gold

You might think Johnny and I are boring Americans because we don't have big July 4th plans today. Our schedule includes:

-Computer time. J. is actually being productive, organizing bills and such. I'm less industrious at the moment, blogging and listening to songs via iTunes.
-Reading. Perhaps I should flip through Stephen Colbert's book - I Am America (and So Can You!) in addition to my other reading material.
-Eating Applegate Farms hot dogs with Whole Foods 365 organic yellow mustard for lunch.
-A neighborhood walk as soon as this spontaneous thunderstorm blows over.
-Praying: God's mercy over the U.S.A., and for the current & future leaders.
-Thanking God for our country, our freedom.
-A nap for Jenni.
-Cooking beef fajitas, whipping up a batch of guacamole, and watching The Science of Sleep this evening.
-Try to ignore the Armageddon of fireworks that will ricochet around our neighborhood way too late into the night. I love fireworks as much as the next patriot, but the kids in our neighborhood are overzealous about the whole thing. We live in an unincorporated zone between the lines of Houston and Katy, TX, so the little tykes take full advantage. They've already tested their bottle rocket skills a few nights this week, and I assure you, it'll sound like a literal war zone until about 1:00 am tonight.

Speaking of that music tickling my ears.... I'm sure you've already heard by now, but NoiseTrade is very worthy of it's hype. You can download an album for free by telling 3 friends, or pay what you want (90% goes directly to the artist). I am loving CDs by Katie Herzig (Apple Tree) and Matthew Perryman Jones (Throwing Punches in the Dark). The Khrusty Brothers are next on my NoiseTrade wish list.

If you're like me, you want a visual of the brilliance that is NoiseTrade. I'd prefer the following widget to be centered, but that's not really the point:

So there you go. Click the widget to sample Katie Herzig's lovely songs, OK?

....Last night, we watched a show about Dolly Parton on the Biography channel. Johnny and I find her to be so charming, and we love her voice. Therefore, another song on repeat today is a gorgeous Emmylou Harris/Dolly Parton duet - "Gold" (from Emmylou's latest album, All I Intended to Be). I've always said if I could sing like any one person, it would be Emmylou Harris. Her voice + Dolly's is almost too pretty for my ears to handle.

With gold humming on my lips, I keep thinking of photos I saw on facebook this morning, of Makoto Fujimura's Charis exhibit. What I would give to see it in person! Or have his work travel to an art museum in Austin, Dallas, or Houston. Or win the lottery so his artwork could hang on a wall in my house. The facebook photos were of massive golden pieces of breathtaking art. Both the wooden floor and human faces reflected gold light. "Charis" is Greek for "grace," and even just sitting on my couch, golden grace seemed to pour from that New York gallery, through my MacBook screen, right onto my lap, spilling over.

[Charis (diptych) by Makoto Fujimura, 2008. Photo courtesy of artnet.]