shine on you crazy diamond

Mark's not feeling well today. last night, a wicked storm blew through town and left him with a crippling migraine. A couple of hours ago I picked him up from work and he's feeling really fragile.

right now, we both feel really sad because, upon returning home, I read that Syd Barrett died on Friday. Last spring, when mark told me about the pink floyd reunion at Live 8 I remember smiling at him and asking, "cool, Syd's back?" sadly, as I knew in my heart, it wasn't Syd who was back but rather Roger and Dave who patched up their differences for a few hours.

the night I met Mark, he told me that he loved Pink Floyd and I remember saying, "cool, Syd Barrett." He said yeah, but really one of his heroes was Roger Waters (David Gilmour never entered into our conversation).

I wonder what music would sound like today, if Syd had never met Roger. Rest in peace Syd.

Guardian Obituary: Syd Barrett

Syd Barrett, the maverick frontman and creative force behind early Pink Floyd, who has died from cancer aged 60, was the ultimate of pop recluses. His departure from the band in 1968 - then on the threshold of global eminence - and his retirement as a professional musician to lead an outwardly unproductive life was on a par with, say, Mick Jagger leaving the Rolling Stones in 1964 to live quietly with his parents.

The fourth of five siblings, he was born Roger Barrett in Cambridge. If blighted by the death of his father, a hospital pathologist, his upbringing was more liberal and steeped in culture than most. Before he graduated to Cambridge High School, he showed promise as a classical pianist and, more so, as a visual artist. However, intrigued by an elder brother's skiffle combo, he taught himself guitar, mostly by playing along to records. He and a kindred spirit, David Gilmour, practised together, but did not progress much further than talking about starting a group.

It was around this time that Roger acquired the nickname "Syd". At 16, he was playing with local beat groups, sometimes sharing a stage with bass guitarist Roger Waters. On obtaining respective scholarships at Camberwell Art College and Regent Street Polytechnic, Barrett and Waters moved to London where their band, the Pink Floyd, smouldered into form, with Barrett, Waters, drummer Nick Mason and Rick Wright on keyboards.

The gradual introduction of adventurous self-written material and lengthy monochordal improvisations made them popular fixtures in the capital's underground clubs where light shows simulated psychedelic experience. Snapped up by EMI, their debut single, Arnold Layne, was, as expected, self-consciously "weird" - and a Top 30 entry, despite airplay restrictions. The follow-up, a tartly-arranged See Emily Play - also composed by Syd - climbed to Number Six. Perhaps more satisfying for the group was recognition by the Beatles, who looked in during a Floyd session for 1967's groundbreaking The Piper At The Gates Of Dawn. The maiden album was penned almost entirely by the charismatic Barrett, who, as a guitarist was as capable of severe dissonance as serene, if echo-laden, melody, and whose vocal style was as English as Elvis Presley's was American.

With the other personnel keeping pace, he'd gone far into the cosmos and back musically with Astronomy Domine, and disconnected with Earth altogether on Interstellar Overdrive. Moreover, Gnome, Matilda Mother, Flaming and medieval-flavoured Scarecrow cornered pop's gingerbread castle hour more effectively and instinctively than, for example, the Beatles' Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds.

Fortunately for the Fab Four, a now drug-addled Barrett was already proving ill equipped to cope with pop stardom, particularly after a troubled US tour and the disappointment of a flop third single, Apples and Oranges. In 1968, David Gilmour was enlisted as the increasingly unreliable Barrett's understudy and then his successor during the making of a transitional second album, A Saucerful Of Secrets. Although happier as concert performers, Pink Floyd - as they were now called - were initially at a loss without Barrett's input.

Attempting to master his more absolute inner chaos, Barrett released two curate's egg solo albums in 1970, The Madcap Laughs and the more focused Barrett, with help from members of Soft Machine, Humble Pie - and Pink Floyd, and was persuaded to undertake disinclined promotional stage appearances. Eventually, he returned to Cambridge where he fronted a trio called Stars, who struggled through a solitary official booking at the city's Corn Exchange in 1972.

The years left to Barrett were almost perversely unremarkable. Though he was known to be a painter, he neither exhibited nor sold any work. Nevertheless, a legend took shape, bringing out strange stories, the most verifiable of which was of Barrett presenting himself, portly and shaven-headed, in the studio when Pink Floyd were recording the 1975 album Wish You Were Here - which included the Barrett tribute Shine On You Crazy Diamond.

Since then, intrusive press photographs of Barrett have portrayed him looking as middle-aged as his now multi-millionaire colleagues. In the teeth of dull truth, Barrett continued to fascinate countless fans as well as record company moguls, scraping the barrel for anything on which he so much as breathed - such as the big-selling 1993 CD box set, Crazy Diamond, incorporating hitherto-unreleased tracks.

Barrett's income of invalidity benefit and fluctuating royalties was buoyed by tributes paid by other artists, most conspicuously David Bowie who revived See Emily Play on his 1973 Pin-Ups album, and more recently Arnold Layne which he performed with David Gilmour in London. Yet few of the faithful expected or even wanted Barrett to make a comeback, no matter how rejuvenated or contemporary. They preferred him as an ever-silent, "no return" saga rather than one in which he was likely to try and fail to debunk the myth of an artistic death.

· Syd Barrett (Roger Keith Barrett, musician, composer, born January 6 1946; died July 7 2006)

the brilliance of vilanch

yesterday was a long day.

up early. errands all afternoon. we were tired last night, probably overtired I guess.

this afternoon, after Mark got home, we took a nap. it felt really good. it did, however contain a rather weird dream, for me anyway.

all through my dream, folks were gathering stuff up. gathering people do. pre-production work was in heavy progress. the next great teen movie, probably better than the breakfast club was about to be made. huge buzz was happening about it and it was going to be directed by bruce vilanch (of all people). however, all through my dream, vilanch was not to be seen. he had become a recluse but he was brilliant. he was so brilliant in fact that he could direct the film without being anywhere near where it was happening to do it. people would just know what to do because of bruce brain waves.

it was a very strange dream indeed.

to say "that shit's fucked up" is a huge understatement.

sun comes up and you're in the cemetary

st mary's cemetary - early morning
Originally uploaded by Julep67.

we were up early this morning.

seriously early.

I know, you're thinking, 'hey peg, you guys are up early every morning.'

yeah, well even we don't think that getting up at 3:30 a.m. on a Sunday is a good idea. unfortunately, we got a phone call at that time, it was Joe, and it woke us up. Joe was a little confused and he left a message stating that he wasn't feeling well and for Mark to call him "when he had a minute."

Mark called back and Joe told him that he wasn't feeling well. When Mark suggested that he tell the nurse about it, Joe said that he had and that the nurse had given him "an aspirin." Eventually, Mark found out that Joe wanted a ride home because he thought that he was at the shul. He told Mark that he didn't know what to do with his car. Mark told him to not worry about the car, and that we'd be there in 20 minutes to pick him up.

Mark hung up the phone, Joe hung up, we haven't heard from him again. I'm sure that Joe went back to sleep. I wish that we'd been able to. Instead, we got up, watched an episode of Law & Order that we'd taped. Eventually, around 6:30, already showered and dressed, we went out for breakfast. It's not even 1 p.m. right now but it feels like we've been up for days. Not a nice way to start your day.

Soon, we're going to head over to Joe's and see how he's doing. Fun times huh??

easy living

ferry dock - cape vincent, new york
Originally uploaded by Julep67.

today has been lovely so far. while I didn't sleep in, I did enjoy a rather leisurely morning. as has become our weekend ritual, coffee was consumed on the deck this morning. the weather is so gorgeous today that the windows in our house are wide open and the air conditioning is turned off. I love it when we have actual breezes cooling our house instead of the air conditioner.

The other day, we discovered the the house we sold a year ago is once again for sale. In all honesty, I'm not 100% surprised, for a couple of reasons.

1. the young couple we sold it to seemed like flippers. we could tell that they were doing a lot of cosmetic stuff to it last summer (landscaping, decorating in the kitchen). We actually thought that they'd try to sell it in the fall.

2. a wall of insanity has been installed. one of our next door neighbours at the old house is insane. she's 90 years old now (maybe 91) and has, as my mum would say "more money than brains." We're pretty sure that at some point or another, over the past 8 years, she's had every contractor and/or landscaper in town come through her house. It's in a constant state of renovations. A few years ago, she built a big pergola and fence blocking out her neighbours on the other side. A few weeks ago, a really huge fence went up (we're talking all the way down the driveway, almost to the street) between her house and our old place. I'm not sure what those new folks did but it must have pissed her off, big time.

What was surprising about the whole thing (and I'm not naive, I know how much the costs of homes in this neighbourhood have gone up in the past 14 months) is that they have listed the house at $33K more than they paid for it. The house itself is quite small and it lacks a basement but it's on a huge, park-like lot so they might actually get their asking price, eventually. Right now though, in my opinion, if they are looking for a quick sale, it's not going to happen, not at that price anyway.

link it up

Blogger had a link on their front page, as they always do, to an "interesting" blog today. I don't normally click on them but today I did, it's called The Luckiest One and I think it's a worthwhile read.

Right now, between spoonfuls of raspberry yogurt, I'm getting ready to go on vacation. Fortunately, this week has not been particularly meeting heavy so I've been able to get things sorted out without feeling overly stressed. It's nice actually. I'm finally transitioned away from my old job, almost 100% actually. The new person is really nice and extremely competent, which makes training/transitioning so much easier.

So yeah, at 4 p.m. I start vacation. Two weeks worth for me this year please? I still have a bunch of time to book up but this will be a nice break. Mark will be off during the second week and we have NO plans. That's just the way I like it. We'll take it as it comes and see what happens.