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Welcome to the Kindle Lending Library
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Posted in Books, Collectable, Community, Education, Health and wellness, Hobbies, library
Tagged Amazon, Best Sellers, Harry Potter, Kindle, Lending Library, New York Times, Prime
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Miles and miles to go…
I was mowing the common area today and enjoying the new crab apple trees (three, count ‘em, three) I planted last month. It is the rainy season in the Seattle area so the grass is heavy and the trees happy.
I have a battery-run mower so I do the mowing in two phases. I did the front of the house and the common area this morning and then charge the battery again. When my grandson arrives later today, he can mow the rest of the yard and not run out of battery juice.
He is also preparing the beds around the hollies you see to the right of this pictures. He digs out the space and I put beauty bark there. This is his only way to earn cash. He has a girl friend and you might remember how expensive that can be.
Here are two more pictures I took recently of the new homestead:
Note the weather vane is up. And the LED exterior lights are in place.
Posted in Art, Community, Everyday Science, Gardening, Health and wellness, Lifestyle, Man stuff
Tagged battery, beauty bark, Bush, crab apple, holly, lawn mower, tree, weather vane
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The Joy of Being a Kid
Discovered on Pinterest today. I just made me chuckle. I have no idea where you get this done for your child. Gotta show this to my Suzy; she can do anything!
A Trip to the MIM ~ Redux
A friend of mine waxes poetic on theSax.Info blog about a trip he took to the Musical Instrument Museum in Phoenix, AZ. You can check out his original post on The Woodwind Forum. He has many, many pictures for your consideration. Enjoy.
Posted in Clarinet, Culture, Education, Music, Music Instruments, Photograph, Saxophone
Tagged MIM, museum, Pete Hales
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Buescher Goodness
From Stohrer Music, we find some vintage badges. I started my saxual adventure on a Buescher Aristocrat in 1965. After a seven year run, I did take a 28 year break before I returned to performance music.
Tagging Douchebags…
This was a popular piece on the Intertubes last year. I don’t know why it resonated with so many people, but it did. I do have a theory though.
The cell phone earpiece or headset is actually a very functional and necessary item for those who drive and have to be on the phone. It just works. But it also is a very strange way to traverse this blue marble we call Earth.
Before these devices became ubiquitous, if you saw someone talking to themselves, you knew they’d kinda lost it. Now you check for the earpiece.
But still, how many of us have been in a checkout lane and had to listen to some numbskull on their phone talking too loud. It really is annoying.
It’s not really just a guy thang, but with the well documented male ego driving many a fellow to look cool at all costs. Witness sunglasses worn inside a building. So yes this is funny because, like most humor, it has its foundation in pain. The Urban Dictionary sez it even better:
The term “douchebag” generally refers to a male with a certain combination of obnoxious characteristics related to attitude, social ineptitude, public behavior, or outward presentation.
Though the common douchebag thinks he is accepted by the people around him, most of his peers dislike him. He has an inflated sense of self-worth, compounded by a lack of social grace and self-awareness. He behaves inappropriately in public, yet is completely ignorant to how pathetic he appears to others.
He often talks about how cool, successful, and popular he is, yet never catches on to the fact that he comes across as a total loser. Nevertheless, he firmly believes that he is the smartest, most desirable, and most charming person in the room… and will try to bad-rep anyone who would threaten to expose this facade.
He fancies himself a ladies’ man, yet tends to be a joke to all but the most naive of women. He tries to portray himself as part of the in-crowd (a fashionista, an upwardly mobile professional, the life of the party, etc.) but only succeeds in his own mind.
To everyone else, he is an annoying and arrogant phony who comes across as a wannabe overcompensating for his insecurities. He tries to appear like the center of whatever group will tolerate him, but in reality, he is just a tag-along who mooches drinks, women, contacts, social standing, and other benefits from the group… while contributing nothing.
Posted in Blogosphere, Community, Humor, Internet
Tagged arrogant, doushebag, earpiece, fashionista, headset, intertubes, lady's man, phony, Tubes
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Sight Reading Music is an Art
“Hell is full of musical amateurs.” ~ George Bernard Shaw
This week I got to sit in with a struggling big band that is under new management. This band has very strong elements and a couple of weak players. I suspect part of that staffing battle due to the band being located in a small town that is kinda far from Seattle.
If I were to make a suggestion to this kind of hobbyist band it would be, do nothing until your rhythm section is solid. Sitting in and sight reading charts is scary enough for this hobbyist without trying to figure out where the beat is. Fortunately I had no solos so I was just able to give the best I have and not worry about holding this band back.
The nice thing about this band was that they had decent soloists in the sax, trombone and trumpet sections. So this band will make gas money. Having a solid section leader who is a great sight reader is the only way to go. Hell, if we band managers could make any serious money, everyone in the band would be pros. The fall back is seed the sections with the best soloists you can. I don’t know who said it but I find this to be true, “In a jazz combo you are only as strong as your weakest player. In a big band you are only as strong as your soloists.”
“Jazz in the Corner” in Seattle 2010
I use a lot of tricks to get around fast parts that I would really need to woodshed. Every time I sit with this band, they seem to have a sax feature number with 16th notes and a pace somewhere north of 220. One of the tricks I use is to try to hit the sweet notes in a run. Guessing which ones they might be is a challenge.
The other thing I do is always aim for the first beat if the run time gets kinda dicey. This has been drilled into me by years of lessons where I’d spend the first half hour sight reading. It was also fortified by instructors who during a duet would drop out unexpectedly and I was expected to carry on as if nothing had happened.
Everyone makes mistakes in a first reading—the true test of a musician is how you handle it when you make a mistake. If you falter, stop, or get really quiet, everyone knows it’s a bolo. If you press on, play with passion, and try to make it work, it can be considered interpretation. No, really…
BTW, this band will make it. They will make it because they have a great set of soloists, vocalists and a world-class band manager.
Posted in Band, Band Management, Big Band, Community, Education, Hobbies
Tagged sight reading, sub
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Scent of a Woman
Women! What can you say? Who made ’em? God must have been a fuckin’ genius. The hair… They say the hair is everything, you know. Have you ever buried your nose in a mountain of curls… just wanted to go to sleep forever?
Or lips… and when they touched, yours were like… that first swallow of wine… after you just crossed the desert. ~ Al Pacino as LTC Frank Slade in the movie “The Scent of a Woman.”
This is for the lovers and dancers out there; keep on dancing.
Posted in Health and wellness, Movies, Music, sex, Style, Too Spicy for some
Tagged Al Pacino, Scent of a Woman
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Bothell Whooping Cough ~ Epidemic yet?
I’m seeing signs on the highway to home saying get your Td (aka Tdap) here. And there are articles in the media like this one: Whooping cough cases still rising in Snohomish County; free vaccine clinic in Lynnwood on Saturday.
“Three people in the county, an adult and two infants, have been hospitalized so far in 2012 because of the disease. In all, 217 cases have been reported so far in 2012, nearly as many as was reported for all of 2011, according to numbers from the Snohomish Health District. In 2010, only 25 cases were reported.
A third of those cases have been reported in Marysville, where 72 cases have been reported. North Snohomish County seems to be a major focal point of the outbreak, as Arlington has reported 32 cases and Stanwood has at 17. Everett has had 26 cases, Lake Stevens has had 24 and Snohomish has had 16 so far in 2012.”
So I looked up Tdap on the Intertubes and found this excellent guide:
Just a word to the wise.
Posted in Education, Everyday Science, Guides, Health and wellness
Tagged Bothell, Marysville, pertussis, TDAP, Washington, Whooping
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The Bis Key Chronicles 