palace of winds

Have I said yet how much I’m adoring Madeleine Peyroux? I love her bluesy jazzy smokey warm old-worldsey thing. Listening to her feels like being curled up in a huge armchair in front of a big window with a Sunday afternoon rainshower outside and a steaming creamy mug of tea at your elbow and a favorite book in your lap. Or being at a little table in a dimly-lit restaurant, all soft easy intimacy and candlelight winking through wine glasses.

A month or two ago I also happened upon 99.5, the local MN Public Radio Classical station. Like The Current before it, it’s lured me away from audiobooks and my ipod with its lovely commercial-freeness. There’s a refreshing abundance of actual music, particularly during my morning and afternoon drives, and the talking is generally brief and interesting. It eliminates the three things I usually detest about radio: commercials, irritating DJs, and the same handful of songs played to death. They’ve just started up their semi-annual (?) fund drive, and I find myself strangely tempted by their stainless steel water bottle, a thing I’ve been wanting for months and months — but which I can get for $100 cheaper in any number of other places. Which isn’t really the point, of course, but then there’s Peru.

Speaking of: to skydive or not to skydive? It’s become our thing (after just two times [and apparently 'beautiful beautiful beautiful' is my recurring impression, huh]), but Peru is so full of things we couldn’t do here, like sandboarding and that whole hiking to Machu Picchu thing, and we’ll only have so much time and money. Decisions decisions.