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.
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.
Finches feeding on the seed pods from the trumpet vines.
Happy Solstice!
These murals above the display windows of the recently closed Maisel’s Indian Trading Post on Old Route 66 in Downtown Albuquerque. The murals depict the Navajo Yoi-bi-choi Dance and the Corn Dance.
In an exchange of comments about Silver and Sasha, I told Resa that Silver is a bully. She asked if he bullied Spunk. The boy kitties bully each other but it’s all play, sparing and wrestling, nothing serious. However, when it comes to the girl kitties, Silver, Spunk and Loki bully and beat up on the girls. I mentioned that Lola got a nick in her ear recently, which I assume was Silver or Spunk bullying her, but I really don’t know who nicked her ear. Resa asked to see Lola’s nicked ear.
Lola’s nicked ear made me think of our old Tom cat Nick, who came to us around 2001. He tested positive for FIV (feline immunodeficiency virus), but he was such a sweet kitty, and had such an interesting personality, we had to keep him. He was a wonderful addition to our family, and showed no signs of illness until fall of 2007. He went down hill quickly and died around the beginning of November 2007.
The City opened the scratchy surfaced, knee scraping, palm grinding, bloody face plant playground at Civic Plaza. As I suspected, the gray surface, though cushy, is rough like tarpaper roofing, and the orange and purple bubbles are like 20 grit sandpaper. Kids running and falling on those surfaces are going to get all scraped up.
Off Center & Not Even 