Second week of August- PUBLIC

8/9 PM Reflection Play
Norman really likes the sound of the Buchens’ bells and wanted to ring them again this evening. After such a wet and foggy start to the day, the sun came out late this afternoon and was still visible at sunset. The sun didn’t “come out”, of course. The brisk wind that came up off the ocean blew the fog inland. That same wind was still blowing at sunset and would have interfered with the recording. Since we wanted to hear the bells and make a decent recording, we decided to ring them in the shelter of our porch. The reflection in the window faces west, by the way and makes a nice backdrop for the shadow play. We even had an audience. When we finished, we looked down the bottom of the stairs, and a woman and her sweet white dog were watching us. They enjoyed our little show.

8/11 PM Norman's Birthday Season

We celebrated a pre-birthday dinner for Norman at Carl and Sue’s in Oakland. After dinner, we watched the first of a three-part series of Dr. Horrible’s Sing-A-Long-Blog which finished just two minutes before sunset.
It’s much warmer in Oakland and we could actually see the sunlight for a change. Someone said that in Beijing because of air pollution, a “blue-sky day” didn’t necessarily mean a day in which you could see blue sky. It simply meant it was a day when you could see your shadow. So maybe we have many more blue-sky days in San Francisco despite the fog if we go along with the Chinese definition.

8/12 PM Can't Tell Which End Is Up?
Bell ringing over the phone with Mary and Norman was not very successful as multi-location ensemble experiences go. Especially since the sound technician failed to fully comprehend whether to receive or broadcast and which end of the phone would do the job. Anyway, while it’s not readily apparent that someone is on the phone ringing bells, Mary was there ringing in the darkness of NYC to accompany us here on the west coast. Thank you Mary. I was calling to find out about the bells, which Norman has come to favor lately. They were a gift from Bill and Mary Buchen, and I wanted to find out more about them. Also to be continued…

8/13 PM Norman's Birthday Burger
Celebrating Norman's BD a day early at Mel's with Budd.

8/14 PM Happy Birthday To YooooooOOou!
It’s still Norman’s birthday. All day. Sunrise and Sunset.

8/15 PM DELTA FL. 240 (the first 15 hours)
Sunset somewhere over Indiana. Just around 8:45 EST. The fellow who had the window seat filmed while we rang and then handed me the camera. I immediately reversed the record and stop functions and stopped filming. I restarted shooting in time to catch my tray table and a tiny bit of the TV when I thought I was shutting down. Everyone in our row rang the bells, but I managed to turn the camera off for that part. And it remained off while I filmed the little monitor in the seat back in front of me. After we rang the bells, my fellow ringers kept their tiny little bells and we continued onward to what we thought was our final destination that we thought we would reach in 90 minutes. Ha… Oh to be so young and innocent.
Delta fl. # 240- Hold that thought.
to be continued next week…