Sea Shanty Saturday

 

Here are a couple of pictures I didn't post yesterday. First, Niko and my Niko shirt at the concert last night.

And when would some DuoLingo bragging work for you? How about right now?

It has bumped me up twice in the Spanish course but now refuses to bump me up again even as it notes my shocking accuracy rate. Yeah, maybe because I already know all these words?

This morning I met Jilly Moose for coffee, then we walked to Grace Episcopal Church to hear the same concert as I heard on Wednesday, only with twice as many pieces, and with Niko. (I forgot to bring him on Wednesday.) The Professor Formerly Known as Lute Player was there with her husband, but she says now she is done with the lute but is thinking of taking up the banjo again. I wonder if she will join our band again? That would be fantastic! The bass's very cute little baby daughter was also around after the concert. She has the biggest brown eyes! The concert was twice as wonderful as the one on Wednesday. There is a song they performed both days that I am so obsessed with that I found it on YouTube and have listened to it about a hundred times since then, and when I told the bass, he said that's exactly what he did the first time he heard it. It's by Adam Drese.

Afterwards, Jilly Moose and I had lunch at Himal Chuli, then we went shopping at the Soap Opera and the new zodiac perfumery across the street from my old church. We bid each other adieu, and I got home just before Travalon, then he and I went to Awildan Distillery for a St. Patrick's Day party. It was a fun atmosphere, very family-friendly with several babies and a preschool girl with strawberry blonde hair who danced vigorously the whole time, sometimes with her dad, sometimes with strangers in the crowd, and sometimes by herself. A woman who seemed to be in charge of things was wearing the same pin as I was! Here I am wearing it, and a close-up.

Travalon got it in Waterford, Ireland long before he knew me and brought it home to his mother. When she died, and the family asked what I wanted, I said her rosaries, so they gave me two rosaries, a Seven Sorrows of Mary chaplet, some random holy medals, and this pin. I have never worn it before, nor have I ever seen anyone else wearing one, until today. Isn't that crazy? Also, people were drinking beautiful green cocktails, but I had told Travalon I only wanted water, so I wished I'd told him I wanted one of those... and he came back with one!

It had matcha tea in it. We split it, and we liked it so much that we split another one. Someone had brought mochi, not with the ice cream but just the stuff that's wrapped around the ice cream, and that was very tasty. We saw one of my Irish language classmates there, and a buddy from the Shamrock Club. There was a group playing traditional Irish music, then we all sang sea shanties, and then another traditional Irish music group played, and I recognized most of the Irish tunes. They were going to have a session after that, but I hadn't brought any instruments, and the distillery doesn't serve food, so we went to Venezuela!

Just kidding, this is La Taguara, the Venezuelan restaurant. I always get the sweet corn pancake stuffed with cheese, so this time I got coconut tilapia, and oh man was that delicious! We also got an order of the fried cheese, which is in cubes, not curds, and it squeaked when I bit into it like a fresh cheese curd. As we were driving home, we realized we had missed both the salsa show and Rockin' John on the local radio station, so Travalon said something in Rockin' John's voice, but I thought he was imitating Bullwinkle the Moose, and that's when we realized how similar they sound. I always thought Rockin' John was trying to channel the rock 'n' roll DJs of a bygone era, but all this time he's been channeling the Mayor of Frostbite Falls. Who knew?

As we were leaving the distillery, we passed this awesome sign:

And I have another train video to post, this one from last May (Pa Hat's birthday, even!), but I'll post that next week on a slow news day. Or possibly tomorrow. 

Famous Hat

Jazz and Trains

 

Last night there was a total lunar eclipse. It was very late at night, so we didn't stay up to see it, but Travalon's high school buddy sent him a couple of photos.

This morning I had a dream that Rodney the Poodle and Callie the Calico Cat were still alive. (A few nights ago, I had a dream about a beautiful old church in a mall parking lot.) Travalon had a very interesting dream himself:

Fox News commentator:

“Here at Fox News I’m supposed to put a fake positive spin on the fact that Donald Trump is destroying the US economy with his unnecessary tariffs on our trading partners. I can’t do it, I can’t lie anymore. I want the US to dump Trump ASAP. and my colleague the mayor of my hometown of Frostbite Falls Minnesota would agree. He has a little poem to share with our viewers:

Welcome Bullwinkle J. Moose:"

“Dumpity Trumpity fell making a great big thumpity, and on his head he had a big old bumpity.. “

Today was the most beautiful day yet this week. I took a long walk at lunch, and right after I got done with work at five, I heard a train horn in the distance, so I went and sat on a rock at the entrance to our driveway, where I could see the tracks. I had to wait a few minutes, but soon the sound of the approaching train seemed to surround me, and then I saw it. That made me very happy.

When Travalon got home from work, we went downtown to hear jazz at the Hamel Music Center. I'd only been in the big concert hall before, but this was in the smaller concert hall to the side. The first half of the concert was the guest artist Terell Stafford with some jazz faculty, and that was excellent. The second half he played with the UW Jazz Orchestra, and that was a lot of fun too. The bassist and pianist were so good, but I'm not sure if they were students because they looked older than all those brass players. They closed both halves with Latin numbers, and the pianist was going nuts on the guajeo, so I was in Heaven. Then the director said, "We'll take a short break... and see you again in April." Ha! He fooled us! We thought he was going to say there was a third section to the concert.

As we were driving home, we saw a train coming down the track in the distance. We got to the crossing just in time for me to shoot this video:

Jazz and trains in one day! Does it get any better?

Famous Hat

Possible Stand-Up Routine?

 

The weather was beautiful again today, and I walked with Hardingfele. (My colleague is back in the country, after her flight was canceled and she had to take an arduous three-stop flight back, but she worked from home today.) It's fun to have someone to commiserate (or, to use a technical term, bitch) with about politics, bandmates, and the stupid new systems they are always coming up with at work. She is a grant administrator, so she has to use the new system for that, while I was told that with the three grants I was doing a year I'd never learn the new system so pre-award was taken off my plate. (Can't say I'm sorry about that.) Also, we have no federal grants while she deals with plenty of them. I am frustrated that the "training" for the new financial system we will go to in July consists of videos and absolutely no hands-on training in a test environment. My current boss and I have already identified ways this new system is set up for failure, and who knows how many more will come to light once I can actually use it?

After work I had to miss a free lesson in Irish dancing at the Monona Terrace for our Union meeting, because we were going to have elections at this meeting... only we were one person short of quorum. D'oh! So it wouldn't have mattered if I had skipped the meeting - what difference does it make if you're one or two people short of quorum?

At least I was well-caffeinated today: I had my usual cup of coffee in the morning before heading to work, then late morning our chair made a strong cup of coffee for me, and then a grad student bought me a latte midafternoon. I was also well pizza'd because I had leftover pizza for lunch... and then I went to grab my falafel and hummus sandwich for dinner before the Union meeting, but there was leftover pizza in the fridge from the grad student recruitment lunch, so I had that instead. That's okay, the sandwich will be perfect for lunch tomorrow - no meat on Fridays in Lent!

The craziest thing is that this morning I felt extra witty chatting with my shuttle buddy, and then I thought, "If you only take my side of the conversation, it could almost be a standup comedy routine." So I tried it out on Travalon, and he laughed. Here it is, more or less (I'm not quoting myself exactly - my memory is no longer good enough for that):

I've been getting these emails lately saying, "Take this quiz to find out when you will die." Who wants to know that? Who would actually take that quiz? I just deleted it the first time, but they keep sending it! If they send it to me one more time, I can tell them exactly when they're going to die! It makes me long for the good, old days when annoying mail meant credit card offers that actually came in the snail mail. Did you used to get those? Most of them were boring, "Sign up now and get 3.5% introductory interest," but I remember I got one for baseball fans, where you could use your points for baseball-related stuff, and then I got one for extreme sports, where you could use your points to buy extreme sport equipment. Extreme sports? Have they seen me?? I'm terrified of heights! What if your parachute didn't open? You'd have all that time to think about it before hitting the ground! If they sent me that email quiz to find out when I was going to die, I'd be like, "Yeah, in 5.3 seconds!" I did think about hang-gliding once, but I talked to a hang-gliding instructor, and he said, "You never die the first time. There's what we call the Coffin Stage when you think you know what you're doing, and you forget a step. That's when it happens." Oh, and the weirdest credit card offer I got was for the Astro-Card, where you could get your sign of the zodiac on your credit card, and your monthly statement would come with a horoscope. So what mailing list was I on that they thought I was interested in baseball, extreme sports, and astrology? Does this person exist? I'd love to meet them. Maybe they sent them to me because of that time I went hang-gliding into Wrigley Stadium, hollering, "I'm a Capricorn!" Thank you so much, I'm here all week.

Famous Hat

Tux Duck in the Rosy Sunset Light

 

Today was very beautiful out, but I spent my lunch hour in the Lutheran church I used to sing in, attending an early music concert. I usually attend these alone, but today I saw a bandmate there, so I sat next to her, and then Kathbert came and sat on the other side of me. My OTHER former choir director played the organ during the all-choral concert, some Johann Christian Bach and some Schuetz and a couple of singalong JS Bach chorales, as well as a gorgeous piece by a guy I'd never heard of whose name escapes me. (I did save the program, so I can look him up, but it's at work and I'm at home.) Afterwards someone insisted on taking a photo of all us former and current choir members with our former director, but I have not seen it and am not sure if I ever will.

So I tried to take a slightly longer afternoon walk but didn't get a workout, and I tried to pray the rosary on the shuttle home but my shuttle buddy got on one decade in and we yakked the rest of the ride. When I got home, since it was very light now that we're on Central FAKE TIME, I prayed the rest of the rosary while walking outside, and that got me my workout. Then I prayed another rosary online with Anna Banana II. That's okay, I never got one in on Monday, so it all evens out. However, the walking cut into my attempt to catch up with recorded Colbert shows, so when Travalon came home, he left me to keep watching them and went down to the dock. He took some photos of the end of the sunset.

Tux Duck and his Lady Love swim in the rosy light.

The secret club I'm in is doing some Festival of Shenanigans that involves me having to download yet another app, and it wanted a profile photo but wouldn't take the ones I was trying to upload from my computer, so finally in frustration I just let it take a photo with my camera. And wouldn't you know that worked? Although this isn't the worst photo of me - it's way better than all those head shots I tried to take or have coworkers take back when the Guidepost people needed a headshot for my article.

Guess I should have sat back in my easy chair, laughed about how silly the whole thing was, and let my camera capture me. Still, the photo they used was way better. It was not a headshot but a crop of a photo my coworker took of me for our department website some time ago, before the pandemic. That coworker doesn't even work at the university anymore. He was named for a Norse god and had a baby he named after a constellation not long before getting a much higher-paying job in the private sector. I would see him around town with his wife and baby now and then, and he stopped in once or twice, but it's been a while. For all I know he now has another child named after, say, a theological concept, or a mountain. Or both: "Meet my daughter, Perichoresis Fuji. We call her Peri for short." That's just what happens, isn't it? We all say, "We'll stay in touch!" and we do... for a little while. Or we become friends on social media and then never see each other's posts because all we see are ads for stuff we'd never want. It's sad, but it's natural. Only a few people come into your life and stay there for good.

Famous Hat

The Return of Roy

 

Today I worked from home, and it was still beautiful out though not as warm as the last two days, so at lunchtime I went outside for a walk. My goal: to walk as fast as I can for half an hour, because that's all the time I have. My neighbor's goal: waste as much time as possible, because she's retired, bored, and lonely and has nothing but time. She asked if she and her little dog could walk with me, and I said sure, but we had to keep stopping to talk to people. Somehow it counted as a workout, but it wasn't much for either steps or effort. The little dog jumped on my knees so hard that my left one kind of buckled backwards a tiny bit, and I was scared I'd be crippled for life, but can you believe it actually felt better going up the stairs than it has in months? Maybe she snapped something back into place. This evening I had to run around the house to get more steps and active time, but my FitBit said my workout was a "walk," and that it was "moderate," not "vigorous." Man, what would it take to impress this FitBit?

At Adoration I was thinking about these televangelist types who say God talks to them all the time, and it seems like they have a very different experience than I do. I talk at God all the time (I mean ALL the time), although I've gotten better about not giving Him a running commentary in my head nonstop. He has only talked directly to me a few times, but every time it was short and to the point, and also it was somehow TERRIFYING. The closest thing I can relate it to is if you had a beloved teacher when you were a little kid, one who thought you were particularly clever and funny, and then you did something bad. (But not that bad - I mean, you're a little kid in this scenario, right? How bad can it be?) Then she says to you, "I think that you should share the crayons with your friend, Famous," and you are DEVASTATED because you let down this perfect person who thought you were so wonderful. It's more like that than being scared of lightning or a plane crash or whatever. It's nothing like, "And then God told me that Dear Leader was chosen by Him to lead this country!" The God I'm familiar with doesn't seem like He'd be too impressed with Dear Leader, but of course He would love him.

Today Roy came home.

Here he is, with his son Roy Jr.

I'll let Travalon tell the story:

Roy, the half red/ half blue British bear has lived with us for almost a year now. He comes from South London and grew up near Selhurst Park, the home stadium of the Crystal Palace FC soccer team of the English Premier League. He is named after legendary Palace manager Roy Hodgson who is now retired and has become a diehard lifetime Palace fan, and has even been employed with the club as a statistician, manager, and scout.

Roy is very happy to be with us at our home in Wisconsin, yet his heart will always be in England. He came along with us on our trip to Colorado over this past Christmas, wanting to see the vast landscape of the American West, but he suddenly received an urgent call with bad news from home that his mother was dying and we had to put him on a flight to London out of Denver. Roy’s young son Roy Jr. lived with his grandmother, who sadly did pass away in late December. Roy stayed across the big pond to take care of personal affairs and stay with and comfort his son, then unexpectedly in early February he was offered a temporary scouting job with Palace and despite his still grieving and having his hands full taking care of his son, he couldn’t refuse the job because of his undying loyalty to the club. He couldn’t leave Roy Jr. alone so he asked us if we could accommodate him here for awhile. Of course we were happy to oblige. Our other live-in critter friends such as Randy Panda, Pounce the Florida Panther, Percy The Snow Leopard and especially Young Fat the Bear all befriended Roy Jr., making him feel right at home and cuddling with him while watching TV in my recliner. He even gets to enjoy watching Crystal Palace matches with fellow huge fan - and BBC sports talk show host Jerry The Kraken. Although Wolves supporters Wolfie and Wendy are a bit introverted and don’t associate much with the others, they let Roy Jr. watch Wolves matches with them along with Rodrigo The Rhino.

Some unexpected good news for Roy Jr. came last week, his father’s scouting stint came to an end, and his work helped Palace win five out of their last seven matches to move up to 11th in the Premier League standings. He arrived today and there was a sweet father and son reunion. They will most likely stay permanently as they love it here and are surrounded by many caring friends. When a Saturday morning Palace match comes on our TV, the club will have quite a cheering section!! It will be interesting when they have their rematch with Wolverhampton as they have an impressive one with us here as well! I may not have much room to move in my recliner.

Famous Hat again. My Yahoo email has taken to giving me an AI summary of my emails, and this is the summary of Roy's story: "Roy, a British bear named after Roy Hodgson, has joined your family in Wisconsin after a year in England, attending Crystal Palace matches and now enjoying a temporary scouting job, with a hopeful future reunion with his father." I don't know why that killed me. Maybe it's because AI thinks Roy's father is Roy Jr.? AI has a ways to go before it takes over.

This scary-looking dog was on the playground where Travalon works today.

It was wandering around without a leash. Fortunately there were some veterinary students visiting the kids, so they were able to take care of the dog. Its owner was playing soccer in a nearby field, and it took them an hour to find him. People, keep your dogs on leashes! That is not cool.

Famous Hat

Simple Spanish, or Hola Hoopla

 

(Apologies to the writers of Bullwinkle for that alternate title.)

Today Travalon and I drove separately to my parking lot, then we left my car there and he drove me to work. He wasn't sure he could pick me up as usual, so this would allow me to take the shuttle home. It was a beautiful day, and I walked with Hardingfele at lunchtime. I did my first "training" for the new system we will be using at work, but it's more of an overview than actual hands-on training, so that was a disappointment. Otherwise, it was a productive day at work.

Travalon was able to pick me up from work, but the traffic was terrible because there was a fire downtown in a residence - apparently five people were displaced. Once we got home, we went down to the dock to enjoy the beautiful evening. Here are some photos. First, Tux Duck and his Lady Love are back.

We saw the muskrat swimming around again, but there is a lot less ice for it to climb onto.

It was fairly windy, and the constant wind vibrated a cord on a boat lift, creating an eerie tune in the background. Another sound we heard was a chorus of cranes surrounding us. We saw "our" cranes trying to get into Mariner's before it closes.

I think we missed our chance to get to Bellitalia one last time, because it wasn't open tonight, and I had heard this was its last day in business. At least we have eaten there many times over the years, so it's not like we missed our chance. I remember about a year ago reading about a Brazilian restaurant on the west side that had closed, and I felt terrible because I'd never even known it had existed. We definitely would have tried it!

We could see the moon even in the late afternoon light.

Then we sat out on the porch, enjoying the lovely evening. I wrote a letter to Mariah, as I try to do every week, and then I did some DuoLingo... and finished the math course! What the hey? I thought it was going to teach me calculus! It didn't really teach me anything, just gave me a refresher on how to add fractions and multiply negative numbers. It was time for Night Prayer anyway, so afterwards I went back on and started the Spanish course. It asked if I knew any Spanish, and I said some, so it said it would test me to see where I should go... but it didn't give me any test, it just stuck me in a really basic lesson: "A man. A woman. A boy. A girl." After I got every answer right in four lessons, it bumped me up a level to "Sorry, please, excuse me, thank you." I'm still getting every answer right, so maybe it will bump me up again. I don't think this is the level of Spanish I should be in, but at least all my lessons have been perfect so far. I suppose there's something to be said for that.

Famous Hat

Gaelic Storm

 

The show last night was excellent. It started with the Madison Pipes and Drums playing a rousing set, then a band came on called Rev. Peyton's Big Damn Band, which was not actually a big band since it consisted of the Rev. Peyton on guitar (and he was unreal, he was so good), his wife Washboard Breezy on the washboard, and Jacob the Snacob on drums. They had a banner of what looked like a classic T-Bird behind them, and when they were playing, the headlights lit up. They didn't even need a bass player because this guy was so good that he played the bass line with his thumb. He had at least eight guitars, and I'm pretty sure he played them all. It was hardcore blues.

The headliners were Gaelic Storm, led by frontman Pat Murphy, who is apparently actually from somewhere in Ireland. He is very entertaining, spending as much time telling stories as he did singing. A lot of the people around us knew all the songs and sang along, including a black guy in a very impressive kilt outfit, and to my surprise I knew quite a few of them myself and sang along. I'm not sure if they're Irish folk songs or Gaelic Storm originals, but I've heard them somewhere before. The guitarist, who was named Parker, would start playing some random song, like "Don't Fear the Reaper" by the Blue Oyster Cult, and Pat Murphy would sing, "I don't know the words to this song," or whatever. When Parker (who is much younger) asked Pat his age, Pat sang, "I write your paychecks." There was also a woman playing fiddle whose name I didn't catch, a drummer whose name I didn't catch, and a guy named Peter who played tin whistle, uilleann pipes, and other instruments. Some local Irish dancers joined them for one song, and then for their encore, the Big Damn Band, the Pipes and Drums, and the Irish dancers all took the stage with them. What an entertaining show!

Today was Daylight Saving Time, but since we go to such a late Mass, I woke up in plenty of time. Right after that we hurried to Rex's Innkeeper for the Shamrock Club's St. Patrick's Day dinner. Here we are!

A band called Slipjig played beforehand, and we talked to a number of people and tried something amazing: Jameson's Orange. So good you can drink it straight! The food at the dinner was okay, but the dessert was this Bailey's cheesecake with a dark chocolate crust and chocolate whipped cream on top. So delicious! Good thing it's Sunday, because it was very un-Lenten. I even had coffee with a shot of chocolate Bailey's. We had bought $20 worth of raffle tickets, and Travalon really wanted a map of Ireland from 1779, so he was watching everyone eagerly whose ticket got drawn to see if they took his map. Of course the first few people took the bottles of booze, and then after all that coffee and Jameson and water I had to run to the bathroom so I didn't see Travalon's number get drawn. He was so excited to get his map! I was bummed to miss his moment of joy, but I contend that the reason he won is because I went to the bathroom. It always works for the Mallards - the moment I pop in the loo, they have a fabulous play. Here is the map.

The winning ticket had been in the middle of the string of tickets we had gotten, so I asked Travalon where the first two were. He had no idea, and I figured the odds that they would draw one of those two numbers were very small, but the lady sitting across from us asked to see the map, and when Travalon picked it up, there were the two missing tickets. And wouldn't you know that they drew one of those numbers? By then there was very little left to win, so I went up and chose a book of Irish humor. We had a good time talking to the couple across from us, who were about our age and very friendly.

It was a gorgeous day, and we had spent enough time stuck inside, so we went to Cherokee Marsh because an old coworker of mine from the Press said the swans were back. Indeed they were! Here are photos.

In these next few photos, you can see the big flock of greater white-fronted geese behind the swans.

Travalon wanted you all to see this picture of a tiger that he colored.

I can't remember the last time I got to color a picture at my job. Not that I'm jealous or anything...

Famous Hat

And the Answer Is...

 

I know everyone was waiting with bated breath to find out whether I went to the International Festival or the Bach Around the Clock marathon today. Well, wonder no more - I am about to reveal the answer.

This morning Travalon was watching Crystal Palace with Jerry and Roy Jr., then he drove me to St. Andrew's Episcopal Church to attend... Bach Around the Clock. He thought about going to the men's Badger Basketball game, but the tickets were really expensive, and he figured it would be a boring game because they were playing Penn State, who are not good this year. Instead, he watched part of the game at the Laurel Tavern, and then he went to Leopold's.

I got to Bach Around the Clock just as the recorder ensemble was finishing up, which includes an old choir mate of mine. The next group included the lead singer from Yid Vicious and a guy I know from early music circles, and they did a really fun mashup of Bach's Invention in D Minor and a Macedonian folk song. My choir mate joined me, and the next group we saw was a community choir, so we talked about joining it. She's already in the St. Andrew's choir and the recorder group. I remember when I used to be in two choirs and three bands - where did I find the energy?? This choir practices on Monday nights, which is the same night as the Russian Folk Orchestra, which I keep saying I'm going to join but haven't yet. After that there was a bell choir playing Bach, and a cellist playing Bach, but the pianist that was next on the list apparently couldn't make it, because the MC led us in a rousing rendition of "A Mighty Fortress Is Our God," verses 1 and 3, with the implicit understanding that we are facing the evil forces in the hymn in Dear Leader, his overlord in the Kremlin, and the oligarchs destroying our democracy. 

And then... my favorite part, a tribute to PDQ Bach. First some singers sang some of his pieces, which sound quite beautiful if you don't listen to the words, like that the hocket causes the singers to sing: "Hot!" "Dog!" "Hot!" "Dog!" Or if you disregard the fact that the bass just wandered off during one piece and started scatting like he was singing jazz, not a madrigal, which I assume is in the directions. After all, these are the "discoveries" of Peter Schickele, who was allegedly the Very Full Professor of Musical Pathology at the University of Southern North Dakota at Hoople. (A real town of 247 people - I looked it up.) Then the husband of the Professor Formerly Known as Lute Player played two Musical Contraptions, one of them based on the simple melody that as kids we sang to the words, "On the Planet Mars/Where the Ladies Smoke Cigars," and the last part was a concerto for viola four hands. I made a brief video.

The concerto had four movements, and in the last one, the two violists get in a fight, run offstage, and make a lot of noise. Eventually one came back triumphantly holding an instrument in several pieces (which was actually a violin), and then the other one shuffled back onto the stage with an ice pack held to his forehead. Then they both exited the stage again, and the pianist kept playing the same figure over and over, waiting for them to come back, until he got disgusted and left too. I was laughing so hard! My favorite character who commissioned a piece by PDQ Bach is Count Pointercount. That reminds me of the terrible jokes in Bullwinkle, which we were watching last night, like regarding Boris and Natasha, "the two heels with no souls." I laughed so hard at that, I didn't even catch the rest of what they said.

This reminds me that late last night I told Travalon that Niko really matches the cover of this month's Magnificat, and he said, "He should have been on the cover of Time. He could have been Person of the Year instead of Dear Leader," and I said, "Person? Nah. Maybe Keychain of the Year."

Anyway, back to the Bach marathon. My former choir mate went downstairs for snacks, but I stayed to watch an organist before joining her. Another former choir mate was a volunteer downstairs, so the three of us chatted before I had to go outside to meet Travalon. As I waited, the sandwich board announcing the marathon ("Free Bach Event Today! BachClock.com") fell over not once but twice. It may have even fallen over again after that, but I wasn't there to do anything about it, because Travalon arrived and told me the Badgers had actually lost to the subpar team. (As Boris Badinov said, "I didn't go to Penn State - I went to State Pen!") (Another line that made me lose it: "Are you incinerating that I'm stupid?") He had brought me a pandan latte from Leopold's, and I happily drank it as we drove to Tiedemann's Pond, where we took a vigorous walk around the circumference. No birds there yet.

We had to get back so that I could go to a meeting of the condo board members from the three area boards, to ask questions of the developer who is buying Mariner's. He says he would like to have a restaurant on the ground floor that honors the memory of Mariner's, so that makes me happy. He is thinking only two floors of apartments above that, and one of the other board's members was not happy that it would be apartments instead of condos, but it was implied that these would be pricy enough apartments to keep the riffraff out. Also, the marina is going to stay the same. The developer really wanted to talk to us after the fiasco with the developer who purchased the Nau-Ti-Gal and then pissed off the neighborhood so much with his grandiose plans that we got the town to turn down his plans, and he has yet to come back with acceptable ones, so the building is just sitting there empty, surrounded by fencing. 

After the meeting, Travalon and I went down to the dock, where we saw geese and some small ducks hanging out on the ice or swimming in the open water in the channel. We saw a muskrat, and he started to climb onto the ice, but then Travalon moved closer to take a photo, so he dove back into the water. It is definitely getting to be spring! 

Tonight we are going to see Gaelic Storm, so I'll try to blog about that tomorrow. It will probably be a late night, so that's why I'm blogging now. Luckily the Mass we always go to is at a late time, because tomorrow Fake Time starts. I vaguely remember someone telling me months ago that, "You might not like Dear Leader, but he banned Daylight Saving Time." I said, "Really? Then I do have to give him credit for doing something good." But apparently he did not ban it. My fear is that, instead, in November he will say that we are never going back to Real Time again. He is totally evil enough to do that.

Famous Hat

Bach Around the Clock in the Frank Lloyd Wrong Auditorium

 

Today my "Irish Word of the Day" was "sneachta," which means snow, and the sentence was, "Ta se ag cur sneachta," which literally means "is it putting snow," but you'd translate it, "It is snowing." And it was snowing outside! (The verb coming first doesn't make it a question like it would in English - it always comes first in Irish. They would have a whole different form of the verb for a question.) The "ag" is basically "-ing" in English, in case you were curious about its function. It was snowing during my morning walk and during my lunchtime walk, but by my afternoon walk it had stopped. 

This evening Jilly Moose and I went to a Bach Around the Clock concert at First Unitarian. The concert was in the Landmark Auditorium, which I thought was the big concert hall I'd been to many times, so Jilly Moose and I went in that end of the compound and were bewildered by the very un-Lenten spread of brownies in front of us. I knew they were having a birthday party for Bach, but I had been expecting champagne and a sheet cake. We sat down, and a guy got up and started talking about the documentary we were about to watch, and I realized we must have been in the wrong place. We snuck out, and a guy in the hallway said the concert was in the Frank Lloyd Wrong area of the compound, so we went to get our coats, and he said, "You're going the wrong way!" We had to tell him three times we were getting our coats, and then he followed us all the way to the Landmark Auditorium, as if he thought we wouldn't make it across the parking lot. Fortunately, a woman had been talking the whole time, so the music hadn't started yet. If you look at the windows, they look a little like a face.

The first part of the concert was inventions in many of the keys, but not all of them. The performer played them on a piano tuned in equal temperament, and I wondered what they would have sounded like on a harpsichord tuned the way Bach's was when he wrote them. I suppose that's why some of the keys were missing, like E flat minor and B major, because they probably sounded horrible in the temperament Bach used. In modern tuning, it just seems random to leave some keys out. 

The second part of the concert was a concerto where the pianist was joined by a string quartet, and that I really enjoyed. Even the slow movement, which was a Siciliana and so not as boring as the slow movements of Baroque concerti often are. Afterwards there was a party for Bach's birthday, but we just had sparkling water instead of Prosecco, since we had to drive home. Tomorrow there are more free concerts for Bach Around the Clock, and also the free International Festival at the Overture Center, so I'm not sure which to choose. Also, I have to go to a meeting at 3:45, so I can't spend all day at either festival like I have in the past. Watch for my next blog post to see which I choose to attend.

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Brainless Day

 

I recently found out that I can get a free subscription to the New York Times through my job, and so I have been enjoying Wordle every day. People told me I'd be good at it, and Prairie Man said the best word to start with is "canoe" because it has so many vowels, and that has served me well. Maybe too well, because yesterday Wordle asked if I wanted to put it into "difficult mode." No, I do not want to put it into "difficult mode" - I enjoy the illusion of thinking I'm a super-genius because I can usually solve it in three guesses. Life is hard - why should Wordle be unnecessarily hard too?

Last night as one of my Lenten practices, I actually got to bed something like on time, and it's just not working for me. I didn't wake up until my alarm yanked me out of a dream, and my brain never really woke up. For example, I was meeting with a person who is one of those incredibly good people, so decent that they almost don't seem real, like he would never do anything the least bit morally problematic, which has nothing to do with the story but I'm just painting a picture for you. We were paying a bill, and I had to multiply the per capita cost by the number of people, but then I forgot it was for four months and had to redo the form to multiply by four. I wrote out the check... and then put it back in my secure file cabinet and locked it. He said, "Um... don't I need the check?" Why yes, yes you do! I was just keeping it safe for you, see. My chair gave me a strong cup of coffee, and it turns out the two of them know each other, so I didn't even have to introduce them. I'm still a little unclear on how they know each other, but the university is like a big small town - everyone knows each other somehow. I am not sure who the Village Idiot is, so hopefully that doesn't mean it's me...

I walked with Hardingfele at lunch; we don't walk together that often because she usually turns me down. Today she said, "Maybe," and then when I asked her closer to lunch, she said, "Sure." It was a bit cold out, but no wind and very sunny, but she wanted to go into the Horticulture greenhouses. She thought it was wonderful in there, but I was dying in what my coworker calls my "sleeping bag coat" because it goes all the way down to my feet. I also have Spyder gloves that I paid a fortune for a quarter of a century ago, and they are just now getting holes in them so I should probably replace them. Those are some high-quality gloves! Hopefully they still make them - I'd like another pair exactly the same.

I'll try to get to bed on time again today, but after that strong coffee, it may be a waste of time. We shall see.

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Ash Wednesday 2025

 

I am still obsessed with "Ai No Corrida," and I wonder how many other wonderful songs are out there that I have never heard. For example, why do you always hear Post Malone on the radio but you never hear Thundercat? I wouldn't have known about his song "Dragonball Durag" if Colbert hadn't had him on his show. How do I find these great songs that don't get as much exposure?

Today: no social media reels for me! I'm addicted to these short videos. I was also trying to fast all day, and right at the end the chair offered me some cookies, but I said, "It's Ash Wednesday!" Then I apologized for being rude, but she said I wasn't rude. Guess I have to try harder...

The weather was terrible today, and I meant to take a photo out my office window of the "winter wonderland," but of course I kept forgetting. I walked outside on my morning break, but under the roof to avoid the snow, and for some reason my heart rate really spiked. Is that a bad sign? Am I about to die? I was hoping to walk in the big conference room overlooking the lake during my lunch break, and the online calendar said it was free, but someone was in there anyway. This time I know I didn't get the day wrong - it was just someone doing a video call. So I went outside again, and again in the afternoon, and by then the ground was icy. 

When I got to my car, it was covered with ice. I drove to a gas station, but the cover to my gas tank was frozen shut. My windshield wipers were also frozen (I should have put them up), but fortunately the snow had stopped by then, so I didn't need them. No idea what I would have done if I had needed them! I met Travalon at the church on the far east side for Mass, and when I told him about my gas cover, he looked online and found the liquid on the squeegees at the gas stations can help melt the ice. After Mass we went to the gas station closer to our house, and by then the gas tank cover had thawed enough for me to open it without using the squeegee, but the windshield wipers never got free even by the time I got home. Hopefully a night in the garage will thaw them out...

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Happy Mardi Gras/St. Casimir's Day/Vivaldi's Birthday

 

This morning Travalon and I went to get our taxes done, and I felt like maybe I left a bit abruptly when my FitBit said I had ten minutes left to get my steps for the hour. We get a little back from the feds (someday?) but owe a little to the state, so we had the deduction set to go on Thursday, since that is my payday. It was all futile, because I missed my move hours somehow between 11-12, after doing a chaplet that usually gets me enough steps and failing to make sure, and then weirdly I was paid today so no need for the delay. I mentioned it on the chat at work, and several other coworkers were surprised to see they had also been paid, but apparently our credit union now puts the money from your paycheck into your account two days ahead of time. So that's cool. 

This evening, once I got back from adoration, Travalon and I went to Lola's for Mardi Gras. They had a special Mardi Gras menu of shrimp po' boys or gumbo, but they were out of the po' boys. I did get the gumbo, and Travalon got pelmenis, which were really delicious; he gave me a few, since my bowl of gumbo was very small, maybe because they were running out. Travalon had a tropical drink called an ornithology.

I always take Mardi Gras seriously because I take Lent seriously. In that spirit, we had the same dessert we'd had on my birthday, the chocolate pot de creme with lavender whipped cream, only instead of dark chocolate, now it's milk chocolate with caramel. Almost too much going on there; I liked the simplicity of the dark chocolate and the lavender, but this was still delicious. There was a DJ playing excellent music like the Squirrel Nut Zippers and Satchmo, and then she played a song I'd never heard before, "Ai No Corrida" by Chaz Jankel. I was eight years old when this song was released, and in all these years I'd never heard it. It's like he wrote it with me in mind: it's fast-paced, syncopated, minor key, and he sings in falsetto. I was so enchanted that I asked our waitress if I could tip the DJ. She didn't have a tip jar, so I just handed her what I had left from my own tip playing in Spring Green, and she lit up: "Nobody has ever given me a real tip before!" I said, "That last song was a revelation," and she told me what it was. (Which I already knew, since I'd asked Shazam.) That felt like some good karma, since the DJ is young and probably needs $5 way more than I do, since I have a day job that pays okay. Honestly, I often end up using my own tips to tip other musicians, since it's the only cash I usually have, and a lot of them do it for a living where it's just a hobby for me. So I have listened to "Ai No Corrida" about a hundred times tonight, and now I'm listening to Vivaldi, first his concerto in D minor for two violins, and now his concerto in B minor for four violins. 

I don't have much to say about St. Casimir, not being Polish, except that Ethel had a friend who named her daughter Casimir so she could call her Cassie, and we all thought that was kind of weird. Then again, that same woman had two daughters named Greta and Gretchen, so naming daughters was not her strong suit.

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Proof You Exist

 

Today I worked on campus and took a quick walk before a lunchtime meeting. Here is another contribution to my "Faces of Campus" series:

I had another meeting after lunch, which was online, and we had our cameras and mics muted so they could talk at us. It was a very refreshing nap. Then in the evening, Travalon and I went swimming in the warm pool. The last few times we have been swimming, it doesn't show up as exercise on my FitBit. I must not be swimming as hard, yet my arms slightly ache. Partly this is because there were pink weights in front of a pile of pink pool noodles, and I was so enchanted with the pinkness of it all that after swimming around for about twenty minutes, I grabbed the weights and used them. 

Here are a couple of things I forgot to mention: during my gig a couple of weekends ago, people kept raving over my mandolin, saying how beautiful it is or that they had one like it once but how did I play it without a strap? That's why I love playing gigs - it's definitely not the money, and sometimes it's not the tunes we play (I like some, and some I could live without) - it's the people going all gaga over my antique mandolin. It makes me feel like a Z-list celebrity.

Thursday my shuttle buddy was back, and we talked all the way to work and all the way back, so she must not be sick of me. When the shuttle dropped us back off at the parking lot, I could hear a nearby train blowing its horn. When I was waiting to turn from Aberg onto Sherman, I could see the train behind the houses there, and I hoped to beat it home. As I turned onto Knutson, I looked down at the railroad tracks and could see it in the distance. I waited in the Nau-T-Gal parking lot for what seemed like much longer than it should have taken to get there, and just when I had decided to go to the intersection at Highway M, I could hear it coming so I stayed put. It was the slowest train I'd ever seen pass by on that track.

For some reason today I was remembering how my college roommate and I wrote a newsletter for our dorm. We had both had friends in high school who called us "Biff," so the newsletter, called "Proof You Exist," was written by Biff and Biff. Our house fellow had said her boyfriend who went to another school might bring some guys with him when he came to visit, so one of our headlines was: "Mass Blind Date from Out of State??" The other Biff and I were considered kind of weird by the other people on our dorm floor (fair enough, we were kind of weird), and they complained about the title of the newsletter, so the next issue was called "Irrefutable Evidence of Your Existence," and it was just as goofy, so two other girls said they would take over. They wrote one issue, which everyone said wasn't as good as the work of Biff and Biff, and then, sadly, the newsletter ceased publication. I wonder if I have a copy of either issue somewhere?

Time for bed! Also, time for some DuoLingo bragging:

No calculus yet. I'm still adding fractions, and negative numbers, and sometimes negative fractions. I thought the next unit was imaginary numbers... but maybe I imagined it.

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Madison Mystery Tour and Schlitz Audubon Center

 

Yesterday I went to get my hair cut, and since it's close to the Essen Haus and Come Back In, we thought we'd get lunch at one of those places. However, they were not open yet, so we went to the Cardinal Bar, a place I went dancing thirty years ago and never pictured having lunch. The empanadas were really good, especially the vegetarian one which was more like a samosa with Indian spices. I couldn't find Niko in my purse and felt a little panicked, but the logical part of my brain was like, "You left him at home," and indeed, he was safe in his Niko Nook. Then Travalon and I took a walk on a boardwalk they have made in our neighborhood for trucks to go into the marsh to work on the power lines. Nowhere does it say we can't walk on them too. It was colder than a few days ago, but still lovely and sunny out. 

In the afternoon we met Rich, Kathbert, and Pete the Sailor Man at Mr. Why's grave to put flowers on it for the anniversary of his death, like we do every year. This time we actually remembered on the right date and not halfway through the month. Then Rich, Pete, Travalon, and I had some snacks and warm beverages at La Brioche. Travalon and I swung by Picnic Point to see if there were any birds around, but we mostly saw ice fishermen who are braver than I am - no way would I walk on that rotten ice! We did see a few geese. On the way home we stopped at Mendota County Park, and Travalon took a couple of photos.

In the evening we went to see a Beatles tribute band called Madison Mystery Tour do music from 1965-66, which is the era of two of their best albums, Rubber Soul and Revolver. I had taken an edible, but I didn't read the directions, which is that you are supposed to cut them in half. Why put the work on me? Why not just make them half as big? Anyway, that was way too much THC, and I felt like I heard every tiny error the musicians made, although I really enjoyed their version of "Tomorrow Never Knows." I felt dizzy and like I didn't know where I was in time and space. Everything was slowed down, and I was having trouble walking like a normal human being. Now I get why Travalon didn't enjoy it when he had a whole chocolate instead of half of one like the people selling it recommended. I was bummed that the band didn't do "Michelle" or "I'm Only Sleeping," but they did do "Girl," which is another one I really like, I suppose because it's minor key. It was still a great show. 

The funny thing about being stoned is that you see connections where there probably aren't any, so maybe stoned people are the ones who create conspiracy theories - I came up with that theory while I was stoned. Can't remember any of the deep thoughts I had, but at one point I was trying to determine the numeric value of two words, and I got as far as figuring out that L was 3 and then realized I couldn't remember what the words were. So much for that theory!

Today I still felt, if not stoned, at least very groggy all through Mass. Immediately afterwards we drove to Milwaukee to visit the Schlitz Audubon Center, but first we had lunch at the Three Lions Pub, and I realized I was wearing a very Irish outfit (scarf and necklace with Celtic symbols) to an English pub. Oops! The center is in Bayside; my interest in going there was to see a display of astronomical photography done by amateurs, and some of them were amazing, of eclipses and nebulas and the aurora borealis. Travalon and I took some photos, but I'm not sure about the ethics of posting them here without permission. Instead, enjoy these photos I took last night of Venus and the crescent moon.

You could really see the planets in an arc across the sky last night. It was so cool! 

There are lots of hiking trails at the Schlitz Audubon Center, so Travalon and I took one down to the beach.

I think we saw a fata morgana, because looking at the far shoreline, we could see a floating peninsula beyond it that looked odd, like it was in pieces. It looked like photos I've seen of the phenomenon. Unfortunately, Travalon didn't have his good camera, and it was way too far away to take photos with our cell phones.

This is a soft-shell turtle they have at the center, burrowing into the sand.

Then we went to Virmond County Park and took a walk there too. From there we couldn't see the fata morgana; the far shore looked totally normal. Here are some photos. The park is on top of a bluff overlooking the lake.

Would you like to take a seat?

We hurried back to Madison, but we were a bit late coming back for me to get to band practice, so we just had some dinner at It's Good for You Pizza. So delicious! We tried to go to Bellitalia, which is closing in about a week, but there was a two-hour wait. We may not be able to get in before it closes for good.

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