Weather was great yesterday and while I was at Doom North worrying over Misha & Sergey, Sir Paul was 3 km south of here playing to about 20,000 on the North Commons. Dodged the swine flu and everything

Paul, I feel your pain. I could barely sing this morning at church after 8 days trying to make myself heard over these guys singing “Ode to Joy.” Yes, Igor, “loony” is about right

There’s a closeup near the end, and you can see me if you know where to look.

There are wheels within wheels within wheels [I could say: reels within reels within reels] at the Tattoo this year. Show #7 last night was awesome.

[5]: (cross-comment footnote’s gotta be a Doom first) Credit Crunch moment: Bud the Spud’s (see above for a great video with a brief clip of them) been trying to sell out, but reportedly interested owners can’t get financing quite yet. So when Peggy and I were down to the Main Branch Library to re-stock on books we were able to sit at Winnie’s feet and share a box of the best fries in the world one last time

The Tattoo sounds marvelous- the amount of effort that goes into it must be astounding. Someday I’m going to make it up your way to experience it! : )

John-

You aren’t the only one who’s wondering about fun and games with the foreign central bank numbers:

It is only a matter of when before there will be insufficient buyers of Treasuries to fund bond issues. We believe this has previously happened from time to time and that buying by the Fed from offshore accounts has held the market up. This we believe is why the Fed doesn’t want an audit. When foreign central banks stop buying, the Fed will monetize more and more as they are currently doing. They will be buying $3 trillion worth of Treasuries, Agencies and CDO toxic waste from banks over the next three months.

Well, we’ve both been playing hooky this week. Here’s what I was doing earlier today

That’s me (from last year’s show) top row 2nd from left. Click the pic to get to the Tattoo site and more photos from ’07 & ’08. This is a cell phone capture from the end of this afternoon’s matinee performance. What’s cool here is the arranger of this version of MacPherson’s Lament (this year’s Finale) was directing it.

I’m placed just 10 feet away from the lone piper, nearly dead centre in the top rank of singers. cstephen98′s cell phone didn’t really do justice to the piece, you really had to be there. It was a wonderful experience. By the way here’s a 4 month old bootleg of a pop performance of the Lament from the heart of depressed Industrial Cape Breton. We may not be an economic powerhouse up here, but we bow to nobody [5] when it comes to live music (Citadel makes a wicked venue when it’s not raining, too). Meanwhile we’re bracing for Paul McCartney’s concert just 300 meters up the street at the Commons this Saturday.

These are performers from around the region, a long sequence of fiddles, drums & Scottish dancers. Here’s part 2. There are also groups from all over Europe, bands from Wales, Denmark, Belgium, Germany and Sweden, plus gymnastic teams from France and Estonia.

The Middlesex (MA) Volunteers Fife & Drums The fifes opened the finale with the instrumental that leads in the tenor soloists before the Beethoven 9th’s “Ode to Joy.” Very effective.

We sing too This is part of the Act I Finale (final bit of Band of Brothers). the 30-odd voice Children’s Choir is caught nicely at the end.

And for a fitting end, here’s the final marchoff. It must have been the July 2nd show, when we choristers were left hanging on the stage. We got in a memorable Oi!! for “The Black Bear” that was captured quite well on this bootleg.