A wet and soggy one here along the Hudson River.  Our little village cancelled the local fireworks due to construction work being done on the street/bridge which crosses over the Hudson River Metro North line.  I contented myself with watching the FABULOUS Boston Pops Fireworks Extravaganza – a really incredible display.

Sad news earlier today when I learned that my next door neighbor (a very elderly man) was found dead on Tuesday evening by his nephew; no news as to when he died and there may not be, will be finding out about funeral etc tomorrow.  The deceased’s brother-in-law lives across the street from me and is also rather elderly – his wife is dead and his son (the nephew) is a priest.  The deceased was living in the house he was born in – I don’t think he ever married.  The house is literally falling down – the back half IS falling down.  The back yard has been in ruin since I moved here. 

That is the view as I stand on my bench under the pergola and look over the fence at the back corner – there is a huge metal shed that runs almost the entire length of my backyard except for this 6 foot space at the back (which I had plugged up with a fence last summer).  I was just eyeing this backyard the other day – dreaming about taking the fence down again and clearing it all up and continuing the garden into this space – I was thinking of approaching Mr. TC about this – and now.  Well.  It will be interesting to see what happens – the neighbors on his other side (who are friends) say that he has several siblings and that the house was his mother’s but we don’t know who owns it now.  

The thing is that in this small village a situation like this is ripe for a feeding frenzy only tempered by the vagaries of the property tax (which apparently is set by no real formula due to the stupid way the NYS law was written).  The house really will probably be condemned and then the new owner(s) would have to build anew and the taxes will be sky high because that kind of situation is the one of the few ways the village can make any decent money.

i am glad I rent. At least for now – I have to say that I had entertained notions of maybe renting the house if the time came when he would have gone into a nursing facility and then fixing it up and maybe buying it down the road.  Its one of the smaller lots and footprints on the street.

So now I must worry about that shed being pulled down and what that will mean to my garden… although I imagine that may be a little ways down the road – all depending of course that he left a will.  And I pray that whomever takes over will put up a fence .

The other news is that my elder cat, Cordelia, has decided to become an outside cat.  She had been getting increasingly interested in the outdoors this spring (I spent most of May out in the garden when I was at home) and being a very vocal missy was driving me up the wall. 

So first I let her out for a few hours – watching her.  And then I decided to just see what happened – she spent the first night out and then came back the next afternoon for food and TLC and then was demanding to be let out again.  This all started last Monday.  

Most of the week she would be out all night and in the morning I would find her either on the front porch or at the back door. 

Monday she came in and slept the entire day only going back out that night – and she hasn’t been back since. 

I am a wee bit concerned especially since it poured all afternoon and evening.  I do miss her curled up at the side of the bed at night.  Her offspring, Katie, has always been a rather aloof cat and keeps to herself; never one to be held or petted which I attribute to the fact that from birth she was in a cage in the waiting area of the vets office and CONSTANTLY picked up with no moment’s piece.

Although I have noticed, in the last week, that she has taken to being either in the same room or near enough that she can keep tabs on me.

Isn’t there a saying that we don’t own our pets, that they own us?

On the other death this week, Charlie Rose was doing a tribute to Beverly Sill tonight – I taped it and will watch later.  Here is a specially NY tribute to her from today’s NYT.

The Paley Center for Media screens…

American Musical Theatre: Beverly Sills and Douglas Moore

As a tribute to the beloved soprano, who died on July 2, 2007, The Paley Center for Media (formerly The Museum of Television & Radio) will be screening a long-lost 1962 WCBS television program featuring composer Douglas Moore (1893-1969), who talks about his opera The Ballad of Baby Doe, and Ms. Sills, who played Baby Doe Tabor in the legendary 1958 New York City Opera production of this work. Highlights include Sills’s rendition of the “Willow Song” from The Ballad of Baby Doe and “When All is Still and Fair” from another Moore opera, Wings of the Dove. The host of the program is Earl Wrightson. (1962; 45 minutes)

The schedule is: Thursday, July 5, at 6 p.m. and thereafter daily (Friday, Saturday, Sunday, Tuesday, etc) at 3:00 p.m.. through Sunday, July 15.

(When the Museum first screened this program in 2001, Ralph Blumenthal covered the event in a wonderful New York Times article entitled “You’ve Come a Long Way, Baby Doe” (March 24, 2001) and earlier he had written about the discovery of the long-lost American Musical Theatre programs in “Legacy of a Stage-Struck Teacher” (October 22, 1998).

From July 17 through July 29 The Paley Center for Media will screen Sills and Burnett at the Met.

The Paley Center will be screening this much-heralded musical special, taped at New York’s Metropolitan Opera House and featuring Sills and comedian Carol Burnett. The program opens with a dialogue between Burnett and Sills, who then sing “Only an Octave Apart.” Highlights include Burnett and Sills in an audition sketch, Sills performing Donizetti’s “O Luce Di Quest’ Anima,” and the two women singing a medley of torch songs paired with arias that also express the blues. Directed by Dave Powers. (1976, 60 minutes)

The Paley Center is located at 25 West 52nd Street and admission is by suggested contribution.

Carol Burnett remembers on All Things Considered

An interview from the Playbill (2006) on the Met’s site

Met Press Release

Washington Post Obit (Ron Blum)

Washington Post – A Voice That Carried Weight (Tim Page)

Boston Globe

Sills – Super Diva, Goofball, Stock Picker: Manuela Hoelterhoff

Vox Tribute   Wednesday Special–WFMT/American Opera Premiere–This week, the Bucksbaum Family Lyric Opera broadcast is Gluck’s Iphegenie en Tauride featuring the wonderful Susan Graham and is conducted by Louis Langree. That is followed by another great performance from the archives of the New Orleans Opera—the 1964 Beverly Sills Tales of Hoffmann, and also from VAI the Carlyle Floyd Revolutionary War tale The Sojourner and Mollie Sinclair.