Good morning Pittsburgh! We’re here a little earlier than expected and a little longer too. I’m not sure if that’s WHAT SHE SAID or not, it seems a little 50 / 50. That’s where we ARE – let’s talk about where we’ve been….
Waking up this morning in Findlay OH – we’d had a HORROR-style hotel with a FLICKING noisy bathroom light and a forever-midnight bedside clock…. we were grateful to see the sun again! 
Growing acclimated to our hosts in Litchfield OH involved coming to terms with these little guys watching us in the bathroom…. 
And the house band… 
And the house butler… 
By the time we made it up to our room we were prepped for all brands of weirdness – so it was time for a more normal surprise! 
Ye olde College Pal by Slingerland! A cool tenor guitar that had me playing blues licks and enjoying its dusty presence. 
Outside the backdoor they’ve got some little bit of farmland, growing vegetables and chickens in mutually exclusive rows. 
Everything’s set up and ready to rock! 
This is Winston. He was yappy at first but we grew on him. 
Our host’s poetry book… Laura Grace Weldon’s “Blackbird” (she uses her middle name because apparently ‘Laura Weldon’ writes books about how awesome Nazis are…) 
Winston’s eager for people to hurry up and get here… AND START DROPPING SOME DAMNED FOOD!!!
Saturday we played another house concert – Wheldon House Concerts in Litchfield, OH renewed a lot of my faith in humanity and we had a really wonderful time. The people were great and we probably could’ve made pretty good friends there if left there for a little more time – the bed was great too! Seemed like a giant sledge with a mattress on it… the food was great, the pets were great, we played great, the weather was great… everything was great except Kristen got bit by SOMETHING while we were playing and she has these two immense welts that are…
… throbbing…
I think we’re not TOO worried about them yet, but if they hatch we may be down by a cellist.
I shouldn’t joke. We’re keeping a close eye on them and it seems like the swelling’s going down. I especially shouldn’t joke because the reason we’re in Pittsburgh early is that the family we’d planned to stay with yesterday had a parent suddenly get very, very sick. They don’t expect her to last long at all and were obviously not up for visitors. I got the call Friday night that our Sunday plans were going to have to change – and it sounds pretty brutal. I was really looking forward to the visit, but it’ll have to happen when Life is calmer.
Good morning in Litchfield! The grandkids have dropped in for a visit changing the footwear demographic. 
Wandering Medina, OH we encounter this Christmas Stargate. 
And this alien landing site… 
… and this holiday bird village… 
Hell, is this town square w. gazebo the only NORMAL thing in town?? (I’m not complaining!)
But our friend Brad Yoder was able to take us in – or at least, was able to instruct his house mates to take us in – and after a visit to Medina, OH (which is kind of a wondrous town – certainly they’ve got spectacular donuts, a Christmas City, an alien village and a toy train museum, and that’s damned close to wondrous) where we took the time to go catch Captain Marvel – it was a welcome and familiar place to rest our wearied selves.
Captain Marvel was great, though I know in reviews it’s pretty polarizing – and as with anything that’s the slightest bit subversive, you can’t tell the honest reviews from the reviews by people who just can’t stand to see a woman as a superhero, or you can’t tell the honest reviews from someone who’s so divorced from reading female expressions that they think Brie Larson is wooden and emotionless… I don’t know. There’s a lot to drill into with that movie and though it had some legitimately powerful moments (rise up rise up rise UP) and I Love the additions to the overall mythology (I feel like it coloured in the universe in a pretty good way, much more interestingly than most prequelly kind of timelines do) I think my ISSUES with it aren’t easy to cleave away from my fatigue with the brand. It’s the 21st (?) movie in the Marvel Cinematic Universe and I THINK I’ve seen them all… it’s legit for them to begin to seem a little lukewarm by now. The fact that they’re still holding my interest at all is a real testament to how great they are… (hrm, maybe 20th – I don’t know that they should count Edward Norton’s Incredible Hulk movie in the current “universe”)
Anywho, waking up in Brad’s… commune (?)… was welcome. The sun is shining, the birds may well be tweeting. His chickens are clucking and the housemates are shuffling around. One by one we make the trek to the third floor where their tiny, powerful, HOT shower Lives and get our act together to battle one last day on the road. We play at Mr. Small’s tonight and then drive home. We’ll probably be about a hundred miles from home by this time in the AM. Though it’s been a good trip, you can tell that I’m literally counting the hours…
Pittsburgh welcomes us… 
MASSIVE CATHEDRAL!!! 
Funny, I thought the landscape had been conquered with blood and tears…
1 thought on “March 18th, 2019.”
You ALWAYS count down the hours to home…usually starting about 48 hours out……and it always seemed to land squarely on your stay at the birdhouse!! But dat’s ok…do it again!