TEXAS

I live in north Texas, and have come to expect erratic weather patterns. But you know, when I got home today, this is what I saw when I looked out on the patio:

Yes, that is my thermometer, which reads 92 degrees. Yes, 92 degrees in FEBRUARY. This is ridiculous people! Normal this time of year is in the 60's. 30 degrees above normal. Yeah, I think that since I packed up my summer clothes back in November, there has been a total of maybe 10 days that were really too cool to wear my capris and sandals. I LOVE living in Texas, but sometimes the schitzophrenic weather drives me nuts. It's not uncommon to have a 35 degree change in temperatures from the time my alarm goes off at 5 a.m. until I get home in the evening. The moral of this story is, if you are coming to Texas anytime between February and April, you really might want to bring both summer and winter clothes, because not only might you need them, you might need them in one day.

NTIF is in a week, and I am definitely ready for a dose of live celtic music! I'm also hoping to get my photo made for my participant pass at Scarby, as long as I'm out there in garb, might as well, right? I'll have friends in from Canada for the weekend as well, which I'm sure will prove fun, especially since my poor boy cat Leo, is afraid of one of them. I'm hoping that with only the 4 of us in the house he'll be a little less freaked out than he was last summer, when he first met Nelson, as well as 6 other people he'd never seen before, plus a couple that he's met but doesn't see often. Perhaps I should go ahead and break out the Rescue Remedy....

HOUSE CONCERT

OK folks, I'm hosting a house concert for my friend Marc, formerly of the Brobdingnagian Bards. He's recently moved to New Orleans, and is beginning to travel nationwide solo. He's got a gig in Dallas at the Tipperary Inn on the 5th of February, and of course I jumped at the opportunity to have another show at my house that weekend. And I SWEAR it's not for purely selfish reasons because I miss seeing him live. I will have snacks/hors d'oeuvres and non-alcoholic beverages, as well as birthday cake as it's just a few days before my friend Lissa's birthday. Saturday, February 7, 2008 @ 7PM Watauga, TX Suggested donation $15. BYOB. RSVP to raevyn3450-iwg@yahoo.com Marc Gunn is Celtic American Musician and Podcaster. Good food, good drink and good company. Folk ballads, Irish drinking songs, fantasy, Sci Fi, and cats on the autoharp (I wish they'd get it off it already). Embrace independent Celtic music!

Craziness coming

I just looked at my calendar again, and holy cow, the next couple of weeks are CRAZINESS! Sunday my sister & I are going to the Tut exhibit at the Dallas Museum of Art. I missed the last time there was a Tut exhibit in Dallas. It’s one of those things that we would have done with Mom, if she was still with us, she was a HUGE Egyptology fan. Next Sunday, I’m flying out to Midland to celebrate Saint Andrew’s Day at a friend’s church. Why, you ask would I fly to Midland for that??? Because the ever fabulous EJ Jones, & Richard Kean will be piping, with the awesome Randy Wothke drumming. Yeah, I’ll fly to Midland for my Rogues fix! Even if they aren’t all Rogues anymore. I’ll fly out Sunday morning and then fly home on Monday morning before I go to work. Fortunately, work is close to the airport, so I can be to work by like 9:30. Between now and then I have a ton of food prep to do. I’m taking a handful of turkey legs, a couple of boneless, skinless turkey breasts, some meatloaf, a batch of soup and a couple of casseroles. Fortunately, much of it can be prepared in advance and frozen until we are ready to actually cook it, and with disposable foil pans, cleanup will be easy too!!! I’ll head out to the sticks on Wednesday, hopefully around 11 a.m. I’ll be on the road, which should get me there by about 6 p.m. Hopefully, the other company that’s coming in from this area will be a little later than I am, so we can get situated before there are too many people in the house. And have a conference or two with the Captain. Come December, I’ll be heading to Galveston for Dickens’ on the Strand. Yep, Galveston is still in recovery from Ike, and the Strand may not be as pretty as it has been in former years, but hopefully there will be an outstanding turnout for the celebration. I know that several of the acts are performing at no cost to the festival, which is awesome of them to do, so if you’re headed that way, be sure to leave something in the tip jar for them, k? I think that’s about it for tonite.

ok so I'm not so good

Ok, so yeah, I suck at this blogging thing sometimes. The last month has brought a lot of activity. The beginning of August, I hosted a house concert for Marc Gunn’s latest cat CD. Big fun for about a dozen folks. I think the cats had a good time too. Princess Rhonda sprawled where everyone could see her, but wouldn’t try to touch her. Leo hid, as it is his firm belief that everyone was here to get him. Bowbits, little attention whore that she is, just wandered about the room from person to person, collecting all the rubs and scratches she could. The weekend after that, I acquired a roommate when a friend moved back to TX and needs a place to get back on her feet. The last time I lived with anyone other than my mother was 1986. Fortunately there’s enough space in the house for both of us. We are still adjusting, but we’ll get there. Last weekend, I had my first public bellydance performance. Happily, I didn’t have any problems, other than a small last minute change to my costume in order to cover up my backpiece and not be breaking the ‘no visible tattoos’ rule that our studio has. My sister, roommate, cousins, and a couple of friends made it out to watch me, which was cool. This past week was crazy busy. On Monday night, my very best friend, Darla, and her 2 boys came in for a couple of days before going on to see her stepmother. 3 adults, a 17 year old, and a 20 month old make for a full house!!! Tuesday night Darla & I got a wee bit toasted. Note to self, Bunratty’s Meade is AWESOME, but dayum it will kick your ass!!!! We had to go shopping for school clothes on Tuesday and Wednesday, and then Thursday they headed east to the next stop, which was supposed to be a 2 night stay near her stepmother. Turns out that she was lied to about accommodations, and therefore needed to get a motel room, at $75/night. Between not being able to afford more than one night, and the fact that the women she was visiting chain smokes despite her COPD, emphysema, and 24/7 oxygen tank, which made Darla & our big boy sick, it was a 1 night stay and they were back here by Friday night 11:30. This next week will be a busy one as well, since I’ve still got to pack for PARF next weekend!!!! Coming, hopefully in the next few days, a handful of reviews on the CD’s I’ve gotten lately…. Teribus, Killdares, Rathkeltair, Marc Gunn…..

My weekend

It’s hard to believe the year is almost half over already! WOW! By this time on Saturday, I’ll be (hopefully) making my final descent into Cancun. Originally, we were scheduled for an early morning something on Tuesday evening, so we were going to have 3 nights and 3½ days, roughly. Once we’d paid our final, nonrefundable payment for our “subject to change until final payment is made” scheduled trip, we were given our schedule. It changed. Now we arrive around 5 pm, and have to leave the hotel for the airport at 9 a.m. on Tuesday morning, so we have 2 and less than ½ days, for the money we paid. But that’s another blog. This has been a great spring for my music collection…. I’ve already talked about American Highlander, the latest offering from The Rogues. I’ve also added the latest offering from Clandestine, ReD. If you’ve seen them live in the last year, you’ve already heard some of the awesome new stuff. From the first time I heard it, I’ve loved Wobbly Wheel Set, Sexy An Dros, and The Ewe & the Sound. The harmonizing of Emily, EJ & Al, is great. Overall, it’s a toe-tapping, dancing in your seat (or jumping up and dancing), fun and interesting disc to listen to. Early last week, I went to the post office to discover my Box O’ Swag, from my pre-adoption of Marc Gunn’s latest 2, Whiskers in the Jar and Going for Brogue. My swag included not just copies of the cds but also a handful of other discs to share, some bumper stickers and a new t-shirt. I think I’ve still got a copy of Going for Brogue to share, as well as an Irish Drinking Songs: The Cat Lover’s Companion, and a couple of his first cat CD Irish Drinking Songs for Cat Lovers. If you’re interested, let me know, or head on over to CD Baby and pick up a copy. Whiskers in the Jar is another fun collection of traditional Irish tunes to which Marc & others have rewritten the words, honoring, playing with, or expressing the loving frustration we cat lovers feel for our feline babies. I SOOO understand Danny Boy… as I have my own obnoxious brat, sweet baby who finds it quite amusing to attack my toes when I am asleep, so as to wake me from deep and blissful slumber. What Shall We Do With a Catnipped Kitty pretty much ensures that I’ll be mixing up the words to Drunken Sailor forever… An absolute must for the cat lover in your world! Going for Brogue is Marc’s offering of traditional Irish songs and sea shanties done with wonderful accents. There’s something for the Irishman in you, something for the pirate in you. At first listen, several of the sea shanties sounded odd to my ear, since I’d really only heard them done in 4 or 5 part harmony by the Corsairs, but by the time the song was over, I was backing up to listen again to Marc’s wonderful rendition. Once again, Marc’s love of music and making music shines through in his voice and music. Order a copy for your pirate, or your irish! In the grand scheme of things, I probably should have spent yesterday doing something totally constructive, like getting laundry done so I could pack for the trip, or cleaning the house because it needs it, or working on the pool, because again, it needs it. The problem with all of those , is that none of those would have distracted me sufficiently to forget that I’ve embarked on what could be a pretty long stretch between live bagpipe shows. I may make it to the Killdares show Friday night, but that’s still very up in the air. Instead of the constructive stuff, I went with Emilee down to Austin so we could make an appearance at Marc Gunn’s CD release party at Things Celtic. Probably 25 or so people were there… got to see a handful of faire folke when Queen Bonnie & Var Grayshadow made it. Marc had a sore throat, but did a great job! Having never been in the shop before, I quite enjoyed looking around and seeing what I could find. Emilee, Marc & I took baby Claire and had an early dinner at a cute little café, Kerbey Lane. I gotta say the French toast was good, and I don’t remember the last time I had bacon cooked just the way I like it… without me even asking! I love it when I have the opportunity to have a nice quiet meal with friends! Marc offered us an opportunity to grow our celtic music libraries that sounds great, and as my library is still fairly small, I’m looking forward to adding new artists to those I already enjoy! On the way home (and down, if we’re going to be honest about it) we stopped in West at the Czech Stop. On the way down we’d stopped for gas and breakfast, and I saw Dr. Pepper cake, but didn’t want to have it sit in the car for who knew how long in the heat. I’ve had a bite or two of it, and it’s definitely yummy, and tastes sort of Dr. Peppery, but also kind of chocolatey. The beer bread I brought home is great too!!! That’s about it for now… gotta go move the laundry now.

A Weekend off

Yep, I finally had a weekend free from commitments. I did managed to get some things accomplished, though not nearly enough. A portion of the around 2000 photos I took at Scarborough are finally edited. Oh, there are plenty more to get done, and hopefully, I'll get a few done each night this week, and before I go to Cancun in a couple of weeks they'll all be done and up. I learned a few things about myself this week:

• I learned that I don't read some people nearly as well as I thought I did. To that end, I'm pulling back out my face reading book, and brushing up on that so that maybe next time, I won't be such a dunce.
• I realized that tapes that I thought were long gone from my head, while not nearly so prominent, are still there, and while they always will be, I know that they were placed there out of love, not malice, and that they are not actually true
• I realized, again, how blessed I am to have the people who are in my world, and how much I have enjoyed adding to my world this year.
• I learned that there is music in all of us, itching to get out, we just have to recognize that music, and let it out, whether it is actually music, or dance, or words, or watercolor, or oils...
• I learned that while, outwardly, I always embrace the person that I have become, I am not always honest with myself, and I don't always believe what I am projecting, though I do believe it is true.