Boston? Boston, Texas?

With only a few months left in New York, Shelley and I have resolved to take advantage of our time and location, not just to do New York-y things, but also to get out and see the greater New England area. I must admit, from an Oklahoman/Texan perspective, I always considered "New England" to be virtually synonymous with the American "North East," that is, anything from Pennsylvania to Maine. Apparently, this is too broad, but for those who scorn such regional naievety, I challenge you to properly describe Oklahoma/TX by region. Often I have heard both lumped in as "The South," though certainly the manifold differences between a TX/OK'an, Louisiannan, Alabaman, Georgian, or Carolinian are enough to make such a corporate identity laughable. Midwestern? Great Plains? Western? They're all tough sells once you actually travel there, and it is just this awakening that I had on our recent trip to Boston.

First let me say that our trip was greatly enhanced by some insider info from our good friend Willy Razavi, who spent a few years at Brandeis and tipped us off to basically everything cool we did all weekend. And even then, we only managed to hit about 50% of his recommendations. It's good to have friends in-the-know. We planned to make the trip a relaxing one, and as such didn't put much effort into an especially long "to do" checklist. Still, by simple wandering we managed to achieve a great deal, without exhausting ourselves.

We took the BoltBus (4 hour trip, $18.50 per person) down on Friday and got into town by 2. We booked ahead and actually found a small boutique hotel (Newbury Guesthouse) in the Back Bay area right by the Copley T stop, with a super deal (apparently, no one travels to Boston in February!). After getting settled, we walked to the Boston Common, then kept walking just to look around while the sun was still up. We passed the state house, the Customs house and Faneiulle Hall, and suddenly we were at the Aquarium. Had no idea just how small downtown Boston was! Dinner was procured (with the assistance of Shelley's iPod Touch, and the free internet of nearby Cheers!) at a decent Mexican joint near Faneuille, "Zuma's Tex-Mex," and afterwards we paroused the collection at the nearby Newbury Comics.

As it got dark, it got chilly, so we walked home, and enjoyed a relaxed evening of watching the Olympics - first time we got to do that this year. Alas, after 30 minutes of Men's Super G, it was time for the Pairs Ice Dance - Compulsory, competition. If there's anything I like less than watching figure skating, it's watching figure skating without aerials, doing the same routine, to the same song, over and over and over. Seriously. Just leave the camera in one spot, and let me watch the ice melt.

Saturday we started off bright and none-too-early for Harvard on the 'ole #1 bus. Alas, no Andes Pipe Band to greet us at Harvard Square, but the atmosphere was its usual bustle, and we quickly skipped over to Harvard Yard for a walk-around. I'm not sure what I was expecting from the Harvard campus, but I must admit, it wasn't quite what I found. For one thing, I naively expected "Harvard Yard" to be a central open yard, like a parade ground, around which Harvard was clustered, a model I've become familiar with at Columbia. But no, "Yard" is apparently just a euphemism for "grassy campus." The library of course was impressive, and I found the enormous size of the Church next door logical, but provoking. At Trinity, the church is certainly large, but just as certainly not a central part of the campus - almost an after-thought in both its original construction, and the habits of current students. At Columbia, we have only a small (albeit very impressive) chapel, also situated off to the side. But the Harvard Church, being both very large and centrally located facing the library, is obviously a major part of the institution, at least by original design. Calls into light many questions about the religious origins (and/or biases) of American higher education, to what degree those are maintained (Orel Roberts) or submerged, and what the process of secularizing these institutions looked like over the 19th and 20th centuries.

Otherwise, our time in Cambridge was spent checking off Willy's list. The Cambridge Common, the Sheradon Commander, the old houses on Brattle, the Harvard Coop (when the apocalypse comes, I do believe one could survive for weeks on the Harvard-inscribed goods available at this Ivy League Wal-Mart), Black Ink, and finally the Algiers cafe, an emphatic recommendation of Mr. Razavi. Not surprisingly, he was dead-on. That was some amazing hummus. We opted for lentil soup to go along, and I had an Orange Mint Hot Chocolate. Awesome. The tower was especially cool. On the way out, I actually passed a table of two guys - one of whom had a plate full of hummus, and the other, a plate full of pancakes - Willy points out this is the only coffeehouse with both as exquisite specialties.

After our snack, we did a good bit of walking. Down to Anderson Bridge and the Harvard boat house, then back over Memorial Walking Bridge (famous to us for its appearance in the movie With Honors - Brendan Fraser's last good role). It came out that I am not accustomed to seeing frozen rivers (in fact, the Charles might be my first), and I was endlessly fascinated by it.

We next took a long walk down Cambridge street in search of the Druid, and "authentically Celtic" pub from Willy's list. Shelley only thought I got lost once, though I maintain that we were always moving the proper general direction. Once found, we enjoyed a couple of local brews while we watched italian-league football and shot the breeze with the very talkative young Irish barkeeps. For example: "Did you know that a man once drank nothing but Guinness for 30 days, like that McDonalds guy? Enough calories in it he didn't go hungry. Only effect was that he started growing chest hair. Not sure any of that's true. Except the last part."

Just for kicks, exercise, and to walk off the effect of 2 pints, we walked all the way down Cambridge to the Museum of Science. Got the impression that was not the side of Cambridge most tourists see. The Museum was packed - apparently it was almost closing time and they were hosting a Cub Scout lock-in that evening. With a Harry Potter prop exhibit. Nice.

We found dinner at a Thai place back on Newbury by the hotel, then it was time for more Olympics. Speed skating (short track), a bit of bobsled, and then on to Curling, a game we keep trying to figure out, but not with much luck. I think of it as Crickett-on-ice, not for any similarity between the two, but because neither affords itself to a casual comprehension.

For Sunday we had time enough before our afternoon bus departure, so we grab a T and headed over to Charlestown for the Bunker Hill memorial. That was a lot of stairs, but well worth it for the views. Made it to the USS Constitution, then a quick walk around the WWII destroyer USS Cassin Young before we beat feet back across the bridge to North Station, back to the hotel to grab luggage, lunch at Boloco (a local "burrito" chain), then 4 hours of sleeping on the bus back.

A good weekend, all in all, and a wonderful escape to a city with open skylines and plenty of sunshine.

And really, what more could you ask than that?

Weber

::(lame) Texpatriot

You can's spell Normalcy without N-Y-C

Though it doesn't make the most interesting blog post, the last week has been an exhilarating return to normalcy for Shelley and I now that we're back in New York. Our diet has (thankfully) stabilized around our old new York staples (pasta, quesadillas, ramen, cheap chinese), my weekly reading homework has recommenced (I'm medulla oblongata-deep in Bruno Latour), and we manage to see friends now on a NY-standard weekly (rather than non-NY daily) basis. Ups and downs, it is good to be getting back in the rhythm of our life in New York.

But lest we get too comfortable, plans are already afoot to yank us back out of these urban doldrums. We're in the midst of planning trips to Boston, DC, VT, and even TX over the course of the next few months, and are contemplating a major Honeymoon trip for early/mid-May. Shelley just started a new full-time job, and I am trying to keep 2 part-time occupations in the air as a book editor/publisher/salesman and a novice webmanager.

Further afield, though not much further, is the looming presence of my M.A. thesis, and even more looming, though unfortunately not much further, is the daunting maw of job hunting/ applications.

And so this is the background, the frame, the structure of Spring 2010 in the land of the Lame Texpatriot. It's nothing novel or revolutionary, no re-invention of any circular mobility device, but it happily confronts us with some of the same old challenges and new opportunities to overcome them in different ways.

It's cold here, but then what's new?

I have a wife now, and a Wii. Beyond that, I'm just going to keep on keepin' on until such time and incident as gives me chance to do otherwise.

And if you come across anyone looking for an aspiring NGO problem solver with a background in radio operations and an interest in Central Asian politics, by all means, get their number.

Weber

::(lame) Texpatriot

They Invented Twitter to Avoid This Post

The problem with writing a blog every 2 months is two fold: first, since no one expects you to write anything as the more common fact is the absence of writing, you simply repeat the vicious cycle of not writing, and second, since so much occurs between posts, you cannot possibly give all events their due, and this also leads to a feeling of insurmountability that most often results in more procrastination.

The solutions are also in tandem:
1) stop being such a p/wussy.
2) go Nike/ just do it.

In an effort to get past both lame excuses, I'll try in this one post to catch you up on everything that's happened since the beginning of November. What's that you say? You really aren't that interested, and would prefer to just pick things up as they are now and move forward? Well tough nuggets - you didn't think this was really for the benefit of my audience, did you?

Begin the catharmanacathon:

Shelley was on tour for November and December, and in her absence I flitted between obscene amounts of time at Columbia's Butler library, very poor regular bedtimes, and an almost singular focus on tearing through as many complete cancelled sci-fi series on Hulu during my lunch and dinner breaks as possible. M.A.N.T.I.S., SeaQuest, Total Recall 2070, and 9/10 of Stargate SG-1 (a little less proud of that last one). I also managed to do a good bit of swing dancing, started my own "practice session" for the Columbia swing club, and had occasional good fun with my NYC friends. Notably, this included a Bob Dylan concert - gratis - as part of a buddie's birthday gift.

As I got into mid-November, it became clear that things were not at all well in the kingdom of time allotments. Dancing was put on hold, my radio gigs ended, and even my casual hulu adventures were reduced. I took a temporary leave from my part-time job, and I tired - desperately- to get serious about my research projects.

Shelley returned (permanently!) at exactly the wrong time of course, but I was extremely happy to have her home after 11 months essentially living apart (tour+kyrgyzstan+tour). This might have resulted in some additional lapses in judgement regarding time allotment, but if you can't take a few hours to lavish attention on your fiance, what's the point of getting engaged? We were also extremely fortunate to have a close friend and Shelley's maid of honor visit us in New York for some weekend fun time. What research projects?

As papers were completed (a report on the Kyrgyz July 2009 Presidential election I observed, a paper on Islam as a domestic determinants of Soviet foreign policy, and an analysis of Turkmenbashi as a "sultanistic" dictator), things began to normalize, but not enough that I was able to complete my final paper before getting on the airplane for Oklahoma. So yes, I took a research paper home for the holidays.

And I don't recommend it.

From this point, this turn more and more into a blur, and if you're interested enough to be reading this extremely dry post, odds are good you were on the invite list for our wedding in January, and hopefully I have personally filled in the gaps for you already. If not, here's the super-brief version:

Shelley and I went to Oklahoma to see my friends/family for Christmas. This included not only my lovable parents, but also their new coiterie of stray/domestic cats. Don't get me started... We ate at the first RAW restaurant in the history of Oklahoma city (thanks Tevingtons). Gave Shelley the gift of her first ever Webber Family Musicale, with the benefit of some extra family drama and no aid of alcohol to lubricate the experience. I also learned that my "singing voice" is a shelley panacea. Not that she enjoys it, per se, but when I slide into a false baritone, it always cracks her up. Good to know.

After 2+ days spent almost entirely with my parents, we got hit with a blizzard on Christmas eve. This of course didn't stop my dad from starting his shopping that afternoon - by foot - nor did it overrule his desire to help the neighbors dig out their driveways. I opted to hold off on my good deeds until after the near-whiteout subsided. 2 more days spent in the exclusive company of my parents went surprisingly well, and then Shelley and I were off on a roadtrip to see her parents outside Houston.

Now it was time to get to work. Wedding preparations needed to be made, odds and ends needed to be purchased, hairs needed to be cut, etc. We were very productive, and still managed to spend a good bit of time watching football with Pat and Kathy. While the ladies did some more shopping, Pat and I checked out Avatar 3-D. Surely someone more clever than I has written a good analysis of that giant digital trope, and I don't think the world needs any more of them. On New Years Eve they threw a huge party for friends and neighbors and we had a great time, and were the lucky benificiaries of gifts (christmas ornaments and family recipes) from many of the participants.

Now it was time to get on to San Antonio and get this Hitchin' Ceremony in motion. So that's what we did. Thanks to our wedding planner Maggie, our cool new photographer West Vita, the venue liaison Crystal, and everyone else. We ate breakfast tacos. Lots of them. Margaritas, chips and salsa, and other delictables were constantly on hand.

Apparently not that many people get married in San Antonio in January. Good news for us. I mean really, who wants to get married when the Riverwalk is all beautiful and full of water? It's like that 50 weeks a year. We got to be... different. Sludge, mud buckets, and heavy machinery rather than riverboats and French tourists defined the riverwalk of Jan 2010.

The wedding weekend included a "guys night," rehearsal dinner, a pre-wedding bar night, lunch for the respective wedding parties, the ceremony, a cocktail hour, the reception, and two simultaneous post-reception social gatherings. We capped it all off with a breakfast taco brunch, of course.

Done with SA (for now), we left reluctantly. Kerrville, Austin, back to Oklahoma. More people to see, Thank Yous to write, gifts to unwrap.

In New York, Shelley has a job setup almost instantly. My classes have started, though I'm still working out exactly what my schedule will be. Trying to re-start my part-time job, this blog, my radio blog, my radio volunteering, swing dancing, social time, and just about everything else.

We've been back less than 2 weeks, and we've already eaten at our favorite restaurant, had 2 brunches, been to the Colbert Report, worked on finishing up Stargate, started on the Tudors, hit the Natural History Museum, mailed an umbrella internationally, had dinner with friends, written more thank yous, made a ton of soup - twice - and applied for a post-grad Fellowship.

What more will the future hold? Check in occasionally, and you'll find out.

Or just put it off for 2 months and then try to catch up.

See, doesn't seem like such a bad plan, right?

Weber
::(lame) Texpatriot

Fall 2009 at a (long) Glance

Some of you (at least, those of you bored enough to be checking this blog) may be wondering what the heck I've been doing this fall. It certainly hasn't been writing blog entries. While it's true that wedding planning has taken up some time, it's equally important to remember just how much of that workload Shelley is taking care of.

Something interesting happens to me when Shelley leaves me along for too long. I develop a condition that is better described as Jekyl-Hydism, than simple bi-polarism. In one state, I sequester myself in various enclosed spaces (studio apartment, library stacks) where I spend hours and hours in solitary servitude to the demigods of academia. I scribble clever little comments in red ink on the margins of xerox'd articles about the language policy of the Soviet union in the national delineation of 1924 (it's fascinating!). And I think to myself, "How could I have lived 28 years on this Earth and never thought about this before?"

Whether this state counts as Jekly or Hyde is a matter of prespective.

On the other side of the coin, I venture out into the big City with my wonderfully unorthodox buddies and stumble down the various rabbit holes they tend to encounter. It's generally a good pairing. We all tend to fall down (to carry the metaphor), but I usually keep my eyes open and land on my feet (metaphorically, and usually otherwise).

As a result, Fall 2009 has been an almost endless chain of dull stasis broken on rare occasions by flashes of hyper-dynamism. The camera tends to tag along on such occasions, but alas not always, and over the past two weeks the drudgery has become temporarily absolute as I prepare for writing term papers and prep my M.A. thesis for next spring.

But here is a very brief recap of what I have been doing, via the few photos that are on my Sony.

This is from the West Indian American Day Parade, and annual event out in Brooklyn celebrating New Yorkers "of the Islands." According to my friend Holly, who lives Directly on the parade route, the party starts about 2 am the day before, with street drumming, etc. then people sleep it off from 5-10, before coming back out for the main event. We're talking dozens of semi-trucks stripped down and packed full of sub-woofers, banners, politicians, and evangelists. Plus there's slaw, fried chicken, beans&rice, and Coconuts!

Did you know that Milwaukee Airport has modern art sculture in the shape of fishing tackle? Well, now you do. I want to tell you that the place was empty because I was passing through late on a week day evening, but I kind of got the impression it was never a very high-traffic zone.

Which is a good thing: more time to appreciate the art.



This is actually how I usually look: tired, slightly confused, and just a bit skeptical about whatever it is I'm being told at the moment. Oddly, I'm not actually tired (my college friends would be Shocked to know how much I'm sleeping these days), and the confusion comes and goes. Skepticism, I'm sorry to say, is getting thoroughly entrenched. Is that because of grad school, New York, or not being 21?

Well, whatever the cause, please know that if you ever see me make This Face (right) it probably just indicates I'm running low on caffeine. Time for a refill.


My employment with the Grand Poobah, Mr. Phil Schaap, continues to go well. We now have 2 books in print (and in need of selling... hint, hint, holiday present), with a 3rd one on the way as soon as I can finish tracking down some rare photographs. Sales have been off and on, but I'm using a lot of the skills I learned at KRTU, and we a totally redesigned website (philschaapjazz.com) coming on-line soon which should help.


Even though it's just me at home, I do end up cooking dinner just about every night, though the temptation of $5.25 cheap chinese just around the corner is a constant Jezebel to my David (but not my Davey, of course). The Buc-ee's shirt is something of a plug; but I have had several compliments from dance students. One in particular stands out, "Man, I really appreciate all the stuff you were showing us tonight, but like, I could barely even listen I kept looking at your t-shirt." "It's a Beaver" I explained.

And then sometimes I get a call to go clubbing down in the West Village at a no-cover converted parking garage with an army of suspended gord-lamps in the open space around the first floor staircase. This picture was actually taken while seated on a bench carved out of a giant gnarly tree trunk. The hot tub upstairs didn't stay empty all night. My buddy practically ripped her skirt in half on a particularly enthusiastic expression of awkward contempt for all the sexy people in the room. And that was about the half-way point of the evening. I turned in early at 3.





Not sure if this was as big a deal where you live, but apparently we just had "off year elections," including the NJ Governor and the NYC Mayor. Apparently, those are both important positions in our National Government, or at least so one would assume from the coverage they received. It doesn't help that both incumbents (Dems) are men of extreme personal wealth, and backed prominently by Obama. The fact that one (Bloomberg) also pushed through an amendment legalizing a third term added some Third World color. In the end, NJ's Corzine took a fall, and Bloomberg gets 4 more years (apparently 8 was not enough), but with a voter turnout of about 10%, is it really a victory for anyone? Oh, and NYC just elected its first Asian-American to city office. Way to go, progressives.

And sometimes I stop it all to go and get a bad haircut.

No matter how much $ I spend, there just doesn't seem to be any other kind. For those of you who just noticed, yes, my hairline is not what it used to be. I'm trying not to hyperventilate on a daily basis.

The rest of it, I hope, will grow back in time for the wedding.






Speaking of which, here's a final (silly) tally of who's "winning" the great RSVP race of 2009:
(assembled in only approximate order, but feel free to brag nonetheless)

1. Jordan Forbes
2. Pat & Kathy Laabs
3. Ken & Linda Abraham
4. Judye & Larry
5. Pete & Amy Rahn
6. Terry & Karen Smith
7. Ben Stull
8. Doyle Weber
9. Paul & Peggy Laabs
10. Craig & Anna Stalcup
11. The Moores
12. Neil & Sunita Crittenden
13. Audrey Reader
14. Dan & Kathy Schewe
15. Carl & Deborah Rubenstein
16. Richard & Judy Lambert
17. Mike & Laura
18. Jim & Carolyn Weber
19. Ray & Sheila Stevens


If this were chemistry, I would estimate there are about 2 parts per million of useful information in this post. I guess the volatility has a lot to do with what kind of parts those are.

Weber
::(lame) Texpatriot

You Might Have Won $0.00: Wedding Progress is a Zero-Sum Game

It's not really my desire to convert this into a wedding blog, but since my current workload has virtually ground my extra-curricular activities to a halt, I really don't have anything else to report on other than the various brilliant and/or sophomoric things I overhear on Columbia Campus, or the best nooks and crannies of CU's various libraries (they have a dozen!).

So wedding chat it is.

As I mentioned quite some time ago, Shelley has already finished most of the wedding planning. In fact, she's been done for 2 months. I, on the other hand, have languished in my few responsibilities, sometimes for reasons of personal negligence, and other times through disastrous conditions beyond my full control.

Luckily, in the past week this trend has (finally) started to turn around. Though I have not yet made a single one of them aware of it yet, I do have a plan for the attire of the Groomsmen; tuxes are rented, ties are purchased, boutinerres selected, and shirts ready to be ordered. Further, I've finally made contact with 2/3 of the musicians (In total, we are employing a small army of San Antonio jazz regulars), booked the date, and am working out the logistics. I even have the musical "style" if not the exact music with which we'll walk down the aisle. First dance music is still being... finicky.

But the big coup de grace so far has been the completion of the now 22-day late Wedding Invite Mail-Out. I won't walk you through the entire fiasco, but let's just say it involves a former "business associate," a sudden inability to operate a cell phone, a discontinued crucial part to a manual printing press, and something about the decoding of Platypus DNA. Well, at least 3 of those 4 anyway.

As of October 6, I was back to the drawing board, or Plan A, or whatever. The point is, by Oct 22 the invites were all printed, stamped, addressed, stuffed, sealed, and in happy, if temporary, residence at a New York City Post Office. Since Shelley wasn't around for the *joy* of this whole process, I documented it thoroughly in .jpg format, and present for you a quick glimpse below:

Oh thank goodness they finally arrived!!!

Wrapped in Orange celophane! How could they know???

Invites


RSVP Cards

Soooooooo Happy to Finally have them Printed


Ready for Stuffing

Making "Plus 1" Cards

Stuffing station (while I watched Firefly... this is the scene where Jayne sings, "the Hero of Canton, the One they Call... Me!")

The lady at the Post Office insisted on selling me these stamps. I was thinking more of a floral, but my options were these, the Liberty Bell, or the Gary Cooper collection.

Stuffing time! This isn't actually the final order in which things were packed...
but it certainly was the most photogenic.

Done. Now they just need to be sealed. I know there are clever ways to do this - glue sticks or some sort of semi-wet rag... Well, you should know that all 87 of our invites are not only going out straight from our hearts, but are indeed carrying a small amount of my DNA.
My tongue still feels funny.

Believe it or not, there are actually even more photos, but none more interesting than what's above. While I will promise to keep (those interested) up-to-date on our wedding progress, I think I can also guarantee that this is the most thorough documentation of our wedding you'll get until the day itself. For one thing, I'm getting burned out, and for another, it's really hard for me make photos of myself hunched over a computer writing e-mails look even slightly interesting.

So the invites are out. Watch your mailbox, and if Ed McMahan shows up, keep the door locked. No matter what he says, we didn't send him; you haven't won a million dollars, and he's not wearing pants. (would you believe me if I swore that I didn't know he died this summer when I wrote that? Sorry, Ed.)

Weber
::(lame) Texpatriot