[Rec] PODFIC of "High Wire" & "This Is Not an After-Action Review" -- MCU/Leverage

Hey people!

FYI, opalsong recorded podfics of High Wire and This Is Not an After-Action Review, my two tiny MCU/Leverage crossover fics. They are now available over at amplificathon, as part of the Awesome Ladies Podfic Anthology 2015.

High Wire & This Is Not an After-Action Review: Two short ficlets in which Natasha Romanova (of the MCU) and Parker (of Leverage) meet. The world may not be ready. (Tony Stark certainly isn't.) [Also available here on AO3]

wherein Liz's parents visit

The plan was for my parents to arrive around 12:30pm on Sunday, after which we'd do lunch, possibly visit Six Mile Creek vineyard, and then head to the concert. This fell by the wayside on account of weather -- the wind was fierce, the temperature never even reached 3F, and the roads between New Jersey and Ithaca were in rather iffy condition. In other words, they arrived late.

I was going to staff the church library in the morning -- which is henceforth going to be a slightly more complicated job, since the DRE and her assistant have decided we ought to open the session with a chalice lighting even though the library is not a workshop or class, as such. But church was canceled, again on account of weather. So I went back to bed and slept an extra two hours. Yay sleep!

We spent the afternoon eating a sort of snack/lunch thing -- cheese, sausage, and crackers -- and going through a bunch of stuff Mom and Dad brought up to see if I wanted or if they should donate it to a church garage sale (either theirs or mine). Then we dressed up slightly and went to the concert at 4pm.

This was one of the Cayuga Chamber Orchestra's chamber music series. They performed three pieces: J. S. Bach's Sonata in B Minor for Flute and Harpsichord (BWV 1030); Lou Harrison's Varied Trio for Percussion, Violin, and Piano; and Antonín Dvořák's String Quartet No. 12 in F Major, Op 96 "American".

The Bach was beautiful, to nobody's surprise, though I think the flutist should have stood beside the harpsichord rather than in front of it, to help balance their relative decibel levels.

The Harrison trio was absolutely fascinating. Harrison is a modern-ish composer -- he died in 2003 -- but unlike a lot of modern composers, he actually bothered to write melodies. I mean, the trio is experimental as all get out, and one gets the impression some of it may have been written from a "you don't think I can do this? well I'll show you!" attitude, but it's by turns gorgeous and infectious and I actively enjoyed it rather than sort of intellectually appreciating it, which has been my usual best-case reaction to most post-WWII classical music. Anyway, the piano is played somewhat as an actual percussion instrument -- the pianist had a soft-head drumstick and knocked the wooden frame in specified places, and also played some notes by physically reaching into the instrument and plucking strings with her fingers. The violinist spent one movement doing nothing but finger-plucking a single four-note phrase for occasional emphasis. And the percussion... well, the first and third movements involve a vibraphone. The second involves porcelain rice bowls of various pitches played with chopsticks. And the fifth movement starts with two drums and two tambourines and moves on to a set of baking pans. And it works.

(Here's a YouTube link to a performance by the Abel-Steinberg-Winant Trio if you want to hear for yourself. I think the CCO's version was better -- it felt more alive -- despite the longer delays between movements that are inherent to live performances.)

The Dvořák quartet was nice but didn't really grab me the way his String Quintet in G (Op 77) did, which I heard performed by the Finger Lakes Chamber Ensemble in June 2014. Mom wasn't fond of that quintet but liked the "American" quartet very much, which amuses me.

After the concert, we stopped by my apartment to feed and walk Dottie, then drove into town to eat dinner at Coltivare, a new restaurant associated with TC3, the local community college. I had the focaccia of the day (mozzarella, onion, and grilled red pepper) and then clams over toasted cappellini; Mom had the artisanal salad and then the duck breast; and Dad had the soup of the day (champagne Parmesan) and the fish of the day (salmon). We came home for dessert, which was Kirschkuchen, followed by champagne cocktails while I opened presents. These included some cooking wine, some cookies, and three boxes of brownie mix. I am quite well supplied on the desert front. :-)

Dottie stayed with me overnight, and either one of her snacks or the ointment Mom smeared on a raw spot near her nose disagreed with her, because sometime between 3am and 8am she barfed on the carpet of my computer room and deposited some very gooey poop on my kitchen floor. :-( I got that cleaned up fairly well, though, and she seemed fine from breakfast onward.

Mom and Dad arrived back at my apartment around 9:15am, whereupon we went to Friendly's for breakfast (I had a coupon) and then crossed the street to Tops so I could do my weekly grocery shopping and they could buy gas. They hit the road at about 11:30am and arrived back in Madison around 4pm. Victory is ours!