On Thursday Betsy and Joe stopped by for about a couple of hours in the late afternoon before we went out for dinner in Chestnut Hill. They hung out with the kids and enjoyed themselves. Their grandchildren are all much older now and I think they loved being with the littles again. Dan came by and hung our for awhile too.
Marissa and Violet really bonded.
I was a little disappointed that we never got a chance to get down there to the restaurant and the Attic Brewery next door to sit at their shared outdoor patio enjoying some brews and BBQ. The weather just did not cooperate as the week went on. I thought I might have at least stopped by the brewery to buy a couple of 4-packs to take back to Buffalo with us but it just never happened. Next time we're in town I'll make sure it happens and it's a damn good reason to take a drive through my old neighborhood.
We had also been talking with Dan about getting together and he wanted to go out to dinner with us too so he came by and joined us. We drove over there but the parking lot was full and we had to park on the street about a block and a half away after dropping off Betsy and Joe at the restaurant. I went with Dan in his car and Becky and him parked next to each other on the street.
After dinner Betsy, Dan, Becky and me walked down the street to the cars. Joe waited on a bench in the parking lot. Dan had something in his car to give us from the house and I walked over with him to his car. In the meantime Betsy and Becky got in our car and drove back to the restaurant. Dan was going home from there which was just a couple of blocks away and I had to hoof it very quickly back to the restaurant to get my ride back to Katie's house with Becky. They thought I was riding back with Dan. Fortunately Joe was slow getting into the car and that gave me enough time to wave down Becky and get into the car. We all had a great laugh about me getting left behind and probably needing an Uber/Lyft to get back to the house. Well, we got back to Katie's and Betsy and Joe got in their car for their drive home. Back in the house we laughed again about me almost getting left at the restaurant. We did have a very good time and it was great spending some time with Betsy, Joe and Dan.
Last year in October we had a nice group dinner at the Chestnut Hill Grill on their patio. This time we were looking for something place different and Blue Bell Inn in nearby Blue Bell, PA fit the bill. It was a great place and they also had a very nice newly renovated outside patio area but the group opted to be inside and we had a room to ourselves. That was good because when Becky and I got there we could see that even on a Wednesday evening at happy hour the place was hopping in the main bar and dining area and was very loud.
We had a couple of people not able to make the dinner because of illness which was too bad. I was looking forward to seeing Margie and Madeline. And Joe too. So we had ten people at our table. There was me and Becky, Tom and Joanne, Tom's sister Patsy and her son, Jerry and Chris, George and Dona.
The food was wonderful. I was sorry that we didn't take pictures of our group. Last year it was Madeline who initiated taking pictures and this year she wasn't there. I should have taken some photos and had the waiter take our group picture but it didn't happen. Next time we will make sure it happens.
We stayed at the Comfort Inn which is where we had stayed previously. We got a room on the second floor overlooking the back parking lot where we had parked our car. We went to bed around nine and just as we had started trying to get some sleep there was a lot of noise out in the parking lot. There was a group of teenagers down there just below our window doing some kind of dance routine with some loud music, hand clapping and some shouting. It looked like there were doing some kind of tic-toc dance thing. The parking lot was well lit and there was plenty of room for the 15 to 20 or so kids to do their thing. It actually looked kind of cool and after checking them out from the window we went back to bed.
A few minutes later the kids were all gone from the parking lot.
I've added the original artists to the list which is something new and I'll probably go back and add them to the previous covers posts. Here is a link to the Spotify playlist and it runs for an hour and a half. The photo is from the Yo La Tengo video of their cover of that Cure song.
Friday I'm In Love - Covers FV
Katie, Todd and the three kids came up from Philly for the party and stayed at a motel down the road for a couple of nights. They arrived Friday evening and left Sunday afternoon towards the end of the party. The kids had school on Monday morning.
We were really excited to see The English Beat that night and R.E.M. was a relatively unknown at that time. Their Chronic Town EP had been out and the Buffalo State College radio station was playing their first single Radio Free Europe and that was about it. The first album Murmur was released the week of this show.
I went out and bought it after the show at Play It Again Sam's and then played it regularly on Saturday nights at the Pastime Lounge. Just gave the vinyl a spin too.
R.E.M. Set List
This mix was originally a neo-psychedelic set that was part of my Orgone Bliss series. For the Final Version series I put it in with the Late Night group.
When I'm Gone - Late Night FV
Then a couple of years ago I started putting on classical music and jazz concerts on during the day. It was like discovering a new world. So now I search for a particular artist and browse the results. Over time the system has greatly expanded the selections. I also started looking at folk music concerts too and an occasional rock concert.
It is interesting that there are so many jazz concerts online that were recorded over the past decades in Europe. It seems like there are very few archival footage of concerts recorded in the US.
Most of the time now during the day I will put on either a jazz concert or a classical music concert and then let it run for a few hours. The system is pretty good with following up one concert with another similar one. Then it keeps them in my account memory for future use.
I always put on concerts that were recorded live at some time but it is also possible to put on music from albums with sound only and maybe just a photo of the record on the screen. I haven't done that yet but it certainly is an option. I have put live concerts on the TV for background music while we had people over. Sometimes folks would sit down and watch a few minutes while snacking on something or the concert would be a conversation starter.
There She Goes Again - Covers FV
I Wanna Be Trash - Late Night FV
It has been three years now since the covid pandemic shut everything down. This time in 2020 everyone was either out of work or working from home. The city had to rescind the alternate parking regulations because there were so many people staying home. It has only been this past year or so that things have somewhat gone back to normal. One might say that actually there is a new normal.
Parking on our block has always been tight because of all the apartments across the street. Every house has a driveway but not enough room for all of the cars. We were lucky that our driveway could hold two cars.
I feel fortunate that the pandemic happened three years after we retired. We were able to travel before the restrictions happened and we had time to get used to being at home a lot more of the time. So when the pandemic hit and people were shut in their homes we were already somewhat used to the new reality.
She also started eating olives today. Her brother and sister were shocked and exclaimed to their mother to stop her from eating them. Violet thinks they're yummy. Becky was happy because she thinks that Violet got some of the Sicilian gene.
Well, she certainly didn't get it from me.
When doing a video chat with Katie I saw Violet grab her shoes in her hand and walk over to the door saying "bye" when she heard her mother ask the dog if she wanted to go out.
I was watching CNN a few days ago and there was an interview being conducted with the author of this book who is an historian and political commentator for The Atlantic, The Washington Post and for CNN. She was promoting this book and I quickly looked up the book on my tablet and saw that it was available from the library. I borrowed it. Within a day or so I had notices that people were waiting in line for the book.
I read the book in about a week. It was a fascinating study of what modern authoritarian demagogue dictators had in common. She described the experiences of Mussolini, Franco, Gadafi, Pinochet, Mobutu, Berlusconi, Putin, Hitler and of course Trump. Every chapter ended with her applying all the terrible deeds and situations of the authoritarian rulers to the American experience of Trump and what he was trying to do to our nation in his attempt to maintain power.
Andrew didn't have a nap and fussed some when going to bed. It's always hard on the little ones after a day of traveling and then sleeping in a different bed and bedroom. He also woke up crying in the middle of the night because of a thunderstorm but that was certainly not unusual for an almost two year old.
Unfortunately it was a cold and rainy day on Saturday and we couldn't take Andrew to the zoo or even go out and play in the backyard but we still had a wonderful time with him. We had a nice morning and then he took a long nap. Sean and Ashley had a friend's birthday party to attend down in Hamburg and we babysat Andrew for the late afternoon and evening. He got up from his nap out of sorts and crabby. He was giving his parents a hard time. Eventually I took him and waltzed him around the house and he was fine as the kids slipped out of the house and on to their party.
He was fine with us the entire time the kids were gone but then fussed a little when they got home. So very typical of a two year old. On Sunday morning we took him for a little walk around the block. He loves the neighborhood and then they were off on the road again.
It was a wonderful weekend and we are looking forward to seeing him again in a little less than two weeks for his birthday party. Katie and the kids will be there too. It should be another fun weekend.
