Oh shit! I was just in Frankfort! I forgot to swing by the Applebee's. Dammit!
Friends from Louisville played a show at some place called Macool's or Magoot's, no maybe Macadoos. I think it was Macadoos. I'll google it up in a minute. Little dive bar on the outskirts of downtown. Make a left at the Hardee's.
I enjoy that bars, even dive ones, almost always have Buffalo Trace on their shelf and it ain't on the top shelf, neither. You betcha.
And I should not forget to mention that Danville opened its first liquor store since going wet. The Kroger and a few gas stations began stocking beer, which I very much appreciated. But now the town has its first liquor store. I live in the county just north of Danville. The store is about a fifteen minute drive for me, not an obstacle. They have a request sheet so their new customers can help drive their shelf supplies. I put in a few requests. Friendly people there.
I've heard rumors we're getting a Liquor Barn soon. For you Chicago people, that the Kentucky equivalent of a Sam's Wines and Liquors. For you Denver people, it's the equivalent of an Argonaut Liquors. For you Champaign people, it's a Friar Tuck's. For us Kentucky people, it's a little bit of happiness.
Hey, Kansas City is finally getting a Trader Joe's! Not one, but two stores in 2011. Can an IKEA be far behind? Nah, St. Louis would get an IKEA first.
Anyway - the Trader Joe's on the Kansas side probably won't carry liquor because of the werid laws around here. The Missori side store will have it all.
Speaking of Applebees. Their corporate offices are in KC. I'm not sure about the whore situation. I tired to hire on there in the IT dept, and as luck would have it, they outsourced a lot of those jobs. Then they had to bring some of it back because the restaurants were complaining. Good thing, I narrowly escaped becoming one of their corporate whores.
That two meals for $20 bucks deal they have? My son and I tried it. Meh. Maybe we got the wrong thing. My neighborhood Applebees is right next to a Panera and I usually go for the Panera.
A few times the Applebees guys yelled at me for parking in "their" spot, but going into Panera. You know, those spots that have signs that say reserved for carryout. Fake signs, in other words.
Great story about Walmart. I hate Walmart, Walmart stores, and Walmart parking lots.
I just don't understand why Louisville doesn't have a Trader Joe's. Louisville, especially the Highlands, is practically custom made for a TJ's. Maybe has something to do with KY's weird liquor laws, so maybe Jefferson County's rules would cut into TJ's bottom line significantly by tamping down their wine and beer revenues. Dunno. Good for you, though. I miss my Chicago TJ's. I had some weekly staples that are no longer a part of my culinary life.
P.S. I heard another rumor that the Liquor Barn is coming, apparently has already rented the Old Kmart space out on the bypass. Nice. Very nice.
P.P.S. Everyone is Kentucky explains where something is based on where something used to be. Need to find the Krispy Kreme store? Well, it's about five blocks south of where the Bacon's used to be. Need to find the temp location of the justice center? It's in the old Gateway building.
So, we started up an arts council out here in the middle of nowhere. I'm the treasurer. We just had out first big festival on Saturday. Officially, it was our second Fall Arts Festival, but our first one was held on private property and was more of a please-donate-money-so-we-can-pay-our-501c3 festival. This was our first biggie. We held it at Fort Harrod. Beautiful ground, lots of trees and space, some hills, good acoustics. We had about forty different artist booths, music on the main stage, community theater on the second stage, the Friends of Fort Harrod sold burgers and dogs as a fundraiser. Kids activities included a build&paint your own birdhouse, coloring books and sidewalk chalk (put huge blocks of chalk in kids hands and let them go to town; kids find it ridiculously fun and its low-budget for us), face painting, and, hm, something else I'm forgetting. We've managed to find a little niche in the community for having a talent for coming up with neat kids activities, which in a small town, makes us kind of valuable. Even our zombie crawl in the summer had mostly kids with their parents or grandparents.
The weather was beautiful. We got there at 6am to set up the premises and didn't finish the day until over twelve hours later. The official count was 754 attendees, which ain't bad for our here and what amounts to our first festival, and with a low budget to work with. Next year, we hope for more, both in terms of artists and attendees. Hopefully in one year, two at most, we'll expand to a two-day festival. We'll see.
It was pretty cool seeing the crowds come in, knowing that I had played a part in making it happen.
The Fall Arts Festival sounds great. Either it didn't get much notice here or I didn't look in the right places. Fort Harrod is a beautiful setting, and it was a perfect day. Congratulations on the all-around success!
P.P.S. Everyone is Kentucky explains where something is based on where something used to be. Need to find the Krispy Kreme store? Well, it's about five blocks south of where the Bacon's used to be.
I don't think that's just a Kentucky thing. We got that a lot when we were in New England. If you didn't grow up there, sure, you have to explain you don't know where the old Sears on Main used to be. It drove my husband bonkers, and he took it as another annoying New England habit. First time he did it to someone after we moved back to KC, I poked him in the ribs and said he'd turned into 'One Of Them'. People who give directions based on defunct landmarks.
Your festival sounds lovely! The bird houses & sidewalk chalk sound super. Kids activities get ho-hum after a while with the routine face painting, balloon artist, and blow-up jumpy carnival bounce houses.
As a Nutmegger I can attest that Katrina speaks the truth about New England directions being anchored by retail detritus. Only slightly more interesting was the habit of residents of Down East Maine to indicate distance by "sees", "Get to Tozier's? Ah-yhut. See the bridge, cross it. See Young's Lobster, don't stop. See Moose Point, ah-yhut, go straight. See Bang-AAAH bank? Straight. Up on your left. Got it? Three sees, left." I lived in Searsport for a year and loved asking for directions.
Connecticuns (my word) have a long memory of how richer life used to be in the small cities. It's easy to see that nostalgia driving through the skeletal remains of Norwich, Willimantic, Putnam, even New London.
In Massachusetts, or at least in the Pioneer Valley, I was always annoyed that streets were never marked, but I was always given directions according to whatever road something was on. It definitely said, "If you don't know the name of the road, you don't belong around here."
It was several years before a local clued me in on how they do house numbers. The lowest numbers are closest to the major road. The major road is the one with more traffic and lights.
And roads change their names in the middle, such as Hartford Ave in Providence, RI changes to Providence Ave when you're closer to Hartford, CT.
They don't have a grid system like KC, where Main street is the east/west divider. As in, 7000 West 95th is roughly 70 blocks west of Main. 9500 Main is at the intersection of 95th and Main. It's pretty hard to get lost around here. Not many bodies of water to interrupt roads - the main barriers are highways, or cul-de-sacs in newer developments. Downtown KC where the MIssouri & Kaw rivers converge is pretty screwy, but that's about it.
I loved it out there, and with a good local map (paper maps, no Google maps when I lived there) I found the best shortcuts!
Another beautiful autumn in central Kentucky. This morning, the mist is so thick it looks like snow.
We moved into a new place in July, a huge house up on a hill, way more space than we need, but after the cramped conditions of our last place, it was a nice change. Katie definitely appreciates it.
Also, we're no longer near the train anymore. I finally have been getting full night's sleep. It's amazing.
My writing room is on the first floor. It's a sun room directly off from the kitchen. It's got wall of windows on two sides. The windows I face when writing look out over our big back yard, our deck, and out across huge yards that bank against ours. Really pretty view. I'll post some pictures soon.
That deck is awesome. We didn't have one at our last place. We had a small balcony which was nice, but being so close to the train, it was never long 'til our peace and quiet was interrupted and we'd have to retreat indoors. Now, we can sit out there, have a drink, grill, surrounded by flowers and christmas lights and wonderful little views of our neighborhood.
Also, we're just down the street from the Fairgrounds, so we can simply walk to next year's Harrodsburg Beef Festival or any time they have a demolition derby.
My last day of work might be today. I knew it was kind of a temp-ish job, kind of accounting-seasonal, and I'm not willing to do some of the work he had me doing last year (personal taxes, mainly), so that means I'm out of a job. Kind of. He'll still (allegedly) bring me back on a job by job basis (I guess as sort of an IC, but not really, since he'll still have me on payroll) when there's work that is more along my line of work (corporate accounting, some corporate type tax returns ie 990s). We'll miss the money, but I'm not gonna miss the work. Because...
...with my wonderful wife's blessing, I'm going to take the next two months off to finish writing my book. I've already completed the first draft and the first edit, and now I'm starting up the second (of three) edits. I have to modify the storyline of one of the characters to better fit how the story's focus changed as I wrote the damn thing, and I've got some fact checking to do, and I've got about one full chapter and three chapter interludes ("half chapters") to write to the story, but that's no problem. I left the one chapter unwritten purposefully, kind of like a catch-all to have to add material that would add texture to the story later on, because the story, no matter how strong an author's outline and plans and notes, will take on a life of its own after a while and change things in important ways, and so I like to leave myself a couple spots in the story that I can make additions to that will allow me weave the story changes into the rest of the story. Last-minute anchors, so to speak.
In any event, I'm looking at having my last edit done by Dec. 15th when I can hand it to my wife to read. She'll do an edit of her own, and I may or may not make changes based on her notes (but probably yes). After that, I hope to have it ready to begin trying to sell to agents by December 31st. After which, I will be a kajillionaire.
I want it to stay autumn here for months, at the very least. It's so beautiful down here in Autumn, especially the weather. There were days last week I coulda worn shorts. Big change from half a lifetime of Chicago lake effects. But I have to admit to getting all excited about the first time I'm sitting in this writing room and the snow starts falling from the sky and tucking in these green fields and wish them sweet dreams of Spring.
Congrats on the book! That is a monumental accomplishment and I look forward to snapping up a copy when it hits the streets and telling people, "Oh yeah, I totally knew jonahpwll back in the day; carpeted eMusers with prose like they were bombs." ;-)
This has been an unusual autumn, about 20 degrees warmer than usual for days now. The trees in my neighborhood just started losing their leaves this past week. We had a bit of a breeze Saturday, so I took advantage of the beautiful morning to rake the front yard. I hate leaf blowers, and spouse likes to mulch with the lawnmower, but raking is one of my autumn pleasures.
The brown, gold, and red leaves were twisting, turning, floating down like rain. I had filled the large yard waste container and had started on a bag when two of the girls from across the street came offering help. They are about 11 to 12 years old, and haven't yet grown into the grown-up middle school look. We raked, bagged, talked about anything that crossed their minds (some of it sad), and they jumped in the leaves and covered themselves. Remember how much fun that was when you were a kid?
The best thing about it was the job didn't have to be perfect. Couldn't be perfect because the leaf fall continued. This morning the front yard has lots of leaves, not as many as Saturday morning, and the back yard has a golden carpet. Maybe more raking this afternoon?
Jonahpwll, I'm looking forward to reading your book. Maybe even meeting you at the Kentucky Book Fair in Frankfort some day.
Were you at the fair on Saturday? Katie and I spent the afternoon and evening in Frankfort.
We drove in and immediately had a meal at Rick's White Light Diner (or something like that). I had a slice of the crawfish pie with a side of mac 'n blue cheese, Katie had the oyster po'boy with a side of farmers market brocolli. If you've never been, you should go. It's just off the river, I think it's just off Bridge St. and the 2nd Ave. bridge (I'll look it up for you). We hung out at book fair for awhile after that, talked with a few people we knew, then spent the day wandering around downtown Frankfort. It was such a beautiful day. I really like Frankfort. I'd move there in a heartbeat. Just to be surrounded by river arms in a shallow valley in the hills, brick street and old architecture, coffee shops, diners, funky restaurants, book stores, candy shop, nice bars, a river walking trail, the malls relegated to a not-pretty part of the city by the interstate; man, I must really miss living in a city that has, y'know, stuff.
Congratulations on your book and best wishes for its success! I live two states over, in piedmont North Carolina, so I completely agree with you that autumn in the upper South is a sweet season. Alas, hereabouts it is followed by three months of climactic confusion where the only certainty is no certainty: could be 70 degrees, could be ice (much more common here than snow).
Plus, woe betide you if don't give a fig about basketball...
pzeke, the weather is the same here. Even in winter we can go from a near 70 degree day to snow the next.
I confess. I do like college basketball. My school years were spent in southern Indiana, and when I was a kid, every barn had a basketball goal. That was back when small schools could compete against the big schools in the tourneys. I was in high school when Milan, a small town in my county, won the Indiana State Tournament -- the movie "Hoosiers" is based on that story. The fairy tale has never died there. The town still has a sign announcing home of the State Champs 1954. The guy who made the last shot is still well known throughout Indiana, has a bar/restaurant in Indianapolis. Big Blue? I became a fan only after my daughter became a student there.
I thought about going to the Book Fair, but I had too much to get done here. I have gone a few times, and I always enjoy it. I do like Frankfort, and the little restaurants downtown are fun. I don't remember the names of any of them, just wander around until I find a menu posted on the window or outside that sounds inviting. Have you visited Daniel Boone's grave? The cemetery is up the hill on US 60, just out of the downtown district, overlooking the river and the Capitol building. I like old cemeteries, and if I have time when in Frankfort, I usually go up there on sunny days just for that view.
This morning was the first morning I've had to brush snow off my car. I've had to scrape frost a few times now, but this was the first actual snow. I'm in upstate New York.
Also looking forward to your book jonahpwll. Let us know when and where to look for it.
Goody! I am in a lotto-type thing with some eBay part-time sellers about a first snowfall in mid-Kentucky.
By cracky, I do not remember what date I picked....this is just a positive sign, I hope, I hope.
Goody! I am in a lotto-type thing with some eBay part-time sellers about a first snowfall in mid-Kentucky.
By cracky, I do not remember what date I picked....this is just a positive sign, I hope, I hope.
Well, it's raining like mad today and it's supposed to get up to 70 today. There was a possibility of snow yesterday, but it never got cold enough. I feel like maybe Sunday is the next call for maybe-snow.
Man, they got an office pool for everything, don't they?
Last night's weather report indicated temps would be falling today with the possibility of icy spots and snow flurries Friday morning. Currently? Rain and 62 degrees per the thermometer outside my kitchen window.
Usually I am not bothered by temps in the 30s, but switching from the 70s, which we have had of late, to 30s and 40s is rather drastic for adjusting all at once. It's awfully hard to make an honest bet on the weather here. It's more of a lucky guess.
There are patches of snow this morning. None on our back lawn, a wide strip on the front, a cover of it on the top of the car. The neighbor directly across has none on his lawn, the house next door to that one has a snow-covered front lawn. We have some tall pines in the back, so that probably accounts for no snow back there.
It was quite warm yesterday, and it did rain all day, and was still raining when I went to bed. The cold and snow swept through in the wee hours.
Whoever had Nov. 25th at approx 9pm EST is the winner. Snow came down hard for a couple hours. Doesn't look like much is sticking around at of 10am this morning, but that was definitely snow. We sat outside on the porch by the fireplace and watched it fall.
Finally, morning snow. It's just as beautiful a view from my writing room/sun room as I thought it would be.
Cats dozing peacefully nearby.
"Adventures of a Polar Expedition" playing on the laptop. Benjamin Koppel has such a warm sound yet retains a satisfying crispness to his notes.
Outside my windows, it's Kentucky as far as the eye can see.
Comments
Friends from Louisville played a show at some place called Macool's or Magoot's, no maybe Macadoos. I think it was Macadoos. I'll google it up in a minute. Little dive bar on the outskirts of downtown. Make a left at the Hardee's.
I enjoy that bars, even dive ones, almost always have Buffalo Trace on their shelf and it ain't on the top shelf, neither. You betcha.
I've heard rumors we're getting a Liquor Barn soon. For you Chicago people, that the Kentucky equivalent of a Sam's Wines and Liquors. For you Denver people, it's the equivalent of an Argonaut Liquors. For you Champaign people, it's a Friar Tuck's. For us Kentucky people, it's a little bit of happiness.
Anyway - the Trader Joe's on the Kansas side probably won't carry liquor because of the werid laws around here. The Missori side store will have it all.
Speaking of Applebees. Their corporate offices are in KC. I'm not sure about the whore situation. I tired to hire on there in the IT dept, and as luck would have it, they outsourced a lot of those jobs. Then they had to bring some of it back because the restaurants were complaining. Good thing, I narrowly escaped becoming one of their corporate whores.
That two meals for $20 bucks deal they have? My son and I tried it. Meh. Maybe we got the wrong thing. My neighborhood Applebees is right next to a Panera and I usually go for the Panera.
A few times the Applebees guys yelled at me for parking in "their" spot, but going into Panera. You know, those spots that have signs that say reserved for carryout. Fake signs, in other words.
Great story about Walmart. I hate Walmart, Walmart stores, and Walmart parking lots.
P.S. I heard another rumor that the Liquor Barn is coming, apparently has already rented the Old Kmart space out on the bypass. Nice. Very nice.
P.P.S. Everyone is Kentucky explains where something is based on where something used to be. Need to find the Krispy Kreme store? Well, it's about five blocks south of where the Bacon's used to be. Need to find the temp location of the justice center? It's in the old Gateway building.
The weather was beautiful. We got there at 6am to set up the premises and didn't finish the day until over twelve hours later. The official count was 754 attendees, which ain't bad for our here and what amounts to our first festival, and with a low budget to work with. Next year, we hope for more, both in terms of artists and attendees. Hopefully in one year, two at most, we'll expand to a two-day festival. We'll see.
It was pretty cool seeing the crowds come in, knowing that I had played a part in making it happen.
Craig
Your festival sounds lovely! The bird houses & sidewalk chalk sound super. Kids activities get ho-hum after a while with the routine face painting, balloon artist, and blow-up jumpy carnival bounce houses.
In Massachusetts, or at least in the Pioneer Valley, I was always annoyed that streets were never marked, but I was always given directions according to whatever road something was on. It definitely said, "If you don't know the name of the road, you don't belong around here."
And roads change their names in the middle, such as Hartford Ave in Providence, RI changes to Providence Ave when you're closer to Hartford, CT.
They don't have a grid system like KC, where Main street is the east/west divider. As in, 7000 West 95th is roughly 70 blocks west of Main. 9500 Main is at the intersection of 95th and Main. It's pretty hard to get lost around here. Not many bodies of water to interrupt roads - the main barriers are highways, or cul-de-sacs in newer developments. Downtown KC where the MIssouri & Kaw rivers converge is pretty screwy, but that's about it.
I loved it out there, and with a good local map (paper maps, no Google maps when I lived there) I found the best shortcuts!
We moved into a new place in July, a huge house up on a hill, way more space than we need, but after the cramped conditions of our last place, it was a nice change. Katie definitely appreciates it.
Also, we're no longer near the train anymore. I finally have been getting full night's sleep. It's amazing.
My writing room is on the first floor. It's a sun room directly off from the kitchen. It's got wall of windows on two sides. The windows I face when writing look out over our big back yard, our deck, and out across huge yards that bank against ours. Really pretty view. I'll post some pictures soon.
That deck is awesome. We didn't have one at our last place. We had a small balcony which was nice, but being so close to the train, it was never long 'til our peace and quiet was interrupted and we'd have to retreat indoors. Now, we can sit out there, have a drink, grill, surrounded by flowers and christmas lights and wonderful little views of our neighborhood.
Also, we're just down the street from the Fairgrounds, so we can simply walk to next year's Harrodsburg Beef Festival or any time they have a demolition derby.
My last day of work might be today. I knew it was kind of a temp-ish job, kind of accounting-seasonal, and I'm not willing to do some of the work he had me doing last year (personal taxes, mainly), so that means I'm out of a job. Kind of. He'll still (allegedly) bring me back on a job by job basis (I guess as sort of an IC, but not really, since he'll still have me on payroll) when there's work that is more along my line of work (corporate accounting, some corporate type tax returns ie 990s). We'll miss the money, but I'm not gonna miss the work. Because...
...with my wonderful wife's blessing, I'm going to take the next two months off to finish writing my book. I've already completed the first draft and the first edit, and now I'm starting up the second (of three) edits. I have to modify the storyline of one of the characters to better fit how the story's focus changed as I wrote the damn thing, and I've got some fact checking to do, and I've got about one full chapter and three chapter interludes ("half chapters") to write to the story, but that's no problem. I left the one chapter unwritten purposefully, kind of like a catch-all to have to add material that would add texture to the story later on, because the story, no matter how strong an author's outline and plans and notes, will take on a life of its own after a while and change things in important ways, and so I like to leave myself a couple spots in the story that I can make additions to that will allow me weave the story changes into the rest of the story. Last-minute anchors, so to speak.
In any event, I'm looking at having my last edit done by Dec. 15th when I can hand it to my wife to read. She'll do an edit of her own, and I may or may not make changes based on her notes (but probably yes). After that, I hope to have it ready to begin trying to sell to agents by December 31st. After which, I will be a kajillionaire.
I want it to stay autumn here for months, at the very least. It's so beautiful down here in Autumn, especially the weather. There were days last week I coulda worn shorts. Big change from half a lifetime of Chicago lake effects. But I have to admit to getting all excited about the first time I'm sitting in this writing room and the snow starts falling from the sky and tucking in these green fields and wish them sweet dreams of Spring.
This has been an unusual autumn, about 20 degrees warmer than usual for days now. The trees in my neighborhood just started losing their leaves this past week. We had a bit of a breeze Saturday, so I took advantage of the beautiful morning to rake the front yard. I hate leaf blowers, and spouse likes to mulch with the lawnmower, but raking is one of my autumn pleasures.
The brown, gold, and red leaves were twisting, turning, floating down like rain. I had filled the large yard waste container and had started on a bag when two of the girls from across the street came offering help. They are about 11 to 12 years old, and haven't yet grown into the grown-up middle school look. We raked, bagged, talked about anything that crossed their minds (some of it sad), and they jumped in the leaves and covered themselves. Remember how much fun that was when you were a kid?
The best thing about it was the job didn't have to be perfect. Couldn't be perfect because the leaf fall continued. This morning the front yard has lots of leaves, not as many as Saturday morning, and the back yard has a golden carpet. Maybe more raking this afternoon?
Jonahpwll, I'm looking forward to reading your book. Maybe even meeting you at the Kentucky Book Fair in Frankfort some day.
We drove in and immediately had a meal at Rick's White Light Diner (or something like that). I had a slice of the crawfish pie with a side of mac 'n blue cheese, Katie had the oyster po'boy with a side of farmers market brocolli. If you've never been, you should go. It's just off the river, I think it's just off Bridge St. and the 2nd Ave. bridge (I'll look it up for you). We hung out at book fair for awhile after that, talked with a few people we knew, then spent the day wandering around downtown Frankfort. It was such a beautiful day. I really like Frankfort. I'd move there in a heartbeat. Just to be surrounded by river arms in a shallow valley in the hills, brick street and old architecture, coffee shops, diners, funky restaurants, book stores, candy shop, nice bars, a river walking trail, the malls relegated to a not-pretty part of the city by the interstate; man, I must really miss living in a city that has, y'know, stuff.
Plus, woe betide you if don't give a fig about basketball...
I am surrounded by people who, for no seeming reason, shout "Go Big Blue!"
I confess. I do like college basketball. My school years were spent in southern Indiana, and when I was a kid, every barn had a basketball goal. That was back when small schools could compete against the big schools in the tourneys. I was in high school when Milan, a small town in my county, won the Indiana State Tournament -- the movie "Hoosiers" is based on that story. The fairy tale has never died there. The town still has a sign announcing home of the State Champs 1954. The guy who made the last shot is still well known throughout Indiana, has a bar/restaurant in Indianapolis. Big Blue? I became a fan only after my daughter became a student there.
I thought about going to the Book Fair, but I had too much to get done here. I have gone a few times, and I always enjoy it. I do like Frankfort, and the little restaurants downtown are fun. I don't remember the names of any of them, just wander around until I find a menu posted on the window or outside that sounds inviting. Have you visited Daniel Boone's grave? The cemetery is up the hill on US 60, just out of the downtown district, overlooking the river and the Capitol building. I like old cemeteries, and if I have time when in Frankfort, I usually go up there on sunny days just for that view.
Also looking forward to your book jonahpwll. Let us know when and where to look for it.
By cracky, I do not remember what date I picked....this is just a positive sign, I hope, I hope.
Well, it's raining like mad today and it's supposed to get up to 70 today. There was a possibility of snow yesterday, but it never got cold enough. I feel like maybe Sunday is the next call for maybe-snow.
Man, they got an office pool for everything, don't they?
Usually I am not bothered by temps in the 30s, but switching from the 70s, which we have had of late, to 30s and 40s is rather drastic for adjusting all at once. It's awfully hard to make an honest bet on the weather here. It's more of a lucky guess.
It was quite warm yesterday, and it did rain all day, and was still raining when I went to bed. The cold and snow swept through in the wee hours.
So, there it is. Snow in Kentucky.
Whoever had Nov. 25th at approx 9pm EST is the winner. Snow came down hard for a couple hours. Doesn't look like much is sticking around at of 10am this morning, but that was definitely snow. We sat outside on the porch by the fireplace and watched it fall.
Cats dozing peacefully nearby.
"Adventures of a Polar Expedition" playing on the laptop. Benjamin Koppel has such a warm sound yet retains a satisfying crispness to his notes.
Outside my windows, it's Kentucky as far as the eye can see.