Yesterday I worked from home, then I drove downtown and picked up Tiffy. We had dinner at the Thai restaurant near the Unitarian meeting house, then we went to the Madison Bach Musicians' Christmas Concert at the Unitarian meeting house's auditorium. It was a really wonderful concert of excerpts from Bach's Christmas Oratorio, and at intermission we bought chocolates. The only odd thing was that we both remembered a secret bathroom at the end of a long hallway, so at intermission we tried to find it so we wouldn't have to wait in line. However, there was no sign of it, so we went down some stairs and found a bathroom with a tiny little kiddie toilet, but what the heck, it worked. After the concert we walked along the bike path that is right behind the line of lit-up arbor vitae on University Avenue. That was very cool.
Meanwhile, Travalon was doing a "dive bar night": he went to the Missouri Tavern, and Connie's Home Plate in Ashton, where he saw this cool neon sign:
Today we met Tiffy for coffee downtown, then we found Rich and all four of us went to the Capitol to see the State Christmas Tree.
It has a very realistic model train going around the base.
I made a short video of it.
Tiffy and I went to the annual Russian Folk Orchestra Concert at Grace Episcopal Church up on the Square, while Rich had a meeting of Catholic Scientists and Travalon went to another dive bar. After the concert he met up with us at the Marigold Cafe for lunch, then we rode the Holiday Trolley up and down State Street, talking to my former neighbor who still lives in my old condo association. We got bubble tea and hung out on the roof of Tiffy's sister's building, since it was a rainy day. Eventually Travalon went to the vintage T-shirt shop while Tiffy and I went to some other shops. We both got a couple of crystals. Here are my pink opal and black tourmaline.
Tiffy wanted to take Travalon to dinner for his birthday, and to thank him for driving us around in Milwaukee when we go to concerts there. Rich and I joined them at Samba, which has an amazing salad bar, and the grilled pineapple is to die for. When Rich told the waitress that I had been "pining for the pineapple," she replied, "I've heard lots of things, but I've never heard that one!" which is surprising, since it seems like such an obvious pun. I wish we knew the joke a woman at another table was laughing at - she laughed so hard and so long! I'm sure the wine she was drinking made it even funnier. The waitstaff there keep bringing around slabs of meat to carve a piece off for you. It's a wonderful place. Oh, and don't miss the cheesy rolls. Yum!
After dinner, Travalon drove Tiffy and me through the Festival of Lights in Olin Park. It was a bit misty out, so I didn't take any photos. It made things a bit eerie. I did take photos of Lisa Link Peace Park on State Street, which we walked through to get to Samba.
When we got home, it felt like Christmas because the duck I had ordered had arrived.
This was an impulse buy when I saw it on the website of a German educational video company. Isn't it cute? It's huge too, which explains why it was not cheap, but I thought, "I just won that award at work, so I can afford this duck." And it didn't disappoint! And I also got my Secret Santa package. My clue word was "blacklight," and this is what she sent me: a blacklight flashlight, a couple of glow-in-the-dark stickers, glow-in-the-dark stars to stick on the ceiling, a little glow-in-the-dark cat figurine, a card that kind of glows under blacklight, and chocolate, which has nothing to do with blacklight but is always welcome.
And here is the stuff under blacklight.
The ghosts and stars and cat glow in the dark even after the blacklight is turned off.
I was expecting more neon-colored stuff than glow-in-the-dark stuff, but this is cool too! And I really love the blacklight flashlight because it's portable. I can use it to see what might glow outside. The Geology Museum has a whole display of rocks that look boring in regular light but glow under blacklight, so I'll have to see if any rocks outside also glow.
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