Update

Forecasts for the track of Hurricane Ian keep moving progressively east. Earlier this week, it was forecast to travel overland along the Florida peninsula and head straight toward Atlanta from there. Now, after crossing (and devastating) the State of Florida, it’s out over the Atlantic and forecast to make landfall again in eastern South Carolina.

That’s the thing - you can never tell what Hurricanes are going to do. They might head out to sea, or they might travel inland. Or they might lose to Middle Tennessee State by two touchdowns.

Home Improvement

No weather maps today, even though the outer bands of Hurricane Ian are already beginning to encroach on the southern edges of my radar area, because this afternoon restoration of my bathroom was finally complete!

One morning last March, I happened to notice a small little puddle of water on the floor just in front of the water closet and shower above.  The puddle was no larger in area than a dollar bill folded in half, but as I hadn't even been in that part of the house for at least 12 hours, I couldn't figure where it had come from. I wiped it up with a paper towel, but later that day it reappeared.  I couldn't find a leak, so I called a plumber to investigate.

Long story short, within 48 hours by bathroom look like this:

It got worse - if only my bathroom looked that good again over the next six months! They wound up tearing out the tile flooring and the remaining wood floor, and completely demolishing the counter and drawers.  Various combinations of delayed responses from Allstate, different contractors prioritizing other clients over this job, and supply-side issues caused the work to stretch out over an unconscionable duration.  

But they finally finished today. They replaced the wood and tile flooring with the faux slate in the top picture, and had a whole new set of drawers constructed and installed.  Off-site construction of the drawers took the longest time of all and was responsible for much of the delay.

So six months later, I finally have a restored bathroom - almost, but not quite as good as before in some respects, and actually improved in others.

Now, with Hurricane Ian approaching, I'm reminded of the fact that the last home improvement project I undertook - replacing my old leaky roof - was completed shortly before Hurricane Zeta dropped a tree on the house and wrecked that new roof.  Here's to Ian leaving this job unscathed!

Blessed Relief

Although forecasts for Ian's path change daily, the latest data show that it will track to the east of Atlanta, possibly striking Augusta but missing my house.  Besides, once it reaches these latitudes, it will likely be a tropical depression, not a hurricane, which means lots and lots of rain but no punishing, tree-toppling winds.

I'm obviously still PTSD'd over the tree that fell on my house in October 2020 (Hurricane Zeta).  The U.S. Preventive Services Task Force has advised that doctors screen all adult patients under 65 for anxiety due to the extraordinary stress levels that have plagued the United States since the start of the pandemic.  I propose that people over 65 - the demographic most likely to have died from the pandemic - get treated as well. If you lived as long as us, you've seen some shit, man.

Ian

Initial forecasts had what was then called Tropical Depression Nine hitting the west coast of Florida, likely to cross the peninsula and head out to the Atlantic.

TD Nine is now known as Ian and is expected to develop into a hurricane by tomorrow. Worse, its projected path has been corrected to now hit the Florida panhandle and then continue north through Georgia toward Atlanta. My home. Great.

The local news is warning about intense showers and flash flooding on Thursday and Friday. Those don't worry me so much as I live on top of a hill. But they also warn of "gusty winds" which have worried me ever since a gust of wind knocked a tree over onto my house in October 2020.

Meanwhile, Hurricane Gaston, last seen in the mid-Atlantic heading toward the British Islands, has reversed course and is now heading west back toward North America.  I'm not worried, though, as it should peter out in the cold mid-Atlantic waters before it reaches these shores.

Fiona hit the Canadian Maritime Provinces earlier this week, caused wide-spread flooring and damage. The storm swept away houses, stripped off roofs, and knocked out power, and troops are being sent to assist the recovery. The troops will help remove fallen trees and other debris, and restore transportation links.

Busy week in an until-now relatively quiet hurricane season!

Number Nine

As promised, that weather system north of the coast of Venezuela has become a tropical depression, known simply as Tropical Depression Nine for now.  The latest forecasts have it developing into a huricane and striking Florida next week.  

After that, will it continue to travel northeast and into the Atlantic, or will it track inland and reach Atlanta?  Asking for a friend . . .  

The Atlantic Gets Busy

After nearly an entire summer of no hurricane activity in the Atlantic, here we are, on the very cusp of the autumnal equinox, with two fill-blown hurricanes and three developing systems.  

As I'm sure you've heard in the news, Hurricane Fiona dropped torrential rain on the island of Puerto Rico and walloped the commonwealth with killer winds.  All this on the five-year anniversary of Hurricane Maria, but this time an orange-faced clown didn't show up to toss paper towels to the people.  The hurricane is expected to stay off of the coast of North America and if it makes landfall at all, it will probably be way up in Nova Scotia.

Hurricane Gaston came up out of almost nowhere.  It was already well up into the mid-Atlantic and headed for the British Islands by the time it even formed, but it is expected to fizzle out before it even reaches Britania.  It may have to content itself with fucking with the Azores.

The system just north of the coast of Venezuela is almost certain to become at least a tropical depression, if not a hurricane.  After that, its path is still uncertain, but is likely to move west-northwestward toward the central Caribbean later this week.  Let's hope it doesn't strike Puerto Rico again before it's even dried out from Fiona.

And if all that's not enough, we have two more developing systems in the East Atlantic and Saharan Africa. The National Hurricane Center puts their chance of developing into tropical depressions at 30 to 50 percent but if they do develop, there's no telling yet where they might track.

Happy last day of summer, y'all!

Pray for Puerto Rico

Hurricane Fiona knocked out power to all of Puerto Rico today, the 10th anniversary of the devastating Hurricane Maria which killed approximately 3,000 people. Forecasters warned that today's storm could bring as much as two feet of rain and cause life-threatening floods and landslides.

Meanwhile, millions of people in Japan have been warned to evacuate ahead of an incoming "violent typhoon" expected to run the length of the island nation.

But He's Not Wrong . . .

 He may not always have been tasteful, but again, R.I.P. Jean-Luc Godard.

Big Ears Preview

And just like that, the Big Ears discovery process begins.

I had heard of Nate Wooley before, but wasn't really familiar with his music. I had not previously heard of Carol Robinson.  

Here the two of them are performing work by French composer Éliane Radigue, who is definitely new to me. The piece is from Radigue's Occam Ocean series. So far, Radigue has released four volumes in the series, each selection composed for the specific musicians performing her music. 

Wooley uses a sheet of some sort of material for special effects on his trumpet; the way it seems to leap to the trumpet's bell at the 0:37 mark suggests he may actually be inhaling rather than blowing through the mouthpiece.  Robinson is playing a birbynė, a traditional Lithuanian instrument somewhat analagous to a clarinet.  The lower end of a birbynė is fitted with a flared cow horn. The instrument's physical traits result in a warm rich sound close to the human voice, an Asian flute, or the Armenian doudouk.

Clocking in at a brisk 4:34, this composition is easily one of the shortest pieces in the Occam series. Other compositions range from 15 to 50 minutes in length and average about 20 minutes.  Of course, the video seems to jump right into a performance already in progress, so it's impossible to tell how long the piece was being performed before the tape began rolling, or how long it continued after the video ends.

The epic lengths and slow, meditative pace of Radigue's music likely has something to do with her active practice of Tibetan Buddhism.

Wooley and Robinson are scheduled to perform a selection of Rodigue's music at Big Ears 2023. The composer, now aged 91, hopefully will be present, conditions allowing.

Fiona

After the Gulf Stream repelled Danielle and Earl, Fiona materializes in the Western Atlantic and may be able to slip her puck past the goalie.  Stay tuned for details on how she's going to make it to Atlanta.

So after thinking twice about it all, I went ahead and purchased my ticket to Big Ears 2023 after all. Among my reasons and justifications were:

• I had already made nonrefundable hotel reservations for that week.  Even if I didn't go to Knoxville, my money would have.  I could cancel my reservation, but that only meant that the hotel would be free to book my room to someone else while still keeping my money.  It seemed that with or without Big Ears, I was going to be staying in Knoxville next March.


• Okay, $800 is a lot of money, but it's really all that I do in any given year.  In my retirement, I'm not, say, going on cruises or travelling to ballparks across the USA.  I'm not even going to other music shows here in Atlanta.  $800 may be a lot, but not so much when it's all you got.


• Also, as previously reported, I finally sold the Unsellable Condo in Vinings. I should get a modest sum of money from the sale, and splurging a small part of that windfall on a VIP pass for Big Ears seems entirely justifiable.


• What turned me off about the lineup was the selection of indie rock bands that I already knew.  A big part of the appeal of Big Ears is the process of discovery - finding new artists one had not heard before.  Last year, it was new favorites Alabaster DePlume and Damon Locks' Black Monument Ensemble.  I playlisted some of the artists for this year that I didn't know on Spotify, and already have made some great new discoveries.  So I'll be going to Big Ears next year not so much for the familiar (the veridical), but in a spirit of adventurous discovery (the sequential).


• The John Zorn sets, even if they're all in one day, still look absolutely amazing (especially the Cobra ensemble).  One of my regrets of Big Ears 2022 was that I didn't attend more of the Zorn sets.


• At this point in my life, the festival is part of my definition of who I am and what I do.  Not going would be a denial of my self.

So, the ticket is booked and the reservations are made!  Now all that's left is the 6-month wait. Let's hope Fiona doesn't derail my plans.

R.I.P. Jean-Luc Godard

Impermanence is swift.  This dew-like existence vanishes in an instant and time waits for no one.

 

I'm On The Fence

 

I'm sorry, but when your headliners are Amadou & Mariam, I have to think twice about buying a pass to your festival.

The lineup for next year's Big Ears Festival - much anticipated in this household - was announced today and it was a bit, well, underwhelming.  I like Amadou & Mariam, I like Malian music in general, but I'm not sure it's enough to get me to buy an $800 four-day VIP pass for the festival.

I'm probably being a little unfair to the alphabetical order of the announcement, but most of the top tier performers leave me as underwhelmed as A-is-for-Amadou.  Devendra Banhart, Andrew Bird, The Mountain Goats, and Iron & Wine would have been great in 2015, but aren't as enticing these seven years later, and aren't the reason to go to a festival like Big Ears.  And Los Lobos and Rickie Lee Jones?  Don't get me started.

The John Zorn 70th Birthday Celebration looks amazing, but I already spent a day listening to Zorn at last year's festival. And if it's scheduled like last year, it will all be performed in one day, leaving three other festival days Zorn-less.

On the positive side, there are several excellent performers listed above, especially the William Parker sets.  I've long wanted to see Charles Lloyd, and The Bad Plus, Xylouris White, Christian McBride, and Vijay Iyer are all solid performers.  Bill Frisell has become something of a Big Ears fixture, which is cool, but I've now seen him several times in a variety of contexts.  I've also seen Marc Ribot at Big Ears twice before as well as Makaya McCraven, and I've seen Bela Fleck and Mary Halvorson each once before. And yes, I did notice James "Blood" Ulmer in there, as well as the great David Murray squeezed in with the band Tarbaby.

So I'm not saying that I'm not going, but I am thinking twice. There's also covid considerations to take into account.  Will there be a new variant to worry about next March? Or something worse? Will the festival become a polio super-spreader? Is that something we have to worry about now?

$800 is a lot of money for a festival pass, plus the cost of four night's lodging, food, gas, etc., etc. Unlike years past, this lineup isn't a sure-thing, slam-dunk decision.  What you're seeing here is me thinking twice.

All Quiet Again Out On The Atlantic

 Also, this is now apparently a weather blog.

And Now Earl

 Tropical Storm Earl expected to become a full-blown hurricane by Tuesday.

Danielle At Last

In unrelated news, the Unsellable Condo in Vinings (aka, The Unsellable, or the UCV) is finally under contract.