I have eaten the city

One of the great things about living in a small city with two universities is that there's a vibrant cultural 'underground' with all kinds of amusements on offer. Though too often we're too preoccupied with simply getting all of our children to the end of the day without killing any of them, we do still manage to get out. Last night, we went to a late night improv session with these guys. I consider myself to be fairly in tune with musical currents, but I don't think I've ever sat and listened to anything like this. It was a fitting end to a day spent mostly trying to figure out how to stretch the definition of a 'map' to include certain mysterious old petroglyphs I'd seen. Now I can spend some chunk of today trying to do some stretching of musical definitions. I suspect the stretching exercises will intensify, as I have a season pass to this, and will spend as much time as possible using my ears from now through Sunday. I'll report back on any new sound mappings, of course.

Sadly, I missed some part of the intermezzo of last night's concert while on a short visit to the sandman. I blame the second glass of rum that I was driven to when, on arriving home from work, I discovered about nine children, not all of them mine, busily painting the front lawn and sidewalk in a dazzling array of colours. My first reaction was to be upset with them. My second reaction was to be annoyed with my unwarranted first reaction. My third reaction was to wish that rather than have any reactions at all, I'd been able to see what they saw and enjoy it. I think it was the fact that this took work and trying that bothered me the most and made me feel old, too insulated by multiple shells of deeply instilled responses to things. Those oven mitts again, perhaps. Alcohol sometimes helps to get them off, but last night it just made me sleepy. So I missed the part where Brandon did the cool trick with the end of his drumstick on the bottom of a cymbal.

Late tonight I'm going to something called "Barnyard Drama" which is described as "Sophia Loren meets Leadbelly in the dark, covered with Cornhusker's Hand Lotion." And if I don't soon make progress on this map thing, I'm going to duck out to go hear some Farsi improv at lunchtime.