Spring Break isn’t really a thing that adults have, but I sort of have one. This coming week the college is off and the following week the before-school school is off and so I get some days off (with some finagling of my private students and careful guardianship of my days and having to say no to things.) Anyway, so I’m really looking forward to having some downtime and doing a little trip which I’ll tell you about later.

We’ve been pretty busy here, though not overwhelming. I was going to take a local audition here but it got canceled so I’ve been a little lazy with practicing outside of being ready for various gigs (one of which takes up quite a bit of today.) I had been having some buzzing on my violin since…all winter?…and I found a time to take it in. It turns out there was a small crack and then some open seams, and at one point my luthier sent this picture.

But I have it back now and it is sounding much better!

I say we are busy, but it’s really just normal stuff lately. We did see a concert last Sunday night as part of the Great Artists Series at Wash U–Tafelmusik, which was really terrific. I have to say, the GAS has been pretty intense this year: 5 concerts in 3 months I think. But it’s all been really high quality and terrific stuff and I’m glad we are subscribers.

Friday night we went out to dinner at Lily’s, our favorite family owned mexican restaurant, and inadvertently just beat the rush: evidently they’ve been swamped all month due to a social media post. Which is great for them but less great for us, haha. After that we needed to watch a movie for the film club we belong to, so we watched All of Us Strangers, which was very thought provoking though we both had trouble keeping our eyes open.

Yesterday we went out for a late morning walk and ended up deciding to get brunch at Winslow’s which is a nice 30 minute walk from here. I had a gig after that downtown at the Hyatt, and snapped this nice picture of the Arch.

It’s just on the other side of the highway.

After the gig we went to see the Arianna String Quartet play with the Kyo-Shin-An Arts at the Touhill Theater at UMSL. I really enjoyed the concert! We came home and watched an episode of Mr. and Mrs. Smith (which we started a few nights ago, it is not great, and might actually be terrible, but it’s entertaining enough) and then went to bed early to prepare for the time change, haha.

My neighbors’ tree looks so pretty out the window of my teaching studio.

I’m deep in planning mode right now, trying to work out the summer plans. We have a big trip planned in the late summer and a small trip in May. We plan to visit my sister’s family in Chautauqua at some point, and I have some interesting work things that I’ll find out about for sure next week. I don’t know if it seems early or late for you at this point: do you have your summer travel plans set or does it seem way too early? I find people are in one mind or the other, but I got asked to play a concert in February 2025 the other day, so it’s just how my schedule operates. This job requires advance planning and so many details!

Miles has been using this one part of the cat tree that he never did before. It’s always exciting when they do something new! I wonder how they decide these things. Wouldn’t it be amazing to be a cat for a day, or an hour, just to learn how they think?

I almost titled this Monday Musings, but then I remembered it was Tuesday! I didn’t have my school class yesterday because of Presidents Day so it sort of felt like a Monday today.

We attended the Doos Trio concert last night at Washington University and it was fantastic! Here is the description from the website: Three masters and old friends join together in a new collaboration. Kayhan Kalhor, Wu Man, and Sandeep Das are established soloists in their individual traditions. Their new trio highlights the ancient traditions of Iran, China and India in a 21st century program. Three-time GRAMMY nominee Kayhan Kalhor is an internationally acclaimed virtuoso on the kamancheh, who through his many musical collaborations has been instrumental in popularizing Persian music in the West. Recognized as the world’s premier pipa virtuoso and leading ambassador of Chinese music, Wu Man has carved out a career as a soloist, educator, and composer giving her lute-like instrument a new role in both traditional and contemporary music. A Guggenheim Fellow and GRAMMY-winning musician, Sandeep Das is one of the leading tabla virtuosos in the world today. Since his debut concert at the age of 17 with legendary sitar player Ravi Shankar, Das has built a prolific international reputation spanning over three decades.

Things that I loved: how much FUN the musicians were having playing together (AND it sounded great), and how interesting it was to watch Kayhan Kalhor play the kamancheh, which seems like a precursor to the violin. I just really loved the concert, and wanted to get up on stage and improvise with them. It seemed they had some things that were set (endings for sure) and other things that were improvised, and that is exactly the sort of thing I was teaching in Creative Ability Development before scheduling got the best of us. I think so much of jazz improvisation has more rules than I want to deal with and I prefer improvising in a more free way and just having fun with it. This doesn’t mean that an auditorium of people will enjoy listening to me improvise, but the fun of it is the same. So much of music should be more focused on how fun it is to PLAY and not so worried about the audience and what the audience thinks. We tell kids not to worry about what other people think, and then we tell them they have to perform in certain ways so the audience likes it, and that certainly seems like a mixed message!

I made bread in my bread machine on Sunday. I rarely do this, and yet the bread is always so delicious. In this case, the bread was also really tall: I made a “large” loaf, forgetting that usually I prefer the “medium” size as it is not quite so tall.

Muriel was being adorable in my chair here. I took a series of photos as she kept changing position.

She was trying to set a trap with her belly, but I don’t think petting her was a wise move at the time.

After Friday’s snowstorm, the weather yesterday and today seems quite lovely. Most of the snow is gone, though not all, and I took my coat off this morning while running errands. February is always a crazy month with the weather.

Louie has come around and decided he does like the look of the fake plants in the sunroom. I find this is often the case with him: he is hesitant to trust my ideas with decorated, but then once I set it up (after convincing him to just let me try things out) he tends to come around. This gives me the thought that I have a good eye for decorating, which may not be true, but I do know what I like to look at. I’m considering some other decorating changes and trying to decide whether to just pull the trigger or wait longer and keep looking around (likely).

How’s your week going? Do you have snow on the ground where you live?

Yesterday we had a bit of a surprise snow day–the weather people had predicted an inch or so, and nobody believed them anyway because it had been so warm. Snow started falling around 10:30 am, and by the afternoon it looked like this.

I think we had 3-4 inches! There were definitely some times the roads got bad, but luckily I was just up at Wash U which is just a few minutes drive (it’s walkable, but I often drive when I’m teaching to save time and also because carrying all my teaching stuff makes the walk awkward.) I enjoyed getting a taste of snow driving on my way home! I was supposed to play in a small concert that evening and it got canceled, so Louie and I went to a nearby restaurant for dinner and then watched Caddyshack (he had never seen it! so we had to watch) and started watching the show Bodies. We have also been watching Fisk this week, which is hilarious.

I did a little decorating in my “sunroom” this past week: it is a waiting area for students primarily, and I recently acquired a second comfy chair for it, so we finally set up a little corner conversation area and I added some artificial trees. Louie suggested that artificial trees weren’t an improvement over no trees, but I am not sure I agree. What do you think about fake plants? We may try our hand at a real plant or two as well, but it’s one more thing to do, you know?

The room still needs some new paint, but that’s on the list. And I will get a different plant pot for the plant, the box is temporary.

Muriel loves the fake plants and knocked one of them over last night…

And Miles is mostly just content to lie in his hammock on sunny days.

Other than the snow, this week has been busy but uneventful. I know it’s bad to be busy, but it seems unavoidable. I also didn’t feel at all well one day (sort of two, some odd stomach issues) but I’m feeling better now. We had a low key Valentine’s Day and had a takeout meal from the Whittemore House. I got my students signed up for the Music Club Spring Festival, which is always a THING and I’m glad to have that done and now they just have to finish learning their assigned pieces. I’m playing a concert tomorrow night with the Metropolitan Orchestra of St Louis (NOT to be confused with the Metropolitan Orchestra as it was at a recent performance), and today we have rehearsal. I taught many students, missed a few, have some today (sadly) and then tonight we are going to the symphony to see a variety of pieces including Carmina Burana. I did get Friday morning off from my school job (this coming Monday as well) so I am slightly more rested than usual.

Anyway, I’d better get going to my rehearsal and not fritter my whole morning away drinking coffee and typing, so I’m off. It’s sunny but cold today so the snow will likely stick around for the most part.

I’m nearly to my first weekend post Funny Girl and it’s going to be great! We are having some friends over for dinner on Saturday night–doing our go to of fish tacos, since we haven’t made them yet for these particular friends, so it should be low stress and fun. Sunday we have a short quartet concert in the afternoon and then I know Sunday night for many is the Super Bowl, but we aren’t big football fans here, so it’ll probably be dinner and watching something on Netflix. We started Griselda the other day so maybe that if we haven’t finished it yet.

It’s been a good week overall. I had an orchestra rehearsal last night for a group I play with: we are doing Tchaikovsky Romeo and Juliet and Mendelssohn’s Midsummer Night’s Dream along with some other stuff, and it was fun to play in a big group. My real love is orchestral playing, and I rarely get to do it, so it’s always nice.

The weather this week has been mild and lovely, and either we are going to seriously regret this in the summer, or it’s a nice respite, and I guess I’m saying nice weather in early February makes me a little nervous, but I’m still trying to appreciate it. If it hangs around for Saturday we’ll get out for a hike or trek in the park or something at least.

I haven’t been taking any interesting photos, sorry, so assume my cats are doing cute things. Miles has become more friendly and has started coming out to say hello to some of the students, which is a truly astounding thing: he has been so shy and his typical MO is to hide, so coming out to say hello is really exciting for everybody!

We had a meeting of the neighborhood movie club this week. Due to my schedule being tight, we attended on Zoom, which wasn’t as fun but it was less stressful and we enjoyed discussing Godzilla Minus One (perhaps a strange movie for a movie club, you might think, but it was really good with many layers and things to discuss.) It’s fun to have a little group, even though we are the youngest in the group…we won’t always be the youngest, so it’s probably fine to still be in that number.

How are you doing? Does nice weather make you nervous for the future? Any big plans for Valentine’s Day?

We got some snow last night!

This was the view from my bedroom window when I woke up. You can see there is a little snow, just enough make it look really wintry.

Louie is finishing up his “J Term” class this weekend. He’s been teaching every day since December 27, and tomorrow is the final exam. That means I’m just hanging around the house today: it’s cold and snowy, so why go anywhere? So far I’ve taken down the majority of Christmas decorations: I left up the trees as I’ll get his help with those (it’s a 2 person job) and the wreath outside and the window candles. Otherwise, ornaments, nutcrackers, and other random decor is in boxes and either down in the basement or awaiting that trip.

I do tend to get a few new items each year, but I also think next year I may have to get rid of a few things: there were definitely some decorations I chose not to put up this year, so I put those in a separate box…mostly…with the thought that when I decorate next year I will decide if I want to use them or maybe give them away. My Christmas decoration storage grows so much that I probably should try to pare down, especially if there are non-heirloom decorations I no longer like or plan to use.

In any case, tonight is my last Christmas concert, thus ending the season. That’s part of why I left up the outdoor lights: I want to see them one more time returning home from work, ha! Very festive of me.

I didn’t mention my Phoenix trip too much: I had a nice visit with my sister Leslie and her family. We went to the Zoo Lights, the Phoenix Symphony New Years’ Eve concert, the McCormick-Stillman Railroad Park in Scottsdale, and some other random places. We had some good food: Thai and Mexican, in addition to some amazing home cooked meals, desserts, and drinks. It was great to see everybody and especially the kids, as they are STILL GROWING, so fast, I can’t believe it!

Anyway, it’s an exciting month ahead: this weekend I’m finishing un-decorating, maybe going to see a friend play a concert/show on Sunday evening, brunch with a friend, concert tonight. Louie is finishing up his class so I won’t see too much of him, but then he’ll have a week off before the semester starts. This coming week is back to teaching, but not college teaching yet. We are also doing a wine dinner at the Whittemore House, the neighborhood movie club (we watched Rustin last night in preparation) and I’m getting ready for two chamber music concerts on Saturday. One is free and open to the public, and the other is at a retirement community.

Then (perhaps a little TMI, but oh well)…it’s time to prep for my first colonoscopy! Yes, friends, I’m having my first colonoscopy the following week. I am…not excited, yet, it’s still a new experience, so it’s kind of interesting, I guess? I expect to have a really not terrific day, and then enjoy relaxing and eating normally the day after. Also consider this your PSA that you need to make sure you are getting your suggested preventative tests and such. I know there’s that other option for the test, but my doctor thought that the actual colonoscopy was better so that’s what I decided to do. Hopefully all is in order!

After that, there’s another chamber music concert, and then it’ll be time for two weeks of Funny Girl at the Fox Theatre. I’m doubling violin/viola and it’ll be a lot of fun, but exhausting. That will bring us into February, which is where I’ll stop telling you stuff right now. The spring looks to be busy (of course, I’m always busy) but full of a lot of fun and interesting activities. And I’m looking forward to seeing students again this coming week, so there’s that.

I’m a few days belated, but I’ve been out of town and just got back this afternoon. I hope this is a good year for you!

I have been catching up and getting ready to work tomorrow. I have early morning class and a rehearsal, easy enough day. I hadn’t played violin in nearly a week so I spent an hour or so practicing after unpacking from my trip and repacking my backpack for my class tomorrow.

I also am writing this because I learned that some people aren’t getting the RSS feed anymore. I did something and perhaps this will work, but otherwise, hmm. How do you read this blog and get updates? Comment and let me know!