Balkan Singing and Croatian Wild Game Feast

 

Today Travalon and I had a very relaxed morning. I started the Portuguese course on DuoLingo and took a vigorous rosary walk in the neighborhood, and I did repot a plant. That was about as much as I accomplished this morning. Then we drove to Oakwood Village, a retirement community, to sing Balkan music in their chapel. We were very confused because we parked close to the chapel, but the doors to it were locked, so we had to go in the main entrance. Fortunately we ran into one of the people leading the singing, who led us to the chapel. We sang for an hour with about a dozen other people; it was scheduled to go for two hours, but we had to go pick up Mamastep to head to the Croatian wild game feast in Milwaukee.

Tiffy and my other college friend met us at the Foreign Legion, which was already very crowded. We couldn't find five seats together, despite having made a reservation for five - there were lots of spaces that were reserved, so we have no idea why we didn't get a reserved space. Tiffy and my other college friend found two seats together, and Travalon, Mamastep, and I found three together, so I only talked to the other two briefly now and then tonight. There were all sorts of wild game dishes, pheasant gumbo and elk goulash and venison medallions and rabbit in cream sauce and fried frog legs, which were my favorite. The gumbo was really good too. I had to eat somewhat lightly because of my diet medication, which will make my life miserable if I eat too much. There were also rolls, green salad, sauerkraut that was very different than German sauerkraut (more like boiled cabbage), and a wonderful thing like polenta. And then of course there were a ton of desserts. 

The tamburitza group of high schoolers that the fundraiser was for played a few songs, including the US and Croatian national anthems, then there were the raffle drawings. Tiffy and my other college friend had not bought raffle tickets because they are smart, so they said goodbye and took off. Mamastep and Travalon had bought raffle tickets, because I had forgotten how interminable the raffle for items on the table was last year, and it was no better this year. Why do people buy raffle tickets and then ignore them? Or were they so drunk that they couldn't figure out if the number called was one of their tickets? (Likely.) The guy calling the numbers would call the same one over and over while the rest of us were like, "They're not here! Just draw another number!" We didn't win anything, and other people at our table had a ton more tickets and didn't win anything. They were joking that the people had forgotten to put their tickets in the basket for drawing until finally one woman did get to go up to the table, and she got a gift certificate for a hardware store. I saw people with way cooler things, like orchids and paintings, but I hadn't really looked at the table before the drawing so I had no strong opinions about what I would have chosen in the unlikely event that our number would have been drawn. Then there was a "high table" with prizes of greater value, but there were only five of those so it went a lot faster. Also, I think the people who had bought those higher-priced tickets cared more. We only had three for the "low table," one for the "high table," and one for the 50/50 raffle. The amount this year was around $500. Mamastep bought a number of 50/50 raffle tickets, but she didn't win either. So we headed home, through a light snow, talking about random things like embryonic development and jazz standards, and so we had a very Balkan day to make up for all the Celtic days that Travalon has to put up with, like Thursday night. I'm all for fair representation of our ethnic heritages - I love tamburitza music. Travalon made some videos, but it was so loud with people yakking that you can barely hear the music. They really got loud during the raffle - if someone won, a bunch of people at their table would make turkey calls. Why? Because alcohol.

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Bob Marley Birthday Party

 

Today I worked from home and went to the dentist. I saw a different hygienist this time, one who was all old-skool and used the scraper instead of the sonic thing. I actually preferred that, because there was a little pain, but it was the kind I could wrap my head around, instead of the five kinds of pain the sonic thing gives me, each unique and excruciating. The only thing that makes me not sure about this hygienist, who is older than I am, is that she had FAUX News on in the background. Come on, either watch fiction or news, not fiction pretending to be news. They were talking about some schools with bad scores were letting their kids walk out early to protest ICE. Yeah, and so what? I'm sure a lot of schools with high test scores did too, and it's not like you could blame the test scores on the walkouts since they predated them.

The kids Travalon works with made Olympic medals, like this one:

In the evening we went to a Bob Marley birthday party fundraiser for a food pantry at the Crystal Corner. They even had a cake for Bob Marley.

It was Black Forest flavored. Travalon said I could post this photo of him.

Here is a better photo of him.

He is enjoying a Commuter Kolsch. I had an infused drink. We were right by a very cute window.

At first, a DJ was playing reggae, and it was loud, so I wore earplugs. Then a live band played a short set. They were really good!

I thought, "Are they already taking a break?" and then I realized they were packing up their instruments. There was a raffle, then we had cake, and the DJ started up again and kept getting louder and louder. We headed home, and I finished the Spanish course.

Pretty optimistic of DuoLingo to think I could get a job in Spanish. Garbage collector, maybe. "¿Es su basura? Damela, por favor. Gracias!" Maybe if we move to Puerto Rico, I can get paid to collect the trash.

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Irish Session at the Elks Lodge

 

Today I worked on campus, and it was not a good day. I made mistakes, other people made mistakes, and it was generally just a crappy day. At least I made my new boss laugh, because she was having a whole crappy week. Weird... I don't usually have two bad days in a given week, but Monday was a weird day too. At lunch I walked with Hardingfele, who was not prepared for the weather - no hat, wimpy gloves, and wimpy jacket, so she wanted to go to the greenhouses again. Not that I ever have a problem with going to the greenhouses, but yesterday Seabird and I walked outside and were fine. You have to dress for the weather.

When I got home, Travalon's Valentine's Day present had arrived in the mail, and when he got home I asked if he wanted it now or on Valentine's Day. We were both curious, so he opened it. It's a Hawaiian shirt of the Mike Tyson Punch-Out game, the one with Bald Bull that Travalon often plays while I'm at my Brazilian drum lesson. Sorry, he didn't try it on, so no photo, but he was very pleased with it.

Then we went to the Elks Lodge in town, a place I have always been curious about. It's on the water just like the East Side Club, and tonight there was the Irish session there, but it was invitation only. The red-headed flute player was there, along with the mandolin player who had his fingers injured in that gruesome saw accident - he's able to play again! Yay! We saw some Shamrock Club members there, our buddy who is always flitting around talking to everyone, and the adventurous couple we see everywhere except the Burns dinner, because it turns out they were in Florida at that time. Apparently part of the reason the Elks Club hosted this session was to get people interested in joining them, so I was afraid they would be giving us the hard sell, but it was the opposite - after seeing that beautiful space, we were curious but didn't see anyone to ask about how to join. We had a light dinner and listened to the music, and we really enjoyed our time there. 

When we got home, Travalon gave me my Valentine's Day presents: a book about the Camino that has a lot of very useful information, and a teddy bear with plaid that matches mine.

She doesn't have a name yet. Come to think of it, I'm not sure my Irish bear ever got a name either, and now she's missing a shoe. When I find it, I can take a photo of them together.

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Coventry the Dragon and the Republic of Leip

 

If you needed further proof that Travalon is a prince among men, today he went to Milwaukee to get a little Christmas dragon that we had seen on Saturday but hadn't gotten at the time. Then we thought maybe this coming Saturday we could go early to Milwaukee and get it at that time, but now Mamastep is able to go with us to the wild game dinner, so that wouldn't work. Travalon said he'd get to the Museum between 10-11, which was right when I was in a meeting, so I had my phone with me. Partway through the meeting I had to powder my nose, and his timing was so good that he texted right then, when they didn't see me on my phone. He sent me a photo of the Christmas dragon.

As you can see, it's holding what I assume is supposed to be a present, but there's no bow. A quick internet search showed there was supposed to be a bow, but some kid probably ripped it off. So it looks like he's playing the accordion instead of handing you a present, and that got me to thinking that it would make a good "Get Kraken with Jerry" episode to have him play the accordion. I sent Famie a text asking if she could send me a short audio clip of her playing the accordion - I'll see what she says. If she says no, maybe I can get the accordion player from our band to do it. Anyway, since one of my favorite Christmas carols is the Coventry carol, I'm calling this little guy Coventry. Here's another view of him:

Today I worked on campus, and Seabird sent me a message: "Come upstairs. We have treats." Usually on Wednesdays most of the FART 5 people are in the big office they all share, and when I come in, they all say, "Famous!" and we all chat. This time they all ignored me - even Seabird, who was busy talking work with another colleague. So I went to talk to another colleague, but then she said, "I have a meeting at 11:30." She didn't say, "Aren't you supposed to be in it too?" and the reminder on my calendar never went off, and I'd thought my meeting was at one, so imagine my surprise when I got back to my desk and saw the meeting was in progress. Why didn't my colleague say anything?? What happened to my reminder?? Last time it was at one, so that's where I got that idea. Later yet another colleague came down to my office because I have the power of FAX, and he needed to fax something, so we chatted awhile. Then a grad student chatted with me, and then I was showing a coworker the woodrow when my sorta-boss came by. I was wearing the outfit I'd worn to the Burns dinner, and with a little string instrument, I must have been quite a sight. Here's the woodrow:

Travalon sent me yet another flag that one of the kids drew. This is apparently for the Republic of Leip:

Is that Coventry on the flag? It's a winged dragon. But it doesn't have a star on its head.

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Talking in Train and Heart Hoya

 

Today when Travalon was at work, the kids drew more flags. I like the weak attempt at a Mexican flag.

And here is the Bahamian flag that Travalon drew yesterday:

I worked from home and thought about going to a protest. I got an email from someone I don't know inviting me to join a pickup choir, rehearsing 3-4 at the Lutheran church right by our old church for a 4:30 protest at the Capitol. I could then have gone right from there to Adoration. It was tempting to slip out of work early, but I had a lot to do and couldn't bring myself to leave for the protest, as much as I'd love to sing in a choir again. I felt a little glum about it, but then on the way to Adoration I drove down Troy Drive, and a train was going over the bridge. I wouldn't have seen that if I'd gone to the protest. Is God speaking to me with trains? This is the second time I didn't go to a protest because I felt like something was telling me not to, and then a train assured me that I was right where I was meant to be.

I forgot to mention that my rick-rack cactus bloomed when we got back from vacation, as if it was very happy to see me again. I thought they bloomed in the autumn, but I'm not complaining. This is the one plant that ever "talked" to me, when it said it wanted to go home with me. And I can't find the blog post about when I got the little heart-shaped leaf that is actually from a hoya, but it was a number of years ago. It has survived longer than a lot of my plants, and today when I watered it, I noticed it has a shoot coming out of it, so maybe it will grow into a whole plant. A few years ago I had several hoya plants (not with the heart-shaped leaves) that were thriving, and one even bloomed, so I thought maybe I should give up on everything else and only grow hoyas... and right after that thought, they all got sick and died. I hope I can keep this little hoya alive, and maybe someday it will be a big hoya and bloom. Their flowers are amazing, so fragrant and dripping with nectar. This also gives me hope that my black ZZ plant will grow again, if I'm just patient. Of course, my purple oxalis died back, then it sent up one leaf, so I was hopeful it would come back, but the leaf died and I've seen no sign of life from it in a year. Maybe it's time to give up on that one.

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Feeling a Bit Yelled at

 

Today I worked on campus, and Hardingfele and I went to the nearby greenhouses over lunch. To my surprise, the leaves I had wanted to pick up last time when the students suddenly invaded were still lying there, alive, so I took some back to my office and stuck them in dirt. We'll see if they survive. I was working on a big project for my sorta-boss, and I had some questions for him, but from his response he seemed annoyed by my questions. That was the first time I felt kind of yelled at today. I did get the project mostly done.

Meanwhile, Travalon was drawing flags with the kids at work for the Winter Olympics. He drew the Croatian flag.

He said he also drew the Bahamian flag, but they said the Bahamas wouldn't have a team in the Winter Olympics, so gave the drawing to his coworker who is originally from the Bahamas. His coworker loved it and hung it on the fridge at work. He didn't take a photo of that, but maybe he can tomorrow. Here are the flags the kids drew.

After work I went to Moldy Jam for the first time in over a month, and it sounds like a lot of other people were also gone recently, because everyone was saying how large the group was but to me it was normal sized. For some reason we played a lot of minor-key and Irish stuff tonight, and some people were complaining about it, but I was loving it. A new couple came and said they wanted to do a song called "Groundhog" since it's Groundhog Day; the group didn't know it, but we had fun learning it. I noticed that early in the evening I was doing really well with learning tunes by ear, but as the evening wore on, I got worse at it. After we took a break (and I ate way too much cheese), some of the leaders called us back by launching into one of my favorite tunes, "Butterfly," a slip jig in E Dorian. Since I know the tune well, I played it with great enthusiasm until noticing people were signaling at me, so the tune had changed, but it was another slip jig in E Dorian so I hadn't noticed. Oops! That was the second time I felt a bit yelled at. It's probably a bigger deal in my mind than in theirs. Once when I sang with the OTHER choir, we were doing a Sweelinck piece I knew well, and I was singing very confidently but was apparently off the beat, because the choir director was signaling at me frantically, so I stopped, listened, and got back in. He probably doesn't even remember that, but it will be forever seared into my memory.

There was a post today about a new Irish session on the first Thursday, so I put a comment asking if it was an open jam. When I got home, I saw the local fiddler had answered "NO" in all caps, and he had sent me a private message that read like an email that I hadn't gotten with more details about how it was only for advanced players, etc. That was the third time I felt a bit yelled at today. There must be an email list I'm not on, because I only know when the Lakeside sessions are by checking the Lakeside website, or when the red-headed flute player mentions them. This session will be this week, in a location I've been dying of curiosity to see, but there's also a Scottish fiddling class at the same time. Maybe I should do that instead and go to the new Irish session next month. Decisions!

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Kaaona Necklace and Thrill Factory

 

Today after Mass Travalon and I recycled the plastic, again with some help from the guy who always used to do it, then when we got home my aunt texted me a photo of an envelope from a card I must have sent to my cousin back when I was in college. I drew this on the back:

She said, "A Famous Hat original. May be valuable." So I asked her if she wanted the crab necklace that used to belong to my grandma. I liked it because it came from Hawaii, but I realized it was for someone born under the sign of Cancer, which I was not but both my grandma and my aunt were. She said she might be interested, so I sent her a photo.

She said thanks, the photo was good enough, I didn't have to send it to her. Maybe I can wear it, because it only says it's for the zodiac sign on the back, and there probably aren't a lot of people around here that know what "Kaaona" means. Maybe I talked this up too much because I remembered the crab being cuter than it is, and I thought it was carved from a coconut, but it's just plastic. Wish my grandma had gotten one for me, but maybe I wasn't even born yet when she got this. It isn't the only jewelry she brought back from Hawaii; I had a seed lei of hers that I wore a ton until it broke, being cheaply made and like eighty years old, and I'm guessing the pin with the palm tree on it is from there too.

Then I had my Brazilian drumming lesson, and today we played with both the other instruments and the dancers. There are less dancers than I expected, but today I was in the very back row, so nobody in the audience would see me. Then people realized I had no idea what was going on, being a short person behind a lot of tall people, so they made me move up. I did improve a lot over the course of the lesson, and one of the teachers noted that we all improved a lot, but he also said we wouldn't have an hour to get better on stage. Will we be ready by the 21st for showtime?

Travalon and I went to Garver Mill after that for some tea, and outside of it was this... sculpture of a giant banana?

Then he took me to the Slow Irish Session. It really went well today, but we're a bunch of regulars so we know most of the tunes, and we all go slowly on the newer ones. I try to sit where I can't see the music projected, but today those spots were all taken so I was smack in front of the music and found it too tempting to look when it was a new tune - to be fair to myself, it's very hard to learn a tune by ear if nobody in the room knows it. We are getting pretty good, especially at playing together really well on the slow, soulful tunes. Travalon snuck in toward the end and I didn't even see him. He had gone to East Towne Mall to check out Thrill Factory, and he took some photos. Some of these are frankly rather terrifying. There's a miniature golf course, a bowling alley, and a tiki bar.

He spent time there playing Space Invaders, which my Gen X readers will remember. After all that, we went home and I skipped band practice. We have a gig in early March, but I know all the tunes. I'm happy with the schedule of Slow Irish session for my fiddle every other week, and band practice for my mandolin every other week. Tomorrow I have Moldy Jam, and a couple of people who were there tonight will be there tomorrow, and they both said bring both. Will let you know tomorrow what I decide to do.

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