At a Jack Johnson Concert

I heard a story on NPR the other day that outlined the lag in the concert business this summer. Ticket sales are down and some shows and even some tours have been cancelled.

Ironically, this year has been my family's busiest concert year in some time.

Karen, the girls, and I cruised down to Virginia Beach on Friday for a Jack Johnson concert. The opening acts were ALO and G Love. It was a great show.

We were all four of us already Jack Johnson fans. The concert cemented that for us and gave us a good introduction to ALO and G Love. 

Jack Johnson uses his tour to connect people with his All At Once social action network, and with local non-profits who are invited to take part in the "village green" that he establishes outside each show. We chatted with folks from the Chesapeake Bay Foundation and Food & Water Watch before the show.

By the way, we read that Johnson has dedicated all of his profit from this tour to charity. I think that's pretty cool.

Gordon Sumner and the Royal Philharmonic!

Karen and I had the great pleasure of seeing Mr. Sumner, known professionally as Sting, perform with an orchestra last night in Camden, New Jersey. He was quite good.

We had traveled up to Radnor, Pennsylvania, yesterday morning to collect Christina from Cabrini College. She has just finished two weeks of ballet classes at Philadelphia's The Rock School, which houses its summer students at Cabrini. We packed her out and Colleen drove her home, while Karen and I checked-in to a hotel and got ready for the show.

We parked at Penn's Landing and took the RiverLink ferry across the Delaware River to the Camden waterfront and the Susquehanna Bank Center. That's a nice way to get to the show, though there was a loud, annoying, preppy dude yelling that we all had to sing a Sting song on the way across the Delaware River.

"It's a tradition," he yelled.

I always thought traditions were things that happened without someone yelling that you have to do it. But, in any case, he gave the rest of us something to bond around: "That guy is a boob." "Yeah, he is..."

Sting performed with a 45-piece orchestra, members of the Royal Philharmonic. He had his own percussionists, a bass player, a guitarist and a back-up singer. His music lends itself well to orchestration; it sounded wonderful.

Great Wisdom From Freddie Maugatai

The Discovery Channel program Deadliest Catch has been outstanding this season. I've been a fan for several years, but this year has been remarkable; not least for the story line involving the death of Captain Phil Harris.

I noted Captain Harris' passing back in February. At the time, I wondered how the show would handle his death. In the event, it has been one of the main story arcs for the season and has produced one of the best, most touching scenes in the show.

Phil had just suffered a massive stroke and been rushed off to the hospital. One son went with him and the other, the eldest, Josh, stayed behind on the boat to take care of the family business.

The scene I wanted to highlight finds Josh sitting in the wheelhouse uncertain whether he should stay with the boat or go to be with his father. Freddie Maugatai, a Samoan and a long-time and model deckhand, speaking in broken English, encourages Josh to go to his father's side and leave the crab fishing behind for a bit.

Season every year... crab every year. Dad? No.

The crab is always catch... we make money every year. But we cannot catch a dad every year.

I strongly recommend you watch the video. I've just quoted the small bit the touched me most deeply.

Personal Traditions: How My Family Celebrates July 4

I've been blogging since late 2004 and taking and posting digital photos since early 2005. So I have about a half-decade of documenting my life now on-line. This morning, I thought I'd take a look at how we -- the Lovely Karen and I and our girls -- celebrate the Fourth of July.

Most years, we spend the Fourth with elements of my family at my folks' place in North Bethany. We often attend the Bethany Beach July 4 Parade, we always lounge on the beach, eat great food and watch Bethany's fireworks show from the beach north of town.

2005
This was the first full year of my flickr/blogger obsession and the July Fourth celebration was just the sort of material I needed. I wrote a longish post about it that simply detailed what is our usual approach:

We spent the fourth with my folks, one of my brothers, and some family friends at Bethany Beach. We went to the Bethany Beach Fourth of July Parade, where I took a mess of photos. We spent the afternoon on the beach at North Bethany. We had a traditional meal of Burgers and Dogs, and eventually went down to the beach to watch the fireworks.

2006
Our 2006 Fourth was much the same. We always enjoy the Nur Temple Little-Car Shriners who turn parts of the Bethany Parade into a little Daytona .500. Later, the weather gave us some headaches:

... we waited for the sun to set and the Bethany fireworks to start. Unfortunately, a large thunderstorm rolled in and put paid to the fireworks show. So we sat and watched lightning from the living room.

2007
We broke tradition somewhat in 2007. Daughter #1 was finishing a lacrosse camp in Westminster, Maryland on July 4 so I spent the day driving out to pick her up and we joined the family for dinner later in North Bethany.

The Fourth was a Saturday that year so I spent the Friday night, after work, in a hotel partway between work and Westminster and finished the trip in the morning. I had stopped in northern New Castle County after work for a partial round of golf with my friend Sandy. The drive out to Westminster took me through some places I had not been before, including a lovely ride through Gunpowder Falls State Park.

2008
We were back to our normal Fourth of July activities in 2008. The parade included lots of politicians. And, oddly, Santa Claus.

We had a primary for the Democratic nomination for Governor that year and I was torn, since both John Carney, then the Lt. Governor, and Jack Markell, then State Treasurer, are great guys. I could cheerfully have supported either of them.

Ultimately, Jack Markell took the nomination and won the Governorship. He's been doing a great job, I think. John Carney is now running for Congress, where he would be a real asset.

2009
The parade was on July 3 in 2009. There were somewhat fewer politicians in the parade, because the elections were over. But this parade is a regular stop for some of our leading elected folks. Tom Carper, now our Senator, is one. I got a sweet shot of him greeting a young constituent.

Since the parade was not on the fourth, Andy and I had a chance to play golf on the morning of the fourth. We played Ocean Resorts, outside of Ocean City. We were back on the beach with our families for an afternoon of sun, dinner, and fireworks.

Somewhere in the last few years, we've added Andy and Lynne and their girls to our Fourth of July gatherings. They fit right in and add a new dimension to the holiday.

2010
This year Andy and I played our golf on the Third. And we included daughter #1's young man, who is visiting from out of state. He's a fine golfer and a good kid. He passed the test of golf-with-the-girlfriend's-dad with flying colors. Not that it was really a test; I just wanted to play some golf.

We're headed out to North Bethany for beach/burgers/fireworks soon. The parade will be tomorrow, for some reason, so I'm not sure if we'll see that this year.

Meanwhile, daughter #1 is starting a new tradition by crafting festive desserts for the family gathering. Among them is this Fourth of July tart which she photographed for me with her cellphone.

Why Are Mug Shots Always So... Off?

I keep noticing that the mug shots posted from time to time in the local papers are always somehow just "off."

This is a mug shot of a guy named Charles Willis and the police in Milford, Delaware, are looking for him. I know nothing about this guy, but his mug shot matches the off-centered-ness of many I've seen in the local press lately.

Why can't these mug shots be better centered? It's off-putting to see them this way.

Mid-Year Reader's Report

I have read 32 books so far this year. That is slightly ahead of last year's mid-year pace and about the same as at this point in 2008.

This year, I'm tracking my reading using a Google spreadsheet.

I finished book 32 -- A Lion Among Men -- last night. Seven of the 32 (about 22%) were purchased. The rest were from the Lewes Public Library (Yay, the library!). all but one -- Craig Furguson's memoir American on Purpose -- were novels. I read for escapism; I prefer fiction.

To get truly geeky, I have read 10,507 pages this year. That's an average of just over 328 pages per book.

(Ahem...) GOOOOOOAAAAAAALLLLLLLL!!!!

Ahh... That's nice.

The Steampunk Treehouse Comes to Delaware

Steampunk Treehouse
Originally uploaded by Mickipedia

The fine (but delightfully twisted) folks at Dogfish Head Brewery have arranged to give a home to the Steampunk Treehouse. The Treehouse was created in 2007 for the Burning Man Festival and has been erected for a few other festivals since, but has not had a permanent home -- until now.

Mariah Calagione explains on the Dogfish Head blog how the brewers reached out to Treehouse builders Sean Orlando and the 5-Ton Crane Arts Group last year:

We quickly realized that we were on the same page of a pretty off-centered book as Sean and his crew. We enthusiastically agreed to make a permanent home for the Steampunk Treehouse at our Milton, Delaware brewery.

I saw this blog post yesterday and found the idea fascinating. My nephew Magpie Killjoy spent some years publishing a steampunk magazine and has a good understanding of that world. I sent him a note asking what he knew about the Treehouse. He was excited at the news:

These people put a huge amount of energy into creating this entirely weird thing. And one thing that is beautiful about it is that it was built before steampunk got really codified and snobby, So it's the kind of thing that people now might say "oh that's not steampunk enough" or some such crap. I haven't seen it in person, but I was corresponding with one of the makers while they were working on it.

Cool that it's in Delaware. I was sad that it didn't have a permanent home.

One more reason to go spend more time with my off-centered friends at Dogfish Head.

At a Dance Recital

My view...
Originally uploaded by mmahaffie

The girls had their annual dance recital with the Sussex Dance Academy last night. I wasn't planning on taking any pictures, but a group of three very tall and very large-headed men sat in front of us. Our view was, therefore, somewhat obstructed.

It was a long show; the Academy continues to grow and now serves many students, girls and boys, of all ages. I looked around at the very large crowd before the show and realized just how much our friend Kate Walker's business has grown.

Class after class of dancers performed, from tiny, twirling tots to sophisticated and well-trained teens. They represented a cross-section of Sussex County, daughters and sons of dentists and doctors, teachers and farmers, cops and engineers.

Colleen danced a solo in the show. By tradition, graduating seniors have a farewell solo in the recital. She did herself proud, dancing her own choreography to Coldplay's "Yellow." Christina also stood out, she has developed into a fine dancer.

It's fascinating to watch these kids progress and develop. Christina now leads a core of talented kids who were gangly tweens just a short while ago. Behind them are younger boys and girls starting to grow into their talents. And in the many groups of very small kids being introduced to dance, you sense a number who get it, who belong on-stage and who will be part of the corps de ballet in years to come.

I'd just prefer not to be behind the big-head family any more.

An Afternoon of Golf

15th at garrison's
Originally uploaded by mmahaffie

A colleague and I took the afternoon off today to play 18 holes at Garrison's Lake Golf Course, just south of Smyrna, Delaware. Garrison's is coming back and offers good value for the money.

I had a fairly good start, but fell apart a bit on the back nine. I ended the day with a 115, about what I've scored each time out the few times I've played this year.

My drives have gotten better, but I was trying to hit my second shots with woods, instead of irons -- for the distance. Unfortunately, I wasn't hitting the woods very well at all. There are a few "blow-up" holes on my scorecard.

Still, it was a lovely day and we had fun.