Virginia Breeze

I was having trouble discovering a topic to write about today. I was even considering writing about Sparky and Malarky my two German Shepherds who guard the house while we are gone. They are downstairs at the moment imagining how great the trash man would taste and discussing who will get the more tender parts.

But that’s not going to happen. He’s a good guy. Still I don’t want to tell the dogs it won’t happen . In the first place they would be upset with me. And in the second place they might try to eat me. And I am not safely on the other side of the door like our neighborhood trash guy.

I left him a trash can full of woodworking trash today. Lots of little 2 X 4’s that add up to about half a ton. He’s probably not too happy about that right about now. He has to pay a whole lot more money for gas just to get here and then I am weighing down his truck with all this wood.

I’m a bad customer.

But on the other hand I could share some good news with him. This will make him happy enough to forget about a bunch of 2 X 4’s.

Oil slipped off a record high above $143 a barrel today as US crude rose 11 cents to 140.59 a barrel. I know that seems like not so good news. You have to dig deeper to find the pony as President Reagan used to like to say. Because the US Energy Information Administration revised down US April oil demand by 863,000 barrels per day. That’s nearly 4 percent below demand last year in April.

“This revision of the US oil demand for April has certainly put pressure on crude futures. This is demand destruction before our very eyes” said Phil Flynn of Alaron Trading. “This is a huge revision and it happened when fuel prices were still lower, so you can expect that there could be more future downgrades in demand data.

On the other hand we have the weak dollar and escalating tensions between Iran and Israel over Teheran’s nuclear program.

Those two are gonna have a showdown at some point. But what I interpret this guy saying is that there is probably a huge glut of oil out here and the traders have gone too far. Prices are going to start down in the very near future.

And we can all take our cars out on the road again! Who has cut back on their driving?

Just about everybody. We all make those little decisions that cut our fuel costs by five, ten or twenty percent. And it adds up! So I need to run down the street and catch my trash man before he turns the corner. And tell him the good news.

Maybe Sparky and Malarky would like to come? Would you guys? Great! Come on then. Let’s get some exercise and run down there to see the trash man!

beethovens-symphony-no-9-scherzo

So I have finally taken the plunge (in a very small way) into the area of blogs and music by adding this short bit from Beethoven to a post. It was really very easy to do. And I have no idea what the ramifications of doing it are so please let me know. If you know.

Wordpress 2.5 has this little deal they have added to the Write Post area. It makes it simple to upload music files. And then the Windows Media Player pops out and starts playing as well as making color and movement out of sound.

It would be nice to have some really GOOD color and movement made out of sound. I will have to look around this morning and see what is out there. I am sure there is quite a bit FOR a price.

We shall see. Does the WMP pop out when you click on the link to Ludwig above? Please let me know. I am very curious about all of this. I have some things that are very good and you don’t hear them every day. In fact you don’t ever hear them and I would like to share them.

NOT share them in terms of sharing the file. We are just going to share the SOUND here. Please don’t try to download any files. But I know you wouldn’t. Here is something else that I used to love to listen to all the time. It starts off slowly but really goes to some amazing places as things progress.

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Alright. That seemed to work well. It’s in a WMA format. And this next one is the third portion of the same symphony by Gorecki if you are still with me. It’s a bit longer but even more amazing than the second part. And I will do this one in WMA loss less. Maybe there is a difference.

Well it takes forever. Or maybe never. I got tired of waiting. So scratch that one. I have the movements backwards. Sorry. Here is the one that can take one to the moon if one lets it.

01-symphony-no-3-op-36-symphony-of-sorrowful-songs-movement-1

Just plain old WMA works much better. WMA Pro is the other option. We will have to see about that one later. But this is enough for now. It’s something new for this blog in any case and I hope it will gather a positive response.

BTW this music was featured in the movie Fearless with Jeff Bridges , Rosie Perez and the ever lovely Isabella Rossellini.

It is a fine movie made more wonderful by parts of this symphony.

Your mind may be telling you that you have things to do as you listen to it. Mine does. But I was able to relax and let the music gradually take control. It rewards towards the end with some inspiring passages .

Fearless
Adapted by screenwriter Rafael Yglesias from his own novel, Fearless explores the complex struggle back to mental health of post-traumatic stress disorder victim Max Klein (Jeff Bridges). One of few survivors of a fatal plane crash, Klein remains calm and assists other survivors out of the burning debris, earning praise as a hero by the media. After stoically departing the tragedy without a word to emergency officials, Max returns home with detached feelings towards his wife (Isabella Rossellini) and son, along with a bizarre, seemingly authentic belief that he is now impervious to harm. Bill Perlman (John Turturro), a psychiatrist for the airline, fails to reach Max about his newfound fearlessness, but asks for his help in aiding Carla (Best Supporting Actress Oscar nominee Rosie Perez), a fellow crash survivor filled with grief and guilt over the loss of her baby. In one of his earlier roles, Benicio del Toro plays a small part as Carla’s boyfriend. ~ Lisa Kropiewnicki, All Movie Guide

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If you would like to see another rendition of this work with a video that carries a deeply spiritual message go here. But I warn you it is not easy to watch.

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When you have thousands of photos around you can always find a few that maybe can be dressed up and taken out in public. So here is a candidate for this Saturday afternoon. Soon to be Saturday evening (second photo below).

How are things going in your area this weekend? It seems rather low key around here. Perhaps everybody is saving up their energy for the upcoming Fourth of July weekend. That’s a pretty big one around this neck of the woods. Helena may not think so but that’s because she seems to be so attached to Great Britain.

Except when she is flying above it in an airplane. And even then she can’t resist diving out the door just to get back in a hurry. I’m kidding of course.

We went to a concert last night at an area shopping plaza. I was taking photos of the band The English Channel when I inadvertently pointed my camera at a building being constructed nearby. And wouldn’t you know it a large and very round security guard had to stick his face in my comfort zone to tell me about the policy of the stores.

You can’t take photos of the stores or the buildings. So much for celebrating freedom and the upcoming 4th. Perhaps somebody can explain that one to me. Here’s a photo of some of the band  and the crowd.  We enjoyed them a lot. And you can see from these photos that many fans were relaxing and enjoying them too.You can see some more photos of the band here on my Picasa Web Gallery.