Peggi and I headed out for a walk today and ran into a neighbor, Larry, who was walking his dog. We were in his house once and he and his wife had Fox News on in the middle of the day. In summer we can hear right wing radio coming from his garage. He wore a red MAGA hat during the 2016 campaign and today we found him sporting a new TRUMP hat with the slogan “Keep America Great” on it. He’s a nice guy and although I think the hat is absurd we don’t talk politics.
I’m putting out feelers for a Don Jr. Tee. Something equally absurd. I created this graphic and I’m thinking about putting it on a white t-shirt. We printed some shirts a long time ago and it was a lot of work. I’m thinking of sending the art work off and getting someone else to print them but there is the question of how many to order.
With only the semis and final ahead of us and the Jazz Fest behind us we are out of the woods with DVR issues. Our Spectrum box went rogue on us. Soccer matches that we recorded would freeze while we were trying to watch them or sometimes they would not even be there when we got home from Jazz Fest.
Spectrum’s customer service number is manned by a dumb AI maze, designed firstly to not get their employees involved. I take it they get lot of calls about streaming issues, which rightly they should not have to field, so if you have a real cable issue you have work your way to that topic. And when you get there, there is only a limited menu of problems to report. Why did we have to wait while they checked for an outage in our area? Why do we have to watch while they reboot our cable box when we already did that?
We gave up and took our box to Spectrum’s office. They gave us one that looked brand new but it had apparently already been refurbished and the first soccer match we recorded jumped from the 82nd to the 90th minute in the blink of an eye, We missed the game winning goal. The second debate gave out in the middle of Kamala Harris’s take down of Joe Biden. When we rebooted the box the whole recording was gone.
We drove over to Spectrum again the next morning and signed in on the iPad at the door. I sat down and noticed there were two Paul Ds on the monitor. I thought I may have submitted my name twice. Two clerks’s were helping customers. The one on the left of us was talking to a woman who thought she was being overcharged. She was. The Spectrum employee pointed out the promotional offer she had signed up for had expired. She didn’t remember ever signing up for a promotion. Listening to this conversation was painful but I wasn’t being paid by the hour.
On the other side of us someone was looking at a list of cable packages and trying to decide which one included the stations he wanted. We were planning to meet at a friends house to watch the US France match in a half hour so we getting antsy. He finally decided on a package and left. The Spectrum clerk went in the back room. A third clerk came out to man another station but as soon as she did her phone rang, the one in her pocket. She was still carrying on a personal conversation when the clerk on our left called “Paul D.”
I stood up at the same time as the guy across from us, the other Paul D. I said “I’m Paul D” but he just gave me a blank look so I went up to the desk and traded in our gear.
Cyro Baptista performing at Geva Theater during the 2019 Rochester International Jazz Festival
Brazilian percussionist, Cyro Baptista, played with Laurie Anderson, Gato Barbieri, David Byrne, Dr. John, Brian Eno, Milton Nascimento, Carlos Santana and Caetano Veloso. He has been here a few times, always with a completely different band, and he is always irresistibly entertaining. Joyous Brazilian rhythms are the foundation of his music but his ensembles, exceptional team players, work with a full palette of world music. They opened the set we saw with a Don Cherry composition.
I wore my Spain shirt yesterday and tried to stuff my soft spot for their beautiful game. I expected the US to run over them but Spain gave them a real test. I’m happy for that. Rose Lavelle played great and Rapino, of course, but the US defense looked shaky. We are going to have cheer especially loud when they meet France.
I hated to see Canada go home but their match with Sweden was a duel between two teams with similar skills and approaches and consequentially they trapped each other in the center of the pitch. Canada had an edge in possession but Sweden was a bit tougher and put one in in the second half. I’m pulling for Italy and I was so happy to see them take down the tactical Chinese side. Valentina Giacinti is a joy to watch. I will cheer them all the way up to a possible confrontation with the US.
Switch, street band, performing at the 2019 Rochester International Jazz Festival
Switch was tearing it up in the street. The band tip box was was chocked with quiet money and the singer, a commanding force, had East Avenue full of people doing dance moves in unison. She briefly broke it up by the announcing “the cops have asked us to for a minute so a big-ass truck can get through.” We headed into Christ Church for Empirical.
Our schedule for the last few days revolves around festival because those start times are fixed. We’ve been time-shifting the World Cup, watching a match before and one after the festival. The Norway/Australia match went beyond overtime and into a penalty kick round on Saturday. That kept us up past one and France and Brazil went into overtime last night against Brazil, the team we love but know aren’t able to go all the way.
View of High Falls from Genesee Brewery on Saint Paul Boulevard in Rochester, New York
Not much of a lineup for opening night of the annual Jazz Fest but we did find a gem.
Girls In Airports will probably reconsider their moniker when they get a little older. A five piece from Denmark, they appeared here with only one sax player and he was filling in for the other two. The keyboardist’s layered, sweeping, full range soundscape was the foundation with drums on one side and a percussionist on the other and a breathy saxophonist. There was no lead instrument, just dreamy textural magic.
I won’t have to keep doing this if they keep bring back the same artists. Here’s a link to photo I took of Jake Shimabukuro, the ukulele YouTube sensation, from eleven years ago. Julia Nunes, a local ukulele YouTube sensation, can be seen down front. Jake in Rochester 2008.
Furry black guy at Rochester Contemporary 6×6 show
Still no strawberries. The clerk behind the counter a Aman’s said they had two suppliers and both said they expected their strawberries to be ripe enough for market by the end of this week.
I finally won at horseshoes. First time this year. My neighbor keeps track of these things. We’ve played eight times, best out of three, and he had won them all until yesterday.
We may be overusing our iNaturalist app. We are stopping at every strange looking tree and ordinarily ones that we should already have in our database. Today we identified something we thought was an unusual oak as a Silver Maple, and two different Locust varieties.
We stopped in RoCO’s 6×6 show and this furry guy caught my eye.
Dandelions in the South Wedge neighborhood of Rochester, New York
Out of sheer desperation Pope Francis is open to ordaining elderly married men, “men of proven character” or ”Viri Probati” in god’s language. He needs to get a lot more desperate.
Rochester used to be a soccer town. I have no idea what happened. In 1975 the Rochester Lancers filled the old Aquinas Stadium when they met the New York Cosmos, featuring the great Pelé. The Rhinos carried on that legacy and all I have left is a hat. They got local government to build a soccer specific stadium in a run down part of the city. Of course there was public money involved but a good bit of the public was afraid of setting foot in that neighborhood.
It became the home stadium for a women’s profession team, the Flash. They became the best team in NWSL. They outdrew the Rhinos (before they went dormant) and won the championship in their final season here before the franchise moved to North Carolina.
We’re currently loving the Women’s World Cup, cheering for the US with former Flash members, Carli Lloyd, Sam Mewis, Jessica McDonald and Abby Dahlkamper. But also cheering on Australia with Sam Kerr (four goals last night) and Alanna Kennedy, former Flash members. Christine Sinclair, playing for Canada and four goals away from Abby Wambach’s record, was named MVP of the 2011 Final after the Flash won the championship. And most every international star came through Rochester playing for their club teams including the great Marta and Heather O’Reilly.
I’ll stop here but I’m still wondering what happened.
Our backpacks were full., a lot of can goods this time, mostly beans and peanut butter and jar of tahini so they were heavy too. But we soldiered on, down East Ridge to Aman’s, on the chance they had fresh strawberries. We spotted Bob, who runs the place, and he said he had just talked with the farmer, who told him “this is the first time in fifty years that he didn’t have strawberries by Father’s Day.” Bob added, “Too wet, too cold.”
To get out of our neighborhood and up to Wegmans we have to walk by a dog at the end of our street. There are many dogs on the street but this one does not like us. He comes at us barking loudly with his teeth showing. I had a dog take my hand in and it bit down so hard I couldn’t get my hand out without shredding my fingers so I’m a little gun shy. The dog has come at us five or six times now and if the owner see’s what happens she says she’s sorry.
Today we got by the dog without a hitch and we ran into a young woman who told us she was also terrorized by the dog. She showed us the scar on her leg from a dog that had come after her while she was walking a few years back. While we were talking a large branch fell across the road. It hit the power lines and a crackling bolt of electricity shot down the line that ran just above our heads. We continued on up to Wegmans and by the time we returned the power company was restoring our electricity.
I got up on the roof to blow off all the stuff that has fallen from the oak trees and the power went off again. A large Hickory tree fell across the road behind our house. I know its a Hickory because I took a photo of the a leaf cluster and used the iNaturalist app to identify it. The same power company crew and tree surgeons came down to address this problem. We asked for the firewood and they told us we had until Monday morning to pick up the wood.
With the lake level at an official record high we tossed around the idea of driving across the river and walking along the lake but we decided to just walk from our house. So we zigzagged our way over to Titus Avenue Extension and wound our way down to the bay where the road became impassable. In fact a mother duck and her six little ones paddled across the road as we stood there. We are lucky to have so many dreamy little neighborhoods to wander around in within a five or six mile loop.
We passed a neighbor on the way out and we told him we were going down to look at the lake. He said, “people say it’s global warming but we had more rain in (some year, 2014 maybe?) and the lake wasn’t this high. It’s because of the IJC didn’t let enough water into the Saint Lawerence. Having spotted Ann Coulter’s “How to Talk to a Liberal” book on his shelf we just kept quiet.
Bob Dylan reminds us, “Life isn’t about finding yourself, or finding anything. Life is about creating yourself, and creating things.”
Dylan’s Rolling Thunder movie on the big screen at the Little Theatre was a blast. It was like going to a concert without the sameness that sets in. We saw the rambunctious tour when it stopped at the War Memorial in 1975. Scorcese captured that and so much more of the heady era. With masterful editing we hear just enough of the songs before getting another glimpse of the enigma that is Dylan, our generation’s foremost bard.
Joan Baez is strong enough to wrestle Dylan. Patti Smith, influenced by Dylan is shown influencing Dylan. Scarlett O’Hara is the foundation of this band’s gypsy sound. Joni Mitchell’s guitar rings above all the strumming. Allen Ginsberg cuts above all the cynicism with an optimistic mystic’s summary of what we’ve witnessed reminding us of our duty to create. The long movie felt short. We will watch it again on the small screen.
USA team in warm-ups at Red Bull Stadium, the last match before the 2019 World Cup. Rose Laverre is shown with red USA tape on her hamstring.
Finally coming up for air after the World Cup’s twelve opening matches. Yes, we watched all twelve matches. We only manage by time shifting most of them. Our recording of the Sweden Chile game, which was 0-0 when thunder caused a delay, ran out before the game was resumed. Sweden should have run away with that one but the fact that they didn’t made it all the more exciting. Japan Argentina went scoreless in a thrilling match where technical expertise was stuffed by a brilliantly stubborn defense.
Brazil, with almost the full squad returning, is the most colorful and one of our favorites, even with Saint Marta on the bench.. We are partial to Spain but realistic. France and Germany both look tough and Canada could get to the final four. The Italy Australia matchup has been the most fun to watch but the Cup is still in the early stages.
Even the lopsided US Thailand match was fun to watch. Especially because Rose Lavelle got two! We have the best team ever by a long shot but the whole world is getting better.
My cousin showed me the family tree data base that she is building on Ancestry.com. She did their DNA test, they confirmed she was 100 percent Irish and they have been providing hints as to further family connections. She found some real surprises, relatives she didn’t know we had. I don’t like the idea of having to subscribe to a service. There is completion, 23 and me for instance, but if I do Ancestry she can share all her work with me.
My father built a family tree the old fashioned way, by going to court houses, libraries and cemeteries, and his database is on a hard drive. I wish there was a way for all these databases to share information with each other but then that would be too much like Big Brother. I’m not looking for a new hobby but I would like to see the big picture.
Flooded Seneca Road along Irondequoit Bay in Rochester, New York
It is hard to resist the pull of the lake especially when the water levels are at historic highs. We checked out what’s left of the beach at Durand when we walked Peggi’s sax over to the repair shop. And walked down to the pier at Sea Breeze when the waves were pounding the shoreline. Wind surfers were out but hardly any boats. The emergency speed limit is 5mph and the state boat launch is closed. A big sign on Mayers Marina read, “Repeal IJC Plan 2014.”
In the Schnackel Drive neighborhood on the east side of the Bay, where many of the homes don’t have automobile access, we saw a sign calling on “every able-bodied resident/owner and renter” to get out and help at Saturday’s “Road Work Party.”
“The road and drain systems have taken a beating from all the heavy construction equipment and deliveries to properties that invested in flood fortification. We would especially like to see those properties represented with this work effort.”
You hear that when someone fortifies their shoreline the water hits their neighbor’s harder. And here the neighbors who brought in sand bags and heavy equipment tore up the road for everybody.
We live near the world’s largest fresh water supply and we have more than ever but our friends on the west coast are watching every drop.
I positioned our sledge hammer in from of this stump so you could get some idea of the scale. This oak tree fell on Peggi’s birthday. It took down the power lines and trapped our whole neighborhood. The power company cleaned it up but there was three log lengths of good firewood still on the base so Peggi and I went down there with our chainsaw, the one we bought from John Gilmore when he retired. It has a sixteen inch blade and it wasn’t quite long enough to cut halfway through. We wrestled with this one for a few hours.
In our neighborhood it is all tumbleweed. We have a lot of oaks and they are dropping the male flowers called catkins. It gathers in big clumps. One block over it is all helicopters from the Maple trees.
We are addicted to walking and always looking for a destination. Today we took Peggi’s sax over to Carl’s place. He used to run the musical repair shop next the Little but works from home these days. We caught him just before his busy season, when high schools drop off horns that have taken a beating. Peggi’s sax needed a new cork, the lining between the brass horn and her mouthpiece. Carl did it while we waited.
We estimated he was an hour away but it was more like an hour and twenty minutes. And we were wrong about which route was quicker. We went down Center Entrance, through the park on Log Cabin and along the lake to Colebrook and then up Oakridge to Carl’s place. We guessed that was the quicker route but coming back by continuing on up Oakridge and then down Pinegrove to the end where we picked up what’s left of Edgerton Road, behind the sewage treatment plant and across the golf course to Hoffman Road was much quicker.
Gardens at Winona and Saint Paul Boulevard, Landmark Society Tour 2019
The 1000 foot span of the Veterans Memorial Bridge led to the development of West Irondequoit, an early bedroom community for Kodak Park on the other side of the Genesee River. Gullies run all through Irondequoit, most so deep they remain undeveloped. Left here when the glaciers receded, their wildness is the prime attraction. Many homes have picture windows in the back that look out at them. The original owner of 959 Winona, on the corner of Saint Paul, cultivated his portion of a gully but the gardens were swallowed up by time. In the late seventies, the new occupants of the Neo-Classical home restored the garden and it was a feature of 2019’s Landmark Society Tour.
We picked up our tickets to this year’s event at Saint Mary the Protectress, the Ukrainian Orthodox Church on Saint Paul Boulevard. Cynthia Howk was sitting at the welcoming table and she introduced me to her colleagues as “Leo Dodd’s son.” This is Olga’s church. We were here for the funerals of both her parents and their services, sung in four part harmonies in Ukrainian, were extremely beautiful.
My watch said we walked four miles between houses but even the ones not on the tour showed nicely. The wet weather this Spring has been especially kind to plantings. There was a stately 6000 square foot mansion with dual staircases and two Arts & Crafts style Bungalows with wrap-around porches and a tiny little French Cottage, built in 1927. One house had a Speakeasy style bar in an inner room with no windows, just a wrap around bench, dark wooden paneling and a corner bar with just enough room for one person to stand behind and serve cocktails. The liquor bottles were lit and displayed on glass shelves in front of the mirror backed corner. Very dreamy.
The neighbor across the street found a tick on her back, a big one, big because it was so engorged. She went to Urgent Care and the attendant called another worker in just to look at it. It was the biggest one they had seen. It was easy to get off because it had already done its thing. She was given some antibiotics and sent home. No symptoms of Lyme as yet. If you can believe what you read, the chances of that are only one in fifty.
We’ve both had ticks attached and we know a few people with Lyme so we are somewhat short of super-vigilant. We wear Permethrin-treated socks for the most part and if we’re gardening or walking in the woods we wear pants that we have sprayed and a hoodie we bought at LL Bean that is treated. Ticks are on our radar but I don’t want to buy into a conspiracy theory.
I remember someone we worked with coming in with a video about the government being behind 9•11, something produced by a guy named Alex. And we have a few friends who still believe there’s much more to the Kennedy assassination. Our niece won’t vaccinate her kids! I try to steer clear of the theories.
The research on Lyme is so sketchy. Rep. Chris Smith of New Jersey wants Trump to investigate and he is calling attention to an explosive book that alleges the epidemic started with an American biological warfare experiment gone awry. The theory has been around for years. A naval base off Long Island where the government ran experiments and deer swam from there to Lyme Connecticut with the tick borne virus. Say it isn’t so.
