Road to Phoenixville

While idly checking Facebook the other day, I spotted a little ad in the corner for a show by singer-songwriter Al Stewart on Oct. 26 at the Colonial Theater in Phoenixville. Al Stewart, here in Chester County! His "Year of the Cat" album was the soundtrack to my sophomore year in college! I immediately went to the Colonial's website and bought my ticket, and thank goodness I did because there were very few seats left.
Al and guitarist Dave Nachmanoff -- just two very talented guys with acoustic guitars on stage for two hours-- put on a terrific show, including the classics "On the Border," "Lord Grenville," "Palace of Versailles" and "Soho (Needless to Say)." In addition to being a marvelous singer -- that voice is unmistakeable -- Al is so cheerful, amusing and self-deprecating, telling funny stories like how he shared a dressing room with the Rolling Stones in the 1960s and irritated Mick Jagger by asking why the band members weren't wearing uniforms.
Few in the Colonial audience were under 50, and I think we were all not-so-secretly excited at the novelty of staying up long past our usual bedtimes (I didn't get home til midnight!). The couple next to me, Steve and Linda Crane from Methacton, introduced themselves to me as soon as they sat down, and we had a great time chatting in that way that people who grew up in the same era, and the same area, do (suburban Philly in the 1970s).
WHYY taped the show and will air it in January, and somebody has already posted two songs from the show on YouTube.
The Colonial is a great venue, and I was surprised at how thriving downtown Phoenixville appeared on a Friday night. 

Bamboo-zled

In last week's paper one of my colleagues wrote about a neighborhood dispute in Pocopson Township involving the cutting of a resident's bamboo. Bamboo is a plant that is all in the eye of the beholder, I suppose: some consider it to be an insurgent, out-of-control pest and take aggressive measures to root it out, but others see it as providing a graceful Asian touch, a soothing rustle in the wind and an excellent privacy screen for their yards.
What no one can dispute is that it will grow back, and quickly.

Shiny and new

There's a gleaming new guardrail, with orange reflectors, on the northwest corner of the 926/841 intersection, the scene of frequent crashes despite the four-way stop signs. We'll see how long it remains unblemished.
Not long, predicts a West Marlborough resident who lives along Route 82: "A new shiny guardrail was installed last week across from my home. In less than 24 hours a speeding woman bounced off it, shot across Route 82, then nailed my mailbox and the unshiny guardrail in front of it."

Kinloch

Kinloch Woodworking's annual open house is Friday, Nov. 2, from 5 to 8 p.m., and Saturday, Nov. 3, from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Here's your chance to see the amazing furniture created by owner Doug Mooberry and his team and to meet these terrific craftspeople. Kinloch is on Route 82 in the heart of Unionville.

Time time tickin'

I fear I'm becoming one of those TV-ad characters who is worried about exceeding her monthly allowance for cellphone minutes (more First World problems). With two days to go in the billing cycle, I've used up 397 of my 450 minutes.
450 minutes a month works out to 7.5 hours, which seems like plenty, especially since I also have unlimited night (after 9 p.m.) and weekend minutes, and calls to other Verizon cellphones don't count. But I also have one especially talkative pal who has only a landline phone and feels the need to unburden himself during prime hours.
I didn't give him a hard time when he phoned at 8:50 last night, figuring that it was only 10 minutes until the free period started. Wrong: apparently they bill your call according to when it starts! I was on the hook for a 30-minute call even though most of it was in the supposedly free period. Good to know.
Of course, friendship is priceless. But an upgraded cellphone plan, the one with double the minutes, is really pricey! 

Township meeting

The November meeting of the West Marlborough Township supervisors and planning commission will start at 7 p.m. Monday, Nov. 5. Yes, that's a day earlier than usual. It seems there's something else going on at the municipal building on Tuesday, Nov. 6. Get out and VOTE!
I stopped by the township hall yesterday morning to make sure I had this date right, and as I was turning off Route 82, a group of maybe 10 bicyclists were heading the opposite way. I stopped so they could go by, and every single one of them smiled, waved and/or nodded. Excellent behavior! Or maybe it was just being out in the fresh air in our beautiful countryside that put them in such a good mood.

Buckley's to reopen

A lot of people will be very happy when Buckley's Tavern on Route 52 in Centerville reopens. It has been undergoing renovations for some months, but I'm told that when the Buckley's sign goes up out front, it will be officially open for business again! It should be in the next week or so.

Thank you!

An extremely kind reader from Romansville gave me these beautiful equestrian-themed bracelets, which belonged to his late and deeply missed wife, Jane. He told me he knew I would give them a good home, and I promised that I would: I'll start by wearing them at the Pennsylvania Hunt Cup on Sunday.

I am profoundly honored.

Modena Rocks

Frankly, I had no idea what to expect. A Tuesday-evening party and open house, at a waste-oil recycling facility and a potting soil manufacturer, in downtown Modena, a suburb of Coatesville.
WELL! I'm so glad I went! It could well be the hippest party I've attended all year.
It seems that a crumbling industrial area in Modena along the west branch of the Brandywine is undergoing a renaissance. Waste Oil Recyclers, Organic Mechanics (they make organic potting soil out of coconut fibers, rice hulls, worm droppings and mushroom compost) and mechanic Fred Sinton's garage all call the flourishing Phoenix Court "home" now. There's a lovely garden between the businesses with Swiss chard, parsley and a fall crop of spinach.
A huge manhole cover that resembles a face now decorates a repurposed cinder-block building that used to house, yes, a manhole-cover manufacturer. 

I met a lot of nice, smart, down-to-earth folks and was struck by the pride that everyone took in their work. Everyone loved explaining what they did; one guy told me that he felt a sense of community energy every day and deeply appreciated how the entrepreneurs he worked with shared their expertise.
In addition to Rob Mastrippolito and Dave Dickens of Waste Oil Recyclers and Fred Sinton and three generations of Sintons, I had fun talking to Claire Murray of Inverbrook Farm in West Marlborough; Jill Benjamin and John Hodges of Unionville; and Michael and Sally Green of Ercildoun.
It was such a great mix of people that I found myself talking about everything from the reconfigured Hunt Cup course, to the proper planting time for broccoli, to the transmission of DNA through generations.
Not to mention: the food was delicious, the artwork on display (paintings, ceramics, photographs, furniture) was wonderfully creative, and the live music by the Modenites (Paul Wilkinson, Rob Mastrippolito and Pat Hughes) was just right for the warm autumn evening.
And then there was the woman who, as dusk was falling, put on an astonishing performance with twirling flaming hoops. It was a great party!

Book Worm

Bayard Taylor Library director Donna Murray passed along the following news:

"The library has a living sculpture in front of the building on State Street, a Book Worm that is devouring books. It’s an adorable monster made out of moss with teeth and a tail and huge glowing eyes, created by library staffer Ivy Weir and her mom, Anne Eder from Chansonette. But people keep picking up the books and bringing them into the library, quite horrified that someone has vandalized library books! The books were selected for the display because they were old and tattered anyway. So no worries folks. No one is destroying library books. Well, no human, anyway; just the moss monster book worm."

"Goodnight Ladies"

"Goodnight Ladies," Christianna Hannum Miller's documentary about her grandmother, Nancy Penn Smith Hannum, will premiere at 5 and 7 p.m. Wednesday, Nov. 14, at the Chester County Historical Society in West Chester. 

"In Goodnight Ladies, I show the grandmother I remember, speeding down country roads in her battered Jeep," said Christie. "Gran was passionate about her grandchildren, and this film is for them, and for their children.”
Christie told me that after each screening of the 35-minute film, she and cinematographer David W. Leitner will be doing a Q&A. No reservations are needed; suggested donation to the Historical Society is $10. 

Mrs. Hannum was for years the master of Mr. Stewart's Cheshire Fox Hounds, which was founded in 1912 by her stepfather, Plunket Stewart. Cheshire is hosting a series of events this autumn to celebrate its 100th anniversary.

Samara at Starbucks

I had coffee with Samara last week!
This probably won't mean much to people of my generation, but my hipper readers will doubtless know that Samara is a character in the "Mass Effect" science-fiction video game. The model for Samara's face was a young California woman named Rana McAnear, and last week Rana happened to be visiting her aunt, a dear friend of mine who lives in East Marlborough. We met at the Longwood Starbucks.
Samara is bright blue and odd-looking (she's an alien, after all) but in person Rana is absolutely stunning, with a chiseled face and very long, wavy red hair. She had just worked at the famed New York Comic Convention and told us some funny stories about the not-so-glamorous side of being a "cosplay" participant: wearing the skin-tight Neoprene costume for 12 hours at a stretch, and contracting the legendary "Nerd Flu" that seems to fell so many convention-goers. She said that the character Samara has a very somber personality (she has a lot on her mind, such as a serial-killer daughter), so her fans love it when they catch her in a candid smiling moment.