Sunday, April 29, 2007

glad I'm home as usual

Last Sunday, I flew to Chicago for some training on the software we use to do the website. Here are the people I went with left to right: the two women from Seattle, Ryan who has my job in Flint and Kevin who has my job in Chicago. We were on our way to a teahouse where I had an earl grey with vanilla and cream. Delish.

We walked by this marquee



I had these scallops at the Park Grill.
Here is the park the grill is in.


Here is the inside of the Park Grill.



Here is the giant jellybean sculpture thing there.






Tuesday I had breakfast by myself in the Renaissance hotel dining room. I had a fruit granola yogurt compote in a martini glass and some toast and a latte while doing a crossword puzzle.

Today I went to get my mom out of the nursing home, thereby having to spend an entire beautiful day inside. Yesterday I had a radio show and then Amy and I killed a couple bottles of cheap wine.

This week is GNO at Deb's and Friday it's Norah Jones and Saturday is Cinco de Mayo and La Revancha is at Howard's and Sunday is Ana Popovic. Roll on.

Wednesday, April 25, 2007

back safe home again

My kids used to love that line from some Richard Scarry book. About a worm, I believe. I have some great pictures from Chicago but my camera turned on in my purse on the way home and the batteries are dead and the extra batteries are in my suitcase which American Airlines can't find. I roll into T-Town yesterday about 5 p.m. and alas mine is the only bag lost. Between Chicago and Toledo on a teeny tiny plane. Many calls today have not established the bag's whereabouts.

Also missing in the luggage: makeup, phone charger, clothes and worse, some credit card bills I was going to pay while gone, but didn't. IDENTITY THEFT FEAR!!!! And those three new CDs Sherry made for me.

So last night instead of driving to Flint and staying overnight in a hotel, I drove home from the airport. Finished reading Jim Harrison's new book Returning to Earth. It was great. He's the guy who wrote Legends of the Fall, made into a major motion picture starring Brad Pitt.

Today I drove to Flint and back for some other training. Two hours door to door. Told me it couldn't be done.

Also the social work guy at my mom's nursing home called today to say Mom gets to go home Saturday. Only I have a radio show Saturday so I have a call into the guy to see if she can wait until Sunday. When it will be beautiful outside.

Tuesday, April 17, 2007

Happy Birthday, Bomeli

Tonight, I came home and did a tape and Connie came over for me to take pictures of jewelry she and Amy had made for the Humane Society benefit auction and then I make little fences around my bushes out back with chicken wire which they now call hardware cloth and I do the dishes and some laundry and Annie calls saying she has stuffed peppers in the oven and they're probably on burn so I go over there and the oven has shut off, as it has been doing lately inexplicably, so I go to the bar where Tony and Joe and Nate are playing al fresco. But alas, it is towards the end so I have two beers and a shot of some buttery stuff with Dave since it's his birthday and I come home.

But I did endure an entire night Monday with no drinking in my attempt to lose this flabby tire around my middle. I watched "The Three Burials of Malquiedes Estrada" with Tommy Lee Jones and Levon Helm and Dwight Yoakum which was fabulous.

Sunday night, we saw Lucinda Williams in Ann Arbor and she was GREAT. I'm sorry to say that Carrie Rodriguez was not great. I liked that perky little voice she sang with Chip Taylor with but now she seems too serious. Here's Lucinda taken with my cell phone from the balcony.



We saw Bucktown Kickback Saturday night after which we went to Ricky Ault's new bar 149 North and then went to Howard's to see Student Loan but we saw Indgrass instead who was opening for them and I drank a lot of Jack Daniel's and then Sunday I went to see my mom before going to Ann Arbor. Amazingly, this lead singer for the band looked a lot like Amy's son Evan, even down to the smallish stature. Once again, taken with the cell phone.



Another giant weekend coming up with Ronnie Baker Brooks and Rod's two nights and go to see mom on Sunday and fly to Chicago that night.

Wednesday, April 11, 2007

checking my calendar

I see I have done about nothing for two weeks. There was GNO and a radio meeting. And I visited my mom on Easter and got a visit from the Easter Bunny.


But stuff starts up any day. My Aunt Naomi died so I have to go to Delaware Friday for the funeral but it relieves me from going on the weekend when I intend to see BuckTown KickBack at GFT Saturday night and Lucinda Williams in Ann Arbor on Sunday.

Also, I got a new haircut today. It's very short. I took in pictures of Meryl Streep in The Devil Wears Prada as the idea. Now I need a whole new wardrobe and a Prada handbag.


And possibly a BMW convertible.


But not that bag with that car. Ucky.


Sunday, April 01, 2007

give me a freaking break

Many of you have heard of my hectic schedule. Today I went to Delaware to visit my mom in the nursing home and got back to town just in time to do my radio show. Then I had a couple hours off before my play. Which Amy and Connie and Sherry and Ginger came to. Thank you. So we go to Beckett's after for a couple of drinks and I get home at midnight and.... my front door key won't unlock my front door. My back door is locked and no key is in the secret hiding place. The only window without a screen in it, the inside window is locked. I go around to the only inside window I know is unlocked, and in the process of getting the screen out, one of the storm windows falls down and breaks into a thousand pieces. I fling the detritus to the ground, get a porch chair and climb in the window. I guess I should be glad it wasn't a window on the side where Mrs. Eilert lives or she would have been out there in a NY minute at the sound of breaking glass.

Tomorrow is the last play performance after which we strike the set and go to Perrysburg for the cast party. On to April. Yay.

The Rodney Crowell show at the Ark got canceled because Rodney is sick. But soon enough it will be on to Lucinda and two nights of Rod's Collision and Norah Jones and Eddie Shaw and Ana Popovic and the Madison Folk Fest. And then it will be Memorial Day. Cripe, before you know it, it will be the Harvest Party.