Music, music
It was a very musical few days.  We--that is , Urbana, IL and Amasong hosted a women's music festival under the name of "sister singers".  There were women's groups from   Portland Maine to SanDiego, CA, and many places in between,    including Chicago, Cleveland, Cinncinnati, Charlottsville, Grand Rapids, Lansing, Minneapolis, & D.C.  Groups varied in size from duos to, at the end, two massed choirs of 250 each (combining all the groups).  Music started Wednesday evening & the final concert was Saturday evening.  Variety of songs & styles,  Subjects ranged all over, from folk to "girl shoes" ("pointy toes, thin soles, high heels") to one sung at the beginning & the end: " Peace, Salaam, Shalom."  Some a cappella, most piano accompaniment; one group had two bowed psalteries, which I'd never before seen/heard in a concert/choir setting.  All in all, a marvelous experience.
     And just to end the weekend on another grand musical note,  our Presbeterian Church had, Sunday evening, Vespers, with a Bach Cantata. listed as "Vespers on the Inauguration of the Town Council"..  I hope that town Council did a good job.

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The Water is Wide
The  weather was warm today, & the snowbanks are melting.  Result--I can't cross o'r the resulting puddles. I need a boat, though it does not need to carry two. Just something to  row.

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Shutdown!
It snowed for 24 hours.  Not heavy snow, but enough that there is a lot of the white stuff on the ground.  It isn't actually cold yet, though the temp is supposed to be dropping for the next 18 or so hours. But the response of the Powers That Be has been a total shutdown of all facilities, events, what have you.  All schools, including the U of I, Eastern IL university, and the 4 more-or-less local community colleges are closed. The public health district(s) are closed.  Christie Clinic (a major health care facility) is "closed at all locations".  The park districts & all their events are closed.  In the 50 + years I've lived in this community, this is the most complete shutdown I've ever seen.  What  will they do if we get a REAL blizzard?  Schools are mostly out of "snow days", & the road crews are running low on salt.
PLEASE, SPRING, WILL YOU COME SOON?

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It's cold out there!
I haven't been on LJ for a fair while--busy with bird counts. I just got the last piece I needed to finish up the data for the Champaign County count, done Dec. 14th.Which went better than I had expected:  the weather forcast had been for 3-5 " of snow & what we got was 3+5 = 8"..Still we tallied 65 species, including a Merlin and a very cold pipit. Yesterday I went over to the Illinois River for the annual eagle count:  Saw fewer birds than I had expected, given that all the still water was frozen solid so the only open water was on the river itself. However we were apparently too late for the birds that were out hunting in the morning--the lady at a riverfront nature center said that a "whole bunch" had been following a barge earlier.  I was accompanied by a fellow from Mumbai experiencing his first Midwest winter.  The snow was blowing over the road resulting in near whiteout when something in the other lane (such as a snowplow) came along.  He took lots of pictures.

    So right now we are in what the weather folk are calling a "polar vortex".  It's been snowing all day & the temperature has dropped 17 degrees since this morning.  It's supposed to drop another 15 or so degrees overnight, putting us well sub-zero.
Brrrrrr....  OK, I lived in Minnesota for 6 years, so it's not as though I haven't encountered this stuff before, but I've been down here in central Illinois since 1964 & I'm no longer used to it!  Oh well, I'll survive, & if I open a faucet  a bit, so will my plumbing.

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Musical days
In  3 days, I attended 3 very different musical events.   First, on Thursday evening ((/12), I was at Krannert for a concert by the Jupiter string quartet, who performed works by Hayden, Benjamin Britten, and Mendelssohn.  Then Friday was the park district's "jazz walk" at Meadowbrook park, where a bunch of different groups were set up along the mile+ path performing whatever works they wanted, although presumably it should come within some version of jazz.  (Actually, I got an early start on that, since the district hosted food and a piano player for volunteers before the main groups started playing.)  Finally, yesterday (Saturday) I went over to Taylorville for the Sacred Harp (that's shape note singing) annual state convention.  A large contrast in types of music, but allenjoyable.

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Audubon convention
This year, National Audubon is having a national convention for the first time in  several years.They used to have them every other year,  but it does take a lot of work on the part of staff & they apparently lost money on one or two.  But this year they are doing it again--in Washington State basically on the Columbia River,  The nearest airport is Portland, OR--people will be bussed to the convention site.  I decided to go,although the trip is going to be expensive & trying to make travel arrangements and  pet care arrangements has proved to be a bit more complicated than I had anticipated.  But I take off tomorrow, & will return on the 16th.  (I am calling it a birthday present to myself, since my birthday is the 17th.)  Hope I find it as much fun as I am hoping!

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A very birdy weekend!
This weekend was the annual meeting of the Illinois Ornithological Society.  Despite the fact that many roads were under water due to recent rains, (Some rather large fish were swimming in or across some of the roads) there were a lot of birds seen/heard.  My personal total was 101 species; I think there were 20-some more seen by others.  On the whole, the weekend was a success!

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New Mexico Trip
I'm back and slowly recovering from the OLLI trip to New Mexico.  We left Wed., May 15; bus from Champaign to St. Louis, fly to Albuquerque via Dallas/Ft. Worth.  Sounded easy--but Mother Nature did not cooperate..We sat on the tarmac in DFW for 3 hours; the pilot said there was some "bad weather".  When we finally were flying, we flew through clouds with lightning--beautiful to see! The next morning when we saw the papers we discovered that the weather we stayed on the ground to avoid had been a tornado!. A BAD tornado. You've all read about it.  So it was good that we stayed on the ground--but when we finally got to our hotel in Albuquerque, we found that that part of  town rolls up the sidewalks at 10 p.m. and since we had not gotten there until almost 11, we could not get any food.  Even the hotel room service, which according to posted hours should  have been open, was shut down;so we had to go to bed without any supper. I think everyone had a hearty breakfast the next morning.
 Thursday we went to the Pueblo Indian cultural center asthe main attraction, then for dinner took a arial  tram to the top of Sandia Peak for dinner at the "High Finance" restaurant. The sunset was spectacular & the view of the lights lighting up in Albuquerque lovely..  Oh,yes, the food was good, too.
Day 3--Friday Acoma pueblo & El Morro National Monument. Day 4-- drive to Santa Fe with stops along the way.
The rest of the trip was from our base in Santa Fe;  one day there was a choice--stay in Santa Fe, or one of 2 trips to old pueblo ruins. I chose to go to Bandelier National Monument (which was very impressive;)  Followed by a visit to Los Alamos.  (The 3rd option was a trip to Chaco Canyon which was physically too strenuous for me.)  The final full day was a trip to Taos, both the town and the pueblo.
Finally, it was time to return to Champaign. This time  the weather in DFW  was fine.  The airline was not.The flight was delayed 2 hours and we changed gates 3 times. However, made it home OK,staggering in my front door at 12:30 a.m.  Pet the dog & go to bed.
  On the whole it was a great trip, had a good time.  New Mexico was a new state for me bringing the total I've been in to 48.  I have not yet downloaded my pictures but hope to have a decent photo album soon.

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Slowly returning to normal
I haven't been on line much lately--Bronchitis, dehydration, and 3 days in the hospital will do that to  you. Then--today was tax day.  I always have a problem making myself get  started on taxes, but normally, once I kick myself in the butt and get started things go reasonably smoothly.   This year, however, I just could NOT get going.  And when I did, I could not FIND some of the stuff I needed.  When I clicked on the "file for an extension" button, I discovered that yes, they will give you an extension of time to file, provided that you have paid any taxes that you owe.  Now if you know what taxes you owe, why would you need an extension?
  Anyway, I DID file the tax forms.  I strongly suspect that not all the data is correct, but I did what I could with what I had.  And I realized later that I had missed a fairly major charitable deduction.  Well, If the Feds bounce the forms for correction, I'll have to file an amended return anyway, so I'll worry about it then.  But I'll TRY to have things in better order next year.   At least I should be getting a fairly substantial refund.

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Today is cancelled
due to snow.  Well, OK, the DAY exists, but all my scheduled activities are cancelled.  Except for shoveling snow, and walking the dog.Isn't spring wonderful?

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Irishfest
This past weekend was Milwaukee Irishfest.  I went up Friday afternoon; as usual stayed with Art & Cynthia Warneke.  Cynthia was working for the fest selling drink tickets much of the time (it's amazing how much beer gets consumed at this event!) which permitted us to park fairly close and fairly cheaply.  Art & I had a bit of mis-communication as to meeting (I did not get his final e-mail to me) but managed to get where we were supposed to be anyway.  The theme of this year's fest was the connection between Irish & bluegrass music--much of the latter supposedly derives from Irish immigrants who settled in Appalachia.  My reaction was that I don't come to Irishfest to hear bluegrass.  However, there was much good music.  A major surprise was encountering Mary Burtke at one of the concerts!  (sorry, I have problems with peoples LJ handles. I know Mary is "Braider" but I forget how to do the silly little icon thing.)  She's just had surgery on her throat & wasn't up to much talking, but it was good to see her.
  The weather was fantastic--not hot but not cold either.  Coming home, the cloudscapes were fantastic, with huge cummulus clouds in the foreground & either blue sky or wispyclouds (you have to be a meteorologist to know the names of some of the formations) as background.  This was the first road trip for my new car; I was pleasantly surprised at getting a bit over 37 mpg for the trip. Of course this was highway driving & I was staying within  a reasonable approximation of the speed limit.

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no kite
A friend phoned me around noon today to report that she had just seen a swallow-tailed kite at Homer Lake.  Now, this is a bird that I've only seen once--in Florida--so I promptly headed out.  Needless to say, I did not see it.  Swallows, yes, kite, no.  Given that this bird is so distinctive that a  split-second glimpse woul identify it ,(think tern with a 7-foot wingspan) I'm pretty sure tht it is a long way away by now.  I hope some other birders see it!

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car
There is now a new Honda Fit in my garage.  I need to spendsome time with the owner's manual.

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new car
Well, I did it!  I just bought a new car:  A Honda Fit.  (I should be able to actually bring it home on Friday.)  Silver, 4-dooor hatchback, stick shift.  Much better turn radius than my current Mazda.  This is basically exactly what I was looking for; I was sort of expecting that if I wanted a stick, I'd have to order it, but they actually had one, although it was not quite ready to be driven.  The one I actually test-drove was an automatic, but I trust they will handle pretty much the same--like a dream.

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New Computer
I finally broke down, went to Office Depot while they were still running their sale, and bought a new (desktop) computer. 6 meg memory, terabyte hard. This one runs Windows 7;  one of the reasons I needed a new one is that Windows XP will soon no longer be supported.  Part of the deal was that they would port my files over from the old to the new.  Which is fine except that I can't FIND a lot of stuff.  They downloaded the current version of Firefox:  I know they did,I saw it on the computer.  But it's not there now. I can't find whatever this machine uses for "Bookmarks".  It took me until this morning to get to e-mail.
  However  with any luck I'll find my missing stuffand figure out how to use this machine.  And things will be MUCH fasterwithadequate memory.

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phone, internet back!
After being without any connection to the outside world since Saturday afternoon, I returned from my doctor's appointment near noon today to find the ATT guy on my doorstep, so to speak.  My phone and internet are back!  The repair guy said that somebody had backed out of their drive and over something vital, cutting a cable.  Let us hope that I will now be able to stay connected!

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Damn Phone Company
My phone suddenly stopped working this evening.  I have no dial tone, just a hiss when I pick up the phone.  So I call ATT repair service--and basically they want me to fix it myself.  If  I can't, they will try to get somebody to me on Monday.  (If I didn't have a cell phone, I'd be really cut off!)  In the meantime, nobody can call me if they don't have my cell number--which I seldom give out!

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Farmer's Market
I saw, I bought, I ate.  And it was good.

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Visit to the eye doctor
This morning I had my annual eye check-up.  I am happy to report that the doctor found no sign of glaucoma or maccular degeneration--and I DON'T NEED NEW GLASSES!  My current prescription is just fine.  This is good.

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Thanksgiving
Some years ago, my friends Rolf & Mary Wilson began having a party for Thanksgiving in the summertime, complete with turkey, ham & trimmings.  (This came about after the November Thanksgiving that Mary was sick & couldn't eat)  Well, Rolf & Mary got divorced & the big house was sold and you can't do that sort of thing in an apartment, so the tradition was broken.  But then a few months ago, Rolf bought a big house with a big yard--and so, today was Thanksgiving in May!  There were over 30 people there--don't know if anybody got an accurate headcount.  The rain held off until most of the food was gone and the people that were left had moved into the house anyway, so a good time was had.  I had been stupid enough to leave my car windows partly open, so the seats were a bit damp, but not bad.  Got home to find that my dog had been too stupid to come in out of the rain--I'd left her in the back yard with access to the patio and garage which were perfectly dry, but she was wet.  Dried her off the best I could.  We needed the rain .
 

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