If I was a drinking man the 4th would be followed by a 5th
Full day. Up at the crack of 9, at the park by 10. The band played for half an hour before the 4th of July ceremonies started, and we played several pieces scattered through the program. Dome by 11:30, home, lunch of cold cuts & Coke (very American). Went for a massage. My favorite place was closed, but #2 was open, and she did good things for my back. Home, online for a bit, then off to a friend's to meet the gang and carpool to the amphitheater for the SF Symphony concert & fireworks. Usually we have close to a dozen people but this year almost everyone bailed, so there were only 3 in the car, plus a couple and their two annoying children joined us later. I moved up the hill a ways to get away from them, when it was clear they were building a whole gang of annoying children from neighboring areas.
The place was packed, and it's clear that whoever is running the place is no longer interested in routine maintenance, or fire codes. There is a vast lawn above the reserved seats (we were way up on the lawn, which is a hill) but they had made no effort to create aisles. They used to, and it made it a lot easier to get to the restrooms and food stalls, and find your way back. Lots of inconsiderate late-comers who plopped themselves down where other people were already sitting. At least there weren't any drunks, which is surprising because they were selling beer and wine, which they didn't used to.
The SF Symphony in the summer doesn't include many of the better musicians - they go on vacation and/or go on leave to play in other orchestras. There's a guest conductor too, who usually leads the youth symphony. They did sound better this year than the past couple of years, but only on the pieces which were originally scored for orchestra. I had spent the morning playing many of the same pieces with a brass band, and hearing them from an orchestra was mildly annoying. Sousa marches just do not work as well if you only have three trumpets, three trombones, three clarinets, one piccolo, one tuba, no baritones or euphoniums and limited percussion. He didn't write for strings. They did the best they could, but it was like listening to Kiss without electric instruments.
The fireworks were good, but for some reason they did their low altitude show, some of it was below the fence line, and some of the more fancy displays were not used. It's always fun, though.
We had paid extra for VIP parking, which was supposed to get us out of the venue without the long lines, but the bozos who set up the traffic barricades got it backwards - they blocks us off and let the cheap parking go through. Until a couple of irate VIPs walked up to them and said rude things about their mommas. Then the bozos pulled the barricades away and let us through.
Home, went online, posted some mediocre iPhone videos of the fireworks on FB, remembered I needed to find a dentist and tried in vain to find one in the south bay who speaks Thai, found who whose name is Thai but they are Vietnamese. Canceled my iPhone4 order after a friend at work who has one confirmed that holding the phone kills the reception. Note to Apple: New stuff is supposed to work better than old stuff.
Plans for tomorrow:
Nothing other than take out the garbage. I'm not expected at work, though I could show up if I wanted to. Probably could use a Me day, though.
The place was packed, and it's clear that whoever is running the place is no longer interested in routine maintenance, or fire codes. There is a vast lawn above the reserved seats (we were way up on the lawn, which is a hill) but they had made no effort to create aisles. They used to, and it made it a lot easier to get to the restrooms and food stalls, and find your way back. Lots of inconsiderate late-comers who plopped themselves down where other people were already sitting. At least there weren't any drunks, which is surprising because they were selling beer and wine, which they didn't used to.
The SF Symphony in the summer doesn't include many of the better musicians - they go on vacation and/or go on leave to play in other orchestras. There's a guest conductor too, who usually leads the youth symphony. They did sound better this year than the past couple of years, but only on the pieces which were originally scored for orchestra. I had spent the morning playing many of the same pieces with a brass band, and hearing them from an orchestra was mildly annoying. Sousa marches just do not work as well if you only have three trumpets, three trombones, three clarinets, one piccolo, one tuba, no baritones or euphoniums and limited percussion. He didn't write for strings. They did the best they could, but it was like listening to Kiss without electric instruments.
The fireworks were good, but for some reason they did their low altitude show, some of it was below the fence line, and some of the more fancy displays were not used. It's always fun, though.
We had paid extra for VIP parking, which was supposed to get us out of the venue without the long lines, but the bozos who set up the traffic barricades got it backwards - they blocks us off and let the cheap parking go through. Until a couple of irate VIPs walked up to them and said rude things about their mommas. Then the bozos pulled the barricades away and let us through.
Home, went online, posted some mediocre iPhone videos of the fireworks on FB, remembered I needed to find a dentist and tried in vain to find one in the south bay who speaks Thai, found who whose name is Thai but they are Vietnamese. Canceled my iPhone4 order after a friend at work who has one confirmed that holding the phone kills the reception. Note to Apple: New stuff is supposed to work better than old stuff.
Plans for tomorrow:
Nothing other than take out the garbage. I'm not expected at work, though I could show up if I wanted to. Probably could use a Me day, though.
