Pulla-Pulla-Pulla & More Pulla-Pulla-Pulla

Now that the novelty has worn off my solid gold crown that’s nicely installed atop my solid titanium root implant, I went back to the dentist for nothing more than a regular dental hygiene session & routine check-up.

Teeth are nice & clean. X-rays all look good, the dentist says. But in his professional opinion I really ought to have my 2 remaining wisdom teeth taken out.

While I am not looking forward to that experience with any positive form of anticipation, I still have to acknowledge that for the most part I have a very high grade of problems to deal with compared with (say) folks who have bad teeth or no teeth or no dental plan or no money to pay for dental care, etc.

So even having all this additional & unanticipated pulla-pulla in the picture can’t really crimp my Attitiude Of Gratitude.

Trailer Roulette 2008 . . .

. . . in some ways was a replay of Trailer Roulette 2007.

The Chief Of Staff & I didn’t move our trailer.

Chief Of Staff’s sister did not move hers.

However, there were some moves.

Our nephew was able to pick a splendid new site — right across the road from his old site — with a great view of Rehoboth Bay. On clear days the view extends all the way to the bay side of Dewey Beach DE. Moving across the road takes just as much preparation ahead of time & just as much work afterward as moving from 1 end of the park to the other. Fortunately, all that was accomplished with no injuries to anybody & no damage except 1 broken drinking glass that rolled off a shelf.

Our son & daughter-in-law got a site in the park this year, so their trailer moved from its temporary parking place to a spot on the row right behind ours & just a few spaces up from ours — easy for our grandson to come visit Papa Alan & Grandma Carol when everybody’s down at The Port.

Our nephew’s mother-in-law also moved up the waiting list & got a spot, & likewise her trailer was moved from a temporary site to a place of its own in the interior of the park.

Once we got our nephew’s trailer all ( — i.e., mostly — ) squared away, everybody set about getting our son’s trailer & our nephew’s mother-in-law’s trailer likewise squared away. None of these travel trailers actually travel, so they get stabilized with stacks of concrete blocks & rigid sewer connections, not just crank-down stabilizer jacks & flex-drain waste lines.

“Squared away” means different things to different campers. To me, it means lined up, leveled, blocked, connected, etc. To others in the clan, it means the satellite dishes are aimed accurately for optimal Direct-TV reception.

Just because we’re all “camping” doesn’t mean we’re roughing it in any significant way.

Subba-Subba Follow-Up

At 8AM we rehearsed 3 tunes for 2 church services later in the morning. We also ran through another tune planned for Palm Sunday.

Same as last time, the brass musicians got to leave before the sermon rolled round a 2nd time, then discretely came back for the postlude.

Prelude: The Church’s 1 Foundation
Offertory: Fairest Lord Jesus
Postlude: Thine Is The Glory

Afterward I got a nice thank-you to the group via E-Mail from the church music director, forwarded to each regular & substitute player by the brass ensemble leader. Also, the guy I was subbing for sent me his own E-Mail thank-you, which included a compliment on our actual playing. He said was there for the 2nd service, seated inconspicuously up in the balcony where he could hear just fine. Nice playing, he said.

The same guy I subbed for in church was at band rehearsal last night. But he got tuckered out from playing his part & went home at halftime. Here’s hoping he’s all the way back into playing condition for Palm Sunday & Easter.

Installa-Stalla-Stalla & Adjusta-Justa-Justa

OK, Friday the dentist installed my solid gold crown on top of my solid titanium implant. Before he could get it just exactly right, it got stuck. So he said I should show up at his other office Monday morning so he could get it all squared away for me.

Monday morning, he snicked that stuck gold tooth clean off the implant quick as can be, did something to the little gold nugget, stuck it back on to re-check (bite, contact, etc.), declared it good to go & cemented it on forevermore-amen with Super Glue or J.B.Weld or Mighty Putty or whatever the dentists around here are using these days.

I expect the new tooth will last longer than I will — for a total cost roughly equal to the $$$ I’ve got tied up in 4 timeshares. Who’d a-thunk ?

Subba-Subba-Subba

The horn player I was filling in for with The Cathedral Brass — because he underwent major serious surgery back in December & is still on the mend — does not yet feel up to playing 1 rehearsal + 2 church service performances, so once again I will be substituting for him in church, this coming Sunday morning in fact.

Meanwhile, the other regular horn player in The Cathedral Brass is fully recovered & once again good to go. Unfortunately, however, she forgot all about next Sunday’s scheduled rehearsal & performance, & will be out of town. So the other substitute horn player who subbed side by side with me last time is also signed up to sub with me again this next time.

When the 1st string players are ailing or away, it’s an advantage to have decent 2nd stringers warming the bench.

Floaters & Fixters

My Orlando timeshare deed says I own Unit 36 in Building B during Week 10.

The operating master association documents of the timeshare, which are recorded down at the county right along with all the deeds, say that the whole timeshare operates on a floating weeks system, mox nix what specific unit & week anybody actually owns.

I’ve never even seen the inside of Unit 36 in Building B — & it’s possible I never will, not during Week 10 or at any other time of the year. So it goes.

Owning that specific unit & week gives me no special claim on it under the floating-weeks system — not that there’s anything wrong with that.

Do You Know Your Timeshare’s A Rip-Off? No — But Hum A Few Bars & I’ll Fake It.

Union musicians are supposed to be guaranteed a “union scale” pay rate, which governs actual per-gig rehearsal & performance time, not total yearly wages. Not all live entertainment performances are union gigs.

Our conservatories are graduating so many highly qualified instrumentalists that when the Pocatello (say) Symphony Orchestra announces a call for 1 new oboist (say), the oboe players are lined up all around the block waiting their turn on audition day — & that might well be for just a 17-week concert season. And there are far fewer oboes per orchestra than violins, cellos, etc.

After the playing positions in the Big 5 symphony orchestras — New York, Boston, Chicago, Philadelphia, Cleveland — some of the best & most sought after musician jobs (specially for wind instrument & percussion players) are with the top service bands in Washington DC — Marine Band, Army Band, Navy Band, Air Force Band. The Coast Guard band is in New London CT, & there are a few other top service bands in other locations, e.g. USMA Band, West Point NY, & Army Field Band, Ft. Meade MD.

Civilian & military musicians alike are apt to augment their income via teaching, free-lancing, dealing in instruments, working as custom instrument technicians, etc. Many have day jobs in fields unrelated to music. Across from us once at 1 of those little tables in a timeshare sales room was a talented up & coming Orlando musician. Who’d a-thunk we’d meet a professional musician whose day job was selling full-freight timeshares for big bux?

Electric Sand Box

Our free “accidental” cat came equipped with his own high-tech self-scooping electrically powered automatic sand box.

It requires high-tech hard-clumping cat sand. Old style clay-based kitty litter is no good with the electric sand box, nor are high-tech clean-green products like Feline Pine & shredded newspaper pellets, etc.

I would never have thought that a gimmick like an electric cat sand box would have much practical value, but I would have been wrong.

The self-scooping feature is a help, & emptying the waste from the box where the automatic scooper deposits it is less trouble than scooping the poop the old-fashioned conventional way.

Who’d a-thunk ?

Our Town

Read Act III of Our Town by Thornton Wilder.

Better, read the whole play.

Best yet, go see a high school or college or community theater production of Our Town. (Skip the TV & movie professional versions.)

PriceLine-Dot-Com

Our PriceLine reservations at Brunswick GA (to & from Florida) were at Hampton Inn.

Our early March PriceLine reservations in Jacksonville FL each of the past few years were in Extended Stay America or a competing place that’s comparable.

Our only bad PriceLine reservation was when we went too cheap & put in a lowball offer for ( – shudder – ) One Star accommodations in Orlando FL, on the basis of checking in late & checking out early so we just needed a place to crash. We got a Days Inn over by 1 of the convention centers that was just a tad too shabby — won’t be going One Star via PriceLine agagin any time soon. Live & learn, eh?

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We Are Unable To Beat PriceLine By Calling The Hotel Direct.

Every time we’ve checked with a hotel or motel by phone or by Internet, the best rate they’ve offered has been about double the name-our-own-price PriceLine rate.

For example, that Brunswick GA Hampton Inn was $28 (+ fees & tax) via PriceLine when we stayed over night on the way to Orlando FL. The best they said they’d do when we called for an overnight stay on our return trip was $80 (+ tax). So we got The Chief Of Staff’s sister to log on to PriceLine for us & she snagged us a Brunswick GA room for … $28 (+ fees & tax).

We didn’t know it would be Hampton Inn till PriceLine accepted the offer, but we were guessing they’d put us in the same place on the way back that they put us in on the way down. And they did.