Philadelphia Folk Festival

Going to musical festivals and sleeping in a tent was one of the rites of passage (along with the trip to California and the youth hostels) of being young in the 70's. Heeding this life requirement I went to the Philadelphia Folk Festival in the summer of 1971. Muddy from the recent rain, there were a number of great performances by Janis Ian, Doug Kershaw, and Doc Watson. Oscar Brand sang bawdy songs, and lots of other amateur and professional musicians played. The Hare Krishna people chanted and sold spiritual food. Our group made hot dogs, then used the water to make corn. What a swell weekend.

Today I went to a sneak preview of the festival/cum street fair in Philadelphia. No spiritual food but some nice tamales with corn husks and Vietnamese food, etc. was eaten by yours truly. If it wasn't so hot it would have been a fine day. The full 50th anniversary of the Philadelphia Folk Festival is coming up too. Today, unfortunately, nobody thinks they can save the world with a guitar.

Aunt Agnes on Murdoch

Aunt Agnes called me this morning. She was very upset. "Everybody knows the only place where you hear the real story on this country is on Fox. Why all this foldorol about that British business has nothing to do with what's going on over here. Just that liberal media gloating over the troubles of an honest man and and honest folks at Fox."

Two new blogs

Two new blogs, one on Balcony Tomatoes and one on the librarian blog. Idle hands are the devil's workshop

Testing the tubes

Recently read an article that made me nostalgic for the good olde days. Remember when a radio stopped working and you would pull the back off and take the tubes out? Then you would bring the tubes to an electronics store or even Modell's and test the tubes in a device like that seen in the picture. More often than not, you'd find out you had a bad tube. You'd buy a replacement and you'd be on your way. You had to be careful putting the tubes back in the right slots, though, or the radio might explode.

Facebook

I've had Facebook for over a year now. I got an invitation from someone who wanted me to look at a movie she put up. The movie was good and it introduced me to Facebook. The best part of Facebook is in discovering people you used to know but lost track of. It's fascinating to see what people you knew from elementary school or the street where you grow up look like and what they ended up doing. The weird thing about Facebook is that once you friend someone, you get to follow them and their families as they go on vacation or to the zoo and soon the novelty wears off.

Facebook groups can be fun too, in a way. I am in the group for my high school class. They apparently have a core group that has mini reunions in a bar. Thanks to Facebook I now know about these events. The big local band in high school, Filet of Soul, is performing again. It's just like being in high school again. Isn't it wonderful

Corn fields in the garden state

This may be anecdotal, but this weekend, driving around Mercer County, I noticed a lot of corn fields in the suburbs. Vacant tracts, being held in waiting for the next housing development or mall are being utilized as corn fields. Apparently corn harvests are supposed to be high this year. Sort of fun, passing corn fields on the way to the mall.