The Night The Lights Went Out For Kimbo!

Last night was a bundle of Adventures! They started with picking up the Mighty Kimbo, who I haven't seen in a year since our vid shoot, (two of the best weeks EVER) from the airport, and nipping off to the gig at Charlie's.

it was 92, and felt like we might well be getting some Storms, which I was all for. I mentioned to Kimbo that I had set things up so she would really get to experience the whole Mid-western STORM thing (she s a tried and true New Yorker) She asked would there be lightning and thunder, yes, I said, and she asked will there be Swirling Clouds and Tornadoes????? But of course, I say, all for YOU!!!!!!!!! And get this, I am even having the power go out, and we will play for you by candle light!!!!!!!

We were, of course. Kidding. Truly.

The first set went great, tho I was feeling kind of ooky, with stomach cramps and a Bad Feeling, but still it was fun. Kimbo warmed my little heart by saying "I knew you would be good but I didn't know you were GOOD!" and I am thinking she had a good time. Took her about five minutes to get to know everyone in the place.

We took a break, and low and behold, there were Black clouds rolling in, aha, thinks I, there IS a storm coming. Then the Sirens went off. Then came the swirling clouds, and a quick look at the radar says, yup, sure as heck are Tornadoes about 5 miles to the North. The lighting was like Bad CGI, you would not have bought it in a movie.

Very exciting it all was, there at the pub. Then the power went. Am I good or what, I asked Kimbo, who was thrilled by the entire event. She must have called half her phone book, telling everyone HI GUY! I AM IN A TORNADO! (well, sort of, near one anyway, and darned exciting anyway)



We played lit candles all over the place, and played a second set, off the stage, acoustically, with a nice crowd all loving it. Then the Pub hearing that 26, 000 people were without power and not likely to be getting it back any time soon, decided to close, and we went home early.

I spent the entire night dealing with some nasty food poisoning, or an equally nasty virus, which was not good AT ALL (details omitted, trust me )but feel fine today, except kind of weak. We took Kimbo to the bees, which she loved, warily, and now I am for a nap before recording tonight.

Which, one hopes, will rock.

Love and Storms, Lorraine

Storms All Over Dog School

Very exciting storms here today. All the truly exciting storms MISSED us by a county, which did not make Weather Girl happy, but we had enough so there was some fun watching the radar.

When it got time to go to Dog School Agility Class (Boot Camp for Out of Shape Owners!) there were some more storms popping up. The severe alert came out over the radio, saying Severe Storm! Take Cover! Some towns include Town X! Not our town, but on slightly North of us. We had a quick look at the radar, Boss and I, and figured out it most likely would not be hitting us, and this thing was growing fast, but Town X was going to get nailed.

Dog school is 5 miles from Town X. But what the heck, nothing ventured, no adventures to blog about I say.

Cabal and I nipped out there, it's in the middle of a chunk of farmland so you can see for miles, and sure enough, there it was. Trainer Lady and I decided we would go for it, and take shelter as needed. Two other people showed up, and, one eye on the storms (oh, yes, another was popping up just south, and a third kind of west and don't forget our darling to the North) LOTS of cloud to ground lightning, lots of thunder, but no rain, it was like a pocket of calm there at Dog School.

Until I looked at the Lady next to me, and her HAIR was standing on END! I have heard of this things before. I had heard it means you are about to be hit by lightning. I mentioned this hair phenomenon, to the Lady (while moving away from her) saying "WOW YOUR HAIR IS STANDING ON END!"

Another Dog Devotee told me it didn't mean you were about to be struck, it just meant the potential was there. Oh Good. Because we noticed EVERY ONES hair was standing on end.

Well, it wasn't raining, so we continued. (Note to children and non-Midwesterners: If you are ever outside and this happens, get the heck indoors! This is Very Bad and Dangerous!)

I suppose this blog would be more exciting if we HAD got hit, but there you have it. Wish I had had a camera, those were some really funky clouds.

Tomorrow the Mighty Kimbo comes to town. I'll pick her up at the airport, and we will go to my show. Three gig weekend, which is a nice Ace in the Bill Roulette game, but a little hard on the self. Whole lot of energy going out. Tho it comes in too, I sometimes forget. We record again on Saturday. Sunday it's the Biker Bar.

(Bikers on Sunday seems a whole lot happier than Church People do, which is something to think about, sitting outside, listening to music, riding your bike seems a far better way to feel good and close to Fod than telling it how horrible you are, in my personal opinion)

It's funny, she says, tying both storms and Fod together, this is the song that was going on in my head the entire time we were foolishly hanging out in a field with severe lightning storms all around us...Funny old world. I think I will sing it tomorrow, in honor of, well, everything.

Does God look down on the boys in the barroom,
Mainly forsaken but surely not judged.
Jacks, kings, and aces, their faces in wine,
Do lord deliver our kind.
From singing for whiskey three strings on the fiddle,
Four on the guitar and a song that I love.
Many’s the night we spent picking and singing,
In hopes it be pleasing both here and above.
Jack’s string fiddle to my sawtooth bow,
Who loves loneliness loves it alone.
I love the dim lights like some love the dew,
Only thing I wonder sometimes:
Does God look down on the boys in the barroom,
Mainly forsaken but surely not judged.
Jacks, kings, and aces, their faces in wine,
Do lord deliver our kind.

Love and life,
Lorraine

Malena? Ready to rest?

Ok folks, I have the new candles and lotions up on my shopping site ready for purchase. Thanks for helping me formulate the scents. You all had a hand in that. It's great to have such an intimate connection with all of you.

I broke my diet and had some buttermints in celebration. This data entry stuff is tiresome, but well worth it. I even added a clearance section. You can find nice gifts for $10.00 there, like this oil burner set.

All I need to do now is put up more earrings. Kitty did a fantastic job on them. I'm down from 8 boxes of merch to 2. Yeah! Now I'm off to take a break. I assume that will last about 20 minutes. he hee

Here I am talking to a client, Sandy, at the Midnight with Malena Event. I hope you are having a good week! Love you all to pieces!

Malena

Robber Bees!

Today, when everything was rolling along just fine, thank you, I went to do errands and thought to myself "My what a lot of Bees there are around." HA! By the time I got back, Hans, our Sherpa guide and woodsman par excellence mentioned that there seemed to be a LOT of Bees in the Garage, in fact the place sounded like the inside of a hive!

Holy Hive Batman! A swarm! (thinks I) and I went out and darned if there weren't 100's of bees all over the old frames we had from last years Kitty hive (may it rest in peace). Of course the Bee Suits were hanging NEXT to these 100's of Bees, so I did what any competent PA would do in a situation like this and said "Hans, I will give you one million dollars to go in there, get some bee suits" Bless him....

Here is a picture that looks very like what my brain saw...



I got on the phone to the Birdchick and explained the situation, and she asked would I like her to come out? I asked if that was some sort of strange trick question and could she please come as quickly as possible. By this time it was a full on Bee Party in the garage.

One thing you look for in a Swarm is a large ball of Bees, in the middle of this would be the Queen. This we could not find and came to the conclusion that some random Bee, in the half hour I had the garage open wandered in and went "WOW!!! An empty hive with frames with HONEY bits!!!!!" and flew back to her hive and did the "You gals aren't going to believe this, but come with me Dance" and as word traveled, more and more of her friends came to check out the Party.



We got the frames out, opened things up, and told them Party Over. Out. And went off to check the other hives...

(The Birdchick will no doubt be telling the Full Story of what we did to the other hives over on her Blog, so I won't worry about that now...Including the bit where we did in fact steal some honey, all in the name of Beekeeping)

Here is a Bee's Eye view into the Kitty Hive, it's such an amazing Bee World in there, and so beautiful...



One of the most Magic things ever happened to me next. The Birdchick wondered aloud if she could get a Bee to eat from her hand, and I wondered aloud if I was brave enough to do that too...So I took off my gloves, dipped my finger into some honey and...



Magic. Here is me and my new Friend. It felt like electric, magic, connected and like nothing I have ever felt.



I wondered what she would go back and write in her Bee Journal that evening something like "Magic today, I don't know, never experienced anything like it, I was in the hive, and honey came down, so sweet, and another being and I bonded together, two souls linked forever...."

The Birdchick said....

More like she wrote "Licked a Girl and Liked It."

Love and Bees,
Lorraine

Not a Whole Lot Going On....

Well that was certainly a fun 24 hours! A new religion, what WILL we think of next???? Fod help us.

Cabal the Dog got his Canine Good Citizenship award for the second time tonight, only this time, we did it with a collar and lead, not the Gentle Leader. It worked, but I still would not want to take him out anywhere like that. He does fine until he sees something else he wants and then pulls so hard I can't handle him. He's 80 pounds of pure muscle.

We had teaser storms all day, north and south they were all anyone might ask of a thunderstorm, but HERE, they could not have gotten closer and still missed us. Sigh. We need the rain! And quite frankly, the excitement, Weather Girl is Bored.

Hmm..Lots of excitement coming up, the Boss coming home, dance class, three gig weekend with houseguests, but I am having trouble coming uo with with Adventures today.

Dried some mangoes, took the Bengals for a walk, did the dog school, baked everyone chicken (which even Venus admitted MIGHT not suck) had a fine time at the post office, bank, grocery store and evil Wal Mart, snuck in a ten minute call to Malena while driving, dashed some hopes and dreams as the Princess of No, went by the Bees and ascertained they were doing Bee Things, located, pulled and washed 100 T-shirts (more on that later) wrote most of my Essay on Fod for next Sunday and won at Bill Roulette

(that's where you call the bank, find out how much is in there, gather up the checks you haven't deposited, make a pile of the months bills, and do some fine maneuvers in mathematics, and see if what you owe is less than what you have, and just how much can be put to that new washer and dryer.)

There was a lot more, I am certain, as I received and answered more e-mail than a girl should get, as well as spending a fine amount of time on the phone with people, and whatever it all was, it sure tired me out, as when I sat down to read (Bill Bryson this week) and listen to some music (I am SO on an Oysterband roll!!) I fell asleep after five minutes.

(Waking to pounding on the door, Cabels's playdate Freckles had escaped and his owners, there to pick him up for dog school, could not find him. Sent Cabal out to find him and after a romp in the river, the two wet dogs were back and ready for action)

But other than that, not much happened.

The thing that makes me laugh tho, reading this, is that it really WAS a day when nothing much happened...

But it's all good.

Love and Fod,
Lorraine

My Day in Church

Let me start this by saying that I completely and totally support ALL religions and the choice for everyone to choose which one works best for them. Or to go ahead and make up their own, doesn't matter, it's a personal thing.

I was hired today to play in a band, outdoors in a park, where three Lutheran Churches were gathered to have a big celebrate together sort of thing. The music, as it turns out was great, but I started off a bit nervously tho everyone was really nice. There was a little of the "Who are you," vibe going on (Lasted till I started playing.) but it wasn't too bad, I think they were just nervous. I wasn't, tho I hadn't heard the music, if you can count 1,3,5, 7 and Sus, you can play anything.

I did get a little nervous tho when the service started. It opened with everyone saying:

(and I am taking this from the program, NOT paraphrasing)

"We poor sinners confess to you that we have sinned: We have worshiped other Gods, we have dis-honored your name, we have neglected true worship, we have dishonored our parents, we have treated life as cheap, we have betrayed our loved ones, stolen, lied and coveted what is not ours. And other things known only to You."

WHOA! I thought, (barely remembering in time that this was NOT an improv gig or my stage, and I should keep this to my inside voice) You managed all that JUST this past week??? Ye gads, I have fallen among miscreants!!!!!!

Then they offered me wine.

I thought a moment about giving them a little info on how wine very often wasn't the BEST idea about how to save yourself, relieve stress, and feel joyful, yes, it does WORK, but can land you in some trouble too....But the guitar player saved me, by taking mine discreetly after I told him wine-wine was a Bad Idea.

That being said, the music was REALLY fun. The players were all really good, piano, guitar, bass, drums, me and two Vox. Mostly I stayed in the background, adding bits here and there, but when we got to the last song, a kicked up version of Joyful Joyful (Beethoven's Ode to Joy for you purists out there) I thought oh yeah Whhhee-hoo, love this song, and then the leader guy after a couple singing verses nodded at me and the piano and said TAKE IT, which means WHHHEEEHHHOOO in my book!

Surprised the heck out of that congregation. Beethoven rocks. And so, do the Lutherans.

Only, remember, that bit at the end, the Ode to Joy, when you were tapping your feet, singing and rocking and even dancing, that's what makes God happy. Enough with the miserable sinner bits.

Love and joy,
Lorraine