Philadelphia Freedom, 1 of 2

My last week in Philly was crazily eventful, and in the chaos of moving back to Santa Fe on Sunday I can't find all the right cords and cables and things to get pictures from once Kate was back. It was a wonderful week, though. Highlights included:

A pub quiz with a belligerant drunk Irishman Quizmaster and a pretty tough team of Good Looking Bastards (US Edition) Adam and Cameron did College Bowl back in the day, so their trivia was pretty incredible. The bar was chaos and the poor quizmaster had no mic, leading him to get rowdier, drunker, angrier, and sounding more and more like Forrest Gump as the night went on. Gave me Auld Alliance nostalgia, but was a great night out.

Fruit Picking and Emu/goat petting with Brody and Megan! We picked blueberries, blackberries, peaches, and rasberries. The blueberries, though prickly, were just gorgeous. Another highlight was definitely the hayride. I agree with Megan that the hayride could have been much longer and we would have stayed very happy.

Next: Night on the town with Joanna, featuring ice cream at an old-fashioned ice-cream place! Joanna and I have been leading fascinatingly parallel lives for the last, mm, lots of years? Lately she's been into the Buy Fresh Buy Local campaign which is striking my fancy so I'll be off to the farmer's market Saturday. She also shares my taste in Snape and general other men. She understood that I would find the employees of this ice cream soda shop incredibly attractive in their bowties and suspenders. I miss her already.


I miss Philadelphia already.

Gogol Bordello!

There aren't really words for this show, except that it was a bouncy, sweaty, salty, sticky mess of fun and great great music and the best fiddler ever and all in all, one of the best live shows I've seen. I'm wearing purple, are you?

Girlyman

What a beautiful show! At the famous WXPN Live at the World Cafe, at slightly awkward tables with dozens of Swatties from various eras, all quite lovely company.
This song just stopped my heart:


The harmonies these three churn out are really something, and the gender-stuff and really good stage banter and touching lyrics... yeah, I'm a fan.
And this song, well, I need to know the story behind it. Needless to say I take it quite personally.

Sunday Morning Bird
by Ty Greenstein
(© 2006)
Little Sunday morning bird yelling at me to wake up
Screaming at the top of its blue lungs, at the top of its blue lungs
Northern New Mexico feeling like the driest of dry land
Keeps that Rio grand

I've been wondering, wondering, waiting for you
Since the day you came through
Fare thee well, every day I do

You're that stretch of spaceship houses on the mesa past the bridge
So far off the grid
You're a score of a score inside of some great opera years gone by
You are given to goodbyes

Now and now and now I'm losing
Always chasing, always choosing you
In the car the car because you always go back to what you know
Feel that tailwind blow
Thursday Sunday morning thinking nothing's gonna get me to give up
Baby no such luck

Elbow Lane

Since I last updated, I've spent a fair amount of time bumming around the Philly area, My old friend Heidi drove down from New York for two nights, so we spent the weekend adventuring. We went to my much beloved Mutter Museum, and since she's in medical school it was all the more exciting! We also saw the Liberty Bell and wandered through Old City. We also decided to visit Elbow Lane and take the obligatory elbow picture, at which point a guy in colonial garb walked by and looked at us like we were crazy. We didn't mind since he was in, you know, colonial garb.

In case I get too nostalgic...

I'm guessing this will be hilarious. And no, I wouldn't miss it for anything!

Bastille Storming and French Revolution performance Saturday, July 14
Media Borough
Presented by Hedgerow Theatre
Free!Kid-Friendly!
· · ·
Get prepared to help actors from the Hedgerow Theatre storm the Bastille in Media! Hedgerow will rally the crowds to the Armory building, where the Bastille will be stormed.

Then the activity moves down the street to the Olive Street Stage at State and Olive Streets, where the Marquis de Lafayette will give the key to the Bastille to General Washington.

Then Hedgerow will continue its performance with two songs and brief scenes from their original 1995 musical, The Scarlet Pimpernel written by Margaret Royal with music by Philadelphia composer E.A. Alexander. The show was set during the French Revolution. The songs are ''No Mercy'' and ''Liberty, Fraternity & Equality''.

This is all part of Media's Second Saturday Independence Celebration. France's Independence Day (July 14) falls on Second Saturday this year. Media will celebrate the anniversaries of French and American Independence, and the historical links between those two countries. There will be events for the whole family!

This is presented by the Media Arts Council and the Media Business Authority. The Independence Celebration sponsor is La Belle Epoque Cafe.

Dates:

* Saturday, July 14, 2007 @ 6:00 pm


edit: Oh Media. You're adorable.

Mid-Atlantic

I am sitting here in Media, PA waitching a true mid-Atlantic downpour. After spending the morning doing geneological research (I'm going to get copies of birth and marriage certificates tomorrow for the Important Passport Application) and eating far more leftover potato salad than I ever thought possible, the dark muggy sky finally opened up and it is raining with as much force and fury and heat as I've only seen here.

It has been incredible to be back. After the Heathrow debaucle, getting re-adjusted to being surrounded by friends and wedding madness was lovely if disconcerting. Especially since my first day back we bought Spackle and powertools to assemble a giant cake Nick had designed and built in san francisco.
)
We then frosted and decorated it with stolen flowers from around the hotel, then inserted some topless boys.


In some sort of summary, it was a great weekend. After the party Friday there was a picnic Saturday, an exciting rehearsal dinner Saturday night (with a literature explosion I'm -still- excited by) and of course Sunday was the rehearsal, the getting ready, and the wedding. Absolutely beautiful ceremony, and Kate and Rob are very much in love in one of the healthiest relationships I've ever seen. It was a pleasure to be around them together, and that makes me deeply happy.

When I first met Kate at the Swarthmore ice cream social, the first words I said to her were "Oh! Kate! Like the Taming of the shrew. I'll remember that." And I did. Is she tamed? Unclear, but doubtful. Same goes for Rob. What good people. And now I guess we're all growing up...

Anything to declare? Yeah. Don't go to England.

Heathrow, Terminal 4.

However, soon after the Pilot announced that they had evacuated the terminal due to suspected terrorist activity and that we were going to be on the runway for an undetermined period of time, he reassured us that the flight attendants would be coming through shortly serving hot tea. He promptly turned on some generic classical music.
Oh, England.

Come, Come whoever you are, wanderer, worshiper, lover of leaving. Ours is not a caravan of despair. Come even if you have broken your vows a thousand times, Come, come yet again.

-Rumi