The celebration is based on the rise of the Harvest Moon. For Moon Festival families travel from all over to return to their hometown to celebrate with their families with a feast, fireworks, and consuming many Mooncakes, which is a small pastry traditionally filled with a lotus seed paste but now you can also get cream cheese, green tea, chocolate or even chicken floss.

In thinking about my time in China, I pulled out my blog entries about my Moon Festival…

Sunday night was the Moon Festival. This is a huge holiday here. We stopped on the way back from Wudang to buy some more Moon Cakes, which are only made this time of year. Kind of like the bunny and chick Peeps. We had a good dinner for the festival followed by fireworks. Two of Chen’s friends came over for the fireworks. One was the driver of the Citroën we had the last two days and another was the guy with the nice car who drove us to the tea farm for our hike. The Citroën driver proposed to Maria. Apparently for the second time. I got an introduction for marriage with the other guy. They told me he was a banker from a good family. Hmmm. I just don’t think I am ready to settle down and start a family in Yan Che village.

After the fireworks we had a bonfire in the courtyard. Jing sang some traditional songs for us and Lilian sang a lovely song. It was cloudy so we could not see the full moon. I was exhausted from the trip down Wudang and went to bed as soon after the bonfire and singing. It was so nice to have a comfortable bed and modern bathroom

Monday night we could see the full moon so we extended the Moon Festival one night.  Chen opened the Moutai, an herbal wine they tell me is he national drink.  After that he opened up some of the Kung Fu wine. We drink this in small glasses about the size of a shot glass.  These are both about as strong as a port wine so when you are drinking small portions it really isn’t much.  Some of our group gets hit hard by it. It doesn’t really affect me too much.

That night some of us went to the courtyard with an iPod and speakers and danced our hearts out. After several drinks later I must have been a little tipsy as I realized the next morning I sent some incomprehensible text messages. Sorry about that. The Pearl is not that easy to type on sometimes. It was a good time.

Pretty much everyone is REALLY ANGRY about the ongoing BP oil volcano deep in the Gulf of Mexico.  I'm angry too.  But when lots of people start calling for a boycott of BP, I get off the boat. Or oil rig. Or whatever.  Boycotting BP just won't work. For one t … Read More

via the adventures of ernie bufflo

  As technology advances, it can be a bit sad to say goodbye to some of the old things.  But there comes a time and place when you have to accept that your powdered wig is no longer cutting it.  Here's 11 "things" that are refusing to go quietly into the night.  Oh, and I don't have things like "world hunger" and "child slavery" on here, though certainly those things should not exist, either. 11) Beepers Yes, you can still buy these dinosaurs.  J … Read More

via Maps of the Problematic

American photographer Susan Anderson has released High Glitz, a book that examines the perverse world of child beauty pageants and accompanies her photographic series of the same name (recently on display at acte2galerie, Paris). The photographer has spent the past three years on the pageant c … Read More

via Leg of Lamb

Growing up there was always music. We always had a stack of 8-tracks, cassettes or CDs depending on the decade. There were always records – something about vinyl. My life is a soundtrack – certain songs will bring a flood of memories. On a recent trip to LA, I was on the freeway at night near downtown with the lights of the Hollywood Hills in the distance with a traffic slow down. I was scrolling through the radio stations and stopped at Everybody’s Talkin’ by Nilsson. A rush of memories of one the many nights sitting on the freeway with my mom, going to or coming from some adventure that day.

As much as I say I’m not a fan of country music, I can’t deny my roots. It’s a large part of the soundtrack of my childhood. My grandmother started the day with music in her bedroom. Car trips meant a collection of tape or radio – always country with the regular break by Paul Harvey. My grandfather preferred the old stuff – Hank Williams, Sr, Sons of the Pioneers, Gene Autry (his distant cousin). My grandmother was the real influence. Up to the last few years, she could recite the at least the first 10 of the Country Music Top 40 without even thinking.

The song I wanted to hear this morning was Daddy Sang Bass by Johnny Cash. I listened to it then got on a roll starting with Tennessee Ernie Ford’s Sixteen Tons, a song that always brings the memory of my grandfather and the many road trips we took growing up. He had a CB in the car and all the grandkids had their own handle. I was Roller Derby Queen because I lived on my skates (Roller Derby Brand) and from the roller derby episode on Happy Days thought it could be my calling.

Next up, Mamas Don’t Let Your Babies Grow Up To Be Cowboysby Willie Nelson. This song reminds me of my mom and my brother. About the time this song came out my brother was doing rodeo in Texas.  My mom and I were in California; I was young and didn’t really (and still don’t) get the rodeo thing. I was afraid Willie was right and Bubba would never be “a doctor or lawyer or such” and instead would “like smoky old pool rooms, clear mountain mornings, little warm puppies and children, girls of the night”. Well today he wears Crocs instead of a Lonestar belt buckle but it’s true that “he ain’t wrong, he’s just different”.

This morning I jumped through the years to Guitars, Cadillacs by Dwight Yoakam which reminds me many a night at The Tumbleweed in Stillwater.

When I was in middle school and early high school, my dad and brother lived in New Braunfels, Texas. The Crystal Chandelier was a huge Texas family dancehall, where people like George Strait played. I had never seen anyplace like this. There learned to love the two-step, a skill I needed in college. I didn’t feel I had  much in common musically with my college friends. Despite my time visiting in the summers, I was a California kid and into post-punk and new wave. But thanks to those days in Texas I could do a mean two-step and was never opposed to a night out at “the ‘weed” in Stillwater. It was much smaller back then but always a good time.

Even in college I never fully embraced Country music but I did like fellow Cowboy alum Garth Brooks. This was something my grandmother and I shared. She was crazy about him. A series of events and connections, allow me to take my grandmother to his first concert in Stillwater after making it big. We had stage-side seats for an incredible concert. He is an amazing performer.

To this day, I still can’t listen to The Dance without tearing up. The first time I heard it was at the funeral of a friend killed in a car accident. One of those memories you don’t always want to flood back.

I’ve listened to a lot of old country and western swing while writing this. Roy Acuff, Patsy Cline, Waylon Jennings, Lefty Frizzell but I’m finishing up with one of my all time favorite artist, Lyle Lovett. I think he is brilliant and can’t be simply classified as modern country – he’s more old school Western Swing but let’s not put him in a box. One of my favorites is That’s Right (You’re Not From Texas) cause I’m not from Texas and I’m not country but I know Texas wants me anyway.

Why I Love Decatur

In March, I started writing for Decatur News Online.  This is where my recent blog posts have gone.  The first post, My Decatur-versay, is a slight modification of my Give Me Wool, Copper or a Desk Set post.

Next is a post about getting back to boot camp, Getting Back to my Skinny Jeans. A new post will be up today. Check it out.

I will start posting links here to anything I post on DNO as I work through what topics to post to there vs my blog.