Mom and Dad and I went to this tonight:
The Jung Center of Houston: The Soul of Houston -- Blues Stories:

The Soul of Houston: Blues Stories

Following our successful spring conference, this free lecture series, hosted by Houston author Roger Wood, continues to explore the hidden, unexplored soul of our community by focusing on the music and fascinating life stories of three Houston blues legends.

... and it was awesome. 
Texas Johnny Brown was born in 1928 and is still going strong, playing blues and telling stories about his life inside the music. It was amazing.
And then afterwards Mom talked to him over coffee while he was signing CDs, and Dad regaled some of the Blues Society folks with a tale of the Beatles' visit to Houston, when they were mobbed by crazy fans. They never came back to Texas after that.  ;)
Anyway, it was a really nice time, and I just fell in love with the Jung Center. Why have I not been taking crazy amounts of classes there and hitting their lecture circuit since I moved back?  It makes me want to go back and re-examine Pacifica's graduate programs in Depth Psychology and Mythology, too. Mmm, myth.

There are two more Wednesdays of Blues programs, we're planning to go to those, too.

Melfina:  wow, there is a plan to put a banana over texas.  http://www.geostationarybananaovertexas.com/en.html
me:  hee I've seen that before.
Melfina:  But why a banana? does Texas have some connection with bananas that I am not aware of?
me:  no, I think that's just an artistic choice. why not a banana?
Melfina:  Dunno.  I thought maybe that Texas had some connection to the banana like GA does to the peach, or FL to the orange
 me:  no, our state fruit is the red grapefruit.
 me: but it would probably be hard to differentiate a round fruit of any sort from the moon, if it was in low earth orbit.  a banana is nicely distinctive
Melfina:  True, true. 

 

Mom says that rather than my being grateful to have geek parents, they are grateful that I turned out to be a big geek, too.
:)
Awwww.

We're going to see Pompeii at the MFAH this afternoon.  Yay!!

Periodic Table Printmaking Project:

Ninety-six printmakers of all experience levels, have joined together to produce 118 prints in any medium; woodcut, linocut, monotype, etching, lithograph, silkscreen, or any combination. The end result is a periodic table of elements intended to promote both science and the arts.

My mother regularly wakes me up on the weekends by shrieking.  I have 3.7 seconds of absolute panic and then I realize, "Oh, it's the baseball/football/soccer/fill-in-sport-here game." 

Apparently, watching TV with Mom and me is very difficult.  We've been watching Tin Man on Sci-Fi for past two nights, and making snarky comments.  Mom and I snark about the names; the dialogue; the acting; the internal story logic.  And every time Dad sighs and mutters, "Can't you just suspend your disbelief for a couple of hours and enjoy the presentation?" Well, we are enjoying the presentation. And snarking at it.
I do wonder on occasion if this interpretation would make any more sense if I read the books. But on the whole, probably not.

This morning there was ice on my car.  On Sunday when I took out the trash it was muggy and I was in a tank top and flip-flops.  Today there was ice on my car.  Thank you, East Texas weather.  If you don't like it, just wait. 

My office is having a door decorating contest for the holidays.  I want to do something Solstice-y.  Any ideas?

Also, Happy Hanukkah! 

We have begun the Season of Light.  (I know because my neighbors down the road have a giant illuminated inflatable Santa on a Harley in their yard.  If that doesn't scream "Season of Light!" I just don't know what does.) 

And in the spirit of Peace on Earth, Goodwill to Men (hey, it's not my holiday slogan, but it's a pretty good one), Banksy returns to Bethlehem at the BBC In Pictures.  Be sure to click through them all.

Mom and I are off to ArtCrawl.  Woot!

I've got A Day in the Life... for the summer solstice:


Skyline from I-45 (my morning commute)

See whole set here.

And then I've got FSG 2007 (mostly arts and crafts, with a few people thrown in:

Maria shows off a home-knitted sock in a transparent boot.

See whole set here.