This Xmas audio treat, Bob Dylan's It Must be Santa, is only a year old. Not all 30 or so will be moldy oldies from a middle-aged guy's sepia colored youth. At least one is a newer one by a senior citizen. So we got that going for us.
Bob Dylan is the eternal enigma. Even the biggest Dylan fan will admit that Bob has dropped some real clunkers. But now and again Bob will pull out yet another masterpiece. When it was announced Bob would be releasing an Xmas album, there was very good cause to expect it to fall into the clunker category. Being Dylan fan, I was cautiously optimistic.
This song and video are the very definition of masterful. After 50 years of doing this stuff, Bob knocks it out of the park. I dare you not to smile repeatedly while listening to this song and/or watching the video. Even Dylan haters love it.
Back to Bob's Xmas album, it's a mixed bag. Right this second, I'm listening to Hark the Herald Angels Sing and it's pretty painful. I'll be Home for Christmas has started off bad but Bob is finding a sort of Louis Armstrong thing in his voice and it has gotten more interesting. The Little Drummer Boy is a pretty basic version in a light traditional Dylan sauce that works very well. Earlier in the album, I really liked Do You Hear What I Hear, which is one my favorite carols (and one I didn't yet have a version of in my collection of several hundred Xmas songs). Bob does it justice. There's more to that album, but
I'm done writing.
Sunday, November 28, 2010
Saturday, November 27, 2010
30 or so Songs of Xmas # 02
I'm blogging one my favorite Xmas songs every day until New Years.
Today's song is Carol of the Bells, a techno version by DJ Demonixxx.
Back in the old days of widespread dial-up Internet, the early 2000s, there was a certain file sharing service. I'm usually a first mover on new technology, but I poo-poo'ed Napster when it came out. Why would I want to listen to music on my computer? My computer was slow and buggy enough without trying run music in the background. My stereo with multi-disk CD player was in the same room and always on anyway. A few computers and kick-ass speaker computer system later, I now pretty much only listen to music through my computer.
When a non-techy 21 year old talked Napster up, I finally decided to check it out. Since most folks still used dial-up, the selection was mostly single songs rather than whole albums. Searching for Christmas music, I found this gem. That service made collecting music much easier. It was great for obtaining stuff you knew was out there but not commercially available. Due to the limitations of dial-up, buying music on CD when possible remained the easier and better option.
I tried finding other DJ Demoixx stuff a few years ago, and couldn't, leading me to think it was a one-off, long forgotten thing. So I was very pleasantly surprised to find this song on YouTube this morning. I probably had been searching for Demoixxx with a third x. Google search is smart enough to search on what I want rather than what I type; that's probably a good thing. Turns out DJ Demonixx is still around, living in New Orleans. And Demonixx with two x's is much cooler than with three.
Today's song is Carol of the Bells, a techno version by DJ Demonixxx.
Back in the old days of widespread dial-up Internet, the early 2000s, there was a certain file sharing service. I'm usually a first mover on new technology, but I poo-poo'ed Napster when it came out. Why would I want to listen to music on my computer? My computer was slow and buggy enough without trying run music in the background. My stereo with multi-disk CD player was in the same room and always on anyway. A few computers and kick-ass speaker computer system later, I now pretty much only listen to music through my computer.
When a non-techy 21 year old talked Napster up, I finally decided to check it out. Since most folks still used dial-up, the selection was mostly single songs rather than whole albums. Searching for Christmas music, I found this gem. That service made collecting music much easier. It was great for obtaining stuff you knew was out there but not commercially available. Due to the limitations of dial-up, buying music on CD when possible remained the easier and better option.
I tried finding other DJ Demoixx stuff a few years ago, and couldn't, leading me to think it was a one-off, long forgotten thing. So I was very pleasantly surprised to find this song on YouTube this morning. I probably had been searching for Demoixxx with a third x. Google search is smart enough to search on what I want rather than what I type; that's probably a good thing. Turns out DJ Demonixx is still around, living in New Orleans. And Demonixx with two x's is much cooler than with three.
Friday, November 26, 2010
30 or so Songs of Xmas # 01
It's the day after Thanksgiving, so it's time to start cranking out my collection of Christmas Music.
Back in the day, the early 80s, Christmas rock music was hard to come by. There wasn't much of it, and what there was wasn't available in stores. You would have to wait until an Xmas song you wanted came on the radio and you had to have your cassette recorder ready to tape. Jeez talk about primitive. Music collecting back then really was about the hunt. And the good thing about music collecting is that you can listen to it, rather that just have a useless possession.
By the 90s, some Xmas songs wound up on singles or on greatest hits albums. So you actually could possess the music, but playing it around the holiday was extremely laborious.
How it's the 21st century and I have 100s of Xmas songs on my hard drive. All in the same folder. No labor at all to play them.
I'll post one my favorite Xmas songs every day until New Years. Hopefully I can find each on YouTube, which would take care of any copywrong issues.
My first pick is Sting's version of I Saw Three Ships.
Sting has his share of duds as a solo artist; this sure ain't one of them. I really,really love this song, especially the percussion. The whole sound is really different. Caribbean maybe?
I really like this song despite its seemingly stupid lyrics. There were several YouTubes of this song. I picked one with lyrics (which don't seem to match up 100%, but it's good enough for our purposes here, already created, and free).
Three ships? I guess that's a reference to the holy trinity, but that seems to be stretching it. It could be a reference to the three magi, but they didn't travel with Jesus, they traveled to him. So pretty much the title and overall theme are questionable.
And then there is the line featuring "The savior Christ and his lady". Jesus never married, so who is his lady? I guess that would have to be Mary, but when is your mother ever called "your lady"?
Think about that if you wish, but enjoy the song either way. I do.
Back in the day, the early 80s, Christmas rock music was hard to come by. There wasn't much of it, and what there was wasn't available in stores. You would have to wait until an Xmas song you wanted came on the radio and you had to have your cassette recorder ready to tape. Jeez talk about primitive. Music collecting back then really was about the hunt. And the good thing about music collecting is that you can listen to it, rather that just have a useless possession.
By the 90s, some Xmas songs wound up on singles or on greatest hits albums. So you actually could possess the music, but playing it around the holiday was extremely laborious.
How it's the 21st century and I have 100s of Xmas songs on my hard drive. All in the same folder. No labor at all to play them.
I'll post one my favorite Xmas songs every day until New Years. Hopefully I can find each on YouTube, which would take care of any copywrong issues.
My first pick is Sting's version of I Saw Three Ships.
Sting has his share of duds as a solo artist; this sure ain't one of them. I really,really love this song, especially the percussion. The whole sound is really different. Caribbean maybe?
I really like this song despite its seemingly stupid lyrics. There were several YouTubes of this song. I picked one with lyrics (which don't seem to match up 100%, but it's good enough for our purposes here, already created, and free).
Three ships? I guess that's a reference to the holy trinity, but that seems to be stretching it. It could be a reference to the three magi, but they didn't travel with Jesus, they traveled to him. So pretty much the title and overall theme are questionable.
And then there is the line featuring "The savior Christ and his lady". Jesus never married, so who is his lady? I guess that would have to be Mary, but when is your mother ever called "your lady"?
Think about that if you wish, but enjoy the song either way. I do.
Monday, November 1, 2010
iPad Will Not Save Struggling Media Companies
I just read an RSS item about a Hip Hop magazine that had stopped publishing a while back, due to publishing costs and decreased advertising, was returning as an iPad store item. It's surprising that so many people still don't get it. Magazines were very essential at one time, but now with a practically infinite number of Websites available 24/7 and updated all the time, there is NO NEED FOR MAGAZINES.
It was like we were starved for information and we had to wait for the regular (weekly or monthly) meal. Now that we can eat whenever we want until we are stuffed, so who needs (or wants) the big meal?
I may be an old foagie but after checking RSS feeds and numerous Websites everyday, the last thing I want to pick up is a magazine or newspaper. I'm full. Plus I have already read or will read the content of the newspaper or magazine on line anyway.
It was like we were starved for information and we had to wait for the regular (weekly or monthly) meal. Now that we can eat whenever we want until we are stuffed, so who needs (or wants) the big meal?
I may be an old foagie but after checking RSS feeds and numerous Websites everyday, the last thing I want to pick up is a magazine or newspaper. I'm full. Plus I have already read or will read the content of the newspaper or magazine on line anyway.
Saturday, October 2, 2010
Reading the Dame Part 2B: The second half of the 1930s
Reading the Dame Part 2B: The second half of the 1930s
When I first starting writing this it had been about 3 months since I last updated my Agatha Christie project progress. Reading the notes I've been taking on each book, Murder in Three Acts seems such a long time ago.
Last night I walking to a couple from Baltimore who were up at the Grey Lodge for an Authors A'Plenty event. They actually think me doing this is cool (cheers to them for having such a broad interpretation of cool). While mentioning I had read a lot of those Christie books as a youth and was now rereading them as an adult, and the differences between reading them in the 1980s and reading them in 2010 (such as being able to find out what a Continental Baldwin is), I also realized that I have doing this project for a year now. When I mentioned using my buddy's laptop to Google Streetview the address of a then chain coffee shop and finding that the coffee shop is still there. I had a clear memory of sitting on that sofa in Ocean City Maryland reading The Secret Adversary, and thinking I wonder if that coffee shop is still there. And being 2009, I had the tools at my disposal.
So I have read 32 Agatha Christie books in about 12 months. At that rate, I should be done this project (and able to read other fiction) sometime in late fall of 2012.
The latter half of the 30s features two Christie most famous books Death on the Nile and Ten Little Indians/And Then There Were None. She is in her late 40s here and really in her prime.
(1935) Murder in Three Acts
Ah, one I haven't read before. Satterthwaitte reappears, as does Hercule Poirot.
One of the lead characters, Sir Charles, a retired actor (of the stage), is a quite well fleshed out as a character.
We finally got a tiny bit of backstory on Poirot who tells Satterthwaite that we was born into a large poor family and had to make his own way in the world. He entered the police force and worked his way up, gained some renown, and finally retired. The war happened, he was injured (I suppose as a citizen not as a soldier) and then left Belgium for refuge in England (which was the set-up for the Mysterious Affair at Styles, Christie's first book. He solves the rich woman's murder and then becomes a celebrated and highly paid personal detective for rich people. He has now made his fortune. Still no mention of any wife or children.
I was actually getting jaded of the project before reading this book, but it, and the ones after, have been so good, I'm back fully committed. In her mid 40s, Christie is really firing on a cylinders. She has also improved greatly as a writer.
(1935) Death in the Clouds
Wow another one I haven't read before. Planes, still a novelty, were featured in two other Christie books so far. P and H take one to France in The Big Four. The salary man looking for adventure takes on in Mr. Paker Pyne, Detective. A good mystery involving a blow pipe, which comes back to haunt her. She really didn't research how large a blow pipe is, and how impractical it would be to have one on a plane.
One of the characters takes something called a Continental Baldwin out of his suitcase. 20 years ago, just what a Continental Baldwin was would have been a mystery. Was it a fancy pen? A portable typewriter? Or something else entirely? Even reading the whole book gives no context cues. Now thanks to Google, I know it is or was a schedule for trains in continental Europe. That's something even if you had a whole library at your disposal 20 years ago that you would unlikely be able to discover. Though I guess since it was a book, it might, might have been the card catalog.
(1935) The ABC Murders
Hastings and Poirot are back again. This time though Hastings explains that he was in England to personally look after some business for six months due to the bad economy while his wife remained in Argentina looking after the ranch. Poirot has moved from the Sherlock Holmes style rooms at a lodging house to a modern apartment building. Poirot seems to allow Hastings to stay there. Hastings remains pretty much an idiot. It still remains unclear why Poirot and Hastings are friends.
I have a memory of reading this as a teenager at the swim club during summer vacation. It was bit fantastical, but I seemed to have liked that as teenager.It's still rather fantastical, but I like that less now that I'm older. Still a good read, and rather well plotted, but a little far fetched. Like The Big Four (1924), I liked this one way more the first time around.
Christie was really cranking on cylinders at this point. Plots are solid, characters are well made.
(1936) Murder in Mesopotamia
This one is set before Murder on the Orient Express, explaining Poirot's presence in that part of the world. This is a good one utilizing Christie's trips to archaeological digs in Iraq. It was one of these trips that she met her second husband, Max. The characters are well crafted.
(1936) Cards on the Table
In this book, a rich weird-o invites four detectives and four killers to a bridge party. Unknowing to them, he "collects" killers. He invites the detectives to appreciate his collection. He winds up dead during the party. The detectives are Poirot, Colonel Race (making another appearance after a decade), Superintendent Battle (a bit character in loads of Christie books both with and without Poirot), and Ariadne Oliver, a female mystery writer who is based on Christie herself. It's a good read.
(1937) Poirot Loses a Client
I don't recall reading this one before. Great premise: a letter gets mailed to Poirot months after the writer has died. Was the writer paranoid or was she murdered? Great mix of characters and a somewhat complicated but believable plot. Hastings is back. He seems to have moved back to England permanently and has his own place and owns a car. His wife isn't mentioned.
(1937) Murder in the Mews
Another that I hadn't read before. I have learned that a mews is a street of stables. One of the row was converted to a residence (cars are displacing horses rapidly here) and the occupant is found murdered. Poirot winds up being involved.
(1937) Death on the Nile
I saw the movie in the theater way back in the day but never read the book. The copy I have is a slightly fancy paperback, but normal shape, not the oversized version, with lots of empty pages to make it look classier. It even has a forward by Christie where she says the book is one of her favorites.
It's a great book. Well drawn characters, great motivations for the characters, and a great plot. Colonel Race is back as well as Poroit. The movie made me want to take a cruise down the Nile some day. The book still makes me want to.
(1938) Appointment with Death
A week before reading the book, Maureen and I watched this on Masterpiece Mystery. For some reason Masterpiece/BBC usually radically rewrites the plot when converting a Agatha Christie book to a movie. Not merely combining characters to make a novel fit into a 90 minute film, they go as far as to switch detectives, change eras, switch murderers, or keep the murderer and switch motives. I don't get why they would do such a thing. On the plus side, it means that any I've watched on TV won't ruin the book for me since they are so radically different.
The book takes place somewhere in the Middle East, a day or two's drive out of Jerusalem. I imagine there are highways now and it's much quicker to get this impressive place.
(1938) A Holiday for Murder aka Murder for Christmas
I read this one during the 1993 Xmas holidays, which seems appropriate back then. I was working the cubical job and had 5 years in by that time, which meant 3 weeks of vacation per year. If you took 4 days off between Xmas and New Years, with 1/2 days, holidays and 4 weekend days, you could be out of the office for almost two weeks. Nearly two long, wonderful, amazing weeks, spent mostly at home. It was a great time to start and finish a novel. One bad thing about working for yourself, you don't get almost 2 weeks of no responsibilities. I do get a little time most days to sit and read in my garden though, so as with most things, it's a trade off.
The book still had/has a holiday greeting to riders from SEPTA. I left it in there as a time capsule. I remembered the story, but not the ending. The ending was a mild surprise to me, but it seemed very fair that I could have guessed it.
(1939) Easy to Kill aka Murder is Easy
I read this one before. Christie takes a break from Poirot here. Christie in prior books, as fictional mystery novelist Mrs. Oliver, complains about her foreign detective. She was also known to mention dislike him in interviews. Strange should she should have written so many Poirot books in a row if she disliked him that much. The one features a middle-aged former policeman who has retired and returned to England after years in the Malay Straights. This is another really solid one. Clues to the murder are well placed but not too obvious. Well paced.
(1939) Ten Little Indians aka And Then There Were None
Another break from Poirot. I remember reading this one for high school English class. It was one of the few books I actually read for that class, yet somehow I passed all the test and the class. The others I bluffed/guessed my way through the tests. It was a quick fun read back then. It still is.
(1939) The Regatta Mystery and Other Stories
Back in the day writers could make a good buck writing short stories. This is a collection I assume of previously published short stories featuring Poirot, Parker Pine and Marple. Good stuff, a quick read. One of the rare ones I hadn't read before.
Sorry that this was pretty dry post.
When I first starting writing this it had been about 3 months since I last updated my Agatha Christie project progress. Reading the notes I've been taking on each book, Murder in Three Acts seems such a long time ago.
Last night I walking to a couple from Baltimore who were up at the Grey Lodge for an Authors A'Plenty event. They actually think me doing this is cool (cheers to them for having such a broad interpretation of cool). While mentioning I had read a lot of those Christie books as a youth and was now rereading them as an adult, and the differences between reading them in the 1980s and reading them in 2010 (such as being able to find out what a Continental Baldwin is), I also realized that I have doing this project for a year now. When I mentioned using my buddy's laptop to Google Streetview the address of a then chain coffee shop and finding that the coffee shop is still there. I had a clear memory of sitting on that sofa in Ocean City Maryland reading The Secret Adversary, and thinking I wonder if that coffee shop is still there. And being 2009, I had the tools at my disposal.
So I have read 32 Agatha Christie books in about 12 months. At that rate, I should be done this project (and able to read other fiction) sometime in late fall of 2012.
The latter half of the 30s features two Christie most famous books Death on the Nile and Ten Little Indians/And Then There Were None. She is in her late 40s here and really in her prime.
(1935) Murder in Three Acts
Ah, one I haven't read before. Satterthwaitte reappears, as does Hercule Poirot.
One of the lead characters, Sir Charles, a retired actor (of the stage), is a quite well fleshed out as a character.
We finally got a tiny bit of backstory on Poirot who tells Satterthwaite that we was born into a large poor family and had to make his own way in the world. He entered the police force and worked his way up, gained some renown, and finally retired. The war happened, he was injured (I suppose as a citizen not as a soldier) and then left Belgium for refuge in England (which was the set-up for the Mysterious Affair at Styles, Christie's first book. He solves the rich woman's murder and then becomes a celebrated and highly paid personal detective for rich people. He has now made his fortune. Still no mention of any wife or children.
I was actually getting jaded of the project before reading this book, but it, and the ones after, have been so good, I'm back fully committed. In her mid 40s, Christie is really firing on a cylinders. She has also improved greatly as a writer.
(1935) Death in the Clouds
Wow another one I haven't read before. Planes, still a novelty, were featured in two other Christie books so far. P and H take one to France in The Big Four. The salary man looking for adventure takes on in Mr. Paker Pyne, Detective. A good mystery involving a blow pipe, which comes back to haunt her. She really didn't research how large a blow pipe is, and how impractical it would be to have one on a plane.
One of the characters takes something called a Continental Baldwin out of his suitcase. 20 years ago, just what a Continental Baldwin was would have been a mystery. Was it a fancy pen? A portable typewriter? Or something else entirely? Even reading the whole book gives no context cues. Now thanks to Google, I know it is or was a schedule for trains in continental Europe. That's something even if you had a whole library at your disposal 20 years ago that you would unlikely be able to discover. Though I guess since it was a book, it might, might have been the card catalog.
(1935) The ABC Murders
Hastings and Poirot are back again. This time though Hastings explains that he was in England to personally look after some business for six months due to the bad economy while his wife remained in Argentina looking after the ranch. Poirot has moved from the Sherlock Holmes style rooms at a lodging house to a modern apartment building. Poirot seems to allow Hastings to stay there. Hastings remains pretty much an idiot. It still remains unclear why Poirot and Hastings are friends.
I have a memory of reading this as a teenager at the swim club during summer vacation. It was bit fantastical, but I seemed to have liked that as teenager.It's still rather fantastical, but I like that less now that I'm older. Still a good read, and rather well plotted, but a little far fetched. Like The Big Four (1924), I liked this one way more the first time around.
Christie was really cranking on cylinders at this point. Plots are solid, characters are well made.
(1936) Murder in Mesopotamia
This one is set before Murder on the Orient Express, explaining Poirot's presence in that part of the world. This is a good one utilizing Christie's trips to archaeological digs in Iraq. It was one of these trips that she met her second husband, Max. The characters are well crafted.
(1936) Cards on the Table
In this book, a rich weird-o invites four detectives and four killers to a bridge party. Unknowing to them, he "collects" killers. He invites the detectives to appreciate his collection. He winds up dead during the party. The detectives are Poirot, Colonel Race (making another appearance after a decade), Superintendent Battle (a bit character in loads of Christie books both with and without Poirot), and Ariadne Oliver, a female mystery writer who is based on Christie herself. It's a good read.
(1937) Poirot Loses a Client
I don't recall reading this one before. Great premise: a letter gets mailed to Poirot months after the writer has died. Was the writer paranoid or was she murdered? Great mix of characters and a somewhat complicated but believable plot. Hastings is back. He seems to have moved back to England permanently and has his own place and owns a car. His wife isn't mentioned.
(1937) Murder in the Mews
Another that I hadn't read before. I have learned that a mews is a street of stables. One of the row was converted to a residence (cars are displacing horses rapidly here) and the occupant is found murdered. Poirot winds up being involved.
(1937) Death on the Nile
I saw the movie in the theater way back in the day but never read the book. The copy I have is a slightly fancy paperback, but normal shape, not the oversized version, with lots of empty pages to make it look classier. It even has a forward by Christie where she says the book is one of her favorites.
It's a great book. Well drawn characters, great motivations for the characters, and a great plot. Colonel Race is back as well as Poroit. The movie made me want to take a cruise down the Nile some day. The book still makes me want to.
(1938) Appointment with Death
A week before reading the book, Maureen and I watched this on Masterpiece Mystery. For some reason Masterpiece/BBC usually radically rewrites the plot when converting a Agatha Christie book to a movie. Not merely combining characters to make a novel fit into a 90 minute film, they go as far as to switch detectives, change eras, switch murderers, or keep the murderer and switch motives. I don't get why they would do such a thing. On the plus side, it means that any I've watched on TV won't ruin the book for me since they are so radically different.
The book takes place somewhere in the Middle East, a day or two's drive out of Jerusalem. I imagine there are highways now and it's much quicker to get this impressive place.
(1938) A Holiday for Murder aka Murder for Christmas
I read this one during the 1993 Xmas holidays, which seems appropriate back then. I was working the cubical job and had 5 years in by that time, which meant 3 weeks of vacation per year. If you took 4 days off between Xmas and New Years, with 1/2 days, holidays and 4 weekend days, you could be out of the office for almost two weeks. Nearly two long, wonderful, amazing weeks, spent mostly at home. It was a great time to start and finish a novel. One bad thing about working for yourself, you don't get almost 2 weeks of no responsibilities. I do get a little time most days to sit and read in my garden though, so as with most things, it's a trade off.
The book still had/has a holiday greeting to riders from SEPTA. I left it in there as a time capsule. I remembered the story, but not the ending. The ending was a mild surprise to me, but it seemed very fair that I could have guessed it.
(1939) Easy to Kill aka Murder is Easy
I read this one before. Christie takes a break from Poirot here. Christie in prior books, as fictional mystery novelist Mrs. Oliver, complains about her foreign detective. She was also known to mention dislike him in interviews. Strange should she should have written so many Poirot books in a row if she disliked him that much. The one features a middle-aged former policeman who has retired and returned to England after years in the Malay Straights. This is another really solid one. Clues to the murder are well placed but not too obvious. Well paced.
(1939) Ten Little Indians aka And Then There Were None
Another break from Poirot. I remember reading this one for high school English class. It was one of the few books I actually read for that class, yet somehow I passed all the test and the class. The others I bluffed/guessed my way through the tests. It was a quick fun read back then. It still is.
(1939) The Regatta Mystery and Other Stories
Back in the day writers could make a good buck writing short stories. This is a collection I assume of previously published short stories featuring Poirot, Parker Pine and Marple. Good stuff, a quick read. One of the rare ones I hadn't read before.
Sorry that this was pretty dry post.
Tuesday, September 28, 2010
Tuesday 10am, So Far so Good
Actually it's only 9:59am.
I got up this morning about my usual time, 6:30am. Caught up with Facebook, browsed my subscribed feeds in Google Reader, made myself a light breakfast, which I read in front of my computer while reading my daily links via the My Morning Coffee plug-in for Firefox... pretty much my usual morning. Nerdy and boring but it works for me.
I had done all that, and was presentable and out the door by 8:45am. I had an appointment at the oral surgeon for 9am. I could have drove, but I like walking, especially since the office is only a mile or so from my house. The receptionist who sat me in an examining room asked me if I had the day off. I said no, I was working a double shift. Which is true, I have today planned by the hour, sometimes by the minute up to 9pm. I have many tasks at both businesses to do plus some personal errands before that. I thought of being my own boss, I looked down at the comfortable clothing I was wearing and would be wearing all day and thought of the Beastie Boys line "the truth is I'm exactly what I want to be".
My mouth has healed well and I'm ready for a new tooth to be done by my regular dentist. Dr. Kaye's office is extremely efficient and they had me in and out in about 13 minutes. The walk home was equally as pleasant as the walk up. I really like living in a walkable neighborhood. I like the inefficiency timewise of walking and the non-hurried pace walking provides, though since it adds some exercise to my day, walking might be considered very efficient. And I even had a few minutes to sit on my front porch.
At this stage of my life, I am not really into material stuff. The less the better, but my post-Victorian house brings me a lot of pleasure. I live in an unglamorous but safe neighborhood and my house didn't set me back much. It's my middle-aged man house and being a middle aged man I really like it. It has all sorts of things I was looking for including an open front porch and a decent sized back yard for gardening
I sat on my porch for a few minutes contemplating my landscaping efforts, the very comfortable wire/resin wickerlike furniture I got a sweet deal on and was sitting upon. I contemplated that I hadn't really sat on the porch much this year, having spent lots of time out back now that my efforts have resulted in a very nice garden. I thought of the juxtaposition of my front porch on a noisy busy street and the quiet solitude of my garden out back. I remembered how much fun it was hanging on the front porch last summer with lots of friends after Tanconellis and thought we should have a porch party before the weather turns.
I contemplated the unsociable cat that has been hanging around the house for a week or two now who took way too long to notice me. He/she finally saw me, came in for a closer look and then took off. I thought on being at a stage in my life to have all that and be able to enjoy it. I thought about my wife and how I wouldn't be happy living here alone without her.
Now I'm in my home office, catching up on email, and knocking out the first draft of this blog. Next I'll work for an hour on the somewhat involved project of restoring my garage windows. Then a short nap then off to the Grey Lodge and then to Hop Angel where I have a long list of things to get done.
The truth is I'm exactly what I want to be, and where I want to be.
I got up this morning about my usual time, 6:30am. Caught up with Facebook, browsed my subscribed feeds in Google Reader, made myself a light breakfast, which I read in front of my computer while reading my daily links via the My Morning Coffee plug-in for Firefox... pretty much my usual morning. Nerdy and boring but it works for me.
I had done all that, and was presentable and out the door by 8:45am. I had an appointment at the oral surgeon for 9am. I could have drove, but I like walking, especially since the office is only a mile or so from my house. The receptionist who sat me in an examining room asked me if I had the day off. I said no, I was working a double shift. Which is true, I have today planned by the hour, sometimes by the minute up to 9pm. I have many tasks at both businesses to do plus some personal errands before that. I thought of being my own boss, I looked down at the comfortable clothing I was wearing and would be wearing all day and thought of the Beastie Boys line "the truth is I'm exactly what I want to be".
My mouth has healed well and I'm ready for a new tooth to be done by my regular dentist. Dr. Kaye's office is extremely efficient and they had me in and out in about 13 minutes. The walk home was equally as pleasant as the walk up. I really like living in a walkable neighborhood. I like the inefficiency timewise of walking and the non-hurried pace walking provides, though since it adds some exercise to my day, walking might be considered very efficient. And I even had a few minutes to sit on my front porch.
At this stage of my life, I am not really into material stuff. The less the better, but my post-Victorian house brings me a lot of pleasure. I live in an unglamorous but safe neighborhood and my house didn't set me back much. It's my middle-aged man house and being a middle aged man I really like it. It has all sorts of things I was looking for including an open front porch and a decent sized back yard for gardening
I sat on my porch for a few minutes contemplating my landscaping efforts, the very comfortable wire/resin wickerlike furniture I got a sweet deal on and was sitting upon. I contemplated that I hadn't really sat on the porch much this year, having spent lots of time out back now that my efforts have resulted in a very nice garden. I thought of the juxtaposition of my front porch on a noisy busy street and the quiet solitude of my garden out back. I remembered how much fun it was hanging on the front porch last summer with lots of friends after Tanconellis and thought we should have a porch party before the weather turns.
I contemplated the unsociable cat that has been hanging around the house for a week or two now who took way too long to notice me. He/she finally saw me, came in for a closer look and then took off. I thought on being at a stage in my life to have all that and be able to enjoy it. I thought about my wife and how I wouldn't be happy living here alone without her.
Now I'm in my home office, catching up on email, and knocking out the first draft of this blog. Next I'll work for an hour on the somewhat involved project of restoring my garage windows. Then a short nap then off to the Grey Lodge and then to Hop Angel where I have a long list of things to get done.
The truth is I'm exactly what I want to be, and where I want to be.
Saturday, August 7, 2010
Delaware River Heritage Trail
A little while back, 2008 - 2 years ago, they opened more parkland here in Northeast Philly along the Delaware River north of Rhawn Street.The first part of this park was created in the 1990s. It served to connect the Pennypack Park Bike Trail out to the river and as a large recreation area. It was mostly acres and acres of playing fields with a path along the river. It was a good place to park your car and unload your bike to for the trail. Unless you were a bike rider or had a softball or soccer game there, you probably never went there. It was nice but there wasn't much real there there.
Two years ago they opened the new part which is to be part of a trail going down the east coast of the USA. So the rail will eventually go up to Trenton and down to Wilmington and onward in both directions.
A year ago, a minor big news item was a couple of bald eagles set up a nest in the new part of the park.
Today after a lunch of Steak and Eggs with Marty and before heading up to my parents house to fix their computer and install their home theater system, I decided it was finally time to check out the new part of the park. And it was en route too.
The new part has been open for about 2 years, but for various lame reasons I didn't make it there until today.
Wow. The new part is amazing. So much untouched land. It's all wetlands and meadows, which makes for a very interesting and pleasant stroll.
It's probably about a mile from my house. I can't believe I hadn't bothered to come here before now.
I only encountered two people there. Both were middle aged. A guy sitting on a bench in a really neat grotto near the river and a middle aged guy on a bike. So there's the tie-in with the theme of this blog. It's something middle aged people like.
Northeast Philly has a reputation as an uncool and lame place to live. This miracle is right here and hardly anybody knows about it.
I won't be there daily, but I'm going to try to pop in whenever I am passing through and have some time to invest there wisely.
As this trail gets longer, Northeast Philly will become a nice place to grow older. I look forward to eventually walking or riding for dozens, maybe hundreds, of miles on it.
Picture 1: Where old path meets new.
Picture 2: The fence that served to end the old trail is now open.
Picture 3: A very pleasant place to sit near the river.
Picture 4: Wetlands view from the pleasant spot of Picture 3.
Picture 5: A big bug on the path. I saw butterflies, birds, but no eagles.
Picture 6: Where the trail now ends (for now). Eventually there will be a bridge that should connect up to the park and hatcheries at Lyndon Ave.
Picture 7: Marker.
Pictures 8, 9 and 10: Turning back now. Meadows. I saw wildflowers and trees and all sorts of native plants.
Picture 11: The fence from the other side, with a view of NJ on the other side.
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