Putting on some miles

Pulled into a parking space and just happened to notice that my car was RIGHT THEN rolling past 140,000 miles! Mr B has the same year and model (2000) and his has about 155,000 on it. I've never had a car that went this far!

And speaking of going a long ways, check out this hitchhiker I picked up on Friday. I was driving home in rush hour (and it IS an hour long commute but there's not much RUSH about it or I would get home in half that time) and I see this bold grasshopper riding outside on the passenger side. He moved around quite a bit, despite being blasted with winds as high as 50mph. Look at his antennae blown back by the wind. I started worrying about him (which seems to be my main pastime - worrying about stuff), because I was afraid he was going to be dislodged to meet with a sudden splat behind me, so I started driving more carefully - like having a baby on board. ;-)

He rode the car all the way home to the driveway after riding at least 5-6 miles, then flew away after I nudged him with a leaf.

I wonder if this was a joy ride or absolute terror for this awesome little dude?

Running to help

That's our Mayor, Lee Leffingwell, as Batman. It's a fitting choice of superhero for him because this is a bat-oriented city. The reason these folks are addressing the press dressed up like this is to promote the CASA Superhero Run on Sep. 30. CASA is "Court Appointed Special Advocates" and their purpose is to help abused kids to get into a safer situation. The motto of the run is "Every child needs a hero, but abused children need superheroes." This video is just too darned cute.

2011 CASA Superhero Run from CASA of Travis County on Vimeo.

On Oct 20 there will be a differently-themed run called the Austin Thong Jog, held in honor of the memory of Leslie and benefiting the homeless. This is the first one, so there's no archived footage, only this little promo.

A bit less dressed than the first event, but probably more dressed than this annual World Naked Bike Rise that Austin participates in every June.


The Thong Jog happens at the same time that MrB likes to ride his bike (in costume) in the Tour de Fat Parade so we might miss the underwear spectacle. I can't run or jog (with this misbehaving foot of mine) and never could ride a cycle with fewer than 3 wheels - so I'm pretty much a freak and a permanent spectator, but I'm glad for the folks who do get to play along.

How do I look?

[Seen in parking lot last Friday.]

Chillin' with music in the extended dog days

Well, the "Dog Days" trudge on still hot as hell (98-101°F, ~37°C) and no relief for another month. Apparently, the Dog Days are called that because in ancient times they thought that the Dog Star, Sirius, was helping to heat things up. I'm still avoiding some outdoor activities, but on a hot night with a spectacular blue moon overhead we did make it out to see MilkDrive co-billed with Phoebe Hunt. If you've not heard of Phoebe, you might have heard of Belleville Outfit, and band she used to be part of. She has played in and toured with many bands and done plenty of session work. Now she's got her solo thing going. We were happily surprised to see that Carrie Rodriguez stopped by and played a tune with her. Check it out for wonderful fiddle goodness:

Here is MilkDrive with one of their new ones, and I promise this one will stick in your head in a good way:


This morning we are going to a kickass brunch show, hopefully indoors, featuring amazing guitar and vocals from Jeff Plankenhorn, Guy Forsyth, Malford Milligan, David Grissom and others. Wow.

For no reason at all, other than I love the idea of it, here's a squirrel playing electric banjo.

You can buy this on a t-shirt here.

How old am I? This many.

This was my favorite TV show as a kid. I also loved The Liberace Show.
There were lots of shows on where you'd get to watch people dancing. The music was great too. Late at night, there was only a test pattern on.
These were my heroes as a pre-teen. I kept scrapbooks of clippings about them. I met Alan Shepard as an adult (during his book tour) and he signed my old LIFE magazine with him on the cover.
I witnessed these events on live TV. What an emotional roller-coaster!

This guy on the right held me in his arms onstage. Toddlers are hard to resist. About 12 years later we met him again, and when my mother asked if he remembered it, he nicely lied and said that he did. I got to see the guy below, on the left, when he looked like the picture on the right.


My first concert that was unaccompanied by parents was this one. I went with my older girl cousin. I don't think she was into the British Invasion, she preferred Elvis and Frankie Avalon.
I got to see these rock icons in concert. I most regret not seeing Jim Morrison, Brian Jones, or The Beatles.


The 17-yr-old version of me had this closeup view of Plant. More about that here.

I lived in a whole bunch of places, some of them twice. Trying to settle down a bit more these days.

Yes, it's another birthday. Nothing planned except maybe a day off work. I will most likely be well-behaved and probably go to bed early.

Here is Liberace playing "Bumble Boogie" on his TV show.

Low Rent Birds

We have a whole lotta birdhouses. We have about 3 of the fiber "hive" style (all unoccupied), store-bought styles made of wood (unoccupied), cutesy store-bought metal ladybug (unoccupied), a couple of ones I made from plastic corrugated yard signs (unoccupied), a couple of multi-unit condo styles on tall poles (probably partially occupied, hard to tell), about 5 plastic "gourd" styles (maybe a couple occupied, not sure)...

...but instead of choosing one of those, some birds have made a nest in this ripped-up party balloon that is lodged in a tree.

Birds.

They do whatever they please.

:-)

Death, warmed-over

Seen today on South Congress Avenue, always a good place for people-watching, day or night... it's a real person in that getup, which isn't that strange except for the fact that it got up to 102°F today (38.8°C) with a heat index of 107° - and he/she did it voluntarily and not as part of one of those "dress up as a mascot and wave to people driving by" jobs.

This music could melt your face

Ramen Noodle Rag

The South Austin Jug Band became one of our favorite bands after we moved down here in 2000 (which is right about the time the band formed). They were amazing, and we felt lucky to be able to see them fairly often. The peak of this version of the band was when they won "Best New Band" at the Telluride Bluegrass Festival in 2003. It was a pretty big deal. Over time they had some personnel changes, and each person who left took a few songs with him along with a playing style. The ones who joined the band in their absence were equally awesome, the overall sound was a bit different... more of this... less of that. They finally called it quits at the end of 2008, all of these guys and the later band members went on to be part of other bands, both new and old, and are all still hitting the stage on a near-daily basis. This reunion show of the original line-up (which may be just a one-off) that just happened on August 5th will be a night to remember for all of us.

Enjoy!

This lineup, left to right: Matt Slusher, Will DuPuy, James Hyland, Warren Hood, Willie Pipkin. Later band members include Dennis Ludiker, Brian Beken, and Matt Mefford. All musical monsters down to the last man.

Rental Review Time

A Face in the Crowd [imdb] [wiki]

This is an old classic, and yet, amazingly, neither of us had seen it before. Made in 1957 and directed by Elia Kazan, it was a story with a strong statement about the always unholy relationship between entertainment and politics, and the raw power that comes out of it. If you were a Keith Olbermann watcher, you know that every time he brought up Glenn Beck, he called him "Lonesome Rhodes" Beck. The Lonesome Rhodes character is the one played by Andy Griffith in this movie. He was a drifter who happened to have a folksy personality, a little musical skill and a lot of charismatic crowd appeal. He ends up on the radio almost by accident, becomes really popular, and the spiral begins. Really recommend this one that we watched on DVD via the library. The DVD also included a little documentary about the making of the film, and it includes relatively recent interviews with the now-deceased Budd Schulberg (the screenwriter), Andy Griffith, Patricia Neal, and Tony Franciosa. Also in the movie are a young Walter Matthau and Lee Remick.

The Adventures of Tintin [imdb] [wiki]

I love Steven Spielberg, Peter Jackson, Steven Moffat, John Williams, Andy Serkis, Nick Frost, Simon Pegg, Mackenzie Crook, Daniel Craig, etc., I love animation, kid movies also made for adults, adventure, and action. Despite all that, I got bored watching this and we didn't even finish it. That's very unusual. Maybe it's better if you have some background with the Belgian Tintin comics - getting to see the characters come to life - maybe it would have helped. This kind of realistic motion-capture animation sometimes gives me the creeps, and other times (other movies) I think it works fine and doesn't bother me. This one is in the former category. I was just wishing they would have either used real-life people (animals included) or go completely cartoon and give it the look of the original. In fact, that would have been awesome. The action scenes in this just didn't carry me along with them, and characters were pretty flat. I won't say "don't see this," but I will say that we got bored with it. Your results may vary.

The Grey [imdb]

This was presented as a true-to-life survival drama, but I would really say it's more surreal than real because of the way the wolves are portrayed. There are probably animals in the wild that are this big, this dangerous and possibly this mean, but not wolves. OK, so suspend disbelief and pretend they are real wolves (and I wish that they had just made up a fictional critter instead of fostering unnecessary wolf-hatred), and it's a pretty good story about survival, living vs dying, overcoming fear, the basic nature of humans, and sorting out religion. It was a teensy bit predictable here and there, but did have quite a few surprises, including the ending. Even though there are lots of philosophical discussions among this bunch of Alaska plane crash survivors, the movie doesn't resolve them for you. I liked that. One of the most striking things about this movie is the reminder that there are places on earth where humans are not meant to live, but still do.

We saw this on regular DVD which included some deleted scenes, none of which I thought should have been left in, so good call there. It was entertaining and worth a rental. Also, the snow scenes might help take the edge off these hot summer dog days.

Smoke monster

My mother always told me that she quit smoking while she was pregnant with me. I was going through some photos in a trunk, and found some very strong evidence to the contrary!

In most of the adult photos of my mother, she is holding a cigarette. Not sure what made her start, just the usual reasons probably - trying to fit in with the other 'kids' or wanting to rebel. It wasn't really known to be dangerous when she started, probably in the 1930s or 1940s, but by the 1950s (this is taken in 1953) people were becoming aware of some of the hazards.

The others in the photo are her parents, who were visiting her in Phoenix from southern Illinois, so she is openly showing rebellion in doing it. She would tell me some stories about her father, who was a strict Southern Baptist and on many occasions unleashed fiery righteous indignation and abuse upon those within his dominion, especially the females. She told about the time, and this was as an adult after she had moved out, where she spent a very long day working in their house... sanding, wallpapering, scrubbing and painting... and when she was finished she took out a cigarette and lit it. Her dad grabbed her arm, twisted it around to her back (nearly breaking it), put his foot on her behind and shoved her out the front door. He told her that she would never light another cigarette under his roof.

She didn't quit though. She smoked for the rest of her life right up until she was in her early 70s and had been bedridden with emphysema for some time - she had the oxygen tank with her, and was pretty addled from morphine (and just lack of oxygen in the brain) so that she somehow thought it was OK to continue smoking. She started a fire in her apartment (and luckily her home nurse was there to take action) but ended up being burned in the face and all the way into her poor old already-shredded lungs. She didn't die from that, but, boy was she angry. Her burned lungs wouldn't let her smoke anymore. She had been calling smoking "her only pleasure" for years. She lived for maybe another year, and we lost her just 2 weeks apart from MrB's father who had lung cancer. They were both almost militant smokers... take the cigarettes out of my cold dead hands... that sort of attitude. (I've told some of this tale before a few years back.)

I don't think the pregnant smoking stunted my growth or anything. I was a big 9 lb. baby. As a toddler I was playing with the butts in an ashtray, and she made me eat a bite of the ashes. It worked. I never, ever, wanted to smoke a cigarette in my life, so as bizarre as it sounds, she did me a favor. Don't know if all those long car trips with both parents filling the car with smoke hurt me either. Something with surely get me someday, but I don't think it will be nicotine.

My Beatle jacket

We finally watched "Living in the Material World," the Martin Scorsese documentary on George Harrison. First, it's really excellent, and not simply another entry in the huge pile of Beatle documentaries. This one has more in it, especially about the music itself. It's a 'duh." See it if you are a Beatle fan, music fan, or interested in the sixties at all.

The reason I'm posting is because it shows George Harrison wearing a jacket that made me hit the pause button and go to the closet.

It looks almost exactly like the matching jackets that my mother and I bought during the same time frame. They were wool (of the scratchy kind), stitched together with some kind of wool yarn, and lined with either silk or satin, I don't know which. They were from Greece, and we lived there at the time.

Ours were both turquoise in color, but I wish I knew what color George's was. I haven't found any color pictures of it. I am not sure what happened to my mother's jacket. I probably gave it to a cousin after she died. I was unable to transport her entire collection of things across the country.

Life is full of weird coincidences.

DailyShow-worthy headline!!

An actual screen-grab from the Huffington Post today. It was inspired and irresistible for the writers, I'm sure.

And in other news, this actually relating to The Daily Show and Colbert, looks like the satellite/cable wars are going to prevent online streaming of my 2 favorite shows for awhile. That's how I watch them (during my lunch break) so now I guess I'll have to squeeze in more TV time during the evening. Not sure I have that extra hour. Grrrrr. Thankfully it's supposed to be temporary (wonder if hulu will still have them?)

Total tourists!

We are back from vacation, as of Sunday actually, and just now getting caught up with sorting pictures, unpacking, doing laundry, working 3 days and catching up on Breaking Bad before it kicks in for another season. Santa Barbara is a beautiful place and it was worth it to postpone a few purchases in order to visit it. The weather was wonderful and cool every day. Overcast every morning and most afternoons. The "No high heels" sign isn't a statement on the importance of being casual, it's a safety warning for anyone thinking of trying to walk on the old wooden pier wearing stupid and dangerous shoes... ... and in this clip form the 1966 Batman movie that was filmed at this very spot (Stearn's Wharf) you can see that there were several violations of the shoe policy, but Batman was still doing his best to keep the place safe.

The whole town of Santa Barbara (California) was like a botanical garden. I don't know how much of the beauty is the result of careful plant-mothering and how much is just from the cool sun and sea breezes, but everything looked healthy and non-distressed. I imagine it's a bit of both. Things seemed to be kept clean and tidy, and I was a bit surprised to have not even seen one stray cat in the whole 4 days.
We got there on the 4th of July in time for one of the longest parades I can remember, followed that night by fireworks at the beach. Here's a group of re-enactors having an opportunity to fire their muskets. Big noise, and the poor dudes seem to get a faceful with every shot.
This excellent sand sculpture was unofficial, and the artist was collecting tips. It was flattened by the next day.

We were the unashamed tourists in getting on the amphibious tour bus/boat. This one is called the Land Shark. Here it is from the pier with pelicans getting a free ride on top.

These were taken from the tour boat, a bunch of sea lions all snuggled and cuted up. They can pretty much guarantee that you'll see sea lions on your voyage, but we didn't see any dolphins, sharks or whales.


This was pointed out to be David Crosby's boat, his "wooden ship," the Mayan.

This is a famous Moreton Bay Fig Tree, supposed to be the largest of its kind in the USA. It was stunningly gorgeous. Trees are magnificent.


Santa Barbara's courthouse is a tourist attraction because of its architecture, tile decor, murals, stained glass, and tower view of the area. This is my "post card" view of one area, and below that is a partial view of the sunken gardens, basically its perfect lawn occupying a corner of the block.


We were back at the same location that night, and here is a night view of one wing of the courthouse, for a free outdoor movie to be shown.

One of my favorites... and a reminder that the peoples of Earth are never going to get their act together and make peace, regardless of all the convincing arguments that they should.

Just for grins, we priced some real estate listings in this area, and were not surprised to see that they are 3 or 4 times more pricey than where we are now. It's a wealthy area, not a good place to be poor... but you can always collect a few pennies on the beach if you have a creative blanket.