Musical Interlude

In the Classic/Groundbreaking category, we have Les Paul and Mary Ford.


And in the category of "Things I missed because I was watching Masterpiece Theater instead", we have Jeff Beck and some rad Irish chick doing a Les Paul tribute.


And in the category of "Matt's favorite guitarist in the world who has really grown on me + craaazy singer" we have Jeff Beck again with Imogen Heap.

On Sunday Dinner And Lenses (with an edit for SCB)

The cardinal rule of Sunday dinner at my house is, there had better be leftovers. Which is why I did this with four pounds of pork shoulder, carrots, tomatoes, onions and celery (and a blop of white wine [the next unit up from a splash]). And a chicken. And a couple of pounds of asparagus. And onion potatoes, which everybody liked, but all gave me weird looks when I told them there was bacon grease in there (you have to caramelize the onions for ever in the bacon grease). So I could have beautiful leftovers for the next two to three days. Yum.

Also, it is amazing what a good lens can do.


Thanks for sharing, Zack. There are far too many unflattering pictures of me on the internet.


Also, I may need to figure out how to schedule posts. Then all my posts wouldn't end up being put up two days after I write them.

edit: I want to mail one of these to SCB for her brainstorming sessions.

Yes, Virginia, There Is Another Project

But of course! When your 102-year-old grandmother tells you she wants to give you something, you don't say no (well, not more than two or three times). Despite all the doilies and china she has given me that are stashed away in the closet (at least I use the silver!), this time I said yes to something I will actually use! The table that held her turntable (and my board books in the drawers, way back when) will soon be holding our stereo (and probably guitar tuners in the drawers). However, it's a project (of course). We're going to call this part of #25 on the list (which involves basically "finishing" the living room to some degree of personal satisfaction).



What do you mean, "Annie take some damn Before pictures"? I like a nice During picture instead. The old finish is coming off, slowly and stickily, to reveal much lighter wood in some areas than others. I am hoping the sanding part of the process will even things out a little bit. The veneer on the sides is a little chipped but that is mostly on the bottom corners so I may just ignore it and go La La La instead. The top is solid and cleaned up well, but I am a little scared to start the sanding process. I am thinking of finishing it with some sort of wax because I really like the grain of the wood and wouldn't mind showing it off.



Here you can see the drawers, one with no finish and one still with gloopy finish and awesome pull. The pulls are brass or something, and definitely too cool to get rid of, so I have to figure out how to clean them and possibly put some kind of protective lacquer on them (as I seem to be removing whatever was left). Also, my wonky toes.

So far everything is going well (knock on wood) as long as I remember to keep the door to the garage open so I get a little ventilation in here. I know I should wait until summer and do it outside but I am doing it in short bursts so I don't kill too many brain cells. Next up... sanding! Wish me luck!

Opinion Time Again! (in which I can't make up my mind)

So the drapery rod in my office just came down. As in, one side just pulled itself out of the wall. It is currently dangling drunkenly and I am pretending to ignore it. And the curtains were one of my first-ever sewing projects so they are getting pretty limp and frayed by now. So I need some opinions. My office is basically chartreuse with tan (a.k.a. totally ignorable) carpeting and dark wood accents. You may remember it from most of my early decorating posts. This is still pretty accurate, only the art has changed.
The main points of interest are the art which is all very colorful and in black frames with white mats, and the futon, because it is covered by a gorgeous multicolored batik quilt made just for me by my mom. Now I need to suck it up and get some better curtains in here. So here are my current options:

I am terrified of pattern mixing. But I figure this has lots of white and the pattern is pretty mild-mannered. Also, these are on sale.


I am developing a deep love of orange in my old age. There is orange in the quilt, and in my little hanging lantern my sister brought back from Vietnam. And the plus here is these are so big, I only have to buy one curtain and cut it in half.

There are blinds underneath so they don't really need to cut the light, I just think the blinds are ugly so I'd rather distract from them a little bit. Also, privacy, as this room faces the street. And walking by houses where you can look straight in the front windows, while I find it entertaining (hi, I'm nosy), also creeps me out.

Your thoughts? I have more sales to scour, but so far these are the two leading contenders.

Reviewing The Situation

Being sick leaves me with not much in the exciting blogging department. But it did give me time to catch up on some reading and movies, especially after figuring out that the new-to-us TV will talk to my computer now so we can watch the streaming Netflix movies whenever we want. That was a treat. Other than that, things have been pretty slow. So let's start with the books:

How The Irish Saved Civilization: slow to start, with the necessary Roman background, but compelling by the second section (when we finally get to Ireland). The author brings up some fascinating points, the basic premise being when the Roman empire was falling apart, Irish monks were transcribing the written treasures of Western culture. It's pretty interesting reading the Amazon reviews as the book gives Irish monks a lot of credit, but I will still call it a well-written and interesting read if you can get past the first section.

This reminded me how much I love mythology so I had to dig out one of my favorite children's books, The Hounds of the Morrigan. An awesome quest with a brother and sister through mythic Ireland, this book makes me want to be 10 again. Or read some more good Irish mythology. I am thinking I need to check out those Dark Is Rising books, on a similar note.

Then I hit one of my Christmas books - a very pretty reprint of Eleanor Perenyi's Green Thoughts. I have to say, it's a little depressing to read this when snow is still on the ground, but it did make me start on my garden To-Do list for the spring. It's a collection of her essays on everything from weeds to pruning to buying from garden catalogs. It's a little bit dated partially just because it's 30 years old and partially because her focus is on much more traditional gardening - I've hardly ever bought anything from a garden catalog and rarely if ever start anything from seed other than veggies as the growing season is so short here. But some of the stories she has are fantastic - growing standard rose trees and then in the winter having to bend them down to the ground and bury them so they will survive the bad weather. Does anybody do that kind of stuff any more? It is a great read, and a nice segue into my next book.

More Was Lost, also by Ms. Perenyi, but fully autobiographical. This reads like it should be a black-and-white movie, from her meeting the son of the snobby Hungarian baron, to her moving to his estate in then-Czechoslovakia and learning to speak Hungarian and interact with the locals. The people are wonderfully written and I definitely stayed up until midnight last night reading this one when I should have been sleeping. Now all I can do is hope that Hollywood doesn't make this one into a movie. I'll probably finish this one tonight so I will update if it suddenly veers into disappointment. But so far, I doubt it. I don't know if it gets all the way to her time in the U.S. and her tenures at Harper's Bazaar or Mademoiselle, but so far, so good.

Huzzah! A Forgotten Update.

I did it! I got out of the old band without totally offending them. Well, most of them. They have been around for 20+ years with varying players so they have had personnel changes before but they were getting huffy so it was really nice to escape. Now I can focus on the other band and attempt this Pilates madness (see #14). We'll see if I survive. And now I can spend some cash on music for the other band...

Lovely sound clip stolen from these guys.

I Give.

You win, world. I'm off to bed. Glarey screen is too bright for the headaches, anyways. Matt is off at a show and we have concert tickets tomorrow night too. Also it is snowing again. Maybe it will snow enough that I can just stay home for the next few days. They could close the school and I could have a snow day. That makes it sound nicer than a sick day. Also, there could be hot chocolate. And naps.