Huggin' necks, shakin' hands.

What do we want?
NYCADS!
When do we want it?
NOWCADS!

Mmmm....right. NYCADS is the New York City All-Day Singing (as certain readers of this blog already know, I have a fondness for acronym-izing anything that I can, including but not limited to WTTAN).

Anyway, the singing extravaganza was this weekend, and what a good time it was. Never a dull moment. The singers started rolling into town on Friday, and come Friday afternoon, my apartment was hosting a plain-dressing woman (part of the River Brethren...sect? Faith? I don't know. They're sort of like Mennonites. I hope no one googles River Brethren and gets directed here and leaves me nasty comments) and Matt, the maker of a documentary on Sacred Harp. Aldo and I rounded out this odd quartet and spent a few hours sort of entertaining... I went to work until midnight and then slept at Emma's in E. Wburg, as my bed was being slept in by an out-of-town guest (and kickass lady), Judy. I miss what was apparently a really exciting and good singing school taught by Richard DeLong and Judy Caudle. Whatever.

Saturday morning: I was supposed to get to the singing at 9, as I was head of the 'welcoming committee' (I AM very welcoming) and had to set up nametags and registration cards and such. Ryan was going to be my second, so we made plans the night before to coordinate our travel so neither would have to endure the long G-train ride alone; we took matters into our own hands and decided to ride bikes. We met at the Graham stop at 8.20 am and took off. I was a little apprehensive because I'm so out of shape and didn't really trust that I could get there unscathed, but Ryan was confident in our combined ability. Let it be said that he has an actual bike that he rides all over-- as opposed to mine, which is thirty years old and weighs about fifty pounds and is constantly falling apart in different ways. Things went just fine until we got to Fort Greene and I got a FLAT TIRE. That's never ever ever ever happened to me, in all my years of riding bikes, ever. Fuck you, Fort Greene! After three minutes of ranting, we took notice of the time, renewed our vigor by thinking of all the singing that awaited us, and started trudging towards Hicks Street. After five minutes, Ryan gently suggested that it might be faster if he carried my dead bike and I rolled his. Sadly, he was right. I am, in the words of Sven Ugendugen, a 'puny weakling.' We made several wrong turns, sweated and cursed a lot, but got to the church only fifteen minutes after our desired time of arrival...dirty and sweaty and discombobulated. It was a very unexpected 'adventure,' to say the least.

The singing was really great. Dinner was lovely, with more than enough food. Ollie Stokes was honored that I made a coconut cake with him in mind, and ate about six pieces. Greg was given a farewell card, at which point I got teary-eyed and had to think about something other than him moving, or now, the fact that as I write this, he's halfway across the country. I don't like that one bit. Afterwards there was a lot of cleanup, then a listening party for Matt's new CD, and a little composium, at which I was starting to get a little post-singing hysterical and was of no use to anyone. Then we spent half an hour tying my dead bike onto the roof of Greg's car so I wouldn't have to take it on the subway, which was amazing. So much chivalry in one day; I should have bike disasters more often. (I can't neglect to mention a previous Herculean effort when another gallant maneuvered the cumbrous Schwinn up the narrow tenement staircase of my building. It proves my point again!)

More jollity followed later-- eating street food/trying to keep up with Matt Hinton's hilarious sense of humor with Justin, Ben, and Ryan; playing stupid games and putting on wigs; lots and lots of geeking out; Sacred Harps dorks drinking. Blah blah blah. Slept at Emma's again, and managed to see her for all of five minutes.

Sunday was the monthly singing at St. Bart's, which, like last year, was populated by a lot of holdovers from the All-Day, which was terrific. Justin and I led "Sweet Affliction," which contains the words "In the floods of tribulation/While the billows o'er me roll..." Lauren maintains that I said "While the 'dillos o'er me roll" and the (cutest ever) image of armadillos curling up and rolling over me while I'm sleeping was born. Things wrapped up, and as Hugh McGraw says, we were all huggin' necks and shakin' hands. Greg left for good. Lauren, Ryan and I went to drink our sorrows away at Jimmy's Corner, and then at her house with Jesse and Judy. Sacred Harp gossip, geeking out, drinking, until midnight. Sometimes I am slightly overwhelmed by how weird and wonderful my life gets when I'm Sacred Harp singing.

But now, the party's over; Greg's in Oregon, Jesse and Lauren are back in Troy, the Boston gang is long-gone.

I guess I had other stuff to talk about, but this is pushing it. I'll stop here, with this admonition from the hallways of St. Bart's.