Happy Philippines Independence Day!

If you go to http://www.google.com.ph/, you will see an animated GIF file honouring Philippines Independence Day. Because of the time difference, it is already the morning of June 12, 2013 over there as I write this. (Manila is 12 hours ahead of the East Coast of the United States.)

Hopefully if you click on the link above, you'll see the animated GIF. Failing that, I hope it will turn up below.

Using the Fitbit Ultra to Get Into Shape

One of the best purchases I've made in recent days is that of the Fitbit Ultra, pictured above. I got it during the "Black Friday" sales at Amazon.com last November. It seemed like a good idea at the time. Admittedly, I did little more than to just wear it daily to get a baseline of my normal activities and to track my sleep. It pretty much told me I was quite sedentary, and my sleep was continually interrupted, plus I did not get enough sleep every night.

My recent appearance on SQPN's Catholic Weekend convinced me I had to do something more than just sit around all day, eating bonbons. I made a post on Webshoo about my recent physical activity, using tools like the Fitbit and apps like RunKeeper Pro to keep me accountable and to motivate me to exercise more.

Click here to read the story. And feel free to comment here or over on Webshoo.

Lyn's Mini-Bucket List

Before I delve into practice-land, I decided to take a page from Maria Johnson's playbook and come up with a little mini-bucket list of my own. This, of course, is subject to change.

• Meet some SQPN community members in person, especially Fr. Roderick Vonhögen, Inge Loots, and Mike and Denyse Kuypers. I know there are others I haven't named; I'd love to meet them in person as well! (I've already met Deb Schaben, Jeff Nielsen, and Jenny Townsend. :) )
• I would love to return to Rome someday. I spent one wonderful week there with Sherrye Glaser and Martin Kaczocha following a conference we had attended in Naples in June 2004.
• I would love to visit some of the most beautiful (and historic!) organs in Europe. Too many for me to mention here.
• Making a return visit (or several!) to the Philippines would be lovely, too. I still have many relatives who live there, not to mention other friends and schoolmates who had returned to the Philippines after having studied here in the US or other countries.
• I know this is entirely up to me, but there are some pieces I would love to be able to play on the organ fluently. Most of them are pieces by Bach and Buxtehude...
• I would also like to regain speaking fluency in Tagalog. I can still understand it. This is another thing that is entirely up to me.
• Of course, the companion item on the bucket list is: learn other languages. I envy those who can switch from one language to another quite effortlessly. That includes my friends here who are conversant in Cebuano (or their other native dialect), Tagalog (most of my friends learned that after they left the Philippines!), Spanish, and English...
• Go back to Hawaii and explore the other islands I haven't yet seen. I spent a week on Oahu as the guest of a friend at whose wedding I played the piano. I also spent a week on Maui with family last September. I really really love it there; it feels like home to me. :)
• Travel to Australia and New Zealand. I often wonder how Ross Landles is doing. He was an exchange student to San Diego who my family hosted during my senior year in high school. He's a year older than me and is from Launceston, Tasmania. I hope he's well. I also have friends in Australia and New Zealand I'd love to visit with.
• I'll echo Maria's tenth item on her bucket list: go on the Camino pilgrimage. It would be nice to do it with friends; I'm not sure I'd be up to doing it on my own.

Well, enough dreaming for now. I have work to do to prepare during this Holy Week. Many blessings to you and yours! x

Conclave Excitement and SQPN's Lenten Giving Campaign

(Photo courtesy of Fr. Roderick Vonhögen. If you click on it, it will take you to Catholic Insider Episode CIV009: Extra Omnes.)

If you've been following the events going on in the Vatican, you'll know that the Conclave had started earlier today. My friend, Fr. Roderick Vonhögen, has been there since Sunday evening, doing what he does best: bringing us the information, the news, the environment, the ambience through audio podcasts and short videos that he shot and edited himself. Of course, he's also fulfilling his duties for Dutch TV whilst there.

For Fr. Roderick, his being in Rome right now brings him full circle: his podcast career was launched in 2005, thanks to the growing popularity of the audio recordings he released in the wake of Bl. John Paul II's death and the 2005 Conclave that elected Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger as Pope Benedict XVI. Then as now, you can hear the enthusiasm in Fr. Roderick's voice and the excitement he and those around him are feeling as we all wait together for the conclave's chimney to spew the white smoke that would lead to the Habemus Papam announcement that a new pope had been selected.

Within the past couple of days, Fr. Roderick has released five episodes of the Catholic Insider, one audio teaser on SoundCloud, and at least 5 pairs of videos (one each in English and in Dutch) on his YouTube channel. He has also posted videos and photos on both his own Facebook page, as well as the Facebook page for SQPN. So you can see he's been very busy.

What makes it possible for him to bring us this content (and facilitating sharing on the social networks via his producer, Inge Loots) is the support from listeners and viewers just like you and me. Fr. Roderick and Inge are part of a Catholic New Media organisation called the Star Quest Production Network (SQPN). SQPN is currently in the midst of its Lenten Giving Campaign, and the goal is to raise at least $50,000 by the end of Lent. The end of Lent is just around the corner. If you are enjoying the audio and video content that Fr. Roderick has been releasing on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, etc., then please consider becoming a friend of SQPN. Any amount, big or small, will help bring SQPN closer to its goal. It will also help Fr. Roderick bring more content like that he's already delivered to you.

I'll end this post with Fr. Roderick's words in which he ended Episode CIV010 of the Catholic Insider earlier today, as well as a YouTube video of his Lenten Giving Campaign appeal that he recorded last month during his earlier visit to Rome.

Father Roderick said, "Support us, support SQPN, support our network during our Lenten Giving Campaign. We can only continue to do this kind of stuff if you help us, if you can provide us with the financial foundation for our work. We do this with you, we do it for you. If you enjoy it, we hope that you want to support us as well. Thank you so much!"



Again, please do consider giving. Click here to donate. Thank you!

(For the record, I am one of the podcasters on SQPN's roster, having co-hosted the Secrets of Harry Potter podcast. I still keep up with SHP's blog whenever interesting Potter-related news pops up from time to time.)

What's Up with Lyn?

Oh, hello there! Remember me? I will admit that I really haven't done much blogging lately. (What I really have to do is consider updating the look of my blog. Kind of tired looking, isn't it?)

Right... what I've been up to lately. If you've been following Fr. Roderick Vonhögen's show, The Break, you'll know that he's been working on writing a book that he hopes will be released in the Fall of 2013. His deadline for submission was March 1. I had volunteered to beta-read his manuscript and mentioned that in addition to my adminning for The Petulant Poetess, I also had extensive writing experience from my days as a neurochemistry researcher, having written a Ph.D. thesis, several first-author papers, and a couple of book chapters. Oh, believe me, research is not the only thing you do in that field. If you can't write well, forget about being able to compete successfully for grant funding!

But I digress. Back to Fr. Roderick's book. Thanks to the unexpected announcement of the now-Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI's intention to abdicate his position at the end of February, his writing schedule was thrown off as well as our revision schedule. I was hoping to have had a chance to both alpha- and beta-read his manuscript. Fr. Roderick had allocated two weeks for that to happen. However, thanks to the demands of his "other" job with Dutch TV and radio, he wasn't able to get a manuscript to me until almost the last minute. We essentially had two-and-a-half days for me to proofread the whole thing and for him to go through whatever corrections or comments I might have and revise accordingly. To be honest, for what would be a ca. 160-page book, that really wasn't enough time to do what I would consider to be a thorough job. So I essentially had to "move heaven and earth" to get the whole thing proofread. I would have wanted to do much more than check for SPaG (his writing tended more towards UK grammar usage, and his publisher is American, so I had to essentially "American-pick" his work in addition to taming his commas and his sentence fragments), but oh well. By the way, English is something like his third or fourth language (Dutch is his mother tongue) but for someone for whom English is not his native language, his writing is amazingly good and, frankly speaking, much better than a lot of Americans whose native language is English.

Complicating the entire thing was the fact he had to go to Rome for three days to cover Benedict XVI's last hours as pope for Dutch TV. So I took it upon myself to get the whole thing read and commented before he returned to the Netherlands. I figured if I were able to do that, it would give him a chance to incorporate any comments or changes in his manuscript before he submits.

Complication #2: the time difference. There is a 6-hour time difference between me in the East Coast of the United States and Fr. Roderick in the Netherlands. As far as his deadline is concerned, that works to his advantage, but for me... not so much! So I worked through the night to ensure that he would have something to look at if he had any down time in Rome (to be honest, it didn't sound like it). There was even one very early morning (for me) when I received an IM from him, expressing surprise that I was still awake. I think it may have been around 4.30 am my time (10.30 am his).

Sleep was lacking, but I managed to finish proofreading his manuscript before he landed in Amsterdam. This enabled him to get his edits done much sooner than he expected, and I received a message from him around 1.45 pm my time on March 1 informing me he had sent the manuscript to his publisher. The smile on my face when I received that email was so huge, and nothing would be able to wipe it away for the rest of the day... except for a little bug I somehow picked up, which eventually landed me in an outpatient clinic last Sunday. But I digress.

What is his book about, you ask me? In Fr. Roderick's words, "It's a book about all my adventures in new media. It talks about geeks, Hobbits, and Jedi." This is not surprising if you know Fr. Roderick well and if you're a long-time listener to his podcasts.

You want to know a working title, don't you? Uh, sorry, but I value my life too much to divulge that information to you. But if you want to follow Fr. Roderick's journey towards being a published author, feel free to subscribe to his "Secret Diary." To do that, you'd have to go to his blog on FatherRoderick.com and sign up to get his updates.

If you're curious about his writing style, I'd say as I read through the manuscript, I can see it evolving. One thing I can tell you is that you can really hear his voice as you read his writing. His writing is very engaging, and his personality shows through very clearly, as does his keen sense of humour. I had completely lost track of time as I was reading, which tells me that his book, when completed, has the potential to be one of those page-turners that you won't be able to put down until you've read the very last word... and then you're going to want to pick it up and read it from the very beginning once again!

Life goes on. I'm hoping to have some quality time with the organ this week, especially since I'm trying to get back a pair of Bach pieces back in the fingers as well as learn a new Buxtehude piece that I hope to play for Lent V. This, of course, doesn't include all the practicing I'd need to do for Holy Week and Easter.

So now, I'd say you're all caught up with me. I do spend quite a bit of time on Facebook and Twitter, so you might be able to catch up with me there.

Pax et bonum!

Organ-ic Chemist on Catholic Weekend 157!

Well, well, well. Guess who was on Catholic Weekend this morning? Yes, yours truly! I was brought on to talk about Filipinos' devotion to the Sto. Niño de Cebu (also known as Infant Jesus of Prague). Yes, it's a week late, but better late than never, right?

I was on the show with Jeff Nielsen, who hosted it, Billy Newton, Angela Sealana, and Sarah Vabulas. The audio should be posted and uploaded soon (usually sometime on Sunday). In the meantime, you can have a look at the Google+ Hangout below.

Enjoy!

Saying goodbye all too soon

Yesterday, my friend Cindy told me about the untimely passing of a mutual friend of ours, David Hockenberger. He died suddenly last Friday, doing what he loved (bicycling). He was only 55 years old.

David, Cindy, and I were part of the Music Ministry at St. Stephen's Episcopal Church in Durham. David and I were in the bell choir, and I had also sung in the choir when Richard Townley was the organist/choir director.

I had moved on to another music program in the area, and David eventually moved away from the Triangle area. I didn't see him again until last February at Holy Comforter in Burlington. My friend, Colin, was ordained a Transitional Deacon, and David was singing in the choir. He had recognised me and approached me after the service. We chatted for a little bit. It was great catching up with him.

Last Saturday, my friend Laurie, who is the organist/choirmaster at Holy Comforter, posted a note asking our prayers for one of her choir members, David H. It didn't register to me that I knew who that was until I talked to Cindy yesterday evening. And then it hit me—this was someone I knew, someone whose company I had enjoyed, someone who was a devoted father to his two children and husband to his wife of 30+ years, and this someone is no longer with us. His funeral was earlier this afternoon, and according to friends who went, it was a good celebration of his life.

Please pray for the family David leaves behind: his wife, Beverly, and his children, Evan and Kaitlyn. Requiem aeternam dona ei, Domine, et lux perpetua luceat ei. Requiescat in pace. Amen.

Here is a link to David's obituary. In lieu of flowers, memorials may be made in David's name to Hospice and Palliative Care Center of Alamance-Caswell, 914 Chapel Hill Road, Burlington, NC 27215.

More Maui Vacation

Taken on our way to Hana. From left to right: Hermie, Richie, Josie, Ella, me, and Jacob.

Aloha Mabuhay from Kihei, Maui, in the beautiful state of Hawaii! We've been enjoying ourselves, having visited the Maui Tropical Plantation, the Iao Valley State Park (and seeing the very prominent Iao Needle), and shopping (and shave ice!) at the Kihei Kalama Village on Monday, and taking the road to Hana and then taking the (very winding and in some places unpaved) road that goes around the periphery of the eastern and southern parts of the island on Tuesday. I think we'll be visiting a beach or two today and then watching the sunrise from the Haleakala Crater on Thursday. We'll also be enjoying a luau during our trip here.

If you're Facebook friends with my sister-in-law, Grace, and my mother, Josie, you can see some of our pictures. I'll post mine eventually to my Facebook page (and place a link here) but that may not happen until I return to the mainland.

I really like Maui. Such a pretty place, and in our drive yesterday, we were able to see the vast contrasts in the terrain (and the weather patterns!) here.

More later! Mahalo!

FranFam in Maui!

Greetings, friends! It has been a very long time since I last made a post on this blog. As you can see by the picture, I'm not in North Carolina at the moment. I'm in Kihei, a city on the southwest shore of Maui. I'm here with my parents and my brother, sister-in-law, and their three children. We started our trip early this morning, and we shared the plane with the men's and women's soccer team from Notre Dame de Namur University in the San Francisco area. A very nice soccer player named Kim W. was my seatmate for the flight. They're scheduled to play 3 matches whilst in Hawaii, and I wish them all the luck.

We landed in Honolulu around the noon hour and went straight to our connecting flight to Maui. We were a tired bunch, but after a good rest, we'll be ready to start our Maui adventure. Stay tuned! I may or may not record brief soundseeing tours on AudioBoo... if I do, I'll post the links here (they will automagically cross-post to my Twitter and Facebook pages. (I might even post it on my very neglected Google+ page.)

Aloha!!!

Past AGO Conventions, Revisited

As I mentioned in my previous post, I'll use this post to collect links to the posts I made during the 2010 AGO National Convention in Washington, DC, as well as the Audioboos I recorded during the 2011 AGO Region IV Convention in Greensboro, NC.



2010 AGO National Convention in Washington, DC

• Travelling to Washington, DC
• AGO Convention, Day Two
• AGO Convention, Day Three—I Has a Squeeeeee!!!
• AGO Convention, Day Four—Heat Exhaustion
• AGO Convention—The Grand Conclusion

2011 AGO Region IV Convention in Greensboro, NC

listen to ‘Day 1—2011 AGO Region IV Convention’ on Audioboo

listen to ‘AGO Region IV Convention, Day 2’ on Audioboo

listen to ‘Region IV AGO Convention—Day 3’ on Audioboo

listen to ‘Last day of 2011 AGO Region IV Convention’ on Audioboo

Catching Up Yet Again with the Organ-ic Chemist

I'm back after a long time of not blogging. I could tell that I haven't been blogging much when my blogging partner, Tyler, notices that I haven't been blogging much lately! Well, my globetrotting friend, here is an entry. Just for you.

I've been trying to find more time for myself. Of late, I've been bouncing from one thing to the other, keeping so busy that by the time I get home, all I want to do is flop into the bed and close my eyes. I'm trying to organise my time more wisely. Using tools like Workflowy helps immensely. There's nothing more satisfying than clicking on a task and marking it complete.

The picture above depicts one of the activities I'm trying to do more of: yarn work. I've been knitting and crocheting more. Two pieces I completed recently were prayer shawls for friends who were recently ordained a deacon and a priest, and now I'm working on a couple of other super-secret pieces that I can't say yet what they are until the recipient receives them. The piece pictured above will be a multi-coloured afghan using the diamond shell stitch. I'll admit that it took me several tries before I worked out what I was doing wrong. It looks like it will work up pretty quickly.

I'll be heading off to Nashville, TN to the 2012 American Guild of Organists Convention this coming Sunday. I'm looking forward to it. As my friend Kathy says, we'll be there with 4,000 organists. There will be lots of organ recitals, plenty of workshops, lots of trade shows, and networking to look forward to. I'll do my level best to keep up with posts here. In the meantime, you can have a look at my posts about the 2010 National Conference in Washington, DC on this site, as well as listen to my AudioBoos about the 2011 Region IV Conference in Greensboro, NC. I'll collect those links in a subsequent post.

In the meantime, I've been asked to join the Webshoo network, which is comprised of a group of people who blog about anything and everything under the sun. In addition to my posts here, I also contribute to the Secrets of Harry Potter podcast and website, and I still have a presence on LiveJournal, which is targetted towards my activities in the Harry Potter fandom. Of course, I can also be found on Facebook, Twitter, and Google+.

See you around the interwebs!

James Garfield Richardson (1964–2012)

Last Thursday, we gathered in the garden behind the Parish House at St. Joseph's Episcopal Church for a Memorial Service for James. The decision was made to have it in the garden because James loved being outdoors, and he was particularly fond of the church's community garden. It was a hot late afternoon, but the skies were clear.

After the service was over, a dogwood tree was planted in James' memory. It's a fitting tribute to a man who was always greeting people with a smile and telling them to "stay blessed."

Almighty God, we remember before you today your faithful servant James; and we pray that, having opened to him the gates of larger life, you will receive him more and more into your joyful service, that, with all who have faithfully served you in the past, he may share in the eternal victory of Jesus Christ our Lord; who lives and reigns with you, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.

---

James Garfield Richardson, son of J.W. and Clara Hall Richardson, was born on January 31, 1964 in Johnston County, North Carolina, and on April 25, 2012, he departed this life at Duke Medical Center.

Garfield, as he was called by his family and friends, was educated in the Public Schools of Wake County. He was a hard worker and a kind-hearted man who loved his family and his friends.

He leaves to cherish his memories his loving and devoted mother, Clara, and father, J.W. Richardson of Raleigh; sisters Sherri Richardson and Teresa Richardson of Raleigh; brother Gregory Richardson (Betty) of Raleigh; two nieces, eight nephews, aunts, uncles, cousins, and other relatives and friends.

(And also a community of friends and neighbours in the Old West Durham neighbourhood. James, you touched more people than you'll ever know. Stay blessed, my friend.)

Questioning Why and Finding Comfort

I found out the news that a person whose athletic (and academic) successes I had heard of since high school, and who grew up to be a legend in the National Football League had passed away today. Junior Seau was a standout student-athlete at Oceanside High School, and he had graduated the same year as I did.

When I had heard the news, I was immediately taken back to 1986. Both the newspaper and yearbook staffs from my high school were in Anaheim, CA for competitions that included high school newspaper and yearbook staffs from all over California. I was serving as the sport editor for the paper and competing in the sport-writing competition. The person we interviewed: Junior Seau, then a standout athlete who lettered in four sports and was also an honor student at Oceanside High. I didn't remember much about the interview... just that we had a limited amount of time to ask him questions, and then we had a limited amount of time to write a 750-word story.

There isn't much I remembered about that day, except that I was struck by how well articulate and poised this guy from Oceanside was and that he seemed to be destined for greatness. He would eventually go on to USC and then play professional football with the San Diego Chargers, the Miami Dolphins, and the New England Patriots.

The news of Junior's death had spread through Facebook and Twitter. I had friends who not only knew Junior, but was also friends with him. One of my friends was in anguish. He kept on asking "why?" Why did he have to do this; why couldn't he have talked to someone; why couldn't he have turned to family and friends to ease his burden and his pain? "It's frustrating when people who need help, who really need help, don't turn to their family and friends. This is happening too often! For the record, I have a shoulder for you to lean on, I'll listen as long as you care to share your thoughts! Reach out for help!!!"

We don't know what was in his heart and in his mind. It seems rather uncharitable towards him and towards his family (his poor anguished mother and his three teen-aged children, amongst others) to speculate what that may have been or to even link previous accidents and incidents to the final, fatal action he did earlier this morning. All we could do is offer prayers to the family and friends Junior left behind and to offer comfort to those who knew and loved him.

Speaking of offering comfort... in late March, a fellow NC Filipino Choir member had lost a relatively young relative (36-years old) to a brain aneurysm. He left behind a wife and a young (7-year-old) daughter. I was asked at the last minute to play the organ for his funeral. Following the funeral was a Rosary said as part of a nine-day Novena following this person's passing. Somehow, in the repetition of the prayers and the Tagalog songs to Mary sung in between each decade, I found comfort. I didn't know Roderick well... I saw him at various Fil-Am gatherings, especially those in which the choir had also sung... but despite that, I still found comfort in the Rosary, in the songs, and being with others lifting their voices and their hearts in prayer together. I kept thinking that despite the sad occasion for everyone gathering, it is comforting to know that they were there and praying, specifically, those prayers, and then those litanies, all for the repose of the soul of Roderick. Perhaps it's morbid of me to think this, but I think it would give me comfort to think that someday, when it is time for me to be called from this earthly life, that someone would want to do the same for me and find comfort from it. I know when we said those prayers for my Tito El, we had been comforted by them. I remembered people coming to the apartment in Makati every day for nine days after he had passed away, and we had prayed, talked, eaten, reminisced.

I end this rather rambling post with a YouTube video by USC Athletics that was made in memory of Junior Seau. Neighbours had known him to sit in his balcony facing the Pacific Ocean and play his ukelele and sing songs. For Junior and for Roderick: Requiem aeternam dona eis, Domine, et lux perpetua luceat eis. Requiescant in pace. Amen.

Reflections on a Friday afternoon

On this day 15 years ago, I received the news that my Lola Ina (Ceferina Sablan Yalong) had passed away. I remember thinking it was rather unexpected. She always seemed so healthy and so active. I remember my parents were visiting the Philippines... my mum really missed celebrating Holy Week and Easter in the Philippines (and in Baliuag, Bulacan in particular). I remembered that upon her return, she expressed a lot of concern for my grandmum (her mother). She said Lola had caught "a cold" and was slow in recovering from it. My parents were to have left Manila the day after Easter, I think... and my mum said she wanted to stay. My Lola told her to go back to the US where she had her work and her family to take care of and that she would be fine.

Little did they know that about a week or so later, my parents would be flying back to Manila to be with my Lola in her final hours.

Even though I was born and grew up an ocean and a continent away, Lola Ina was special in my heart. She always encouraged me to do my best in everything I did. She didn't speak much English—she maybe knew a few words here and there—but at least I understand Tagalog, so she was able to speak to me, even though I might not have been able to communicate back to her.

When I was still in graduate school, I was home in San Diego visiting for the holidays. We rang up relatives in Makati (where a good number of the Yalongs were living at the time) to wish them a Happy New Year. (The Philippines was 16 hours head of San Diego.) My Lola told my mother she wanted to speak specifically to me. Mum said that I might not be able to respond much back since my "box of Tagalog was very small," but Lola said she still wanted to speak to me.

So I took the phone, wished her in Tagalog Happy New Year and that I loved her. She responded back in kind, and then she proceeded to give me a rather long lecture. She emphasized to me that I must finish my education first before I even think about settling down with a boy and having a family. I didn't want to end up like some cousins and other relatives who "made the mistake" of having a family first before finishing up the education. (I rather suspect things were a bit different in the Philippines back in the mid-1990s; nowadays, you see many women go back to school for a degree. Many of my students when I taught Chemistry at Campbell University did that. Even my own mother did that. Even though she had a B.Ed. from Far Eastern University, she went back to school when I was about 9 or 10 and completed a nursing degree. But I digress.)

What could I say? I kept on saying, "Opo. Opo. Opo." (That means "yes" in Tagalog.) Even my mom was looking rather frantic, urging me to say something. But how could I interrupt when Lola was in the middle of a lecture?

A few years later, as I was writing my Ph.D. dissertation, I remembered what she told me. I had already moved to Durham, NC, having left Clark University as an A.B.D. student ("all but dissertation"), due to graduate in the spring. I ended up dedicating my thesis to Lola Ina, and I had my mom and Tita Edith help me write the dedication in Tagalog to her.

I kept my promise to Lola Ina. I finished my education and then settled down. (Still single, though.)

In other news... one of the guys from the hill, who lived in a tent in the woods, and who St. Joseph's Episcopal Church had befriended, died the other day. J. had cancer in the leg, and he couldn't live out in the woods anymore, so St. Joe's took him in and tried to make arrangements to make his final days as comfortable as possible. I remember that an ambulance had taken him to Duke Hospital shortly before my choir rehearsal last week, and the next day, parishioners received a message that J.'s condition was serious and to pray for him. He passed away last Tuesday. I remembered that he'd always be around, smiling at you and telling you to "stay blessed" as his way of saying goodbye. Well, J., you have touched the lives of many here. Stay blessed and pray for those of us left behind. Requiem aeternam dona ei, Domine, et lux perpetua luceat ei. Requiescat in pace. Amen.

John Scott, organ

By request, I am actually hopping onto the blog and doing a blog post. Surprised?

Once you've inhaled your smelling salts, have a look at this wonderful program John Scott played at St. Michael's Episcopal Church last night. It's one of the recitals celebrating their new Nichols & Simpson organ that was formally dedicated with a Choral Evensong and Organ Dedication last January 29.

I had posted pictures of the organ on my Facebook page, which you may see by clicking here.

Here is his program.

John Scott, organ
Friday, April 20, 2012

Veni Creator Spiritus
Eugenio Maria Fagiani (b. 1972)

Est-ce Mars?
Jan Pieter Sweelinck (1562–1621)

Concerto in F, Op. 4, No. 5
Larghetto
Allegro
Alla Siciliana
Presto
George Frideric Handel (1685–1759)

Prelude and Fugue in E-flat, BWV 552
Johann Sebastian Bach (1685–1750)

March on a theme of Handel
Alexandre Guilmant (1837–1911)

Cantabile
César Franck (1822–1890)

Prélude et Fugue sur le nom d'Alain
Maurice Duruflé (1902–1986)

Miroir
Ad Wammes (b. 1953)

Chorale
Recessional
William Mathias (1934–1992)

Encore:
Tuba Tune
Norman Cocker (1889–1953)

Lyn's Once in a Blue Moon Post

So much for making 2012 my Year for Blogging. This is, what, my second post for 2012? Call me a slacker!

Actually, you're probably more likely to see my posts over at SQPN's Secrets of Harry Potter. Feel free to pop over there and have a look. :)

I've had this pervasive earworm in my head for the past couple of days. It's not a bad one, actually. A friend of mine, who is now based in Norway, had asked me to send her some music for "Filipino Praise Songs" that can be sung in church. I gave her what I had on hand that I thought might be popular amongst members of the very diverse Filipino Diaspora. I think the two songs she and the members of the Filipino choir she's conducting settled on two songs: Fr. Manoling Francisco's "Tanging Yaman" and Raymund Rema's "Tanging Alay Ko", also known as "Salamat Sa Iyo". It's the latter that's been the earworm, and for as many years as this song has been around, it's really nice that the person who composed it has come forward and recorded himself playing and singing it.

Here is a YouTube video of Mr. Rema playing and singing his song, "Tanging Alay Ko."

Where has the month gone?

It has been a long time since I last posted to this blog. In fact, the very last post I made was my New Year's Eve post. Maybe I need to keep signing up monthly for NaBloPoMo to ensure I keep posting...

Admittedly, this month has been a blur. I managed to pick up the flu virus, and it completely knocked me out for essentially a week. Even now, I'm still suffering from vestiges of the cold, and my singing voice is still not quite there, but it is returning, slowly but surely. (I should be able to sing on Sunday. Hopefully.)

If I feel up to it, I'll post my music lists and backdate them. In the meantime, there is a brand new month to look forward to. My parents will be celebrating their birthdays (Dad's is tomorrow, Mom's will be on Saturday), my nephew will be enjoying being First Chair (trumpet) with the East County Youth Symphony Concert Band)... oh, and I've agreed to perform in the Durham-Chapel Hill AGO's Member's Recital on Monday, February 13 at Watts Street Baptist Church in Durham. Members who will be playing are encouraged to play music composed by African-American composers in honour of Black History Month. There are at least six organists playing, and there is always room for more.

I can't make any promises that I'll be more regular in posting here... but at least I will try. Hopefully, I won't catch any more evil little germs or viruses anymore this season.

New Year Traditions

We are approaching the end of 2011 as I type this. Of course, most of my friends have already marked 2012, and those keeping Mountain Time has just passed midnight.

I started thinking of traditions my family has done when the clock turns to midnight, marking the coming of the new year. In the days leading up to it, my mum would start gathering 13 round fruits to place in a bowl at the dining room table. Why thirteen and why round?

This is a tradition that came from the Chinese. The fruits need to be round because they signify coins, which signify wealth and prosperity. As for the 13, I've heard many different reasons, but the explanation my mum gave makes sense: she merely pointed at the tapestry of the Last Supper on the wall when I had asked her about it. It, of course, depicts Jesus and His 12 apostles, hence 13 fruits. It's a perfect explanation, especially considering that the majority of Filipinos are Catholic and/or Christian.

Of course, another explanation is that the number is lucky, so having 13 round fruits should bring about luck and prosperity for the new year.

Here's another thing: some say the number should actually be 8 because to the Chinese, it sounds similar to the word for wealth or to prosper. So whether one does 8 or 13 round fruits, the effect is still the same: it's done to bring about good luck and prosperity for the new year.

More traditions: My mum hangs green grapes at the kitchen window. She'll put a fresh bunch on a hook on New Year's Eve, where it will hang for the entire year. She said it signifies money and prosperity.

As the clock turns to midnight, you would be wearing polka-dots, and you should have some money in your pocket, which will also signify prosperity in the new year. Essentially, if you wear anything round (there's the round thing again), it resembles coins, which signifies wealth and prosperity in the coming year.

If you're a kid, you would jump up and down in hopes that you would grow taller. Even if you're not a kid, you'd still jump up and down anyway. :)

We also turn on every single light in the house. It's said that your coming year will be filled with light if you do that. In addition, all the doors and windows would be open, which means all the grace would be flowing in for the new year.

In the Philippines, it's very common to set off fireworks as the clock goes past midnight. One would set them off to give off light to greet the new year.

Filipinos have a tendency to celebrate "Media Noche", which is the counterpart to "Noche Buena" which one does after Midnight Mass. The Media Noche would be a meal to honour Mary, especially since January 1 marks the Solemnity of Mary, the Holy Mother of God, in addition to being for 2012 the Octave Day of the Nativity of the Lord. The food on the table: in addition to all the round fruits, one would have noodle dishes. My friend, Jared, said he had spaghetti after midnight struck in the Philippines. We made sotanghon ("glass" noodles made from mung beans). The symbolism is that the long noodles signify long life.

There would also be an abundance of food in the house.

What traditions do you observe as the new year dawns?

Feeling Crafty, Part II

In this post, I had mentioned that I was working on some booties for my mother. I finished the project, and I'm working on writing down what I did. I'll probably post it over on Ravelry.com... eventually...

Here are pictures of the finished product. :)

Feeling Crafty

Warning: This post will be image-heavy.

Those of you who have been following me through my attemtped NaBloPoMo postings know that I like to knit and crochet. I had mentioned in this post that I had made an afghan for a friend's baby. Since she received it, I can finally post the picture. Here is a yellow afghan, made with Caron's bamboo/acrylic blend yarn. It was done with the garter stitch, so it was a good, 'mindless' project when I needed good stress relief. The colour is 'soft sunshine'.

I'm working on another couple of projects as well. One is a knit project, but I won't reveal what it is until the recipient (who doesn't know it's coming or that it even exists) receives it. The other is a crochet project I'm doing for my mum. She was the one who taught me how to crochet when I was 8 years old. Unfortunately for her, carpal tunnel syndrome prevents her from doing anymore crochet, so I told her I'd give this project a go. It will be a couple pairs of booties when I'm done with them. Here are a couple of pictures of this project in progress.

This was crocheted in the round, using Red Heart Yarn's "Super Saver" yarn in country blue. I'm using a size J / 6.00 MM hook.

We're still deciding what the second colour will be. We'd welcome suggestions, although I suspect we'll be running off to the store after we eat lunch in search of yarn.

For those of you who knit and/or crochet: what projects are you currently working on?

And yes, I'm on Ravelry.com, but I'll admit to not visiting the site as often as I'd like. Feel free to friend me there. I'm 'cartilagineol'.