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beige_alertWhat a fun con!
(This is sort of a vague and chaotic kind of con report)
I followed my first rule of happy long trips, which is to have lots of time. I took a total of four days off from work. I headed out comfortably early (about the same time I normally head off to work) on Thursday and arrived 10.5 hours plus one hour of time-zone later at a reasonable time in the evening. No problem. I saw the old fart concert (and later on in the weekend got to tell Bill Sutton my "Only Here for the Beer" story, from the LARP in Germany last year. * "Oh, you were already in the third verse! That's the verse to be in!"
There was a nice circle in the big room, and I got to bed at some sort of reasonable hour and slept nice and late.
Friday there were concerts, and more concerts. Toyboat was fun. (I have photos!) It was great to see Duane Elms. Never saw him before, but of course I know some of his music. I was unreasonably happy hearing Ghost Puppies. I've had that in my book for a long time and just recently dragged it out at a housefilk (live and unrehearsed!) when we got to that time of night when you've run out of stuff you've been practicing and move on to the other stuff.
It was wonderful to see Heather Dale and Ben Deschamps again. I first saw them in Germany a few years back. They are really great performers.
And the Pegasus nominees concert was great as always. I'll get some photos of bits of that up eventually.
And it's great seeing Judi. I always think of her as a part of OVFF.
At some point I got into the chamberfilk thing again, there was a rehearsal Saturday and Sunday mornings. It amazes me how after so little rehearsal somehow it always comes together during the performance. It is also fun to be up on stage, with the sound guys running around setting sound stuff up, the sort of thing most of us aren't involved in very often.
The Gigantic Stage-Filling Concert by Mary Ellen Wessels and a great many friends was just a delight.
I also enjoy the Farewell Jam. I haven't usually been able to stay long enough to attend, but these last two years I have. That's the kind of thing I don't get much practice at and am not very good at, but participation is encouraged and, really, everyone is making such a loud joyful noise that you're not going to cause a disruption by being clumsy.
Oh, and Mongolian Barbecue is great.
I had fun with my own music making over the weekend. I played the flute quite a bit. I played![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
peteralway's flute piece, the Allemande from Bach's A-minor partita more than once (one time in the hallway), and a quite good run through the Sarabande (though there is nothing like playing the sarabande in the staircase at the castle in Germany).
I really enjoyed seeingmoshez again, and was great to meet nightface. Collectively, I think we are The Phoenix Conspiracy. I sang Der Phoenix, the German translation, and saw moshez run over to nightface while I was singing. I figured they must be up to something. If I was to guess, probably something in Hebrew. Indeed, there is a Hebrew translation. The next day tigertoy sang the original KlingonEnglish, and I followed that with the Kanefsky version, so over the weekend every known version of that song got sung.
On Sundaypeteralway set up a Newtonian reflector on a Dobsonian mount in the parking lot, aimed at Jupiter. The four Galilean moons were plainly visible (you can see them with just binoculars) and Jupiter itself was a small disk with a few cloud bands visible, something I'd never actually seen before (it's just a dot with no features in normal binoculars). Also during that break in the music moshez and I went out in the hallway so he could sing the Hebrew Phoenix for me again so I could get a good listen. Song translations delight me.
I had all Monday to drive home, again no problems. I took Tuesday off from work, so I could sleep a bit and have another day to get my wake/sleep schedule back closer to business hours, and to run errands. I got groceries, went to the library, wandered through a used book store, and went to the art museum. I don't go to the museum that often, but I do always enjoy it. There are always a few new exhibits and I do like to see my favorites again in the collection.
* What story? Oh, at the LARP at one point some of us were hanging around, and drinking beer, because we were in Germany, and drinking beer is one of the things you do there. I broke into song: "I'm only here for the beer! I'm only here for the beer!" One of the women said, "You came a long way from America just for the beer." Now, the beer is better in Germany (I never liked beer at all until I visited and sampled the good stuff), so it's probably worth the trip. But also at that moment a very lovely woman and good friend wandered into the room, and I walked over to her and snuggled up and gave her a little back rubbing and said, "well, I'm not here only for the beer."
(This is sort of a vague and chaotic kind of con report)
I followed my first rule of happy long trips, which is to have lots of time. I took a total of four days off from work. I headed out comfortably early (about the same time I normally head off to work) on Thursday and arrived 10.5 hours plus one hour of time-zone later at a reasonable time in the evening. No problem. I saw the old fart concert (and later on in the weekend got to tell Bill Sutton my "Only Here for the Beer" story, from the LARP in Germany last year. * "Oh, you were already in the third verse! That's the verse to be in!"
There was a nice circle in the big room, and I got to bed at some sort of reasonable hour and slept nice and late.
Friday there were concerts, and more concerts. Toyboat was fun. (I have photos!) It was great to see Duane Elms. Never saw him before, but of course I know some of his music. I was unreasonably happy hearing Ghost Puppies. I've had that in my book for a long time and just recently dragged it out at a housefilk (live and unrehearsed!) when we got to that time of night when you've run out of stuff you've been practicing and move on to the other stuff.
It was wonderful to see Heather Dale and Ben Deschamps again. I first saw them in Germany a few years back. They are really great performers.
And the Pegasus nominees concert was great as always. I'll get some photos of bits of that up eventually.
And it's great seeing Judi. I always think of her as a part of OVFF.
At some point I got into the chamberfilk thing again, there was a rehearsal Saturday and Sunday mornings. It amazes me how after so little rehearsal somehow it always comes together during the performance. It is also fun to be up on stage, with the sound guys running around setting sound stuff up, the sort of thing most of us aren't involved in very often.
The Gigantic Stage-Filling Concert by Mary Ellen Wessels and a great many friends was just a delight.
I also enjoy the Farewell Jam. I haven't usually been able to stay long enough to attend, but these last two years I have. That's the kind of thing I don't get much practice at and am not very good at, but participation is encouraged and, really, everyone is making such a loud joyful noise that you're not going to cause a disruption by being clumsy.
Oh, and Mongolian Barbecue is great.
I had fun with my own music making over the weekend. I played the flute quite a bit. I played
peteralway's flute piece, the Allemande from Bach's A-minor partita more than once (one time in the hallway), and a quite good run through the Sarabande (though there is nothing like playing the sarabande in the staircase at the castle in Germany). I really enjoyed seeing
moshez again, and was great to meet nightface. Collectively, I think we are The Phoenix Conspiracy. I sang Der Phoenix, the German translation, and saw moshez run over to nightface while I was singing. I figured they must be up to something. If I was to guess, probably something in Hebrew. Indeed, there is a Hebrew translation. The next day tigertoy sang the original On Sunday
peteralway set up a Newtonian reflector on a Dobsonian mount in the parking lot, aimed at Jupiter. The four Galilean moons were plainly visible (you can see them with just binoculars) and Jupiter itself was a small disk with a few cloud bands visible, something I'd never actually seen before (it's just a dot with no features in normal binoculars). Also during that break in the music moshez and I went out in the hallway so he could sing the Hebrew Phoenix for me again so I could get a good listen. Song translations delight me. I had all Monday to drive home, again no problems. I took Tuesday off from work, so I could sleep a bit and have another day to get my wake/sleep schedule back closer to business hours, and to run errands. I got groceries, went to the library, wandered through a used book store, and went to the art museum. I don't go to the museum that often, but I do always enjoy it. There are always a few new exhibits and I do like to see my favorites again in the collection.
* What story? Oh, at the LARP at one point some of us were hanging around, and drinking beer, because we were in Germany, and drinking beer is one of the things you do there. I broke into song: "I'm only here for the beer! I'm only here for the beer!" One of the women said, "You came a long way from America just for the beer." Now, the beer is better in Germany (I never liked beer at all until I visited and sampled the good stuff), so it's probably worth the trip. But also at that moment a very lovely woman and good friend wandered into the room, and I walked over to her and snuggled up and gave her a little back rubbing and said, "well, I'm not here only for the beer."
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no subject
Date: 2009-10-29 11:10 am (UTC)I really wish Phil Textor would sign up for LJ or FB.
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Date: 2009-10-30 03:30 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-10-30 10:44 pm (UTC)