chocolat

You start with farms that grow cacao trees.

Safari!

The San Diego Zoo's Safari Park (renamed from the Wild Animal Park, as it was very emphatically known last time I visited... when I was about 12) is less zoo-like than the actual Zoo (though there is a small zoo there), and has more emphasis on the wide-open spaces of the majority of the park.  They have options to rent Segways or get driven around in a small cart, or in a truck, but my friends and I chose to do the standard tram tour.  A lot of the animals are kind of far away, so I didn't take as many photos as I  might have - I only had a point-and-shoot and not very good zoom capabilities. :)

Francis

I went to the San Diego Safari Park last week (will post that... later...), then went to a professional conference. One of the lectures I attended was about training and medical/husbandry behaviors at the Zoo.

Imagine that you need to examine the mouth of a tiger.  Or do an ultrasound on a panda.  Or trim the toenails of an elephant.  Or apply moisturizing cream to the feet of a bear.  Or acquire a blood sample from a cheetah.  If one of those critters doesn't want to let you do those things, you will have to chase it around with a dart gun (from the other side of a fence, no less), which is stressful for everyone, and anesthesia can be incredibly risky in some of these animals, and if it does for a minor procedures... well, that's a problem.

Zoo!

I just got back from the San Diego Zoo.  I ran out of space on my camera's SD card (2GB) and had to sit down for a while to delete the obviously blurry pictures.  I went yesterday with S-, at whose apartment I am staying, and went back today.  After all, it's only a 5-10 minute walk away!

Incarnate

I was at the library a couple weeks ago, picking up a book I'd put on hold.  On a whim, I thought I'd see if Jodi Meadows' Incarnate was in - didn't expect it to be, as this was the small, local branch library.  I was pleased to discover that it was.

Horse magic

Last night was magical.

A three-sectioned curtain hides half the stage from us.  Over the course of the next two and a half hours, the two-level arena, with sections which can be curtained off, opened up, and turned into a small ring - becomes a Roman arena, a snowy wonderland, a Western plain, a sylvan fantasy.

More organ pictures

Since I had to be kind of choosy about the pictures I shared in Robin McKinley's guest blog post (part three is here), I'm putting up some of the less good (or less relevant) photos here.  A few may be duplicates of photos already posted, but in higher resolution.

Birds

In mid-June, G, his parents and I went to the Parc Ornithologique de Pont du Gau - a large wildlife preserve in the Camargue delta, where hundreds on hundreds of water birds spend time.  We got lucky - a few minutes after we arrived, a walking tour started, allowing us to learn far more about the various species we were seeing than we would otherwise be able to.  The Parc does avian rehabilitation, has several birds on display (mostly raptors, most of which I presume are injured and cannot be released).  I also got to use G's father's nice camera to play with.  Which I think is about all the introduction to this than you need. (sorry, this post is a little picture-heavy) :)

Organ guts

Here is the second part of G and I's visit to the organ :)

http://robinmckinleysblog.com/2012/07/11/the-organ-of-eglise-notre-dame-la-dalbade-part-ii-2/

Visiting an organ (part 1)

Back in May, G and I had the wonderful opportunity of seeing the insides of a 19th century church organ.  Since Robin McKinley's piano teacher also plays organ, she has posted occasionally about organs, and I thought perhaps some of her regular blog readers might enjoy an account of our experience.

The post is a bit long, so Ms. McKinley has split the post into pieces.  The first installment was posted today.

http://robinmckinleysblog.com/2012/07/05/the-organ-of-eglise-notre-dame-la-dalbade-part-i/

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edit 2018

Robin McKinley rebooted her blog, and the archives are no longer accessible to the public. I managed to find the original text lurking in the depths of my computer, but will have to do some hunting in order to find the photographs, but the captions are there...

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This post is all Robin’s fault. After all, if she hadn’t mentioned folding origami the other day, I would not have desired to fold some origami myself, then gotten lost looking a little paper shop, seen an intriguing old-looking building in the process of finding the correct street, gone around to the front of the intriguing old-looking building, gone inside, and discovered that there was going to be something that involved organs the next day.

And if Robin hadn’t, in the past, posted occasionally about Oisin and his obsession about organs, and a little bit about how organs are really cool, I might not have gone to said event involving organs. But being sort of a musician, and thinking that organs might be kind of interesting, my boyfriend and I went.

I was expecting a recital or something. What we got was a brief recital… followed quickly by the opportunity to go up into the organ loft, see the keyboards, the stops, the pedals, hear the organ from the galleries as well as from the organ loft, go into the back and see (some of) the insides of the organ, see and hear the various pipes, hear how the different stops affect the sound of the instrument, watch a little of how the mechanics of this incredible instrument work, and then get to doodle around a little on the instrument myself.

---

The Eglise Notre-Dame La Dalbade is in the Carmes neighborhood of Toulouse. Surrounded by other old buildings*, it stands on one of the many twisty streets that meander through this medieval city. When I made a wrong turn looking for the paper store and saw the high walls with the old gothic buttresses, I had to investigate. Built of the red brick that gives the city its nickname of La Ville Rose, it has an entrance with carved columns and a beautiful mural depicting the coronation of the Virgin Mary surrounded by angelic musicians.

<IMG 4857 : Front of church.>

It seems that the original church, built in the 6^th century, was white – hence its name**. After being destroyed in a fire in the 15^th century and rebuilt in the 16^th, it acquired its current red brick and the tallest bell tower in Toulouse. It houses an organ, built by Eugène Puget in 1888***. In 1926, the bell tower collapsed, taking a small secondary organ and a large portion of the church with it****. Luckily, the main organ was minimally damaged, and the church was rebuilt in the 50s (some of the organ’s restoration at that time was performed by Eugène’s grandson Maurice).

When I ventured inside Friday afternoon, I admired the vaulted ceilings, the stained-glass windows, the paintings and statues in the alcoves… all the usual things I look at when I enter these old churches. Some churches, including this one, have fabulous organs – the detailed carving of the dark wood is always amazing to behold. This organ was designed to frame a beautiful rose window. I was a little surprised to hear someone playing on it, though – all the other organs I’ve seen have been silent when I visited. They were clearly practicing – the same run was played several times, the music stopped and started, and after a while, I became aware that there were two people in the organ loft – the player and someone who seemed to be instructing the player. I enjoyed the music, such as it was, and after taking several photographs of the church’s interior, I prepared to leave.

<IMG 4885: Rose window.>

As I turned to the exit, I took a quick look at the bulletin board. A poster caught my eye – Presentation de l’orgue historique Puget 1888, it said. The date was, serendipitously, that of the next day. I took a picture of it (so I’d remember) and showed it to my boyfriend that evening after he got home. He thought it might be interesting – why not go?

<IMG 4892: Flyer. Background is a drawing (I believe by Puget) of the original organ’s conception and/or construction (I am not completely clear on that part).>

And so, as the morning turned to noon on Saturday, we entered the church. Again, there was somebody practicing at the keyboards as we wandered up the center aisle. There were very few people there – maybe a half dozen at first, though there were perhaps as many as fifteen or twenty by the time we left. Shortly after we sat down in the pews, a man came down, asking if we were here for the organ? We were. Were we organists? No… Ah well, come on up anyway.

<IMG 4898: The organ. Unfortunately the best picture I got was crooked.>

Initially, after climbing the twisty wooden steps to the level of the organ loft †, we were led into the galleries along the right (as you face the altar) side of the church. The organist, a young woman from Japan, played an arrangement of a CPE Bach cantata (I think). The acoustics of this spot were different from where we had been on the floor of the church and the difference in how the echoes reflected back to us was audible. I also was able to see the stained glass windows around the church better from this elevated viewpoint, and noticed some of the little carvings at the tops of the columns and other details that had not been visible from ground level.

<IMG 4913: View from galleries.>

After the Bach, our little group was then treated to an informal couple of hours of playing, demonstration, and explanations by the professional organist, Mr. de Miguel (the instructor I’d seen up there the day before) and a young man who we believe to be an apprentice organ builder. Unfortunately, my French was unequal to the task of comprehending everything that was said, but even the 1/3 – 1/2 that I understood was extremely interesting. Anything I get wrong is entirely due to the fact that I know almost nothing about pipe organs to start with, the men who explained things talked really fast, and my understanding of French is as yet rather imperfect. Many thanks to boyfriend, who, as a native of this country actually understood most of it, and was later able to explain things to me that I didn’t quite follow at the time.

<IMG 4920: The pipes from the organ loft.>

Eugène Puget, the second of four generations of organ-builders in Toulouse, built this organ, which was inaugurated in 1888. Its most recent restoration, about two years ago, was due to damage during the droughts and heat of 2004, and cost more than €500,000. It is apparently unusually playable, having a relatively light action ††. There are three manuals, a pedalboard and fifty stops, each labeled with a different instrument and pipe length. It also has the ability to control dynamics and has a number of “effects” pedals which affect the tonal quality of the instrument. These features provide this organ an extremely versatile range of tones and colors, and allows for everything from a simple, pure sound to a fully symphonic sound.

<IMG 4910: The keyboards and stops.>

<IMG 4925: The pedals. The flat wood pedals in the center above the keyboard pedals control volume. The metal pedals on either side control other effects.>

An electric air generator now replaces the original man-powered bellows, forcing air up toward the organ’s pipes continuously. When all the stops are in, airflow to the pipes is blocked, and no sound emerges if you press a key. When a stop is pulled out, a particular “instrument” is activated, and air flows to the pipe corresponding to the key pressed by opening a hole by means of some really very clever mechanics. The more stops are opened, the more “instruments” sound when a key is pressed. As I understand it, each manual corresponds to some of the stops, and you can hook things up so one manual controls more than one manual’s worth of stops†††.

<IMG 4942 - 4943: Stops in and out.>

The current organ has been modified from its original design. At one time, there was a small organ that was in the same location as the keyboards. This is a holdover from a time when organs actually were portable instruments! ‡ The pipes associated with this organ have since been moved inside the main instrument, and are surrounded by a series of vertical levered wooden slats which can be opened and closed by means of two foot-pedals to control the volume of the sound produced.

We got to see the insides of the organ – hundreds of pipes in all different sizes crammed into a fairly small space – and we could only see about 1/3 of the pipes (there’s not a lot of space in there for visitors, and access is via a trap door and a rickety wooden ladder). There are both metal and wood pipes. The pipes can be tuned (this is not a job I would want!) by means of adjusting curls of metal on the metal pipes, or adjusting a sort of stopper thing on the wood pipes‡‡‡. Not all the pipes sound by means of air moving past appropriately shaped holes – some have a vibrating piece inside instead.

<IMG 4927: Just a few of the smaller pipes. The pipes in the foreground are about waist-high.>

<IMG 4936: Note curls on metal pipes. These can be rolled to varying degrees to tune these pipes.>

<IMG 4938: Note handle above wooden pipes and slot in side with a slidey thing inside. The stopper can be moved up and down to tune these pipes.>

<IMG 4940: Another view of the handle/stopper tuning mechanism of wood pipes.>

<IMG 4933: The vibraty bit for some of the pipes.>

The organists of Toulouse rotate churches they play in on a regular basis. Mr. de Miguel was amazing to watch as he navigated the several manuals, pedal board and stops (often reaching arm-over-arm to pop a stop in or out as he kept playing with the other hand, as well as manipulating the tone color with his feet), and kept track of music with THREE staves (as a primarily string player, who only has to keep one track of one staff at a time, I found it dizzying to just follow along). There were Post-It notes on the music to help him remember what stops he wants set on this instrument, and hand-written markings all over indicating when to change the stops. We were treated to demonstrations of some of the versatility of this instrument. It can do the full-out classic organ sound one associates with Bach’s famous Toccata and Fugue… or a light, fluty sound suitable for Fauré or Debussy… a symphonic richness for orchestral rearrangements... music reminiscent of an oboe concerto… the list goes on and on.

Anybody who wanted to was also allowed the opportunity to play a little on the organ. I was surprised at how easy the action was – it felt more “solid” than a piano, and had the peculiar quality that it didn’t matter how hard I pressed the key, it didn’t affect the volume§. Each manual has the same octave range as the other two (the pedals seem to be what play the deep bass) but based on how the stops are arranged, one can get a full range of notes, from almost-inaudibly low to tooth-achingly high, as well as imitating the sounds of different instruments. I was also surprised at how quickly the sound responded. The quiet wooden shuffle-clack of the Barker mechanism behind the bench was a little distracting at first, but apparently do their job well, as the sound was almost immediate when the key was depressed. The sound was a little muted from the vantage of the bench, compared to elsewhere in the organ loft, but easily audible and it was not at all difficult to hear what I was doing (and realize when I’d made a mistake!)

<IMG 4961: What’s easily visible of the Barker mechanism. The “wall” behind the organist is actually a sliding door which hides this. The “room” where we were with all the pipes is above and behind that.>

I’m not much of a keyboardist – it’s been months since I’ve had access to a piano, and years since I’ve played much – but I made some attempts at the first third or so of Bach’s cello suite in C§§, a few lines from a Mozart piano sonata and the first section of Für Elise§§§. The organist adjusted the stops as I went – it was fascinating to hear how the different pieces sounded and changed as the stops went in and out. It was very much fun. I didn’t do much with the pedals – played a few notes just to do it, but what keyboard ability I own lives in my fingers, not in my feet.

All in all, the afternoon was wonderful. Apparently Saturday was National Organ Day, and Toulouse, being the second most organ-populated city in France, had to do something, and this is what was planned. Mr. de Miguel was very passionate about how the organ has declined in popularity, and how many instruments are unplayable (including another, almost identical Puget organ in a theater in Paris), and is hoping that publicizing and demonstrating this amazing instrument, more people will become interested in learning more about the organ.

There’s apparently going to be an organ concert at the Basilique Saint-Sernin next weekend…

* The building across the way, for example, has a plaque on it dating it to the 16th century.

** That would be the Dalbade part (dealbata = whitewashed in Latin)

*** According to this website ( http://www.toulouse-les-orgues.org/les-orgues/instruments/toulouse-16/toulouse/eglise-notre-dame-la-dalbade.html ), Puget actually rebuilt and expanded on a previously present organ built in 1850 by Prosper Moitessier.

**** The French Wikipedia site has a couple photos of the tower before and after its collapse. http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C3%89glise_Notre-Dame_de_la_Dalbade

† The floor of the loft trembled slightly as people moved around. I found this somewhat alarming at first, though I did get used to it. Being a Californian by upbringing, all I have to say is, thank goodness they don't seem to get earthquakes around here. Most of the city would be rubble.

†† Mr. de Miguel, the organist, mentioned another organ in town (I think this one: http://www.toulouse-les-orgues.org/les-orgues/instruments/toulouse-16/toulouse/eglise-du-gesu.html?lang=fr ) that is very difficult to play due to the heaviness of the keys, which is related to the mechanism that transmits the key movement to the air-opening-bit of the organ.

††† It’s rather odd to watch someone playing on one manual (or the pedals) and seeing other keys on the other manuals moving simultaneously).

‡ From poser (to place), it is called the “positif." Again according to the website above, the positif of this organ is mostly what's left of the Moitessier organ.

‡‡ Boyfriend thinks they said over 3000 pipes. We do know that they ranged in length from less than a foot to 32 feet in length. The stops are labelled, plus we could see them.

‡‡‡ Mr. de Miguel mentioned that they had tuned most of the pipes Friday night in preparation for Saturday - a task that took two people over six hours, and lasted til past 1am.

§ This is sort of like many unsophisticated electric keyboards – but those are “bouncy” and difficult to play in my experience. This keyboard was much more substantial.

§§ I started with that on the theory that it’s really hard to mess up a descending C major scale, followed by some broken chords before it got to the more interesting bits, and I thought I could probably mostly sound it out as I went along.

§§§ It happens that at one time, I had all of the afore-mentioned piano music memorized... about ten years ago. It was kind of embarassing how little I could remember. I so need a piano.

green things

1.  It takes a remarkable amount of dirt to fill a pot.

bricks

I have joined a Ravelry sock knitting group.  Every two months, they have a "knit-along" - where people choose a pattern based on a theme, and attempt to complete a pair of socks in that pattern within the specified time frame.

seeds

I'm not particularly good at keeping plants alive.  Or at least, I'm not particularly good at getting them to thrive. I have had several plants over the years that survived (an African violet that never flowered after the ones it had when I got it died, though it stayed green for a few years... a handful of orchids that were similar... a couple kitchen herbs that made it a few months...).  Most of the time, I get a young plant, and forget to water it.  Or get some seeds or bulbs, and they sprout, and turn into seedlings... and then die from over or under watering.  I did have a number of plants in my aquariums that did pretty well, but mostly as long as I had the appropriate amount of lighting for them, they were fine - because if I didn't have enough water to keep them alive, there wouldn't've been enough water to keep the fish alive either. Plants are simply not as good at reminding you to feed them as cats are.

iris

What is there not to love about the iris?

I love the shape - with the central petals standing, the outside petals gracefully folding out.  The way some have smooth edges, and others ruffle.  The variety in sizes - from small and demure to huge riotous blooms.  The way the colors shade from the center of the flower toward the edges.  The slender buds.  The fuzzy yellow stamens. The fact that a lot of them are in my favorite shades of purple doesn't hurt - though they also come in a variety of beautiful blues and yellows and reddish tints as well.

G's mother, it turns out, has some gorgeous irises in her garden.  When my lack of garden grows up, it wants to have this many irises in it.  This may be difficult, given my history with plants, and given that currently, we only have a balcony... but I can dream.

(warning:  this post has a lot of pictures in it)

one of those knitters

It appears that I have become one of those knitters.

As best as I can tell, there are more or less three kinds of knitters.  I started out as the first, was comfortably one of the second, but seem to have become one of the third.

samoussa love

Last night, G and I went to one of my two favourite restaurants ever (unfortunately, the other one is on the other side of the world, but then again, this one was on the other side of the world from me for a long time, and I've been to the other one more, so I guess it works out).  This is going to be a boring post.  It is going to involve me raving about how tasty my appetizer was.

baguettes

I will start this post with the definition of the French word "baguette," from my "All-New Edition Larousse's French-English English-French Dictionary" (copyright 1996 - I've probably had it since about then - it's certainly not all-new now!).

baguette [bagεt] nf [pain (bread)] French stick. || [petit bâton] stick; ~ magique magic wand; ~ de tambour drumstick; mener qqn à la ~ to rule sb with a rod of iron. || [pour manger (for eating)] chopstick. || [chef d'orchestre (conductor)] baton

I have long been familiar with the bread definition, as are, I presume, most people in Western countries.  It is such a classic French thing - like croissants and berets and the Eiffel tower.

kitty girl

Last night, talking to G's parents on the phone, the question of what my cats' names were came up.  They are apparently avid readers of my blog (I have blog readers!), and the question of whether or not we were still alive (yes) and had good things to eat (yes) came up as there hadn't been any pictures posted for a while.  So I thought I'd do a little post about the cats (since I've been thinking about doing a cat post for a while anyway, as it should be fairly easy, and avoids my having to actually come up with something semi-interesting to write about).

adding colour to the city

Alerted to what might be a memorable event by someone on Ravelry, G and I hied off to the Place de la Trinité this afternoon.

As part of the festivities for the Toulouse Carnival, a group of intrepid sewers and others decorated the square with large quantities of fabric.

pi(e)

On Monday, I saw something on a website somewhere that reminded me that Wednesday would be Pi Day.

So I said to G (who was home sick, which he would very shortly give to me...), "Pi day is coming up.  I'll have to think of what I'm going to make."

G looked at me with a look of vague bewilderment.

"You, know, Pi day.  Like, 3.14.  Pi."

The look of bewilderment acquired an edge of concern (possibly for my sanity).

points

A while ago, I made a beautiful purple shawl (a couple photos in this post). I've been wearing it a lot as a scarf, just kind of bunched up (which doesn't show off the lace well, but it's warm, if a touch scratchy). I've been thinking, pretty much from when I first blocked the shawl, that I should have blocked it so there were double the number of points - but when I looked at the photos provided with the pattern, only the points below the hearts (though they look like tulips to me) were pointy. So that's how I blocked it. However, it really looked to me like there was enough fabric to bring down intermediate points as well.

food

I appear to be an extremely delinquent blogger.  From day to day, I do not feel that anything that has happened is blogworthy (or perhaps, one small event might be blogworthy, but certainly would not make up an entire blog) and I have thus completely avoided the question by avoiding the blog.

Clearly, this is not a workable long-term solution for keeping a blog up to date and interesting for anybody (including me).

Therefore, I give you food.

fifty pounds and five thousand six hundred ninety nine miles

Actually, it's 100 pounds (plus whatever the carryon weighed).  Plus however many miles it is from Frankfurt to Toulouse.

I have now successfully arrived in France.  Since, according to the United Airlines website, there would be a $200 fine for having a piece of checked luggage that weighed more than 50 pounds, I spent most of the day and night prior to my flight trying to get my two pieces of checked luggage to be under fifty pounds.  It turns out that both my parents' old green hard-shell Samsonite suitcase and G-'s suitcase-sized rolling duffel bag thing that he left last time he was in the States close easily when their contents are less than 50 pounds, but they do not close easily when 54 pounds.  Interesting, especially as the Samsonite was probably made prior to all these super-strict luggage rules.

packing

The last bit of packing prior to a move is always the most hectic.

The last bit of packing prior to a trip is always the most hectic.

I'm sort of doing both - going to France for a semi-indefinite period of time.  I am starting with packing the *things* - the books (in English) that I'll miss, my knitting supplies, my favorite teapot and mug, my US measuring cups and spoons, my favorite spatula for cooking with, various nick-knacks.  I will follow this with what clothes fit.  Unfortunately, there are strict weight limits and suitcase number limits on planes nowadays.  I will fit as much as possible into my viola case - it will be carryon.  My new nifty laptop messenger bag (thanks sister!) doesn't seem to fit quite as much into it as I'd hoped, but it ought to fit my computer, important papers, and things to do on the plane.

I also have to do some last-minute chores - go to the bank, pick up my new glasses, mail things to people that I've been uncovering over the last few days that don't belong to me, stuff like that.  Ideally I'd do my taxes before I go, but I kind of think that's not going to happen... however, I do believe that I can file my taxes online, so that should work.  I hope.  In addition, I've got some furniture and random other stuff that I've brought back to my parents house for storage and/or getting rid of (sorry, sister, who is living in this house right now, and gets to deal with the aftermath).

I foresee a rather sleepless night.  I'll just have to sleep on the plane.

they make their music with their mouths

Rockapella is possibly one of the best live shows ever.  Not that I've been to a lot of live concerts other than Rockapella and things like the San Francisco Symphony.  But seriously, I don't know how it could get more awesome than this.

public knitting

Knitting in public, it turns out, is a variable thing. Most of the times I've knit in public have gone apparently unnoticed. Today, while waiting for my doctor's appointment and later' for my blood draw, I had at least four or five people ask about it or conment on it. I got to hear about makinh afghans (blankets), sweaters, sewing projects, and reminiscences of relatives working needlecrafts. It certainly made the 2-3 hours I spent waiting pass much quicker!

catchup

Well.  Since I procrastinated so hard on finishing the road trip blogs, I more or less failed to make any new posts between then and now.  Stuff has happened.  Knitting.  Thanksgiving.  Christmas.   New Year's.  Sending my cats to France.  I think this is where I post a whole bunch of pictures and pretend that I wrote some fun, interesting posts.