Dogs on the lawn.

Daddy and i drove down to Montoursville to see Batman Begins and do a bunch of shopping. The movie was much better than i expected. Pretty cool, in fact.

I drove down to Middleburg, VA, leaving the pups behind with their grandparents. Before i left i got a package of 3 CDs from the Erin McKeown website: her newest album "We Will Become Like Birds", her first "Monday Morning Cold", and an EP of "Queen Of Quiet". All good.

After a "business meeting" with Aeron, we went out to check on her horses. Then i drove down to Fairfax and visited my friend Tyler for an hour or so, then drove through hellacious traffic down to Jason's apartment in Alexandria. We went out for pizza, then played a game of Scrabble.

I left Jason's place after he'd gone off to work and drove up I-295 to 895 to 95 to 76 to my parents house in Philly. I went over to the hardware store in Chestnut Hill, had lunch at McNally's with Russ, then hung out at the store for a while before going back to the 'rents place in Mount Airy and wallowing in the wonder that is cable TV.

I got up and drove up to Oaks, PA, near Valley Forge for a little one-day ultimate tournament, but after waiting around for an hour and a half, no one else showed up, so i drove back to Mount Airy and got online to discover that the tournament had been postponed until the next weekend. Arrgh! I spent the rest of the day scanning pictures from my mom's photo albums, then drove back up to Shunk via non-interstates. The dogs were exstatic to see me.

Walked around the property.

Ian, Crystal, Ana, and Masha arrive.

My frend Linda Cotta Leonard and her 4 kids arrive for an overnight stay.

We all hiked around the lake, the kids enjoyed the trampoline, then the Leonards headed off down the road on their cross-country trip. That evening we all played with sparklers.

Ian and Crystal and i went over to Jason's piece of property and picked raspberries. I made 'em into raspberry jelly.

Ian, Crystal, and Ana headed back to NM. Masha stayed here with Grandma and Pop.

I went over to Jason's property, picked more raspberries and made some more raspberry jelly.

Walked up along the lake and picked blueberries, then made a batch of jam and a batch of jelly. That evening Caroline, Thomas, Daniel, Charlie, and Charlie's girlfriend Christyl all arrived.

Jason called from Virginia to say that he had been sick for a couple of days and so was not going to bring his girlfriend up to meet the family that weekend.

Jason called from the hospital and reported that he had a ruptured appendix and was about to go into surgery. That evening we had a campfire and made s'mores.

Mommy and Daddy drove down to Virginia. Caroline and i drove down to Williamsport to see Erin McKeown and Ani DiFranco. Paul, Wendy, Nate, Colin, Casey, Connie (nanny), and Lakota (puppy) all arrive.

I wanted to go to this show really to see Erin McKeown, but i was also interested to see how Ani DiFranco was, as i'd never seen her perform and in fact, didn't know any of her songs. The show was in a great old theater and when i asked one of the ushers where the bathroom was, he said that there was 1 men's bathroom and 3 women's bathrooms that night. That's an indication of the clientele at this show. When i walked into the men's room the guy walking in in front of me remarked how there were never any lines at men's rooms at Ani's shows. I told him what the usher told me.

Erin came out with just her and her electric guitar and played:
Funeral *
To The Stars
An Innocent Fiction
Cinematic
Beautiful (I Guess)
Aspira
Life On The Moon
Slung-Lo
Float

Ani's set was interesting. It was just her on guitar and the stand-up bass player. She played only TWO songs where she did NOT switch to a different guitar before the song. It looked like she had at least 5 guitars that she rotated through, one of which seemed to only have 4 strings (hard to see from our balcony seats). It was interesting because i knew NONE of her songs, but obviously from the responses, a lot of the folks in the audience knew them all. When i see dada i know all the songs and i've often wondered what it's like to see a good performer or band when you don't know any of the songs. Now i know. Good show.

After the show, Caroline and i went to the supermarket and got some ice cream, then drove home to the crowded lake house.

*I didn't know the name of the first song that Erin played, but i emailed her and about a month and a half later she graced me with a reply, telling me that it was a new song called Funeral. Cool!

I helped Thomas turn a wooden bowl out of a nice piece of birch.