Posts Tagged: postaday2011
A Confluence of Musical Memories
Audience member plays the off-center wheel of death after the final performance of Schick Machine. San Francisco, CA. march 2011.
Way back in the mid-1980’s, when we lived in Fresno, Sarah and I came to be friends with Steve Schick. At the time, Steve was percussionist and young professor in the music department there. And for awhile we shared a circle of friends, local music events, reading and listening groups, and generally hung out.
Meanwhile, Sarah and I were in the habit of coming up to San Francisco to see music and performance works at what was then Theater Artaud, a fantastic space devoted to avant performance works of all kinds. And it was there that on one occasion we saw Paul Dresher Ensemble with Rinde Eckert perform Slow Fire. I’ll save the life-changing details for another post. Let’s just say we were blown away and a lot of things were fixed in our young minds about what was what in contemporary performance.
Eventually, Steve took a job at UC San Diego, and his career and reputation grew as a solo percussionist and champion of contemporary composition. And the rest is history. We moved to Seattle where I stuck my nose in the philosophy books for the better part of a decade. We generally lost touch with Steve, but did connect once or twice after we moved to the Bay Area in 2000.
Today, we experienced an interesting and joyous alignment. We went to see Steve perform Schick Machine, a percussion/theater work written for Steve by Mr. Dresher and Mr. Eckert, at the former Theater Artaud, resurrected a year ago as Z Space. The piece was a fabulous, sprawling cacophony of rhythms, looping textures, words, and visual delights issuing from a stage full of homemade percussion instruments and self-propelled noisemakers. There was a homemade pipe organ, a hurdy-gurdy, sheets of metal, spinning disks, steel hula hoops, slit drums, bottles, cans, alarm bells, and more, all mic’d and looped. We had seen the piece performed almost two years ago at Stanford. Since then, it has changed quite a bit, getting better and more focused. And seeing it in this space somehow made it all the more compelling. Maybe that’s just me and the history it has for me.
We went with friends and all brought our kids to this, the last matinee performance. The kids loved it. As it turns out, there were a total of 19 performances, with many matinees just for school classes that came over the last two weeks. And today, just like as with the school classes that attended, everyone was invited up after the performance to play with all the crazy instruments. Kids and adults alike had a blast.
Reconnecting with an old friend, a former fave venue, and the performance world all in one day. That feels good.
Audience members play the hurdy-gurdy after the final performance of Schick Machine. San Francisco, CA. march 2011.
Organ Wheel
Can’t Fail
Can't
Fail
It really is true. Parenting takes time. We’ve had a lot on our parenting plate lately, and that’s another reason, perhaps, why I’ve missed some days posting. But today was the culmination of much of that effort with the execution of the dreaded piano recital. I say “dreaded” because we all came to dread what might happen. Theo was not practicing as much as a tiger mother would have him. The pieces were not there. We would put our foot down. He would pout. We would yell. He would frown. Then he’d play for a few minutes. Then jump up to reenact a Clone Wars battle scene. Occasionally, a real practice session would ensue.
And so it went until the day was upon us. Boy was he nervous. Frankly, I was nervous too, like I was the one going on stage. In the end, he did reasonably fine (Crappy compressed video here.) Better than he thought he would. Indeed, all the kids did really well, so much so that the whole thing was thoroughly enjoyable. Theo’s reward was going out to dinner to his favorite restaurant, Rudy’s Can’t Fail Cafe in Emeryville for a cheeseburger and a root beer float. And of course, along the way I found the opportunity to get my daily photo and even daily post out of it.
Can’t Fail. It all seemed fitting somehow.
Ocean
Ocean
Two things happened to coincide: I was preparing to back up the next folder on my hard drive and it happened to contain photographs from last summers trip to Hawaii. Then I looked at the daily email from WordPress for the postaday project and it was the weekly photo challenge: Ocean. So, what could I do? I had to post a photo of an ocean. But I suppose to be my usual solf-subverting self, I ended up selecting this blurry one instead of one of the more conventionally pretty ones. Who knows why?… not me, that’s for sure.
Retrograde Commute part 2
Part 2 of Retrograde Commute has some of the different square approaches I’ve been exploring.
Macarthur Station, Oakland CA Retrograde Square #1
Macarthur Station, Oakland CA Retrograde Square #2
Macarthur Station, Oakland CA Retrograde Square #3
Macarthur Station, Oakland CA Retrograde Square #4
Retrograde Commute part 1
El Cerrito Plaza Station, El Cerrito CA.
I catch the BART in El Cerrito. Often, but completely accidentally, I find myself on the Fremont train to downtown Oakland. I say accidentally because it could just as easily be the San Francisco/Milbrae train. When it is the Fremont train, it waits at Macarthur Station for the SF train on the other line, so that people can transfer. And it waits to allow that train to pull out first. That leaves me with the views pictured below, which I am intrigued by. I’ve playing around with some different processing approaches. These are the full frame versions. The next post will present the square crop versions.
El Cerrito Plaza Station, El Cerrito CA.
Macarthur Station, Oakland CA.
Macarthur Station, Oakland CA.
World Events Undermine Recreational Productivity
On the topic of why I have not been keeping up with my commitment to a blog post a day, I have already expounded on Vegas and computer problems. I did in fact write another post detailing the 24 hours of delirium wherein “someone” went to the ER a couple times. But that entry has been rejected by the censors, and so nothing more shall be mentioned regarding said event, other than to say it’s impact on my blogging momentum was not insignificant. And, of course, one can’t lean on the crutch of a past excuse forever, so let me move on to another one.
As some may already have guessed, I tend to be obsessive and compulsive at times, and I’m also very sensitive. And paranoid. And sometimes pessimistic. And defeatist. So when the news of the earthquake in Japan first arrived, I felt tremendous sympathy and began following the news intently. Then, as the enormity of the tsunami became clear, empathy and profound sadness welled up within me. Finally, when the nuclear reactor catastrophe started to unfold, I was simply stunned and transfixed. Close proximity to any sort of information device and I was glued to it trying to stay informed about latest developments, palpably hoping for the best, and fearing the worst. And as it got worse, I envisioned it swirling around me, borne on winds from Japan, or simply from our own Diablo Canyon nuclear reactor after the next shake of the ring of fire. I was sure this was the beginning of something very bad for a much wider area.
So, there went another couple of days of without a post. But I eventually came to my senses, and sympathetic though I am, I started worrying about more real and proximate things, like the storm patterns on the west coast of the US–that is, like my flooded basement, which I’ve had to pump out every couple days when the water level overtakes the burner on the water heater. Or maybe the news switched to other topics, like dealing with the situation in Libya. Whatever it was, it didn’t help with getting back to the daily practice of writing. But today is a new day, and though we’ve lost Elizabeth Taylor, I’m finding the strength to renew my commitment. I might even try to catch up and crank out an extra couple posts over the next few days. In this wacky world, anything is possible.
Lunch Rush
City Center
Right now, the lunch rush is to shoot as much as possible in downtown in the time I have left. I’m gettin’ everything I can from big to small, and close to far. The downside is forgetting to eat, and then getting low blood sugar and then wandering around looking for the perfect thing that I want to eat right now that I’m fixated on and that only exists in my addled mind. And then I end up back in the cafeteria on the fifth floor of the Federal Building. At least I get some photos out of it.
Stand-off
Ghost Sign
14th St Window Display
Today’s Narrative #2
Efrosini
I picked up my mom from the board and care home today and took her with us to have lunch at my cousin Aglaia’s home in Oakland. She really was not in a particularly good mood today. I don’t think she was feeling all that well, and she was showing her surly, stubborn side a bit, so i wasn’t sure how well this luncheon was going to go.
It’s about a 20 minute drive, and on the way, she asked if were going home about four or five times, about every two minutes. Each time, I explained to her that I had just picked her up from her home and that we were going to Aglaia’s house. She’d say, “Oh, okay” and be silent for a minute. Then ask again. After a few iterations of that, the conversation moved on to whether they would have food for us, and we did that repetition only about 4 times. Then she returned to the theme of us going to our home.
Effie: After we are done, take me back to our house.
Neo: I’m going to take you back to where you are staying mom, the place where you have a room.
E: Back to the hospital?
N: Its not a hospital mom, its a γηροκομείο (old folks home).
E: What do I need that for? I’m not old. They aren’t doing anything for me; they aren’t giving me therapy or medicine or anything. They aren’t doing surgery.
N: Mom, we have you there because you forget everything, that’s the illness you have. And what do you mean you aren’t old, you are 92 years old.
E: 92? What does that have to do with it?
I couldn’t help but laugh. Sarah and Theo in unison asked what she said that was so funny. When I related the conversation, they laughed, too.
The Dowry
Covered skillet
My mother-in-law said, “We have something for you, if you want it. I told Ray it was my dowry. We haven’t used them in a long time.” She was talking about the cast iron pan set that had belonged to Ray’s parents, or possibly even grandparents, and was passed down to them sometime after they were married. I guess she meant it was Ray’s dowry for her. And now, it is Sarah’s dowry for me, some 20-odd years after tying the knot.
“My god, yes! Thank you so much, Marge,” I said excitedly. I looked over the rusty and crusty pans. There were no cracks or chips, or anything a good scrubbing and seasoning wouldn’t fix. This was an interesting covered pan set I had not seen before. The bottom is an extra-deep skillet, and the top a shallower pan with a ridge along the edge that fits snugly inside the rim of the bottom. It wasn’t until I cleaned it up and prepared to photograph it that I noticed that the edges opposite the handles looked like a slot and bump that fit in it to form a hinge. Brilliant!
I gave them a good scrubbing with hot soapy water and scrub sponge. To season them, I wiped them down completely with vegetable oil and baked them in a 450-degree oven for 30 minutes. Then, I removed them from the oven and allowed them to cool completely. I repeated this three more times to put a total four coats on over the next couple of days.
My cast iron collection now includes this set and a smaller 10″ skillet I inherited from my father that’s probably about 80 years old, a small dutch oven purchased at a yard sale for $5, and big Lodge 14″ skillet I received new as a gift. I have to say, it’s heavy, but I love cooking in this stuff. I’m gonna see if I can’t ween myself off the teflon for good.
Morning Commute, March 16
This morning’s commute was inspiring. Starting with the dumped over the shopping cart and bag of baby shoes and ending with downtown buildings in soft overcast light.
“Confusion will be my epitaph
as I crawl a cracked and broken path
If we make it, we can all sit back and laugh
But I fear tomorrow I’ll be crying
yes, I fear tomorrow I’ll be crying”
State of California
I’m not sure what further connection there is between these two yet, but I feel strongly that there is one.
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