A Man and His Love

Yeah, he went there. This guy is brilliant, a shame he does not tour in the U.S. due to a lack of a market.

Down for Maintenance

The laptop is in the shop so I'm not quite sure when the blogging can recommence.

Here's a great book you should be reading in the meantime. Not for the squeamish as it has santorum coming out of many of the pages.

I've Got Something Inside of Me!

This was from a 1972 appearance on the Dinah Shore Show. Had not seen this interpretation of the Harry Chapin song, until today.

I am, once again, forever changed by Shatner

Tapping on the Shell

I was able to speak to one of my son’s therapists at school yesterday when I picked him up for his vision therapy. They’re using sentence strips with him, to encourage language use, and reading. He seems to have a lot of fun with the strips and his use of phrases starting with the words, “I want…” is increasing.

She told me he was on the computer, and he left his seat to go to his box where all the sentence strips are kept. He rummaged around the box, looking for the right strip. Then went to the work table with the strip in hand and waited for one of the aides to come by.

The strip said, “I want a walk,” which means he wants to take a little break, a stroll in the school hallway. So he got his walk.

To get him off the computer with no fuss is a major accomplishment in itself. For him to leave it voluntarily is huge.

Another important thing to come out of this is that we know he can read.

His vision therapy is going very well also. His therapist said he works well on a slant board and was doing a fantastic job at connecting dots, with the prism lenses on. With the prism lenses off, he did not do so well. She asked me if I would ask his teacher if he can use the lenses in class for a few minutes each day. I asked his teacher last night and she agreed. He’s not going to be wearing them during recess or anything, but when he’s working at a table, on writing skills.

These are positive steps. He is much calmer these days. Whether or not it's his age, being back at school or the sensory learning that started back in June is not really relevant. He's adapting, slowly, but noticably. His sleeping has also improved, even though he was up at 5AM on Tuesday morning. Toilet training though, is another issue entirely.

Your Time is Gonna Come

Dreamed last night that my son was standing by a piece of paper on the floor. He had a marker in his hand, bent over and wrote Led Zeppelin quite legibly on the paper. Somehow, it was implied that he wanted to listen to the first album.



Maybe he liked the graphics, or wanted to hear Good Times, Bad Times. It's almost time to wake him up. He was awake at 5AM, being Mr. Giggles. It's hard to reach him when he will not stop laughing for reasons unknown, or when he repeats the same words in a circular pattern.

His mother emailed me yesterday and asked if we were going to be home when he got off the bus on Wednesday. I told her no. She replied 'good' because her mother was going to be getting him off the bus that day and she did not want the potential for a confrontation.

Is this shit still going on?

That's moving forward? Gives me little reason to be optimistic about my college homecoming in a couple of weeks. My first wife is allegedly going to be there and who knows what type of buried drama is going to be stirred up.

I do not know why I compared the situations. Two different things. Or are they? It's baggage no one needs.

The Woods are Lovely, Dark and Deep

Had a very relaxing weekend in the middle of nowhere, Ohio. It was good to unplug, even though we discovered the cabin had Direct TV. The woods are not quiet. The roof was bombarded by random assaults of walnuts. Even our hike was dangerous, as we we dodged a constant dropping of hickory nuts.



Ever eat a tree? Many parts are edible.

I built a fire, on my own, out of logs and a few Sunday editions of the Akron Beacon Journal. Eventually it burned on its own, and I figured out how to open the damper so we did not die of carbon monoxide poisoning.

It was an easy two hour drive. The car did well enough, getting almost 25 miles per gallon. Something's up with the tailpipe though.

Took today off to make sure the gas meter got read and to have the furnace looked at. It conked out on us in April and it's time to get it ready for winter. It's been having a repetitive issue with the pressure switch, which is easily fixable but there's a new twist to each repair.



I'm really digging Band of Joy, the new Robert Plant album. He has Patti Griffin as his foil this time around and it's quite gritter than Alison Krauss on Raising Sand.



One thing I admire about Plant's post Led Zeppelin career is that he's not coasting on his accomplishments. Sure, he's worked with Jimmy Page and done the one off reunion concert, but he's not peddling the same old show the way many, many, many other rockers of his generation continue to do to this very day. I'm not going to name names, but you can guess a few.

He also looks his age. Every one of his 62 years.

He's challenged himself by working with a diverse and talented cast of musicians and reworking the folk rock that influenced him. My one complaint is that he's not doing any originals, where are they at? Buddy Miller's collaboration is much rawer and looser than T-Bone Burnett's polish. Band of Joy is going to be one my favorite records this year.

The New Retail God

Spoonful Records came through again, without even asking. The owner posted that he had some new vinyl in, including Mumford & Sons "Sigh No More."



I immediately asked what he was asking for it. He told me, and I said I'd be there in less than an hour.

This is excellent customer service in the age of social media. Odd that the next time I would have been there I was going to ask him if he could get this for me. Knowing a customer needs without asking, that's amazing!

Now I'm on my second spin of this record, and it sounds so much better than on the laptop. The vinyl is thick! The sleeve was shrink wrapped! I think it's the second new vinyl I've purchased in years, the last being Mossy Liquor by Robyn Hitchcock - that would have been 1996,

Going on a bit of a road trip after a half day of work. You kids have a good weekend.