This Thanksgiving was a wonderful one for us. Uncle Ron and Aunt Marty came up from San Antonio along with Tanya, my cousin, and her husband Ken Sonnier. Ron’s turkey was as lip-smackingly tasty as I’d remembered from past holidays, and my cranberry salsa was well recieved, even by my recovering-yankee bride. That contingent was then followed by Dad McMains, Lana, and Meara, who had been visiting Lana’s folks earlier in the day. Lana treated us to one of her fantastic pecan pies, all credit for which she claims should go to her granny, whose recipe she uses, but I’m pretty sure that I’d get different results if I tried to make it. Finally, our next-door neighbors the Isaacs dropped by for some visiting, which was all the more valued since they’re in the process of moving up to Possom Kingdom Lake, where Jake will be running the fish hatchery there.

We decided that this year, instead of killing a tree for that authentic holiday smell, we’d plant a couple of little christmas trees out in the front yard and decorate them instead. Kathy had done most of the hole-digging — a signficant chore in our part of San Marcos, since you hit layers of limestone about 6 inches below the surface — earlier in the week, so it was a relatively simple matter to get them planted on Friday. They look great, and should grow pretty quickly to a more standard christmas tree size in a year or two. (They’re about three feet tall at the moment.)

During the day on Saturday, we popped down to San Antonio and helped Mom McMains and her housemate Julia decorate for Christmas. They really enjoy Christmas decorating, so we scrambled all over the house hanging lights, putting up ornaments, deploying nativity livestock, etc. We had a great time with them and with Gayle, who also dropped by for a bit. Gayle is putting together a website for her photography business, so I should be able to point you to some of her work soon.

Steve, Travis and I played our last weekly gig at the local coffee shop on Saturday night. We were pleased to have Travis back from Russia, where he’d been on a mission trip for the last three and a half weeks. I pulled out the hammered dulcimer for the first time in public for two tunes, one of which went pretty well. It honestly comes as a bit of a relief to be cutting back from weekly performances again. Though I enjoy the gigs a lot, every Saturday was starting to feel like just a bit too much.

Liam charged into the study yesterday as I was setting the synthesizer back up, obviously ready to play. I pulled out a couple of pencils and showed him how to use them to beat out rhythmic patterns on the countertop. That kept him entertained for about 4 seconds. Then he wanted to use the pencils to swordfight. We did that for a few minutes, after which I returned my pencil to him. He manipulated them, fiddling around until he had them crossed at their centers. He then started shouting “Airplane! Airplane!” and zooming his little makeshift aircraft around all over the place. It was the first time I’d seen him come up with something really new without prompting, and my chest swelled with pride at his ingeniousness. (Yes, I know. I’m easily impressed.)

David Brin’s Uplift series is among the best-known in Science Fiction, and with good reason. The series takes place in a universe where all sentient races are “uplifted” by other patron races, who breed and cultivate their client races for intelligence. Humans are a notable exception, as they somehow reached sentience without known help from outside. The Uplift War focuses on the invasion of a human-colonized world by a senior avian race, and combines the appeal of many war movies, where one roots for the ingenious underdogs, with a bit of political intrigue, some human drama, and a good dose of humor. Good reading; I’m looking forward to the rest of the series.

The last time I spoke with Dad McMains on the phone, he mentioned that he was slated to speak at a conference in Las Vegas in September, 2001. I mentioned to Kathy that I thought it would be fun to go out there with him, and to my surprise, she said “I think you ought to go. I’ll take care of the kids.” So, recalling that Ross had mentioned en passant that it would be fun to hit Vegas sometime, I asked him if he’d be interested in crashing Dad’s conference, to which he responded an enthusiastic affirmative. Then I remembered that Chris and Ross had a great time together when he was out west, and that we hadn’t had a time to all get together for ages. I fired off an email to him, and he duplicated Ross’ response. So, it looks like not only will I finally get to see Blue Man Group in person, but I’ll get to do it with 3 of my favorite people! In Ross’ words, I am SUCH A HAPPY MONKEY!

I really like the days before holidays, as everyone in Austin seems to take off early, making my commute almost pleasant.

We’re getting ready to have family over tomorrow for Thanksgiving dinner. I think it’s the first big holiday meal we’ve hosted, and we’re looking forward to it quite a bit. I’m going to make cranberry salsa for a bit of seasonal regional flavor.

The Korg Trinity keyboard I’d bought on eBay arrived yesterday, and I spent a happy afternoon getting to know it. The sounds themselves are of course great, but the fun really began when I fired up the sequencer and started layering dance rhythms over pipe organs, marimbas, and panpipes. What can I say — I want to be Mannheim Steamroller when I grow up.

Christopher Guest, of This is Spinal Tap and Waiting for Guffman fame, brings on another documentary style comedy. Best in Show focuses on the world of Dog Shows and the people and hounds that inhabit them. Though not quite as funny as Guffman, there are bits that make the whole thing worthwhile. The interplay between the announcers at the show is marvelous, Guest’s portrayal of a southern man who discovers his true gifts is great, and the Busy Bee crisis caused my Palm Pilot to fall out of my pocket. I don’t think the big screen adds much, but it’s not to be missed once it gets to video.

The 1960 film version of H.G. Wells’ classic, The Time Machine, is a fun romp. Though the pacing is a bit slower than modern films, it clips along nicely once it gets started, with some fine time-lapse photography during the time travel scenes. The acting is serviceable, and the Moorlocks appropriately scary looking, especially when their pants pull down a bit too low in back as if they’re some kind of far-future refrigerator repairmen. Actor trivia: Rod Taylor, who plays the lead in this film, also voiced Pongo for 101 Dalmatians. (The real version with no Glen Close to be seen.)

Mel Gibson has a pretty credible American accent, I’ll give him that. But that’s pretty much where the credibility in The Patriot ends. The historical aspects of it are a bit goofy, the portrayal of the British ridiculously one-sided, and much of the plot is predictable melodrama. But once one starts thinking of it more in terms of Zorro than Glory, it becomes a fairly enjoyable romp through Revolutionary War Lite. It’s worth seeing for entertainment, but not if you really want to learn anything about history. Looking at Roland Emmerich’s Film History gives you a pretty good idea of what to expect: Independence Day with rifles.

My friend Angela Doss is going to a Paul Simon concert this weekend, and has a chance of meeting him. She asked if there were any questions I had for the legendary musician. These are all I could come up with:

“Paul Simon, how do you get your whites so white?”

“Why didn’t you ever tell Art to get a haircut?”

“During the Graceland tour, did you pay that guy who only played one note every other measure less than you paid the rest of the band?”

“Now that you’re older and more experienced, do you still think that it’s all happening at the zoo?”

“You remember when…when you and Art…y’know…played in New York…in Central…in Central Park? Y’know? You remember that? Yeah. That was awesome!”

“Do you have any insight into Fermat’s last theorum? I mean, that so-called solution from a few years back couldn’t possibly have been what Fermat was thinking about, since it’s obviously not ‘elegant’ and wouldn’t have fit into the book, much less the margin.”

Thanks for delivering these to the one man who’s capable of answering them.

Sean

Today I took out Emily and Abigail for a wonderful romp through Austin. We started at the Texas Book Festival, where my friend Paul Hightower had alerted me he’d be manning a booth for the weekend. It took us quite a while to get past the storytelling and crafts tents, where the girls spent a delighted 90 minutes, but we finally were able to track down Paul and get in some visiting. He and some of his family members are starting Upstream Press, a publishing company that will be doing both traditional paper-based publishing and electronic educational materials. After the book festival, we took a quick tour of the awe-inspiring Texas Capitol Building, an enormous edifice constructed of Texas pink granite. From there, we started off for lunch. Midway through the drive, I realized that we were only four blocks away from Things Celtic, a store in Austin I’ve heard advertised on NPR I’ve been wanting to stop by and check out for ages. The girls and I spend a half-hour rooting through all of their wonderful stuff, which included pennywhistles & bodhrans, jewelry, kilts, books on Celtic history and art, various celtic crosses and artwork, and much more. I eventually bought them each a little book of temporary Celtic tatoos, Kathy a lovely matted illuminated rendering of a traditional Irish blessing, and myself a pennywhistle with the Guinness logo emblazoned upon it. (It doesn’t play quite as well as my Susatos, but it’s not bad.) Finally, we made it to The Hula Hut, an unusual eatery I’ve been wanting to check out since we moved to Austin, which combines Mexican and Polynesian cuisines with some great results. We sat at our booth, munching down goodies and applying temporary tatoos to each other, making our plans to surprise Kathy when we came home by telling her that I’d taken the kids to the tatoo parlor as part of our romp. Knowing me as well as she does, she didn’t believe it for an instant.