Plan B: Jazz

 

Today I worked from home, and when Travalon and I went down to the dock, we saw a couple of ring-necked ducks, or maybe scaups. First the male is doing his neck stretching thing.

Is the female impressed? I can't tell.

I took some photos of flowers on my lunchtime walk.

Meanwhile, Travalon was at Stricker Pond, getting attacked by this goose:

In the evening I was planning to go to a German play on campus, despite the fact that I studied Romance languages. They promised subtitles, and it was a comedy, AND a faculty member was playing the ukulele. However, I couldn't find a single parking spot anywhere after fighting traffic and dodging road construction, so I parked at my church, figuring it would be a long walk and I'd be late, but what else could I do? I ran in to powder my nose, and when I came out, a person I know who can be very strict parked next to me and was texting someone, so I panicked and just went home. Travalon and I went down to the dock to watch the sunset; we missed the sunset, but we saw some neighbors and this crane:

Then the two of us went to Bierock to get spinach puffs. We were shocked to see the place was jam packed, because this excellent jazz band was playing called the Trilobites. 

I think by the time I took this video, the crowd had thinned out. We did manage to find a table and have our spinach puffs, and I had some lavender lemonade that wasn't very lavender-forward and a five-ounce serving of 420 infused drink. That just made the music even better. Was this more fun than the German play? Hard to say, but it was certainly a great evening out. I was dressed up for the German play, so it was good to have somewhere to go.

Oh yeah, I generally go for a walk at three, but today I was futzing around until suddenly hearing a train horn, so I ran out in time to see the train. Then as we were coming home, I thought I saw a train headlight as we crossed the bridge, so Travalon said we could drive to the crossing, but I could hear the train alongside us going clickety-clack. It was hard to see in the dark, but then we could see its little red taillight. We drove to School Road to see it cross the bridge over Troy Drive, but it was gone by then. Too bad, I could have made a video of what it's like to go through the tunnel under the train tracks while a train is passing by overhead.

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Photos of Lisbon and Memories of College Parties

 

Today Travalon went to Patrick Marsh before work. He saw some pelicans there, but the photos aren't that clear. Feel free to refer back to previous photos of pelicans on this blog. Then he went to Columbus and Portage to do some rail fanning. He made a couple of videos that I will make into a movie at some point, and he took some photos of the cool graffiti on the train cars.

And a colorful engine.

Next he went to Whalen's Grade and took photos of what I'm pretty sure are gadwalls, some more pelicans, and a pair of sandhill cranes, but the birds were so far away that the photos aren't very clear.

Meanwhile, I worked on campus and walked with Hardingfelde at lunch. We went to Allen Centennial Gardens again.

When I got back from lunch, Seabird started texting me from Lisbon. I am very flattered that she and Tiffy take time out of their wonderful vacations to send me photos. First she sent me something to translate:

It says: "(The) my bakery, always fresh and delicious." (They always use the definite article in Portuguese, even with a person's name, so I would say, "The Travalon was taking train photos.") Then she sent me photos of Lisbon. So gorgeous!

And, just in case this post doesn't have enough photos on it yet, here are some more Travalon took yesterday at the zoo and forgot to send me before I blogged last night.

In the afternoon I went to another research study, and on the way I saw a train pass by very close, but the horn was so loud that I had to plug my ears, so I didn't make a video. This study was on algorithms; I was supposed to choose between two pieces of artwork about a hundred times, and then it showed me ten pieces of artwork I hadn't seen and asked me to pick my five favorite. The algorithm guessed the exact order I picked them in. The grad student said I was an excellent research subject since I clearly had strong preferences, and then she gave me $20 in singles. These research studies are kind of fun, and I make a tiny bit of money, but most of all they make me feel like I'm extraordinary. The grad student said during the driving one last week that I was doing really well, and I did one last year where I seemed to shock the grad student with how good I was at navigating. I have some weird talents, that's for sure. I've always said I would have been a great hunter-gatherer because I spot birds quickly and always remember where I saw plants.

After work my Union peeps were meeting down at the Terrace. It was a glorious evening, and there were quite a few of us drinking beer and having interesting conversations. Just about the time they all left, Travalon arrived. so we sat enjoying the lovely weather as we ate a pizza. When we left, we passed a frat house that was having a party, and they had a professional-level setup of lights and sound equipment. Did they rent it, or did they actually invest thousands of dollars in equipment you'd expect at a nightclub? It was Senior Night, so State Street was crawling with undergrads, some in costumes. It made me think of some of the crazy parties I went to in college, like the one where I was hula hooping on a roof, and the one where one girl was writing down everything people said with a colorful marker while another guy kept hollering that the song playing was a foxtrot, although it was not big band music but 90's grunge, and the one where everyone brought beer from around the world (I brought Chinese beer), and the crazy house party where a guy pulled me into the closet to hide from the cops busting it, and then those of us who didn't get arrested eventually came out of hiding, ordered a shamrock-shaped pizza, and watched a foreign movie. And the one in the wildly painted basement, and the one where some of us were standing out on a balcony, and a Brazilian girl mused, "What is it to be lucky in suicide - to succeed, or to fail?" and we all thought that was such a deep question. My housemates and I hosted a few ourselves, like a Halloween one where we were the Lion, the Witch, and (poor Tiffy!) the Wardrobe, and a really lovely Christmas one. I am definitely much happier now than I was in college, but some of those parties were really fun. The one I didn't like was a "kegger" where you had to pay $5 for a red plastic cup, and then nothing came out of the keg but foam, and the house was so packed you could barely move. That's what it seemed like some of the bars on State Street would be like tonight, and I've never understood how that could be fun.

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Panda Farewell Party

 

Today Travalon did something really fun - he went to a farewell party at the zoo for one of the red pandas. They had brought in a new male after the previous one died, but he and the female are not interested in making baby pandas together, so they're going to send him to another zoo and bring in a different male panda. I get it, pandas - I wouldn't want to be forced to breed with some rando either. Travalon saw a couple of our Shamrock Club buddies there, and he made some videos of the pandas eating their special cake that were so cute that my coworkers were entranced. It got too late for me to make a movie of them tonight, but hopefully tomorrow. Here are some photos. 

The farewell card. Travalon signed it for both of us.

A hornbill who lives nearby.

As usual, the aardvark slept through all the excitement.

Travalon saw this event on Facebook, but Kathbert also alerted him to it. I, of course, could not attend because I was working on campus today. During my first meeting, I was annoyed by the sound of everyone's voice. My second meeting was canceled - yay! Just before my third meeting, I remembered that one person who attends is on leave, so I ran upstairs to 1111, the big FART 5 office, to ask her replacement to join us, but she was on a Teams call, and oddly nobody else was around. There were some sesame blondies, so I helped myself to one before going downstairs and sending her a message. She did get done with her previous call and joined our meeting, which only took 15 minutes, so then I could walk at lunch with Hardingfele before HER meeting. We walked in the Allen Centennial Gardens and saw fritillaries.

Hardingfele said, "I thought fritillaries were butterflies," and I said, "They are. But these are fritillary flowers. They're both named after a Latin word for a checkerboard." Or so I read. Then we saw one of those little white cabbage butterflies, and Hardingfele said, "Look - a fritillary!" but fritillary butterflies are big and orange with a checkerboard pattern on their wings. We did enjoy all the blooming verbenas. Everything is so early this year, which is surprising because it was cold for so long. I guess all the tornados woke the flowers up? 

One semi-miraculous thing did happen today: as I was on my way to work, I suddenly remembered that I was supposed to be watering my neighbor's plants, but for some reason I hadn't done it in... well, I couldn't remember. Since before Easter? It was hard to concentrate at work, but I called Travalon before he left for the panda farewell party, and he went to our neighbor's place and said the plants were still alive. He took photos and sent them to me, and I could see they were a bit stressed but nowhere near dead. Phew!!! After work I watered them well and picked off all the dead leaves. Why did I suddenly forget to water them at the same time as my own plants? My subconscious must have been trying to tell me, because lately I've been thinking about how Ma Hat once gave me a peperomia cutting that I set behind another plant so I couldn't see it, and by the time I remembered, it was withered up and dead. Or when someone I don't even know that well dumped a tiny aquarium on me that had belonged to a friend of hers who died, someone I never met, and I totally forgot she had done it for over a week, and by the time I remembered, the fish were all dead. They were just little tetras - I'll bet goldfish would have survived. They're resourceful. Both of those events happened decades ago, and I thought I was more responsible now, but even last week when I watered my plants in the plant room, and then the plants in the kitchen, and then the plants in the loft, I thought, "Is that everything? Yes!" Wrong!

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Alumni Party at Garver Mill

This morning I had to get up early for an appointment, but all went well and it was done quickly. We saw these cute stuffed flowers there. They sure look happy!

We went down to the dock, but at first we didn't see anything other than Tux Duck asleep on our neighbor's dock.

Suddenly five cormorants flew in and landed on the river. When they swim, they only have their heads and necks sticking out of the water.

Also, here is a photo of two mallard drakes that Travalon took yesterday at Mendota County Park which is so sparkly that I have to include it.

We braved the road construction on Troy Drive to go to Governor's Island for a walk over lunch, but we may not do that again - the road is all torn up, and we can't figure out another way to get there. Travalon didn't think to bring his camera, but we saw ring-necked ducks and at least one blue-winged teal.

I had another busy day at work, then I left a bit early to go to an alumni event at Garver Mill. I dressed in a work outfit that has cardinal red, the school color, but everyone else was dressed like they were going to a football game. Worse, they had all come with people and were not one bit interested in talking to me, so I mostly talked to a guy I know who was working there. The event was advertised as having "trivia," so I thought it would be a game like Sunday, but it was just a sheet with multiple choice questions, and then they used those to draw for gift baskets, but you had to be present to win. They were out of pizza at first, but they did bring more. There were people wandering around the crowd handing out falafel and chicken skewers, but I must be invisible because they would offer them to the people around me and then walk away from me, so I had to say something to get any. We got a free drink voucher, but since I couldn't stay long and had to drive, I asked about a mocktail. They didn't have any, but they did have this wonderful hibiscus lemonade with some other flavors I can't remember offhand. There were also crackers and cheese, fruits and vegetables, and sugar cookies that weren't that great. Supposedly the band was going to play, but I never saw them before I had to leave for adoration. Since it was rush hour, I left earlier than necessary in case I got stuck in traffic, so then I just sat outside the church enjoying the weather, and that was a lot more fun than being ignored indoors. It was the perfect temperature, not too hot and not cold at all. Seabird tells me there is a city in China renowned for always having this weather, and that sounds amazing, but would you really appreciate it if you hadn't just survived unseasonable cold and three days of tornados?

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Belleek Castle Clare Tower

 

Today I had a very busy day at work. I had to take a phone call that was half an hour late, so I had no idea when I'd be free to walk at lunch and didn't bother to try to hook up with Hardingfele. But an email arrived that said my Castle Clare ornament had been delivered, and when I got home, there were four packages. It was like Christmas! Three were for Travalon, but he tells me two are presents for me. Here is my Castle Clare ornament.

Here it is between Blarney Castle and Nenagh Castle, with Travalon's antique map of Ireland in the background and the nameless castle tower on the right. (Thought I had gotten it in the photo more.) The big tower is a vase, and the smaller ornaments are all bells.

Now I am done getting Belleek castles, at least for now. There isn't really room for any more, although today I got a notice that my $150 gift card for doing health stuff at work is on its way, so potentially I could buy more. Do I need more? There are other castle ornaments, but I don't like them as well.

Also, my Blog Monster at work has faded, especially the hot pink, which has vanished.

As a reminder, this is how it looked when I first created it:

Guess I shouldn't have hung it up where the sun can kind of shine on it.

This evening I went to Moldy Jam, and lately the group has been half the size it used to be. I wonder why? I brought the fiddle this time, and the woman who can really play the mandolin asked which instrument I liked better, but I couldn't really say. We had a new person who was way younger than even I am, a graduate student who plays the banjo, and she had it tuned in D so for the first half of the jam we played in D. Then she retuned it to G, so for the second half we played tunes in G or E minor. I was having a tough time with tunes I didn't know, since the other two fiddlers would play harmonies instead of the melody, so I couldn't follow what was going on. However, when it was a tune I knew, like "Pig Ankle Rag," then I found the harmonies to be a lot of fun. I love songs with a lot going on in them, like some hip hop tunes and Baroque choral music, so when there was a lot going on with chords and harmonies in the tunes I knew, it was an amazing sound. It was kind of fun with only nine people, but still, I hope the others show up again soon.

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Two Concerts in Episcopal Churches, a Ghost Train, and a Terrible Trivia Host

 

Travalon has provided some more photos of Tux Duck on our boat slip.

And also a wild-type mallard drake at Stricker Pond.

Yesterday we met Tiffy at the usual Park and Ride, then we drove to Wauwatosa because Just Bach was performing the same concert there as the one they did Friday night during the tornado. I always think of Wauwatosa in a rosy, golden light after my brief sojourn there last summer for Irish Fest Summer School, since I was able to walk everywhere, and we played so much music. Yesterday we went to the restaurant with the North Woods theme, and Tiffy knew it because she had gone there with her brother and his family over Christmas. The food is really good, and they play loon calls in the bathrooms. Then we walked to the chocolate shop, and this may really be why I think of Wauwatosa so fondly, because the chocolate gave me kind of a buzz. We had affogatos and truffles, but not whatever "tirimasu" is.

I am a fan of tiramisu, but we didn't get that either. Then Travalon dropped us off at Trinity Episcopal Church for the concert, which was supposed to last an hour. There were still several songs to go at four, and we had to be in downtown Milwaukee by five for our next concert, of Chinese music, so we snuck out between numbers. I felt a little awkward doing so, since I know several of the people in the group, but one of the leaders knew we were going to the Early Music Now concert, so he probably understood. It was such a good concert, and when Travalon said it would only take eighteen minutes to get to our next venue, I was so bummed: "We could have heard the whole concert!" I was all for sneaking back in, but Tiffy said, "We're out now, let's just go." 

Of course we got to the next place, St. Paul's Episcopal Church, with lots of time to spare, so we took a walk and admired these fritillaries in bloom.

Nothing like a checkerboard flower! This concert was also very enjoyable, but we were sitting way in the back, in the cheap seats, so we hoped to see the interesting instruments up close afterwards, but the performers rushed off the stage with them. Meanwhile, Travalon saw the Amtrak train and discovered a pedestrian bridge that used to be a railroad bridge.

He picked us up, and we went down by the lake and saw these cool clouds.

He told us about the pedestrian bridge, and how it has a light show called the Ghost Train after dark, so we went there and discovered it happens at 9 pm this time of year. We went to Indulgence Chocolate and got more chocolate (that we didn't eat until today), and then we had dinner at the Three Lions Pub, which was started by three actual British guys. We got done not long before the Ghost Train, so we went to see it, and while we did see the light show, we didn't hear the promised whistle and train sounds.

Today Travalon and I relaxed a bit after Mass, then I said I'd like to see birds but wondered if there was time before my first drum lesson of the new session, and he said let's check out a place nearby where there are often coots. And were there ever coots!

There were also two Tux Ducks, and one was almost black.

There was also a pied-billed grebe.

The straggling coots were rushing to catch up with the big group.

And we also saw a killdeer.

We had a ton of people at the drum lesson today, many of them new. My buddy from the other sessions was there, just back from Costa Rica. It was new for all of us, because we played a different kind of drum today, a big bass drum as we stepped back and forth. The guy who plays the little instrument like a ukulele never seems that impressed with me, but today he asked if I would be at the next Brazilian jazz session, and he said, "I heard you were killing it over there!" Oh, but I desperately need to practice! It's one thing to be a great sightreader at your first session, but there's no excuse for not having looked at the music since then. I definitely want to learn this music!

After my drum lesson, Travalon and I went to the East Side Club for a member event consisting of a pasta dinner and a trivia game. I should have taken a picture of the setup - it was a colorful stand with four spots for contestants. Travalon and I were a team against another couple, and we were pretty closely matched, but this wasn't the trivia I'm used to, it was identifying clips from movies, TV shows, and songs. Travalon was much better at it than I was. A couple of ladies who sat with us at dinner went before us, and they beat the team they played against, but the one lady was laughing about how terrible the host was - he was always playing the wrong clip, like he'd say, "Identify this TV show by its theme song," and then he'd play a clip of someone saying. "I am your father," or whatever, and then he'd go, "Oops, wrong clip!" The ladies told us we would have won our game if the host had been consistent about deducting points for wrong answers, since he did it to us and not the other team we played, but we lost by one question. It was hard to care, since it was so hilarious how bad the host was. Travalon went over to the prize table after we played, and I had to remind him that we didn't get to choose a prize since we'd lost, but he was coveting a Bucks baseball cap, so toward the end of the game I said since there were tons of prizes left, and nobody was paying attention, he should just take it. All the prizes were booze swag the club gets since they buy so much alcohol for the bar, and his cap said Jagermeister on it. During the game Hardingfele texted me to say they were all at band practice, and was I coming? but you will be shocked to learn I never made it to band practice. Next week.

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