Naughty or Nice
Dec. 21st, 2024 01:47 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
captainsblogTwo threads in the head as we head into the holiday week and the Solstice. Pick either or both depending on your mood:
The downs of the week, some mentioned in the last post's proposed solar expedition, involve bad assumptions and really bad hockey. I'll begin closer to home:
A few times in recent years, we had some issues with neighbors on either side of us. The longer and louder feud was with renters on one side, but we've reached a remarkable state of detente with them and have even had some positive communications with at least the husband. (The wife continues to give us stinkeye, but she wasn't the one making the trouble in the first place.)
On the other side is the couple who bought the cornering lot from a longtime dear friend of ours after she passed away. Our issues weren't so much with them but with the wife's brother, who was a regular visitor, serenading our summer evenings on our then-patio with very loud, often profane and probably drunk or stoned diatribes- not directed at us but they carried over the fence anyway. When we complained to them about it, his sister seemed a bit defensive, but her husband got really pissed that we were ruining their backyard vibe, and more than once in that standoff he referred to us using one of his favorite (and probably few four-syllable) words:
"Ridiculous."
It's one that has funnier associations for us on account of this old Odd Couple moment:
Things have been improved since that with them, as well. We've relocated the patio away from the noise (and occasional smells of cigars and weed), the bro has been less present and better behaved, and while we're not fast friends or anything, the detente to our east seemed to have settled in to our west as well.....
Until Wednesday night.
I was entering some late day work data into this computer when a "Facebook user" message started to appear down in the corner. This turned out to be from none other than Mr. Ridiculous himself:
Since we don’t have your phone number, and I don’t feel like walking through the snow to knock on your door, just thought this would be easier.
Thanks for calling the township on us about our camper. I know it must be a hindrance to you sitting in OUR yard.
"Our camper" is a fairly small RV they hitch to their truck. It showed up two summers ago, came and went throughout the camping season, and when done for that season was parked on the strip of their lawn between our driveway and theirs. That, apparently, is a Town Code no-no. Mind, if they had instead ripped OUT that strip of lawn and paved it, it would have been fine, but why should they have had to? We never said a word to them of complaint. The only time I can remember mentioning it to them at all was a few weeks ago when I was putting out the garbage tote and their dog was sitting inside the camper door, unleashed and looking perfectly content to sit there waiting for Mommy and Daddy to come get him. Apparently, though, someone in the neighborhood decided to play Junior Deputy Homeowner Association Enforcement Officer and snitched on them to the town. They likely got a form letter saying to remove it immediately or there would be daily fines. Right before Christmas, which they pretty heavily decorate for.
The Messenger rant continued:
You two are ridiculous. Wait till the summer when I jam my music again as loud as I can.
There's the R-word again, and the threat of Death by Decibels. And finally,
And do not shame yourself by saying you didn’t do it. No other person in the neighborhood would. The guy actually said it was our next-door neighbor. Just didn’t say which one.
So, he ASSUMED. There's an Odd Couple lesson in that one, too.
I showed Eleanor, and we figured some quick clarification was in order. We coated up and knocked, and could see him and Baxter the Dog in their living room. He saw us- and dropped his living room blinds, walked away and would not come talk to us. (The husband, that is. The dog wagged his tail as always but he has no thumbs to open the door.)
Classy. I did have his wife's contact on Messenger, so we told her flat out we hadn't done anything to report them. Her reply was a bit more conciliatory-
I’m actually not home right now but he said he sent something to you. I’m not sure why anyone would care that we have a camper parked on our own grass but we were told a neighbor called. It’s super inconvenient to have to move it in the middle of the holidays and the middle of winter so I’m very frustrated by the whole thing.
At least she didn't outright go J'ACCUSE! on us. I spent a half hour of the following day trying to get information out of Town Hall. They won't tell you who reported a code violation- if they even know, since you can narc on someone anonymously- but I'd hoped to get "the guy" to tell them, if he does know who, that it wasn't us. He wasn't there, but I got his card, and someone in the office also confirmed that, no, they're not going right back out to issue fines or anything until after the holidays. So there it sits for now, as unoffending to us as it ever was. We haven't seen them out to say anything, but my hope is that cooler heads will prevail in these colder temperatures.
----
Nothing's colder than ice. Except the local hockey team attempting to skate on it.
How far we've come from the happier times of barely a month ago, when I finally saw the Sabres play (and win!) on home ice. After that victory, they embarked on a three-game swing to the West Coast, one that in past years has returned them tired and decimated, yet they won all three games and were actually holding playoff spots under either of the two ways of qualifying! As I drove to an open mic a few Tuesdays ago, they grabbed a four-goal lead against one of last year's Cup finalists!
Which is, almost to the second, when it all went to shit.
Colorado stormed back and won that game in regulation, 5-4. That began what is now a current league-leading twelve game losing streak (with a few regulation draws resulting in a "loser point" here and there mixed in). The next longest of any of the other 31 teams? Three in a row. This team hasn't won four in a row in literally years.
Twice this week, the Sabres have played their closest rival, Toronto. The first was Oop North, and the schedule said it was an ESPN game. For no reason other than masochism, I went to see if the kids' expanded Disney/Hulu/ESPN subscription would get us this spectacle. The channel? There. Every other game? There. That one? Blacked out:P Just as well, because they didn't stand a chance against even a goalie making his first NHL start. They then headed to Montreal, facing the only Eastern Conference team below them in the standings. Their reclusive owner, fresh off an inspiring win by his Bills team over a favored Detroit home team, met the players and gave them all votes of confidence. It didn't help, or matter, as the Butterknives barely made a peep against Les Habitants who passed them in the standings when the final horn blew.
Last night, it was Toronto again, only in our building. Except this night it was their building, as disgusted Sabres fans all sold their tickets to Leafs fans who probably made up 80 percent of the crowd. I was in Rochester when it started (part of the nice part of this entry to follow), and their better-playing AHL affiliate Amerks were on the radio there, so I tried to stream the game from the Sabres' flagship in my car. Nope, another blackout, but just as well, because the Leafs again blew the game open early and held off a late comeback with some help from the REFSYOUSUCK. The sad thing is, unlike other years, the Eastern Conference is having its collective lunch eaten by Western teams and a few elites at the top of the East, and even a showing like last year might have been enough to break this team's record playoff drought. I see only one way they'll overcome the hole they've dug:
Grimace saved the Mets' season last June, but can he skate?
Whether or not you read all that misery, things haven't been all bad around here. A decent workweek is yielding to what will likely be a quiet multiple off-day one next, and it's been Mostly Music and some office camaraderie keeping things upbeat:
Thanks, Mom.
Though she wasn't part of the past week's nice things, I did promise to give some more spotlight to the Indigo Girls' opener from earlier in the month:
Lucy Wainwright Roche is the daughter of two famed folk singers. Dad is Loudon Wainwright III, who I first saw as the singing "Captain Spalding" in some early episodes of M*A*S*H. Mom is Suzzy Roche of the singing sisters I discovered in the 80s going by the Roches. Lucy has grown into a singing and songwriting career of her own, although her opening set was as much stand-up comedy as folk music. Several of her stories were delightfully memorable, one involving the singers she would spend the next two hours singing before and with. When she was about 8, she said, her mom was opening for the Indigo Girls, and she brought young Lucy to the band's hotel rooms. It was the first time I'd ever seen a minibar, she said, in a dry delivery that Stephen Wright would have been proud of. Amy let me have candy out of it. A brief pause, then the punch line that another famed Amy would have been proud of:
That's right. Strangers with candy.
After at least two of her five opener songs, she asked the audience, Does anyone have any questions? One shouted out what her best memory of a performance was. I don't know, but I remember my worst one. Lucy was invited to perform at what was pitched as an "American folk festival" The "festival," held on a July 4th, turned out to be a re-enactment of the Irish emigration to America with fake boats landing at a fake Ellis Island and fake immigrants touring a fake American city. Lucy's job was to stand in place and sing probably horrific shit like "Danny Boy" while the tourists passed by. Later, she segued to a different tale: she has now become a mom herself, and she enrolled her two-year-old daughter in a New York City preschool that happens to have a predominantly Portuguese speaking population. Before she embarked on this most recent series of opening gigs, one of the teachers, knowing her musical prowess, invited Lucy to sing at the school's annual holiday party. And, she quoted the schoolmarm, You can even sing in English if you want. Another brief pause, then punch line:
This might take the place of the July 4th re-enactment festival as my worst concert memory ever.
Her CD is full of loveliness and I hope to hear her in a full set sometime somewhere.
----
Another singer I did get to hear, at least a little of, was a stop on my snowy way home last night. It was the day of our annual Rochester office holiday event- held, as in previous years, at the local laser tag and axe-throwing emporium. I've had mixed results with the latter in recent years, but this year they added "krazy dart" games to the mix, and I did quite a bit better at that.
The drill remained the same: you registered your prepaid video game play card (with liability waiver, of course) with your "codename" of choice for any live games your group chose. This was this year's model, which has a story behind it:
Earlier in the week, a client brought in papers he'd been served with. The lawyers on the complaint were named "Zwicker & Associates." I've dealt with it before. They have offices in other states so apparently they designate mail for this one with an "NY" in their email address. Unfortunately, this is the first time they've noted that distinction in their email address, which makes it come out as, wait for it,
ZANYLITIGATION at ZWICKERPC dot COM.
That immediately got images in my head. Associates running around their office in propeller beanies, the sound of slide whistles in the background, three of them going through a door simultaneously and poking random opposing attorneys in the eye.
I decided I will sign my answer as a member of the Nyuk Nyuk Bar, but meanwhile I chose that nom de guerre for the evening's fun.
This is an event I enjoy more for what it is rather than the actual components of it. I don't drink anymore (they did have an O'Douls to indulge in with no alcohol), the food was totally off diet, I suck at the games, and I walked out of the gift exchange with a Lululemon travel mug, of all things. But it's just that this firm encourages everyone, and their spouses and kids, to have fun together for a few hours is more than any other firm in 40 years ever did. My last one before going mostly solo, which I met the principal of this one in, never did anything like a family-friendly outing; that head guy believed children, especially, were to be neither seen nor heard. My original firm did little other than a drunken passing-out- of lawyers and staff but also of the generous but never assured Christmas bonuses on the late afternoon of the last Friday before. I've watched kids of coworkers in this one grow from diapers to taller than their moms. The firm owner's daughter is now old enough to drink herself, which I guess balances out having me out of the alcohol consumption.
----
So, nice all round, but I decided to skip the axe throwing and headed home via a little club on the edge of the RIT campus that I'd never been to before and that was hosting a musician I'd been looking forward to seeing sometime somewhere:
I first heard Sarah De Vallière on WRUR, Rochester's NPR music station, and she commented she would be playing at a small club in Buffalo's Allentown neighborhood soon- but this was too close, too early and right on my way home last night.
Said station has gone through a rebranding recently, now calling themselves "The Route," but my car's bumper sticker still proclaims its longtime logo and slogan, as this venue in Henrietta still does:
(And unlike many places, their bar had many choices of NA beers, none of which are for wussies;)
This place didn't even exist until around the time Emily arrived there in 2010, but behind the bar at Lovin' Cup is a homage to Rochester's checkered past with musicians:
It was pretty disgusting outside and I'd had a long day of driving and darts, so I only stayed for a few of Sara's songs. We've connected on socials, though, and I will find my way to Allentown when she makes it there next year:)
And that's all the N's for the day.
Oh you troublemakers!
Date: 2024-12-23 02:43 pm (UTC)