Flower, Sunny Ridge, and Family.

I really like music and while I have examples of just about any genre you can think of in my music collection, the biggest part of my collection is indie rock. One of my favorite bands is Tortoise and I have seen them live many times. While they are an indie rock band, in a live setting, they are very much like a jazz band. Rarely do they play a song that they have recorded but rather tend to use the song as a starting point. Five years ago, the booking agent for Tortoise, Flower Booking, decided to celebrate their 10th anniversary with a series of concerts at the Metro. They (actually she, because, while there was more than one person working for Flower Booking in 2000, the founder and lead personality, of Flower was Susanne McCarthy (now Dawursk)) set up a five night stand called Flower10. After expenses, they were giving the money raised to P.L.A.Y. Tortoise played one night and I definitely had to see them but there were a few other bands on other nights that I was interested in. I wanted to see Califone on Wednesday night and Isotope 217 and The Sea and Cake on Saturday night. I was able to get tickets for Wednesday but unfortunately Saturday night sold out before I was able to get tickets. I really liked Califone but I also discovered The *&^O*& Champs, The Black Heart Procession, Don Caballero, and Trans Am. Friday night had The Lonesome Organist, Antietam, and Tortoise and while The Lonesome Organist was interesting I could have really done without seeing Antietam. Except for the fact that I remember they were really bad, I don't really remember much about them. So, why did I tell this story? Flower has decided to celebrate their 15th Anniversary with a 6 night, eight show stand at the Metro called Flower15. While not all acts have been announced yet, the internet presale has already begun and I bought tickets for two nights, Thursday (Ted Leo and the Pharmacists) and Saturday Early (Tristeza and The Promise Ring). Wednesday is still a distinct possibility (Pelican) but they haven't announced who the headliner is. Tortoise is not yet on the bill and I have to think that that night would be the best fit for them.

Sunny Ridge had their annual consignment sale yesterday and I helped with the clean up as part of One Brick. This used to be a Social and Service Chicago event and my friend Sharon used to run it but SASC is going through growing pains right now and couldn't handle it. Besides that, most of the people that used to do it are now in One Brick. While Sharon wasn't running it and isn't in One Brick, she was there because her sister Karen (who adopted all three of her children through Sunny Ridge) is in charge of the sale. Sharon's friend Jennifer ran things on the One Brick side and I thought she did very well. She invited her Dad, who was visiting her from Michigan, because she was a little short on people and he was nice enough to pick up the tab for lunch after the event.

Today I worked on my genealogy. I was contacted recently by a third cousin who was interested in my branch and she sent her family history report to me. I am going to combine her information with mine and send her the updated report along with a list of data files that I possess. Generally the way it works between relatives is a free exchange of data. However, as it looks like she has much of the same data that I possess, we have to figure out what the other person needs like birth, death, and marriage certificates, obituaries, photographs, etc. It will take a while to go through this report but I did get a good start today.

Four people have been killed since Thursday night which brings the death totals for American military in Iraq to 78 for August and 1877 in total.