Welcome! I hope I bring a spot of calm and happiness into these uncertain times. I blog about my photography adventures, flowers, gardening, the importance of chocolate in a well lived life, or anything else on my mind.
This year (long story) we haven't put up bird feeders. So today I wanted to share a memory from last April 18 (2024) when...
...a brown thrasher, a bird we've only seen this one time during now five years of birding, visited our yard. And, my spouse was actually able to get a picture of it.
Today
I am joining up with other Music Moves Me bloggers (and you can join us
at the linky above). We are a group of music loving bloggers who blog about music
each Sunday or Monday (or even later in the week). If you have music to share with us, you are most
welcome to join! (Music Posts Only-meaning at least one music video,
please! Otherwise, your post link may be labeled "No Music" or even removed.)
Every
other week we have a theme. This week's theme is "International Artists/Songs".
Since we have bloggers from several countries participating in this weekly meme, this should be interesting. As for me, I'm going to somewhat stick to the familiar: international artists whose songs have charted in the United States (although the song I choose may not be one of their hit songs). Bonus points if the song is in a language other than English.
This song is a bit outside the genres I usually listen to. Here's Ella Marija Lani Yelich-O'Connor, better known as Lorde, who holds dual New Zealand and Croatian citizenship. She's perhaps best known for her hit song "Royals" but I chose a song "Te Ao Mārama" ("World of Light"), which has had some controversy surrounding it, but here it is.
The Swedish group ABBA has recorded several of their hit songs in their native Swedish language. Here is "Waterloo".
And, since the 2025 Eurovision Song Contest concluded this past Saturday, why not also feature the 1974 Eurovision performance of Waterloo by Abba which helped to launch their career?
As a matter of fact, a number of Eurovision Song Contest winning songs have charted in the United States. Although he was not the artist who won with this song, French musician Paul Mauriat & His Orchestra charted in 1968 with an instrumental version of Love is Blue (L'amour est bleu).
The late, great Austrian artist Johann "Hans" Hölzel, better known to us as Falco, charted in 1982 with Der Kommissar. He later reached #1 with his 1986 "Rock Me Amadeus" but tragically died in a car/bus accident in 1998. (Yes, I know the big hit was Rock Me Amadeus but I was in the mood for Der Kommissar.)
Thanks to social media, this arrangement of Barry Manilow's Copacabana by Dutch musician Emma Wieriks went viral several years ago.
Last but not least, although he sings in English, there is Canadian Tom Cochrane, one of many (many, many) musicians who have hit it big in the United States. Today, with his group Red Rider, is the hit "Lunatic Fringe" from 1981. I love the beginning of this song.
And that's a wrap!
Join me again next week for another episode of Music Moves Me.
Today, I bring you skies from yesterday, several hours before thunderstorms hit our area of the Southern Tier of New York. What I did was point my camera at each direction and took a picture.
Now I can't remember which direction was which, so let's just let the clouds and sky tell the story. Direction #1
Spring has arrived in my zone 6a garden in the Southern Tier of New York. Or, should I say, it's been shot out of a cannon? That's how it's been: one flower after another, boom boom boom! And many of the flowers haven't lasted long, either, due either to the weather being either too warm or rainy. But other flowers are soaking it up.
Shall we peek outside and see what's blooming today?
Our tree peony flowers are just starting to open.
Euphorbia is in full bloom.
Violets are hanging on.
These are, or were, orange.
White and orange
Then, there are the almost-done-but-hung-on for GBBD flowers, like the last of my late daffodils.
But so many of my spring flowers didn't make it, even my lilacs, although one lilac hung on. My purple lilacs were disappointing this year, and I'm not sure why.
In my sideyard (very shady), cranesbill geranium.
Star of Bethlehem, which I never planted but showed up several years ago, being choked out by vinca.
In the back, another resident wildflower I never planted, yellow Corydalis.
We all dream about May, we in this clime, when the flowers bloom and the weather (maybe) finally becomes springlike.
Joining Carol at May Dreams Gardens for Garden Bloggers Bloom Day. Why not click on the link and visit other gardeners who, each 15th of the month, show what is blooming inside or outside their abodes?
Today
I am joining up with other Music Moves Me bloggers (and you can join us
at the linky above). We are a group of music loving bloggers who blog about music
each Sunday or Monday (or even later in the week). If you have music to share with us, you are most
welcome to join! (Music Posts Only-meaning at least one music video,
please! Otherwise, your post link may be labeled "No Music" or even removed.)
Every
other week we have a theme. This week's theme is "You Pick"
My last living uncle passed away earlier this month at the age of 100. I was fortunate enough to be able to attend his memorial service via the magic of the Internet (aka Zoom). I mentioned a little bit about him in my blog post yesterday.
My uncle was the lastborn of his six siblings (one of whom died as an infant), born into an immigrant family who had settled in Brooklyn. (Brooklyn is one of the five boroughs of New York City). My father's father owned a candy store in the Ocean Hill section of Brooklyn and all the children were expected to work long hours in the store. They lived in poverty, in an apartment that only had heat in one room (the kitchen).
My uncle excelled as a student, but his mother died when he was only 10 years ago. He was raised by his older siblings (including my father) and, eventually, he earned a PhD in chemistry. Much of his life was spent in the field of organic chemistry. But that only tells a part of his story.
As a college professor, he mentored many of his students. When I first visited him as a teenager, he and his family were hosting an exchange student.
He loved to work with his hands, and loved poetry. He memorized entire (long) poems like the one I posted yesterday. I remember him reciting Oscar Wilde's The Ballard of Reading Gaol on a long drive.
When my spouse was in basic training in the military, I lived with his family for two months in a small town in Iowa called Fairfield. Several years previously, my father and I had flown out to stay with him and his family for a week. What an adventure that was for a New York City born and bred girl.
Here are a couple of my blog posts about my visits to Fairfield, Iowa.
Some of the memories shared at the memorial service brought back happy memories of that time.
I wanted to share a song I remember from that time, and a couple of songs played at the memorial service.
Mason Williams and Classical Gas was released in 1968, when we visited my uncle and his family out in Iowa for the first time.
One of my Iowa cousins introduced me to Larry Fast/Synergy and their cover of Slaughter on 10th Avenue during my 1976 stay with them. You have to love electronic music to listen to this - for me, it was instant love.
And from the memorial service, two of my uncle's favorite songs.
Danny Boy was played by the pianist at the service so I decided on an instrumental.
Finally, John Denver and Take Me Home Country Roads.
My uncle didn't have an easy childhood or, in some ways, an easy adult life, but he impacted everyone (I suspect) he came in contact with. May he forever rest in peace.
And that's a wrap.
Join me again next week for another episode of Music Moves Me.
