Gwen, my neighbor who knows something about just about everything is home after what felt like six weeks but was only half that long. She was doing the European thing while I was home on Lucy duty. Lucy is her 15 year old gray and white with smudged-nosed cat. When Gwen goes away, she sets  Read the Rest…

I recently spent a wonderful afternoon with the lovely, the beautiful, the brilliant Anna Ellermeier, president of the student body of Western Washington University, soon to graduate with a degree in Spanish, and Law, Diversity and Social Justice; and formerly a voice and piano student of mine.  She made an apple tart with Granny Smiths  Read the Rest…

When my brother and I played Scrabble as kids, it was a triumph to spell a word at all, never mind scoring.  Even the high scoring letters didn’t improve our games because our vocabulary wasn’t up to our aspirations.  The only words with an x that we knew were ax and ox and we’d argue  Read the Rest…

I sealed up the last Christmas card this afternoon to be delivered at tonight’s Lessons and Carols service which begins an hour past my bed-time.  I voted against this schedule because not only do I have to be there, I have to be alert.  I direct the choir for one song and I play the  Read the Rest…

A year ago today I launched this web site.   Joan, my friend with the theological chops, had been telling me for years that I ought to consolidate all my mischief into one site.  She designed the first OK Chorale web site but she said her skills weren’t up to anything more complex.  Not wanting her  Read the Rest…

My friend Jenni, a student who single-handedly improved my sight-reading abilities by 75% by showing up with new music every week, recently accomplished something admirable: She went without words for a week.  Part of an Artist’s Way class, she called it her Reading Deprivation week.  She went without books, television and computer, explaining in part  Read the Rest…

  When I was at Whitman College in Walla Walla (not Spokane, that’s Whitworth) I was part of a recurring act called the Temperance Union.  Four of us donned the frumpiest outfits we could put together and performed “Away with Rum” to whoever would listen: We’re coming, we’re coming, our brave little band, On the  Read the Rest…