What a weekend

I am addicted to "Random Spirit Lover," the sophomore album from
Sunset Rubdown. I listened to the first four tracks like 20 times
while driving this weekend.

And what a lot of driving I did, all short trips of course. The big
event was my friend Topher's birthday at Boom Noodle on Capitol Hill
Saturday night. This is my fave photo from that evening, of Jon and
Maria. I like the body language.

I spent the bulk of Saturday finishing a song. I also practiced
guitar, which I'm finding quite enjoyable. I haven't even plugged it in!

I sent email tonight to the three wind players I've recruited for my
rescored version of "Slow Poison." I find that my mind still drifts to
Dream a lot, not surprising when it comes to this project, but perhaps
more surprising when it comes to listening to other music. The first
Sunset Rubdown album I burned for Dream to listen to last fall, only
to learn that he already had it. The new one is the sort of brilliant,
manic record that I felt I could really connect with Dream on. I felt
pangs of sadness many times this weekend knowing that I'd never be
able to talk to him about this album.

Gardening

I asked one of the landscape workers what was going to replace all of the plants that are being ripped out in front of UWMC. He didn't know: "That's up to the landscape architect." What power! I wish I had an army to redo my garden whenever I had a whim. Though I'm told that the plant scheme here has been the same for at least 20 years.

I stopped here on my way to a class on effective presentations. I know that I could use some help in this area. One of our exercises was to rewrite an introduction to give it more punch. This is what I wrote:

Here's a fact you may not know: The largest manufacturer of baby carriages in the U.S. is not Scwinn, Tonka or GM. It's Anheiser Busch. So perhaps it's not surprising that kids are abusing alcohol at younger and younger ages.

Georgetown Super 8

Tonight was the third(?) annual Georgetown Super 8 Film Fest. I think
around 500 people showed up; an overflow crowd.

The flicks were very hit or miss, as one would expect. Too many
cameras jerkily moving through the neighborhood for no particular
reason. But the interview with the veteran whom everyone knows as that
old guy who takes a walk every day was touching.

I skipped out at intermission to grab a Manny's and a Gringa at Smarty
Pants. Some loud, rather drunken party was going on there.

Unhappy dogwood :(

I began today doing chores and running errands. This included a stop
at Swanson's to ask for advice about what to do with my Cornus kousa
which, as you can see, is not doing well. Its bark is covered in white
spots, and it leafs out less and less each year. Last year it produced
almost no blossoms, and this year seems likely to be even worse. "Why
did I buy a supposedly disease-resistant dogwood when this one is
clearly dying?" I wondered.

About ready to chop the thing down, I decided to take photos of the
poor patient to Swanson's where, to my surprise, they diagnosed the
problem as simple underwatering. "These trees are not drought tolerate
AT ALL," Brenda firmly (but politely) informed me. I asked her if deep
watering twice a week - her recommended regimen - would bring it back.
"Not this year," she replied. "It's very stressed."

I hope a year of proper watering will produce a different result. I'll
put it in my calendar to take the same photo a year from today.

Book club

We were lucky enough to have scheduled book club on Saturday, which
turned out to be the nicest day of the year so far. The book, for
those of you keeping score, was "The Gathering," by Anne Enright.
Beautiful but sad.

Also beautiful, not sad, is book club member Julie. Here she is
studying Kirsten's back yard. And for the benefit of the pregnancy
fascists, yes, that is water in her wine glass.

Blossoms everywhere

I took this one of pear? cherry? trees in full bloom outside UWMC.
Some of these damn trees are giving me terrible allergies, but I love
them anyway.

I wish I had three hours off every day!

I had to leave work for awhile today to have my water heater replaced. Since they always give you a two- to three-hour window, I took advantage of the opportunity to clean up the basement a bit (at least enough for the guy from Benla to get my water heater out!) and pull some dandelions.

I also did some Internet browsing and ran across the review I wrote of Sketchingham, which I saw two weekends ago when I drove north to perform with RCB. 

Here's my new water heater, which I should have had put in awhile ago . . .

Obama vs. Entitlement

The time it took me to compose this photo of the signs outside the
43rd District precinct caucuses was unfortunately the best time I had
at that event. Well, that and the hot dog I bought from the cart out
front. I can't imagine going through this torture again, not even for
my man Obama. Nothing but a lot of irritating, entitled white folks
asking stupid questions and making boring speeches. Granted, I did
leave before 1pm, before the election of delegates to the next level.
I just could not take one more minute. Plus I had an RCB concert in
Bellingham.

Ants on the move

Swarming ants were an endless sorce of fascination when I was a kid.
I'm still mildly fascinated. Yesterday the ants in front of my house
were going frigging nuts, presumably preparing for the apocalypse.

Apologies for bad photography

but I had to put up something when I saw this guy driving the 44
yesterday. Like all of the other passengers who boarded after me, I
just smiled politely and didn't say anything to acknowledge his crown
when I boarded. And as I was sitting, chastising myself and Seattle
for being too cool to say some word of encouragement for this guy's snappy headgear choice, I thought damnit, I'm going to take this guy's photo and ask him his story.

So I didn't get a great picture obviously, but I did find out that it was not his birthday. Rather, he said he wears it as part of a group of drivers who wanted to reduce or mitigate complaints against them as Metro drivers. This guy hasn't had a complaint filed against him in 38(?) years of driving for Metro.

Busy weekend

I have all of these photos I took of RCB's "Renegayde Pep Band" when
we played impropmptu at various Broadway locales on Saturday. I would
not have participated if I'd realized how cold it was outside, but I'm
glad I took part. There's not enough impromptu anything in Seattle.
And how else are homeless guys in wheelchairs going to hear a gay pep
band?

This is Brandon in the foreground, by the way. He's a major
cornerstone of RCB and a heckuva nice guy.

Lost post

I wrote a few paragraphs about dosas at Malabar and how Paul Constant
at The Stranger beat me to the punch in blogging about what he read
during, and where he ate, lunch. But my post disappeared before it
could reach blog status. One thing I didn't mention in that lost post
- the owner tells me that the secret to the great dosa taste is using
mustard seed oil in the potatoes.