The Perfect Song Blog

It was a pleasant week.  Kim flew in from Alaska to be with her brother Nathan on his birthday.  I’ve done a blog on what she and I did together.  On Thursday night of Nathan’s birthday we headed for Tannino’s in Horseheads, a quiet but elegant place that plays only Frank Sinatra.

Now, I’ll confess that when Nathan chose Tannino’s, I was a little leary.  It’s pricey, especially with seven people.  As they ordered wine, appetizers, and finally (after more deliberation than what’s gone into the Iraq war), dinner, I was adding it up, feeling a little sick.  I get this penny-pinching characteristic from my mother who inherited it from her mother.

Then I realized that Kim flew in from Alaska, that we’re all in pretty good health and we were all together in this wonderful moment that we may not ever share again.

I picked up my camera and started taking pictures. . . .

I found this inspirational poem on a website and recorded for a friend.  I want to share it with anyone who might be able to get something from this wonderful piece.

I hope you enjoy it.  Please feel free to download  it and listen to it whenever you need to.

Kim flew in from Alaska Thursday as a surprise for her brother Nathan’s birthday. She was due to arrive at midnight Wednesday but storms in Chicago stopped all flights and she wound up with a several hour wait in Philadelphia.

Nathan was scheduled to come up Thursday night but at the last minute said he’d forgotten he’d scheduled band practice. Leigh tricked him into coming up.

Kim sat out on the deck in the darkness wearing a ski mask and holding a bottle of Alaskan beer. I’ve never seen such a puzzled, disoriented, shocked look on Nathan’s face when he realized it was Kim.

Anyway, one of Kim’s passions, aside from her dog, the outdoors and reading, is food. So this morning we drove up to Wegman’s in Ithaca.

Yes, some people like to go to baseball games.

Others go to museums.

We go to the grocery store.

I don’t know what it is about Wegman’s. It’s always chaos, especially in the produce section. If you’re moving, you’re always about to hit someone. God help you if you stop. People are milling, armed with grocery carts pushing them like benevolent torpedoes, intent on the produce and absently ramming you as they study the state of the organic shitake mushrooms.

I stocked up on dried Chinese soups, knowing this is stuff is a double threat. In it’s best state it’s not healthy. It’s all sodium, for God’s sakes. In addition, lately the Chinese have been inadvertently killing people all over the world with the tainted food they’re sending out.

Ah, well, live dangerously. I love the flavor. At the check out counter I got a cooking lesson from Jason, a tall, lanky kid with dark hair. “Hey, my favorite food!” He exclaims, holding up my hot and sour mix. “Give me a microwave and I’m an excellent cook! You know, it’s not the minutes on the microwave that’s important. It’s the seconds. You put it in for too long and it’s too hot to eat. Get it a few seconds too short and you have to mic it again. I’ve got the seconds down to a science. Now, if my microwave dies, I’ll starve.” He holds up a plastic bowl of chicken mushroom instant soup. “Ah! My favorite!”

He looks at me and I know there’s a bond that no one can take away.

It was not the most intellectually stimulating conversation I’ve had with a cashier, but what the heck, everyone has his specialty.

Here are a couple of photos of Kim.

For the first time since I started The Perfect Song Web site, I’ve been down for more than a week.  It was a helpless feeling.  Three years worth of text, photos and recordings floating in the gray netherworld of the World Wide Web and I could get near it.

Here’s what happened.  I was talking with a rep at the company that hosts my domain.  Why, he asked, didn’t they have my domain name (I’ll spare the details to readers who don’t have web sites don’t care about geek speak.)  I said I had it with a different server.  He listed all the advantages of having them host name as well as the site.  It sounded good so I began the process of going to the first server and transferring it to the latter server.  I foolishly thought it would be an overnight process.

It turns out the first server waits five days to make the transfer.  When I finally got a message that the transfer had been made, I still couldn’t get to my web site or this blog site.  I contacted the server again.  “Oh, you need to go into your account, go to this page, check these things, go back to the first page, refresh, then go to this page and check these things.”

Anyway, I’m back and it feels great to be connected again.  I haven’t been sitting idly during the long wait.  I’ve been reading the draft of a really fun novel written by a couple friends in their 80s.  I really hope they publish it.

I’m also proofing a photo books of the last 150 years of Mansfield University where I work, and Mansfield Borough.  It’s a fascinating trip.  I wrote the introduction and back cover.  It should be published by September.

Anyway, sorry for the absence.  Drop me a note to let me know how you’ve been.