BilikFamily.com

Music - I recently noticed that Mighty Timbo, in his fascination with buttons on the piano, had changed the default piano instrument a few weeks ago. A few recordings had a cheesy 80's style MIDI piano voice, sounding like a $200 keyboard. I knew things sounded a little off but I didn't investigate why at the time. Below are Claire's three current piano practice songs. The first is a new recording I did today and the latter two are re-recordings with the instrument "fixed".

• Pumpkin Boogie (source ) - new
• Minuet in G (source )
• The Entertainer (source )

I'm including the MIDI source files for two reasons. First, if you have a decent MIDI capable keyboard (like TJ) you can use the files to play on your own keyboard. Second, if you don't have broadband internet but would like to have a quick listen at the songs, the MIDI files take only a second to download on dialup. They don't have the same quality, but at least you get something close. I'll try to include the lightweight MIDI source files from now on.

If you're not using Internet Explorer, you also notice that I've updated MP3, MIDI, and QuickTime movie links with new graphical tags that serve as hints about the nature of the link.

Weather - We've had unusually warm and sunny days recently. Temperatures hit 55°F today and yesterday! I used the opportunity today to break the ice off the back deck. My real motivation was to encourage Michelle to make dinner on the wood grill this afternoon. Sweetie that she is, she made hamburgers and hot dogs. I believe in the law of averages though. This won't last long. Even as the grill was cooling off, the wind was blowing strongly, bringing in the new cooler weather front. We won't be seeing mid-50's again anytime soon…

Firefly - A few weeks back Michelle and I watched the movie Serenity. Two thumbs up. When I told Michelle it was based on a short lived TV series on Fox called Firefly, she said she'd like to see those shows. Luckily the entire series is out on DVD so I rented the first one in the series. We finished that disk tonight. It had the show pilot and the second episode — both as good as the movie. I think that even though it's Sci-Fi, it has enough Western themes in it that Dad would enjoy it. Perhaps he and Tom should watch it together. Anyway, look for subsequent disks in the series to be popping in and out of our DVD queue on the front page over the next several weeks.

Sorry the webpage looks so monochromatic today. I was trying some techniques, but the color scheme is beyond boring. If I get some time, I was thinking of going with some combination of pottery red with a light tan. On the flip side, if I was doing a web site about black and white photography, this would be ideal!