Stage 3 Arrives

 We are the last county in Ontario to be allowed to move to Stage 3 (Stage 1 being the most severe).  It makes little difference to us, since one of us has an auto-immune disease.  And though I am really starting to miss my visits to Detroit, and it seems highly doubtful that I will get to New Mexico this autumn, I am still fine staying home.  Reading and practicing are all going well, and the movies from Criterion just keep on coming.  Deb is deep into her latest Shakespeare film, and my 2nd Valeria novel is nearly done its rewrite.  So it will be status quo around the Homestead.  Maybe a day trip or two once the kiddies are back in school, and if we can get Deb's cough fixed.

I got a phone call from my M.D. this morning, informing me that my latest blood work results were nothing less than perfect.  I am happy to hear it, and have just started Week 10 of the indoor fitness program.  I am anxious for a long walk outdoors, but it's still too warm and humid anyway.

On Sunday afternoon Randy G. stopped by for a visit.  It was scorching hot, but we sat underneath the trees on our front lawn, with a lovely breeze off the river, and sat around and talked for nearly two hours.  Randy is a fellow astronomer I have known since about 1978, and a music lover and loyal attendee at my concerts.  I showed him the new eyepiece set, which has really taken my observing to a new dimension.  These eyepieces give the impression of actually being in space, rather than just looking at it from afar.

As I write, some fierce storms are about 3 ours west, and heading our way.  Chicago just got socked, and looks as if Detroit is next . We are currently playing Middle Earth The Lidless Eye card game, a second try at learning the new game.  We will continue later; now it's time for some dinner.

In movie news, we watched Museum Hours, the 2nd time we have seen this wonderful little film.  It's more an ode to Vienna than a real film, with an extremely thin story backed by plenty of images of the city, and especially of the Kunsthistoriches Museum, and especially the Bruegel paintings.  The city images are not glamourized at all, and Vienna doesn't even seem all that attractive.  It's just a city with working people, and it's December, an off season for tourists.  More than anything else, this film was responsible (after our first viewing several years ago) for finally getting me to book flights to Vienna, and see the city and the Bruegel paintings.  We have now visited twice, with at least one more visit planned, and have now seen almost all the extant paintings by the master.

Now showing on Criterion. 

 

I reconnected with Taeko S. on Facebook, after thinking about her on Hiroshima day.  Of course we have a standing invitation to stay with her in suburban Sydney.  They are currently doing huge renovations on their house.  Her husband is Australian, whom we met in Windsor at a dinner party, but I would love to meet her daughter, who is a music major!  Who knows, it might happen.  I would give a lot to have a dark sky view of the southern constellations.

 

Mapman Mike

Final Teaching Week of 2018

It has been a highly unusual Autumn as far as teaching goes.  Two weeks off in September to go to NM, and another week off in December to visit Vienna.  It's been lovely!  After tomorrow I will have earned another 19 days off before resuming duties in January.  I am hoping to really dig in deep to my piano pieces, and should have them ready to perform by early January.  As to when they will actually be performed, that is hard to predict just now.  January is already a very busy month for us, but I hope to play before my eye surgery.  I should know when that is by mid-January.

Work has begun on the written journal.  I went to town Sunday to get some prints developed, but the machine was down and out of service.  By Monday evening I was in business.  The Bruegel exhibit continues to resonate strongly with me, and it has barely sunk in that I got to view 31 paintings, including 17 I had never before seen.  There were a total of 15 works from Vienna, three of which we had never seen, as well as 16 loans, of which I had previously seen two in London.  That means I have now seen 35 (?) paintings by Bruegel, which is most his work.  It doesn't get much better than that.  And the exhibit only cost 5 Euros extra, above the regular admission, so it was a real bargain, too.

As a bonus, we saw Vienna in December, and it even had snow upon our arrival.  However, the rest of the week was mild, and we enjoyed each of our days to the fullest.  We both truly love the city.  The interesting bits are very close together, and we really know our way around now, including short cuts and direct routes.  It is very easy to escape the maddening crowds of tourists, and we often found ourselves alone on wonderful and narrow back streets.  We never made it to any of the famous cafes this time, though the cafe at the art museum has probably the finest setting in the world.  I made it to two craft beer places; we made it to a craft coffee shop 3x (two different ones), and we ate out 4x at three different vegan restaurants.  We rode two streetcar routes end to end, and made a triumphant return to Kahlenberg, at the top of the Vienna Woods.  The trip was a huge success.  The web version, with photos, should be underway by this weekend.  Right now, we are preparing for Winter solstice, on Friday.

 We flew Lufthansa from Toronto to Frankfurt to Vienna, and back on the same route, in the same type of jumbo jet.  All flights were packed.

Back From Wien

After an epic, 4-stage trip home, we are back.  Sunday was a very long day, with two flights and a long drive home.  Everything went smoothly, and we were in the house by 9:35 pm.  Using the same time zone, we had left for home at 12:30 a.m.  It was quite a ride.

Vienna was simply awesome, and we had a very enjoyable 5 1/2 days there.  We visited the Bruegel exhibit on two different days, and it was fabulous.  Never again will there be so many works by Bruegel in one museum.  One recently discovered work, from a private collection in Hungary, did not receive customs clearance from that country, and did not make it to the exhibit.  All others promised were there, including some from private collections that may never be seen again.

On our free days we walked the city, and made a return visit to the Vienna Woods (should be called the Vienna Mountains instead) via Grinzing and Kahlenberg.  The weather was incredible for December, with a few days being very mild.  There was some snow on our arrival, as it had been very cold the week before.  Christmas in Vienna is a big deal.  There were vast Christmas markets in key areas, and smaller ones in lesser plazas.  There were lights everywhere, and as it was dark by 4:30 pm, we got to experience them a lot.  It only rained miserably on us once, as we left the Kunsthistoriche Museum one day.  All in all, it was a wonderful journey, worth the significant expense and hassle of getting there.  The Bruegel exhibit was always packed, but with patience you could get right up in front of any painting, and stay as long as you wished.  Some of the best paintings were very small, and often no one was in front of these.  Luckily we had spent a lot of time with the Vienna Bruegel paintings a year ago, so we were able to concentrate a lot of our time on the visiting works.  I bought the catalogue and poster.

After I get the written volume complete, I will update the London and Europe blog with images, both from Vienna and the exhibit.  Photography was allowed of most works in the exhibit.  I only wish the Detroit Wedding Dance could have travelled.  It would have been stupendous to see all three peasant paintings on the same wall.  Sometime next year Detroit will mount a small exhibit on the Wedding Dance.

 Deb stands before an Assyrian sculpture in the Kunsthistoriche Museum, Vienna.  

Mapman Mike