While You Were Out

Most of the time nothing happens back home when you are at work, and that is good. It's important to keep that in mind when you travel. Nothing is going on. No thing. The house is fine. Everyone is OK. But then you stay home one day and you become aware of all the hubbub outside and it kind of draws you in: a def increase in dogs and dogwalkers early in the morn, delivery trucks stopping by the convenience store on the corner, and a yellow school bus picking one up one lone kid--in late July? You see that a crew from Ridgewood Redevelopment Corp. is removing graffiti from the Amtech HQ across the street, so you go out to oversee that little job and get some pix. And then within an hour a DEP truck is at the catch basin that you called in about, with a big scoop thing dropping big loads of wet dirt and debris into the truck. You are glad you are there to help; to tell the guy that it was Con Ed who was responsible for putting that mud there in the first place. But it almost seems like he does not care. Hmph. Failure to value backstory (call that in, too). More pix. Then the lunch crowd, the guys from Communicar, mailman, and kids. Again the dogwalkers. Lot of activity, indeed, and you would be unaware of it all if you were back at your cubicle where you belong.

totallylookslike

Our blogfriend posted about a new site, and when we saw her post we thought back to our recent photos and said...wait a min, that totally looks like...

Saturday in the Park

Saturday: Up early, check garbage by curb,OK; feed the cats, check NY1 and click around the dial that isn't a dial anymore--what is this GreenPlanet: a story on a green home in Albuquerque?; check to see if the garbage was picked up; go out for coffee and Ridgewood Times, peer into catch basins, note empty Corona bottle on sidewalk, and new grafitti across the street; wonder if I have an obsessive mind; worry that I have an obsessive mind; distracted again, this time by squirrel; Brex and an early start on the Sunday papers sections that arrived, two piles: keep this, toss that; need for third pile?; check again, garbage; bring empty bottles from pantry to basement. Garbage picked up, but missed it because I was distracted by something in basement. Wait for K. to get up. Look in. Cats snuggled on bed with her.

Our plan was to get out, pick up our CSA goodies, and then go to the church to drop off for the pantry. McCarran Park was in full Saturday mode--full of hipsters, as she calls them, and their dogs, on leash and in the dog runs. Two surveyors on the corner of Driggs; the big red decorated bus that is parked in the same spot every Saturday and which reminds me of Kesey's "Further."
The distribution point was pretty busy with latecomers in the last 20 minutes. Boxes of veggies, the scale, and familiar faces with the sign-in sheets. Loading up the car with the leftovers I met and talked with two new members, a couple from Jackson Heights, Queens. That was a surprise; It has its own CSA. They seemed very interested in CSA stuff and I suggested they show up at Sunday's Core Group meeting. We'll see...
The trunk and back seat were loaded with corn, zucchini, onions, eggs, and assorted greens, which we delivered to the church. Kim had to move stuff around in the one fridge to get eggs in there and we left the other stuff on the floor in crates. The church soup kitchen is overwhelmed with too much food from us, and changes have to be made. Donnie, a kind of super I guess, told us about his troubles with the chain, the gate, the need to get a new combination lock, all relating to a story of a homeless guy who got into the church yard at night. Nice guy.

Then back to McCarran to shop at the Green Market--eggs, berries, goat cheese, carrots, and tomatoes--all locally grown and fresh, if not all strictly organic, all sold by friendly vendors who had left early in the morn from Jersey or LI farms Our friend from Garden of Eve Farm said his assistant was in Brooklyn for the first time and she was out exploring. "I told her to go down Bedford." It was fun walking from stall to stall together, making big decisions.

On the drive over, Kim told me how, earlier, she had heard Dawn read the riot act to one of the latecomers who arrived after 12--who told her that he was "having trouble getting there" each week. I would have said, "Well, You are making progress. Next week you may get here on time. And then you will get your veggies."

Anyway, this is boring but at least we are getting out, for whatever reason, on a Saturday morn, rather than hanging back, getting stuck and depressed or angry with each other. But we missed The Soup (again); it will roll around (again), and we will probably miss it again. But we got out, and we brought back some Good Eats!

TOTHism

Of course since I haven't been able to find an existing religion I can believe in fully, I had to create my own: TOTHism.

You'll notice that it's in all caps. That's because it's an acronym. It stands for:

Thinning
Of
The
Herd

Thanks to the newsmedia, I am able to practice my religion daily, sometimes several times a day. I was at the alter of TOTH just a few minutes ago while at KAKe's blog. She posted an article about a woman who died after she ate wild mushrooms from the side of the highway. KAKe said "Eeew" and "Moron."

But I say: TOTH!

My soul doth magnify the greatness of TOTH! All around us in this world are shown to us the ever-present and all-encompassing TOTH! TOTH knows no color, race, sex or creed. Hail, TOTH! Long live TOTH!

Seriously, I'm sure it's very sad for that woman's family. But I still say: TOTH!

In Newsday today it was reported that a young man in Suffolk died while driving his car at excessive speed, driving across the double yellow line, with his friend as a passenger. He wanted to study criminal justice and become a cop. His family reports that everybody liked him. Unfortunately (or perhaps fortunately for the rest of us), TOTH liked him best, and took him into its embrace. The friend was very near to TOTH himself, blessed are those who see TOTH in person and live to tell of it. Perhaps his encounter with TOTH will be a life changing experience (i.e. he won't let himself be a passenger of such a dumbass "friend" again!).

Someone hit by a train and killed while spraypainting graffiti on LIRR tracks? A fine work of TOTH!
Someone killed while car surfing? A superior work of TOTH!

And how many of them say "S/He wanted to be a lawyer." (I'd say, about 70%. The rest wanted to be cops or firemen or entrepreneurs with successful businesses.)

My beliefs may make me sound harsh. Deny TOTH if you must, but for believers and unbelievers both, TOTH's boundless work continues across all time and space.

(Can I get an "Amen?")

Good God, It's Wednesday Already!

Where DOES the time go?

I took vacation time this week, and intended to sleep late, and do gardening, and take the kitties outside, and basically just do happy, relaxed fun things. I had been feeling the need to have some down time, and so when Martin canceled his originally planned vacation for this week (it's his birthday tomorrow, and every year so far he's taken off the week of his birthday; this year it coincided with a visit from our uber-boss, Nicholas Riddle, and just to prove that he doesn't take off when Nicholas is here--whole other story there--he changed it to the last week in July) I jumped at it.

Well, so far I feel neither particularly happy nor relaxed. In fact, I guess I'm feeling a bit stressed because I haven't done any of the "fun" activities I had originally planned....Ok, I did sleep a little later than usual yesterday, but it doesn't count in my estimation because I didn't wake up feeling relaxed and happy and ready to greet the day.

For sure it doesn't help that I'm PMSing, but could the little shits in the neighborhood (*cough cough*Tommy*cough cough*), and the idjits from the bar, and the schmucks who park their trucks in front of my driveway PLEASE take this week off, too?! Please???

And could the day maybe slow down a little so it's not suddenly 3pm and all I've managed to do is eat a bagel, feed the cats their lunch, and read the paper? I don't think that's asking too much. Thanks.

Catch basins (We'll look into it)

Catch basins are my current obsession: I can hardly walk by one in this neighborhood without peering in. They are mostly all filled with debris and dirt. Rain causes some of the buildup, but it is also the result of humanoids using the catch basins for garbage. Coffee cups pile up in catch basins near delis and bodegas; and I have seen dog owners toss their goody bag in them. Think of this happening three dogwalks per day, for several different doggies/owners.

It all started two months ago when I complained at a CB5 meeting about three catch basins that were covered over when Atlas Mall repaved Cooper Ave. This was during a discussion about flood mitigation, which is a critical issue in Queens. CB5 took up the matter, contacted Hemmerdinger, and he was, supposedly, furious when he learned about the problem (perhaps we should say "shocked, shocked" as in that film). Anyway, the one in front of our house is pretty much filled with dirt; this morning around 6, I stuck a stick in there and it was impossible for water to flow through. I called 311 to report.

Remedy: Every catch basin should have an "address", a number/location identifier. We should be able to find out the number of the catch basin in front of or near our house. Then, with technology being what it is today, we should be able to go on nyc.gov and just research when our catch basin was supposedly cleaned out.

You might want to look into the catch basins in your neighborhood.

Captain Justice

Charity (and Drama) Begins in Williamsburg-Greenpoint

So today we went to a CSA core group meeting for the first time in many months. Last year we had gone to every meeting, held about monthly, until Kevin got ill, after which I continued going until December. At that point I was pretty unhappy with how things were going and decided to move back from it all. It had come as a shock to me that some of the other core group members were receiving 50% or 100% discounts (depending on position) on their vegetable shares in compensation of the work they did coordinating the various things that must be done to run the CSA (accounts, communication, distribution, etc). It made me upset because I felt like it was hidden from us. Then when it came time to "vote" (and I use that word very loosely) on who would be in the coordinator positions in 2008, I felt completely shut out because of the poorly run process.

Kevin was kinda unhappy with them from earlier in the season, though I don't recall why exactly, and so I thought we would be happy to just be "regular members" for 2008. Kevin was spooked about signing up for 2008, he thought we might be shunned as nasty people who couldn't be bothered to stay with the core group, PLUS who lived not in Greenpoint or Williamsburg but...[gasp!]...Queens! But it was no big deal.

As the new season rolled around, Kevin became interested again and decided he wanted to be involved in the core group again. He has since said to me that he stepped back to let the new group of young high-energy types go ahead and take care of things, but he felt compelled to rejoin because he thought they were "screwing things up" and he might be useful, and a voice/opinion that is needed to get things back on track. The first project was the first few distributions, which would be run only by core group members to ensure that things started smoothly. So I dropped him off at 8:30am a few Saturday mornings in June, and picked up our shares and went to the green market, and came back later to pick him up. We also ended up dropping off the leftover shares (some ALWAYS end up not getting picked up) at a local church that is running a food pantry and soup kitchen program.

I should mention that we stayed on the fringes of the group the whole time because we had continued to get all the list-serv emails and postings, and sort of knew what was going on.

The reason for the meeting we went to today--which was not a regular meeting but a "meeting about meetings"--was because at the previous core group meeting some personalities had a complete clash and one of the coordinators, who is VERY involved in the CSA as well as a number of other grassroots organizations in the W'burg area, stormed out of the meeting because she felt attacked. So it was bad situation all around, including the fact that three newbies witnessed it, and so some other regularly-attending members thought that we ought to prevent that kind of thing by splitting the meeting into two parts: the first hour for current core members only, and the second hour for new attendees. The coordinator who is always the voice of reason (I am sure it is sometimes very hard to be her, as I think people go to her with their greivances and often ends up in the role of negotiator when she just doesn't want to have to deal with other peoples drama...) suggested the core meet to discuss the issue. I am flatly against that policy, as is Kevin, and so we ended up going to the meeting. I was nervous about the situation because I thought we were going to be the minority opinion in the group. Well, as it turns out we weren't, and all the people who initially thought that they wanted the two sections had rethought their initial reactionary opinions, except for one person who wasn't able to attend this quickly-scheduled meeting.

Anyway, when we were all done speaking (we went round the table because noone really wanted to begin, lucky me I was first) I felt much better about the group as a whole. So when it was decided that since we were mostly all together that we also needed to discuss what was going on with our friends at the soup kitchen/food pantry. Some of the food was going to waste because of timing and communication: the soup kitchen is on Wednesday evening, and the food pantry is on Thursday, but the bigger of the CSA's food donations are on Saturday, and some things just won't keep, especially if they're not refrigerated. And the Wednesday night drop offs needed to be put away, too, and more importantly labeled so that during the food pantry people knew what they were getting.

After the positive, reaffirming first half of the meeting, the discussion was going downhill. The coordinator who had been kinda flowing things through to the church (she had not made the intial contact with them, but felt that if she didn't step up to that role then nothing would have happened at all with us making donations), the same one who had stormed out, was getting frustrated in explaining the situation and options and the responses to them, began raising her voice: "Well, if you want me to tell the church that we won't be giving them any more vegetables, I will. It wasn't my idea in the first place!"

I had an immediate response in my brain to that: go ahead and help make this work. So I agreed to be the coordinator for getting the food donations to the church on Wednesdays and Saturdays, in a manner in which they can use them.

As a general rule I do not love churches and religion, but this particular church gave me a good vibe when we dropped off the veggies. The pastors of the church are a lesbian couple, who just had a baby the other day. We had met Pastor Ann a few times, and she seemed genuinely open and positive and non-descriminatory. The church itself is a gorgeous old mansion on Milton Street in Greenpoint. And I really like the idea of reaching people with a food pantry and soup kitchen; I think those kinds of programs meet an immediate and present need. I have been trying to find something "important" to do with my time for a while. I had thought about volunteering for a group like Save Kitty, but that's just too heartbreaking for me. Last year we got involved in the CSA, early this year I thought I might want to become a Citizen Pruner, and most recently we've been getting more involved in local politics. This kind of just fell into my lap, and I hope it is a good fit for me. I would be pretty disappointed in myself if I'm not able to make this work without getting burned out.

The Booth

This is the reason that we went to Nashville.

Just A Good Ol' Boy

I could not let this visit end ignominiously. I needed a win-win. I needed something good to report to my love. There it was across three parking lots: Cooter's: The Dukes of Hazzard Museum. Parked out front is the old General Lee, with 01 painted on the side. Nearby, is a charming little mini-me, the 01/2.

Inside there was lots, and it was all free. The front part was merchandise, more on that in a sec. The back was "the museum." Every item ever made for sale in relation to this popular show-- beginning with lunch boxes, along with posters, fanzines, cutouts, and other promo materials--was arranged behind glass cabinets.

A TV in the corner played an episode, the usual trouble, and I realized how many guests appeared on the show, usually B actors that we recognize but can't name exactly. Also inside were cars used by the sherriff, Boss Hogg, and that old guy who was their surrogate daddy. And, of course, many pics of Daisy. (There was nothing at all relating to the movie with J. Simpson).

Back up front, t-shirts, hats, magnets, keychains, videotapes,etc. And there was a pile of books. In real life, the actor who played Cooter is Ben Jones, who is a politician and a writer of note. Jones was elected to Congress twice, and made a good showing in a race against Newt Gingrich. He has a book just out, Redneck Boy in the Promised Land: Confessions of "Crazy Cooter." It's a memoir about his highs and lows, his deep love of the Southern way of life, and the need to change ourselves and society. You heard it here first if he is selected for the V.P. position on an Obama-Jones ticket. He may be crazy, but he's not dumb.

So, my visit to Cooter's redeemed a jeapardious day, and I returned to Opryland, saying hi to the horsies as I passed by, and walked through to the convention center, where I found Kimberly in the Peters booth. I told her that not much happened, really, showed her the pix in the camera, and then...I broke down in tears and told her the truth. (Oh, maybe that didn't happen) Anyway, she laughed and laughed, and I like to hear her do that, so all was OK.

Bad Day at Shoney's

"Remember. You are in the South; and you are a Northerner." My wife warned me before I left her that day, and it makes you wonder what was in her mind. Does she think I am some kind of certified nut? (Or an uncertified one?) Sheesh.

My last day would be spent around the hotel, checking the local sights. A long walk to the end of hotel property, across a highway and then into an area with large parking lots. I went this way, then that way, looking for the right place to have lunch. The night before we had seen old people making their way towards a restaurant that, sure enough, had blowups of old people eating. They know their clientele. But it was closed, and the urge to use the facilities was getting more urgent. The Thai place we ate at the night before was a possibility--They have good, cheap lunches usually. No, we are traveling, I should try something new. The Shoney's sign beckoned. We had popped in the night before to just check it out and figured it was like a Boston Market. Wrong. I went in, saw a buffet, and smelled something. I wish now that I had left then. But I was hungry. So, first a pit stop to wash my hands.

It was one of those large wheelchair access booths that I hate. I never feel right in them. Then afterwards...the paper. Nothing to grab. It would not roll out. It was one of those super huge rolls, big as a cheesewheel. I tipped it, tapped it; pushed it. It was a goddamn new roll! And no one had gotten it started! Distress rising, I figured if I could somehow get the plastic cover off of it...and then crash, the whole thing hit the floor, a screw rolled on the floor. I stopped, waited, listened. Nothing.

I was desperate, had to get out of the bathroom, and out of that restaurant. But maybe they would not like that; if I ran. Be cool. Breathe. I picked up the whole thing, held it under my right arm, reached in with my left hand and just clawed out a chunk of paper, which served its purpose. Someone came in, I was quiet. I suited up, placed the cheesewheel quietly on the floor against the wall, and then, damn fool, reached out with my foot to drag in the big screw that was on the floor just outside the booth. It was just out of reach and I had to try again. Then I realized I was in the South, in a public bathroom, there was a guy at the sink, and I had my foot outside the booth, tapping the floor! Help! He left, I hurried out (yes, I washed my hands, even though I am not an employee!), and then nonchalantly stood by the host's station. The food was crap, but I was hungry so I probably ate too much of the crap, washing it down with a milkshake, bad choice. But I got out of there alive! Advice to all: never, ever, eat at a Shoney's. I know I never will.

Frist Things First

Wrapping up the Nashville notes, or trying to, so we can get to current drama, of which there is some...
I will be brief on the Frist Gallery of Visual Art, though my visit was not. Located in a spiffily-refurbished post office designed in art-deco style, the building is a jewel, to coin a cliche. The collection? They don't have one. It's my understanding that the Frist just exhibits and does not collect. I like that. I was delighted when the volunteer at the admissions desk, who perhaps was overly generous with information (heck, she was chatty) told me the exhibit was "Color As Field," because those artists are old favorites of mine from back in the '70s: Robert Motherwell, Helen Frankenthaler, Mark Rothko, Jules Olitski, et. al. Just a few points here: I was happy to see that Frankenthaler had a primary place in the exhibit, because back then she was sometimes just "Motherwell's wife." As for Motherwell, himself, I always associate him with black & white, because of an old museum show of that name, and here there was some real nice color. Best of all, it is not always the case in museum shows with a thesis like this one that we get to see more than one canvas of any individual painter; here you got several, and it helps. Oh, and of course, it is good to see really BIG canvases. I focused on the dates of the works and this show draws from the the '50s, '60s, and early '70s. That is a long time, and the curator's point about influence does not really hold up. Some of the later artists in the show, especially Kenneth Noland, are what I would call "geometrists," and they have a wholly different sensibility and technique from the color field painters. They use masking tape, for example.

Upstairs was an exhibit on Tiffany, and I had trouble concentrating; all I could say was "Antiques Roadshow, Antiques Roadshow." But I learned a bit, esp. about a collector of Tiffany who single-handedly made this stuff acceptable---Philip Johnson had called it "bric-a-brac." This guy collected hordes of the stuff, and when Tiffany & Co. went out of business (I did not know that), he bought up 5,000 crates of glass. One room explained the issue of replica, reproduction, and fake/counterfeit, which was a good move. One my comment card I wrote, "I believe I noticed several more fakes in this exhibit. Recommend you double-check everything."

The community gallery showed works by local, disabled artists. It made an impression. You would first think the works would be amateurish, but many/most of them had something of interest, and you got the sense both of intense focus and of playfulness. There was a moving video in which three distressed women just talk about their very difficult lives.

On the way out I asked a simple question of the volunteer which led to a lengthy discussion of many things, including cats, hers and ours. She was nice, and I have felt lately that I should try to talk to people more when we travel. But then I assume a persona, which is weird. Looking back I see I was not as brief as I had intended to be on the Frist. Perhaps I should tell you about my difficult time at Shoney's.

Music City, USA

Nashville is, after all, Music City, USA, and you may be waiting for a report on the Grand Ole Opry, or the Ryman, or sightings of Tex Ritter or Reba McIntyre. Noop. Sorry. [We found out too late that Earl Scruggs was at the Grand Ole Opry the night we arrived, and that was just down the road a piece. Too bad.] Anyway, the hotel is now the home base of legendary radio station WSM. Guests can stand in the hallway, and watch and listen to the host and engineer (and musical guests) doing their stuff. Text panels on the wall provide the long and distinguished history of the station. (Factoid: Pat Sajack worked there early in his career) I listened a few mornings as I passed by for coffee and the paper, and one morning we put it on in the room. Some of it was the typical morning radio of the Howard Stern school; but they played a Tom T. Hall song called "Another Town": "Another town another grocery store/Another town another set of swingin' doors...Another town that don't need my kind."


Going downtown was important for music education and appreciation, and that we did. Just after coming out of the Hatch Show Print shop, we walked across the street to the original Ernest Tubb Record Shop. We flipped through the selection of CDs--of Hank Williams, Patsy Cline, Tennessee Ernie Ford, Tammy Wynette, Jimmie Dale Gilmore, and others. We wanted to find just one to bring back with us to remember the trip by, and since we like old timey music, the Original Carter Family was our pick--a collection of 40 songs, including "Keep on the Sunny Side." We enjoyed the signed photos along the wall, as well as the late Pete Drake's pedal steel guitar, which was under glass. He played on a few good Dylan albums way back. At the rear of the store is a stage, where for many years they have broadcast a live music show every Saturday after midnight. (Today it is streamed online.)

Later that night we were in front of the Wild Horse Saloon waiting for the bus back to the hotel. After a while, Kimberly noticed that there was no traffic at all on the street, and there was a growing crowd of young people milling about the street and assembling in front of the Wild Horse. They were dressed in goth clothes with their faces painted white, not the fashion we expected to see here. It was just a little unsettling, there were so many of them. A mob, really, and noisy. We found out that they were lining up for a concert by a group called Dark Lotus, which is made up of former members of the Insane Clown Posse. Hee haw!


The Country Music Hall of Fame was the big destination on Sunday afternoon. The driver told us it was important to start our day there, because it was closing early in the afternoon because of the induction of new members later that day: Emmylou Harris, Tom T. Hall included. The Hall of Fame did a good job of explaining the different streams that went into country music including music from England, black music, and theater and show music. They then covered the rise of barn dances, the importance of radio in broadcasting live music events, and the rise of recording studios and the music business. There was a lot of archival material, including television tapes, as well as instruments, costumes, and promotional material--a visual delight. Country music posters and gold records filled the walls, and there were high-interest oddities like Elvis's gold piano and Webb Pierce's cadillac with guns for door handles, rifles along the sides, and bulls' horns on the fenders. There were also a lot of Nudie suits, and record studio boards. A special exhibit covered the sad life of Hank Williams as well as that of his son, Hank Williams, Jr. and various children and grandchildren. His life was a pre-TMZ mess (not to judge! He wrote great songs and made good records). They covered the bases, from Hee Haw through '60s country rock, to contemporary stars whom I have trouble listening to. The capper was a rotunda, the actual Hall of Fame, which had a plaque for each member.



Downtown Nashville is filled with saloons that are open early in the morning, where you can hear singers and groups perform live. I guess these are people trying to break into the music business or people that were broken by the music business. You wonder if they have been awake all night long. The music spills out onto the sidewalk, and most of the songs are standards, classics, oldies, old chestnuts, or whatever they call them. I heard a rousing "Six Days on the Road" and just stood outside and listened.


On the way back to the hotel, our driver kept us entertained in the usual fashion, and gave us a little Q&A to test our country music knowledge. I was glad I paid attention at the Country Music Hall of Fame when he asked who was inducted twice--once as a member of a group, and once as an individual. "The gentleman from New York," that was me, was the only one who knew the answer: Roy Rodgers. He was inducted as a member of the original Sons of the Pioneers, and as Roy Rogers.

"Happy trails to you...."

Nashville Cats

Even before we left, I was missing the kitties. So always in the back of my mind as we went to the various places in Nashville I was looking for a kitty fix.

The conservatory garden at the hotel would be perfect for a kitty or two or a hundred to roam around in, but alas it was clear that outside of the two ducks and this one poor schmuck bird who clearly had gotten in accidentally, there were no animals to be found outside of the human kind.

We didn't arrive in downtown til fairly late in the afternoon on Friday—after we spent the better part of the afternoon setting up the booth—and not realizing that things might not stay open (t'ain't New York, darlins'), we just about missed being able to go into Hatch Show Print, a place which had been recommended by Frommer's.

In another random act of kindness to strangers in Nashville, the female clerk at the front opened the door and said "well, we're about to close up, but you can come in and look around if you'd like." To be honest, I hadn't even noticed that they might be closed. I was busy looking at the sign on the door: "Please keep door closed - we have cats."

Cats?! CATS!? We walked in and I spotted an orange tabby. In my reverie I think I replied to her something along the lines of "Is it all right if I pet the cat?", as opposed to politely going on about how we were grateful to be able to look through the posters and see the machinery in action.

Well, Maow turned out to be the flighty kind. She had been a stray, and had not grown to enjoy petting. Especially by kitty-starved strangers, I would imagine. So instead, I turned my attention politely to look through the racks of posters. We quickly spotted one on the Hatch Cats, and an old-timey one of Uncle Dave Macon, that fit into our budget. So we went to the counter to pay, and the clerk told us about Maow's background, and that there was another cat around somewhere. As she spoke, Maow was tentatively poking her whiskers at a box of the large size posters near the door. I decided to try to pet her again. No luck.

No. Wait. LUCK! Maow, that smart kitty, had clearly been listening to our sad tale of woe, and though she was unwilling to sacrifice herself she WAS willing to point out where the other kitty was to be found! Huey, a white kitty with orange patches who weighed at least 20 lbs, was stretched out in the box. Sorry, Huey, to have disturbed your slumber, but I had a fever and it could only be cured by a furry feline.

And here's a short YouTube clip of the shop. Watch for a brief appearance by Maow herself!

Nashville Skyline

The Opryland Hotel was an extraordinary experience. But the most TRULY extraordinary experience on our trip happened in the downtown area.

After setting up the booth, we took the shuttle downtown to look around, and had planned to eat in the area.













Using the Frommer's guidebook we had chosen a place just a little north of the downtown area, called The Mad Platter. It sounded like we would get a modern, healthier take on traditional Southern foods there. So using the map in the guidebook, we walked up 5th Avenue, and as we walked the signs of people started disappearing and the landscape changed to a less lived-in look. I wasn't overly worried, as I knew we were going past the area with their state government buildings, and it was after 5pm on a Friday, and so it shouldn't be surprising that it seemed like a post-apocalyptic, 90% of the population died kind of vibe. Hey, it happens in lower Manhattan every day, too!

But Kevin was getting worried, because on the map it looked like we should have reached the block before our destination, and there was still nothing but Centennial Park (not to be confused with Bicentennial Park, btw) and what looked like residential houses going on for a stretch. Of course there weren't any street signs to assure us. We saw a dog walker, and Kevin settled on the idea that we should ask that person as they went by; no luck, they turned well before reaching us. I was convinced we were going in the right direction, and wanted to "stay the course" (don't worry, we ended up faring better than the other guy who's known to use that phrase)--after all, we were at least halfway there! So we spotted a black couple at a picnic table, and Kevin agreed to ask them. I was a little dubious...what kind of people would be eating at a picnic table in the middle of an empty (though pretty) government park on a Friday well into the very late afternoon? Most likely some lower class people possibly in distress, more like the people I used to see in Far Rockaway where my mother lives. Well, they turned out to be very nice and knowledgable; they knew the place, and told us we were going the right direction, just keep walking maybe another 10 minutes (though they seemed shocked that we were on foot), but they didn't recommend that we walk back through the park when it got dark. OK. So if they were warning us, probably they weren't the kind to be warned about. :-)

So we kept walking, and soon enough we hit the houses we had seen in the distance, and some had been converted into restaurants. We stopped to take a picture of a purple house that was being converted into a bakery when a car stopped in front of us on the street.

Lawdamercy, it was the same couple, come to tell us they had called the restaurant and found out they were closed for a private event! These extraordinary people (who clearly were at least middle class, despite my assumption otherwise) had not only made the effort to call ahead, they had interrupted their dinner (or so it seemed, since they had been in the middle of eating maybe 10 minutes before) and gotten in their car to come intercept us with the news. [Totally aside, they were very impressed with how far we had gotten...I guess most Southerners move a bit slower....] They then proceded to give us a ride in their car to the place to doublecheck that they were right (they were...) and then dropped us off at a place a couple of blocks away that they thought was similar, good food; they even made sure from the valet parking guy that the restaurant was indeed open for dinner!

Maybe the only thing that shocks me more than this couple's extraordinary [did I use this word enough yet in this post?] generosity is the fact that we got into their car without any hesitation. [OK, really what happened was that Kevin was getting into their car without any hesitation, and my brief moment of "Stranger. Danger!" was completely overridden by the unwillingness to rudely question Kevin's judgment in front of these strangers even though there was a 50-50 chance that they were taking us on a ride to Our Final Destination rather than to the Germantown Cafe.]

Well, the Germantown Cafe (named for the area both restaurants were in...if I had known The Mad Platter was in Germantown, I never would have suggested eating there, as I had read in the guidebook that Germantown was a bit too far north of downtown to really be walkable...though I guess we proved that theory wrong) turned out to be fabulous. The food was very good (I LOVED the squash fritters!), the service was excellent, and the view of downtown was...extraordinary.

On the Road Again

When we go away, usually for Kimberly's job, we arrive a day ahead of schedule so we have a little "together time"--for seeing the sights and so we have something to remember the trip by. For our Nashville trip, after some consultation (or because we did not do a whole lot of planning from guidebooks, mea culpa), we chose to take a chance on a tour and leave the driving to them. Tix at the hotel were $106 for the historic tours of The Hermitage, the home of Andrew Jackson, and Belle Meade, a mansion long associated with horse racing.

Our bus driver, who introduced himself as "J.C" ("not that one upstairs" ha-ha) had a dj's voice and the gift of gab, and was full of info about Nashville sights and history. Our first stop was a strip mall, his company's office, so that we could pick up tourists from feeder buses from other hotels. We were given time to visit the shops and we were drawn to the Ernest Tubb Record Shop 2, associated with the famous original in downtown. In addition to racks of country music and related stuff there was the actual tour bus that Ernest Tubb traveled in. It is a quintessential example of economy of space, and fun to climb into, to boot! We purchased an item called "Hillbilly Cookin'" which has some old recipes such as Hashed Hominy, Mush Biscuits, Squirrel and Sweet Taters, Aunt Liza's Pickled Okra, and Rebel Cake.

So back on the road, with J.C filling us in with facts and anecdotes from his world, and soon we pulled into the grounds of the Hermitage. All of these places usually have a visitors center where you start out and finish, with bathrooms, restaurant, and shops. It quickly became clear to us that we were to go through by ourselves, and J.C was to stay behind. Had we paid a good amount of money for essentially a shuttle with two stops? It looked that way and we started to have regrets that we did not rent a car, which would have given us independence.

Anyway, there was a small exhibit in the visitors center on slaves, naming them and their occupations, along with reproductions of pictures of life at the mansion. In a way the exhibit honored the slaves, because it clearly underscored their importance to the mansion, and it featured them as individuals with achievements of their own. It also was interesting to learn about some of their lives before and after emancipation. But in the back of our mind was: what is going on here? Andrew Jackson owned more than 100 slaves. While there were stories of benevolence on his part, such as buying a slave from a neighboring farm at his own slave's request in order to reunite a family unit, you can't get past the big fact that he bought and sold them, and their lives could not have been far different from what we have read about the "peculiar institution," as it is sometimes called. We had both been curious as to how the South was going to present this aspect of their/our history, and we were still not sure.

The mansion tour itself was conducted by a woman in period costume, and many of the rooms were closed off by glass panels, open for viewing from the doorway only. The Hermitage does not compare with a really rich person's mansion, such as Casa Loma in Toronto, but we are talking about the president whose name is associated with democracy. While the rooms in Old Hickory's house seemed large and spacious to me, we were told that that bedrooms were shared by several people--with nanny slaves sleeping on a mat on the floor in children's rooms. Included in the tour was a lot of information about the Jackson family and the house, as well as interesting facts and customs of the day. Guestrooms were necessary and used often for long stays. In Tennessee, I guess, fish and visitors do not smell in three days. Oh, and there was an interesting piece of furniture, a chair made of animal hides and antlers that was given to a later Jackson by Teddy Roosevelt.



On the grounds we saw the kitchen which was separate from the house for fire reasons, and near the main house was a cabin designated as "a slave's quarters." Kimberly found a nice creek and a summer cottage that was out of the way, and we came upon a family graveyard, including a marker for a family servant. There was a beautiful garden, and we saw some cows in a field!





We made the bus just on time, and J.C. took us to Belle Meade, a mansion belonging to a family that acquired its fortune by raising notable race horses, including Enquirer, Man O'War, and others whose names I have forgotten...No farming at all was done on the property; it was totally dedicated to grazing. (The surrounding town of Belle Meade, an exclusive community of "old money" that never welcomed any country singers, is on former grounds of the estate, which had over 5,000 acres.)



Our guide--or docent, or museum educator--for this tour was in jockey or groom costume, and we learned that he was training to become a curator. His tour, he told us, had a theme: "money, riches, signs of wealth in the house." He began with the entranceway, with its pink glass window over the doorway, which is an indicator of wealth as that glass is made from gold. He pointed out paintings and photographs of the family members of several generations, explaining who owned the house and when. There were an equal number of horse pictures, and he named each one and explained their importance as race horses and as studs. He traced the lines of most of the name horses in major races back to Belle Meade studs. The rooms were full of fancy and rich items such as musical instruments, which he explained were played by slaves who were trained on them (Not the children in the house?). The dining room had a silver pourer, fine china, a gas lamp, and more pictures of horsies. Our guide had a subtheme of language, and, as he explained the use of fans he pointed out a cloth mask which he told us were worn by ladies who, back in the days, women waxed their faces. They had to be careful when sitting near the fireplace, and the cloth masks helped prevent the wax from melting. Sometimes a woman was told to "mind your beeswax" meaning "mind your business." That got an Aha! chuckle from the group.

I loved the design of the house, which had an entranceway in the center, and two rooms to the left and right, with sliding doors from each to the other. A later owner added a second piece, behind these rooms, with a corridor separating the two parts. There were doorways leading outside to verandas everywhere. Upstairs were the master bedroom and bath, children's rooms, and guest rooms. We learned that in those days guests stayed for long periods, and that it was their choice when to leave! As at the Hermitage the kitchen was separate from the main structure of the house, for fire safety reasons, though the open area between them had long been closed off. The grounds had a large stable/barn for the horses, a doll house for the kids, and a small garden. There was also a tomb/grave for the great horse Enquirer.

On the ride back, J.C.explained the long-standing enmity between the old money of Belle Meade and the new money of the music business. He also pointed out what he called the "slaves walls," which were low walls made of piled up limestone, that evoked the style of walls back in Ireland, where a lot of immigrants came from at one point. They were called "slaves walls" not because they were intended to keep people in, but because the slaves built the miles and miles of wall.

We were pretty tired when we got back to fortress Gaylord, so we decided to defer our trip to town for dinner at the Mad Platter. Perhaps we would have seen more and done more if we had rented a car that day, but we had some time together, and we have some precious memories.

Gaylord Opryland

(Titter titter). I'm sorry, I know I'm an idiot, but I can't help but laugh at the quintessentially-Southern name of this hotel/resort chain.

I have to admit that the Gaylord experience was astounding (is that the sound of YOU tittering, now?!). There was not just one enclosed atrium, but three (Cascades, Conservatory, and Delta areas, which were apparently built section by section over the years), and they were larger and more detailed than my imagination would have ever conjured up for a hotel. It takes literally 10-15 minutes to walk from where our room was near the convention center part of hotel to the main lobby. And that's only if you manage not to stop and look at something that catches your eye.

For example, here are some baubles near one of the restaurants in the Delta area, which has the manmade river (including an island and a riverboat tour...though I think the tour is unnecessarily expensive at $9 per person...we opted not to take it).

And I spotted Nessie's American cousin, Glessie, in the far reaches of the Delta "river."

Our room was in the Magnolia section, which is the one outdoor section, with the pool—though we were off the beaten path, we still had a nice view, with trees, etc—and more importantly is next to the convention center area. But my favorite area was definitely the Conservatory. There was an overhead walkway that would breeze you across it, but if you took the other fork in the path you would hit walkways that go up and down and around, finding nooks and crannies with benches to just sit and relax. On Sunday we went down there in the evening and found a bench near the mini-waterfall and just sat and listened to the soothing sound of the water. It wasn't too busy with explorers, so there were stretches when it was like our own private park.

Of course with any little slice of heaven on earth, there is the bit that sends you on the road to hell: imagine the energy expenditure to heat/cool and de-humidify these huge sunlit spaces 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year, not to mention the 2800+ private rooms. Add to that the shuttles (these are not special-ed sized things I'm talking about...huge airconditioned buses with well padded seats, more like tour buses) that run all day: to the Opry Mills mall, the sister-hotel Radisson across the street, and to the downtown area; there are also shuttles to the General Jackson Showboat and to Opryland itself, but they run based on showtimes rather than all day.

Btw, except for downtown, all these places are short walks from the hotel on clearly marked and well-groomed paths. We walked from the Radisson area back to the hotel, and were delighted to discover that it went past their three Tennessee Walking Horses. Though I get the feeling that walking is somewhat unusual in Tennessee as a general rule. We went for dinner to a Thai place Kevin had seen from one of the shuttles that was a little outside the Opryland area, and at one point the sidewalk just ended—it hit a gas station, and on the other side there just wasn't any more sidewalk. We had to cross the street anyway, so it wasn't that big a deal, except that crossing the street could potentially be a little hazardous (traffic signals out in the Music Valley area are few and far between); fortunately the car traffic is pretty minimal.

As an aside, the Thai place shared a building with the office of a go-kart place. Probably the go-karts were left over from when the mall was an outdoor theme park. I'm hoping Kevin will include some of the other area oddities he explored (while I was working) in his blog (like Cooter's Museum...yes, that's the Cooter from The Dukes of Hazard!).