Our CD Beyond the Portal was nominated for Best Ambient Album of 2009 by ZoneMusicReporter.com, a music industry website.


It would be nice to win, but it’s very gratifying just to be nominated. And I’m a big fan of Deborah Martin and Erik Wollo’s wonderful work, Between Worlds, as profiled at this blog earlier, so it would be great if they won. It’s very moving music. Congratulations to all the nominees!

Last year was, uh, interesting. Time for a new one. Today we wish you a Happy New Year.

Today we are re-launching our main real estate website, RedHotHomes.com It was sort-of cutting edge back in the day (like last year), but was starting to look a bit stale.
Some of it needs more work, but what doesn’t? Click on the image to take a peek. And thanks to all our viewers last year. May the next year and decade see all your real estate dreams realized.

Took these shots in Karry’s flower garden. Nice colors.

I’m not a doomer. Well, not exactly. But I occasionally read some of the doomer stuff, and one of the more interesting authors I have come across online is Dimitry Orlov. He was a citizen of both the US and the former Soviet Union during the period of the old USSR’s collapse, and traveled between the two. He has a really unique perspective. He sees parallels between our two empires that citizens of only the US might not have considered. In his opinion, we have much more in common with the old Soviet Union than we usually think. And because of our relative wealth, a greater distance to fall….

Anyway this video goes on for quite a while, but I found it worth a watch. Dimitry has that dry Russian style that can be so endearing and so disturbing all at once. His ideas are quite thought provoking. Whether or not you agree with his conclusions, you can learn from his experience. It’s hosted by Stewart Brand, who is a very interesting character himself. If you have the time, take a look:

They floated me a few days, but finally called me to serve. I sat with the hundred or so of our fellow jurors in Shasta County waiting to do our duty. There was fellow Chamber Member, Kurt Mitchell of Edward Jones. Also seen there were was fellow agent and friend Lara Wells Osborn of Coldwell Banker. All taking a day (or more) off to do our civic duty. Good to see our citizens exercising their rights and duties under our judicial system.

We watched the video from the judge, and listened as staffers talked us through the process. Did you know it’s against the law to take pictures in the Jury Assembly area? I didn’t. You learn several new things at every chance to serve.

As it turned out I was juror 11. The plaintiff acted as her own attorney, in pro per, as I understand it. (Note to self – NEVER DO THAT!) We sat through her day in court, but she seemed to have no case. The opposing attorney absolutely SHREDDED her, although very kindly and professional, all the while. The judge, Cara Beatty was exceptionally patient and understanding, and made an excellent impression. That’s how all judges should treat people. It was dismissed mid-afternoon on a motion, mercifully. You should have heard people’s comments as we walked out the Courthouse. Wow, they were very patient in the jury box, but the conversation at deliberations would have been flaming, I’m sure. Glad we didn’t get there.

As I arrived in the assembly area, my shoe disintegrated. These were Clarks, supposedly a good British shoe. I wonder if this was a knock off? Naturally, I sat in the front row of the jury box, so all assembled in the room could clearly see my toes. Nice. If ever there was a good indicator that I need your business, this was it. I need new SHOES!

Heh.

I was given a reprieve by the blog gods, and one of my restore operations brought the old blog back to life. I had spent yesterday moaning and wringing my hands as 3 years of posts turned to dust. Okay, I was more like wailing in sorrow, and shaking my fist at the cursed fates. Heh. Today, I feel a whole lot better.

I will be more vigorous about fixing errors before they have an opportunity to corrupt the database. But then, I always say that….

Actually, the world without my posts looked just fine, as it turns out. Blogs can be instructive that way. And in 3 years and 120 posts, only a few seemed worth keeping. Most of it is blather, like this one.

I like the photos, though. Like these two I took.

2009 is off to an inauspicious start, here at the ReallyRedding blog. The database had been acting up on the backups, and I thought I’d use the holiday break from work to “fix” whatever was going on with the tables. Instead, it seems to have completely bit the dust. I killed it, somehow. And because the database was acting up on the backups, the backups won’t restore.

3 years of work, 123 posts, abruptly vanish.

Well not exactly. I can still read the posts in raw html. I just can’t seem to publish anything on the old blog. The pages all publish blank.

Much heavy sighing ensues. I was happy with the look and feel we had developed. The content offered a glimpse into my work and thoughts over the last couple of years. It was erratic in the beginning, but I had developed a voice, of sorts, and was posting pretty regularly throughout 2008. You could look back and get a good idea what I was thinking and some insight into my personality. Which I hope was helpful. But it all evaporated somehow. It’s very discouraging.

Well, it’s a new year, or so the calendar says. Perhaps it’s time to wipe that slate clean and move on.

No doubt.

Unless something magic happens to that data, I really don’t have much choice. I will try to re-post some of the work as time goes by.

Perhaps appropriately, a couple of buzzards find a dead possum outside my back window, which only adds visual imagery to my blog’s untimely demise. Watching them work, it occurs to me that this is the reason we humans bury our dead. Nobody wants to watch old Fred the possum as he is dispatched. Nobody wants to see their blog end either, but it inevitably does.

I have so much to be grateful about, it wouldn’t even fit into a day. Nevertheless we are celebrating at home with friends and family, and Karry’s usual “Martha Stewart on steroids” dinner. Love it all.

If you make the rounds of local blogs, you’ve probably seen this recent post. But if not, I will bring this to your attention for today, as it follows the spirit. My friend and fellow Realtor Lara Wells Osborn wrote a thought-provoking post over at Food For Thought. It’s one of those rare pieces that stays with you long after reading. Lara is one of my favorite fellow agents. She and her husband have several cute kids too, which added poignancy to her excellent prose. That, along with the fact that she has established herself as a marketer of luxury homes, and has done very well with that high-end market segment. She’s just a good person to be around, and people sense that sort of thing. You should read her post if you didn’t already, and the link is HERE.

Thanks for writing, Lara. And a Happy and thoughtful Thanksgiving to all!

Diestlehorst bones by Skip

I ran across this intrepid reporter getting video of the cheap $2.12 gas at Arco yesterday. Never thought I’d see that again. Later I went by there after he’d gone, and they had dropped it again to $1.99. That news video didn’t last long! Send out the reporter again.

This tune titled Indian Spirits is another piece from our live series at the Schreder Planetarium, as promised yesterday. It features Craig singing. Here’s the lyric sheet: “Ahhhhhh.” Hee. Well maybe it’s Uhhh, not exactly sure about that, it’s been a long time. Anyway I enjoyed hearing it again today, and I hope you like it too.

Right after Veterans Day in Redding we can expect a frost. Not yet, so far, but soon.
The musical excerpt Lithium is from Craig and my CD Planetary Elements Vol 2, released on the Space for Music label. It was recorded live at the Schreder Planetarium on Magnolia Street in Redding around 2004. Here’s the story of the music. We played as a duo under the dome, while Brian Grigsby ran the planetarium visuals. It seats 64 people. We’d played there before but this time we decided to play improvisationally. We planned to play floaty synthesizer textures and ambient soundscapes. We deliberately didn’t play much beforehand, except to setup, so we wouldn’t know what each other was going to play. Here’s the kicker: playing in the planetarium is done in total darkness. We even had to cover the the LED displays on the synthesizers so their dim light wouldn’t bleed onto the dome. So here we were as usual, playing improvised music in total darkness.
About 10 minutes in, I started up a sequence texture that had a mildly rhythmic bass drum in 4/4 time. I figured Craig wasn’t going to like it much actually, so I thought I’d fade it up and then back down. To my surprise, Craig launches into a full-on lead synth line over the texture. Now, it’s going somewhere. At some point based on Craig’s stellar lead, I transpose the sequence, and follow along.
I guess the piece stands on it’s own, and would be otherwise unremarkable beyond that, except to us. Both of us were thinking, where the hell did that come from? It sounds planned. It wasn’t.
One of those weird moments you get after playing music with somebody of like mind for a decade or so. In the dark. It still weirds me out to hear it. Where does music come from?

Photos by Skip on Northpoint in Redding, Fall 2008