Movin' Out, Movin' Along, Movin' Back....

Other than my brief report on baseball-related legends passing, I've been quiet here of late.  Last Thursday, we confirmed that the concrete casing from the side yard fence wasn't going to get disposed of unless we did the disposing.  It wasn't a long drive- barely a mile up North Forest to the highway department HQ- but there was the minor matter of getting it off the curb and into Eleanor's trunk.

We did have some help:

In the 25-plus years since Emily last rode around in this Little Tykes toy, it has hauled stones, pavers, planters and all other manner of things too heavy to carry from A to B. I rolled the concrete cast from the curb into the wagon, then we lifted it into the trunk, drove it up the road, and then dropped it in for its final one foot drive.

First we Found the Squishy, and now we have lost it. But the wagon lives to haul another day.

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The other oddity from the neighborhood came yesterday. Back in the spring, we got an envelope sent to our house, addressed to someone named Courtney. It had a Florida return address, and bore all the signs of a Gramma card. We've been here, then and now, over 25 years and I knew of no new recent move-ins to our street that might have been off a digit. It's also a fairly distinct street name for our entire area.

I struck out on finding the recipient, but I had Gramma's return address, found the phone number associated with it online, and called her. She asked me to mail it back to her, which I did, and then got a nice thank-you note from her a few weeks later:

Take a wild guess what showed up in today's mail? Another card for Courtney from Gramma.  Guess I'm calling her again;)

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Last night brought a baby step of back to normalcy: my first time in over six months in a restaurant for anything other than takeout, and the first live music I've heard in even longer.

The rules on this are bizarre. Licensed establishments which meet the COVID requirements for indoor and/or outdoor dining can have musical entertainment, but it must be "incidental." To the performers, that means a swift kick in the cash flow: the venue cannot advertise them, or charge specific admission for them (and places that tried workarounds like charging for "reserved" tables were threatened with the same loss of their liquor licenses). Plus, with no merch tables and practical if not legal limits on hat-passing, it's really up to the musicians and restaurants to just take their chances that they'll draw a good crowd.  Fortunately, last night's duo- Maria, who I met back in February and was one of the last four performers I saw in person anywhere that night, and Frank, who I'd never been in the same room with but saw for the first time in a streamed show back in July- have a good following. Including me.

Their gig was at a seafood place on Transit, well south of usual haunts, so I wasn't sure I'd see it from the road. No worries:



It had begun raining steadily as I walked through to their covered patio; that didn't stop them from singing-



- although a lack of roadies did require Frank to do his own cleanup between sets:



I got to say hello to both, somewhat distanced, thanking them for their performance. Maria, who I became Facebook friends with after the February gig, later confirmed that she didn't connect me as being that Ray; rain, dark and masks will do that.  It was just a start on the road back to musical normal, but I'm still glad I, and especially they, made the effort.

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Still made it to a park for this morning; only worthwhile picture was of me and the other two dogs, me complete with poop bag and Pepper probably off to the side making more:



Since then, a quiet Sunday, some spent reading up on the protests that have reached closer to home than Minnesota or Portlandia.  First was a pair of marches in a seemingly progressive section of North Buffalo, which came close to but did not end in violence when an agitator came out of a Hertel Avenue bar, knife in hand, dropping a slew of N-bombs and telling the protesters to get out of "our neighborhood." (His actual "neighborhood" is over 50 miles away in MAGA country; he was later charged with a hate crime.)  Then, over the past several nights, protests have arisen in Rochester over a previously unrevealed incident back in March when city police and emergency workers caused the death of a Black man under highly questionable circumstances. Words have been hurled in both directions, but overall the armed response to the protests has been, again, highly questionable. Fox News and its ilk have been broadcasting video of the protesters at their worst, without telling the whole story of why these people are so angry or about what is being done to many of them in response.

If that's all you've got to scare the "suburban housewives," bring it. We'll just keep pointing out who you consider to be losers and suckers.