The snowmen in our front yard have taken on real personalities with the new snow. I’m seeing Winston Churchill on the right.
I paid extra to have the hard drive that I ordered for my father delivered in two days. That should have been Friday. Tracking info showed it out for delivery but later in the day the page show an “Exception”. If I hovered over the word it said “Emergency conditions beyond UPS Control”. I’m guessing that was the snow we had. UPS doesn’t work weekends even in the holiday season so that would mean today if I’m lucky. You would think they might put it at the front of the line but it’s after four now and no package. The only reason I’m writing about this is the “Exception” claim. Can I use that on deadlines or do you have to be in a union?
I have a bunch of passes to MacWorld at the Moscone Center in SF if anyone wants them.
Watkins and the Rapiers at he Flipside on Main Street in Rochester, NY
You can tell it’s near Christmas by the amount of red that bands are wearing. Another clue is that almost every tune we heard last night was a Christmas thing. I finally got the picture and got in the spirit. Down on Main Street, at the Flipside, Watkins and the Rapiers were thoroughly entertaining. They have a Christmas cd under their belts and add new chestnuts every year. Their Christmas tunes sound like classics. The place was packed but there should have been a line out the door. These guys have rescued Christmas.
Bob Henrie and the Goners at Abilene
Over at Abilene the joint was rockin’. We had just walked in, our glasses were still steamed and people were trying to get us to dance. Bob Henrie and the Goners are real treasures. They are better at early rock n’ roll than anybody. Their covers sound better than the originals. Some bands sound too loud in this room and others just get lost unless you are right on top of the band but these guys sounded like a live record. They have been playing together for twenty five years or so and they are real pros but that is no reason to go see them. Go see them ’cause they are a blast.
Peggi buying cabbage at the Public Market in Rochester, NY
I loaded my mother-in-law’s SUN though SAT, MORN, NOON, EVE, BED pill container like we do every weekend but today I felt like I was loading an Advent calender. We used to have those things in our house when we were growing up and most of the little doors would be open by now. This one though has no surprises unless you forget what medicine you’re taking every day and my mother-in-law just may fall into that category.
We started the day at the Public Market downtown. I love this place especially the way it seems to draw equally from all sub cultures of the city. Red peppers were in abundance for some reason and local cabbage, pears, onions, potatoes and apples were everywhere. Christmas trees were fifteen dollars and every sort of nic nac or common junk drawer product was there, fresh off a Chinese container. One of the fish guys tried to talk Peggi into buying an eel by wiggling it at us. “They’re good in soup”, he said. We had read a rave review of Barry from Fair Game Foods’ pastrami sandwiches in City Newspaper so waited in line for one of those and took it to our car where we listened to a cd of Margaret Explosion with Phil Marshall from last week.
It started snowing on the way home and it looked like a shaker scene. We are up to about fifteen inches of the white stuff now. We had arranged to ski with Rick and Monica so we headed right out in to the woods. Rick led the way and took us across the golf course and down a few thrill seeker hills. When we got back home we built a fire and put James Brown’s “Hot Pants lp on.
There are a few things in the running for tonight. Bob Henrie and the Goners are at Abilene and Watkins and the rapiers are doing their Christmas show at the Flipside. We might try to do both.
Lumiere at the Litle Theater Cafe in Rochester, NY
We were kind of tired last night but heroically headed downtown for Lumiere’s last appearance this year. Guitarist Roy Berns fell off a ladder and injured his shoulder. He’s having it operated on and will miss most of next year. The violin player they had fits their gypsy jazz sound perfectly. I still miss Ed the accordion player but no sense crying over split milk. The band sounded great.
We must have had eight inches or up here near the lake. We talked about skiing all day but didn’t get out until four or so. We skiied down to the park and then back through the woods. The path was buried and it was pretty dark so we got lost a few times. We were so turned around we didn’t even know if we were headed in the right direction. We’ll look for our tracks tomorrow and find out where we were.
“Paul Dodd, made from Paul Dodd paintings” digital print by Steve Piotrowski
“Paul Dodd, Made from Paul Dodd Paintings” digital print by Steve Piotrowski on display at High Falls Gallery in Rochester – click photo for full picture
I first heard about this piece from John Gilmore. And then Steve emailed me that the piece was in a show at the High Falls Gallery. So Peggi and I headed over there this afternoon to check it out. Sally Wood Winslow (Janet Reno’s cousin) runs the gallery and she is so much fun to chat with that it took us about a half hour to get up the stairs to where the art is.
It is a portrait show and Steve, who also has a sensational oil painting of the falls on permanent display here, did this piece in Photoshop. He grabbed a photo of me off the web and digitally repainted my big pixels with other paintings of mine that he found online. You kind of have to squint or get away from it to make sense of the big picture. We were kind of knocked out by all this.
It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas around here. The temperature was somewhere in the low thirties so it was perfect packing and we rolled these two dudes up.
I tried to help my dad by buying a harddrive so he good do a proper backup of his system but the Western Digital drive I bought at Buy.com was defective so I spent a good part of the day getting an RMA number, repacking the thing and running it out to the UPS Store to return it. I took advantage of the trip to buy some new canvases at the Art Store in South Town Plaza. I bought six 20″ by 24″ canvases that were 50 per cent off. I was thinking of doing something other than crime guys but there was an enticing “CrimeStoppers” page in the paper this morning.
The Democrat & Chronicle seems to be falling apart. They have laid off about ten percent of their staff and there were ridiculous typos in the paper this morning like this head, “McCain Rejects Criticism Republican of Obama”. The typos have to be bad for me to notice. Readership is declining (more like dying) and they can’t seem to think their way out of the box. How about some more interesting local content? I already knew someone threw a shoe at Bush before I opened the paper. In fact I had already seen the video.
City does an amazing job with local stuff. There is some meaty political coverage and Frank DeBlase is a joy to read and they even have an art critic. Imagine that. Rebecca Rafferty reviewed the RoCo Members Show last week. We had been to the opening and saw plenty of things that we liked. I usually just let my eye wander and stop when something seems pleasing so I knew I had missed a lot. It’s hard to see the show when so many people are milling about but it’s fun to see the people. We wanted to go back and this time we brought Rebecca’s review and we tracked down the drawings and paintings that she cited. It was a lot of fun.
I like art criticism regardless of whether I agree with it or not. Roberta Smith’s review of “Marlene Dumas: Measuring Your Own Grave“, a mid-career survey at MoMA was tough. Marlene is one of my favorite painters of all time and easily my favorite living painter. She draws raw and right on and her paintings are luscious. Roberta worked extra hard to knock her down. Here’s a quote. “Fusing the political and the painterly, it grapples with the complexities of image making, the human soul, sexuality, the beauty of art, the masculinity of traditional painting, the ugliness of social oppression. How much it delivers on these scores is a question that this exhibition doesn’t quite answer.” Why does this exhibition have to “deliver” any of this. Isn’t grappling enough?
We had an incredible dinner at 2 Vine. We shared a Thai flavored Calamari appetizer and Peggi and I both ordered the bass special. The waitress explained that all their fish comes fresh daily from Boston and it is never frozen. It was also prepared first class. Crispy on the outside but light and moist on the inside with a very delicate orange flavor. It was the best fish I have ever had in my life. Which brings us to the art on the walls. Egon Schiele on Red Bull and Jagermeister?
Peggi’s mom bought us tickets to Handel’s Messiah at the Eastman Theater but we we were a little late getting there so we had to sit in the back until intermission. The sound back there pretty good. It was a good natural mix and not particularly boomy in the low end or anything as I remember it. It just wasn’t present enough back there. The Eastman has recently finished the first of a three part renovation project and the sound stage portion has been completed. It has been re-designed to take advantage of advances in acoustical innovations and I would say they did a great job. The next two phases improve accessibility, a concern of particular interest to this age group, and an all important food concessions lobby. We moved down to our assigned seats at intermission and the sound was excellent.
Christopher Seaman, conducted and played harpsichord at the same time. That was kind of fun to watch. There were about 120 vocalists in the Rochester Oratorio Society on stage with the orchestra and with all those people I would expect something a little more boisterous but it all seemed all seemed too stuffy.
I spent a lot of time looking at the big panels behind the musicians. You know how when a storefront or an old building boards up a window and it looks like it was done for security reasons because maybe the neighborhood is declining or something. Well, that’s how this renovation looks to me. It sounds good but damn, is it bleak looking.
Monica had the brilliant idea to invite us to go skating with her and Rick at Manhattan Square Park after work on Friday. We put our long johns on and warmed up our skates by the heater. Peggi hung on to me for the first few laps and then she was on her own. She had a collision with a young kid and they both fell but no one was hurt. The rink here has been renovated and it is now kidney shaped and very pretty. I could have done without the Christmas music but that is a losing battle.
I clomped next door with my skates on to Manhattan Square apartments where Frank Paolo works but the guard told me “Frankie wasn’t in yet”. We drove over to Corn Hill to look for a Mexican restaurant and wound up at an Italian place called Tony D’s. They specialize in coal fired pizza and they let us to place a special order of caramelized onion pizza with no cheese. We sat by the oven and watched three beefy guys do the cooking. They played eighties soul music and got talking about Sharon Jones and the Dap-Kings and the whole soul revival thing goin’ on.
Over the last ten years or so I’ve made a compilation cds to hand out to friends and I thought I would do a new one before Christmas. I issue them under the “Sam Patch” moniker and I have been titling the collections with words that run in alphabetical order. This is my sixth one so I’m up to “F” and I may just call it “The F Word” and, of course, include Pete LaBonne’s song with that title. These songs below are in the running but they won’t all fit so I will have to do some editing.
“Caravan” There are so many versions of this Duke Ellington song but this one from the Frankie & Johnny lp knocks me out.
“You Belong To Me” by Patsy Cline
“Valse Chiapañecas” from a Nonesuch cd called “Mexico: Fiestas Of Chiapas & Oaxaca”
“I’ve Been A Long Time Leaving (But I’ll Be A Long Time Gone)” by Waylon Jennings
“In My Own Dream” by Paul Butterfield from In My Own Dream lp
“I Could Have Danced All Night” by Sun Ra from the Sound Sun Pleasure lp
“Roomful of Voices” a Playette song with the late Dave Mahoney on lead vocals
“Carnival Song” by Tim Buckley from Goodbye And Hello
“The F Word” by Pete LaBonne from his Yick Yack cd
“Is That All There Is?” by Peggy Lee
“The Minotaur’s Son” by Incredible String Band from The Hangman’s Beautiful Daughter
“Blue Samba” by Ike Quebec from the Soul Samba lp
“Once You’ve Had The Best” by George Jones
“Beyond The Sea” by Bobby Darin from the Live! At The Desert Inn cd
“Tiny Montgomery” by Bob Dylan & The Band from The Basement Tapes
“Harry Irene” by Captain Beefheart & The Magic Band from the Shiny Beast lp
“The Creator Has a Master Plan” by Pharoah Sanders
“Suite For Lester” by Art Ensemble Of Chicago, a tribute to former member LesterBowie
“Peter and Judith” by The Art Ensemble Of Chicago from the Urban Bushmen cd
“The Diving Bell and the Butterfly” is a beautiful movie. The lusiously colored, closely cropped, bedridden, framing really looks great on tv. We watched long stretches of it for the second time last night. The French speech therapist’s endless repetition of the alphabet hypnotized me. I felt as I too had “locked-in syndrome” like the lead character, Jean-Dominique Bauby. Julian Schnabel did a great job bringing this (based on a) true story to the screen. Bauby’s memoir, though, is where the magic came from. “My cocoon becomes less oppressive, and my mind takes flight like a butterfly. There is so much to do. You can wander off in space or in time, set out for Tierra del Fuego or for King Midas’s court.”
I’m thinking our white cat may have a variation of this “locked-in-syndrome. She spends nearly twenty four hours a day on our bed yet we’re certain that she has a life in there and that it is full enough for her. We can see this in her eyes.
Yesterday’s rain turned to light snow this morning so the snow stuck to the top surface of every branch. It was beautiful. I had some packages to mail and I was dreading the lines at the Post Office so I decided to drive along the lake over to the Charlotte office. Charlotte in the winter is doggone forlorn. But there were only three people on line, the new AC DC was playing in the backroom and the clerks were very friendly. I was tempted to stop down at the LDR to visit Patty. She and Rick (the “R’ in the LDR) are back running the place. And Rick’s dad, Russ, still cuts the meat each morning. There was nice article about them in Saturday’s paper. Their steak sandwiches are so good we become meat eaters when we walk in the door. Same thing happens over at Vic & Irv’s but that is usually only when Duane is in town and he goes off his macrobiotic diet.
60 Minutes did another one of its hit pieces on modern art when they interviewed Julian Schnabel last Sunday. The artwork they showed did look pretty bad and his Basquiat movie was pretty bad and the cd he put out was astoundingly bad but “The Diving Bell” is a damn good movie so far. We took a break about halfway through and plan to finish it tonight after the Margaret Explosion gig so I will report back.
We met with our Merrill Lynch adviser this morning and were left with the distinct impression that capitalism is indeed eating itself. Our portfolio is worth less than what we put in to it and we’re doing “pretty good”. The same guys who have been saying for as long as I have been listening that “business knows best” are begging the government, who can’t balance a checkbook, for help. The receptionist, who used to greet us here, has been laid off because of the restructuring that Bank of America, who now owns Merrill, has started. And the Wall Street Journal I glanced at in ML’s lobby had an article about New York’s Attorney General, Mario Cuomo’s son, shaming Merrill’s CEO into not taking his ten million dollar bonus this year.
“Does the that fact that big business is begging the government for help indicate that things are really worse than they seem now?”, I asked. Our guy agreed that that was the case. We pushed ahead. Are there any buying opportunities out there now that just about everything has tanked? Maybe but even with their commission danging there they had no solid recommendations. “Do you feel that the Dow could drop much further?”. Our guy thought we would see a twenty to twenty five percent drop before things turned around.
We sold a few things at a loss so we could deduct it from our taxable income and called it a day at the races.
The golf course usually feels like a jarring intrusion when it appears at the end of the trail in the woods near our house. Maybe it has something to do with the memory of being clocked by a golf ball as we crossed this hole a couple of years ago. Sometimes, though, the manicurred golf course appears like an apparition and it just knocks me out – without the ball to the head thing.
JoAnne Vaccaro sinnging Mele Kaliki Maka at the Vilage Gate Attrium in Rocchester, NY
We stopped out to see Peggi’s mom this afternoon and she was watching the Del Webb Father/Son Challenge, a yearly golf tournament with famous golfers who are past their prime and their sons. Golf brings out the worst in me. The whispering, the goofy outfits and the gentlemanliness make me want to scream. We were going to walk down to dining room but Peggi’s mom was too tired so she decided to order in. I hung Christmas lights out on her balcony. It was about twenty degrees out there and it’s near eighty inside her apartment. It’s a toss up as to which is more uncomfortable.
Margaret Explosion made an appearance last night at Village Gate Atrium. The band, Hunu, graciously hosted a benefit for The Center For Youth Services. Chuck Cuminale worked there before he passed away and this event raised over a thousand dollars for the home for troubled kids. Various people got up to do a song with he the band and lot of guest musicians sat in as well a number of full bands. In our case it was three Margaret Explosion members plus Phil Marshall on guitar and Bernie Heveron on organ. We did an abstract, instrumental version of “God Rest Ye Merry Gentleman”. Peggi and I ran the tune down in the basement before dinner but the performance was a pleasant surprise. Connie Deming did a beautiful version of Joni Mitchell’s “Christmas Song” and my favorite tune of the night was JoAnne Vacarro’s “Mele Kaliki Maka”.
Matt Dodd’s photo of Black Friday shoppers in West Paterson NJ
At least once a week I check in on my nephew at his blog, The iLife. He’s a freshman in college now but he still has good instincts. He went out to the Best Buy in West Paterson on Black Friday to interview some kids on line. He took this shot about one in the morning just before that dude was trampled at WalMart. His interview is as good as the photo.
Indo-Pak Coalition at the Village Gate Atrium last night in Rochester, NY
Last night we stopped in the at the Village Gate Atrium to see Indo-Pak Coalition with Rudresh Mahanthappa on sax . The sax, tabla, guitar lineup had all sorts of potential but it didn’t really work for me. Seemed kind of academic or something and I was never any good with that.
Rochester Contemporary has their Members Show opening tonight. I always like this show. I put this recent crime face in there. We saw Barbara Fox recently and she was complaining about how her work gets lost in it and that is certainly a drawback of an uncurated free for all but I like the chaos of it all. And it is full of surprises. We want to be over at the Eastman House by eight to see the Patti Smith movie, Dream of Life.
Eastman Lake in Durand Eastman Park, late Fall 2008
We walked through the woods and along the eastern shore of Eastman Lake this morning. Up near Lake Ontario we crossed over to Durand Lake and took the path along its western shore to the woods that lead back to our house. I didn’t see a soul the whole time except for my wife. Winter is coming on and the remaining leaves have lost most of their color other than this rich brown.
Winters in Rochester are tough and they toughen us. I’m looking forward to this one. I like the solitude, the warmth of the fireplace, the lighter social calender and the additional time to paint.
There was a squirrel fight going on outside our bedroom window this morning. At least i thought it was squirrels. It woke me up so I got up and didn’t think much about it. Later we saw our neighbor walk up our driveway to look at something in our back yard. We went out and found three large raccoons in a tree. Two were on a perch near the top and one was further down. Every time the third one tried to get on the same perch a nasty fight broke out with lots of loud squealing. Our neighbor said it was too early for mating so who knows what was going on. It was hard to watch. I took a few photos and went back in to work.
