Goodbye, jeans! Hello, cocktails

I made my first pants re-use item. Remember, I am ceasing to wear pants, and so I was going to upcycle all my old pants and shorts. I do not exactly have sewing skills so finding an initial project was a challenge. But I did it!

I made a Denim Ice Crushing Bag. The inspiration came from online. From the site The Kitchn.

The recipe required a minimum of sewing which, any normal person would use a sewing machine, but I could not get either of my sewing machines to start, so I hand-sewed it. That is my handiwork up above.

I sewed it out on the porch, in my long dress. I felt a little nostalgic, I have to say, cutting up these old jeans. They were vintage Calvin Kleins and they had been with me a long time and let me tell you this, they fit me again after all these years, and I looked pretty good in them, too. But they were ripped -- naturally and unfortunately, not on purpose the way all these fake ripped jeans are. I am really not a ripped jeans person. Plus I am hereafter not wearing pants. So, goodbye jeans.

Hello ice crushing bag!

Do read the little writeup on the Kitchn. It is funny. Plus the bag was a present. I gave it to the priest who advised that we stop wearing pants. A bunch of us gals got together and decided we would give him something made out of our now-cast-off garments. We have been laughing and laughing over it. The challenge in this situation, of course, is to find some craft that is not girly. Googling around you can find a million things to make out of your old jeans but most of them are girly.

My friend Amy made the priest a beer caddy. Well, her daughter sewed it. They are amazing and my ice-crushing bag had nothing on the beer caddy. The beer caddy even came with a Buffalo bottle opener! They fitted it out with one.

Impressive as the beer caddy is, I think the ice crushing bag should prove extremely useful.

I am going to make myself one! Out of the other leg.

Cheers!

Father's day

A friend from church pointed out to me a few days ago that our priest, Father Justus, would be celebrating his year's anniversary with us.

Yikes!

It felt like just yesterday he got here.  I wonder what it feels like to him. Probably 10 years HAHAHAHAHAA.

Anyway we swung into action and today we had a special party for him at the breakfast after Mass. One of our number brought in this loud purple cake. I have never seen frosting that purple. Another friend brought a beautiful festive cake piled high with snow-white frosting.

And this is the greatest: Our friend Joan put together a bag of goodies for Father Justus. He lives at St. Rose of Lima with a few other great priests we know and Joan had put together this man-cave assortment of treats. There was a six-pack, this being Buffalo, and Father Justus liking beer. And Doritos and other chips and nacho cheese dip and pretzels, all this stuff that guys eat. Joan is a genius! Above is a picture of the party at St. Rose of Lima they will have with the gift pack.

But back to time flying. Here it was today 90 degrees. The church had that deep summer feel, the fans oscillating, the doors open. The men sweltering in their suit jackets. Hats off to them for keeping their jackets on, you know? I do not know how they do it to be honest.

And it was just a few months ago that it was 5 below zero! I remember that distinctly because by that time I was helping with the coffee hour, and I got there early along with a few other people, and we were all laughing and waving at each other because of the triumph we felt, getting there on this morning when it was 5 below zero. I think that was in March. It was not long ago.

Buffalo, you cannot say we do not get our seasons.

I hope Father Justus is enjoying it!

Stand facing the Web log

Yikes, I have been away from my post for a week! I do not know what happened. Well, yes I do. Tons of stuff, is what happened in addition to as usual working away at the Pennario project. This week was busy mostly on account of my job.

Tonight we were at the Philharmonic for "Carmina Burana."

That is us up above! Howard took that picture. I love the look on his face compared with the look on mine. The reason I am laughing is, I did not know he was taking a picture of me. I thought the camera was facing the other way and he was taking a picture of these people a couple of rows down. Ha, ha! I guess the joke was on me!

Before that I went to Oktoberfest at the Central Terminal. What else do you do before you go hear "Carmina Burana"? Surely Carl Orff, who wrote it, was smiling down.

After "Carmina Burana" Howard and I played the piano for each other. Howard was playing jazz numbers and kept working in the riff from "O Fortuna" which, admit it, is kind of catchy. Last week I wrote a story on Carl Orff and it was fun exploring how Orff would use rhythm. He could take just a few notes and do ingenious things with them.



Later I sat down and started playing Brahms and Schubert.

What would I do without Howard's Facebook pages? That is where I am getting all these pictures.

Anyway we have had a long week of music ... mostly music but a few other things thrown in. But still. It was no excuse to not weigh in on the Web log, that is for sure. That will not happen again!

As a matter of fact it will not happen now either. I am going to go and fill in all the days I missed. I just wrote Thursday's. I am going to go and write the rest.

Better late than never!

Grin and beer it

Today's paper has a fascinating story by my colleague Andrew Galarneau about Buffalo being a beer tourism town. That is a phrase I love, beer tourism!

I also like the phrase "craft beer."

And "Trappist ale."

The story also makes mention of, ahem, "Sierra Nevada's 30th Anniversary Brewers Reserve Grand Cru."

Where do I stop? I could go on like this all day. By the way, is that not a beautiful beer picture up above? I cribbed the picture off the Web log of this great beer brewing company, KegWorks, that I just discovered. The picture was taken at the Buffalo beer bar Blue Monk which I guess is busy, busy, busy, packed all the time. That is why I have not gone there yet. I am too busy with Leonard Pennario to spend time waiting in beer lines. You have to draw the line somewhere.

Andrew's story is about how all the Canadians have to come down to Buffalo to find decent beer. The story paints a chilling picture of socialism in action when it talks about the beer situation in Ontario. The rules and regulations are such so that small beer brewers cannot break into the market. Their beer up there can be sold in only two outlets: the government, or the Beer Store, which is owned by three major beer companies. Lots of luck getting in there.

What is their government doing in the beer business, anyway? This is what happens when you let government run your business. Your choices disappear.

Learn from this, America!

I am grateful to this story because it knocked Pennario out of my head. Normally I get up early and work away at the book and it is hard to switch beers when it is time to turn to other work. Did I write "switch beers"? I meant switch gears.

This story did the trick!

Unfortunately it also left me craving a beer, at this unholy hour.