the faces of failure

Failures

I remember when I graduated from college and I could see in my parents' eyes how truly proud of me they were.

This is not the feeling I feel towards my cats. They are failures.

As you may have read in our previous blog, we attempted to teach the cats to use the toilet via a contraption called the Kitty Whiz. The idea as the that you filled the Kitty Whiz with cat litter and the cats would start using the toilet. Eventually, you ween them off of the Kitty Whiz and the clever kitties are supposed to use the toilet, ending dirty litter boxes forever.

This is what happened when we tried to teach Ishmael and Rasputina to use the toilet:

Dry-docking

Above is one of their more successful attempts at potty training. At least this one wasn't on the floor in front of the sink or in the tub. Idiots.

We were forced to reinstate the litterboxes.

I am deeply hurt and disappointed that Ishmael and Rasputina turned out to be such a pair of haggard failures. I will keep feeding them, but, in my heart, they are no longer my cats...

a holy addendum

If you are familiar with Dogtown or Dudleytown, then you know something about New England ghost towns. The area on Sylvester Street that Erin and I explored was something like what I understand those places to be - a serious of logically positioned foundations with other signs of habitation, such as chimneys, stone walls, wells, and the remains of woodpiles within a general vicinity. The main difference with the Sylvester Street foundations is that they were most likely part of Leicester, not an abandoned colony or town.












The Catholic home across the street from Sylvester Street used to be the Nazareth Home for Boys, a sort of orphanage. Now it is the Mcauley/Nazareth House and a school for mentally handicapped 3rd- 8th graders. Over the summer I work at the Mercy Center in Worcester and Nazareth lets our summer program students go there and swim in their pool on Wednesdays.

In spite of having visited Nazareth several times I had never really investigated the Mary alter and I had never even noticed the nun cemetery on the right side of the main property. Erin has always said that she wanted to see gravestones with R.I.P. written on them and I never thought they actually existed, until we stumbled upon this little graveyard of small, white crosses. All the interned here are nuns, all named Sister Mary, and all the vast majority of the graves are small, white crosses that say R.I.P. It's pretty creepy, actually.

One last fun fact, I read that the small stream that runs perpendicular to Sylvester Street is called Lynde Brook. At some point, a 16-year-old from Nazareth (when it was still primarily a boys home, not in its current incarnation) beat a 6-year-old to death and ditched him in the Brook off Sylvester Street. Perhaps that gave rise to some of the Spider's Gates legends...

full of grace!

Sometimes Eric and I make like Hansel and Gretel and hoof it in the woods looking for neat stuff. We did that on Sunday. First we tried to find a cemetery and orchard that I had heard about in Charlton. I lost the directions so we ended up checking out Southbridge instead. We hadn't heard anything good about Southbridge so we thought maybe we could find a good abandoned house there to explore. When I read electric meters back in the summer of '00, I remember being pretty freaked out in some of the areas. That's probably because I had to go into dark, cob-webby basements with pelts hanging from the ceiling. Ok, that only happened once, but while we didn't find anything abandoned, we did discover Southbridge has great potential to be a cute town. It's too bad about Southbridge.

A little discouraged, we returned to home base to try a new approach. Eric did a little research while I ate a cannoli and found some potential places to check out in Leicester. Our mission to find things in the woods brought us first to Spider Gates. We have been to Spider Gates before and let me tell you, there is NOTHING scary about it. In fact, it's a pretty well-kept cemetery with the least scary headstones from that time period that I've seen. The Quakers aren't too up on showy stuff and the most interesting headstone there is a woman who had 2 husbands.

We showed up to Spider Gates to find a few goth kids at the cemetary, which was funny of course. Especially since Spider Gates is as far away from Gothic as the It's a Small World ride at Disney World. After walking around in the woods near the airport, we left for a different trail/road called Sylvester Street where there is supposed to be an old root cellar which you can walk around in. While we didn't find the root cellar, there were a bunch of old foundations that were overgrown and the houses were long gone. It was interesting to wonder why no one inhabited this part of Leicester anymore.

This was the most interesting plot we found. The front stairs were still pretty much in tact, there were some old metal appliances "in" the house, and there were 2 left foot shoe soles - one from a man and one from a woman - placed next to each other on the foundation. You can tell they're old because they were held together by nails.



Another strange occurrence on our woodland journey was that we found the handle to a gardening shovel in a fresh shallow hole - someone had been there not long before us! That's the scariest part about being in the woods. It's not the ghosts, gouls, wizards, witches, hobbitts, spirits, demons and monsters there; it's the potential people and dogs.



The best part of the day was the end. Where we parked our car is an old, but still functional, Catholic home for boys. Outside along the sidewalk are the stations of the cross. Across the street, is a large shrine to Mary. The statues had flowers and Rosary Beads adorned on them. I wanted to be like Mary.







And one cat picture for good measure. Razzle is so cute!

alone with the owls howling pain, pain, pain

I try not to talk about music too much on the "Owls" blog, but I can't stop myself anymore. Erin and I have been finding lots of amazing new music lately and I have to write about it.

First, I just bought both the new Magnolia Electric Co. CD, Fading Trails and the new solo LP from Magnolia's frontman, Jason Molina, entitled Let me go, Let me go, Let me go.


While the Magnolia Electric Co. is good, it's Molina's new album that I'm really pumped about. Since he stopped doing Songs:Ohia, which was a solo project with occasional players assisting, and started the Magnolia Electric Co., a full band, Molina's music has been increasingly heading toward something...well...good, but safe. The first Magnolia Electric Co. CD was amazing and one of my favorite albums of all times (check out Farewell Trasmission, the first song on the first Magnolia Electric Co CD here), but with each following Magnolia Electric Co. release the music has become a little less remarkable.

Until now. Let me go, Let me go, Let me go follows in the tradition of Songs:Ohia and Molina's earlier solo albums, Protection Spells and Pyramid Electric Co. While I love both those albums, Let me go, Let me go, Let me go is even more accessible. Molina's voice, while often compared to Neil Young, is incredibly haunting and more complex than his classic-rock forerunner and on the new CD it goes right through me. I love this CD. While Alone with the Owls is my favorite song on the CD (the title of this post is a line from that song) Get out Get out Get out is the only free MP3 Secretly Canadian (the label) put online.

Erin's persistance spurred our next big recent musical discovery. Erin listens to the Worcester station on the radio and she kept hearing this song she liked a lot, but they never gave the name. She remembered a line and we searched the Internet until we found it and I am really glad we did.

The song was called Let the Sun Shine Down on Me by Jean Ritchie. Ritchie has been throughout her life instrumental in folk music, performing in the early 60's with Doc Watson and making a name for herself as one of the premier dulcimer players in the country. We were eventually able to get our hands on the CD with that song on it. It was a limited edition release that was discontinued. The entire disc is amazing.

Like Jason Molina, Jean Ritchie has a voice that will make the hair on the back of your neck stand on end. Unlike Molina, it doesn't take any getting used to - it's beautiful. Her songs are traditional American folksongs. Ritchie was born and grew up in Kentucky Cumberland region and the songs reflect this somewhat, but they are much more American and universal than esoteric.

Oddly enough, right after we discovered Jean Ritchie, we saw a documentary on Alan Lomax who did field recordings of folk songs for the Smithsonian Institute and she was featured in it.


Closer to home, Erin and I went to Shelburne Falls in western Mass to see Sarah & Dig's brother John's art opening and listen to him play his songs at Mocha Maya's. John is a killer artist and very nice photographer, which we knew, but I was also really impressed by his songs and what a great voice he has. The two things that stood out the most to me about John's set was, A) he's a terrific storyteller and that really adds a lot to the music and B) he included booklets with the set list and lyrics so you could follow along. That was an awesome idea. John is working on a CD and when it is available we will post how to get it.


In other news, we're still really excited about getting married. What adds to the excitement is that Veau and Emily and Katie are coming! Yaya! Also, Kev and Jen will be home in December, just in time for my birthday! Yay!

I'll leave you with some picture I took in around around the Blackstone Canal park and Stanley Woolen Mill in Uxbridge. I guess place almost collapsed or something the day after I was there.

So long.

Worcester: The City That Weeds...

Ever been kicking back in your low-income subsidized apartment and look over at your homeboy and say, "Shit, I wish some city planner would give us somethin' to joke about while we's was blazin' dis blunt!"

Well wish no more, Homes! You're prayers have been answered! Introducing, Weed & Seed!



Looks like the city of Worcester has finally just given in and accepted the fact that the only economic growth on the end of Pleasant Street closest to down town comes from the sale of marijuana. Not only have they accepted the fact that pot provides all that neighborhood's revenue, they embrace it with a new series of signs up and down that end of Pleasant Street that read, "Weed & Seed - Making Our Neighborhoods Better."

Not only does pot bring money into the neighborhood, it allegedly even makes it better! Here's another one of those signs -

Obviously, this is not reefering..er..referring to pot, but I wonder who was responsible for the blazing oversight of calling a community program intended for the less-than-upscale portions of the city and decided to call it Weed and Seed. Of course, it's comparing the city to a garden and weeding and seeding makes a garden grow, but take a look at these dudes and tell me how much they care for metaphors and tropes.
























Normally, I am not amused by pot or pot jokes, but this is way beyond just Cheech and Chong. Perhaps the originator of these ingenius plan was high when he/she concocted it. If not, then shame on them.

Eat your heart out, Edgar Lee Masters...

As Damien noted in he and Sarah's blog, he and I went and took some night photos in a local cemetery. They came out looking pretty neat.
We felt a little nervous because, by law, you're not really supposed to be in a cemetery after dark. There were some headstones in tough shape and we wouldn't want to get blamed for that. Also, I was using a pretty big spotlight, so being clandestine was out of the question.

Apparently, getting her paw stuck under the stove was the last straw...

Is that a ghost??!!?! Nope - way hotter. It's me popping up in my own long exposure.

Damien.

Damien and Sarah found this neat old house. Future blog?

I'll try to post more of our photography adventures on here whenever I can.

So long.
- Eric

P.S. - After seeing Ishmael's turd in that last post, how could we call him anything but HOT CARL!?!?!