Tonight was one of those nights that doesn’t come around often. Some gigs are great, and fun, and some gigs are a whole lot of work. And some are such a joy and delight that life doesn’t get any better.

Tonight could not have been better. It was a Perfect Storm of really wonderful people coming to hear us, and having the kind of time one is meant to in an Irish Pub. The place went SRO early, and stayed that way, and was filled with a lot of people who have come to hear us before, and made our night, but never have they all been there together.

They made me SO happy. I can’t claim credit, tho if I do say so myself, we did rock, but it was the people who MADE the rock, if you see what I mean. We got it from them and tossed it on back. I’m not sure I have ever felt so loved before..The kind of night where you leave thinking …”THAT is why I do this.”

Aleta and Laser Lady were there too, which always makes me happy. The only sore spot in the night was I had a fierce headache for no good reason, but Laser Lady, apparently, has special powers and was able to fix it. I must learn this skill.

(I know this is mean, but it’s really funny..) It is always lovely to have Aleta and Laser Lady in for a show, but guys, you will be way more popular with the pub if you REMEMBER TO PAY YOUR BAR TAB before leaving…..(call them tomorrow, I assured them it was the Tequila and not intentional…)

Cabal comes home tomorrow, and I think he is getting better. The U of M vets could not have been nicer. They called me every few hours today to let me know how he was doing, and have been keeping them with them, in conference rooms and such, rather than leaving him alone. It was pretty scary, and not at all fun for a while there…Seems to be a case of him eating something Bad, that laid him low, and not something wrong…

It’s funny how I have never thought much about the saying “Every good dead will come back to haunt you..” I mean, there I was a few weeks ago, befriending a Carrot, for goodness sake, it was alone and misunderstood, I wanted to help it achieve everything it wanted, and fulfill its hopes and dreams….And I did. And I thought that was the end of it. It was a one off thing, and made me feel like I could make a difference.

I did. And hadn’t thought much about it since. Until I went for a snack tonight.

Oh Fods….

Love and Magic Evenings,
Lorraine

Hello, my Fiends,

This is not the post I had planned today, but as they say, the best laid plans of mice and men…I kind of feel like the last few days have sort of blended into one sort of long day. And now am here, home from my gig, and awake. I’ve been keeping up on the comments today and loving it more than you can know, you are the best! Truly…A majorly stressed and busy Assistant-girl thanks you.

The lunch yesterday with the Beowulf contest winners went off just fine, despite some delays. Boss has a broken finger, and it had to be ex-rayed, and getting someone off on a book tour is not an easy task. I think the only harder one might be the person DOING the book tour.

It got kind of funny this lunch, I met the winners at the hotel, delightful people all, and we limo’d over to the Greek to Me place, and all went well, but Kitty and I were pretty much non-stop on the Blackberry’s answering last minute questions and the funniest, for me, was us sitting there , schedules and pens and phones, and her saying , “I have to call our limo” and me saying, “I am on the phone, call mine too…”

You have to laugh sometimes.

Today didn’t much stop. Curve balls hourly. And then gig. But you do it. And do it again tomorrow.

Thanks Fiends, for being there….

Love and sleep,
Lorraine

Right. It’s late, and I am almost too tired to be thinking. Certainly too tired to be writing, but after promising all day to bring you some Bees, I am going to Skull up my brain (see how I am evolving this new verb?) and Bee with you for a bit.

(Cut to the chase, Lorraine!) Right. The lucky winners in the Who Gets to Bee stung contest: Boss and the MPR Reporter. Boss on an unprotected bit of ankle, and our hapless reporter friend when he was unlucky enough to squash one under an arm.

But this makes for dull reading. Let’s start with a little Girl-on girl full Bee Suit Wrestling, with The Birdchick and Miss Kitty..(Who won? Who cares!)

Kitty is one of the few people who can actually take a lovely photo of me. Here I am messing around with some WARNING Full on Voltage action tool. (No idea what it does but it lives in a little birdhouse on the fence post.)

Feeding Bees honey from my hand makes me so happy. Actually everything about tending bees does.

Cabal, while loving the bit where we all go off into the woods, does not share this love of our honey making Friends. That’s Non-Birding Bill, bravely at the hives in only hat and gloves. Brave man. I haven’t done that yet. May well not be brave enough.

In order to steal, er, harvest, the honey, you need to get the Bees to leave and go nicely back into the hive. You can do this a number of ways, the most direct being to take the full box, no light thing and give it a few good shakes. See Boss and I convincing the Bees to leave. See Boss and I Covered in Bees.

Another way fun day with the Bees. And all of us there. Check out the Birdchick Blog and Boss’s for more photos and stories….Miss Kitty, it should be noted, took all of these photos today, and shared them with us for tonight’s joint bee post. This one is my favorite: Quiche with Ross Rounds!

Love and Bees,
Lorraine

Late night here, Fiends, but our Miss Kitty is safely here, and that makes us happy. She looks well for someone who spent the last six weeks on the road, (heck or even for someone who didn’t!) And seems entirely as happy to be here as we are to have her. We have some big plans for a few days and her camera has a viewing screen…..

Here is my attempt to embed our Skull Map of the World into a blog….(OK, to be truthful, Philas attempt, I am the cut and paste artist, if you missed it first in the comments, it’s a map that let’s you put up a Skull where you are from,so we can see Skulls all over the world. Go ahead, Skull, you know you want to…)

Tomorrow ought to be an interesting day at work. Besides more media than ought to occur in any one day, we are doing the big honey harvest, which means we go out and steal all the honey they don’t need to get thru the winter, and extract it.

It was meant to be fairly straight forward, with Boss, Birdchick, Kitty (holding fast to my hand, as she says) and me, but Boss keeps, uh, adding to the group. Boss is just back from China you see, and still a little, perhaps, not quite with us.

Every time I turned around it seemed another person was coming along to the party, up to and including a reporter from MPR. I guess he figured he’s kill two birds with one stone, do the interview WHILE harvesting honey and get another pair of hands to help in the process. Which is all good the more the merrier, but I did attempt to point out why he could not have all these people help, and mentioned the number of bee suits we possessed, and the number of people….

He said “You can give up your Bee Suit” (not that this would cover the number needed)

“Why Me?” says I

“You never get stung, you can wear the Bee Hat” he says.

I told him the REASON I was the only one not have been stung was that I was the only one who did not GO to the hives without a bee suit….

Ought to be an interesting afternoon. Never dull, this job.

Kali is attempting to savage my hands as I type, which is kind of cute after experiencing what the Bengals were capable of as Kittens (THEY are currently engaged in trying to pull down all the blinds in my sunroom. Go figure.

I’ll leave you with a picture of her shredding my notebook instead…..

Love, Skulls, Bees, and Bengals,
Lorraine

I was doing some updating on my blog. As in, we aren’t Friends, we’re Fiends, and then I read the little bit under, the bio-y thing, and realized I had no idea what it was talking about.. Did any of you? It seemed a little confused as to what, or who it or I was. Well, cleared that up, Fiends.

Then I went to save this brilliant new intro, and there were two buttons to choose from. One said “Save Changes” and the other said “Delete Blog Forever” with a note saying if you chose Delete, you could put up a New Blog there, but your old one and all of it’s archives, would be deleted forever and they were very sorry but forever means forever and they could not be gotten back ever by anyone!

Pick the right button or be lost forever. Harsh choices.

I think the Save This button and the Delete Forever button ought not be in such close proximity, personally. And WHY is there a delete forever button anyway???? If one ever got tired of a blog, one could say, make a new one, but wiping everything out seems a little extreme.

I know I blogged and linked to this last week, but it is so in my head that I am going to again tonight. Sparrow Quartet. Quite simply one of the best albums I have ever heard. Truly a masterpiece of a work. I haven’t listened to anything else since I got it, and never seem to get tired of it. (Not something you might think of when someone says “Hey, it’s Chinese and the Banjo…You’ll love it!”) It could be one symphony, it is so well constructed. It may well be the best album ever.

If you can get to see them, GO! This isn’t something you want to miss, and it may never happen again. Tour Info Here…

That’s about it for excitement and adventures today. Nathilie did not, during my French Lesson Via Skype, hold her head in hands and shake it (much anyway) nor laugh at me (Very much anyway) and I made it up the four flights of stairs to class. (in one go..) I still haven’t taken the first big test, but I have it, and I could have passed, except, apparently, spelling counts. Go figure.

Sending out Big hugs to Phiala, who lost a friend today. Never a good thing…

Love and music,
Lorraine

I think since fully half of you have caught this computer virus we have been passing around and are curled up with various hot drinks, and tissues, and since I promised, we will go with something light and entertaining tonight, requiring no brain whatsoever…

Sound good?

Princess Kali-licious is some cute overload! Remember with these photos that one, cats do not sit still, and two, I have no idea what I am taking the picture of, as my view screen is toast. This next shot proves my point in that I thought I was taking a funny cat photo, but only managed to take a shot of four skeletons…

This next isn’t particularly a good kitty shot, but I include it just because I REALLY want to know what the tentacled Thing is flying off out the top….

I have this Face, that people laugh at me for. It’s the “Oh Fod! They are taking my picture face” Can’t model to save my life. (Tho Kitty has had some success getting good shots of me, we will try later this week..) Apparently, Mim suffers from the same problem…

Kali is either rubbing out her tears, mourning the mousie, or waving at you. Or perhaps getting ready to rend and tear. Hard to tell. (note to self: Put some water in the coffee table fish tank, or Fishie will be sushi..)

You can kind of see her here, but mostly is is a great shot of a plant…It’s funny, when I think of Kali, she was found in the country, half starved, at about 8 weeks old, no mother, and brought to the shelter, and had been there for a month, in a little cage, way at the top of the room, and not the main room with all the really cute kittens. The shelter is so overcrowded, and I mean no disrespect, just this is all she has known. Truly, a rescue.

There you have it, my sniffling, sneezing, Fiends. I will leave you with an arty shot I call “Bengal With Boots.” Ok, with mostly shoes. But the illiteration suffered.

Love and Tissues,
Lorraine

Some days some things happen that you just didn’t see happening when you woke up. It went like this…

Boss came home from an errand and said he had stopped by the Humane Society and picked up the latest “We need Supplies Badly” list, and I should go shopping when I had time and take them things.

No time like the present, I thought, and off I went. All would have gone as planned, except I thought I might go visit with the Kitties before I went home. They like that. I like that. I want them all.

And then Something fell in love with me. And I it. Never saw it coming.

I did what anyone would have done. I got the Hell out of there. Talked with Boss, (that’s his foot in the picture) and then went back. Surely I was mistaken, yes, I have wanted on more little one. Yes, I had wanted a rescue rather than spending so much on another Bengal. But, not this moment.

The first time I was there and played with her, she was the sweetest little lover, and when I put her back, she was so surprised. She KNEW. She was half mad, half indignant. WHY was I putting her back when CLEARLY she born to be a Halloween Kitty and love with me.

Only 12 weeks and had been in the shelter for a month. Waiting for me. I explained about the Bengals.. She countered by doing the Halloween Kitty move across the floor sideways.Clearly, SHE wasn’t worried, why should I be?

She’s every colour. All her legs are different, she is a crazy wild mixed up Kitty. I asked Boss what her name was, and he said she is a Calico, call her that. Callie, I thought. More like Kali, I say, the little Demon hadn’t stopped running at full speed (still hasn’t) They called her Princess at the Humane Society.

By the time I got home, she had her name. Venus and Mim love her, and are happy to have a sister. (Ok, I made that up, but no one is DEAD.)

Meet Princess Kali-licious.

Love, I’m quite Mad, and New Kitties,
Lorraine

(Well, perhaps not, but what a great title for a post, eh?)

Since I posted last night, I have gained a another Follower. I had two. Now I have three. Following along after me in the shadows…Cloaked in Darkness, and feeding on the moon. Reveling in the night and all the promises that it holds in the Garden!

Yup. Those are my Followers all right.

(not sure what the Google Followers are, there were a lot of them, weren’t there? If someone could explain..)

I might not have mentioned it, but that Haiku War last night, while I was away, was the BEST! And you did make me proud Fiends, and then some.

I have two more night garden poems for you tonight, but first, I thought we should have photos, and I was going to just nip over and steal some from Nathilie, as she is very good with them, but then I told Aleta SHE could not go off and steal things, so I thought I might better make an attempt…Challanged as I am in the matter of picture taking, but these were fun.

(Something tells me I have a seriously limited time to get this Sunflower Photo right….)

Here’s the little darling in it’s entirety….

And then I started playing around with it, and turned it into this….

And not to go all artsy on yourselves, it just struck me that the stories these two photos tell are so completely different, and the feelings they stir up are exactly opposite, yet completely the same.

Ok, Might have lost it, and y’all most likely learned these things in Photography 1101, but I never noticed things like this before. Someone can explain it to me, and tell me what I am trying to say here.

(And yes, I have been struggling with French Verbs all day, and am reverting to Y’all for the remainder of the night.)

Now, as promised, two more Night Gardens…I am so loving seeing these, and if you are thinking about doing one, remember, no right or wrong. No good and bad. Here you will get only love and support for whatever art you are doing. The important thing is to DO it. And then go and do it again. If it is your heart, how can it be less than beautiful? (hey if I can wax philosophical about sunflowers, you can go out on a limb too!)

Love and Art…
Lorraine

From Gayle:

Wait, what…?

The first time you left I fell down on the driveway and cried

The second time you left I fell down on the bed and died

The third time you left I (already being undead you see) hurt somewhat less

The fourth time you left I yelled and screamed and tried not to obsess

The fifth time you left I had my gift and had to make good

The sixth time you left I finally understood

You don’t love me

Right?

Time to go

I plant sunflowers to remind me of life in the sun

Who will enjoy them now

Others will

Just as others enjoyed you when I thought I was alive

So many others

I hear that there are cactus in the desert that look dead during the day but bloom at night

Big beautiful full white luscious Queen of the Night flowers

I think I will move to the desert

And let the others have my sunflowers

And you

Gayle

And from Val…

Once, the night desert was nearly our death.
Sand ran in sheets of sharp water down our
dry skin; flooded through my clothes and parched mouth.
Adan cursed me. Hot wind whipped my mare’s black
hair, and her bridle sang, as Bilal prayed.
His muezzin’s call now: God, give us water.

It was two days since we last drank water.
Two days off our path. I wondered when death
would come to claim us. Perhaps if we prayed
devoutly, Bilal said, we would find our
way to a riyadh. But in a storm’s black
night, all prayer is only sounds in a mouth.

Giving up on God, I covered my mouth,
the better to keep my hot breath’s water.
Adan fell deeply into a cold black
mood, muttering how he might bring me death.
We had long since passed any hunger; our
swift end a fate for which I now half-prayed.

Through the wind, I saw a dark wall, and prayed.
A sharp shout burst from Adan’s cracking mouth,
and he scaled the smooth walls using our
backs. His voice was sweeter than fresh water,
then silent. Had he been found by his death?
I lifted Balil, a shadow in black.

From inside the walled garden’s leaves, all black
I heard Balil, who — of course! — knelt and prayed,
giving thanks for God’s mercy, staying death;
while Adan’s curses flowed, a river’s mouth
of profane praise for the fountain’s water.
Hands raw, I climbed in the garden of our

shaken faith and doubt, where at last all our
hungers were sated. But seeing the black
desert outside — with no hope, no water –
how many others were exhausted, prayed
out? The water dried to dust in my mouth.
I saddled my mare and rode to race death,

to tell the lost of water and of our
lives spared from death, in a black night’s garden.
Come, I prayed, my mouth dry; find what you seek.

Hmm…When I go to my Blogger Dashboard, it now says I have two “Followers”. Followers, eh? As opposed to you run of the mill Fiends? What do Followers DO, besides the obvious? Do they get to help me? Carry things? Or just follow where I may go….

Which is currently off to French class, then dog school, and then to Minneapolis for the night. I have to meet a plane at 5:00am tomorrow morning. A welcome chore, but an early one. I can’t comment here from my phone, tho I will be reading them. If you want to talk about me like I am not here, or do some stalking, now is your chance.

This is where Cuthulu-carrot came from. It is a mess. And full of creeping things. Very creepy. But surely the Mandrake Root Trapped in a Carrot’s body was a fluke…There could not be anything ELSE in there I am sure of it. No, it only FEELS like somethings are watching me when I go out and harvest…..(Cue music and stay tuned for what Might happen next)

If I could see what I was taking a picture of when I took pictures, this would have been a GREAT shot. As it is, here is half a flower.

Remain as sane as you can, my dear Fiends, while I am out in the world. I will be watching. Make me proud!

Love and Magic,
Lorraine

I promise you, we will get to the Carrot. No scrolling down! The music the last few days was too beyond cool to gloss over it. And I made three new friends and got to meet them all in person for the first time.

I had no idea who exactly Bela was playing with tonight, but I love whatever he is doing, and so never looked it up. Turned out to be Abigail Washburn and the Sparrow Quartet. I have no idea what kind of music that was, but Great Fods, it is my new favorite…..

Maybe Chinese-Bluegrass-Irish-Gospel with something else thrown in? Never heard anything like it. Two banjos, a fiddle and a cello and some amazing vocals.

Listen….

Told you it was cool. Amazing players all. The second funnest surprise of the night (the first would be that “Aisle 1 row A” is every bit as cool as it sounded when I picked up the tickets) was that we were sitting next to Dave Stenshoel and his wife. Dave is, among other things, the fiddler from Boiled in Lead, and more to the point, the man who taught me to play Irish music, long, long ago. Very fun to see them again.

Meeting Bela in person was perfect, one of those, oh, yeah, I Know you and we have a lot to talk about sort of meetings. An exchange of swag, and way to little time to talk. Looking forward to next time, to be sure…

(This is my “Oh Fod They Are Taking My Picture Face”, as Boss calls it. Mainly we were trying to smile and talk at the same time.)

As I said in the comments, The Shondes Sunday night were well worth staying up WAY too late for. Kind of Post-punk-meets Klezmer and gives birth to something new. I am really looking forward to seeing what they do, they are onto something new, and very cool.

Here’s me with new friends Temin and Eli after the show…

I had a letter this morning,and I want to share it with you all….It’s personal to me, but I feel you, my Fiends, need to share…

(Bare with me here, Carrots are online more than you can know…)

Here it is:

Dear Quiche (if I may be so bold as to call you so..)

I want to thank you for your efforts on my behalf. It is because of you, and your Fiends, that all of my hopes, and dreams and wishes have all come true! I have been misunderstood, laughed at and reviled. I am a Mandrake Root Trapped in a Carrots body and had despaired of ever finding and living my destiny…I was meant for greater things, I was meant to live on, in the hopes and dreams of others like me, and gain lasting renown….

I have achieved all that I could ever dream of. And my people, others like me, now have hope that it IS possible...

I will live forever, in joy and triumph!!!!!!

And I thank you.

And so, life is good. Love, Music and Living Your Dreams,
Lorraine