We went on vacation this weekend. Here are a couple of the photos I took. We hiked a lot, and it was wonderful. The sky was low and brooding the entire time, and there was a shifting mist over everything that made ordinary objects and plants glow.
Believe it or not, this shot used neither a filter nor Photoshop. My little Olympus has a spot-metering feature that allows it to focus and meter on a tiny spot in the middle of the viewfinder, which meant that I could meter on the bright edge of the clouds and get the equivalent of a underexposed shot.
This is the sky above my house. You can just barely see a mountain on the right. I’m so blessed to be living in a place like this, and I realize it everyday, especially when I’m able to step just outside and see something like this.
I’m a little behind on posts, and while this may be a cheap shot, I’m going to post the first 15 or so songs that come up on my MP3 player. Which I can guarantee will be very eclectic and interesting…
–The Flaming Lips: Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robot. A stupid song if there ever was one, but fun nonetheless.
–Coldplay: Yellow. If you don’t listen too hard to the words of this song, then it sounds pretty good. If you do listen, you might be disappointed by the fact that it really doesn’t mean much. Ain’t no substance under the pretty guitars.
–Mary Chapin Carpenter: 10,000 Miles. I love her music in general and first heard her version of 10,000 Miles on the movie Fly Away Home. She’s coming to Chapel Hill, which tickles me to death. I’ll be on those tickets like white on rice.
–Amos Lee: Bottom of the Barrel. He has a wonderful voice. This song reminds you to make do with what you have. After all, “The world is so much meaner when your heart is hard.”
–The Duhks: Heaven’s My Home. I got to hear the Duhks and Mammals together in concert at Merlefest. Good pair, eh? The Duhks have more soul than any other bluegrass/newgrass band I know of.
–Goo Goo Dolls: Iris. Not a big Goo Goo Dolls fan, because I feel like a lot of their music is a little soft or sappy. But Iris is a good song.
–Lovin’ Spoonful: Lovin’ You. A very happy song, off a CD a friend burned for me.
–Stevie Ray Vaughan: Texas Flood. One of the absolute most incredible guitarists in the entire world. He plays a lot of Hendrix covers, and beats the hell out of Hendrix. You’ve gotta be good to do that. If you doubt me, try SRV’s Little Wing. Heck, try anything by him. He’s amazing.
–Girlyman: Speechless. A great group with tight harmonies and smart lyrics. Both of which are lacking in today’s music market…
–Weezer: The Sweater Song. Another stupid song. But Weezer never fails to cheer me.
–Simon & Garfunkel: The 59th Street Bridge Song. You can’t help but like it. If you don’t like it, you’re probably a miserable, grostesque curmudgeon.
–Wilco: Pot Kettle Black. Wilco is in my top 5 favorite groups. They can change their sound dramatically from album to album and get away with it, because they’re so good.
–Soundgarden: Like Suicide. A cheerful ditty! I like pretty much all of the early 90’s grunge rock bands. Unfortunately, most of the bands that tried to follow in their footsteps failed miserably. I’m not a huge fan of today’s “new” rock. There is a good song here and there, but most of it is desperately unoriginal.
The Winterpills: June Eyes. Also in my top 5 groups. They have the most beautiful harmony. This isn’t my favorite song by them, though…try A Benediction and Hide Me. You won’t be disappointed.
Eva Cassidy: Fever. I think Eva Cassidy has the most beautiful voice of any woman in the whole world that I’ve heard.
The Shins: Weird Divide. I adore the Shins. Also in my top 5 bands.
I have a complaint to make.
The town where I live has always been known as a mecca for Floridians and various other retired/obscenely rich folk. I knew I’d have to deal with that when I moved here about four years ago. But a new, more vicious breed is springing up. And unfortunately, they live next door.
There are two families in particular—a bunch of Floridians with dyed-blonde hair and a similar bunch of people from Charlotte. Now, don’t get me wrong, I don’t resent people for coming here to get away from things. However, I DO resent it when I feel like I can’t get away from them.
These are the kind of people who can’t tell the difference between money and toilet paper, so they send them both down the potty. Both of these families own vacation houses about three or four times the size of our regular house. They both have a prodigious number of children, all of which were reared with the horrible good-job-mom mentality, you know, the kind of kids whose mothers praised them for every word, burble, burp, fart, etc. that they ever made. As a result, these unpleasant children spout noise tirelessly, day and night and every moment in between.
And their parents are hardly better. Said Floridians take regular walks up the road past our house. On the way down the road, Florida dad starts hollering at the top of the hill and encourages Florida kids to do likewise all the way down the road to their driveway. Who knows what prompts that. Florida dad must think, Oh, what a nice little rustic community! I’m sure the rough locals won’t mind if we return to return to our primal roots in front of their houses!
Well, guess what, buddy? We do mind. Really, we don’t care for it when we meet your Infiniti/Lexus/Acura in the middle of a blind curve halfway across the center line. Really, we don’t care for it when your golden retrievers romp through our yards and tear up our flower beds. And really, we don’t care for your sense of entitlement.
Yesterday, for instance, I was headed into town when I encountered some of these vacation folks in the middle of the dirt road. There were four of them and a dog, but they managed to take up the whole road. And they DIDN’T MOVE. Eventually, when I was right on them, they sort of swaggered out of the road, the girls on one side and the guy with the dog on the other, and left a barely car-sized gap for me to get through. I can’t help it, I think mean thoughts about these people. The devil in me wanted to accelerate hard and leave a cloud of dust for them to choke on. Part of me wondered what a flat Floridian would look like.
So what is it that gives these people a sense of ownership over a community that isn’t theirs? Why do they think that it’s okay to disrupt the quiet for people who moved here to have quiet? Between new construction and Floridians/Charlotteans, there is no quiet in the summer anymore. Why is that alright? I know it’s hard for them to understand, but believe it or not, a lot of normal people can’t afford to take a full month of vacation like they can. A lot of us don’t have the money to take vacations elsewhere. For a lot of us, this is all we have. And it is ours, not theirs.
*Disclaimer: No Floridians or Charlotteans were harmed in the making of this angry rant.
We’ve had a lot of thuderstorms up here lately, after a really long dry spell. I reckon they compelled me to do this painting of a tree before a storm. This is the first decent acrylic I’ve done in quite a long time.
