Cemeteries

Today was stake conference, meaning church ended at noon, leaving the rest of a beautiful fall afternoon open for adventure. My adventure took the form of a jaunt through the Forest Hill Cemetery in Ann Arbor with my roommate Katherine. I love cemeteries. Generally, they are peaceful, well-kempt places. I never understood trying to frame cemeteries as spooky, eery places. I think this is disrespectful of the dead.

When I lived in Cheyenne there was a cemetery down the road where I liked to jog and take walks. I love to walk around and read head stones. Where else can you carve words like Love and Wild into stones and no one thinks twice. I also found someone named Chlorene and the grave of John Lennon's wife, although i wasn't aware Yoko Ono was deceased. The little lambs on top of children's graves break my heart but are a darling tribute. Below are some of my favorite shots.

Flee to the Cleve

Last weekend I went to taste of the gloriousness that is Cleveland. Friends, Stephanie and Kate were brave enough to accompany me. Saturday was filled with delicious food and amazing music. We started the day off at the Western Market where I ate the most amazing crepe ever and bought what I think will be the most amazing sausages ever. I can only guess since I haven't cooked them up yet. Then it was off to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. We walked around the main exhibit for more then 3 hours before realizing we still had about 4 more stories to check out. I am afraid the exhibit for "The Boss" and Les Paul did not get due attention. We continued the rock and roll theme with a late lunch at the Hard Rock Cafe.

Sunday was church history day at Kirtland. It was a bit chilly but really beautiful. The pictures demonstrate better than my feeble words. I should confess we watched the 30 Rock Cleveland clip no fewer than 3 times while in Cleveland:)

Yummy crepe being made!

Sausage I can't wait to eat.

Enviro Art?

Rock and Roll Hall of Fame

Kirtland Ashery. I was amazed to learn that 65 sections of the Doctrine and Covenants were received in Kirtland

A great picture of Stephanie that she probably doesn't want posted:)

The three of us in the 'School of the Prophets'

Really cool books

Carolina Chocolate Drops

Friday night I attended the concert of what was probably one of the most entertaining, talented groups I've ever seen. The Carolina Chocolate Drops (CCD) are an old time string band from Durham, NC. My friend Katie, also from NC, raved about them and I was not disappointed. There are clearly very talented, each of them playing various instruments. But, I think what really appealed to me is that they play instruments I can relate to; there was a lot of violin and banjo throughout the sets.

They inspired me so much that the next day I removed my violin from the case while there were other people in the house that would be exposed to my scratchy discord. I wanted to try the bow hold I saw the female violinist use. You can see in the video below that she doesn't hold it at the frog like a traditional classical violinist; perhaps that is unique to fiddling? I gave it a whirl and am still unsure about the advantages but I played a rather slow song so I will have to try it on some songs with greater tempo to gauge the advantages.

The point of the story is that the CCD have inspired me not only to practice my banjo (which I do pretty often) but also to try my hand at fiddling. The downside to this all... well, you'll have to ask my roommates about that. Maybe I'll buy them ear plugs:)

I love this video mainly because of the bones player!