I don't usually shoot pictures of half-done pairs of socks, but wanted to show Lisa how her India sock yarn looks in the different stages. This yarn looks different each time I do something to it -- unwind the skein, wind into a ball, knit into a sock. Isn't it lovely? The colors are actually a tiny bit brighter in real life -- there are tiny flashes of orange in the mix, and the purple is more muted in the photo than it is in the actual yarn. (I couldn't find a clean, solid-colored towel to use as an impromptu background, so I swiped one of our beach towels and used the wrong side. Funky.)
The heat has transformed us into a family of slugs. When we're not taking siestas in an effort to fast-forward to the cooler times of the day, we're all holed up in the bedroom or the office, huddled around the air conditioner. I've made much more progress in knitting than I usually do on a given weekend, since we've mostly just watched the Comedy Central marathon of Adam Sandler movies (and not even the good ones) all weekend. (We saw "Click" in the theater. It was a hoot -- maybe not a candidate for next year's Oscars, but fun enough -- and the theater had its AC cranked to the max. That made the trip worthwhile on its own.)
I feel halfway guilty for wasting all that time when I could be doing something more productive, like cleaning or obedience training, but the dogs feel pretty much the same way I do. When I leave the nice air-conditioned room, they all follow me, but they immediately do a 180 and head back to the bedroom door, scratching and whining to be let back in where it's cool.
Not that all that time has been wasted. In addition to cranking out the socks at record speed (for me), I've also managed to make multiple updates to the BCCME Web site, set up a Cafepress store for our logowear, ship off loads of club and dog-show paperwork, and get caught up on stuff I wouldn't otherwise find the time to do if I weren't trapped in the only cool room in the house with my knitting and my laptop.
Here's the club logo in all its glory, designed by my friend Maryann:
And in Music News...
Greg has been making little refinements to the Sax Quartet all week. Once he's finished with the actual composition of the piece, he goes back and places all of the dynamic markings, tempo markings, and any articulations he feels are important for proper phrasing. Since I played sax in a previous life, he's been asking me a number of questions about how one would play a certain phrase for best effect. I haven't picked up a sax in more than 20 years and don't currently own one, so I try to visualize what I'd have done (What would Charles Mingus Do??). Maybe generations of sax players will look on those articulations and curse, but I hope not.
After he's happy with the finishing touches and sends the Sax Quartet off to the New Hudson guys, Greg plans to turn his attention back to Niagara -- or more accurately, Ongiara. We saw a documentary on PBS about Niagara Falls, and one of the people they interviewed was Michael Daugherty, another composer who wrote a piece called Niagara. Like the documentary itself, his piece has more to do with how people have affected the Falls over the past couple of centuries. It's nice enough, but a bit hokey in spots (just like the attractions at Niagara Falls). Greg's piece focuses more on the Falls itself, the unrelenting power and texture of the water, and its place in Nature.
No comments:
Post a Comment