brainsplotch

As I write this, news broke that there was a school shooting in Minneapolis. "Murica doing what it does best...and just the excuse "Dear Leader" needs to send the National Guard to the Twin Cities (I am only half-kidding), extending his authoritarian tentacles even further. Sorry to finally get back to this blog and immediately start in on a downer. I am returning to this post four days later. I finally finished reading The Swerve: How the World Became Modern by Stephen Greenblatt. It was the heaviest reading I'd done in a long time, and a good primer into the world of Epicureanism, the search for ancient Roman manuscripts, Poggio Bracciolini (a seeker of said manuscripts), and how Epicureanism and Atomism flew in the face of Catholic/Christian orthodoxy. Advocates of this forward-thinking philosophy often paid with their lives. This was a dense but ultimately rewarding reading experience, a little bit out of my comfort zone, but that can be a good challenge. So now...

I attended one evening of one day of the annual Rockin' the Suburbs SuburbsFest. Having already blown through 96 or so hours of vacation time for Europe, I wasn't sure I'd have enough for two days, plus I need to save up for trips to Baltimore and Savannah. So even though the fest was in Michigan (or maybe because the fest was in Michigan) I only went for one day. I'm not sure why I feel the need to explain myself, but there it is. The one night I was there (Saturday night) I was pretty, pretty, pretty good (as Larry David might say). I saw several podcast friends, as well as the RTS "house band" Frank Muffin, the Stick Arounds (from Lansing), and an excellent young band from GR/west Michigan called Money Soup. When I say they're young, I mean it. I'm not sure any of them are over 21 years old. They play a funk/soul/jazz/pop hybrid and write their own material. I'm astounded at how good they are at such young ages. Their drummer, Lainey, is a pure ...