Old Crow Medicine Show!

Finally, I saw these boys live. Oh, I love them so much! The first time I heard "Wagon Wheel" was fall 2004, and I heard it once on the radio then couldn't get it out of my head for 3 months and finaly caved and bought their cd. Now, three years later, they are every bit as good as I could have hoped, although I'm disappointed Kritter the Dobro Player was absent from the show. Willie Watson, their guitar player/singer, might be the best thing ever. For this song, one of my favourites (I was obsessed all last year), I got to be right up front and center, dancing like a fool next to the stage. Yay!

California!

Popped up to Los Angeles for the weekend for long-delayed Grandmother time. I flew out at 6 AM, got there at 8:30, and we scuttled right out to the Huntington Gardens. Scuttled is perhaps the wrong word. My mother's best friend's son MP came over to help us, and we manouevered our way to, and around the beautiful gardens.



The rest of my trip was mostly low key, talking with Herself and enjoying her company while she recovered from the trip out. But what a grand time!

back in NM

There's so much to say about Spain, and so many pictures! I learned -so- much. Spanish language, Spanish culture, a load about theatremaking... it was exciting and fun and stressful and terrible and marvelous and all those things. I got to visit Salamanca and (briefly) Segovia, had a visit from a Belgian friend, and, well, put together a show with Antxon. More, actually, that he put together the show and I helped. I'm still waiting for the promo dvds to see how it turned out!



I am, however, glad to be home.

Nueva Entrada

quick note to say, I´ve made it to Spain. I´m completely exhausted, so I won´t write about the last days in Santa Fe or the misadventures (which, thankfully, were slight) of the trip, or how odd it is staying with strangers, lovely though they seem.

I´m here, all is well, I´m going to sleep!

Bandelier

Bandelier National Monument is my favourite nearby place to take visitors. It's the site of an ancient Anasazi community, with cliff-dwellings carved into the volcanic rockface. The formations themselves are beautiful, and it's one of my very favourite places. There's a cool stream and lots of Ponderosa pines nearby, so after climbing through the caves and cliff dwellings, you can walk back through the pines.
It'd on high mesa, near the San Idlefonso Pueblo, so it's high and dry and the sky is incredible. We watched a thunderstorm come in for hours. It caught us in Santa Fe, but when we drove to Albuquerque and took the tram up Sandia Mountain, we could watch it keep creeping across the state.

Fiestas! part 2

All weekend there are parades and other events for Fiestas. I took my friend Sarah, who was visiting from San Francisco, to the Hysterical Historical parade. Every year there is a Fiesta Court, featuring Don Diego De Vargas, his men, his monks, the Princesses, etc.
there's singing and dancibg and mariachis, who I really only like at this time of year... I kid you not, they thre Green Chiles to the crowd!





QUE VIVA LA FIESTA! QUE VIVA SANTA FE!

Fiestas! part 1

The burning Zozobra is the kick-off to our annual Fiestas, celebrating the founding of Santa Fe. My city pride never gets higher! Zozobra himsef is Old Man Gloom, and by burning him we burn all the gloom of the previous year.


What happened instead was that I ran ahead of my friends to try to get into the park where the burning happens, failed, and watched from the outside, meeting a woman who is usually a Fire Dancer in the event. We both felt like outsiders and watched Zozobra from the outside. We screamed and shouted as he burned and it was kind of wonderful. Afterwards, a whole bunch of old friends came to my house for ice cream, wine, and sparkling pomegranite juice.

Que Viva la Fiesta!