Yesterday was the day that the drive is usually blocked at the home office hovel, blocked by over-eager pastry purchasers who, in their holiday frenzies, park just wherever. Had a fire engine blocking it at one point and beep-beeped and had firemen waving merrily. I was rushing out to the big U for an assignment and their really big red truck needed to move in a jiff.
Went to Michele's b-day soiree last night and gave her a remarkable bowl that looked like it had been fashioned from Pucci fabric.
Tonight is the ICP at Hallwalls and Kennedy and I have created a late-night feast for all ten of them, plus their manager, et al and et al.
Saw them in Amherst, Mass. a little over a year ago and enjoyed them v. much.
Only worry is that the easy-bake oven will not bake the lamb leg portions in the amount of time that it should, about 2.5 hours.
There are enough prepped courses before the main to keep everyone from resorting to cannibalism at table.
Dreaming of a convection oven, all that forced air shaving off baking times.
Finished the mammoth piece for the Shiney Happy Mag yesterday, a triumph.
Of course I chose to write about divergent and farflung places and spent many hours driving before note-taking, shooting, writing.
But that is done. Now for the lamb legs. And the rest of it.
Off to points beyond, the concert, the final push of the feast.
Tomorrow the pagan-christian hybrid holiday that really is a jumble of both - eggs, lambs, resurrections, lilies, jelly eggs, mysterious crypts, peeps, pig meat.

Hybrid Love.

Tomorrow night is what Yours Truly has dubbed Summit Meeting - gatherings with Polly/Liz/Cheryl and the designated joint is a Middling City Scene Newbie, a place with pretensions but nicely designed.
We decided there were too many weeks that'd go by and we would not connect so now these Summit Meetings, as Martha says, A good thing.
Drove out to the big U's Confusement Centre, a.k.a. Ellicott Complex, to not only get my fair share of daily confusion, but to enjoy the sight of meandering ducks.
One seasonally-thematic thing is that the Middling City is enjoying a new trad, a Dyngus Day parade from the B'Way Market to the Central Terminal. Thinking that paraders and maskers and marauders and revelers should probably dress like pussy willows (whilst also brandishing same) or as Polish sausages. Or maybe butter lambs.
Will be again, as is tradition, at the Lownies's Ukrainian Easter brunch and, as is also trad, will lop head off the butter lamb.
hot tip: the butter lamb features two peppercorn eyes, lopping head off yields a spicey, buttery spread for whatever one has designated a spreadee on the table.
Spring and itchy eyes are in the air, as is the scent of earth warming.
The crocii and daffodils are unleashing their magic and coming up next are the most beloved spring arrivistes of all - the hyacinths.
Ahhh, the hyacinths.


Pepper-eyed Love.

+
this just in.
Literal Harold, who You may recall collects hotel/resort/motel soaps, received his package from YT bearing same. He, safe to say, is t.h.r.i.l.l.e.d.
And You should note, all of Yous, that the 13th is, bien sur, the hap-slappy anniversary of the premier and Perfect blogpost of epinw - b-day of Sam.
Please do send gifts of all shapes and sizes to me. At once, for timely delivery.
I thank You in advance.
And also I proclaim that it is truly uly spring.
I have evidentiary allergies.

This is one images Yours Truly is especially happy with from the latest nuptials socially documented in early March, and, desite the big chill in the air, the couple agreed to pose outdoors at Glen Falls with Nature all nude.

Yesterday was the book clubbing and, as is our wont, there was some discussion of the book at hand (Fear of Flying, that early feminist book all concerned about liberation, and therapy), but more about life in general over several goblets of thematic beverages. Next book is Tristram Shandy, a college fav, and just ordered a new copy as mine from college was severely yellowed and annotated by my 18-year old hand. Along with some plans for t-shirt designs and ruminations that were so ... heavy in my undergraduate mind.
Soon or now is the year anniversary of the death of Mr. Ganey and then that of Mrs. Ganey. What a sad time that was, good to see the fam, but tragic when she passed one month after his. Same funeral home, same room, same cast of characters.

Celebrated the birth of my mother yesterday at a middling restaurant on Hertel Avenue. As I said to the parents, it seemed a bit dishevelled at the edges but the food was passable.
The lag of the jets (3 in total) has passed, thankfully, no more operating on 3 cylinders.

Onwards to edits galore.

Love galore.

Harry N. Konst, Esq. of the Sicilian trip just emailed the lot of us to inform that the day after we left Sicily Mount Etna blew some vulanized molecules into the crisp air.

CBS News RAW: The southeastern crater of Sicily's snow-covered Mt. Etna volcano belched lava, smoke and ash. Vulcanologists say this latest eruptive spell poses no danger to people.

When You witness how closely people live near the craters You do wonder.
Yours Truly has met her fair share of vulcanologists at the big U and have concluded thusly: Vulcanologists are a nutty bunch.
Do we trust their words, these magma weather people.

One of the more unforgettable Sicily images emblazoned is the hardened, antique lava flows that remain on the landscape - deep, black rock, in Euro parlance a few meters high/deep. The devastation possibilites of these wide paths of lava is there, right there, remaining from every flow.

Last night had a job for the big U and had to shuffle dozens upon dozens of awardees to and fro, a real work-out. I had an excellent suggestion to the event planners to efficiently keep groups of awardees (You see, they are categorically photographed, without getting into too many details) together - duct tape. They'd only be un-duct taped when they needed to be photographed - to heck with worries about delicate fabrics, documentation is more important. Left a cable behind at the locale (a pool-scented Holiday Inn in the suburbs) and had to return today to fetch it and discovered that the room so full of students last night was today full of evangels who were lunching ... books on Mother Theresa, paraphernalia on merch tables and confessions being heard in another, smaller banquet room.

In midst of another gig right now, in sub-midst of a break and need to head out to ghostful East Aurora soon. Exact locale is Roycroft, home of the best verandas in Western New York, in my non-humble op. A fine destination for sniffing their courtyard garden, enjoying a cocktail, maybe some light shopping.

Onwards to that crafty exurb of the Middling City.
After my absence the MC looks flat, dark. Where are the cactii, the vibrant flowers.
I ask. Coming, You reply.

Magmatic Love.

This is a very quick pick from the 600 or so Sicily images made during the past 9 or so days, made in the mountaintop city of Taormina, outside Saint Caterina Church near a shady piazza filled with gelato, people, taxis.
Inside, there are electric candles - plop in the Euros and screw in the candle's bulb of your choice. I suppose a good way to prevent fires, pesky wax drippings. I made images of these candles, as well as other churchly features like relics, and select marble floors.

Just finished several hours of judging a SUNY-wide photo contest for publications that promote various colleges and U's. Did so with boy colleague Marky Mulville of Middling City News fame, Deborah Parks of Canisius College. Claire Jones of Buffalo State College invited us to judge (I judged the newsletter category two years ago) and hosted our time together which we ended discussing the nature of students in this day and age of media saturation and the phenom of hellicopter parents.
The judging went swimmingly and we proffered up comments to the first and second place winners and the honorary mention.
One comment was written by Yours Truly - We enjoyed your images very much but would like to suggest that you pull back on the usage of PhotoShop filters.
Anyone in this racket, or who has ever played with that hyper-expansive software know the allures and massive pitfalls of using filters which, as I am wont to say, include the horrendous shower door filter.
Mulville and I stood in the sun afterwards discussing the diffs between Nikon and Canon, my adorable new Leica DLux2, cars, and other equipment matters.
Always good to talk shop, especially in the sun.
Onwards to deadlines both real and imagined.

Imaginary and real Love.

If only Yours Truly had figured out this neato little techno bonus trick earlier I would have saved several Euros.
Someone on the hotel staff was, obviously, looking at internet porn whilst we were all eating our ultimate (as in final, not as in best) dinner on this Sicilian tour.
So I sit down at machine ready to fire it up with my paid-for i.d. number for access with meter running when I see a lurid page open and ready.
Actually, the window is underneath this window and the url is www.archiviosex.net etc. etc.
(There was just now a colossal crash that came from the kitchen and/or dining room and then the traditional and subsequent roar of the crowd.
And now the sad sad sound of the sweeping up of glass.)
From here I zipped in the Yahoo url and then onwards to Blogger.
At one point the King, also referred to as The Godfather (the hotel proprietor who lurks about and does on occasion even sit in a carved, wooden chair resembling a throne in the lobby), hovered over me wondering what YT was up to.
We have caught suspicious eyes in the lobby, that King and I.
Today we bussed on over to Catania. Not to be confused with Calabria.
I did witness the parched and kind of mummified black hands, well, just bone, of a cardinal in a glass case. I was mesmerized. This viewing took place during a mid-day mass and so the lights in the showcase were on. A priest was singing quite well, a far far cry from the folkie-suffused warbling one usually hears from priests over there in the USofA.
Mass over. Lights in showcase off.
Show's over, leave.
Exeunt YT to the sunny sunny street and felt, as the day was moseying along, to walk at a Shiney Apple pace solo up a hillacious street toward a city wall or gate.
I did so at an alarmingly speedy pace, just breathing in the diesel fumes and feeling my face roasting in the sun.
I stopped for only the oddest of sights which included a traffic cop looking like he was holding a nice red lolly to direct the comings and goings around traffic.
I stopped also for a taste of grilled artichoke, 1 Euro.
Wended back to the less ghetto quarter and began looking for a motherly birthday gift as her birthday is the 28th, tomorrow, as we begin the 24-hour sojourn.
I could not find It.
In lieu of That I did find a Perfect pair of canvas cowboy boots which, despite my rule about buying European shoes, found themselves not only being purchased, but on my feet and walking out the store.
Amongst other stops stopped into an artist's studio and managed to be in there and made one single image of it and soaked up the trumpet-featured classical piece blaring from a hi-fi sans being noticed.
I later said to a few fellow tourmembers that I pondered making a citizen's arrest.
Dorota will get this joke.
But I will explain it to You.
There is a dearth of heart-stopping modern art in parts of Europe.
Onwards.
Mary and I co-hostessed a cocktail party for our fellows and it was fun.
Everyone felt our view was worth the shakedown extra Euros.
Onwards to the final night and the long trek back to Kennedy and the rest of the US.

Onwards, Love.

Yesterday was a day most Perfect, back in Taormina.
Wending through tight alleys, making some images, looking up at the stoney mountain I traipsed up and was surprised by the lady in shadows, not our lady of sorrows.
Ate at Nino's joint, a fine trattoria near the sea, and he insisted or strongly suggested we have a familyesque and trad Sicilian feast for the four of us. Out came the courses of fresh fishes, locally-grown vegetables, a sweet pea pod each for a taste refresher, vino, an apertif. All again just Perfect-perfetto.
On way to Nino's directions were asked to see if in sooth numero 37 was just up ahead on Via Pirandello. It and it were.
I strongly suggested to a man getting on his very stylish Italian motorbike that he give me a ride up around the bend to my luncheon.
He handed me his helmet, put down the passengerial footpegs and off we zoomed. I had a few moments of that travel wonderment (always solo) whilst standing on a stone wall overlooking the sea and down at greenery still unfamiliar - cactii, lush bouganvillea (Liz can send in corrections), camellia, et al.
Onwards.
Today was Mount Etna day.
Picked up loads of little lava rocks and lest You do not catch the joke here, so Euro, so geological, lava rocks are light you see for the magma that bursts forth as lava catches air when it is arrabiata up in the sky and after it has scorched the earth. Dried to sponge candy perfection.
(Luca is meandering behind me, hands crossed behind him so officially as he makes his way from lobby to kitchen, disappearing, as Julie the Cat would always like to do, into the cucina).
Mount Etna air is so crisp and the fog wraps around your face when the weather shifts.
Men in a Jeep show up looking all muddy about the knees and you can see in the back of the Jeep that there are provisions. From their dazed conditions you reckon they have peered into the crater. Or have been lost for days.
We more adventurous journeyers forge onwards and wonder at the chestnut trees, the endless rocks, the flora just awakening.
Onwards again.
Another twisting and turning of the bus to another hillock farm and vineyard owned by a Baron, Emanuele Scammacca del Murgo, who insisted upon meeting me and then images were made of the two of us together. He presented me with one of his books, as You see, he is also a photog. We photogs seek each other out. We talk or gesticulate moments, gadgets, glass, ops, chips, and the like.
He signed my book For Nancy Emanuele.
His wine was the best here yet, Murgo is the label.
Onwards to the pool where a nice glass of Asti awaits me.
I have new Etro shades and I may contact them to see if the corp would like to become my corporate sponsor.

Murgo, Etro, vino Love.

postscript for Literal Harold.
have some rather odd images quite appropriate for VH1, will send upon return to Middling City.

postscript for LH and all You others.
no postcards sent out by YT, they are all too hideous. Really.
You know I dig that oldschool tradition, they are really all too ugly, not a trace of irony upon them.

Today Mary and I have given the group the slip.
We are off shortly to Taormina, the fav spot so far, a hilly city with sea and mountains in the distances.
The place where I wended up the stone steps.
Yesterday was the mainland, Calabria, where I decided to procure a present for me (the usual something to wear from Europa) and where we later bussed off to farm country where we served a lavish lunch of products made on the farm - vino, cheese, meats, etc. There were goats tied to trees, herbs minding their business.
One of our two buses, the one Yours Truly was on, got stuck coming and going on the tight and winding roadway that no one ever imagined would see the likes of a bus such as this Mercedes-Benz behemoth. All the neighbors were out on their terraces watching. The owner of the joint heard the ruckus and drove his car down to witness and to join in some helpful gesticulations.
The slip was necessary to have less of the school marm thing going on and to get back to more of the poesie.
There are two minutes left on this internet card so it is time to exit, right out the lobby, past Julie the hotelcat, out into the cloudy day and toss myself into a taxi.

Poetic, far-away Love.

And how is Sicily Trip going, You may ask.
And ask You may and shall.
Let Us put it this way.
Yours Truly just returned from historical out the wazoo Taormina with cohort Mary of LaTeeDa fame in a man named Nino's luxe automobile after giving our expensive tour group the slip (as well as the pesky intra-ear devices one of the guides called the whisper but which YT calls just plain annoying) and YT trekked to the highest point of the city basking in sunshine and wild plants and aloe vera and cactii as big as cars. We gave the slip as I am wont to do and that is when best photos and mems are made. After my trek to the top and making some images of a demi-grotto church and all and talking to some scientists in for a gathering of same, found Mary at bottom of stone steps (all 6 million or so of them) and wended about a different direction, toward the sea. It was several moments-miles later that we realized we might never see that piazza and designated time. Oh well and hell we both said and proceeded to further enjoy the sun and view and time.
Mary said let's hitch.
Four seconds later we were in Nino's luxe car, the three of us singing How Deep Is Your Love by the ever-famous Australian Brotherly Outfit the BeeGees.
Nino, seemingly like all extra-tour men we have met, owns a trattoria.
Trattoria Nino.
I mentioned the bus stop and that we would like to end up near the one about 10 minutes from our hotel - Sant Alphio Garden Hotel (run by a hardass, ever-beshaded quasi-mafioso who is about 4'7" and who shook me and Mary down for another 35Euros each to upgrade to a shared suite with balcony over sea after we saw our own respective and deplorably under-starred chambers). This was very kind of Nino and only about 2 minutes out of his way. This means that we not only gave the group the slip but saw several more momentous things and met yet another local ... and beat these groupies back to the hotel which I stated looks like something out of Vegas or Israel. Mary has redubbed it, more appropriately, Salvatore's Italian Gardens.
And so it is.
Time to have some Asti by the pool, under the palm trees.
Is it that warm.
Uhh, nope, but hell if I'll admit to that.

Seaside love, Love.

Above is from Spartacus, which starred Sparky as thee best-ever slave who emoted better than all the rest of her oppressed fellows.
Went with Mish, Annie, Jana, and Heather to witness Sparky's wonders and to see the ballet. Afterwards, the after-party with cheese cubes - thank goodness as Yours Truly was beyond a famished condition. At the party saw several desirables of the art and judicial spheres.
Talked to TMO yesterday to wish him a super 5-O. He was angry that Karen, his loving spouse, published a photo of him in the local journal of him from a Bar Mitzvah from several years ago. He is wearing a tiara in the shot. He said You know, the person that prints a picture of you is supposed to use a humiliating shot of you when you're 4 or 5, not 48. I could not stop laughing.

Tomorrow jet off to the Shiney Apple and then point beyond, Sicilia, with former Congressman John LaFalce, the rents, et al et al totalling about seventy. As I wrote to Dorota, it appears to be loads of couples but then discovered this past Thursday evening that Mary of LaTeeDas will be coming on this journey, filling in for a traveller who had to unmake travel plans. I also bring along the new sweet compact Leica which replaces the abused former fav mini dig cam which got its lens coating rubbed right off.
I look forward to seeing Mount Etna and the dogs that live near there, hounds. And some olive trees. And shores.
All for now, time to zip up the bag and spend q.t. with Kennedy.

Travelling Love.

As Holly Golightly would say Quel day.
Up and running at crack of the dawning hour to see the smattering of snow.
I do not complain about snow, never - notez bien.
Skipped out to Park School to document a great keynote talk by brain and learning researcher (and pal of Tom Wolfe's, a point that perked up my small ears) Dr. Mel Levine who, apparently, has been on some of those self-help or book-help television shows.
Then onwards to park in the Hallwalls lot and catch the above-ground subway where it's gratis at West Tupper. I heard the helpful ringing bells that are rung maniacally to warn potentially off-kilter drivers, I presume, who are on verge of driving/diving down into the tunnel. This does happen periodically and Yours Truly follows these tales with intent, much like the stories of the bodies that turn up in the East River.
So on the above-ground subway I was.
Standing. Eavesdropping.
I heard a man at the back of the stench-ridden car telling a rapt femme about Lackawanna, how Lackawanna is a District of the Middling City.
And then his thoughts drifted to Converse Chuck Taylors the colour of pollution, deep black. And then he rambled about Bethlehem Steel and inter-racial strife.
I was on this stinkbomb, lest You wonder, as I was forewarned by those at the big U that, due to the NCAA proceedings, parking was nil.
I arrived and shot the heck out of the annual Match Day, an annual fav, whereby med students discover (via envelopes and computer print-outs) where they'll be jettisoning off to for the following year (definitely) and beyond.
There are squeals of delight, some grimaces, many draft pints of beer.
I was at the podium awaiting the onslaught and helped thee Dr. Nancy Nielsen shuffle all the envelopes so that they were no longer alphabetical as all the matchees are asked to drop a dollar in a basket and then the final matchee collects all the dough.
It is serious business. Maybe not as serious as the matching at hand. But really.
Traditions exist on all planes of import.

I am merrily chained to the laptop, editing like there is no tomorrow.
Tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow, happy Ides of March.

Watch your back, Love.

Sloan last night was a rollicking throwdown.
My ticket was a holiday gift from Michele and the show was rescheduled due to some sort of border or licensing meltdown.
Me, Annie, Michele, Gary, the nephew, et about 7K other al, grooved to these Canadian boys this past summer at the Middling City's pro bono outdoor concert series, Thursday at the Square.
At one point during last night's concert I misheard Michele.
Another band, I queried.
No, she replied, The Other Man, seconds before they launched into her fav Sloan number.
Last night, pre-concert, supped with the fam at the downtown restaurant/boozehall Laughlin's and had to send back my few saladtop grilled shrimp as someone in the kitchen had forgotten the grilled part and I realized this halfway into one raw creature.
At some point between din and gig spoke with Sparky about her upcoming appearance as a slave in the Neglia production Spartacus.
We discussed at length earlier this week the controversial poster that featured the prominent ass of the company founder, Sergio Neglia. It appeared naked, completely devoid of dancerly tight.
In sooth the tights were so tight and flesh-coloured that they appeared invisible.
A protest of sorts ensued, the image was removed from a billboard and perhaps more.
Then it was someone's PhotoShop job to PhotoShop out the asscrack, to create a uni-cheek for Sergio.
Ahh, all is ass well in the Middling City, where the deaccession appears to be imminent despite protests, raucous meetings, threat of lawsuits, etc.
As You may recall, YT posted via Buffalo Rising online, a concise freakout about this tragic event.
What has been most shocking is the shortsightedness of those who wish these deftly-crafted items, 200 in all, to be scattered to the four winds, no longer a visual excitation for anyone traipsing through Albright-Knox Art Gallery.
The older should merge with the new and YT's thoughts immediately visits some of the finest galleries and musees in this human, hubris-filled world.
Where old and young pieces of all media mingle.
The gallery of RISD is a primo example of this style of curating and presentation.
My beloved Whitney always features the shows that visit as well as their wondrous collection which is there sans surprises. As I have written and stated many times.
You love that Kiki Smith/Jasper Johns/Whatever.
It is where you saw it last visit, same wall, waiting for you.
There is an article in today's NYT about the Albright-Knox sale.
The piece begins in a manner that makes the MC look most sad.

For a city that has lost so much unwillingly over the last several decades — industries, prestige, jobs and more than half its population — perhaps it was inevitable that a decision to allow anything of great value to leave here willingly would be met with howls of protest.

The AKAG ditches priceless objets for speculative newbies on the scene.
This prospecting amid an art market that has gone mad in favour of artists, yes, but prices soar and the curators at this mid-sized gallery clamor for pieces on the top-40 lists - so the collection resembles more and more a greatest hits compilation.

Toss in the unexpected priceless links between ideas and cultures.
To see examples of what's to be auctioned off viewers will have to daytrip or fewdaytrip to Cleveland, TO, Rochester.

Sad sad art day, Love.

As Kennedy so astutely noted, no one ever claims to have been purposely landing on the Middling City's ranging cable access station.
They were just noodling about.
So at this moment there is a handful of people who have reported that they saw the televisional likeness of Yours Truly on same electronic outpost.
Back story.
A few years back You may recall that YT blogged about the surreal circumstances of that breakup of about four years ago.
And Richard Wicka asked about three or so years ago if I'd participate in his five minute series whereby individuals sit in front of his vid cam and, with camera rollin' rollin', talk and tell.
My narrative was about the above. Following that humourous retelling Richard peppered me with about fifty questions ranging from serious to utterly ridiculous, fashioned to eke out responses galore.
One of these questions was What was the worst gift you have ever received.
Sans hesitation I replied that it was a Valentine's gift from the young man inferred to above. His odd forays into the realm of humour were usually painful, sometimes just plain annoying.
For Valentine's Day one year he thought it'd be fun and funny to purchase me a vibrator.
I found it to be an odd sentiment, choice, gift, message.
I was going to run a classified ad in the newspaper where I was working.
Unused vibrator for sale. $5.00 or best offer.
Then I did not.
Instead, YT left it on the bar at Nietzsche's one fine evening after a full night of roaming and shooting.
I left it running.
I moved away from it and enjoyed the reactions of men and women confronted with an odd bartop embellishment.

The End.

Not the end of Love, Love, ever.

Today.
Two boy colleagues sent me, and they do not know each other, Remember When emails.
One sent a beautiful black & white image of thee John, of Toppermost of the Poppermost fame.
The other sent two images of the likeness of Yours Truly from several years ago, me swaggering and loaded down with gear, making my way into a venue and from the looks of the situ it is the Middling City's downtown baseball centre/diamond.
So that would be one of the all-day fests that transpire there.
My hair was very long, as it's aiming to become again, and I think there's a pager - a pager - clipped to my belt loop.
There was an era, like around before when digital hit the mainstream, that we journalistos had pagers and YT knew, absolutely, the locale of each and every danged payphone in this Western New York.
And, lest you forgot, one could receive pages from parties that ended or began their phone numbers to be returned with a 911 meaning Jeez, call me like PRoNTo.
The latter sender, Chris Borkowski (he's himself + the dotcom if You wish to see his site), catapulted from MC artsy venues to a gig at the Guggenheim, as in that snaily viewing venue that, in this op, worked best for the overtakage of Matthew Barney.
Onwards.
The biggest and perhaps, no, def the best, news to hit this frigid village is that Albright-Knox Art Gallery is to show the work of Francis Bacon in May.
That is correct, Bacon.
This may be the verysame show YT saw in Paris a while back - popes, dogs, twisted countenances, and ever ever those lush topographies.
Just typing those last two words made me have a micro-pang for grad school and truly this reason has escaped just as quickly as my little fingers typed that all in a flash.

Flashes of Love.

Well can You say that Your day included, perfectly, as Mine did, a special proximity to a faux, life-sized skeleton.
I think not.
Yours Truly was called to make some ports of a femme at the big U and we meandered a bit after getting a feel for how best to illustrate her craft and craftiness.
Gallery, hallway, foyer, window port, monitors and then, o then, discovered that my pal Jeff Sherven has, for some reason, this skeleton in the check-out area for media equipment.
The photo subjet du jour deals not only with epidemiology but with media so this quite handily worked most parfait.
Stand in between the monitor and the skeleton, YT directed.
And I bet this phrase will just never be repeated ever again.
Now on the rock classique station is that wondrous sonic piece of art the Stones made with Keith's ragged vocals - Happy.
Today is one freakin' Happy Day.
Last night, whilst shopping for fresh fleurs (dig french, dig) spotted #61 - Max Afinogenov - of thee Buffalo Sabres, jaw clenched tightly, circling some roses, obviously in a state of flusterment. I nearly stepped in but amused myself greatly by watching his typical boy quagmire of which to give - the reds, the pinks, the non-roses. Then back to roses. He was in a flowery pickle, to be sure.
Boys/men attach too much to flowers, well, some anyhow. My most recent X always thought, or believed, erroneously, that I preferred to receive a delicious gourmet sandwich to some nice flowers. Not that that stopped the flower gifts but his belief was like so wrong.
Just like bats, I believe everyone has a good flower story - giving or receiving.
YT has her share, to be perfectly sure.

Happy Rosey Day.

'Tis nearly the wearin' o the green so therefore in the Middling City this means 'tis the runnin' o the tipplers. In essence Yours Truly means the annual Shamrock Run of course, the pesky race that wends its way throughout the historic Old First Ward, in plain view of the majestic grain elevators, the train tracks, the swill halls that remain.
This means that YT was dodging barricades and warmer-uppers en route to meeting in the suburb of Hamburg and am now in hiding with Blogger and NYT to amuse me until I am certain the coast will be clear, as military planners are wont to say.
Last night was a girlie meet-up with Jana at Ikea-ful Brodo which is never half full before adding Liz to the cast of characters, meeting her over at the nouvelle Scarlet on Virginia Alley.
This joint is confused, not confusing.
It is in the former Crash Club where crazed events and things transpired in the 90s and they have taken out all the mirrors, carpeting, brass railings and general architectural disguises to reveal a place with antique character - exposed bricks and beams.
The ol' b&b.
The owners or management were, apparently, not so sure if they wanted to make this a sports bar or an upscale dining venue so they aimed for a 50/50 aesthetical split.
There are sets prominent on the two-story wall with tastefully-arranged bottles of spirits placed just so, as well as some botanical embellishments.
Then there was the overwhelming scent of fish, obviously the exhausting of vapours was not thought out enough. It was strong enough that it made YT consider making an about-face and leaving as who wishes to subsume oneself in the wafting scent of fried foods and fishticuffs. We stayed. Liz came. We cocktailed. We left.
Will I return.
That is a question.
If it's on someone's to-do list and I am into seeing the to-doer yes.
Time to see if the runners, walkers, barricades, cops have left the scene.

Scenic, hideout Love.

Was informed today by one whose op I rather treasure in parts that today We are to wear pink as a sign of solidarnosc for Anna Nicole.
Her fav colour was pink, You see.
I was not wearing pink earlier, nor now, although I looked at a pink sweater (subconsciously) and chose to wear purple instead.
I found her curious.
Did I think she was like Marilyn, as she blathered.
Only in the faux blondeness, the exuberant sexuality, the selling themselves to men in a rather gross manner, becoming a caricature.
Marilyn was more of a talent, in my non-humble op.
Heard from JW,Esq. who has informed me that for a Cali pal's b-day soirée where one and all were asked to come as a rock star or behave as one, he chose to dress an none other than Ozzy.
As not in and Harriet but thee Ozzy, one of the most kind-hearted rockers of all.
When JW,Esq. sends along a jpeg of himself in his costume (which was described in great detail and it had all the Ozzy bells & whistles) it will be appearing on epinw.
I did warn him of this.
Perhaps it will not arrive.
Off to points beyond and that is how all weekends should begin after a day of slogging and editing and the like.

Like editing, Love.

That very yumbalicious Jonny Lang performs at The Native American Money Sucking Pavilion tomorrow night.
First photographed that lanky blues man when he was about seventeen and glad to see his cheekbones have only improved with age.
Dined with Literal Harold last night at Republic on the square, as in Union.
Dorota breezed in for a quick Hello and marveled at how the joint was hiding some work being done on the ceiling above the kitchen and bar areas with red construction paper affixed with duct tape. It seemed so Middling City.
After goodbyes meandered into the Barnes and Noble over there to pick up Tiffany's pick for the book club, Fear of Flying, apparently most famed for coining phrase zipless fuck. I am like so not impressed with this book, which reads like a screeching proto-feminist tract that rails on about analysis and being liberated.
This book was published during the most seminal of years, '73, when Dark Side of the Moon emerged on the rock scene.
Always glad to be reading a tome for moiself and scanning ahead it seems it becomes a bit more of a narrative but as I was reading it in LaGuardia whilst waiting and then spotting someone who shall not be named who I know I did tuck it away, realizing it's just not the sort of book you want just everyone to know that you're reading.
Would Erica Jong state, back in the 70s or in these wartimes, that that makes me oso unliberated.
Geez, I really do not give a jot.
So, away the book is tucked, the flight was miraculously on time and Yours Truly is lightly humming the praises of both Delta and USAir, kind of leaving jetBlue alone for a while.

Lang Love.

Whilst dining last night in the Shiney Apple spotted Savion Glover, that tapdancing sensation. And, really, if he wanted to not be spotted he'd have a hell of a time with all those enchanting dreads and all.
Had a spectacular day of wending and wending and looking and watching. And, of course, thinking.
Found myself amongst the clothing of dead Nan Kempner, the socialite who wrote a book about entertaining, a sort of gossipy cookbook. The Met now owns her clothes. Laura and I marvelled at some items, chortled at others, mainly the 80s-era brandishments.
Why were we all so excited about such brandishments - the complicated collars, wrapping coats. I told Laura that I had a gray coat I was especially proud of back Then - a wrap coat that required scads of patience to get all affixed into place with its Japonaise, kimono-inspired wrapping on the inside.
The tour guide gave her quippicisms to the gaggle of ladies following her, marvelling at the cuts and fabrics (Yours Truly was truly aghast at the jacket lined with ... squirrel) and such and concluded with a controlled Q&A. She did proffer up the fact that Nan Kempner (who was about seven feet tall and from the looks of her clothing weighed about eighty pounds) has three children and her daughter, an artist, lives in the Village and is overweight. I said aloud, somewhat loud enough for the tour guide all dressed in orange and short of stature and also peculiar of stature so that she did resemble an Oompa-Loompa could hear - Geez, that isn't very kind.
Onwards now to more more more.
Before planing and deplaning once again.

Art starry Love.

Back in the Shiney Apple, spice snots streaming down my merry face.
For Yours Truly is happily seated in the front window (perhaps the nice girls behind counter will tap me on shoulder and say You know, every time you come here you eat a half bottle of our nuclear El Yucateco green hot sauce and scare pedestrians with your snot face, could you be so kind as to relocate to this more distant, less public table.) of Cubano Cafe Habana which has unfortunately painted over their colourful murals and have gone very minimalist.
Jumped off the J/Z on the Bowery and rushed over to Prince @ Elizabeth.

A funny, short tale, a YT highlight.
So there I am, post-asscrack of dawn, fumbling with the self-checker for USAir, having booked online via grand expedia.com for same.
Nothing. No getting of me on docket, no recognition of flight number.
I stand in line. A man calls to me I'll help you with the machine. I'm warbling I tried that already. Grimace, grimace. Man shouts Come down here and I'll help you and if it doesn't work HE (gesturing to man behind counter) will help you.
I shuffle down there. I say Well, maybe it's because it was booked online.
Swipe credit card. Nothing. Grumble.
I pull out my print-out of itinerary.
He takes a quick look.
Well, he says, the trouble is you're on Delta.
Oh.
Problem Solved.
So, for Your Enlightening, Delta is a good Choice B, C, or A for jetting from the Middling City to Shiney Apple.

Over and out.

Elizabeth@Prince Love.