Still no sign of a city plow, since early this morning when a plow came through just to make a path for emergency vehicles....here's a street by street neighborhood update as of 2:00 pm on Sunday 2/10.
Roosevelt St looking north from Edgewood
Edgewood Ave, looking east from Roosevelt
Kennedy Drive, looking North from Edgewood. Nary a tire tread, but someone with a snow blower cut a walking path
Benson Street, looking north from Edgewood
Fulton Street is driveable (with caution), single lane
Hudson Place, looking east from Fulton. Not plowed, sorry Dattco....
Astor Place, looking east from Fulton. Suspect someone on the (dead-end) street had a plow truck.
Parker Control Systems on Edgewood. Lot is nice and clear, has been since yesterday.
Here's the present state of the roads in my New Britain neighborhood:
Fulton Street has been nominally plowed with a single lane. Someone ran a plow down Edgewood (and backed it up) - limited access and not really what I'd call plowed. Fulton, Kennedy, Roosevelt, and Crescent have not been touched.
I walked the dog up Edgewood and all the way up Fulton - folks are digging out. While the snow plow owners were pretty quick to get out and clean up, it was pretty amazing to see the shovelers also doing a decent job of digging out.
No sign of street plow today, nor anyone to clean up our condo lot, although there are signs of life - a pickup did a first pass on the apartment lot across the street.
I suspect today will be a day of waiting - and hoping that those with transportation do not get out and about too early. Already there's a pickup parked on the street (visiting? resident who parked off site and came back?) that was in the way of the lot plow dude, and will obstruct the town plows if they show. And another dude rolled through in a Pontiac Sunfire (a shitbox in any weather, but particularly unsuited for the snow) and got stuck on Edgewood Ave - five of us out cleaning up pushed him out.
I recently received a rebate from Pep Boys for some things I bought over the holidays. In the past, the rebate shows up as a check, which I eventually deposited into my account. But this time (and more frequently, of late) rebates are coming in the form of a debit card.
Now, these things are kind of annoying. They are rarely sufficient to buy much (in this case, $10), and it's a hassle to pay for something with multiple cards, card / cash, etc. On more than one occasion, I put the card in a pile with my unused gift cards, and promptly forgot about it. Or I rang up a small purchase, and left a buck or two on the card. In either case, the card expires, I lose my money.
But now, I have a new Square account / swiper. I simply charged myself $10 and ran it through my Square account - and within a day, $9.72 was deposited in my bank account. The small Square fee (in this case, 28 cents) is less than the gas it would cost to run down to a bank or ATM, less than a first class stamp. And I can dispose of the card promptly.
Having just plowed through seven seasons of The West Wing (my January binge), I was delighted to see Rob Lowe featured as a political consultant in the upcoming film Knife Fight.
West Wing's Richard Schiff has a supporting role, juicing up the West Wing vibe.
Coming to Real Art Ways March 10th for a short run. I plan to catch it....
Stole away for the evening tonight, to watch the Oscar Nominated Short Films - Live Action and Animation - over at Real Art Ways. The Live Action and Animated films are playing now through Feb 14th, the Documentary films arrive Feb 15th. Click through to find out more about the films and see the trailers.
First off, apologies to Real Art Ways. My membership expired in September - and I have just tarried on signing back up. I wrote a check out and everything, but figured I'd drop it off the next time I was there. And I've been horribly anti-social (and also a big underfunded) since then; this was my first foray back in months. But I'm back on the member roles and hope to show up in the real world occasionally as we start to move towards spring.
Now, on to the films. First, up, the Animated Shorts, in order of viewing:
Maggie Simpson in "The Longest Daycare" - Maggie Simpson attends the Ayn Rand Daycare Center, where she finds a caterpillar and faces off against her nemesis.
I'm a huge Simpsons fan, have been for years, and the creative team has kept me amused for over two decades. But I just do not get this (or any other animated franchise) in this category. Yeah, cute story, yeah, nice to see an underused character fleshed out, yeah nice to see the show animated in a bit more detail and texture. But....not really what I want to see.
Adam and Dog - A playful dog exploring the newly created world comes upon the first man.
OK, maybe it's the dog owner in me, maybe watching the Genesis story from a different perspective and fleshed out, made human, was enough. But I was sobbing. Beautiful old-school animation, sweet, substantial. My vote for the Oscar, hands down.
Fresh Guacamole- An unseen cook uses a series of unusual ingredients to prepare a bowl of guacamole.
Totally charming, very short (2 minutes) and a little bit of a one joke wonder that sustains and amuses for the lentgh of the short.
Head over Heels - The emotional distance between a long-married husband and wife has resulted in an unusual living arrangement.
Very sweet, and little weepy, done with puppets. It has a little bit of the cleverness of last year's winner The Fantastic Flying Books of Mr. Morris Lessmore, although a bit less magical. I liked it, did not love it.
Paperman - A young man working in an office tries desperately to attract the attention of a girl in the building across the street.
Very clever animation and story, and aiming for the same turf as Mossis Lessmore. But a little too perfect and Disneyfied for my taste. Suffers a bit too much from "me too" flying paper, sweet romance, wind all hearken back to last year's winner.
Between the films, there were some bits by Morris Lessmore's William Joyce and Brandon Oldenburg who were funny, smart, and magnanimous in telling their story. Nicely done!
Now, on to the Live Action films, again, in order of viewing:
Death of a Shadow - A soldier attempts to ransom his soul from Death and return to the girl he loves.
Beautiful, creepy, dark, romantic, steam-punk. All of this and more. It was a really engaging, creative, beautiful film. Not my favorite, but the competition was fierce in this category.
Henry - Henry, an elderly concert pianist, undergoes a series of confusing experiences as he searches for his wife.
And...more tears. Having a friend's mother struggle with Alzheimer's, this film was especially poignant. Again, not my fave, but a real winner.
Buzkashi Boys - Two boys in Afghanistan, a
blacksmith's son and an orphan living on the streets, dream of winning a
popular and fierce polo match.
This one gets my vote for the Oscar, in a very strong field. The Kabul cinematography is stark, gorgeous, and so very sad - shot amidst burned out buildings, palaces, and rubble. The story is amazingly simple and yet so well told. I am sure there was a lot of money behind this (including the US Dept of State) and it shows - normally I'd discount that but for this one time, it does not matter. There is no sign of ongoing war here - just the charred remains of decades of war, poverty, and a beautiful, up close and personal, and so very sad story set in that backdrop.
Curfew - A young man on the verge of committing suicide receives a call from his sister asking him to babysit his niece.
Like Paperman, this film has a similar vibe to last year's winner (in this case, God of Love) - albeit darker. It was very sweet, had it's whimsical moments, and a precocious and lovely child actress. It all worked, totally worth the watch - just not my winner.
Asad - A boy from a poor Somali village must decide between piracy and life as a fisherman.
And...this must be the year of putting boys in ravaged landscapes and telling a story. The heart of this film is in the right place (almost all the actors are Samoli refugees or asylum seekers) and the story has it's moments. But the darkness and horror are neither fully explored nor completely redeemed. The ending / resolution seemed a little off - fantastic, impractical, unsatisfying. Tore at my heart strings, but something lacking in the storycraft here.
As with the Animated Shorts film, the between film patter was handled by last year's winner, Luke Methany. Not as effective - partly because there was just him, with no partner or foil to bounce memories off. And partly because, dark horse that God of Love was, he's not quite as seasoned as Mssrs. Joyce and Oldenburg - so a bit more of the "gee whiz, I won" and a bit less of the "we've been at this for 15 years, we've done a lot of grunt work, so keep hold of your dreams no matter what" that made the Animated segments work so well.
So my last blog post was Dec 2012; on the day of the tragic Newtown shooting. Much has happened since.
I've been pretty quiet - a combination of seasonal blahs (winter and holiday), busy work life (especially since the first of the year), and just that slow, sad erosion of the blogosphere in favor of social media platforms. Facebook, yes. Twitter, just a bit. But my poor, unattended blog - not much.
Hope to correct that. I'm feeling a bit more like writing, I need to get my creative, social, and cultural mojo engaged, and I'm overdue for a commitment.
It's everybodies worst nightmare. And my heart and thoughts go out to the families - of the lost children, the lost teachers, and everyone impacted by these murders - students, teachers, family, first responders.
But I'm not going to blog about it, editorialize, memorialize. There is enough pain in the world. I'm just sitting with it.
Way back in 2006, I saw Jonathon Demme's Neil Young biopic Heart of Gold. I blogged about it back then:
I thought how blessed Neil Young was to go toe to toe with mortality, to
survive, and to be wise enough to throw his own goodbye party / concert
and to film it. May we all be so fortunate.
Little did I know that Neil Young would survive his aneurysm survey, and keep right on rocking. And I was fortunate enough to see him as he came through Bridgeport (Webster Arena) last evening.
Now, Neil Young and I go way back. I thing I wore the grooves down on my Life Rust album (remember double albums?). I owned an erratic sampling of his works on album and cassette: his self titled first, Everybody Knows This is Nowhere, American Star and Bars, Re*actor, Trans, Landing on Water, Freedom. And when I made the jump to CD, I've picked up a bit over the years: Everybody Knows This is Nowhere, Rust Never Sleeps, Decade, Life Rust, Sleeps with Angels, Mirror Ball, Ragged Glory. Not canonical by any means, but a good sampling.
And as an angry young rocker, Neil Young was an icon. Needle and the Damage Done was part of the walking D acoustic trilogy (also, Willin' by Lowell George and Friend of the Devil by the Grateful Dead). A guitar, and amp, and the right effects pedal, and one could blast out the riffs to Hey Hey, My My. Every band I've ever played in had some Neil Young in the set list - Powderfinger, Hey Hey My My, Like a Hurricane. Even today, the Guinea Pigs play Cinnamon Girl. Neil Young's music is nothing if not messy, emotional, heartfelt.
First thought: Is that the set from Rust Never Sleeps? Indeed it was. No idea if Crazy Horse gigs have had this set all along, but dude - that album came out in 1979, the year I graduated from high school. And yet, here it still is, 30+ years later. It was both reassuring (some things never change....they stay the way they are....) and kind of sad.
Similarly, the intro to Needle and the Damage Done (with the lightning graphics and sound, and the Woodstock "please get off those towers...no rain" recording) was straight out of Live Rust. For someone who often obstinantly refuses to play the greatest hits (the folks behind us were kvetching about previous concerts where he did nothing old or classic), Mr Young is awfully faithful to the past.
And there were Greatest Hits - Mr. Soul, Hey Hey My My, Cinnamon Girl, Powderfinger, Needle and the Damage Done were all woven into newer material. It felt a little polarized - old FM classics or brand new material. Not a lot of middle ground, mining the many albums of material out there.
I was struck by a certain level of goofiness, bordering on surrealism, that infused the concert. The big amps and microphone, and the video monitors (trimmed out to look like 60's TV sets hung in the arena) reminded me of a bunch of kids playing in the basement - Neil and the band (with the exception of the keyboard player) hugged the center of the stage, facing inward towards each other as if avoiding eye contact with the audience. This was their fun time playing, and we got to watch and listen, if we dared.
Their set opened with the National Anthem (dude, you are Canadian, right?) complete with flag unfurled behind the band - serious or making fun? Hard to say. During one song, an old pump organ was rolled out on stage, and when the short organ instrumental rolled around (played by the keyboardist on a more modern instrument) the old pump organ was spotlit, unplayed. At one point, the roadies crumpled papers and bags in front of a fan, blowing across the stage for no real reason other than perhaps the joy of watching things blow across the stage. You get the feeling that maybe back in '75, someone decided to screw with Neil and send stuff blowing across the stage via a cooling fan, and they decided to keep the bit. There was a lot of that going on. Like some weirdly serious, weirdly comic ritual that has evolved over 40 years - nobody knows why they are doing all these things, they made sense once upon a time.
Me at 51 is a far different person than me at 18. I grew tired of the endless guitar riffing, and the prolonged (10 minutes maybe?) of messing around with feedback and sonic blasting. I wanted a little more song and a little less riffing. But, 35 years down the road Neil Young is still rocking it out. He was up there amusing himself in 79, and he's still up there amusing himself today. We can choose to come along.
The second song in was the anthem Powderfinger - and it was like I was scratching a 35 year old itch to hear the song played live, after playing it so often in my own basement rock past. It did not disappoint.
Jonathon Demme has a follow-up film (Journeys) - part of an accidental Trilogy - and I need to see that. 2006's Heart of Gold was amazingly moving. But for now, I'll let the ears ring and the energy settle. Glad I finally got to see Neil Young and Crazy Horse.
So I got a letter a few weeks back from TaxServ Capital Services. The gist of it was that I owed some back property taxes on my cars, stemming from the time I lived in Hartford. It basically amounted to one half tax year ($240), plus minor amounts $25 for other years - although by the time interest and fees were tacked on it was $400.
I paid up, not happily, but without rancor. I owed the taxes, the bills probably got lost in the mail forwarding / moving process when I relocated to New Britain. No idea why I underpaid two years of bills $12 (perhaps late fees or interest or something). I'm happy enough to be free and clear - that sort of thing tends to catch up with you at registration time, which usually involves a trip down to City Hall (where they have odd rules like cash only and even odder business hours) to make things right. So here's my credit card number, I'm all set, right?
But it struck me that this was clearly a place where the local tax collector (looking at you, City of Hartford) had not the interest, time, aptitude, or motivation to go out and get this money. And some wizard in the private sector figured out how to make it work, collect debts that Hartford probably had tossed into the uncollectable bin, and make a few bucks on it. I not a scofflaw, the tax bills just got lost in the shuffle.
Stuff like this reminds me that not EVERYTHING the Republicans stand for is bogus. I'd love to see a political movement that is socially liberal and fiscally moderate / conservative. Northeast Republicans used to hold that ground - perhaps these days the Democratic Leadership Council (which both Bill Clinton and Barack Obama both play nice with) are seeking the same ground.
I know the mess is still happening - and thoughts go out to those on the CT coastline, to the folks in New York City, and those who remain without power.
Sandy was a lot like last year's Irene for me - never lost power then or now, never lost cable / internet. The UPS kicked on a few times due to sags / instability but otherwise, no problems. The upside of living in / near a city.
I have to believe that this is going to help out President Obama. Even though he'll have to suspend his campaign, and turnout in the northeast states (mostly safely in Obama's pocket anyway) will be impacted, he'll have a week of lookign and acting presidential (don't blow it!)
And after an event like this, I would think that the candidate who accepts the concept of global warming and climate change, and who supports the federal role in emergency preparedness, disaster relief, and things like strong building and zoning regulations might have a bit of a leg up.
But we shall see. In the meantime, stay safe everyone!
Made my occasional pilgrimage to see the high priest of Rock N' Roll, Mr. Bruce Springsteen, last night at the XL Center. I went with Robert and Kristen (my frequent Bruce companions) and Robert's daughter Devon, for her first arena show and her first Springsteen show.
Anne Haines did us the solid of recording the set list; I've been a twitter follower of hers for a while (and have been keeping up with the tour as a result) - wonderful to have the list in front of me as I recall the show.
Mostly, it felt a little like hanging out with old friends who kept pulling oldies but goodies out of theur hats and giving them a whirl. Songs I never expected to hear live again included Held Up Without a Gun (the opener), Spirits in the Night, Incident on 57th Street (a request), For You (a request, solo on piano). Lot of stuff from Wrecking Ball, a whole lot from The River, and a healthy dose of the classics - Badlands, Tenth Avenue Freeze Out, Born to Run. No Rosalita, no Jungleland, no Thunder Road.
I think my favorite song pairing was Point Blank and Because the Night - I go back far enough to remember when Point Blank was unrecorded and Because the Night's Patti Smith bona fides made it a real treat (although I kind of would prefer her take on it, I'm liking it a little darker)
I only cried a few times - Wrecking Ball (that whole coming to the end of the road thing), the Rising (with it's 9-11 imagery and energy), and Land of Hope and Dreams (gotta love a little come to Jesus revival moment!)
I was surprised that Bruce said not a word about the election - not even a "get out and vote" message - maybe he knew that with the aging frat boys in the house, the hall might go for Romney. He did plug Foodshare Hartford, though, so I will too!
Not much else to say. Was an awesome show, as they all are. We were in some reasonably bad seats - halfway up the second level on the side. Sometimes ludicrously bad seats (behind stage, or last row, all the way back) are more fun.Once upon a time Bruce could take an arena down int silence with just a gesture - but there were a lot of not-so-true-believers in the house (the couple next to me sat through most of the show and left after Born to Run) - so there was a lot of chit-chat through the quiet songs (come on dudes, it's Bruce and a piano playing For You - when are you ever gonna hear that?).
There was a nice tribute to Clarence (mostly) and Danny (a bit) in the middle of 10th Avenue Freeze Out that was very sweet, and Clarence's nephew Jake Clemons did an amazing job of filling his late Uncle's shoes - both technically and energetically.
Mostly though, I am thankful that my self-employed lifestyle means I could sleep in a bit today - unlike my fellow travelers (teacher, student, and corporate gig). Need to gargle a bit before I teach today - my throat is a bit raw from the singing, the yelling, the beers, and the hours.
I have a high deductible, HSA based health insurance plan; it really does not pay for much. But the other day I received this letter - women's health coverage is increasing significantly. And even though I'm not going to need most of these services, getting coverage for an annual trip to the gyno is a good benefit. (Not to mention the colonoscopy that got covered 100% in the past year, also thanks to the Affordable Care Act).
But for other women, women who are in their reproductive years and considering having kids, this is great news.
Thanks, President Obama. One more reason I am voting Dem in 2012.
As a result of the Health Care Reform law (Jude notes - aka "Obamacare), the following preventive services are included in your plan. Preventive services are covered with no cost share when provided by a network provider. No cost share means that your deductible, coinsurance and/or copay do not apply to these services.
• Well-woman visits (this includes prenatal visits)
• Screening for gestational diabetes (diabetes during pregnancy)
• Human papillomavirus (HPV) DNA testing
• Counseling for sexually transmitted diseases (STDs)
• Counseling and screening for human immunodeficiency virus (HIV)
• Screening and counseling for interpersonal and domestic violence
• Breastfeeding support, supplies and counseling
• Contraceptive methods and counseling (when prescribed by a physician)
Some of these services are already benefits under your plan. These changes go into effect on January 1, 2013.
It was a "back of the envelope" estimate of the number of dead on Sept 11, 2001. I'm an engineer, so that sort of calculation comes naturally.
I was out in Chicago that week; and watched the towers fall from the floor of the Stephens Convention Center in Rosemont, IL. Somewhere that morning I heard the total occupancy of the towers, and based on where the planes struck, the time the towers remained standing, and the number of first responders, media, and onlookers, that was the number I imagined I had just watched perish as the buildings collapsed.
A lot of things went right that day. The World Trade Center occupants and safety personnel had a test run back in 1993, and folks remembered and kept their heads. The terrorist attacks came early in the day before the offices filled. The towers stood long enough for many to escape. The buildings pancaked in on themselves, containing the damage to the World Trade Center footprint. When all was said and done, 3000 had perished - a horrific number, to be sure, but I never quite forgot my initial estimate. And so I walked away thinking "it could have been so much worse".
In the ten years since that tragic day, we've witnessed a lot of mass casualty events:
Yet those things happened far away, the World Trade Center was right here - on the skyline, in our collective and recent experience, our friends and neighbors. And the attacks were not arbitrary acts of nature, of chance, of misfortune - they were deliberate, targeted acts.
Perhaps my initial calculation tempered the shock and grief, for me. I mourned the 3000 dead, but I also felt deep gratitude for the 47,000 I had imagined to be dead who remained alive. And in the subsequent years, I have carried that sense of proportion with me as I watched my government and country respond in terms of security, privacy, military actions, torture. I don't think it was wrong to seek retribution and justice. But I wish we had a more intelligent, more thoughtful, and more patient government at the time.
Revenge, as they say, is a dish best served cold. How much sweeter would it have been to track down and dispatch Osama Bin Laden had we not added nearly 6,000 dead, 40,000 wounded, to the pricetag. The terrorists could not have scripted out a better response to the attacks in terms of American costs - loss of life, loss of capital, loss of world reputation, loss of rights and freedoms, distraction from global and national issues.
So, on this 10th anniversary, I mourn the loss of those who suffered and died ten years ago. And I mourn the effects of the resulting 10 years on my country.
Mitt Romney got caught on video a while back, at a fund-raising dinner in Tampa. Mother Jones recently released that video, and it does not reflect well on the former Massachusetts Governor.
The content itself is not all that controversial. 47% of Americans pay no income taxes, and those folks are not going to respond to Romney's sales pitch of lowering taxes. So he's going for the folks who do pay taxes. And I'm open minded enough to understand that when Romney says "[M]y job is not to worry about those people.", he's talking about getting their votes, not their lives.
But it was the surrounding opinion - wholly not needed to make a point but probably reflecting Romney's personal feelings, that are damning.
There are 47 percent of the people who will vote for the
president no matter what. All right, there are 47 percent who are with
him, who are dependent upon government, who believe that they are
victims, who believe the government has a responsibility to care for
them, who believe that they are entitled to health care, to food, to
housing, to you-name-it.That that's an entitlement. And the government
should give it to them. And they will vote for this president no matter
what…These are people who pay no income tax.
"[M]y job is is not to worry about those people. I'll
never convince them they should take personal responsibility and care
for their lives."
Mighty big brush you are tarring a huge swatch of the American populus there, Mr. Romney. And a lot of "those people" are your base - senior citizens, military personnel, the working poor.
It's not the politics I find objectionable - I do not agree, and feel there is amble evidence that Romney's policies and monetary philosophy are bankrupt. But on top of all that - Romney appears to be too dumb, too inept, too incompetent to be president. Who, running for president and knowing that every moment may be caught on video or audio tape, says these things? If Romney's main claim to the office is his executive experience and competence, he's demonstrating, over and over, that he's not qualified.
OK, I'll fess up. I pay income taxes. I am self employed, I'm not wealthy by any standard. But despite my best efforts to optimize expenses and deductions, my mortgage deduction, etc. I write a check every year for Federal income tax on top of my Social Security and Medicare dues. I am, therefore, part of the 53%. And I'm voting Obama.
I'm coming off a rather remarkable period of productivity - checking items off my "to do" list that go back months, if not years. I moved into my present digs three years ago October, and at that time I pretty much threw my office into boxes and moved it into the basement. Not much got organized below grade....ever. Until now. So here's the canonical list of my September cleaning and organizing.
Purchased and hung a wall rack to store speaker and mic stands
Consolidated and organized PA system cables, mics, accessories
Permanently mounted 2x track lights and associated dimmer switches.
Removed most of the wire that once supported a suspended ceiling in the basement
Removed all remaining ceiling tiles (stuffed above walls, etc.) that carried some cigar / smoke odor
Cleaned and organized desk, two tables, four shelving units, and one printer station
Cleaned and organized the under stair crawlspace
Installed hangers for XC skis and got those off the floor
Purged several boxes full of paper, magazines, etc. (four more to go)
Cleaned out and organized all desk drawers
Installed a perf board to hang tools, and organized same
Installed a wooden shelf to store chemicals, paint, etc.
Vacuumed office area
Reorganized and consolidated all electrical and mechanical household supplies
Purchased and installed a new label printer (the old one ate a label and died)
Took several boxes of old electronics and cables to Green Monster
Installed a pencil sharpener that has been lying around forever
And above grade, things were also pretty busy:
Removed bedroom A/C unit
Removed, cleaned, and stored bedroom and yoga room fans
Installed track and hangers for guitar, bouzouki, and bass in bedroom
Cleaned top of fridge and put everything there-on away
Cleaned both bathrooms
Purchased luggage tags and laminated business cards for luggage and tool kit ID
Not 100% sure of what is behind all this productivity, but a bunch of things factor in:
I love the cooler late summer / early fall weather
Fall is a good time to transition / make changes
My 11 days without a car got me cleaning to start with (nothing else to do)
My 11 days without a car had me cooking in more, eating healthier (higher energy)
Once I got the car back, hitting retail shops to pick up supplies and hardware seemed like a privilege
I have a bit of romance in my life. It just does a body and spirit good
I can only hope that this spurt of energy and drive to get things done continues - I really like it, and I am truly enjoying my much more livable and pleasant work and living spaces!
An unlimited season pass to Hartford Stage’s 2012/13 season. If you are
18–27
years old and love theatre, Stage Pass is definitely for you. Purchase a
Stage Pass for only $38 – yup, that’s it – and get into every Mainstage
production at Hartford Stage for the 2012/13 season. That’s basically
what you would spend going to the movies twice, and just think how
sophisticated you’ll sound when you tell your friends and family you are
“going to the theatre tonight.” Speaking of friends, want to bring a
friend when you use your Stage Pass? Go ahead and do it! Purchase up to 3
companion tickets for only $20 each.
I'd slap a big old Facebook "Like" on that if I were not, well, 51, and therefore ineligible. FWIW, I love the theater, and I'm not really able to afford Hartford Stage except on special occasion.
Apparently, offering a special to a particular age (and by default, not offering it to those outside of that age) is legal and socially acceptable (of course it is, look at all the senior discounts out there). But imagine if this special offer were limited to people of a certain race ("If you are white and like the theater....") or religion ("If you are non-christian, come on down...."
I get that they want to bring a younger crowd in the door, but jeez, there are ways to do that (how about targeting the offer via youth-heavy conduits such as QR Codes, twitter, handing out physical coupons at particular events) - instead of blatant age targeting (and flipping the coin over, de facto discrimination).
Instead, I'm vaguely resentful that Hartford Stage is not offering me this particular special.
I mentioned in an earlier blog post that I lost use of my car for 11 days. Here's the blow-by-blow.
My Check Engine light has been lit for, well, months. No excuses there - I needed to get it in, but the time and money never coincided, and the car continued to run. A bit roughly, but it never conked out, never stranded me. I assumed it was a bad spark pug or something.
So when I got some money and the end of the summer rolled around, I took it in. I've been meaning to find a regular, independent mechanic and garage, but never got that sorted out. So, needing to get the brakes checked out, and having had the brakes done in the past (with a lifetime warranty) at Pep Boys, I took it there. Mistake #1.
I took the car in late in the day on Wednesday. Waited around for it - by diner time, they had gotten stuck (Cylinder #3 was not firing and had low compression) and were dialoging with a national specialist. They took me home, and I started figuring out options. Thursday morning the diagnosis came in - bad ECM (computer). Bad computer = big money ($1200) but what are you going to do. The problem was, with Saturn out of bizness, parts were not easy to come by, and the Pep Boys folks could not program (or "flash") the computer. So I'd have to wait over the Labor Day weekend. They hustled to get a computer on Friday, but when they replaced it, the new one was dead out of the box. So I waited until Tuesday.
Tuesday, the call came - the computer was replaced. The problem was still there. Upon further inspection, it turns out that here was a bent valve, it had damaged the #3 spark plug, coil, and head. They *said* that had damaged the computer (I remain dubious, think they were just throwing parts at it, and one of the parts they threw was the computer). Nevertheless - big job. To make a long story short, they ended up remachining the head, which took until Saturday). $2900 later, my car runs great.
I'm going to write a couple of letters. Pep Boys gets a letter- both for the length of repair (11 days? really?) and the computer (which as I noted, I do not feel was bad). And Saturn / GM gets a letter, since th Pep Boys folks feel (based on the engine head damage) that the net valve may have been there from the get go (the car has 80K on it, but never really ran smoothly, and the first tank of gas post repair got 4 MPG more than any previous tankful, and I monitor that fairly closely)
While the car was out of commission, I ended up riding my bike a bit - mostly back and froth to the studio (15 miles round trip). But I only rode up to teach (15 miles bike ride PLUS a hot / power practice would have been too much) so my own practice, as well as my social life, suffered.
On the up side, being home alone gave me the time to clean - and that has precipitated an amazing life change here, to be blogged next!
One of the off-shoots of Camp Camp 2012 is that I met someone.
Won't go into too much detail, other than she is my age, is a lovely amalgam of goofball, sweetie, and hottie, and lives along the Boston greenway. And so my energy is drawn back to Boston, after many years. There is a largish camp enclave in Boston, and I think I'll end up visiting this coming year.
Kind of weird - I've lived in Connecticut my entire adult life - since graduating in college in '83. Yet Massachusetts was where I came of age - learned to drive, went to ball games and concerts, took the T. I have a certain familiarity and fondness for Beantown.
So when I drove up for a visit last weekend, it was all familiar, comfortable. And although I drove through more rotaries in one car trip than I have in the past calendar year en route to West Roxbury. It was altogether familiar.
We took two laps around Jamaica Pond, which was beautiful and fun - sort of like the WH Reservoirs in energy but embedded in the city - not reserved for the suburban crowd.
I miss having a queer community. I miss having friends who might drop by and visit, or who might call up for dinner, music, a movie, or a night on the couch watching TV. And finally, with my mom getting older, and we siblings starting to face our own mortality, the prospect of moving back to the Boston area seems a lot less like an unreasonable than it might have in the recent past.
I do not move around a lot - I've been in CT nearly 30 years and have lived in just three homes over the past 25 years. So the idea of picking up and moving is a lot to wrap my mind around.
But, if one intends to turn an aircraft carrier, one starts planning for that a long time before one makes the turn. let's just say I am thinking about it....
I must admit to having fallen in love with the Obama Administration and the DNC this past month.
I watched a bit of the RNC - know your enemy, and all - and was unimpressed by the whole thing. I actually have attended the RNC back in the GWB era, in Philadelphia (I was back-up sound engineer for pseudo.com that was live streaming the convention) . Anyway, RNC was kind of bland - speakers not all that energizing, message muddled, even if I disagree I can appreciate a good show. Not happening in Tampa.
The DNC, however, had me hooked. Michelle Obama was amazing, and so many of the speakers that first night were energizing, passionate, engaged and informative. Contrast to the DNC of the past, where the party was so intent on pandering to the middle that they lost the passion of the left. It was a wonderful change, IMHO, and I ended up online Tuesday night to throw in some bucks (via Trans United for Obama) and buy some swag (a campaign kit and a shirt, neither of which has shown up yet). Then Bill Clinton on Day #2. I hang on until the end, and was entranced. I'd vote for him again.....
Finally, the president himself. Older, greyer, a little less passionate and little more careful, but still my guy.
I'm feeling good about the presidential election this year. Romney is another one of those "next in line" Republicans - I remain convinced that his religion and his moderate history in MA is keeping the red meat conservatives from getting behind him. And his pandering to the right will keep the moderates and independents away.
My two cents on the economy - I am an engineer, so it's hard not to look at the problems of the past few years as being analogous to an underdamped control system. The monetary policy and the regulatory environment resulted in the gain (especially on the housing market) as being too high - so prices rose too fast and hit the rail - and the system crashed. The present economic policy - perhaps a bit cautious and conservative, is still resulting in slow and steady growth, and a gradual recovery. The last thing we need is to return to the policies of the past, set a fire under the housing market and reignite the underdamped control loop.
Yes, unemployment is high, and that sucks. But I'll be honest - I've never been that impressed with the 9-to-5, corporate america crowd. It's my freelancer, techno-ninja history and experience perhaps (and my lean to the bone lifestyle), but it seems like a lot of the folks working in corporate america are filling out suits and holding a spot in the daily meeting. A lot of waste in the system. So not too sure those jobs are (or should) be coming back all that quickly.
Rainy Saturday morning, and a long overdue blog update.
The end of summer was a busy time - I spent a week on a Hillside in New York at the Falcon Ridge Folk Festival; my annual musical retreat among a family I have known for 20 years. In addition, I spent a week in Maine for my second visit to Camp Camp - a GLBT adult summer camp which, truth be told, has stolen me heart and spirit. I am sure I will be back.
In addition, I spent a few days in Missouri at a customer site, and a week in Tulsa at another customer facility. And finally, I had an 11 day car fast - took my vehicle in for a long overdue tune-up (check engine light) and it took 11 days and $2900 to set it right (bad computer, bad head, destroyed cylinder)
So it's been a bit of a crazy few months, and one very bad blogger. This morning - I'm going to post a bunch of things - catch up a bit. And then see where we go from there.
