Today was a busy day for Travalon and me. After Mass I had our monthly Care for Creation meeting, where we talked about how we would get people to contribute to the fund for putting solar panels on St. Peter's. The church we go to, St. Dennis, already has solar panels. Meanwhile, Travalon recycled the plastic and went antiquing. I forgot to take a picture of the cute little coal car he got, plus he got a couple of books, and all that for ten dollars.
We were running a little late to my drum lesson, and then my water bottle leaked in my "Train Nerd" bag, so Niko was soaked. Poor guy! I pulled him and my phone out of the bag, but then I forgot the phone in Travalon's car. Worse, the water had gotten onto my jeans (it was kind of cool out today), so it looked like I had peed my pants. Everyone was all ready to go with their drums when I got there, but people are so nice - they helped me out with getting a belt, a drum, and drumsticks. I asked my buddy in the class if I could text Travalon from her phone, and he texted back that my phone was safely in his car, so then I could focus on drumming.
Afterwards we went to the co-op, and I insisted on buying a bunch of healthy stuff that's on the grocery list for the Mediterranean Diet. Back home we took a walk on the bike path along Highway M (and the vermilion and purple and white flowers are blooming by Athens Grill), then we had rotisserie chicken, whole wheat pita, and kale with feta cheese for dinner, and afterwards we both did feel good. Is it psychological? I have to change my evil ways, and Travalon says he should too.
We had band practice in a new place tonight. A banjo player has recently joined our group (she and our leader both play in the same ukulele group), and we had practice at her very lovely condo, with her musician husband and grumpy dog listening to us. (The dog didn't like when I had to powder my nose, and he wasn't going to let me come out of the bathroom if they hadn't intervened. He is a very small dog, but I still wasn't sure if I should just walk past him when he was barking angrily at me.) We were told not to pet the dog, so I didn't even try. The banjo player didn't know that we play each tune in a set until the leader puts her foot up, so she had moved onto a second Irish fiddle tune while we were still playing the first one. She said, "Something's wrong! I'm not playing the right chords!" and I said, "They're not actually in the same key - 'Coleraine' is in A minor, while 'Cliffs of Moher' is in A Dorian," and they all sort of rolled their eyes and were like, "OKAY, Famous, enough with the 'Dorian mode' stuff." When Travalon came back to pick me up, we went down into the basement and saw all their instruments, her husband's guitars and bass and her ukuleles. She has one that lights up! I thought I was recording longer than this, but you get the idea.
As promised, here is the video of the two trains we saw yesterday in Portage. Watch for the windshield wipers on the freight train engine just as it starts to leave. Just be warned that this video is almost ten minutes long, but it's worth it to see all the different types of cars and the awesome graffiti.
