Appalachian Christmas

The pbf and I are in the hills of eastern Tennessee for Christmas. We're visiting his side of the fam, enjoying seeing his many sisters and bro's in law, his mom and our sweet, adorable, smart, perfect niece and nephew. Today was his mamaw and papaw's 65th--please reread--65TH(!) wedding anniversary. They got married at 4pm on Christmas eve many moons ago. Since then they have done a family dinner at that same time every year. Today was no exception. It was complete with delicious southern goods including banana puddin', cornbread dressing and string beans with potatoes and of course Mountain Dew! It's always fun to come down here and see where the pbf grew up. It's so easy for me to forget that my oh so city dwelling baby grew up with a wood burning stove as the only heat option, 60 acres of land to be perused while squirrel and rabbit hunting and having one high school for the whole county. Today, his cousin told him he had a Yankee accent which I found amusing. It is true, you would never know that my husband is genetically a hillbilly (his mother suggested that I say that, so don't be offended) but when he drinks he starts to sound like the country boy he actually is. I'm always proud of my husband for deciding to go to art school in NYC when he had such rural roots, but I also really appreciate those roots and I want to honor them. For my wedding present to my pbf I got him a banjo. Sadly he has yet to pick it up--baby, it's never too late!--here's to hoping.

Thanks to my Tennessee family for a wonderful Christmas!

Death in London

The last leg of our Summer '09 Europe trip was London. Two days before we left to go home Michael Jackson died. I remember very clearly sitting on the toilet in the bathroom with no door in our tiny (and I'm a New Yorker people) hotel room. The pbf tells me, "Michael Jackson died!" The next day in Trafalgar Square there was a whole mess of memorials, flowers, impersonators and mourners. I just wanted to keep being a tourist and in all honesty I was selfishly annoyed with MJ for dying when he did and not waiting til we were stateside. Again--I acknowledge that as an unbelievably shallow and selfish thought! On that same day I bought blue Roman sandals that got a serious wearing-with many compliments-when I came home but will likely be out of style next season.

Oh Queen of England!
Oh King of Pop!

A Superficial Christmas Miracle

I've been waiting for six months for my new ukulele, the ukulele that will subsequently have a pick-up installed so I can plug into sound systems and move around rock 'n roll style. Ok, patiently is maybe not the right word. I have called every week since I ordered to check on the status. Each Monday afternoon a new detail would unfold, the delay, the new headstock logo, different design, when it was shipped from Indonesia, when it was stuck in customs, when it arrived in Indiana, when it shipped from Indiana and when they gave it to me FOR FREE for waiting so long. It's a beautiful instrument, I may post a picture. I changed the strings, added the humidifier and have been playing it like crazy to break it in so it will be ready to share with the world! I take such tremendous joy in playing and singing that's it's difficult to describe. During the work day I think to myself-if only I was playing my ukulele right now. When I travel, it travels. I took it on our three week Europe trip over the summer. I took it on a two days work trip later in the summer. If I leave the city, it has to come with me because if I can't pkay and sing then I feel like I can't express myself. I say, "it" but I actually have multiple ukes, the one that currently travels with me is a soprano meaning it's about 20 inches long and weighs less than three pounds. This has been a full two years leading up to doing the album and doing the music thing. I feel so grateful to have music back in my life and find amusement in the ukulele being the catalyst for this. Ok and Jimmy. Also God. Three different sized catalysts.

Again I acknowledge this is a crappy, generic blog post but I refuse to let facebook eat my blogging so crappy generic it will be until inspiration bubbles.

Time after time after time after time

The semester is almost finished! In two weeks I will have a month long break that will be productive and relaxing (hopefully). The album is coming along, it's probably about 75% done so that's good. It has been a really interesting process, parts of it exactly how I would imagine other aspects very different. My producer has really challenged me and I know this album would not have happened if not for him, so I'm feeling blessed by his presence in my life. Hopefully the album's gonna have 13 songs, one hymn and the rest original. The pbf is doing the cover art, he has a really awesome concept that I shan't speak of here-but it's really great. We moved upstairs into our dream apartment, well ok, that's a bit much but it feels as close to a dream as we can get in our price range-two bedrooms, washer & dryer, dishwasher!! For those of you from out of NYC these last two are luxuries that seldom folks get so we are thrilled. Also the renovation on the apartment is newer and feels more homey. Our Christmas tree is up and we are basically settled. We need to get new blinds but that's going to take time because they are pricey little mofos. We've got skylights which are a nice treat to be able to look up and see the clouds moving is a taste of heaven for me. My Mom, in an unbelievably generous early Christmas gift got us a new TV! We are total movie geeks and it has really made watching movies even more fun. The TV came with a Blu-Ray player and we got a few--whoa, it's so clear! Having the TV in HD has made for some interesting moments of holy crap that person looks terrrrrible! I see Ann Curry in a new and more blotchy light! Poor woman. In other news we are thinking about taking our summer trip to Iceland. We were both just thinking it could be a neat place to go. We'll see if it ends up happening, I hope so.

I know that this was an unbelievably generic post but I am bound and determined to not let my facebook completely stop my blogging so this was an attempt.