Max and Esme

Deliver Me From Nowhere: I forgot this one in my November round-up which probably tells you all you need to know. A biopic focusing on one year of Bruce Springsteen's life while he was struggling with depression and wrote his 1982 album Nebraska. The movie contained very little music considering. The two Jeremy's (Allen White and Strong) are both highly watchable. Was entertaining enough for $5 movie night. 

I'll be honest, November feels like a long time ago already. But here are some highlights of what we watched: Life of Pi: National Theatre Live filmed stage production. I actually wouldn't have elected to see this show over other options on the London stage. Transforming a novel about a boy and a bunch of animals that is one big metaphor into a live stage production seems an impossible feat. (Puppets, really?)  But it was brilliant. The animals are stylized and yet completely lifelike in their movements - it took no time at all before I didn't even notice the people articulating them. It took 4 people to be the tiger, btw. Hiran Abeysekera - the actor who played Pi - delivered a energetic performance that brought to mind parkour. We had the pleasure of watching this in a movie theater, but you can stream it at home.  Honey Don't: Ethan Coen's second movie with the marvelous Margaret Qualley. It bills itself as a "neo-noir dark comedy" if Matthew Gilmore wa...

During our short Autumn break (October) we decided to head to Tallinn for a day trip. Which naturally means that I have to publish a month late blogpost about it.  The journey is extremely popular with Finns, who take advantage of the low liquor taxes of Estonian waters. Multiple ferries (small cruise ships in size) take the 2 hour trip across the Baltic, and one of the departure terminals is only three tram stops down the road, so it made for a convenient trip. The Old City was a short walk from the cruise ship terminal, and offers well-preserved medieval architecture, complete with winding alleys, fortress walls, and a beautiful town square. It's an excellent city to get lost in and walk around. Signs are helpfully stationed around the area, and most sites in this city core can be seen in a day or two. I'll be glad to return and see the inside of many of the churches and castles we saw.  Alexander Nevsky Cathedral, the most prominent building in the city. An orthodox church ...

We had two events in October that I'd count as "cultural"... Choral Concerto: Nine, by Tan Dun :  A performance of this new work by the Bard Conservatory Orchestra and Chorus at Lincoln Center; performed in repetoire with Beethoven's Symphony No. 9. as it was written to be. Truly novel, Dun deploys voices and instruments in unique ways but not so much that your reaction is "wow, that's wierd." It was so powerful I was crying at the end. It's not often you hear a piece that makes Beethoven's Ode to Joy feel kind of meh. Bonus, our friend Nate Valsania, is in the graduate program at Bard for percussion and was in the performance.  Mrs. Warren's Profession : National Theatre Live recorded broadcast of a West End stage production of George Bernard Shaw's play. A morality story about economics and class centered on a mother who is a brothel owner and her independent daughter who discovers her secret. This version starred Imelda Staunton and he...

  Nothing completes a delightful home cooked meal like some delicious and fresh herbs. Yet the nearest grocery stores only sells entire plants. I attribute this to the lack of demand for flavoring in Finnish cooking, but it's inspired us to begin a small home garden. Alas, with October finally arrived the temperature and daylight hours are diminishing by the day. Violet's valiant efforts have kept most of the plants alive so far, and hopefully when the Finns discover cilantro we'll cultivate it as well.  To take advantage of the lovely weather I've been spending lots of time birdwatching in local parks and the nature reserve near my campus. Many birds in Europe have cousins in the U.S. that are quite familiar, but there are plenty of new species to discover. I've made it a goal to spot all of the birds that appear in Wingspan that can be spotted in Finland.  The Whooper Swan, national bird of Finland. They have bright yellow bills (compared to the black and  orange ...

Taking a page from Rob's and Matthew's blog posts I'm going to share what Peter and I have watched lately. Unlike our food consumption, which is generally healthy and quite elegant, our visual media diet is strictly junk food. This is what we've seen since Max and Esme left home again... Naked Gun 2: Mostly gentle humor - more smiles than laughs, but plenty of them. Liam Neeson is a good comic actor; I didn't recognize Pamela Anderson at all, but ditto. Extra points for a Buffy the Vampire Slayer reference. Perfect for $5 movie night.  AP Bio: Selected on Matthew's recommendation last spring. Started strong, legit funny. Slowed down after the first couple seasons but by then you cared enough to keep going. Glenn Howerton basically toned down his role of Dennis from Always Sunny to play to a PG13 audience. He's still a dick, but not a predator in this one.  Wenesday: Took me a minute to remember the first season. And I'm sure by the time the third comes o...

For the past ~10 years?!? Esme's annual birthday celebration has included a broadway show. This year we picked a play rather than a musical, which meant that Peter was happy to join us as well. John Proctor Is the Villain was worth the hype. Strong script, amazing cast, it captured teenage angst (and in some cases trauma) beautifully.

A long awaited update to my adventures in China. I visited for the Lunar New Year and stayed through the lengthy series of celebrations up until the beginning of Spring Lantern Festival. We're on Year of the Snake already. This is supposedly bad luck for any Snakes (sorry Violet) but intrepid Horses such as myself have naught to fear.   Unless you have a fear of crowds...  The weather in Xi'an was brisk (30s) but this didn't seem to deter anybody from being on the streets at a given time. Lunar New Year is one of the few holidays in China where you don't have to "work back" your time off, and most people get the entire week off of work. I had fun exploring the city and getting groceries and other essentials for our New Year dinners.  Cool architecture in Xi'an Everyone is expected to bring a dish to family gatherings for the New Year. I was asked to bring mashed potatoes (a classic American dish according to the movies that many of the older relatives had ...

 Hi Grandma! At the bequest of my lovely grandmother, here is a *quick* review of my fall semester so far. If I'm being honest, most of my time thus far into 2025 has been used to write papers. (hence the very late blog post ((sorry Grandma!)) 1. Outside of being an academic victim, I started stage managing for Urinetown!!  Do practices and production meetings eat away at any free time I have left? Yes! Do I wake up every morning to a panicked email from the director? Yes! Have the logistics of how to push someone off a 9-foot set invaded my every waking thought? Yes! But also, the whole process has been so ridiculously fun. I've loved being a part of a production this size coming together and am very excited for -- in just a couple of weeks-- when we will have an audience! 2. We are back on our hair-cutting grind! And so very professional with it!  3. We remembered that nowhere does it say you have to hang your hammock outdoors! 4. And finally, The Snow!!-- which lasted ...

I visited Symphony Space in NYC on Tuesday evening with a friend to hear Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie (author of Americanah) talk about her new novel: Dream Count. The evening opened with Tony Award nominee Montego Glover doing a reading, followed by Adichie talking about writing and then taking Q&A from the audience. My iphone camera isn't great from the back of the room, but she had an amazing presence on stage - she came across as very authentic, funny, honestly interested in the people who asked questions, and of course incredibly intelligent. I am not inspired to be a writer, but I am inspired to read more. 

A home improvement project led to Peter and I solving a mystery this weekend...  When Esme went off to college in August 2023 she left behind 100 notes and small rubber ducks for us to find. While we eventually found all 100 ducks over the coming weeks (months?), we were short one note. On Saturday, we replaced a section of wall in the hallway that had screened vents cut into it. (Don't ask why. We lived with the oddity for 20+ years, but hey, sometimes it's finally time to fix it!) After we cut away the wall we found two rubber balls that were probably pushed through by a Girard toddler many years ago, and this sticky note which had fallen through more recently.  I happen to know that Esme does know how to do her own laundry. But finding this so many months later was a wonderful way to start the day!

Spending a couple of days in Rodman after taking Esme back to St. Lawrence. Mom and Dad have two deer that spend a significant amount of their day (and night) nibbling on the bushes around the house. They come right up to the windows - often getting between the hedge and the house itself. They are skittish if you move quickly, but in general they don't mind the presence of people just a few feet away behind a pane of glass.