Category: Life Is A Spell

Pete and Shelley live in a dead zone and they like it that way. There are no cell towers near by and the mountains block the distant ones. There’s no electricity or running water either so well meaning family members give them battery operated toys. Last time we were up there I took this photo of Pete preparing food with a head lamp. And we came home with some coasters that Shelley’s sister gave them.

I read a small piece in our local paper (most of the pieces are small) about the government’s efforts to provide Internet access to all Americans and much faster connections to those of us who already have it. The article finished by saying the FCC was facing stiff opposition from broadcasters. So what are we to think about the Time Warner arrangement in this area where a giant media company controls our internet access? That’s an open question.

We switched to Time Warner’s digital phone service a couple of years ago and it has been pretty reliable. When our internet connection goes down it is usually just confused so I reboot the cable modem and routers and we’re back in business. Last week though that routine didn’t work. I picked up the phone to call Time Warner and it was dead too. I called Time Warner on a phone company land line and only got a recording saying they were “experiencing difficulties”. (I remember when the tv used to do that) Without internet access our small company ground to a halt. The rush revisions to a job we were working on couldn’t get through. We took a walk.

The next day our lawyer called from San Francisco. We were chatting and the line went dead. This usually happens when someone is on a cell phone and the signal is dropped but this time it was phone and internet problems in SF. Luckily we had already covered important matters like pre-ordering the iPad and finishing “Willmaker”, the 2006 Nolo publication that walks you through creating a will. Fortune magazine says “Willmaker is such an easy-to-use program that users may never need to look at the manual.” Sounds pretty easy and I committed to finishing the project but I can’t find the Quicken PC cd that came with the book/manual. I want to go on record saying “I leave everything to Peggi”!

Jaffe sat in with Margaret Explosion at our last gig and Peggi and I felt like the sound got to crowded and the conversation was all run-on sentences. It’s not Jaffe’s fault, it’s just a delicate thing. We thought the night pretty much sucked until we heard the recording. Funny how perception seems to carry so much weight.

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I was really excited about seeing the Roger Ballen photography show at the Eastman, a little too excited. We got there a week early. The opening is next Friday! So we headed over Abilene and heard a few songs by a young band with a woman who sang like Janis. We ordered a Genny Bock beer and had them put in a glass. On to the Bop Shop where we caught a trio with guitar, bass and Gunther Schuller’s son on drums. I spent most of my time in the store and bought a cd in a jewel case and everything. I heard a song from this cd on Pandora so I guess they have a viable business model. It’s seductively entitled “Live at the Velvet Lounge” with Fred Anderson and Hamid Drake. Why aren’t these guys ever at the Rochester Jazz Fest? Or Joe McPhee? Or Ornette before he dies.

Brian Peterson suggested we follow him over to Boulder Coffee to see a band whose description had intrigued him. They were a Buffalo band called The Bear Exchange and they were impossibly young and primitive. They played an intriquing combination of low tech (toy accordion, melodica, trumpet, Fender Rhodes) and high tech (two Apple laptops). Very intriguing and dreamy. The lead singer wore big glasses and the keyboard player wore a tweed jacket. I couldn’t help but think how all these essential fashion elements, hoods, tight pants and vintage clothing, are going around again and they still look good.

We finished the night at Bill and Geri’s watching Women’s Curling. The Danish team was exotic as hell and the Canadians they were playing against held their own. We were transfixed on the high def makeup, hair styles and grunts of “hard, hard”. We were all laughing at the sexually charged nature of this arcane game (sport?) and we weren’t the only ones who noticed. Charles Isherwood, writing in this morning’s paper, “But the dream that excites me most is this inspiration, which came upon me as I sat transfixed by boredom and confusion for a couple of hours last week, watching the women’s curling competition. Fanfare please: drag queen curling.”

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A few years back I was having a discussion with Mike Deming and he said, “Oh yeah, you’re the ‘half full’ guy”. And I usually am so I didn’t argue. I spotted these coffee cups in a gallery in Williamsburg last weekend and recalled that quip. I had always heard the “half full, half empty” part but didn’t know there more to it.

Back on the street, our host, Duane, pointed to some of the newly painted bike lanes there and he told us a bit about Mayor Bloomberg buying some votes by having the lanes removed before the election so the Hasidic community didn’t have to look at scantily clad women as they rode through there neighborhood. It all sounded whacked but it’s a real story.

I road my bike to the post office this afternoon in fifteen degree weather and because the sidewalks are snow packed I stayed on the road. It gets crazy where Culver meets the Expressway. I’m thinking of painting some bike lanes over there when the weather breaks.

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