Month: December 2005

On the Apple website where you ask for help, someone started a new topic called “So I Dropped My ipod in a Cup of Coffee”.

It’s such a perfect statement, I could cry.

I could so see myself dropping my ipod in a cup of coffee. “Oops.” Then, I would go on to wonder what good thing had happened to me lately that I was paying for. Then, I would conclude I was getting off lightly (vs dying in the WTC). But then I would think, well, maybe I was paying for a little good thing. Then, I’d be distracted by a cat.

I love singing. I especially love singing in beautiful places. And I can’t get over that we get to sing here (the Metropolitan Museum of Art).

Tonight is the dress rehearsal, then there are two performances on Sunday. The 6:30 performance is sold out. There are still some tickets left for 8PM. To purchase by telephone, call 212-570-3949, any day before 5:00 p.m.

Finney was a finalist in the World Coolest Cat Contest on Catster, but he didn’t win, alas. But look at the little (big) guy. You win some, you lose some, it doesn’t change the fact that Finney is the best cat in all the world (tied with all of your cats, of course).

These are the pictures that were graciously given to me by Sylvia Sodder Paxton, the youngest surviving child from the fire on December 25, 1945.

This is the billboard the family put up starting in 1952.

Maurice Sodder, 14 years old on December 25, 1945.

Martha Lee Sodder, 12 years old on December 25, 1945.

Louis Sodder, 9 years old on December 25, 1945 (his birthday was in 5 days).

Jennie Sodder, 8 years old on December 25, 1945.

Betty Sodder, 5 years old on December 25, 1945.

And I loved it. Loved it. Had a great trip to West Virginia with Art Silverman, my producer at NPR. We were there to do a piece about a fire in 1945 in Fayetteville, WV. It was a sad story, but I loved Fayetteville and all the people I met there.

This is me in Not New York City.

This is the Fayetteville Courthouse.

This is the site of the fire. The family constructed a billboard which sat at the top of the rise, by the pine trees.

I have pictures of the billboard and the children who were lost in the fire which I will scan in later.