Category: People

1655 Trip Miles, Part 1: Shufflin’ Off

Just got back from a major road trip family vacation. Great to change your mode of living every once in a while. The last couple of years we’d taken flights to faraway lands, but this year, between having a new car and a desire to avoid any Imperial entanglements at airports, we opted for a car trip.

We started with a drive up to Buffalo a few ago Friday. The kids were already up there with my Mum, having all kinds of adventures of their own. Meanwhile Jeannie and I had a week to catch up on our work and our rest. So it was just the two of us for the drive up. Got an early start; it was smooth and mellow. Made great time and explored the satellite radio stations.

We spent a few days in Buffalo. It was a very chill scene. The kids went swimming at the local lake. I put new wheels on my rollerblades. Jeannie and the girls did some shopping. Went out to see the new Harry Potter movie one night. It was probably the best of the bunch. We hooked up with Larry and Jackie at a beach bar on the Lake Erie waterfront; it was a good time and good to catch up. Larry had the good fortune to see the circus elephant walk last time he was in NYC. Sunday we went out to Rochester for my niece’s birthday and swam in Denis and Sara’s pool. Sara made me a Jayne hat for my birthday. Awesome thanks!

Monday we went up to Old Fort Niagara, which is now a very cool living museum. It was established by the French in pre-revolutionary times, and subsequently captured by the British in the 1751, handed over to the Americans in 1783, re-captured by the British in 1813, and returned to the Americans a year later. Lots of history, old stone buildings and wooden furniture, cannons, muskets and bayonets. Re-enactors really brought the experience to life, garbed as colonial soldiers in layers of hot wool on sweltering summer day. They put on demos and answered questions about weapons, food, and lifestyle from back in the day, and were knowledgeable and friendly. The high point was the drum and fife exhibition by two lovely ladies in colonial military drag, followed by firing a cannon into Lake Ontario by a group of more veridical soldiers.

After that we headed down to the falls. Hadn’t been there in a few years and it was great to walk around and take in the views. We took the tour of the Cave of the Winds. It takes you down an elevator carved into the rock of the falls. At the bottom you can walk around on some boardwalks and get the view from the bottom. They give you sandals and ponchos because it’s really wet down there. The kids got completely soaked. It was an awesome experience.

Tuesday we lit out for part 2 of our trip, a tour that included several destinations in Ontario and upstate New York.

Crackin’ Foxy at the Jalopy

Last weekend I saw a show at the Jalopy bar and theatre in Red Hook, Brooklyn, featuring a bunch of old-time country and folk bands as part of the Brooklyn County Fair. This isn’t my usual genre of music, but in this day of electronic hypercompression it was refreshing to hear acoustic music done well by good musicians. All of the bands were excellent, and two of them featured a really amazing fiddle player named Jason. The first act was him and a bass fiddle player doing standards from the nineteenth century. Later he appeared in a four piece combo with male and female co-lead singers and an awesome pedal steel player.

One of the bands on the bill was Crackin’ Foxy from Saranac Lake, NY, led by my friend Mark H. The Foxies diverged from the format a bit by doing old-timey jazz and pop, things like Cole Porter and The Triplets of Bellevue.

They feature a lineup of three female vocalists, resplendent in black polka dot dresses and white opera gloves (for that show at least). Mark played ukulele, and there was an acoustic guitar, standup bass and a clarinetist who doubled on tenor sax. They group was really good, with great energy, style and musicianship. They had pretty complicated arrangements, with lots of vocal harmonies and instrumental sections, which they pulled of really well. Great group sound as well as lots of individual feature moments. The singers were all great individually and in harmony. After the set Mark told me they missed a few cues, but I never noticed. Crackin’ Foxy has been around about a year and are picking up momentum. They’re gigging out more and more, mostly in the Adirondack mountain region. If you ever get a chance to see them, go for it!

Also, the Jalopy is a great place to see live music!

OUSA ’11 Recap

With the 4th of July weekend right on the heels of the origami convention, it’s been a busy few weeks. So here’s a bit of catching up. I had a good time at the convention, and caught up a bunch of friends. I also to a very positive response to the release of my new eBook. I taught my Walrus, which turned out to be a big hit, as well as my Narwhal. I also taught my Stellated Octahedron with Color Change, which turned out to be very challenging to fold. I came up with several new models including my two interlocking cubes (I’ve been working out how to do it with a color change from a single sheet), and some new tessellations including a Quadrose tiling and a Penrose tiling. I bought some nice paper from a vendor from Ohio, Origamido-style but thicker. The plan is to fold a few of my complex models out them, including the Zeppelin, Dragon and War Elephant. I also got an idea to extend my origami-from-space series to include a Space Shuttle. Photos of all this coming whenever I get around to it.

Every few years it seems someone new arrives on the scene folding amazing stuff. In the last few years it was T.J. Norville and then Dinh Giang. This year it was teh charming Beth Johnson, who has lots of curvy, dimensions models such as a pinecone and sheep that make use of tessellations as a design element. You can see some of her work at http://bethorigami.wordpress.com

My publisher Brian gave a Monday talk about eBook publishing for origami. One topic he covered is the diff between eBooks and apps. After we got to talking, and I realized my Foldinator is almost ready to be an origami app engine (notwithstanding the issue of running a Flash application on iOS). I haven’t worked on it in a while, and when I left off I was getting deep into the heart of the computational problem of mathematically representing and manipulating a folded piece of paper. The whole thing can be greatly simplified by just using pre-rendered graphics for each step. This may be a bit of a cheat, but it’s a good hack, since I’ve had to create images for all the models in me eBook anyway. So soon I’ll be putting together a prototype. Meanwhile, Brain has been dusting off my OrigamiXML spec with an eye toward expanding it for use in ebooks and apps.

Also, now that my ebook is done I’m working on putting together a print book. I’ve been going thru and making page layouts. This well be a superset of the ebook, with 20 – 24 models compared tot eh ebook’s 12. Hopefully when that’s done I can move straight on to a second ebook.

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For the long weekend of the 4th we had out of town guests, a 70th birthday celebration for my father-in-law, a big ol’ barbecue the next day, plus trying to fit music and origami stuff and work around the house and yard. More on that soon. Back to the office today, which almost feels like a break. Lots more excitement coming in the next few weeks, with travel and adventure, so stay tuned.

Fire On The Mountain

In other news, my brother Jim and his family live in the mountains of New Mexico, where they’ve been experiencing the worst forest fires in the history of the state. About a week ago, the fire was threatening their town and everyone had to evacuate. After almost a week firefighters were able to contain the blaze at a road at the edge of town. Yesterday people were able to return home. Luckily their home was intact, if a bit smoky, and the threat to the town has been averted.

See Ya in the Funny Papers

It’s been a while since I wrote, because I’ve been busy folding for the origami conference. Now that it’s come and gone I’ll be writing a full update soon. Bottom line it was a great time and I got a bunch of new ideas. Meanwhile, the paper of record, the venerable New York Times, sent a reporter and photographer around to see if they could locate some human interest. They interviewed my family and me among others. The article was mostly good but a bit weird, implying (unfairly) that we’re a nerdy and scruffy bunch. Ah well, any publicity is good publicity I suppose.

http://cityroom.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/06/26/at-this-gathering-everyone-knows-how-to-fold-them/?ref=nyregion

Summer Kick Off

After all that rain and cold, summer arrived full blast, just in time for Memorial Day weekend. It was in the upper 80’s and maybe even the 90’s the whole weekend. This is the earliest I can ever remember putting in the air conditioners.

I worked a half day Friday, and it seems like the first time since the new year I didn’t have something on my todo list that needed my attention. I managed to do some shopping: bought a new pair of shoes and a couple shirts suitable for work. Jeannie was with Lizzy in Philadelphia for a class trip on Friday, so Michelle and I had some time together to ourselves.

Saturday I had a gig, my first live appearance in quite some time and my first ever as a guitar player. It was a coffeehouse kind of scene, at the BeanBerry Café in nearby New Rochelle. Nice place. Erik and his cousin Jerry had worked up a set of music in the unplugged classic rock vein. I’d jammed with them a few times around the campfire, so they asked my to join in. They’d rehearsed together, but I was winging it. I gave Erik a list of songs I knew and he told me which ones he know too. And so I led a few songs including I’m Only Sleeping, Friend of the Devil and Wish You Were Here, and followed along with a a bunch of others. (Sorry, no Elvis.) The first song was a bit rough for me, cuz as soon as I started singing I realized the mic wasn’t set up right, but I (unlike with keyboards) I couldn’t take my hands off the guitar for even a second or so to adjust it. Erik and Jerry did a few originals from an album they’re writing. After The Fall was a standout. For me the high point of the show was Erik doing Wild Horses. I’m not really a huge Stones fan, but he really sang the hell out of that song. I didn’t know he had it in him.

After the set, Erik suggested we come back and do a set with me on keyboards, which is much more my main instrument than guitar. This got me thinking. More on that soon.

We went to a barbecue on Sunday at our friend Nick’s. Good time, but I got eaten alive by nosee’ums.

I bought a new digital stage piano Monday. I’d been meaning to for some time, and after months of spending my shopping cycles on utilitarian things like snowblowers and cars I finally had the opportunity. Spent the evening working on music. Felt really good.

Michelle Communion

One thing I can tell you is the kids are growing up fast. This weekend was Michelle’s birthday and first communion, and so we had a big celebration for her rite of passage. My parents came into town for the weekend. Got caught up on life and their recent trip to Hawaii. Martin and his family came down for the day, as well as lots of Jeannie’s family from NYC and Long Island and some good friends too. It seems you never get to spend enough time with family, and sometimes I really miss not having mine close by, but Jeannie’s are all such excellent people it goes a long way to make up for it. Anyway, it was a great party and beautiful day. Lizzy and her friend Ella played a duet for Michelle on flute and violin. Lots of good vibes all around.

‘Tis the season, and next weekend we’re going out to Long Island for Abby and Phillip’s communion.

Stratification

I’ve been back to work for two weeks now an already it’s back to full-on busy business. It’s also been cold, dark and snowy. We got a good foot of snow earlier in the week and it’s only been up in the 20’s in the daytime. I’m predicting I won’t see my lawn again until March.

Last weekend Martin came down for a visit. Just before xmas he contacted me asking if I’d like some spare parts for my Rhodes piano cuz there were some for sale on Craigslist. The guy was asking more individually for the parts that I was really interested in — the hammer mechanism, the rack of tines, and the pickups — than for the whole thing, so basically I ended up buying a complete Mark III Rhodes sans legs and pedal and with busted electronics. Martin came down last weekend, and we had great fun fitting the parts back in the original cabinet, destined to be stashed away somewhere until. And Jeannie didn’t even complain!

We spent most of the afternoon jamming, which was great fun. Martin mainly called the tunes, from the songbook of his now defunct band. A good handful of interesting 80’s tunes I hadn’t played before, but totally in my zone, by the likes of Sting and Joe Jackson. While we was visiting he gave me a primer on how to use the multi-effects box he lent me in the fall. And best of all, he lent me his old Stratocaster guitar! Martin mainly plays 12-strings now so he’s not using it. Plus he lives in an apartment and Charlie is at the age where he’s getting into things, so partly is was for the sake of guitar’s safekeeping. I hadn’t really been considering a strat, but hey, awesome!

It’s funny too, because my friend Mark, who years ago sold me my old electric guitar asked if he could buy it back. Which is cool, so I asked him for his thoughts on what to replace it with. His advice was to up my budget a few hundred bucks and focus only either a genuine Fender or Gibson guitar. (“Then you’ll have a great guitar that will keep its value.”) Martin’s strat plays and sounds so much better, so now I have a basic of comparison of what a really good guitar sound like for next time I go back to the music store. And when I sell my old axe I’ll have a little extra money for better new one.

Giant Origami Santas

My friend Brian Webb has one of his origami designs featured in a new storefront display here in New York. Brian sez:

If you happen to be in NYC, stop by the Uniqlo store display at 546 Broadway, New York, NY 10012 USA. There you will see huge versions of three Santa models. The display is based on Santa models by Edwin Corrie, Noriko Nagata, and Brian K. Webb (me).

The project was put together and installed by Mona Kim.
http://monakimprojects.com

There are a few pictures of the display on my Flickr site.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/bkwebb/5237424883/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/bkwebb/5237424613/