Well, sort of… :-)
The day started with WeatherGirl and I having a very productive strategy meeting with Arne and Athena to work on the design of a MARQS pamphlet in support of November’s school levy vote. While we were deep in planning, who should come into Common Cup but Loudon Wainwright! He apparently came in last night, and spent the day wandering around town and campus on his own, including lunch at our little coffee shop.
Many (most?) artists and speakers that come to UMM tend to hole up in their hotel rooms and spend almost no time in town among us plebs, so it was particularly cool that Loudon was so comfortable cruising around town. We talked about going over and saying “Hi”, but I’m frankly a total wimp about talking to famous people like that. In the end he left before we did, saving me the trouble of having to think about it.
After that exciting time WeatherGirl and I went over to the PRCA Gallery to take photos of art. As a fund raiser for the Center, we’re working on a calendar of photographs of the work of PRCA artists. I already had quite a few relevant shots from outside the Center, but needed to spend some time in the Center of some of the cool stuff on display (and sale) there. We stayed a couple of hours and I took some 150 shots. I think we’ve got a pretty good set of shots to work with, and will hopefully have the calendar design and permissions sorted out in a few weeks.
This fine day was then capped off by an excellent concert by our lunch guest. Loudon played a fine 90 minute set as the opening act of this year’s Performing Arts Series, mixing crazy fun stuff with his great family songs and political commentary. Edson Auditorium wasn’t full, but it was close (400 people?) and the audience was very enthusiastic and supportive, and he got a nice standing ovation at the end.
We bought a copy of Here come the choppers, and Sub-Evil Boy got in line to have it signed. Sub-Evil really enjoyed chatting with Loudon, and I think that Loudon got a kick out of having a really cool young fan. Sub-Evil told him that he’d wanted to request “Unhappy anniversary” (a pretty unusual request from an 11 year old), but he was pretty pumped that Loudon finished up his encore with “Hard day on the planet”.
All in all, an excellent Saturday!