Okay, so – technically – summer doesn’t arrive until 7:28 tomorrow morning; but, as far as I’m concerned, it’s been here for a while.  My brain gets fooled when every day features 100-degree heat and humidity approaching that of the inside of a tea kettle.

On this glorious Sunday morning (Fathers Day, for those of you in North America), I’m sitting in my office naked at 7:25 in the morning, already sweating, trying to determine what I’m going to wear to a baseball game this afternoon.  Do I go for the “so sweaty it looks like I’ve been swimming in brine” look by donning jeans and a tee-shirt, or do I shoot for the “my legs have been painted with mercurochrome” badge by sticking with shorts and hanging out in direct sunlight for several hours?  Right now, I’m leaning towards the sweaty look, but anything could happen between now and the time that I’m supposed to meet Rich, John and Betsy for lunch.

Last weekend, I attended the Great American Brass Band Festival in Danville, KY – or at least as much of it as I could stand before the incessant heat forced me to ditch it for the relative comfort of sitting in my air-conditioned car for the 6-hour drive home.  I drove up to Kentucky on Friday morning, got set up in the worst campground ever imagined (the Pioneer Playhouse Campground, if you need to avoid it), and then went to a nearby airport where there was to have been a hot-air balloon race to kick off the festival.

Unfortunately, high winds grounded the balloons.  I spent about two hours walking around the airport taking pictures of a clown band out of Indiana and a brass quintet out of Tennessee before heading back to my campsite to read, make some ravioli and suffer.

Was up early on Saturday, thanks to a brief rain shower at around 6:00.  After a tepid shower in the campground’s disgusting shower room, I went to downtown Danville and took a quick walking tour.  Not a great deal to see.  Danville is a small college town (Centre College).  At one end of Main Street, there was a gazebo.  At the other end, there was a large stage.  Since the bands that would be playing in the morning were scheduled to do so at the gazebo, I grabbed a seat there and waited until 9:00, when the Saxton’s Cornet Band out of Frankfurt, KY, kicked the weekend off.  They’re a period band (Civil War), which generally doesn’t appeal to me, but they were quite good and highly entertaining.

Also at the gazebo, I saw a ragtime quintet and the Fountain City Brass Band.

There was a parade down Main Street at around 11:00, by which time it was getting uncomfortably hot.  After the parade, I went back to my tent to change into clothes that weren’t sweat-soaked and scarf a couple of sandwiches.  Then it was back to the main stage to catch the afternoon & evening performances.  I caught bits of the Millenium Brass quintet, the Southern Stars Symphonic Brass Band and the Canadian Staff Band of the Salvation Army before the heat just got to be too much for me.  After hastily throwing my tent and gear into the car, I hit the road for home.

This past week was sort of a rotten one.  My renter became severely ill on Wednesday, which prompted me to learn where the nearest emergency room to my house is (it was not necessary to go there).  I worked from home on Thursday and noticed in the afternoon that I was also getting a tad sick.  By Friday morning, I was feeling bad enough to call in sick and I spent most of the day in bed, although Chris lit up my world late in the afternoon by bringing me some matzah ball soup, cookies and nyquil.

I spent most of yesterday doing nothing and trying not to get any sicker.  Woke up this morning with a chest cold, but I’m hoping the worst is past.  I guess I’ll find out while I’m sitting in the oven that is the Braves’ stadium later this afternoon.

Happy Dads Day, Dad!  Wish I were in New England with ya.

TWD

So I said I’d post again quickly to catch you all up on what I did in the week before the morons tried to break in.

I lied.

Basically, I did nothing in the week prior to that august event.  The brass band played a concert at a church in Chamblee the Sunday before then.  That was pretty much it.  I goofed around with my new camera during the concert and shot some pictures when I should’ve been counting rests, but they aren’t all that interesting.

So…you’re all caught up now.

For the last week, I’ve been extraordinarily unbusy.   Betsy and I went to Andersonville National Cemetery on the morning of the 28th and then wasted much of the rest of the day doing touristy things on the way back to her house.  Stopped in Montezuma, GA, for about an hour’s worth of picture taking.  Old houses, a broken-down gas station, a confederate memorial…all the usual tripe that one would expect to find in a small town in middle Georgia. 

After that, we made a brief stop at the Lane Packing Company, which is a large peach distributor in Fort Valley, GA.  The idea was that we’d eat there, but the cafeteria frankly didn’t look all that appetizing.  Instead, we took a self-guided tour of the peach processing room, played on the tractors in the playground outside, and headed to Warner Robins, GA, where we ate at a Cuban place before spending a couple of hours at the WR Museum of Aviation and then driving around the WR Air Force Base.

I had the day off for Memorial Day on the 31st and basically slept for the entire day.  The rest of the week was a typical short work week.  I accomplished very little other than watching some training videos that I’m required to watch (I’m about three months behind in this task).

Wednesday night found me poking around the Marietta National Cemetery before gorging myself on Sicilian pizza at the Marietta Pizza Company, and Thursday night I headed back to Marietta to frolic in a pool and have dinner with Chris prior to a rehearsal that she had. 

Worked from home on Friday and watched a movie on Netflix Friday night.  Fun week, eh?

Yesterday, I left the house at around noon looking for some gravesites in two cemeteries that I didn’t know about.  The first one, Union Hill Baptist Cemetery in John’s Creek, GA – about 15 miles from my house – was very pretty and quite depressing.  It has been either vandalized (I suspect) or hit by severe storms or both.  60% of the stones are pushed over or broken.  Why anyone would get their jollies by doing that is beyond me, but it does make for interesting pictures.

The second cemetery, Kirkland, is located right across the street from one of my old watering holes and – as far as I can tell – is completely inaccessible. I *think* I drove past it, but saw no way to get my car to it.  If what I saw is indeed the cemetery, I’ll try parking down the street and walking to it later today.  A couple of the requests in that graveyard are for members of the Medlock family.  I’m wondering if they’re related to the family which lent its name to Medlock Bridge Road, near my house.

This evening, I’ve got the next-to-last concert of the season with the brass band.  We’re playing at a Methodist church which has hosted us at least twice previously.  Very cramped stage, but the room sounds okay.  We’ll be doing mainly fluff pieces as we wind down the season, but will be premiering a work by Stephen Bulla called (I think) Decade.  We commissioned the thing about 18 months ago in the hope of premiering it last September – 10 years after the band was founded.  Unfortunately, we didn’t receive the piece until about a month ago.  So we’ll still get to premiere it during our 10th season – just not our 10th year.   The piece’s main little motif (if it can be referred to as such) is “G-B-B” (get it?  Georgia Brass Band?  Ha!) and, though it’s not something that I’d want to run out and purchase were I a brass band music director, it’s nice enough and it’s a new addition to the brass band repertoire…and it’s ours, dammit.

In a couple of weeks, we’ll finish the season with a performance at the International Euphonium Institute and then take a week or two off before resuming rehearsals with the hope of recording a Christmas CD in late August.

My plans for next weekend are to travel to Danville, KY, to get a little camping in and to hang out at the Great American Brass Band Festival, which I’m sure I’ve mentioned in these pages previously.  Those plans could change if Chris is available and wants to do something; barring that, I’m Kentucky-bound next Friday.

I think that pretty much covers everything of non-interest for the moment.  If anything world-shaking happens in the near future, you know I’ll rush to write about it here.

TWD