red balloons & seared scallops

(Yes, I know it's the wrong date. MovableType got confused because I posted TWO entries yesterday, so I had to pretend it's tomorrow today. Don't worry, it'll all make sense by tomorrow. :-))

The photo above is of Allison holding some of the balloons from The Red Balloon conspiracy (organized by Mary Bertke, assisted by John Hall); it's one of my favourite photos from the weekend. John, by the way, has some great photos online from the weekend, including the Red Balloon conspiracy. I especially like the photo of Mary with all the balloons in her car.

For those who missed it, I now have my FKO moments posts online:

Post-FKO preamble

FKO Moments (Part 1): includes a now-updated list of other people's FKO reports and photos.

FKO Moments (Part 2): posted late yesterday!

My FKO photos (Click here for slideshow)



I continue to enjoy my cooking experiments; maybe it's because I haven't set off the fire alarm in a very long time. Last night I made Seared Scallops, Sweet Potato, and Pecan Salad (from Cooking Light). Jeff wasn't crazy about the sweet potatoes, but in general I thought it turned out pretty well. :-)

For dessert: one of the four Green & Black Organic chocolate bars that Lissa gave me - Maya Gold (orange and spices). YUM. I love the combination of chocolate and fruit.

And for those of you who are dying to know, my Tamagotchi Sam is still alive! Though I was horrified to discover that he somehow became un-paused at FKO, so that by the time Sara asked to check his stats when we got to my sister's place, he was VERY unhappy and on the verge of starving to death. Annie and Sara were not impressed, but they were kind enough to help me nurse him back to health again.

Parenthood is definitely not my thing. :-)

I seem to have caught some sort of bug on the weekend, ugh. Hope it goes away soon.

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fko moments (part 2)

(Part 2, FKO moments continued from Part 1)

As Allison posted in her LJ, one of the most magical moments of the weekend for us occurred at around 3 am early Sunday morning. Allison, Jodi and I were heading off to bed when we were lured to linger by a gathering of filkers in one of the alcoves in the main hotel lobby that included Mary Ellen Wessels, Dave Clement, Greg McMullan and Pete Grubbs.

After a some great singalongs led by Pete and Dave, someone asked if Urban Tapestry could do "The Lady." As much as we love that song, we had to say no... it's a pretty demanding piece, and the three of us were dead tired (plus Jodi still had a lingering cough which had gotten a bit worse through the evening).

The fabulous Boogie Knights.

Noticing Michelle and Tom standing nearby, we launched into my new Michelle song again since several people said they hadn't heard it yet. Michelle was thrilled of course (insert evil grin here). After that, we all sang The Hockey Monkey song, and I started hearing some great harmonies from behind me. Later, Allison told me that the group of women behind us had been bopping along for a while to all the music.

When Dave led a version of "Dixie Chicken," one of the women saw me with my shaker egg and asked if she could have something to play, too. "Me too! Me too!" came other cries, and I opened up my percussion bag to them all. They even used my cowbell! :-D Allison has a great picture here. After the song, I asked them where they were from, and they said they were all part of a choir called Youthful Praise from Bridgeport, Connecticut. They were in the area to perform a concert in Malton at Mount Zion Apostolic Church as part of GospelFest 2005, perhaps other engagements as well (I Googled this info).

"So what are you guys here for?" one woman asked me as she returned one of my rhythm instruments.

Tanya and Michelle.

"A music convention," I told her, deciding that trying to explain filk at 3 am in a few seconds was probably not a good idea. She asked if we were local, and I told her we were from all over the globe, that we got together to play music for the fun of it.

We asked if they could sing something, and they sang part of a song called "Awesome God"; the a capella harmonies and arrangement were incredible. Then one woman launched into "Amazing Grace" with a virtuoso skill you usually only hear in concert halls; we were all blown away. She stopped after one verse, saying she didn't know any more of the song, so then Mary Ellen picked up the second verse, Pete Grubbs sang the third.

By last two verses, everyone had joined in. Filkers had wandered in from other areas of the hotel, other guests and hotel staff were watching with astonished smiles as the music filled the space, spilling out into the rest of the lobby, drawing people into our circle.

And in that brief moment, our two groups -- so different in so many ways -- were bonded by music and happy coincidence in a way that could never be planned in advance; it was an experience that we all knew would never happen quite in the same way ever again.

I will never forget it.

Ellen.

Other convention highlights, moments, memories:

- Hot tub and chocolates with Lissa, Katy, Dave, Mary, Tom and Marlene on Friday morning.

- Hanging out with Lissa in her hotel room on Friday. No matter how long has passed between our visits, our conversations always fall immediately back into a comfortable rhythm as if no time has passed at all. Really, really enjoyed our conversation.

- Hearing Graham Leathers do his "Chocolate Is A Vegetable" song again. I want to teach this to Sara and Annie. :-)

- Finding out that Melissa Glasser is pregnant!! Yes, I'm behind in LJ so hadn't heard the news.

- Interfilk auction wench conversation snippets with Mary Ellen and Erica. You ever see the wenches huddled together in line whispering to each other and giggling? Believe me, they aren't talking about the weather. :-D

Freddy and Karen, now engaged. I used to know Karen when we were kids!

- Michelle's reading.

- Randy Hoffman's "Naked Mole Rat" song.

- Dave Alway buttons!

- Co-writing Michelle's bio with Tanya Huff.

- Tom Smith's tactful apology. It must have been difficult, and he handled it with class.

- The Filk Hall of Fame concert. Really enjoyed listening to these performances.

- Filk Hall of Fame banquet. I mentioned the wonderful speeches in Part 1, but forgot to mention that I also very much enjoyed the dinner conversation! My tablemates: Gary McGath, Hilary Sherwood, Howard Scrimgeour, Sheryl Gere, Gary Ehrlich, Lissa & Phil Allcock.

- Hearing Katy and Ju perform again. Some of their songs made me cry, especially "Across The Room." I bought their latest CD and have already started listening to it on my iPod.

I took this photo of Lyanne by semi-aiming my camera over my shoulder. :-)

- Lissa throwing Oreos into the audience while Allison and I performed "Life Is A Bowl Of Oreo Cookies," a song I wrote for her some years back. (Jodi had to go home early because of a family situation.)

- Finding out that Bob Guest's sister Karen Davidson was at the convention; we used to know each other when we were little kids. Karen's now engaged to Freddy Brown. Karen and I found a quiet corner in the lobby and caught up with each other's lives.

- Finding out that Chris Conway is Guest of Honour at FKO next year, woohoo! And the lovely Tanya Huff is Filk Waif! And Judy Miller (she's the woman does sign language to some people's songs, did a hilarious interpretation of Katy's & Ju's "Bathtime for Nanny Ogg" last year) is Interfilk Guest! Way too many exclamation points in this paragraph!

- Mike Browne truffles. Drool.

- Wonderfully silly frogs from Lissa who stuck their tongues out way far when you squeezed them. When I stuck my frog's tongue out at Tanya Huff, she said it would start rumours that I had been tonguing her in the hallway at FKO.

:-D

- Getting a chance to hang out with Tanya Huff more than I usually do. And man, she looks SO great in that little black dress...

- Hearing Lissa sing in the Filk Hall of Fame concert.

- Getting a list of tips on "Reading Your Cat's Body Language" from Crystal Paul and Steve Brinich after seeing my Blathering about Allison's cat Nova. :-D

- Seeing Lissa pregnant.

- Singing Home To FilKONtario with Allison in the closing ceremonies and seeing everyone in the audience sing along on the chorus.

- Getting the Hockey Monkey Song sung at me by friends in the lobby as Jeff and I left the hotel. Jeff was highly amused. :-)

Thanks SO much to the FKO concom and guests, all of whom did a wonderful job at making this past weekend a special one. Can't wait for next year.


Moleskin manuscript book I used to write the Michelle song.

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fko moments (part 1)

Breakfast on Friday morning. Dave, Tom, Marlene, Phil and Lissa.

FilKONtario reports that I've found in LJ so far (I'm using LJ usernames since I'm never sure who prefers to keep their real names under wraps):

oreouk (Part 2, Part 3), ldwheeler, filkertom, phillip2637 and another phillip2637 post, allisona (part 2), chirosinger, tnatj (and part 2), tarkrai, spiritdance, daisy_knotwise, maedbh7, katyhh, shannachie,, kyttn, sposter, zencuppa, musicmutt, catalana (part 2, part 3), jhayman, smooom, demoneyes, folkmew, sexybass, gorgeousgary, billroper, madfilkentist, tnatj, braider, peristalismum.

FKO photos: The ones I took, Phillip, Allison, tnatj, John Hall.

Hey, it's April. That means, of course, that I can now say that we get possession of our new house next month.

The following is Part 1 of a few moments, notes and highlights of FKO for me. Part 2 will be posted later today. To those who responded to my Filker Photo Challenge in LJ: Most of you got the correct answer...Juliane Honisch!

Tom and a Woman of Mystery.

In no particular order...

- Seeing the Urban Tapestry "What Were We Thinking" DVD raise $600 for Interfilk (!). Thanks SO much to Gary and Sheryl for buying the DVD, and to John Durno for all his hard work in putting this project together!

- Erica Neely and I being able to finally grab a few minutes near the very end of the convention for Erica to play a song that she had written for me. Holy toledo, am I glad we managed to do so! I've always adored Erica's voice and have very much enjoyed chatting with her in the past, but this was the first time I got a glimpse of the Truly Evil Erica (deliciously so). And I Must Have My Revenge, of course. Ms. Neely won't know when or in what form. (insert maniacal laughter fading into the distance...)

Allison in our hotel room.

- Being able to spend some time with Dave Clement on Thursday evening. As I've mentioned before many times, as much as I enjoy group gatherings, I'm starting to value one-on-one time with good friends even more. It happens so rarely at filk conventions, and I prefer not to book my weekend up ahead of time. This time I purposely arrived a day early so that Dave and I could get some time together. Bonus: I got to see other early FKO arrivals as well, and got some Lissa time (details in Part 2).

- Surprise birthday party for Maya, organized by Greg, in the consuite around midnight on Saturday. Got to chat with lots of people.

Allison and Becca.

- Seeing Andrea again, checking out her kid pics, talking cooking. And camera wars at breakfast. :-)

- Meeting Rand's girlfriend, Erin (mentioned this yesterday).

- Hearing Steve announce his and Katy's engagement during his concert, just after he had sung "Home" to Katy. God, did I bawl. I have a huge weakness for romantic songs of this type. Steve's entire concert was amazing, by the way. That guy has such incredible stage presence.

- Bill Roper's dinosaur impression during Steve's concert. I can't even think about this without a big smile on my face.

Sheryl and Gary.

- Girltalk with Judith. We were rehearsing for her concert since she had asked me to play flute during "Maid of the Mist" and we just got talking...and talking... :-)

- Seeing Tom West sing in open filk again. Tom, as some of you may already know, was the one who first introduced me to filk.

- The hallway Irish session on Friday night, organized by Mary. WAAAAY fun (thanks so much, Mary!). I had to use my sheet music for most of it, but at least I could play along a bit this time. I would kill to be able to play whistle like Juliane!

- Learning "Paige's Polka" from Dave Clement, doing other whistle stuff with him. He's an incredibly patient teacher.

Andrea.

- Morden chocolate ducks from Dave, Green & Black organic chocolate bars from Lissa, keepsake box from Kathleen. Got "Spinning Reels" as a birthday gift from Gary & Sheryl, a great CD from D. Glenn Arthur's band. Lots of tunes I've heard of! Veryvery cool; I can practise playing along with these. Lyanne made me Oreo cookie pants! They fit perfectly, and I'm wearing them now; they're ideal work-at-home comfy pants. Rand gave me a copy of the Ookla the Mok Consonance concert DVD for my birthday; I'm looking forward to watching this.

- Chatting with Clark Wierda on the phone. Clark is in Kuwait right now, where he is doing a tour of duty with the US Armed Forces.

- Hearing Peggi and Carolyn perform their parody of Urban Lullaby in concert.

Lissa with Oreos.

- Seeing Tom's (as in Tom Jeffers, not Tom West) girlfriend Marlene again. Marlene attended her first filk convention last year at OVFF; I was so happy to see that we hadn't scared her off! :-)

- Carla Ulbrich's dress at the Saturday night banquet. Her concert was fantastic; I had SO much fun as did the rest of the audience. Plus she and Joe are just so darned cute together.

- Hallway conversation with Paul Estin. Wish it could have been longer.

- Mini birthday celebration with Allison and Jodi in our hotel room. Got a gift certificate for Staples from Jodi (Jodi knows I have a thing for office supplies, plus I'll need more for my new office) and some heavenly-smelling Mango Mandarin body cream (Bath & Body Works Pleasures line). Allison gave me an Incredibles gift bag with fun stuff inside like mini-bubbles and Incredibles stickers but also practical gardening items to help my new garden survive my less-than-expert care. I especially loved the plastic flowers (a suggestion of Allison's husband John, apparently) in case ALL MY PLANTS DIE. :-D

Tom and Michelle at the Filk Hall of Fame banquet.

- Being able to take so many photos of Michelle. My favourite photo: Michelle in a gorgeous sleeveless evening gown at the Filk Hall of Fame Banquet, looking elegant...and with her clenched fist upraised in her usual "I'm gonna kill you, Ohi" gesture of affection.

- The Filk Hall of Fame Banquet. Moving speeches, well-deserved awards. Congratulations to Clif Flynt, Tom Smith and Judith & Dave Hayman. I'm very glad I attended.

Jodi as a Filk Wench (runner for the Interfilk auction).

- RED BALLOONS! I posted a handwritten entry explaining my red balloon obsession on my birthday, and apparently more than a few people saw it. Mary Bertke organized a conspiracy in which some of my friends came up to me at random times during Saturday afternoon with a helium-filled red balloon, saying, "I hear you like red balloons, Debbie. Happy birthday!" By the end of the afternoon, I had quite the floating bouquet. Ju tied them to my ponytail at one point. Here's a photo Allison took partway through the afternoon.

- Seeing the Boogie Knights perform again! Geez, they are SUCH good performers...such amazing energy and good humor.

- Hearing Becca Allen sing anything.

(Continued in Part 2...)

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post-FKO

Michelle, me and Tanya. Photo by Allison, I think.

Had much fun at FilKONtario this past weekend but I'm too braindead from lack of sleep to post a proper report yet.

I'm gradually uploading photos from the weekend to my Flickr account. Feel free to check them out here, or you can also view all the photos as a slideshow if you don't feel like doing all that clicking. Move the cursor a bit after the page loads to rid of the thumbnail images along the bottom. I took nearly 400 over the weekend, ended up with about 90 after eliminating the ones that were blurry, unflattering, repetitive, or just too baffling (e.g. I have NO idea how or why I took a picture of a blank wall).

I had a LOT of fun taking photos of my friend Michelle (who was the Author Guest at FKO) this past weekend, as you may notice.

Erin and Rand.

And I finally got to meet Rand's girlfriend, Erin! Very cool person, and I greatly admire her for coming to a weekend full of people she hadn't met before. Also good to see Rand again; our paths don't tend to cross all that often these days.

Jodi and Allison. I love the expression on Allison's face here. :-)

More later after I've had a chance to get my brain back as well as catch up with some work. Be sure to check Allison's FKO pics. I especially like the one she took of the hallway Irish session; I had SOOOOO MUCH FUN. Thanks so much for setting it up, Mary!

Thanks to the FKO concom for a wonderful weekend.

:-)

Michelle and me. Photo by Allison.

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Painter Wow!, Sam and whistles

I spent some birthday money from my mom-in-law on the Painter 8 Wow! book, something I've been lusting after for a while. I love these Wow! books because they give explicit details on how artists created specific pieces and why they chose to do it that way. All the illustrations are in high-quality colour on glossy paper and there's also a CD of goodies like extra Paper Textures and instructional Quicktime movies; hence the hefty price tag of the book.

I've also decided that it's time I learn some proper drawing techniques that I only have a vague recollection of learning back in high school, like perspective drawing. I've been researching courses in Toronto but most don't start until the fall (summers are out for me since we're at the cottage a lot), so I've been researching some interesting-looking resources online:

Using Perspective in Drawing
Introduction to Perspective Drawing
Drawing in One-Point Perspective

Experimenting with paper textures.

Any other suggestions for online resources (having to drawing and illustration, not necessarily just perspective) appreciated. I've already been paid for some of my doodles, which always comes as a surprise to me, but only realized recently that duh, maybe I shouldn't ignore this potential of this "fun hobby." Drawing using my Wacom artpad doesn't seem to tire out my tendons in the same way as typing, though I'm happy to report that I can type for much longer stretches at a time now. Anyway, if I take my doodling a little more seriously, I'm hoping that I might be able to supplement my writing income with some freelance illustration. Many thanks to pro illustrators like Kate Parkinson and my sister for their encouragement.

I want to learn to draw things from more interesting angles instead of always directly from the front or side (see My Life In A Nutshell for my typical style now), so I'm going to start carrying around a small sketchbook with me, or my laptop and Wacom artpad for location sketching. Be warned that you'll probably start seeing a number of these dull-looking sketches appear in my Doodle Sketchbook. My office set-up until we move is such that I need to hook up the scanner manually each time I want to use it, which means I'll probably stick to posting digital sketches.

Tamagotchi update: Wee Sam is no longer wee! He's evolved into a teenager. Needs somewhat less maintenance, but sleeps in and has a tendency to sulk. I definitely owe the survival of my Tamagotchi to my frequent support calls with Sara and Annie, by the way, both of whom have been a wealth of Tamagotchi maintenance information. Yay for nieces!

Illustration Friday post. Topic: "Crowded."

Had a good penny whistle lesson with Karen Light yesterday. Right now we're focussing on ornamentation, and we went through "Dusty Windowsills" a measure at a time. In the end, players pick whatever ornamentation they'd like, and some don't do ornamentation at all; there is no one right way of doing things. Karen, for example, doesn't use slides (gradually moving one's finger off one hole to "slide" into the next note) whereas I quite like them. She has nothing against slides, but has pointed out that some whistle players tend to overuse slides and can't play certain note combinations (going from an F to a G, for example) without doing a slide.

Since I've already learned some of the pieces from my 121 Irish Session Tunes book with slides because of listening to the CD recordings, however, this means that I'm now playing some tunes with slides and some without. Karen says not to worry about it, that I'll eventually settle on my own playing style. For now, I'm focussing on the Mary Bergin style of playing for my in-depth study of certain tunes. As far as I can tell, her style involves NO slides though plenty of cuts and rolls, quite a bit of tonguing and staccato for emphasis. Last night I learned how to do a Long Roll, which is fun to do but HARD.

Right now, I have two modes of tune-playing. One is playing without heed to ornamentation but focussing instead on just getting the notes so I can play along in the session. The other is focussing on technique and putting in ornamentation, but can only do this properly if playing VERY slowly. Eventually, of course, the goal is to merge the two. :-)

I'm realizing that my goal of over 100 tunes by the end of the year is probably unrealistic; it would be good to play fewer tunes WELL, I think.

Anyway, have a good weekend! I'm off to FilKONtario this afternoon.

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