Just got back from the last LPGA 2300˚ event at the Corning Museum of Glass. They must have had 4000 people there...two bands with the big draw being a fab jazz group "Room Full of Blues". The Voices show was open as was retail with people eating, drinking, dancing and shopping. Ran into some friends who had lost their positions and were interested in talking about the new paths they are on. I know this--that when you are walking in the forest, you need to see the sun occasionally to know that there is a world out there with interested people there to support you. I know that these friends are feeling lonely--so I hope I was helpful and encouraging in their new, unplanned trip.
Kitty and I trolled retail--catching up with some of the folks we know that work there. I bought a green beaded necklace. Kitty bought a bejeweled "Hello Kitty" style bauble. There were loads of temptations the foremost being the shoes with toes that turn up totally covered in beads and sequins. Apple green and magenta, gold and ruby, all opal-ie white or tones of black and brown. This sort of glamor for a pittance, $19.95. But somehow we just couldnt rationalize this wonder.
My tree peony burst it's garlic headed sized blossom...thus the picture. We are getting into lilac and peony season. The iris by the house (clear yellow and some that are purple...more the tailored siberian style versus the frill) are opening with their sharp spikes. The hosta have totally doubled in size...so there may be a bit of moving with them. Monarda, otherwise known as Bee Balm, the source of beramot (the zing that makes Earl Grey tea--Earl Grey), is a plant our dear deer detest. They are flourishing. And our fringe tree keeps living despite the woodpeckers who peck away the paint we seal the wood with. I sent some of the teens outside with clippers to start pruning the brown hanging branches/ dead and not additive. So, things are looking cleaner, and more taken care of.
I have my thesis paper out to be edited with a real live editor. Man, Why didnt I learn about this earlier? Peter Hoover is a new friend and a Trumansburg Rennaissance man. He is at this iteration in his career, a retiring editor (from Big Red). He has asked me wonderful, and insightful questions. He has put his eye on the flow and format--and I know that the time spent with him will take my ramblings to a whole other place. Learn about Peter's interest in music>>--Here's an excerpt from John Hoffman's remarkable writing about Peter's field recordings...
It was the summer of 1959 and a young Peter Hoover, having flunked out of Harvard the summer before, was volunteering at the Library of Congress, transcribing inventory information of aluminum disc recordings made in 1937 of Crockett Ward’s Bog Trotters, from Ballard Branch, Virginia (the original Bog Trotters, consisting of Davey Crockett Ward and his neighbor Alec Dunford on fiddles, Fields Ward, Crockett's son, playing guitar and singing, and Crockett's brother Wade Ward often playing the banjo). . Not bad work if you can get it. It seems the young Mr. Hoover had gotten interested in the traditional music of the southern Appalachian Mountain region over the past couple of years and he was driven to immerse himself in all aspects of this musical genre. In between working as a janitor at a local private school to pay the rent, the 20-year old was hanging around the archive listening to numerous field recordings and engaging in conversations about the music with the director, Rae Korson. Peter was spending the summer developing a list of favorite old-time music performers as he hatched a plan that would take him on a journey throughout the southern Appalachia region in search of these old-time musicians. Not long after, in the fall of ’59, Peter drove out of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania having borrowed his parents 1955 Rambler sedan, his Revere recorder in tow, heading straight for Hillsville, Virginia and the homes of Glen Smith, Wade Ward, and Charlie Higgins. Over the course of the next five years, Peter would make these summer journeys an annual affair. During this time, Peter recorded musicians in Virginia, West Virginia, North Carolina, Tennessee, Georgia, Kentucky, Pennsylvania, and Maryland. After five years, Peter had recorded more than sixty players and singers, all documented on fifty reel-to-reel recordings, copies of which are now deposited in the Library of Congress and the Archives of Traditional Music at Indiana University in Bloomington.
And this is just the beginning with Peter. I am sure you are going to hear more about him as we go further. He is an inspiration to me...and we have many common interests and old friends (and for me mentors). Lets just say...he has his fingers in many pies...and now he has his big brain, sharp pencil, gentle persona and generous spirit touching my paper. How lucky am I?
Work awaits. We have 50 high schoolers coming for an evening party. Its a purchased party...meaning we are having subs, chips, strawberries, little chocolates and drinks. There will be frisbees and water pistols--music and dancing...and then it will conclude. I have the compostable paper plates and cups and forks/spoons. Alex is making plans for a party for the "distance runners" and others to cook sausages and "hang". Sounds great he is putting this forth because now we can act on it.
Weekend is pretty open. I hope to touch up the thesis drawings. The big output is coming early next week...and I will decide at that point to print them on my printer with 3 centerpiece biggies (and frame them with an off the shelf frame with acrylic from Dick Blick or output stretched in a smaller size). I am looking forward to a bit of peace.
Queen ensconced, Q. Cassetti, 2010, pen and inkRobbing the Bees by Holley Bailey introduces the concept of Bees as munitions which is very exciting and thought provoking. Apparently, in the times of Charlemagne and forward--the soldiers had small vessels (clay, straw etc) filled with colonies of bees. These babies were launched and you can imagine the results. Skeps were catapulted ...swarms of pissed off, stinging insects projected at one's enemy. Simple, and yet so perfect. She does go on to talk about bees (the nice and friendly Italian ones) as only stinging unless provoked (being catapulted might do just that) and that being stung to death or even dying of a bee sting (even with those who need an epipen) is an insignificant number even lower than being struck by lightening. However, with the progression of the Africanized bees, "the killer bee" (an invasive and very surly breed), they will sting unprovoked as well as swarms will move in to kill.
