Amazing

The weekend whiled itself away; up at the adult family home, even the 90-somethings found it warm enough to trundle outside for some summer air. One of their number died a couple of weeks ago, reduced to less than life while in life. At last she can rest.
A bandmate commented on enjoying the 44 Scotland Street series by Alexander McCall Smith, he of the Number 1 Ladies Detective series. He's Scots, and was inspired to write the former bunch of books by Maupin's Tales of the City. I've read through a few, and enjoyed them, although not quite as much as the San Francisco tales. McCall Smith develops a wonderful dog character in particular.
Now the new week is hitting its hump, speeding towards a weekend of musical and cultural craziness.

Winged time

Still cool up here, and I like it. Not sure why so many people are whining about the "lack of summer." All they need to do is go visit anywhere else on the continent, or just drive over the mountains here if they want to swelter and suffer.
Family visitors recently, and a more enjoyable than expected event with our aged mother; not recalled at all soon after, but in the moment it was good.

Musical doings

A jam-packed weekend, with two parades and a halftime show for the Seattle Storm, the women's pro basketball team; the latter was quite exciting and enjoyable. I had thought it would get boring after halftime, but they played very well and we stayed to see the whole thing. Lots of fans, much hoopla. And they gave us all kinds of teeshirts and jerseys.
Lovely evening tonight with a couple of friends from the band; we went to a jazz show by the Seattle Women's Jazz Orchestra, also known as SWOJO. Another band friend plays trumpet and flugelhorn in this group, and holy shit, were they fine. We left after two sets and they still had one to go. Not a bunch of corny standards, lots of pieces I'd never heard before, plenty challenging. So inspiring, makes you want to practice harder...

Explosive

The parade season marches on; we did a couple of laps over in one city's Family Fourth celebration, rather like a slow motion bicycle criterium. We have more on the horizon, so must strive to find some pleasure in the repetition of the music. Others have particular songs they dislike, but it seems to me important to keep a positive attitude overall; think of those aging rock bands which tour the hinterlands endlessly, one might say purgatorily, caught in a loop of old Top Ten tunes. We don't have it anywhere near that bad.