Fabrics To Dye For Blog

Let's Put Some Music In the Thing, or, How I'm Teaching Jenny to Play the Guitar

When last we met, I was ranting and raving about the bozos who deliver the news to us. (Today's gem being the fact that there are fire ants and tarantulas emerging in the wake of the hurricane we had down here a couple of days ago. Here's a News Flash of my own, folks: Both fire ants and tarantulas live in Texas. They have this tendancy to come out when Bad Things happen to their habitat. It ain't the end of the world, and it really ain't even newsworthy, so get over it, ok? Good grief!!!! Next it'll be some kind of wildflower crisis or something...) Let's forget about them for now, since all they want to do is scare you silly (an impossibility where I'm concerned, that silly part) or create some sort of artificially contrived tragedy. Pooey on 'em; let's move on. In fact, let's move on to music!

 

That said, here's the truth of this gig. (Stephen Stills said that introducing the classic "Super Sessions" album and I've always wanted to use it. Finally I get to!) I've loved music all my life. I pretty much love it all, but at the end of the day my First Love would have to be rock and roll, with blues a really close second. Everything else is ok, but those two styles are pretty much where I hang out. Truth is, I just plain love the music. Love it. End of story.

 

For the greater part of my occasionally mis-spent life I've contented myself with listening to music. If a turntable or CD player (that's about as much technology as I'm capable of embracing at the moment, so don't bother to write me about the other stuff) were a musical instrument I'd be a virtuoso. They aren't, though, much to my chagrin and, perhaps, loss, so I've had to confine myself to being a closet musician, embracing fantasies of playing something, maybe anything, but never taking that Big First Step to learn how to do it. Until the divorce.

 

Let's set things straight right now, before we continue. I don't know where Jenny was for all those years, but I've been waiting for her pretty much my whole life. I'm about to take that giant step into my sixth decade, and she came into my life last year. It's a late start I know, but it's a whole lot better than no start at all. She's my darlin', ya'll. (I think I might have said that once or twice before.) I was, however, married before. Twice, to be exact, and the first marriage produced a daughter, and then a son. I love my kids, ya'll. I really do.

 

I gave my son a guitar, an inexpensive flat top, for our last Christmas together. He wanted to learn to play, and I wanted him to play too, so the guitar was  pretty much a no-brainer. Unfortunately, but setting the stage for The Appearance of Jenny, a divorce quickly followed that particular Christmas. There was Pain, and then the kids moved to The Big City, and I stayed in my tiny little Texas town alone. (Except for Reggie the Wonder Dog, but that's a story for another day.) Then it came to me---I'd buy my son a guitar! If I got one too, that would be something we could still do together! YES!!! So off I went to buy an inexpensive flat top of my own, secure in the knowledge that I'd done The Right Thing. That turned out to be not quite true, since my son went off into the world of electric bass and I had this acoustic flat top, but at least he was playing, and he was happy doing it. I bought him an amp, then sat down to try to figure out how in the world to play that danged guitar I'd just purchased. It was not an easy thing to do, mostly because I decided to eschew a guitar teacher and teach myself instead. What should have taken a few months took a few years, but I stuck with it and eventually learned how to play well enough to fool my friends who didn't. (My friends who really are musicians pretty much laugh, but that's life.) I played from 1995 until this very minute. It got me through that first divorce. I'm ok at it, too. Just ok, not Good, and certainly not Great, but every once in a while I'll plug in the Gibson and it all sounds like rock and roll  to me which is, after all, all I ever wanted to do.

 

Then came Jenny. She was in the back of the house one morning, and I was playing. She walked in on me and said something along the lines of "That's pretty good. I thought you were playing a record." My head immediately grew by about twelve hat sizes---somebody actually liked my playing! Wow! After that, I'd play while she was cooking breakfast, or lunch, or supper. She liked it, and I liked doing it. I think I may have said it before, but my ego truly knows no bounds. Then came The Day.

 

"Will you teach me how to play guitar?"

 

"I don't really know how to do it. I just make noises, that's all."

 

"Well, I like it, and I think you can play, and I'd like you to teach me. Will you?"

 

How could I refuse? We've already determined that my ego knows absolutely no bounds! Of course I'll teach you! You bet!

 

Now we sit down and play almost every day, generally after supper. She knows where several chords live, and she can play the riffs for "Bo Diddley", "Mona", and "Gloria". We're working on Buddy Holly this week. I'm not much of a teacher if the truth be known, but she's a great student and she's learning almost faster than I can teach her. I like it! Nowadays things are a little different around here.

 

"My fingers hurt."

 

"Yep. They will for a while, until you get some callouses."

 

"How long will that take?"

 

"I dunno. Wanna learn another blues riff?"

 

"YES! Let's get after it!!!"

 

That's my darlin', ya'll. It just don't get no better than that!

 

I've been playin' sunshine games,

All my lonely life.

 

Look around, look around,

Look 'round again!

  "Sunshine Games", Music Explosion, 1967 

 

And that's what I know. Be good to those around you and we'll talk again soon!

 

  hasta bye bye,

   phil

Neat Stuff in Our Yard, or How to Find Adventure in the Tiniest of Places

Hey Everybody.

 

Here we are again. It's been a while since last we've spoken, so there's lots of catching up to do, except that we aren't going to do that today since so doing would be entirely too linear. We are, instead, going to go on safari to our back yards. (Oh good grief---what's he doing this time?!) Why in the world would you want to do that, you might ask yourself? The answer to that one is pretty easy---it's something you can do without having to worry about it, or pay money for the pleasure of being able to experience it. You can just do it. You don't need permission from anybody, and there are no rules, no regulations, not even any pending carbon credits! Political candidates don't weigh into it, nor do OPEC, the Euro, foreign leaders you've never heard of before, or any of the myriad of other incipient tragedies that taint our daily lives. Let's ignore 'em all and go on safari!

 

Back yards (or gardens, or even a potted plant if you don't have a yard) can be neat things; miniature eco-systems right there under your nose. It's simply amazing what you'll find in them, and the tiniest things can often be the most impressive and, dare I say it (don't tell my guy friends I said this) wonderful to see. (Aquariums can be even better in some respects, but since they're controlled environments we're going to leave them alone today and concentrate more on the things we can't control.)

 

When my kids were little we used to play a game called Square Foot, so we'll start our safari there. What you do is lay down on your tummy someplace in your yard. Front or back, it doesn't matter which, as long as there's some sort of vegetation and a minimum of neighbors to think you've finally gone off your rocker. Figure out an area that's about a square foot, give or take. (Remember, none of this has to be exact. We're having FUN here!) Now watch it. If it were me, I'd lay there for an hour or so, but how long you stay there's entirely up to you. The main thing is to do it, and pay attention to what's going on in front of you. I suspect you're mostly going to be looking at insects, but you may have a garter snake or similar come to visit too, or maybe a toad or a skink. Mostly it'll be insects though, so be prepared for Low Adventure rather than High unless you laid down in a fire ant nest or similar, in which case we can't be responsible for your complete and total lack of good sense. 'Nuff said.

 

Anyway, now that you've amazed yourself with just how much life is out there, let's broaden the scope a bit. Go find a tree, or a bush, or a flower, and do the same thing. Once again, it's amazing what you can find there, almost without looking. Jenny put up a hummingbird feeder a few weeks ago, and the hummingbirds dutifully came to visit. The feeder ran out of the colored stuff you put inside them, and she went out to re-fill it. There weren't any hummingbirds at the feeder, partly because it was empty but mostly because they were all congregated at the big red flowers (No, I have no idea what kind they are, so they get to be Big Red Flowers in this missive.) at the corner of the patio. I suspect they liked the nectar in the flowers about as much as they liked the solution in their feed, and we really enjoyed looking at them.

 

Then there was the time, a couple of weeks ago, when Jenny came in the house and announced that there was a funny leaf on the side of one of our dog houses. I immediately went out to see what it was, mostly out of curiousity but also because a fella just never knows when he might need a good dog house to stay in. Investigation of said leaf produced, not a leaf, but a Cope's Grey Tree Frog, or maybe just a Common Grey Tree Frog, but a tree frog nontheless Too cool! I'd heard them in the yard for years but never seen one, and there this one was, spending it's day sitting on the side of the doghouse. We watched it for a while, then went inside. It went back into the trees once it got dark, and we haven't seen it since although we hear it every night, but we got to see it once and that was enough. What a treasure!

 

We've also got some common toads living by the patio. Jenny's put in mulch and flowers back there, in an area that was once just grass, and we're developing quite a little eco-system as a result. She found the toads more-or-less by accident; one of them jumped on her when she moved a pot. There was another one hiding there too, and we found two more a few feet away. Bugs like flowers. Toads like bugs. The Labs ignore the toads. It works for everybody, and we don't have to spray with pesticides. (We have a lot of Mediterranean geckos back there too, but that's a story for another time.)

 

Last week it was a turtle, a big ol' slider that one of the dogs had found and turned on its back. We turned it right way up (turtles and tortoises suffocate if left on their backs for too long) and it immediately began to beat feet to get out of the yard, but it was there. I've found more than a few snakes out there too, but we aren't going to tell Jenny just yet---I think she'll be cool with them, but that's one example of fauna that we need to work into gradually. They apparently don't have that many snakes in

Rhode Island

...

 

And that's what I know! We'll talk again soon!

  hasta bye bye,

    phil

Adventures in Housework, or How I Accidentally Flooded The Kitchen

Let's start off by holding one truth to be self-evident; most men don't cope well with housework. Some do, I suppose, and it really ought not be such a hard thing to do, but the fact is that most of us guys just aren't wired for it. There could be a lot of reasons for that, but I'm personally convinced that a large number of adult males possess a Stupid Gene that they've had since birth, and, further, that said Stupid Gene insures that we will inevitably do The Wrong Thing at the wrong time even when we actually meant to do The Right Thing instead. (There's a corollary there, though. We generally only get stupid when our wife, girlfriend, or significant other is there to see us do it; to catch and humiliate us.) Add to that gene a liberal dose of male logic ("It isn't really important to do it that way, is it?") and the skids are greased and waiting for that slide directly into the maw of Household Disaster.

 

We forget a lot of things too, and that doesn't help matters any. It's pretty easy to leave out the water when you make coffee in a coffee maker, for instance. It's also pretty easy to leave out the coffee, or the filter. These things don't constitute The End of The World As We Know It to most men, but they seem to annoy almost any spouse, even though it's only one part of this activity, the leaving-out-the-water part, really does any lasting harm since so doing can fry certain coffee makers. The other two are just messy, which is no big deal at all if you can persuade someone else to clean up said mess. The persuasion often involves admitting one's complete and total lack of sense, of course, but that's a small price to pay where hot coffee grounds are concerned.

 

Some people like to have clean floors, particularly in areas where food preparation and eating take place with any degree of regularity. I like clean floors too, but getting down on hand and knee to perform that particular task isn't much fun, and there's an easier way! Many years ago a friend of mine showed me how to get clean floors instantly, and with no muss or fuss. Jim and Kay had an infant daughter at the time, and also had a herd of dogs, three to be exact. The Patented Jim and Kay Cleaning Process went something like this: Make dinner, eat dinner, feed the baby. Stuff gets on the floor when you cook. More stuff gets on the floor when you feed the baby. Even more stuff gets on the floor when the adults (?) present spill things or drop food while attempting to avoid the projectiles launched by the aforementioned baby. The result? Stuff on the floor, of course! (Pay attention, doggone it!) The solution? LET THE DOGS IN! That's right, let 'em in. They aren't called man's best friend for nothing, you know, and they'll lick that floor clean faster than you can whistle Dixie. Simple problem; simple solution. No sweat, GI!

Then there's vacuuming. Most people vacuum their houses with some regularity (although I fail to see the point since the dust just goes away once it's had a chance to  settle into the carpet), but there are drawbacks to such premeditated madness. For example, anything tiny that's dropped on the floor will be consumed by The Vacuum Troll, that evil being that lives in the dust bag and devours Priceless Heirlooms with wild abandon. Vacuum cleaners aren't particularly kind to small mammals either, although we aren't going to discuss that one, and some of them, those evil devices that were designed for the sole purpose of bedeviling mankind, have a switch on them that lets you blow stuff OUT of the vacuum rather than pulling it in. The so-called shop vacuums are the prime offenders in that arena, but some others do it too, and the mess they make is profound. In other words, that stuff gets everywhere and, once again, the Woman of The House is not amused.

 

Finally, there's the dishes. They're a necessary evil, and they need to be cleaned with some regularity if such minor inconveniences as food poisoning are to be avoided. You can use dogs to clean plates and bowls, and sometimes cups too, but they don't usually do well with glasses or silverware; that eliminates The Dog Option from our list of cleaning possibilities, so we have to actually pony up and wash the dishes. I personally don't mind doing that---it's one of those mindless activities that suits me to a tee---but once you've washed the dishes you have to put them up, and that, my friends, is my own personal Waterloo. Putting the dishes up is no Big Deal; make sure they're dry and put them away. My problem is putting them back where they came from. My logic is simple: If I can find 'em, so can anybody else. You might have to hunt for them a while but they're there. Just look! (No, I'm definitely not brave enough to say that out loud!) Not everybody sees the world that way, of course. In my view us guys are just celebrating our free-spiritedness. The woman of the house, however, won't necessarily see things that way.

At this point in this ongoing diatribe you're probably saying something to yourself like "What about the flood? For cryin' out loud, would you stop babbling and get to the point? We want to hear about The Flood!!!" Ok, ok, I did say we'd talk about it, didn't I? Let's talk about it, then, but it really ain't much of a much, although it does, when all's said and done, show us plainly how unfair life can be.

 

There are two kinds of dishwashing soap, you know. There's the liquid kind that comes in a bottle, and there's the powdered kind. You can use the powdered kind in a dishpan, although it doesn't work very well since it never really dissolves all the way and leaves grit on everything it touches (besides which it doesn't get things very clean anyway). The liquid kind is another matter entirely. It works in the sink, and it will, by Golly, work in a dishwasher! People will tell you it doesn't, but it does. Just fill up that little soap dispenser and let 'er rip! The dishes get every bit as clean as if they were done with the powdered kind of soap, although there are, as the medical profession likes to say, certain side effects. With some types of prescription medications the user is exposed to the possibility of Infrequent Oily Discharge, a concept that frankly scares me to death. With dishwashing liquid you get another sort of discharge (or dishcharge, if you will); suds; lots and lots of suds. So many suds that no single dishwasher can contain them, no matter how well it may have been sealed when it left the factory. Suds, white lovely suds, simply gushing out of every possible door and orifice in that dishwasher---lovely white suds covering, and I mean covering, the kitchen floor, the countertops, the dogs, the kids. Suds from Hades. Suds that can't be stopped, not by anything. Suds that came to STAY. Suds here. Suds there. Suds everywhere! Yikes!

 

Where are the dogs when you need them?

  hasta bye bye,

    phil

On Creativity, Magic Markers, and Corporal Punishment, or Why It's OK for You to Draw On Things With a Marker When You Grow Up

I think I've already told you, probably several times over given my proclivity to repeat myself, that I now possess a certain seniority on life. That means, just in case you somehow missed the concept, that I'm getting old. It also means that a lot of things we now take for granted were Brand Spanking New when I was a kid. Transistor radios? Come and gone; definitely Yesterday's Papers nowadays, but I got my very first one in 1959. Frisbees? Hula Hoops? Yep! Saw 'em both come on the market! FAX? Oh the FAX! Remember your first FAX machine? Voodoo incarnate! Magic markers? You bet--them too! I think I saw and subsequently mis-used my first one in 5th or 6th grade, many years ago.

 

Now, we could talk about hula hoops, or frisbees, or transistor radios, but the title I put up there says we're talking about magic markers today, so that's what we're going to do.

 

Remember when you got your first magic marker? Remember how neat it was to write on a piece of paper, or on a cardboard box, or on the side of your dad's new car (don't ask), and how that black line just wouldn't come off? The things really were magic! You could write on pretty much any kind of surface, and the writing would stay put. Wiping it off wasn't an option. How cool was that? I mean, you could indelibly mark your gym clothes, put your name on your bike, or identify your swimming flippers so nobody would steal them at the swimming pool. You could put your name on your lunch bag. Gosh, you could mark just about everything!

 

Everything. Think about that for a minute, and maybe, just maybe, think about your own life, and those parts of it where you might not have been as socially responsible as you could have been.

 

 My initial Adventure With Markers occurred about ten minutes after I got my first one, when I put black stripes around the soles of my Keds, but that was Small Potatoes compared to some of the things my friends did (I, of course, would never, ever have done anything irresponsible!). For example, did you ever know someone who took a magic marker and put a peace sign someplace they probably shouldn't have, like maybe on an official vehicle of some sort? Did you ever know anyone who wrote something clever, something witty, something for the ages, something profound (like maybe "Hendrix is God") on their home room door just before first period? Did you ever witness someone write something thoroughly derogatory on a piece of paper and affix it to someone else's back in the process of giving him/her a friendly pat? (Did you ever wonder why anybody would tolerate being given a Friendly Pat On The Back, especially when the Patter had a big old pie eating grin on their face while they were doing it?) I bet you did. I'll bet, and I'm not even going to let you refute it, that you, yes you, did some variation of every one of those things with a magic marker and I'll bet, although it's one of those Sure Thing Bets that I couldn't possibly lose, that you did worse than that and you aren't going to tell anybody about it. I'm right, aren't I?

 

Then there were siblings. Little brothers and baby sisters could be a pain in the neck under the very best of circumstances, but they could also be an Opportunity for Creativity. After all, even though your Brand New Baby Brother was born without any hair, he didn't have to stay that way, did he? A mustache could be just the fashion accessory for a two-year-old. And we couldn't forget Little Sister, now could we? How about a fake black eye courtesy of Mr. Magic Marker, or maybe a classic "Kilroy Was Here" across the forehead? And how about when you got a little older and your best friend in college made the mistake of going to sleep (or passing out, depending on your circle of friends) in your presence? The opportunities for creativity in that particular circumstance could be unlimited, just unlimited!

 

Of course, every single thing I've just mentioned would get the perpetrator (you!) into untold trouble, grief, and misery if (or more likely when---it's tough to deny that's your name on the side of Dad's new Buick) you got caught. Spankings (I grew up in an era when parents could spank a miscreant without being reported to the United Nations for so doing), groundings, fiduciary penalties; all were possible results of innate creativity. Yikes!

 

Nowadays there's an easier way, and you won't (well, maybe you won't---you know your penchant for getting yourself into the occasional spot of difficulty!) get in trouble for doing it! Jenny sells fabric markers, and they're meant for writing on clothes. (Well, ok; they're meant for doing artistic things on fabric, but clothes are fabric, right?) Remember how much trouble you got in for decorating your brand new tee shirt with that magic marker when you were a kid? Nowadays it's ok to do it, if you do it the right way, the Right Way being fabric markers. They come in all sorts of colors that you (and me, and all of the Bad Actor friends of our misspent youth) could only dream about Way Back Then (and Jacquard, who make the Tee Juice markers, even sponser weekly and quarterly prizes where you can win money, yep; I said MONEY, for doing the stuff we used to get in trouble in those faraway times). The effects you can get with them are remarkable indeed. The Misdemeanors of Youth have morphed into, dare we say it; Fine Art! Art!!! YES!!! 

 

Fabric markers. You can design and draw on textiles. You can turn your plain white tee shirt into a veritable work of art. You can make the most mundane piece of fabric into something everybody can enjoy. And, I suspect, you can still draw on people. Nothing changes!

 

hasta bye bye,

  phil

Jenny Goes to Abilene and Makes New Friends

And we could probably stop this whole missive with the title, but we aren't going to, because I'm way too talkative for that! I'm not telling you anything you haven't already figured out for yourselves by now, but I do think you ought to know about The Abilene Trip. It was a pretty cool thing, not entirely without humor, and is worth the telling. And, most importantly, I'm going to tell it, so there you go!

It all started with an invitation from Gina, who's from the guild in Abilene. (I'm still trying to figure out exactly what a guild is, by the way, but Gina's in one, and Jenny used to be, so let's take that at face value and move on!) It seems that someone scheduled to speak at their monthly meeting was suddenly unable to do it, and they needed a stand-in toot sweet. Gina, bless her heart, actually reads this blog with some regularity which makes her a Regular Reader of sorts, I think, and noticed the part in one of my previous ramblings about Jenny moving to Texas. Phone calls were made, e-mails sent, an invitation given, and agreement reached. It was off to the Windy Wilds of Abilene for us!

Abilene is a really neat Texas city, around 180 miles give or take (that means I don't know how far it is) from the house. No sweat, GI; I can find Abilene with my eyes closed, and our Number One Vehicle, Gadget (so named for all the electronics packed aboard her tiny frame) can find anything, anytime. Just put in an address and there you are. Except, of course, that she had trouble with Abilene. She did ok getting us through the maze of confusion in South Memphis, and has navigated several major US cities without a hitch, but Abilene taxed her to the limit, it seems. Lessee now, how did it go...

"You should probably turn here."

"Here? Why? Gadget says go straight."

"Well, they're meeting in a church, and all the churches are over there, not straight ahead."

"How can you tell?"

"Because I can see them. Turn here."

"Where?"

"HERE!"

So turn there I did, because sometimes it pays not to argue. Mostly it pays not to argue, but I've never been that smart, but in this case I did the Right Thing and turned right, thus avoiding the normal festivities that result when one refuses navigational advice and turns where they think best, thereby prolonging the journey by some undetermined, but highly uncomfortable period of time. And there, almost right in front of us but a couple of blocks over, was the church. We'd done it! Well, almost, anyway. There was that part where I lost track of where Gadget was in relation to the rest of the world and cut in front of that car on a one-way street, but we aren't going to talk about that and, besides, I was only going one way!

We got there anyhow, and managed our arrival without any further drama, although there was that tiny bit of confusion about which part of the church we were supposed to go to. We got that one figured out with the assistance of a really nice guy that turned out to be the minister, and arrived at The Place. We got gadget unloaded and got everything set up by the appointed time and away we went, in a manner of speaking, speaking being what this is all about. I'd never seen Jenny in action before, and thought she was pretty darned good. I think the ladies of Abilene thought so too, because there were a lot of good questions and some really great discussion. New friends were made, and we're looking forward to going back there some day. (A couple of people asked me questions too, but quickly found that to be A Really Bad Idea because I don't know anything about quilting. They were nice about it, though...)

Speaking of which, Gadget got a little confused going home too, just before the road turned to go into Santa Ana. I'm thinking she (Gadget, that is) must have a friend in San Angelo, but then Gadget has gotten confused there too, and at Fort Chadbourne as well, so maybe that's not the case---maybe she talks to a satellite that has trouble seeing West Texas. Who knows? The main thing is, we got home ok, and really enjoyed the trip. Many thanks to the fine folks in the Abilene Guild, and we hope to see you again soon.

As for Gadget's nav system, all I can say is I think we need a new copy of "The Roads of Texas". So much for technology!!!

hasta bye bye,

   phil

Adventures in West Texas, or How Jenny Shot The Sharps

Here we are again, off on another expedition to who knows where. That's not true, exactly, because I do know where we're going or, perhaps more properly, where we've just been, and, of course, I want to share it with you. The adventure has nothing to do with quilts, fabrics, notions, or anything else that FTDF is about, but by now you've probably come to expect that of us, haven't you? Right, then! Let us proceed, but with the caveat that you're going to be getting a highly compressed version of The Story this time around. There was a lot going on!

This past weekend, ("this past" being the first weekend of May), I took The Fair Jenny to her very first reenactment, or at least the first one she got to go to as a full-fledged participant. We went over to Fort Chadbourne, an Indian Wars post between Abilene and San Angelo in West Texas. The fort, or what remains of it, is on a ranch that has been in existence since the 1870s (the old Odom ranch, I think), and it's a neat place, so let's talk about it for a minute or two before we get to the part where we discuss Jenny's Amazing Feat.

Fort Chadbourne is on private property, but Lana and Garland Richards, upon whose ranch the fort resides, are Texans in the truest sense of the word; people who are proud of their heritage and that of their state. Under their stewardship Fort Chadbourne is coming alive again. They've restored a couple of buildings already, and are presently working on restoration of the old Butterfield Stage Station, which is also on the ranch immediately adjacent to the remains of the fort. The Richards are people who care, and care intensely, about the preservation of the past. More importantly, they care about sharing it with others. They've made the fort site accessible to the public, and have plans for a visitor's center and museum on the property. There is an active archaeological dig in progress on the site. And, throughout the event, Garland and Lana were everywhere, helping out the 100+ reenactors who had come to portray frontier Texas, and personally thanking every attendee for making the trip. It was a truly special thing, given to Texas by two very special people. If you're ever in that part of the world I strongly recommend a detour and a visit.

So, you might ask, where does Jenny fit in with all this? The easy answer is Everywhere, but it might be best to tell the tale from the beginning. (I don't always start there, but today I'm going to. Makes sense, huh?)

I think I might have already mentioned somewhere in these tomes that Jenny and I went to the annual reenactment at Fort McKavett earlier this year. It was Jenny's first in-depth exposure to living history, and she liked it. It was there that she got to meet Gay and Bruce Frazer, owners of Frazer Brothers, one of the larger purveyors of reproduction Civil War and Indian Wars clothing and accoutrements in the country. (That's a plug, pure and simple, if you hadn't noticed.) Gay and Bruce are old and valued friends of mine, and Gay's on the board of directors at Fort Chadbourne, so an invitation was extended, countered by an acceptance. Appropriate clothing was gathered, plans were made, and it was off to The Wilds of West Texas for us!

We got there Friday night to discover that the Frazers had provided us with a brand new tent, not a wimpy modern one, but a proper tent, a period A-Frame some 12 x 14 feet on the ground and tall enough to play volleyball in. It even came with a nick-name: The Bridal Suite. Thanks Frazers; we owe you Big Time!

Friday night was spent getting re-acquainted with old friends, meeting new ones, and participating (somewhat reluctantly, we being of a rather conservative nature) in the general merriment, festivities, and mayhem that accompany any reenactment, and that lasted for a modest portion of the evening. We were able to climb into our bedrolls at an amazingly early hour, midnight or so, and for a while there it looked as though we might even be able to get a little sleep, when, all of a sudden, there sprang up (as if from nowhere) The Wind. Not just any wind, mind you, but a proper West Texas Wind; the kind that picks up full-grown cattle and deposits them in a different county. Our tent shimmied. Our tent shook. Our tent wriggled on its belly like a reptile, but at the end of it all, our tent stood. Bruce Frazer knows how to put up a tent, by jingo!

Did I mention that our tent stood? That's important to note, because some of the others didn't, and I got to spend a modest portion of the evening helping friends and neighbors keep their canvas in its appointed place. It built character, and helped to remind me why I've always enjoyed reenacting so much. It's a family thing, this reenacting, and everybody pretty much helps everybody else when trouble comes, but I digress. (I always digress, don't I? Let's just say it's part of my charm and move on...)

Our tent stayed put, and we managed to keep the others in our immediate vicinity from blowing away as well. We got Bruce safely back to his digs, which was necessary after he came out in bare feet to help with The Great Tent Flap (literally!) of 2008 and found all those burrs and stickers. (You never notice that stuff when you're wearing boots, you know.) The next morning we all walked around the various camps, recovering the assorted playing cards, tin cups, plates, and small children that had been blown away when The Wind came to call. Somewhere in there Jenny asked if the weather was typical for West Texas. I smiled.

Anyway, we survived the night, had breakfast, and got on with our day. Somewhere in there we wandered over to the shooting range that Garland had set up adjacent to the fort. Remember that part where I mentioned that the Richards were special folks?  The target, a full-sized silhouette of bull buffalo sat out in the distance some 600 yards away, and period weapons were there, available for the public to try out (under strict supervision, I have to add) for free, courtesy of the Richards. Jenny and I were standing there watching the goings-on when Garland turned to her and asked if she'd like to shoot the Sharps buffalo rifle. She thought about it for, oh, half a second or so, then walked over to the shooting bench.

Garland got her set up, and showed her how to line up her sights and set the triggers. She snugged up the rifle to her shoulder, got her breathing regulated, and squeezed off a shot. It takes a few seconds for a big old honkin' bullet like that (405 grains of lead in front of 70 grains of powder, if you're interested in that sort of thing) to travel 600 yards, but travel it did, rewarding Jenny with a good, solid metallic "whang" as the round impacted the target. To say she was pleased would be an understatement of considerable proportion. Yahoo!

You might say Jenny's right proud of that shot, and she quite rightly should be. I know people who have been shooting for years who can't make a 600-yard shot and she did it first try, and on a windy day to boot. I am proud, and quite impressed. That's my darlin' over there, ya'll!

Anyway, the weekend came to a close entirely too quickly, and it was time to put the stuff back in the truck and come home. We're back in the office now, working away, but I'm still thinking about the weekend, and I suspect Jenny's thinking about it too. We'll be back there next year, and I think Jenny's going to do some quilting next time around, so come visit with us, ok? We'll keep the coffee on for you.

hasta bye bye,

   phil

Wildflowers in South Texas, or Be Careful Where You Sit, Pardner!

Howdy folks, and welcome! Today we're going to talk about Spring and flowers, so pull up a chair for a minute and let's get started.

Spring has sprung down in these parts, although it's a strange sort of Spring by any standards. It isn't hot yet, and really hasn't been all year. Evenings of late have been in the high 30s and low 40s, highly atypical for Texas weather during this time of year. It hasn't rained all that much either, although that just might be a way of evening things out after last year's non-stop (and I mean non-stop) rain event, a weather extravaganza that lasted as long as the one experienced by that Noah fellow, albeit without all the animals. So there we go, goofy weather in springtime, a condition guaranteed to send the national media into paroxysms of "the sky is falling the sky is falling" as they are so wont to do at the least provocation these days. At the end of the day it's a simple concept though; this is Texas. We have goofy weather, and lots of it. It's normal. Ordinary. Everyday. The sky ain't fallin', it just ain't hot yet, a blessing of sorts.

We didn't convene to discuss climate, though, nor doomsayers, nor the national media, nor even the potential effect of the Wooly Bear Caterpillar on whatever a Wooly Bear Caterpillar could have possibly have any kind of an effect on. That's poor grammar, or syntax, or something equally erudite, but it's also true. We are here today to discuss Texas wildflowers.

Anybody who's been to Texas in the springtime has seen bluebonnets, one of the prettier flowers around in my never-humble opinion. Indian blanket is coming in, as is its cousin Indian paintbrush. The few sunflowers that visit this far south are beginning to show themselves, and a myriad of other flowers are in full bloom as well. I think the lavender might be out too, although I'm pretty sure I wouldn't know what a lavender looked like if it came up and bit me. That's sad in a way, since our community recently declared itself to be the lavender capitol of the known universe (on what grounds I don't know, but we did it), thus presuming that we all know what a lavender is. (I did once have a lavender shirt back in the 60s, an event that went totally un-noticed in my community at the time, but I digress...)

Getting back to wildflowers; my personal favorites, but don't tell anybody because I'm a guy and I don't think we're supposed to like flowers since we're rough and tough and all that stuff, are the little bitty ones. I mean really itsy-bitsy, teensie-tiny little flowers, none bigger than 3/16 of an inch in diameter at best. The little guys come in all manner of colors and patterns, generally grow in little clusters and are really pretty, much more so than their more extravagant cousins, at least in my mind. It's worth getting down on hand and knee to look at them. They're weeds, of course, as are all wildflowers when all's said and done, so they end up getting whacked by the lawnmower at one point or another, but then flowers are a passing thing anyway. There's a certain irony there, I think. I have these beautiful flowers in the yard that I truly love, and at some point in the equation I mow 'em down with the dubious fruits of Technology! It's a plot worthy of Poe! Beauty. Tragedy. Irony. The plot could be made into a major Hollywood production!

Or not.

Sometimes, depending on the flower and how wet the Spring has been, it's possible to have acres and acres of countryside covered in wildflowers. Once, many years ago, I had entered a motorcycle enduro being held about seventy miles east of where I now live. I'd decided that active participation in motocross, my former motorsport of choice, was probably a bad idea since I was getting older (in my late twenties!) and had responsibilities that would soon include a child so, without further ado, it was off to the "safer" world of enduros. The event under discussion was a 100-miler across country far rougher than any motocross track I'd ever ridden, and with a time requirement to be observed. I pooped out after about fifty miles (this was my first event---that's my story and I'm sticking with it) and took a short-cut to get back to the start/finish line and my truck before death, or at least a heat stroke, overtook me. Somewhere in there I crossed a pasture, several acres worth, covered with Indian blanket as far as the eye could see. I rode through them slowly, marveling at the wonderland passing beneath me. They really smelled bad, but I think that's because there were millions of them there---too much of anything is bad, you know---but the memory of their colors is vivid to this day. That's the Beauty part.

There's a down side to everything, though---balance in the universe is one excuse that's frequently offered for the phenomenon. During the same time period a friend of a friend, a young lady in her mid-twenties, decided that the flowers were so beautiful that year that she had to take her infant daughter and photograph her in the midst of nature's abundance, which she proceeded to do forthwith. I'm told the pictures were great, and her daughter was just fine with the experience (something that isn't necessarily a given with small children, who can become absolutely terrified by the most innocuous of events), but our intrepid photographer was bitten in her sit-down place by a Brown Recluse, a spider who's venom inflicts severe discomfort, misery, and scarring upon those it visits. I suspect the scar is still there. That, my friends, is the Beast part, but it's pretty unusual that that sort of thing occurs. I mention it only because I remembered it and was running out of things to write about. The bottom line is that Texas is awash with color these days and it's wonderful. I think I'm going to collect Jenny, put the top down on the roadster, and go explore some back roads. We'll be thinking about you!

hasta bye-bye, phil

Doin' That Blog Thing One More Time

Howdy Ya'll, and welcome back.

It's been a week or two since last we talked, so it's time to catch up, I suppose. Up to this point all my ramblings have been directly concerned with something or other to do with Fabrics to Dye For. Today's installment will be more of the same, but with a little bit of a twist to it. Therein hangs a tale (somebody famous said that, I think), so here's mine:

Way back last year some time, I worked as a buyer for a manufacturer of small airplanes. I've been doing that sort of stuff most of my life, although my previous adventures in that direction pretty much leaned towards Great Big Airplanes, I.e. airliners. It was time for a change though, so off I went to work in the Wonderful World of General Aviation. In all of my former jobs I'd been a raw materials guy, and a processes guy, and a structures guy, but you do a little bit of everything at a small company, so there I was, doing the aforementioned Little Bit of Everything, an endeavor that sometimes involved things I'd never bought before. That said, it came as no great surprise the day I received a purchase requisition to go buy some Finny scissors for our upholstery department. As you know Finny scissors are pretty much top-of-the-heap scissors, although I didn't know it at the time, which means I really didn't know where to buy them either since they weren't an aircraft material, process, or a piece of primary or secondary structure. Fortunately, the requisition had a source on it, replete with contact information. Aha!, said I. A no-brainer! I can cope with a no-brainer---I'm an adult male and that's one of the things we do best---so it's off to the phone to order the scissors. That's pretty much Act 1.

Act 2 ran as follows:

The supplier didn't have the quantity of the particular Finny scissors that we needed in their stock, which meant that said supplier had to go to their distributor to obtain same. The distributor messed up the order and didn't book it, so the scissors never came, thus guaranteeing daily visits from the manager who oversaw the upholstery department. As you may or may not be able to imagine, getting scissors into the company wasn't as high on my list of priorities as certain other commodities were. In fact, on a scale of "If we don't get this on time the whole company will shut down!!!" to ten, the scissors weren't very important at all. The upholstery shop already had scissors; they just didn't have Finny scissors!  Add to that a big dollop of my innate procrastination, and you can well understand that The Great Scissor Tragedy of 2007 sat for a while, festering the whole time, which is another way of saying that some of my discussions with the aforementioned manager were somewhat sporty in nature. Entirely counterproductive, but sporty nonetheless. Finally came The Day;

"Hey Boss. What's up?"

"Phil, what's this I hear about scissors?"

"Upholstery thinks they need some."

"Have you bought them yet?"

"Sure, but they aren't here yet. There's a problem at the distribution level."

"Go fix the problem, and do it now. Don't do anything else until we can assure them they'll be swimming in scissors. Scissors, for crying out loud. How can we possibly have a manager upset over scissors?"

I thought about that question for a minute, but didn't give the answer I really wanted to. It was a respect thing, because my boss was (and still is, as far as I know) a Seriously Good Guy.

"Right, Boss. Scissors. I shall Work the Problem."

So I went off to do same. A quick e-mail to the supplier revealed several things: The person I'd talked to thought my name was Richard (because that was the name on the corporate card); the scissors were still hung up at the distributor, and an apology was in order. It was an innocuous beginning, but it led to a series of e-mails that led, in turn, to a phone call which, in turn, led to other phone calls, which led to a supplier visit to Austin, which led to other visits, which in turn takes us to Act 3.

Jenny and I got married last weekend. It was a wonderful day, maybe the Best Day of my life to date, and looks to be only the beginning of an equally wonderful life together.  I'm happy. Jenny's happy.

I think there may be a photo of the event around here someplace. I'd like to share it with you, but Jenny's going to have to do that for me since I don't have a clue, not the slightest clue, how to do it, which means that you may or may not get to see it---that all depends on Jenny. (If she does append a picture to this, you might want to remember that we're reenactors, which explains our somewhat dated attire.)

And there you have it! Many thanks to Galadriel, Patrick, Gay, Grace, Jan, Dennis, Frank, and Pam. I've never been happier. Yippee-yi-yo-ki-yay!!!

hasta bye bye,

  phil

Neat Things Coming, or How We Broadened Our Horizons In One Not-Particularly Easy Step

Howdy, Ya'll.

This is going to be a really short edition of whatever it is I'm writing here, because it's almost an announcement of sorts rather than my usual illegible and barely intelligible scribblings. We're going to be adding a few things to the items we already carry here at FTDF, and we're really excited about it. We think you will be too. The long-term plan will add a number of things to the plate, but today we'll just talk about a few.

The first and maybe most exciting new thing to tell you about is that we will now be handling airbrushes. I'm going to guess that most of you know what an airbrush is, but for those of you who don't, envision a tiny spray gun about the size of a medium-sized felt tipped pen. Airbrushes work well with all sorts of mediums, utilizing a variety of different tip sizes in order to spray different consistencies of product. The better ones (the ones we'll be handling) all offer interchangeable tips so the material used can run the gamut from inks to dye to paint. We'll also be able to supply hoses and small, affordable compressors. The brands we'll be handling are Badger and Paasche but they aren't in our product list yet, so please give us a call if you're interested in one (or if you just have questions about them) and we'll be glad to help you out.

We're also going to greatly expand the beading supplies we'll be carrying. This is one arena where you'll definitely need to talk with Jenny; she's our Resident Expert on that sort of thing. That particular craft dovetails very nicely into the things we already support and we're looking forward to that addition to our present product offerings.

And speaking of Jenny, the craziness associated with the move to Texas is now largely behind us and she's resumed fabric painting after a hiatus of several months. She's back in the saddle, and we're looking forward to neat things in the days ahead. Stay with us and we'll keep you posted on that one.

We're also adding to our staff. Galadriel, a resident of Austin, Texas, is working with us behind the scenes (at first, anyway---look for her at Texas quilt shows in the months ahead) to make your customer experience more pleasurable. She's a great addition to our staff, and we think you'll be as impressed with her as we are. Stay tuned for more details!

Finally, and perhaps surprisingly to some, we're going to begin an exploratory foray into the world of educational toys. The logic for that one is simple: A lot of us have kids, and a lot of the stuff being offered to the children's consumer market these days is intended purely for entertainment and not for education. We happen to think that's wrong. Kids need to have fun, but that fun ought to include a little learning too, so we're investigating things to offer you to stimulate your children while you quilt, sew, and otherwise participate in all the activities that FTDF have supported for so many years. We think it's the right thing to do, and hope you agree with us. Once again, details will follow shortly.

We're looking forward to nothing but sunny days ahead and hope you'll continue to share them with us. 'Til then,

   hasta bye bye,

      phil

Ever been to Chuy's in Austin?

What an odd way to start off a blog/essay/whatever-this-is, right? How many of you have ever heard of Chuy's in Austin ? Let's see some hands. Hmmm, not too good. How many of you have been to Austin? (That would be the one in Texas, just in case there are any others scattered around the country.) OK, that's a little better. How many of you have heard of Austin, Texas? Finally! Now we're getting someplace, so let's talk about Chuy's.

Chuy's is a restaurant, or more properly restaurants. I think it's turned into kind of a chain (darn it!), but it started out as one restaurant in Little Old Austin. They serve pretty good TexMex food, and are a fun place to go. In the Old Days, when there were only a couple of them around and those only in Austin, you could actually tell your server how spicy you wanted your food to be. Those days are long gone, but everybody in Austin and surrounding environs knows about Chuy's and has, in all likelihood, been to one. Jenny and I hang out at the one on North Lamar, a fact which will become significant in a few minutes, although you really need to go to the original---the one on Restaurant Row---to understand the innate coolness of the thing. Add it to your list of to-dos when you next come to Austin.

At this juncture you would be well within your rights to ask why in the world I'm telling you about a restaurant in a column that's ostensibly about stuff related to quilting and fabrics. It's nonsensical, right? Well, no; it really makes perfectly good sense if you look at the world the same way that I do, and therein lies a tale.

Almost every Saturday afternoon, pretty much without fail, I drive in to Austin to go to King's Hobbies, my favorite aviation-related hobby shop in the universe. I'll spend an hour or two there and then go to supper with friends. That's supper's almost inevitably at Chuy's. Some of the wait staff know Brad, Brian, myself, and, now, Jenny, by first name, and we have a lot of fun while we're there. There was a time, not that long ago, when Jenny had yet to come into my life. In those days the Chuy's Run generally consisted of just Brian and me, or maybe Brian and Brad. We would usually get over there around four (that would be 1600 hrs local for anybody who keeps time that way) because by so doing we could beat the Saturday Night Supper Crowd, which anyone who'd ever been to Chuy's (or any other Austin restaurant) would describe as A Very Good Thing to Do.

Right, then! Let's jump back a year or so. It's four PM (or 1600 hrs local), and Brian and I are pulling into the parking lot at Chuy's on North Lamar. There's generally no lack of parking places at that time, but on the particular day we're discussing the lot is jammed. People are parked everywhere. We eventually find parking places and go into the restaurant, where we actually have to wait a while for a table. Now wait just a ding-danged minute; this ain't right! Chuy's is never like this at four in the afternoon. Where'd all these people come from, anyway?

That's the part where Brian remembered that there's a small civic center across the street. It's usually a busy place, what with gun shows, car shows, collectables fairs and the like, but none of those things had ever caused Chuy's to be packed like it is. What's up? Well, we started to surmise (a fancy word, that) what it could be that was causing our dining discomfiture. Let's see now; politicians? No. A gathering of medieval huntsmen? No. Sailors? No. We could hear those people talking all around us, but what we were hearing didn't make a lot of sense. Ten, maybe fifteen minutes passed, and we finally decided to do what we should've done in the first place---we asked our server.

"Hey, what's going on here?"

"Whaddayamean?"

"All the people. What's going on here?"

"Quilters."

"Huh?"

"Yeah, it's a quilt show. They do it every year. All these people are quilters. Pretty cool, huh?"

"Uh yeah, sure. Cool. Right."

"It's only once a year and then they'll go away. Eat your supper."

"Yes Ma'am."

And we did. Ate our supper, I mean, and then we went away. While I was driving home I thought about where I'd just been and what I'd just experienced. (It's a fairly long drive back to Blanco.) The conclusion I arrived at wasn't much of a much, and didn't require a whole lot of thinking. It was a simple thing---there are a lot of quilters out there. They completely filled the civic center; put more people in there than the train guys, car guys, gun guys, flower guys, reptile guys, or any other kind of guys had ever done, maybe more than all those folks put together. It was impressive, and maybe a little scary. Could quilters be conspiring to take over the world, or at least Austin? Nah, probably not. There were a bunch of them though, and I expect they'll be back in another month or two. The big difference this time will be that Jenny will probably be there with FTDF, and I'll probably be with her. In there. In that civic center. With the quilters. Yikes!

But maybe it'll be easier to get a table at Chuy's that day!

   hasta bye bye,

      phil