My Musical Theater Class

This is the final pose of Your Never Fully Dressed Without a Smile - performed by my wonderful musical theater class at Studios On Main in East Greenville.

I am so proud of these kids. Brava!! You were terrific.

Perkiomenville Stone Circle - triumph !!!!

We did it. Thank you Mark.

Perkiomenville Stone Circle - success

Nutcracker - Widener Memorial School for the Handicapped

My children's ballet company - Pages To Pirouettes - performed at the Widener Memorial School for the handicapped. This is starting to be a yearly gig - pure charity. We are not paid for this one. But they children and the staff love us. We get paid more in appreciation here than we ever do in money at our normal jobs.



After the show - we all did some ballet together (with the arms only). I became aware of beautiful music played in the background and looked around to see one of the students playing the piano so beautifully that it sounded like a concert hall. Please see this website for a picture of him - http://www.pages-to-pirouettes.com/Widener2008/Widener2008_1.html

I love this school, its principle, the music teacher, and all of its kids.

Nutcracker time

Well it's that time of the year again - Nutcracker. Today starts my own 4-day weekend of Nutcracker. I hate putting on and taking off make-up but every other part of the weekend is great - great music, traditional story. Body has some problems - but so far I'm dealing with them. Hoping for good audiences.

We are at Upper Darby Performing Arts Center - a great venue.

The great stone circle of Perkiomenville - grows

The Great Stone Circle of Perkiomenville
November 4, 2008

We live in a rural area of Pennsylvania that was apparently at the leading edge of the last ice age millenia ago. There are large rocks throughout the forest behind my home.

Ten years ago in a burst of, take your pick - ancestral devotion, youthful folly, testosterone poisoning, I constructed a stone circle in my backyard. The stones were very heavy for one guy to move and erect without machines (I refused to use machines because that would be a profanation of the circle's purpose).

But there was one stone - I called it my fantasy stone - that was beautiful, but far too heavy for me to move. It was about 70 feet from my circle. I made an attempt but eventually gave up and figured it would remain always in my heart.

Well this past weekend my friend Mark Thomas came by with 4 big, strong, young guys and we tried to do it. We came close - and soon we will succeed.

Here's a couple pics:

Mark and the guys (l to r)

Mark, Nathan, Josh, Eric, Nick

Beginning the long journey

Halloween 2008

Vic did a really good Samarra Morgan from The Ring. First we went to see grandmommy and scared her good. Then we went to the Crushes for a really nice Halloween party. Vic had fun wth Margaret and a friend.

Here's Vic in the stone circle.

Happy St. Crispin's Day

Henry V at Agincourt

What's he that wishes so?

My cousin Westmoreland?

No, my fair cousin:

If we are mark'd to die, we are enow

To do our country loss;

and if to live,The fewer men,

the greater share of honour.

God's will! I pray thee, wish not one man more.

By Jove, I am not covetous for gold,

Nor care I who doth feed upon my cost;

It yearns me not if men my garments wear;

Such outward things dwell not in my desires:

But if it be a sin to covet honour,

I am the most offending soul alive.

No, faith, my coz, wish not a man from England:

God's peace! I would not lose so great an honour

As one man more, methinks, would share from me

For the best hope I have. O, do not wish one more!

Rather proclaim it, Westmoreland, through my host,

That he which hath no stomach to this fight,

Let him depart; his passport shall be made

And crowns for convoy put into his purse:

We would not die in that man's company

That fears his fellowship to die with us.

This day is called the feast of Crispian:

He that outlives this day, and comes safe home,

Will stand a tip-toe when the day is named,

And rouse him at the name of Crispian.

He that shall live this day, and see old age,

Will yearly on the vigil feast his neighbours,

And say 'To-morrow is Saint Crispian:

'Then will he strip his sleeve and show his scars.

And say 'These wounds I had on Crispin's day.

'Old men forget: yet all shall be forgot,

But he'll remember with advantages

What feats he did that day: then shall our names.

Familiar in his mouth as household words

Harry the king, Bedford and Exeter,

Warwick and Talbot, Salisbury and Gloucester,

Be in their flowing cups freshly remember'd.

This story shall the good man teach his son;

And Crispin Crispian shall ne'er go by,

From this day to the ending of the world,

But we in it shall be remember'd;

We few, we happy few, we band of brothers;

For he to-day that sheds his blood with me

Shall be my brother; be he ne'er so vile,

This day shall gentle his condition:

And gentlemen in England now a-bed

Shall think themselves accursed they were not here,

And hold their manhoods cheap whiles any speaks

That fought with us upon Saint Crispin's day.

My latest and best website

Here's a website I did for a friend who is a counseling therapist.

Nancy Kaye Server, Counseling Therapist

I wish her the best.

A trip down Memory Lane - Harleysville, PA Oct 19, 2008

I remember Mom saying, "I better put out a note for the milkman, we need an extra gallon for the weekend."

About every 2 months a local organization of antique automobile restorers has a get-together in the parking lot of the local Wal-Mart. For many years I've noticed them, but always busy going somewhere, I passed it buy. Today I stopped in with Victoria. Fortunately Vic had her camera with her.

The cars are amazing - sparkling clean throughout - including the engine compartment. The most interesting thing I saw was a perfectly preserved 1957 milk truck. It brought back memories of when I was a boy in Lafeyette Hills, Pa.

See the metal box on the right in the first picture? All the houses on our block had one of those at the front door, and every two days the milkman would come by in his milk truck at an unGodly hour (like 5 AM!) and deliver a gallon of milk.

Sadly the milkman is a dying profession today.

And we are all a little bit poorer for that loss.

To the left was a really nice collection of milk bottle caps.

To the left is a really pretty turquoise car.

Priest inhibited as a result of her conversion to Islam

Interesting. Very interesting.



RHODE ISLAND: Priest inhibited as a result of her conversion to Islam
Episcopal Life online

Bishop Geralyn Wolf of the Diocese of Rhode Island has inhibited the Rev. Ann Holmes Redding for publicly professing her adherence to the Muslim faith.
The notice states that the diocesan “Standing Committee has determined that Dr. Redding abandoned the Communion of the Episcopal Church by formal admission into a religious body not in communion with the Episcopal Church. The bishop has affirmed that determination.”
The inhibition prevents Redding from “exercising the gifts and spiritual authority conferred on her by ordination and from public ministry” and is in force until March 31, 2009. In accordance with Episcopal canons, unless Redding “reclaims” her Christian faith, said Wolf in an interview, the inhibition will automatically lead to a deposition, ending Redding’s priesthood.
“In the process of deposition, we shouldn’t dismiss each other easily,” the bishop said.
According to the “notice of inhibition,” dated September 30 and signed by Wolf, “Dr. Redding has acknowledged taking her Shahadah to become a Muslim.”

Really Cool new search engine

There is a "cool" new search engine. It is here: http://www.cuil.com/

It's name comes from the Celtic poet warrior Fionn McCuill. I love the beautiful black graphic design of the main search page.

Anyway Google is getting very big, very powerful, very Left-wing totalitarian and snoopy - it's time for a change. ..tom

Congresswoman Allison Schwartz (D-PA) - betrays her constituents - votes to give 700B$ to rich WallStreet Democrats

Democratic congresswoman Allison Schwartz of Pennsylvania supported the Lehman Brothers, Goldman-Sachs, Merrill-Lynch 700$ Billion dollar bailout.

The Democratic party, having allowed Fannie Mae to spend 1 trillion dollars on bad loans in exchange for support from the black caucus - now wants us to pay for it.

Allison Schwatz says - pay up or lose your pensions. She'a a big supporter of Democratic congresswoman Nancy Pelosi who called the Republicans who heroically opposed this bailout "traitors."

Allison Schwartz is the traitor.

My latest website

I like to build websites in my spare time. I'm mostly an amateur but I'm starting to make money.

Here's my latest effort

Studio 73 Salon

Best wishes to John and Studio 73 in Skippack, Pennsylvania from Robin Goodfellow Web Designs.

Chamber Orchestra of Philadelphia - All Beethoven Concert

We went to see this - http://www.chamberorchestra.org/concerts/concert1.php Sunday afternoon at the Kimmel Center.

It was wonderful. Conductor Ignat Solzhenitsyn directed both Beethoven symphonies (#2 and #7) without a score!

Beautifully played, beautifully directed. Bravo - we will be coming again.

The Chili Pepper Festival - Sept, 2008 Bowers, PA

Went to the Chili Pepper Festival on Friday night. Glad I did cause I'm sure it was rained out today.

I bought some hot sauce from these people and it is very very good.

It was a fun night.

Here is a little website I made with more pictures. Chili Pepper Festival, 2008

..tom

Vic Pix - extreme closeup of ladybug

So Vic had a ladybug in her room this week and she went to work with her camera. Here's some nice closeups.

Teutonberg Wald

Walpurgis halle Thale
Wotan in Thale

A friend of mine went to Teutonberg Wald recently (battlefield of Hermann's glory). She sent me these pics:

RIP Alexander Solzhenitsyn (1918-2008)

Alexander Solzhenitsyn was a man out of time. A man whose values and outlook would have fit better into the middle ages than it does today.





Having spent years in a Bolshevick communist gulag in Siberia - he knew the longing for home that the homeless feel. He understood that Russia had been stolen from the Russian people - with promises of secular salvation. Most importantly - he understood with the wordless knowing of the aged - that family, folk, and homeland are part of the soul of mankind; an evolved adaptation to a hostile world - a God-given love of the particular and fear of the global that makes man always apart from God - and always in need of Him.











Russian president Vladimir Putin congratulates Solzhenitsyn.



Of course the Left and the neo-cons never understood him - to be more precise, they hated him. It would be too shallow to say they hated him for his last work: Alexander Solschenitsyn, "200 Jahre zusammen." Die russisch-jüdische Geschichte 1795-1916 (200 Years Together. The Russian-Jewish History 1795-1916).





The Left (self-proclaimed progressives) hated him for his grounding nature - the soil of Russia, the Russian Orthodox church, and his abnegation of the Leftist belief man is master of this world. A better understanding of Solzhenitsyn can be had by reading Ronald Berman's book, Solzhenitsyn at Harvard. This book is occasionally a grudging acknowledgement that Solzhenitsyn is right about much of what he says - but always a disappointment that he said it.





At its worst Solzhenitsyn at Harvard is essentially a bunch of neocons talking with each other about why they hate him. It is enjoyable to read Michael Novak, Richard Pipes, and Sidney Hook (all of whom would later lead us into the devastating fiasco of the Iraq war) deride him.





Take for example this from Richard Pipe's essay, "In the Russian Intellectual Tradition." in which he manages to slander not only Solzhenitsyn, but also the Russian people, and the Russian Orthodox church.





"In places, Solzhenitsyn uses virtually the same language as his nineteenth-century forerunners. This fact emphasizes the remarkable continuity of Russian intellectual history, especially its conservative strain, to which Solzhenitsyn indubitably belongs. Each generation of Russians seems to discover afresh the same answers, partly because of the hold on their imagination of Orthodox Christianity.."





If Solzhenitsyn had a modern incarnation it would be as one of the paleo-cons; deeply sceptical of the belief in progress that undergirds the institutions of modern America, and enslaves the American people to the worst angels of their nature - the belief that they know what is wrong with the world and can fix it.




























RIP Alexander Solzhenitsyn

It's Showtime Folks!!!

Finally! I am exhausted - but pleased. We have a terrific show in Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat at Shannondell with King of Prussia Players.

It was truely a collaborative effort among a large number of very creative, energetic people.

I hope now that we are well-attended. It should be. Shannondell is a perfect place for this.

Atlantic White Flash Service Station

Everyone near where I live has noticed what appears to be a perfectly preserved service station from about 70 years ago. In fact with a sign that says "Reg 13cents" the running joke is "hey why don't we stop here for gas."

I stopped today to take some pictures and was shocked when I looked through the window to see a perfectly preserved old notion store. The gentleman who lives there did not want publicity so I won't mention the location - but it seems he loves antiques and this is his house.

Had I known this was someone's home I would never have been so brazen as to peek through thte window. Nevertheless he was kind enough to let me in so I could take some pictures.

What a great way to live and great hobby.

A Tree Falls in Perkiomenville, Pennsylvania

As I blogged last October ( Dead Tree In My Back Yard ) there was a huge dead tree in my back yard leaning towards the house. I intended to cut it down piecemeal from the top; a little bit at a time. After last October I realized that would be too time consuming and frankly a bit dangerous.

Well Memorial Day, with help of a friend I finally brought it down.

Me & Mark

There's the tree.

Vic the videographer.

Jenny standing triumphantly over the downed tree.

After The Crash: An Essay-Novel of the Post-Hydrocarbon Age

Review of

After The Crash

by Tom Blair.

The subtitle, “An Essay-Novel of the Post-Hydrocarbon Age” tells it all. After The Crash by Caryl Johnston is a well-written, breezy book. It is also prescient; obviously so, frighteningly so.

One day soon people will look at this time in American history and wonder why society was so unprepared - the way we look at the Great Depression today. Nature has periods of cataclysm - geological, physical, economic, and social. After The Crash covers them all. And covers them from an epistemological point of view the resonates deeply with mine.


What happens when fossil fuel becomes precious? We are currently at peak production - but demand from China, India and other developing nations is booming. Furthermore for the first time in history, China and India can outbid us for oil. The days of the oxcart are coming back - for us. We are tomorrow’s third-world nation. Full disclosure here - the authoress, Caryl Johnston is a friend of mine. Nevertheless this review is easy - because After The Crash is a very good book.



Look at this historical timeline graphic from the preface. Then look at the headlines today. We are running out of fossil fuel.























Although environmentalists and nature-worshippers imagine this time will be a paradise, the end of fossil fuels will be hard times; causing major social re-alignment unpleasant to everyone. I very much enjoyed Caryl Johnston’s description of our “neo-feudal” future. So also the images of a future without global communication, also the rise of human-generated energy as a currency; the return of localism for lack of energy to transport people.

Having read After The Crash I feel like sticking close to home; saving my money, and contributing to the culture in the town where my daughter is growing up.

You should read After The Crash - it is like lookng at the headlines we will be seeing next year.

Midsummer Night's Dream - week 2 approacheth

This is my computer screen at work. I'm sliding back into a Midsummer Night's Dream mode - Puck needs a forest bower where he can dance.

I had nothing to lose because they think I'm eccentric anyway.

"We fairies that do run by the triple Hecate's team, now are frolic"

Midsummer Night's Dream

Well the first week of Midsummer Night's Dream is over. It has been great. Small audiences but very well done performances and lots of genuine enthusiasm and compliments.

Here's a pic of me, Phyllis & Victoria from Thursday night ( April 24, 2008).

A Midsummer Night's Dream

Well my fantasy role happens to me this Wednesday. We open Midsummer Night's Dream with King of Prussia Players, April 23, 24, 25, 26, May 1, 2. Really an awesome cast - with dancing, and song.

What kind of bug is this?

What kind of bug is this? And more importantly - what can I do about it?

Over the past several months we've had a problem with bugs like this getting inside our house. Help! Where do they come from? Could they be breeding somewhere inside, or nesting outside?

Herstein's Mennonite Church, 1803 - a Good Friday meditation

When I drive from my home in Perkiomenville, Pennsylvania south to Rt. 422 I will take the charming, woodsey backway known as Neiffer Rd. About midway in my journey I pass an old church that would appear abandoned and is clearly unused except that it shows signs of being kept as a museum or antique by someone or some group that loves it very much. So as my peculiar form of meditation and reverence on this Good Friday I stopped at the church, took these pictures, and began this pictorial.

I have asked a German friend of mine to help me read the stone on the left (above). Here is what we think it says -

"Hier

rusten die ge-

beine der verliorbenen

MARIA SCHUMACHER

Sie war gebohrenden im

April 1762 und starb den

12 von July 1803. ihre

alter ??? 3 month

???? Tage"

My German is a bit rusty but I think this would be translated -

"Here rests the bones of the beloved Maria Schumacher. She was born in April 1762 and died on the 12th of July 1803. (41 years, 3 months and ??? days.)"

The church (called a chapel) is smallish but looks like it could easily seat 100 congregants. It sits on an unpaved lot rather close to Neiffer Road. Note that until just the last few years Neiffer would have been a quiet country road. Behind the church - from where I took the photo above is an old church graveyard.

I have done a full webpage of this old church with more pictures and background information here:

Herstein's Mennonite Church

The Dream Garden

This place is like a dream.

The Dream Garden

Philadelphia

RIP - Arthur C. Clarke

Dec. 16, 1917 - March 19, 2008

I was always a fan of Arthur Clarke - long before 2001, A Space Odyssey. But my God what a movie!

After that - everyone loved this great, great man. But we who love science fiction knew him long before. We knew him from The Star , Childhood's End , and his wonderful TV show Mysterious World.








Born in Sommerset, England - Arthur Clarke was a child of the stars. A man out of time - for all time.

May we who reach for the stars - love this man who managed to grasp them.