He's Baaack! (Part 2)

Just finished covering up the last of this week's woodpecker holes.  I decided to count how many pieces of aluminum and cat food lids I have stapled onto my house in the last 4 years - the count is close to 500!!!  And each piece of metal is covering at least one hole if not more.

Despite the fact that my woodpecker is now working  side by side with his lovely wife to destroy my shingles, I do believe the strips of garbage bags, holographic ribbons and rotting windsocks are beginning to have an effect of actually keeping them away.  Plus the house looks so gay festooned with these streamers!  Like it is decorated for some weird holiday dreamed up by Tim Burton or Gahan Wilson.

Just Some Manger Looking for a Joseph

For the last couple of years I have been setting up and taking down the Christmas decorations at my step mom’s place (first at the house she shared for many years with my dad and for the last two Christmases at her much smaller assisted living apartment). 

The decorations have gotten pared down quite a bit over these years - from a 3 foot fake tree and decorations all over the house to no room for a tree at all.  But there are still little dabs of Christmas:  Santas and sleds, angels and snowmen and figurines and wall-hangings here and there that spell out “NOEL.”  And of course I still set up the Nativity Scene in a prominent location.

The stable itself is made of crumbling printed cardboard and it dates back to my childhood.  The Baby Jesus in his manger of straw, one resting camel and one standing donkey, all made of solid plaster, also date back to the fifties.  There are three Wise Men, 3 shepherds, and five bug-eyed sheep carved from olive wood and brought back from the Holy Land by some earnest pilgrim.  The wooden figurines are on a slightly smaller scale than the plaster ones (I position them in the shadows, no one notices.).

Somewhere along the line we lost our matching Mary and Joseph.  Since my years in charge I have alternated between using a creepy looking shepherd lad and an old Confucius-looking guy (with Dan Blocker’s “Hoss” ten gallon cowboy hat at his knees), made from hollow rubber, to fill in for Joseph, but these are not really Josephs at all.  The young one looks like he could be a serial killer and the old one is probably supposed to be one of the Three Kings.  The Bonanza hat remains a mystery.

The Mary in the scene was at least the same scale as the faux Josephs, but she was hollow plastic and had her hands folded across her breast in such a fashion as to make her look more worried than delighted by the radiance of the Babe in the Manger.  I repainted her cloak a couple of years ago but she still had that terrible body language and her face also bothers me – she looks too old and jowly - so this year I went hunting at one of my favorite thrift shops and found a lovely new Mary (“Made in Italy” on the base) that probably dates from the sixties.  This much younger Mary is graced with a tender pose and a beautifully-painted smile.  She is the same scale as the plaster figures – so in other words, Mary no longer looks alike a Little Person who has given birth to a gigantic baby.

Last year I stored the cardboard stable and all of the contents in my garage and due to high levels of humidity everything mildewed except the plaster.  I carefully cleaned, repaired, restored, and reinforced the cardboard, scrubbed the mold off of the carved figures, treated everything with anti-mildew spray, let them dry in the sun and then coated them with varnish.

So now I am on the lookout for a suitable Joseph to keep my new Mary from having to remain a single mother – I have banished both of the rubber figures – I figure for now no man is better than a hollow one (Anyways they are both too short for the new Mary!).

If anyone has a Joseph to spare I would gladly give him an audition (but I guess that is not the correct word since I do not expect him to have any kind of a voice).  The new Mary is almost 4” tall in a kneeling position.  Joseph is usually depicted kneeling as well, so he would have to be slightly over 4” tall (because men are supposed to be taller than women).

(I also have to apologize for this post - once the title popped into my head I simply could not resist!)

The Lake Blessing

Beach glass has always fascinated me – my grandma and I used to collect it when I was little – Grimsby Beach, Lowbanks, wherever we could find it.  I still have a precious few bits of this glass as well as pretty stones and bits of shells that she and I gathered on our trips to the shoreline.

Grandma couldn’t swim, and my Mom wouldn’t go near the water, so despite my Grandfather’s occasional dips and my Dad’s love of swimming, I never learned to swim.  My fascination with the lakes came from the treasures on the shoreline.  I still remember battling with my poor dear Grandma over which one of us had first seen the tiny perfect bonsai-shaped piece of driftwood (and I am ashamed to admit that I won the battle!).

For over 40 years I have lived a half mile from the lake and other than crossing over the river each day, I have been quite lax in giving the waters my due attention.  It seems, however, that the lake has been trying to gain my attention of late – first by sending an awe-inspiring man named Magilla into my shop with the many dramatic photos of his global community of friends - the agile and graceful surfers of the Great Lakes.  Magilla clearly loved the waters of the Great Lakes and spoke glowingly of his life as both a surfer and a photographer.  He also told me that he was dying of a terrible rare form of cancer and did not have much longer to walk the earth.

Then last week the lake nudged me for a second time when old friends presented me with a shoe box full of beach glass. They said they had been picking up pieces for me for years in their travels around the Great Lakes.

What a treasure trove! I have been playing with and sorting these wondrous pieces for days now.  The cache has been sorted into three piles – the first pile of course contains my favorites which I will greedily keep forever (and I must admit I continue adding to this pile every day). The second pile holds the beach glass that I am sharing with others - artists, friends, and customers.  One man (in his mid-forties) was so amazed by it – he had never even heard of beach glass!

The third pile contains about three dozen pieces which I am entering into my newly devised “Beach Glass Catch and Release” program.  These pieces are still too clear, too sharp on the edges - they need the action of the water and the stones to grind them down a bit more, soften the colors, round out the shapes.

I plan to find the perfect location of rock and wave, create a suitable ceremony, and re-gift the lake this small bit of treasure-that-will-be.  Perhaps by next Spring or Summer, Mother Nature will have finished her portion of the artistry and another Grandma or artist child will find them and be thrilled all over again.

This re-gifting ceremony will be dedicated to the memory of Magilla, the Great Lakes surfer, photographer and philosopher who left this world on November 10, 2009.

He's Baaaaack!

In the last couple of days I have made the discovery that my little feathered nemesis, the SOB (son of a bird) woodpecker has been back and very busy drilling yet more holes into my house.  I fill them in with fiberglass insulation, cover them up with can lids and he drills more.

I have tried to reason with him, pointing out the 32 acres of woods and trees which surround my house, filled with many dead and decaying trees - perfect homes for many tasty insects and many snug housing possibilities for himself and his kin. He simply twirls his way up a nearby branch, giving me that smug look and I know the minute I leave my house he will be back at his appointed task.

I received a letter from my insurance company last week - my house insurance evaluation and thus my premium has doubled.  They added a paragraph at the end of the cover letter that there was a possibility that my house may be "overinsured."   Wait until I show them the hundreds of little round holes that my little SOB has drilled into my siding.  Overinsured - ya think?

The Gift from the Maple

Several years ago we had a perfect summer with ideal weather for maple trees.  As the days became shorter the back alley behind my shop filled with the most astonishing array of huge and colorful maple leaves:  red with yellow, yellow with green, green with red and yellow! These leaves blew into my alley from a tree which I assume is located several backyards away.  I  scooped up as many of these treasures as I could find, sorted through them to pick the most perfect, sprayed them with varnish (to bring out the colors) and then scanned them and made copies of various leaf arrangements.

 

I was new to the world of computers back then and I never saved the scans – all I have are prints on plain paper.  But I figured next fall I would do the same thing – this time saving the scans!  However the next year was a rainy, soggy one and to my great disappointment, the maple leaves all had big black spots on them apparently due to the excess levels of moisture.

And so it went for a number of years – I kept searching for some of those splendid maple leaves and every year all I found were the ugly black spots.  Each autumn had been a letdown - until this year.

One morning last week as I was putting out my sidewalk sign, there it was – the gift from the maple – one tiny perfect maple leaf:  only an inch across but with reds and yellows and greens!

I searched the alley and found a few regular size maple leaves with vibrant colors and one massive leaf still bright green, washed the dirt off of them, made a quick arrangement and took some photographs of them.

Whether this is the year I have been waiting for or not it doesn’t really matter. For that one tiny perfect maple leaf is the reward I have been seeking from a tree I have never even seen.

Thank you, maple tree – I have framed your tiny perfect gift in a tiny perfect frame.  (Well, I'm a framer - what else am I going to do?)

Fleeting Glimpses (#3)

Nash Road, North Tonawanda/Wheatfield

Remembering the Limelight

Since my last tale was about the Continental, I thought I would describe my very first forays into the world of live music in Buffalo – the Limelight coffee house – located only a few blocks from the Continental but worlds away in both time and just about every other criterion one could imagine.

The autumn of 1964 found me in my first semester at Buff State (I might mention that it was frowned upon in those days to call the school “Buff State.”).  I was 18 years old, very young and naïve (compared to girls that age nowadays). One evening, a group of us girls from the Cassity Hall decided to go to the Limelight, that “beatnik coffeehouse” over on Edward Street.  We were very excited with the adventure of it all – “going out – to a coffeehouse – in the big city” (we were all small town and country gals).

We called an extra large VanDyke taxi that would fit the seven of us and all piled in for the short ride from Elmwood Avenue over to Edward Street.  When the taxi pulled up in front of the Limelight we peered into the dimly lit establishment – it looked so dark in there – we could see a person with a guitar on the tiny stage, and people seated at small tables - pretty scary for our first time out!

The taxi driver sensed our fear and hesitation and gallantly offered to escort us in the door, or at least wait for us for a few minutes to make sure we were OK.  His obvious concern only served to escalate our fears and we chickened out and had him drive us back to campus.

Later on, accompanied by a proper date, I did brave the environs of the Limelight and found it to be a wonderful place indeed – real folksingers on stage and hot chocolate with real whipped cream!  Yum!  I spent hours dreamily listening to the buttery voice of Jerry Raven.

In communicating with old friends who shared the Limelight experience, I asked each of them, “What were your favorite songs that Jerry used to sing?” No two people have mentioned the same song!  We each had our own list: mine included “Spanish is Loving Tongue,” “Hava Nagila,” and Tom Lehrer’s “Pollution.”

Jerry was the perfect host for the Limelight –he booked a great variety of both local and regional acts into his warm, intimate little club, he played guitar (de rigueur for guys back then!), and he was a walking encyclopedia of music from the Child ballads to English Music Hall silliness and of course the creations of contemporary singer-songwriters.  He had a wicked sense of humor – and all the girls were mesmerized by his twinkling eyes and dark curly hair - and – oh! That voice!

One of the Limelight’s most memorable solo performers was Terry Knight, from Flint, Michigan, who later went on to some fame with his group Terry Knight and the Pack which later morphed into Grand Funk Railroad.  Terry was our own version of Mick Jagger, complete with a mod wardrobe and a Prince Valiant haircut, and he sang soulful and brooding ballads such as his signature cover of “I, Who Have Nothing.”

The group I loved the best, however, was a local band called QSL (Steve Wagner and Larry Bradley) who eventually ended up recording a brief (but in my humble opinion perfect) concert at my house in the early seventies.  These guys were multi-talented, clever and zany and always fun to listen to or just be around.

Jerry Raven, nevertheless, remains perched at the top of my Limelight list and I am so very pleased to hear that he has finally been inducted, in 2009, into the Buffalo Music Hall of Fame.  It’s about time - congratulations Jerry!

Original chair from the Limelight

Tearing Down the Continental

Oddly enough, John Hartford’s song “They’re Gonna Tear Down the Grand Old Oprey” is going through my head right now because I just found out that Buffalo’s punk landmark, the Continental, is being torn down.  The Ryman Auditorium was saved.  The Continental has been doomed to its fate for several years.

I began going to the Continental in early 1982.  My new best friend Kim dragged me there – a group called 1.4.5 was playing that night and after somehow ending up in a closet for a brief smooch with one of the band members (Ducky), I became totally hooked on going there – 2, 3, even 4 nights per week.

As more of a teetotaler than a drinker,  I began bringing my camera and I spent all of my money on film and processing and fell into documenting several of the bands that caught my fancy – how I wish I had thought to take more photos of the patrons, the staff and of course, my friends.  I believe I have a photo of Frank and one of Bear, but I do not have a single photo of Bud Burke!  I have hundreds of photos of the Fems and not one of the Goos!

Even though I was in my thirties when I started going there, I think of the Continental as my second high school – only this time I got to hang out with the cool kids.  Many graduated with flying colors from their years at the Continental School of Rock, many flunked out with equally flying colors, and way too many souls were lost along the wayside.

Most of the best friends I have today can be traced back to the Continental.  This goes for real life friends and Facebook friends.  The Continental was a marvelous motley mosaic of freaks and geeks, gays and straights, punks and poseurs, young and old.  What tied us all together was the music – live bands: local, national and international playing on the scummy little stage – and the throbbing dance music playing upstairs on the mirrored dance floor.  And of course the never-ending parade of fashion and hair and makeup and jewelry.

“Hey, did you know that guy who used to go to the Continental?  You know who I’m talkin’ about – the guy in the black leather jacket…”  “Yeah, I knew him.”

For those of us without cable TV, we got to see music videos on the big screen.  I still hunt these down on YouTube and think of the Continental.  “Smack Jack,”  “Heroes,” “Mexican Radio,” “Safety Dance.”  Talking Heads, Psychedelic Furs, Devo, Ramones, Shakin’ Stevens.

The music was so deafening that the building shook, the stench of the place was indescribable and unforgettable – the floor was sticky, the rest rooms were disgusting. I once bought slide bolts and installed them in the ladies room stall doors and Bud was so astonished and pleased he presented me with a bottle of Champagne.  These door locks lasted about a week.

The Continental rocked along for years after I stopped going there for anything but the Fems’ Christmas show.  To me it was just not the same old place anymore after the stage got moved into the back and the patio was mostly closed and of course the people were all strangers to me and everyone was so young or maybe I just got old.

I dunno, but the Continental will always be in my heart and for that I thank Kim for dragging me there, and Mark Freeland and his multitude of talented friends for the music and Bud Burke for bringing the whole thing together for as long as he did.

“Everyone is trying
To get to the bar
The name of the bar
The bar is called Heaven
The band in Heaven
They play my favorite song
Play it once again
Play it all night long”
(David Byrne & Jerry Harrison)

Fleeting Glimpses (#2)

This was photographed on an entrance ramp to the QEW in Fort Erie - for months there have been a pair of black shoes along the curb, looked to be in new-ish condition. Then suddenly one disappeared and now that remaining one has a fetching and no doubt reflective yellow stripe running perfectly down its middle.

Chinese Junk

When I was a little kid one of those things that would set my mind to wandering was the phrase "Chinese junk."  This described a marvelously different kind of little boat which could be found alongside the teeming rivers, harbors and shorelines in China.  There were people who lived on these junks and they sold merchandise and fish and vegetables and these little boats had those rakish kind of what I like to think of as "Owl and the Pussycat" sails.  Colorful, unique, tiny, safe and found on the pages of the National Geographic.

Along came the seventies and eighties and the definition of Chinese junk came to mean heroin.  Flooding this country and the world with this terribly addicting and deadly drug.

Now, it is several decades later.  Chinese junk has once again changed its definition and once again Chinese junk is deluging North America but this time instead of heroin the term denotes merely junk.  Dollar store junk.  Walmart junk.  Plastic picture frames.  Cheap blue jeans.  Toys with lead-based paint.  Carcinogens in the candies.  Deadly dog food.  The cheap crap we are all so eager to buy because it is so cheap and  we use it once and it breaks and we throw it out.  Chinese junk.

I liked the boats better.

The Power of Cat Hair

As I have been spending this Labor Day laboring with the task of washing all of my cat bedding I find it simply amazing the way cat hair insinuates itself into all kinds of fabric - plush, fleece, wool - whatever!  I know that a tornado can throw a broom-straw into a tree, but by what magic is is that a fine tiny soft cat hair twists its way into cloth?  And how can those same fine tiny soft cat hairs be so very difficult to remove?

Here's another feline observation - cats are known for their cleanliness, right?  So how is it that a cat with glowing white fur ends up dirtying bedding so heavily that the rinse water runs brown?  And my cats are not outdoor cats - they have an enclosure where they tread only upon concrete and gravel and carpet - no dirt, no soil, no earth.

The cat door itself gets itself so laden with schmutz that I have to wash it every month or the clear flap becomes opaque.

So here is my idea - forget carbon fiber and nano technology - we can build a space elevator to the stars if we can simply learn to harness the power of cat hair.  And if we go a bit further and send a passel of cats into space the dirt that they carry in their magical mystical fur can eco-form a barren planet for human (and feline, of course) habitation.

I'll bet dogs could help with this project as well and just as I would not want to go to any Heaven that did not contain cats and dogs, neither would I wish to travel to another world without their hairy companionship.

Shut Up Precious!

We have a small back alley behind the shop with a broken stockade fence between our alley and the next back yard.  There is a dog in that yard and her name is "Shut Up Precious!" as far as I can tell because she barks at everything that moves - sometimes she barks at me when I am inside the shop and I make a noise in the back room.

She sticks her head through the break in the fence and just stares and stares at me - and she is a dog with no short-term memory at all.  I can bring one bag of garbage out to the totes and she goes nuts and I say hello to her and go back inside for more stuff to bring out and when I hit the alley she goes nuts all over again.

Her mommy told me that Shut Up Precious! couldn't even remember the neighbor on the other side who used to give her treats every day.  She runs up the back steps and tries to see me over the fence but most of the time she just tries to get her head through the break.

 

I told Shut Up Precious! that I was taking her picture so I could make her famous on the Interweb but I doubt very much if she will remember our conversation.

Shopping Locally and Loving It!

Last week I came to the conclusion that I really really needed a new drafting stool if I was going to be spending even more time banging on the keyboard what with the blog and Facebook, etc. I needed something comfortable.  I love the idea of my 100 year-old wooden drafting stool but, Lordy!  The seat on it was so hard and it seemed that I spent all of my time trying to find/adjust/replace/reposition cushions on the thing.

So I went Googling for a New Drafting Stool - found thousands of websites with hundreds of stools - padded seats, casters, arms, no arms - adjustable everythings.  Decided I wanted a simple black stool with a padded seat.  Wasn't sure about needing casters.....

Found a whole whack of stools at many websites all offering FREE SHIPPING!  Prices were in the neighborhood of $119.99 and UP to almost $1000.  Well, OK, but I would really like to shop locally and I would really like to actually sit in the chair before I bought it.

So I browsed through the big office supply places and wouldn't you know, none of them actually had any drafting stools in stock - all were special order items.  So, dinosaur that I am, I let my fingers do the walking through the 5 pound Yellow Pages and I found Sutherland's Office Supply on Elm Street.

Phoned them and spoke with Scott who told me he had one black drafting stool left from a special purchase lot and that he had recently lowered the price to $89.00!

I drove there the very next morning (easy to get to, BTW) and when I walked in the door the first thing I spied was a magnificent black and white tuxedo cat curled up on top of a copier.  Well I knew I was in the right place!  The cat, Figaro, was very pleased to have a new fan and paraded around for me.

The end of the story is this - I also bought a used task chair for my office at the shop (although no one would ever be able to tell that it is used!) and together they cost less than the online drafting stool I had originally desired.

I am also really happy that I did not pay extra for casters because with my slippery painted wooden floor I would have had to tie the stool to the bench.  I had to go to Drew's yesterday to find some nice rubber feet to keep the stool from walking away.  Did you know that the opposite of "Glider" is "Gripper?"

Yeah!  Shopping locally!!!

On the Subject of Blog Comments

You may have noticed that I have turned off the "Comment" feature for this blog. I do not follow that many other blogs but I have noticed lately that a lot of them have done this as well. 

My theory is that if you want to make a comment about something I have written there are ways for a person to contact me.  No one else cares what you think.  Really!  That is what Facebook is for:  "Attagirl!" and "Me too!" and "You are an idjit!"

Wearing Fur Pajamas (1)

I photographed this guy thru the window one morning - he was on his way into the woods to rub the velvet off of his antlers.  Taken through a filthy window, a dirty screen and an old piece of plastic - didn't turn out too bad, eh?  There is a whole herd of deer wandering around in my woods. 

When Compliments Go Wrong

Before I got my hair cut this summer, I had my hair tied back into a pony tail one afternoon and I was waiting on a long-time customer - we were looking at various combinations of mats and frames.  The usual frame shop stuff.

All of a sudden he blurted out, "Oh my God what happened to your hair?!?  Did you get it cut?"

I had to give him a little lesson on how that is not the way to ask a lady if she has had a new haircut.

The Woodpecker

I could have nailed a cover over this hole - done an Edgar Allen Poe number on his little feathery butt - but no - I annoyed him enough trying to take this photo that he flew away and then I nailed up the can lids!!!

Welcome to my Blog

I have been threatening to start a blog for many months now and now the elements have finally fallen into place so here it is!  I will probably be tweaking it for a while before I settle down, so don't be alarmed if the look changes from time to time.

The title of the blog, and the photo in the header, reference that dear little bird lovingly referred to as "my woodpecker."  This creature has drilled the cedar shingles on my house full of holes for three winters in a row now - and with the chill in the air I am expecting his return any day now.  I am not really sure if he is a "him," of course - it just seems like he is a "he."  I would also like to point out at this juncture that I live in a big woods full of many dead trees.

Why this little ###### has decided to ruin my real estate is beyond me.  I must have some lousy bird Karma left over from a previous life (not to mention that my kitties, in their chicken-wire enclosure no less - with a polycarbonate roof  - manage to capture, kill, eat and regurgitate the occasional bird) - here is a sample photo of what my siding looks like with can lids nailed and old CDs slid over the woodpecker holes.  The second photo shows the scene on my closet shelf with the huge pile of (thankfully) dry dirt, twigs and leaves (found at the beginning of the October Surprise Storm).
 

Fleeting Glimpses (#1)

One lighthouse, three horses, one pig and the Liberty Bell.