It’s Friday once more, and that means it’s time for another edition of the Friday Random Ten! (cue the audience applause). The rules are simple, set your iPod or other (less aethetically pleasing) digital music player to shuffle/random and report back the first ten songs it spits out. No skipping, omitted, excusing or hedging allowed. Your odd musical selections are what make you you.

1. Golden, My Morning Jacket (World Cafe, Volume 18)
2. Handy Man, James Taylor (Greatest Hits)
3. You’re a Big Boy Now, John Sebastian (The Best of John Sebastian)
4. Love Missile F1-11, Sigue Sigue Sputnik (Living in Oblivion)
5. Are You Tired Of Me, My Darling, Nanci Griffin (Other Voices, Other Rooms)
6. Kathy’s Song (Live), Simon & Garfunkel (The Essential Simon & Garfunkel)
7. Unomathemba, Ladysmith Black Mambazo (Shaka Zulu)
8. Almost, Sarah Harmer (Live at the World Cafe)
9. All The Way Up To Heaven, Guster (Lost and Gone Forever)
10. Boy from Tupelo, Emmylou Harris (Red Dirt Girl)

Favorite Song: Are You Tired of Me, My Darling by Nanci Griffin. I’ve loved this entire album since I first heard it. I remember excitedly asking my dad if he had ever listened to it, and he made a comment about how he couldn’t take anyone who spelled their name with an “i” at the end seriously. I sat him down and made him hear it and he quickly changed his tune.

Favorite Album: Red Dirt Girl. Emmylou Harris is just one of those artists you have to love. At least if you’re me.

Most Embarrassing Revelation: Yes, I have one of the Living in Oblivion cds on my iPod. You just never know when you’re going to need a good dose of the 80’s. In addition, this album also offers such classics as Mickey (you’re so fine) and Walking on Sunshine.

If you’re looking for more Random Friday music than I can offer, check out:
Andrea
Ashley
Ben
Brian
Coffee Girl
Dodi
Ellen
Erin
Fred
Howard
Jill
J-Me
Luna
Mac
Mark
Matthew
Rick
Sherri

If you’ve got a list up and want a little link-love, let me know.

Last night was the annual meeting of members of my apartment building. Once a year, the building maintenance staff set up chairs throughout the entire lobby, and the vast majority of the building residents gather to watch and participate in the theatrics that ensue. The population of my building is predominantly elderly, crotchety and hard of hearing. The first time a friend of mine came to visit, she commented with confusion, “why do you live in an old age home?” They also have no other commitments making demands on their evenings and so are able to pick at points of order, raise unrelated queries and generally make the meeting stretch out for an inconceivable three hours.

The meeting started at 8 pm (this is due to the fact that people won’t come until after Jeopardy and Wheel of Fortune are over), although a few folks did start to head down 30 and 45 minutes early, to ensure that they got a good seat. They come with accessories, canes and walkers, pillows (to cushion the folding chairs) and tricycle-like push contraptions.

The big controversy at last night’s meeting was over the behavior of the nominating committee (they had refused to re-nominate a current member of the board) and the nomination of that individual that everyone knew would be coming from the floor. The building office, knowing that Mr. Smith was going to be nominated from the floor, took the time to print up a second ballot that included his name in the hopes of avoiding confusion (when we first checked in, we were given a green ballot on which to vote for the board of directors). When presumed nomination occurred, the office staff proceeded to take back the green ballots and hand out a new pink one. Who knew that 45 minutes later, we’d still be talking about whether it was fair to hand out a new ballot, and whether we should vote on the pink one or the green one. 45 minutes!

It got heated, and many building residents spoke passionately into the microphone about their feelings towards the green ballot or the pink ballot. Chaos ensued when one color-blind gentleman started referring to the red ballot. People got to their feet and started to shout about pink and red and green. It was at this point that the chair of the meeting turned to the man standing at the microphone and said, “Herschel, you’re out of order, sit down.” I turned to my neighbor Sherri, who was sitting next to me, and commented, “That’s not a sentence you hear often.” Sadly, she wasn’t nearly as amused by it as I was.

I spent the meeting sitting in the back (where you always find the cool kids) with the younger crew, the growing number of upwardly mobile 20 and 30 somethings that are slowly buying apartments in the building as they work their way up the waiting list. Unfortunately, hanging out with them makes me feel a little like I’m back in high school, as they dress better than I do (all the women were wearing heels! At 9 o’clock at night on a Wednesday! Who does that?), have more grown up jobs, and many of them were friends before they moved into the building. We did all bond a little last night though, when two of the old ladies sitting near us started to question whether we belonged there. We were told by a woman wearing a stripped suit and a bad wig that we were a disgrace. She followed it up with an under-her-breath statement that sounded a whole lot like “bitches.” I’ve never been called a bitch by an 80 year old, so it was a new experience for me. A little later on she wheeled by with her walker and cane, and I was momentarily terrified she was going to kneecap me with a jewel-handled walking stick.

I staggered back up to my apartment almost three hours after I had left it, feeling exhausted and completely grateful that this only happens once a year.

Five minutes ago, my cell phone started playing the ring assigned to my parents’ landline. I pulled myself out of my work haze and answered. My mom’s voice sounded more excited and full of laughter than is normal for a random mid-day call and so I asked, “Hey mama, what’s up?”

“I just talked to your sister. She is auditioning for a reality tv show called ‘The Music Project‘ that’s going to be on ABC. She was playing a gig at an Italian restaurant in Woodland Hills (suburb of LA) last night, when a talent scout came up to her and asked her if she’d be interested in auditioning. When she told him that she was only going to be in town until Tuesday, he told her not to worry, he’d absolutely get her an audition before then.”

From what I can gather, this show will be a combination of American Idol and Big Brother, all the musicians will live in a house together and then get voted off, depending on their singing ability. The winner will get a Sony recording contract. Right now, it’s nothing more than an audition, but what a cool opportunity. And if nothing else comes out of it, she’ll now be able to start a story with the line, “I was once discovered by a talent scout in an Italian restaurant in Woodland Hills. My music made him choke on his papardelle.”

(If you believe in the power of petitioning the universe for things, now would be a good time to send some of those vibes and good thoughts down to Raina in Southern CA, in the hopes that she knocks their socks off).

For the next couple of weeks, Ingrid’s harp is residing in my living room. I keep catching glimpses of it out of the corner of my eye and thinking that it is a person, quietly standing there. It has no malicious intent.

Sunday night I vacuumed my apartment for the first time in many weeks (when you live on the 20th floor most of the dirt from the outside gets knocked off your shoes by the time you get home) and was surprised at how peaceful the place looks when the plush of the carpet is all going the same direction. It’s almost zen-like. I must vacuum more often.

I spent over an hour last night taking pictures of forks in the light of the fluorescent bulb over my sink. They were neatly stacked, artlessly scattered, clustered and laid out in rows. I have far too many forks.

The thyme and oregano growing on my windowsill are leaping, abundant, green and tangled, but the rosemary fell over dead.

Standing in line at the Strand on Saturday afternoon, I glanced down at a book someone had left on the counter, obviously having decided at the last minute that they weren’t interested in it. It was titled, The Way to Write and Publish a Cookbook. It was priced at $1. I am always talking about how I want to write a book about potlucks and I knew instantly that the book was for sitting there for me. I bought it.

There is a line from one of my recent reads, “Eat, Pray, Love” by Elizabeth Gilbert, that I am singularly unable to get out of my head (I’ve written it down on a notecard that sits on my desk to the left of my computer). At the bottom of page 75, she writes, “One must always be prepared for riotous and endless waves of transformation.” Every time my eyes glance down at it, my heart rises up, competent and composed, to say, “I’m ready.”

I’ve had this trip to New York planned for several months, and it was just dumb luck that put me there the same weekend as the peace march, but as always, I’m grateful every time for the opportunities that dumb luck sends my way. I haven’t participated in something of this magnitude in several years, and I’m so glad I went and had this experience. There were tens of thousands of people there, but the resounding attitude of the marchers was peaceful, patient and even joyful. The police officers who lined the march route were helpful, encouraging and supportive. I took almost 300 pictures and have managed to “whittle” it down to a set of 204. Still too many, but oh well.

A note about the woman below. I almost missed this shot. I was standing on the sidewalk, just a little ways up from her, my attention focused on the marchers passing me. I heard several people yelling supportively, “Rock on, old lady” and turned to find the subject of their cries. I saw her, in her vintage designer sunglasses, and Chanel-type jacket, holding her fingers up in the peace sign and, on automatic pilot, took a picture. After I took my camera away from my face, she lowered her arm for a minute, gave it a shake and a moment’s rest, and then raised it up again. She made eye contact with me, nodded and then looked back out into the crowd.