Hookah Party and Steel Drums

 

Yesterday I met Tiffy downtown for an early lunch at the Globe, then we drove to the outdoor theater to see Fallen Angels, a play by Noel Coward. This was the play we had been most interested in when the Dairyman's Daughter gave us the list of plays we could get discounted tickets for, but I already had Mallards tickets for the night it was cheap. We decided driving home in the middle of the night on a Friday after a whole workweek was a lot anyway, so Tiffy got full-price tickets for the Saturday afternoon showing. Had we known, we could have waited for a day when tickets are half price, because wow are they expensive at full price! Meanwhile, the Dairyman's Daughter had won tickets in a silent auction, and she could choose any date, so she decided to go the date we were going. During the day there is a large awning over the stage to protect the actors from the sun, but nothing to protect us, unless we wore a hat like some very intelligent people did. (Just sayin.') The Dairyman's Daughter got a bit burned and bought some sunscreen during intermission. Wow, did we get hot out there! By the second half the sun had gone behind the trees enough so that we were in shade, and we wondered why they didn't just start the play an hour and a half later. It was a hilarious play about two women fearing they would be tempted to adultery by an old flame coming to town. Afterwards all three of us went out to dinner at the Riverside Resort, but all the outdoor seating that was actually riverside was full, so we had to sit inside and content ourselves with looking out the window.

After that Tiffy and I drove to Deerfield for an Arabian Nights Hookah Party co-hosted by Mamastep and the actual owner of the house, which had a spectacular garden he had filled with beautiful lights and tables with hookahs on them. People brought Mideastern food, and Mideastern music played in the background. The co-host and his paramour wore matching shirts. His house was full of orchids, and I loved this rug.

I should have taken a photo of the garden. Tiffy just stayed at a table on the deck and smoked the hookah with lemon cake flavored tobacco, but I went around and tried all the flavors: sweet corn, cappuccino (very disappointing), passionfruit, and banana milkshake. A woman I am friends with on social media said to her the banana milkshake was the uncanny valley of banana, which led to a discussion of the House on the Rock, the premier site of experiencing the uncanny valley. This morphed into a discussion of the problems with agriculture in this country, and Mamastep said, "I'd like to change the topic to manure," which isn't really changing it, and my social media buddy said, "By all means, let's talk sh-t." We all lost it, and her husband said, "That's why I married her!" She also brought pistachio cream tartlets in phyllo dough cups with chocolate drizzled on top in an attempt to make her own Dubai chocolate, and they were incredible. Travalon (who had been at Horicon all day with his high school buddy - photos soon) arrived and tried the different hookahs, and he loved the banana milkshake one, which was my second favorite. Almost everyone liked the lemon cake one best. When the party was winding down and I thought most people had left, I popped inside to powder my nose and discovered a small party in the living room, listening to Boismortier. When I mentioned it to the host, he said, "I changed the music to Egyptian jazz, but they must have changed it back." I said, "Egyptian jazz sounds cool," and he said, "Oh, it is!" but far be it from me to criticize anyone for listening to French Baroque composers. This was the coolest party I've been to in years, and I got home very late, so it felt a little like college again.

Today I felt a little queasy (too much hookah?), and at Mass it didn't help that a woman ahead of me had disgusting growths on her shoulders, and someone was having issues with flatulence, but I made it through. We were just going to go home and have a simple lunch there, but Travalon wanted to stop at the coffee shop on North Street, and outside of it was a truck selling lobster products. We got all distracted and forgot about the coffee; I was going to get a good, old-fashioned lobster roll, but they had a lobster grilled cheese sandwich on the menu, and I remembered those fondly from Bimini. Travalon got the lobster tail with tater tots. What an incredible find!

Travalon and I took a walk on Governor's Island, then we checked out a mysterious trail in the woods we had seen nearby, but it only went about twenty feet and then dead-ended, so we walked on the trail across from the bluff. We met Jilly Moose at the East Side Club to hear the steel drum band, and I hadn't realized that both of my Brazilian drumming teachers were in it. Toward the end of the concert it rained a tiny bit, so a bunch of people left, but we hardcore types (including a coworker from years ago) stuck it out. I saw this mysterious arch inside the East Side Club. It looks like it's for an autumn wedding, but it's not autumn yet!

And here is a gaming machine I saw at the Riverside Resort. Am I the only one who find this vaguely dirty?

And my tradescantia that is outside is blooming. This is a "bonus plant," because the pot is supposed to have a fuchsia plant in it, but that died and this plant appeared out of nowhere.

Tonight I had band practice, but I was a bit late getting there after the steel drum concert, so Hardingfele said, "You weren't trapping cats, so what's your excuse??" Apparently she was almost as late as I was. Our bassist was playing fiddle, so there were four fiddles, and I said, "Man, I almost brought my fiddle - we could have had five!" The bassist got her bass, and she let me play her fiddle on some klezmer tunes. It felt weird to go back to playing the mandolin again after all that time with my violin, but we got reacquainted with each other. She desperately needs new strings, so that is a project for sometime soon. Travalon bought me a set at one point, but I have no idea where they went. I might as well just buy new ones.

I forgot to mention that during Irish Fest I was hanging out with a pescatarian (Famie) and a hardcore vegetarian (the red-headed flute player), so I ate like them and never felt better. I came home resolved to continue this but quickly reverted to my old habits and then felt kind of sick. Today at the East Side Club the cheeseburgers grilling smelled so good, so I caved and had one... and it was incredible. Travalon agrees it was the best he'd had in a long time.

Famous Hat

Tropical Night at the Outdoor Theater

 

I am doing something unusual - blogging in the morning - but I probably won't blog tonight and didn't want to get too far behind. Thursday I didn't blog because there was nothing to say. I was too sick to go to the funeral for the woman who was a pillar of our parish, and I took the afternoon off of work (I was working from home) and just rested. In the evening I didn't go to the Quebecois jam at the leftist brewery either, which I had been looking forward to. The air quality was terrible due to smoke from Canadian wildfires, but I put on an N95 mask (the one Hardingfele gave me a few weeks ago) and walked very slowly outside, but due to the virus my heart rate was so elevated that yesterday my FitBit said I had really overdone it and should take it easy.

Yesterday I worked from home and kept pounding the Mucinex, so I had a productive day since that really helped keep the virus symptoms at bay. Now I have to give some exposition to explain the evening: the Dairyman's Daughter, as my regular readers may remember, can get cheap tickets to the outdoor theater if we go on a particular Friday evening. When the list came out, Tiffy and I discussed it and felt like going so late on a Friday was too much, and the only one we wanted to see happened to be a night that Travalon and I had already purchased Mallards tickets for, so she and I got full-price tickets to a matinee on a Saturday later this month. There was one other play I was a bit interested in, called Anna in the Tropics, about a Cuban family, but Tiffy wasn't really interested. Very recently the Dairyman's Daughter reminded us that she could get tickets for the remaining shows, and only Jilly Moose was going to Anna in the Tropics, so I asked Travalon if he would want to go, and he said sure, it's not Shakespeare and it's about Cuba. Meanwhile Rich, Luxuli, and Prairie Man said they were going too, so it was going to be a big crowd. The Dairyman's Daughter knows someone who works at the outdoor theater, so he said he could get her ticket for free... and then he got all our tickets for free! I feel very bad that Tiffy didn't get in on this deal, but it all happened very rapidly, and she was on a road trip out west so I didn't want to bother her, and I had no idea the tickets would be FREE.

So yesterday evening we all met at Grandma Mary's Cafe in Arena for fish fry, except for Luxuli, who was stuck in traffic in Michigan and couldn't get back in time. I thought about calling Tiffy, but Rich offered the ticket to Kathbert, who turned it down, and then another woman from our old church, who took it. She couldn't join us until the play, and she was wearing a perfect tropical print dress so I complimented her on her sartorial choice, and she seemed annoyed and said that was just what she had worn to work, she had no idea she'd be coming to the play. Now she is a socially awkward person and maybe didn't mean to come across that abruptly, but I mean, that's an even better story, so why not play it up? "I know, isn't it crazy? I had no idea I'd be coming to a play about Cuba tonight!" As it turned out, the play was not set in Cuba but in Tampa, Florida, where the Cuban family had a cigar factory in the 1920's and had hired a lector to read novels to the workers as they did their monotonous jobs. He started with Anna Karenina, and there was a lot of drama involving adultery and a shocking ending. If I had read the novel, I would have liked it even better, but I did enjoy it, although I think some of the group didn't. 

Going up the hill at the outdoor theater is part of the experience, but I was a little afraid of going into a fib with my weird heart rate issues, so the Dairyman's Daughter and I took the shuttle up the hill for the first time. I then ran into one of our faculty members, who was there alone because her wife had to run back to Russia to care for her ailing mother, and she had never been to the outdoor theater before. She teaches a course on Anna Karenina, so she was really looking forward to the play. Things worked out well in that I had to go to the bathroom about three minutes into the play but managed to hold it until intermission, when I made a mad sprint to the bathroom and then couldn't find the group. As I stood there alone and bewildered, our faculty member found me, so we had a great conversation about the play, and then she didn't have to stand around all alone during intermission herself, so it all worked out perfectly. Best of all, since Travalon drove, I didn't have to make that long drive back in the dark. That is always my least favorite part of going to the outdoor theater.

When we got home, look who we found on our front door!

And here he is from the other side.

Isn't he just totes adorbs?

Famous Hat

Day of Freebies

 

This was a crazy day from start to finish. I woke up from a dream where Travalon and I had stumbled upon a business that would paint a portrait of a couple as royalty, and we were debating whether to get our portrait done as King Travalon and Queen Famous Hat. (But I woke up, so I'll never know if we went for it.) Then I had no idea how icy it was until braking and feeling the car slide. When I got to the parking lot and walked to the shuttle, the shuttle driver must have been laughing at me because I was walking so cautiously over the icy ground that it took me like five minutes to get to him. Then after he dropped me off, I went to cross the street, but the dip in the sidewalk was unsalted, so I hung onto a railing and then clung to a stop sign. A car stopped at the stop sign and waved to me to pass him, but I waved him through because it was going to take some time to get my footing. Once across the street, I was doing the careful penguin walk when an undergrad walked boldly past me... and immediately fell on her tush. I asked, "Are you okay??" and she was, just embarrassed.

Mid-morning I was trying to stay awake during a meeting about student payments. I arranged some of my creatures at work that are in primary colors and took a photo.

I asked questions in the chat, and other people asked really good questions, but the leader just kept saying, "We'll get to that later." Screw your Power Point, just let us ask relevant questions and answer them! So when it was done I went out into the hall and ran into a couple of grad students, and I said, "I'm so sleepy, but it's too icy to walk outside." They said they were running to the cantina, and did I want some coffee? Did I like it black? I said, "No, I do like some cream in it," and they said, "How about a latte with whole milk? That's what we always get." I blinked in surprise. "Yes! That's what I always order! And they ask if I want a flavor shot in it, but I say, 'Coffee is a flavor, or how could there be coffee-flavored ice cream?'" and they said, "Exactly!" Then they brought me a huge latte that I had with my lunch, and they didn't even want me to pay them for it, plus they said the ice had melted outside, so I took a long, satisfying walk.

In the late afternoon Hardingfele told me her coworker had three tickets to a touring Broadway show called Shucked that she was giving away, and would Travalon and I want to go? I said Travalon would probably not be interested, but I could ask; however, she had already asked her other coworker, the one I have mentioned on this blog before who goes to the church we now go to. Hardingfele said I should call her Crochet Girl. I took the shuttle to my car and then drove to my old church downtown, where the other two met me. The Globe and Himal Chuli were packed, so we went to Ian's Pizza, which worked out for me because I had gotten a coupon for a free slice of pizza when I donated blood last week. Then the three of us found our seats, and the woman sitting on the other side of me somehow became my new best friend - we were laughing about all the dirty lines in this play, and at intermission she said she could get us all free wine because she is a sponsor. Wow! What an unexpected turn this day took! Free coffee, free pizza, a free show, AND free wine! Life is good!

Famous Hat

Travalon's Photos from His Trip Up North

 

Yesterday I had to work on campus, which is unusual for a Tuesday, but we have so much to do to prepare for the upcoming semester. (Though it hasn't escaped my attention that I'm the only one on the team who has to be on campus every day this week...) Then my Irish teacher picked me up from the Killer Building, and we met another woman from the Shamrock Club in the parking lot of a big box store. We were running a little behind because of the rush hour traffic, but it didn't matter because the picnic was in full swing when we got to the outdoor theater, with lots of other Shamrock Club members and some of the actors from the play. There was an acoustic band playing Crosby, Stills, and Nash, which didn't seem to have anything to do with the play, the story of five spinster sisters in Ireland in the 30's. The narrator was the illegitimate child of the youngest sister, and parts of the story were hilarious, but ultimately things did not go too smoothly for the sisters, or their brother, a priest who had worked in Uganda for years until he started "going native." We certainly had a beautiful evening for an outdoor play, complete with a full "super moon" shining above. Here is a photo of the stage.

Travalon is back from his sojourn up north with his buddy who lives in Japan. He took a lot of photos, but I'm not sure what I'm looking at, so I'll just make up a story, and he can correct me in the comments. The first thing he did (again, I'm just making this all up) is look out over Lake Superior.

I already know that's a lie, because the first thing he did was meet with a Wolverhampton Wanderers fan club in Minneapolis to watch the match (the Wolves lost), but he didn't give me any photos of that. Then he heard a little bird singing in a fir tree.

The fir tree was by the lake.

And there were lots of wildflowers!

The lake was still visible in the distance.

Then they crossed a stream.

Suddenly they saw... a lighthouse!

And also, an island.

Whose throne is this? Did Travalon usurp it?

They saw their first waterfall of the trip.

It flowed into a beautiful stream.

Later, they came upon a rocky beach.

The water was very clear.

Then they saw their second waterfall.

I think that's out of order - this river came first.

And these whimsical giant lollipops of animals in two languages. (Ojibwa?)

I am too tired to post all these photos tonight. Watch for Part Two tomorrow night.

Famous Hat

Photos of Milwaukee

 

I forgot to blog about Friday: I worked from home, then I picked up Tiffy and we went to a Thai restaurant on the way to the outdoor theater, where we saw King Lear. Cecil Markovitch was there too, because he loves Shakespearean tragedies, and he LOVED that one: everyone but three people died, one by suicide and one by poisoning, and one guy had his eyes gouged out.

That was far more exciting than the last two days for me. I have been sick with something that is probably not COVID, in that the test was negative, but it also expired back in May. I did get out for a few walks and saw these pretty flowers in the neighborhood. My phone says they are a type of evening primrose called pink ladies.

However, Travalon is having an exciting evening because he went to see Graham Nash, of the Hollies and Crosby, Stills, and Nash, in Milwaukee. (I was never planning to go, so don't worry - there wasn't a wasted ticket.) He sent me some photos from downtown Milwaukee. These are "legendary ducks of the Milwaukee River." First, Debra and Ella.

These are DeeDee and PeeWee.

This is Millie.

Here are some examples of the architecture along the river.

And the artwork along the river.

Look! A tiki boat!

He also sent videos of a boat with a band playing on it, and a video from the concert of "Bus Stop" by the Hollies with a guy playing mandolin. They are too long to post on this blog, but maybe I can make them into a movie that I put on YouTube, and then I can share the link. The mandolin on "Bus Stop" sounds particularly nice.

I almost forgot - I did accomplish one thing today:

The challenge this month was the "owlympics." I was never an olympic-level tennis player, no matter how much I love the game, but I am a champion at DuoLingo!

Famous Hat

Bluegrass (?) at the Edgewater

 

Yesterday I had wanted to work from home, but I had to go to a meeting on campus. Travalon picked me up when he got off of work, then I drove downtown to meet Tiffy and Rich so we could go to the outdoor theater. We saw a play called Ring Around the Moon that was really funny, with one guy playing identical twins. Beforehand we had dinner at Amber Indian restaurant, and they were uncharacteristically slow, so we only got there right before the play started. My weather app said there might be a thunderstorm during the play, but we were sitting right under an overhang, and I brought a rain poncho, so then it was totally dry all evening.

Today I worked from home, then I cut out a little early (with my boss's permission) to meet Tiffy downtown. We got bubble tea (mine was ube-flavored), then we sat on the roof of her sister's building until getting some dinner at Himal Chuli. There was a dance on the rooftop of the Monona Terrace, and of course there was the Union Terrace, but we ultimately decided to go to the Edgewater to hear a bluegrass band. They advertise having free bluegrass bands on Friday evenings, but this band was mostly playing rock music. However, it was a beautiful evening. Check out this sunset.

I gave Tiffy the third Star Wars Mallards hat, and I wore mine, so we looked like a gang of two. Tiffy said we were not intimidating, and I said, "Intimidating? We're invisible! People probably just see two identical hats floating through the air and are all like, 'What's that?'" 

On our way back to her sister's apartment, we stopped at the Globe and got the two desserts on their menu to go, then as we went to cross the street, there were emergency vehicles everywhere. I was afraid there was another fire at my church, but Tiffy thought it was a car accident. Since I was parked at the church, I wasn't sure if I'd be able to go out. She said maybe things would clear up after dessert, so we went to her sister's apartment and tried them. One was a donut hole in sweet goop, and the other was cheese in a rose and pistachio cream sauce. We both really liked that one. Then we went up to the roof of her sister's building to scope out my best escape route. However, when I walked by a cop, I asked if I could just go out the front way onto the blocked-off street, since I was north of the accident (looked like a taxi smashed into a parked car), and he said sure. So I had no issues getting home. Meanwhile, Travalon went swimming in Salmo Pond and then went to a dive bar, so he had a good evening.

Famous Hat

Rich's First Betty Lou Cruise and Mallards Star Wars Game

 

Yesterday I worked from home, then Rich and Tiffy picked me up and we drove to the theater out in the woods. To our surprise, Jilly Moose was right behind us, and then we met the Dairyman's Daughter and the Single B-Boy at the theater. We had a picnic there with take-out fish fries the Dairyman's Daughter had picked up for us, then we saw Much Ado About Nothing, which was hilarious. It was a very late night, and when I got home after 12:30, I fully expected Travalon (who spent the evening very successfully fishing, but he threw them all back) to be in bed, but to my surprise he was still up. Here is a photo Jilly Moose took of the scenery from the play.

This morning I slept very late, well after nine, and woke up from a dream that I had slept so late that I'd missed coffee. We weren't meeting Tiffy, Rich, and Jilly Moose for coffee at Fair Trade until 10:30, so I was fine. Then we went to Dubai (the restaurant, not the emirate) and sat outside for lunch. I had the vegetarian platter, which seemed like it would be a healthy choice... and it probably was, but the rest of my day was so bad. For example, I had a scone when we had coffee. Was that necessary? Probably not. Travalon had a turtle mocha, and look what they drew on his cup!

Rich had never been on a Betty Lou Cruise, and we tried to do one last summer but it was canceled at the last minute, so we tried again for today. It was a historical cruise with a historian who has written a book about the history of Lake Mendota giving a talk during the cruise. This one didn't have a whole meal, but it had some pretty substantial hors d'oeuvres, like pot stickers and meatballs and bacon-wrapped shrimp and (don't read this part, Jilly Moose) stuffed mushrooms. Then for dessert, chocolate-covered strawberries AND cookies. I took an oatmeal raisin cookie, thinking it might be healthier. Travalon took a lot of photos during the cruise.

This is a weird little rock pile in the middle of the channel to the lake.

Here is a bald eagle on the rock pile.

This is a view of the beach at Governor Nelson State Park.

This tree used to be on an island we called One Tree Island, but the island eroded away, and the tree fell over and died.

Some candid shots of us that I didn't realize Travalon had taken.

Rich is consulting the historical map of the lake. He really enjoyed the talk.

Some buildings on campus. On the left you can see the WARF building, which is really weird-looking.

This, of course, is my office building, Van Hise, aka the Towel of Babble.

And here are some shots of the houses in Maple Bluff.

This is the Governor's Mansion.

This is the beach at Warner Park.

And here is the downtown skyline, with the Capitol Building.

More campus buildings.

Here are some posed photos of us.

This is Three-Foot Bay, which is three feet deep so boats stop there and people swim.

I love this little A-frame boathouse.

Look how many lotuses are in the channel!

As soon as we got off the boat, we heard our neighbors the cranes sounding off, so we looked over... and guess what?? They still have two babies! So the one that ran away after the storm must have been reunited with its family. One parent crossed the road, but the other stayed with the young ones.

Tiffy and Rich left to find a book for her brother-in-law about D-Day, while Travalon and I went to the Mallards game. We were supposed to get reversible bucket hats for Star Wars Day (one side is the Dark Force and one is the Light Force), but the hats didn't get delivered in time, so we got vouchers for the hats and for another game for free. We sat right behind a young couple with a thirteen-month-old baby (to quote Stevie Wonder) with the most beautiful dark eyes and long lashes. She was so well-behaved! We were also amused by a gang of school-aged boys who, every time a foul ball was hit toward the stands, would holler, "Go! Go! Go!" and run off like a mini battalion. They were pretty successful too, because I saw at least two of them with game balls. The Mallards were playing the Fond du Lac Dock Spiders, who won it all recently but are the worst in the division this season. The Mallards were up 8-3 at the top of the ninth, and they quickly got two outs on the Spiders, but then both their pitching and fielding fell apart. Here we thought they had the game in the bag, but they made a bunch of stupid mistakes and allowed three runs, so they were only up by two runs. They changed pitchers, and the new guy quickly dispatched the next batter up, so game over and the Mallards won, but I didn't feel very triumphant. How did they almost blow it? 

Oh yeah, remember when I said I saw a dancing chicken on the Jumbotron while driving by the field the other day during a game? It wasn't my imagination - they had something called "Techno Chicken" between innings which was videos of chickens edited so they looked like they were bopping around to the music. I found the video on YouTube, and it's fourteen years old. How is this the first I've heard of it?

It's never the wrong time for some DuoLingo bragging! I got some new stickers in the last few days, including tonight, when I came home from the game and did it for almost an hour.

So that is why I'm blogging so late. I should get to bed so I don't sleep as late tomorrow as I did this morning; after all, we have to go to Mass.

Famous Hat