or so that one normally expects from this size engine.

I am working on another, more elaborate, P. motoro stingray. Which will be for me. Speaking of stingrays, if some of you are insane enough to actually WANT one, don't forget that I need your address; there's an email link over there on the right-hand side of my journal. (Hey, beckerbuns claims to actually LIKE hers!) Your stingray will be chosen at random, most probably polka-dot or blue-spotted ribbontail, since that's what I'm making mostly.

Quick notes: I haven't had time to read my flist for the past three days; if you've had momentous news and I've failed to comment on it, please forgive me; I'll try to catch up later, but we didn't bring our own computer and don't want to hog our friends', so I'm not reading everything.
We've seen Liz and Joe already, and we went to the rehearsal tonight of our former band. There is a tornado warning in effect, and a forecast of 3-inch hail. I didn't really MISS weather reports like that, you know.
Our rental car is an incredibly bright red; our friends Larry and Jeanne from the band have nicknamed it the Tomato Express.
Rob, you'll be glad to hear that practically everybody here is wearing flip-flops; we noticed that almost the instant we got off the airplane. (I will get around to offering my congratulations to landley and fadethecat later, I promise. Sorry we had to miss the wedding!)
Wednesday will be a visit with squirrel_magnet's dad, among other things, as well as squirrel_magnet's birthday. Happy birthday, you!

Saturday was the Navy Band Saxophone Symposium, down at George Mason U in Fairfax. (Well, it started Friday evening, but we had those symphony tickets. Incidentally, the Baltimore Sun's reviewer pretty much agreed straight down the line with my opinions on that concert.) So down we headed to Fairfax, halfway around the nest of evil that is the DC Beltway.

Community saxophone choir rehearsal: the usual bunch of high school kids who think they're hot sh!t, attacking all notes and blithely disregarding all accidentals. But some fun stuff to play, several arrangements by the guy who was conducting the session, Rob Holmes, who plays bari sax, amongst other things, in the Navy Commodores, the jazz band. Since the saxophone is the saxophone, the whole symposium is tilted more toward jazz than toward classical/concert band.

Vendors' room: not enough vendors. But I did grab a moment to speak to the guys from L&L about test-driving some soprano saxes on Wednesday afternoon. The Baltimore SB is doing de Meij's "Lord of the Rings" this spring, and the soprano sax solo is mine if I can do it.

Interservice Saxophone Ensemble: great group, great stuff. A bass sax player, who is also an arranger; they did one of his arrangments which was called "Nick at Night" and was a medley of every corny sixties cartoon and comedy show that's now in eternal syndication. Of course he wrote some great bass sax lines into it!

Whine: next recital we wanted to attend was the Marine Band Sax Quartet; two faults with that: (1) It was in another building, way uphill from the main building, and (2) they played Albright's "Fantasy Etudes." Is there some rule that says someone has to play the Fantasy Etudes every year? I didn't like that piece 10 years ago, I didn't like it last year, and I still don't like it. It consists mainly of "sound effects" rather than music, and just because something can be done on a saxophone doesn't mean it should be done. (Words to live by for many disciplines, including HTML.) Anyway, that said, they certainly did it very well.

The next thing we wanted to go to was cancelled, so it was over to the Thai restaurant across the street for a snack. We seem to wind up there every time we're in Fairfax.

The Community Sax Choir performed in the lobby before the big Commodores concert. It went OK, for something that had had 25 minutes prior rehearsal, had several people who weren't at rehearsal show up and sight read, and about half the people who had been at rehearsal didn't show up. We had fun, anyway, and the audience applauded.

The Commodores concert was fantastic. The guest soloist was Chris Potter, who has an awful lot of awfully good notes stuffed in that horn! He plays tenor sax. My favorite was his composition "Ruminations." He was dressed in "musician casual" which means "whatever you were hanging out in, with a sports coat thrown over it," in this case an untucked shirt, worn jeans, and scuffed boots. I suppose someone that good gets to wear whatever he wants. I really admired the way he could change the tone without changing mouthpieces or even reeds. Plus, did I mention, a whole lotta notes?

A good time was had by all, and we stopped at the Silver Diner for pot pie on the way home. Sunday, we go right back down there for an entirely separate Marine Band concert, and then we're stopping by my brother G's house which is not too far off our route home.

ETA ( pictures of the community saxophone choir )