We celebrated our good friend Lois Brandt’s 100th birthday today. I can’t think of a better way to end the first decade of the 21st Century than celebrating a century of life with good friends. Happy Birthday, Lois!
Cien Años…
Month: December 2019
Blue is Back
Blue, our red tail boa, is back from her few months at Tristan’s. The woman who thought she was interested in a boa was surprised by how long they live and how big they get, and lost interest in helping Tristan take care of Blue. After issues like the thermostat that controls the heating system in Blue’s cage failing, we decided to bring her back to our house where it’s much easier for me to take care of her.
Cold & Cranes
The temperature never rose above freezing today. I walked out to Beaver Point right before sunset, and a group of cranes were hanging out in the Rio Grande, wading around fluffed up to keep warm. There was a lone Canadian goose hanging with the cranes, and a duck floated by and then took off.
Trees for Lyn
Lyn Wilderdean would like to join the tree club with Mia, Resa, Robin and Holly, and have her own tree. I have posted four available trees that photograph fairly well for Lyn to choose from.
The first two photos are of a young, volunteer cottonwood that propagated in the irrigation water. Laurie raised it from a sapling after it sprang forth around 2002. It’s rare to get volunteer cottonwoods.
The third photo (taken today) and fourth photo (during summer, in bloom) are of our Chitalpa that Tristan gave to Laurie for Mother’s Day in 2002. It was heavily damaged from a late hard frost in 2005. We thought we might lose it, but it has come back in a unique shape.
The fifth photo is a gnarly old cottonwood on the eastern edge of our property. The six photo is a big old cottonwood on the southern edge of the property.
Storming & Lounging
Spunk forgave me for droning him, and lounged with him during the winds and rain brought on by a storm that passed through this afternoon.
Droning
Laurie’s parents gave me a drone for Christmas. The above video is Spunk’s and my first go at flying it and taking aerial video. Spunk was sort of okay with the drone’s propellers spinning until it took off. Then he made a run for it as the airborne, buzzing beast followed him. The other cats were inside and didn’t partake in droning this go-round.
Extended Version: Red Cape on the Edge of the Salton Sea
Here’s an audio only, extended version of Red Cape on the Edge of the Salton Sea, which is a collaboration between me (vocals, rhythm guitar and percussion tracks), Ron Blood (bass guitar), and Joel Lewis (lead guitar). Ron came up with a super cool bass line, but Joel is the real star of this version.
This was Joel’s first foray into remote collaboration on a song, and recording. I was on the phone with him when he recorded the lead track (Joel lives in Las Vegas, NV), and he did it in one take (I could hear him playing through his monitors as he recorded it), and then he emailed me the mix-down while we were still on the phone so I could see how the mix came out. It was really quite amazing — he improvised the entire track.
Joel and I grew up together, and we both started playing guitar when we were teenagers. Joel joined the Navy when we were in our late teens, and he was stationed in various places around the world. We had been out of touch with each other for 40 years.
Ron started playing bass at the same time that Joel and I started playing guitar. Joel and Ron had stayed in touch over the years, and Joel got the three of us together while he was in Albuquerque last year. All three of us have done vastly different things over the years, however, we kept up with music, and we all three ended up working in computers and information technology.
