Solstice

Some people go to the beach for the summer solstice. Mrguy and I went to a columbarium to see new music. It was awesome.

One acquaintance performed a Phillip Glass piece in the chapel. One coworker performed the title character in an opera about Emperor Norton. We didn't get to see that. One group stretched out spools of twine taut in a vestibule and bowed and plucked the twine. A woman sang atonal melodies while accompanying herself on cello. Only mrguy understood some of this, but I enjoyed it all. The audience just wandered from crypt to vestibule, pausing to listen to what they'd find there.

Upstairs in a space with vaulted ceilings, a group performed Pauline Oliveros' "Heart Chant". The singers each choose and sing a tone on the syllable "ah", taking breaths when they need to. People join and leave the circle as they wish, and the sound continues as long as the singers continue. It was completely mesmerizing.


Downstairs, a solo electric guitarist played single, ringing notes in another vestibule that was in listening distance of the Oliveros piece. I sat in a chair, closed my eyes and practiced slowing down my heart.

It was so incredibly peaceful.

Anniversary Road Trip

The summer before I entered grad school, we contemplated moving to a small funky town on the water that was about an hour closer to school than the town where we were living.

That plan never got beyond the "Hey, let's go live over there" point, and I'd never seen the place in real life until this weekend, when I asked mrguy to take me there for our anniversary. Time for a road trip. We had a lovely breakfast outdoors:


Then we went to that small town and walked their trails for a while:


Then we wandered around and took pictures of old stuff.


Then we headed to another small town nearby that has a hula halau and some Victorians. On the way to our final destination we stopped at a rummage sale in a mobile home park.


Our final destination was another small town that coincidentally happened to be celebrating Charlie Chaplin Days. Charlie Chaplin impersonators scare me a little bit, but if you pretend you don't see them they can't get you. As an anniversary present to ourselves we bought a page from a calendar produced by the Kalamazoo Vegetable Parchment Company.

Goes well in the kitchen.

'Slagapaloo

The other photos are not shareable, so I give you the ladies of Three Letters plotting their stage layout the week of 'Slagapaloo.

We rocked mightily.

Now in addition to being recognized for what I really do, there are people at work who only know me as one of the members of Three Letters.

I'm in some fine company.

San Diego

Our Los Angeles vacation concluded with a 5 hour drive to the airport near home and a flight just a little farther down from where I'd begun, to San Diego.

The drive was worth it for the additional hang time with mrguy :)

Shee Jimmy dubbed our trip the "Very Important Librarian Conference." Thinking about it still hurts my brain.

There was some of this:


and days of this:
One night after our many hours of conferencing we went here, which was tame and fun until it became bawdy and unpleasant.

Time for this archivist to turn in!


Great conference, great colleagues to spend time with, and a happy journey home.