the illustration I forgot

Happy Equinox

"My mother groaned. My father wept. Into the dangerous world I leapt."
--John Vanderslice

I like equinoxes. Fall because it is the best season we have around here. Spring because it is the end of winter and the beginning of so much hope to me. This year I am especially thrilled for fall because it brings me safely into blessed trimester #2. Also I'm ready to just take my time and enjoy life with that precious/precocious tot-o-mine. She points to my belly button and says "baby in there." And then I hug and kiss her many times. Yes, the whole family (the three of us) is pretty excited for spring equinox, as that is when we are due to welcome kidlet #2. Although I am in no hurry.

We feel ridiculously blessed as the timing could not be better and we are so excited to see our little one become a big sister. I better end this blog post before the crying. Oh ye hormones.

P.s., You may see a reprise of that song early next spring.

Fruit Bats

Recently went to a solid, fun rock show in Lawrence, Kansas. I had seen the Fruit Bats before and I do believe they rocked a lot harder this time. A little less folk, a little more straight-ahead rock, with just a pinch of the silly. Weirdly, the opener (who I guess the Fruit Bats front-man has played with before), Vetiver, played for a longer time than the Fruit Bats and I would describe them as lackluster. Fine, maybe even good, but a bit boring. Fruit Bats, however, were great. Not change-your-life great, but a-good-time-was-had-by-all great. Witness this video release from their new album:

Memories from the mid-00's

Something made me think of both of these things today.

Thing 1, which is funny

Thing 2, which is awesome.

A good egg

LCD just got back from helping some friends rip out all the carpet in their basement post-flooding (their house is about three times the size of ours) and two minutes later the next-door neighbors' teenager knocks and says their basement is flooding and he's out the door again.

I like him.

Sadly, I do fear there is more of this to come as we find out more people we know have had flooding damage (we're fine--I could kiss the dudes that regraded our sidewalk a while back). Worse still, many many areas around the northeast were hit much worse than ours. I guess last week's natural disasters were just practice?

Oh yeah, you music

You would think based on the title of this blog that I spend some time listening to and/or playing rock music. Lately--say the last 21 months or so--you would be wrong. But then the other day LCD was whining about how we never do music stuff anymore and I came up with a project for us--to learn how to play and create our own version of a Beatles song every week. This week LCD picked "Hey Jude," a song most of us have heard a berjillion times. I mean, right?

But do you know that when we were playing/singing it, just about every time we got to the line "Hey Jude, you'll do. The movement you need is on your shoulder," I got goosebumps? Or butterflies. Something. Oh yeah, you music. You poetry.

There's a good chance you've heard the story, but in case not, the legend goes that Paul McCartney was not sure about this line because there's a slight awkwardness to it. "The movement you need is on your shoulder" is just not the sort of thing people generally say. But when he expressed his doubts about keeping it John Lennon told him it was the best line of the song. Based on my goosebumps, he was right. I love it when poetry is empowering without being corny.

Next week I want to learn "Got to Get You into My Life." I think it will be romantic (even though maybe it's actually about drugs--oh the sixties).

P.s., The cute part is that Little A is starting to learn the song. If you sing "Hey Jude," she'll say, "Don't make it bad."