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Flaming bagpipes

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No city anywhere in the world that I've visited had the same warm and optimistic mood that Portland, Oregon did. Does it still exist? Somewhat.

Presently, I live more than two thousand miles away in Lancaster, Pennsylvania and we have stickers that say "Make Lancaster Weird!" We can only aspire modestly to what Portland has achieved.
 
That's how I experience Portland when I first moved there (now I live across the river) from the San Francisco Bay Area in 1996. It's grown, changed as cities do, but the people and place are still, to me, full of heart. It's a good place. Truly. Who'd have thought Portland's "weirdness" would inspire such aspirations elsewhere? But why not? That's a good thing.
 
Bagpipes you say. Allow me to present the soundtrack to the end of the world.

Irish Blues

Historical note-the Swiss also have bagpipes going back to the Dark Ages. Who knows maybe they came with Irish priests like St. Gallus. Thanks Jonny I thunk I need to put this in Feckless somewhere. (F'n AC. Now EVERY TIME I WRITE THINK it changes it to THUNK.
 
. Because my son has pretty severe Auditory Processing Disorder his concept of music is basically theoretical. He first got rhythm from drums. Then we advanced to the bagpipe. I still have it in my closet. It's basically a recorder with a haggis attached. I would not advise parents with children with no idea of what music is-to buy them bagpipes. In the end the teacher who said he could teach anyone begged us to take him away.
 
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I'm sharing this YouTube video just for fun . . . . There was mention of bagpipes during today's Huddle chat and I said there is a guy in Portland Oregon USA who plays flaming bagpipes while riding a unicycle, in keeping with a Portlanders' favorite meme, "Keep Portland weird." Weird, indeed.


I was hoping they'd sound better that way.
 
Bagpipes you say. Allow me to present the soundtrack to the end of the world.



Ah, @Jonny , for a moment I thought this was YOU playing the Uillean pipes! (I can absolutely see you uillean-piping, they look like your instrument. A new hobby?!)

A 300 year-old pear tree in my parents garden split in two during a storm about ten years ago. A man they know is an Uillean pipe maker and they gave him the wood, as it's apparently the best for making the Uillean pipes.

This year, I was taking my (not so little) little ones on a train journey, and this fella sat down beside us, who happens to be a good friend of my big lads. He's an Uillean piper and was coming home with his pipes from performing somewhere. We were chatting about his U. Pipes and he was telling us how they were a set made for him, using the wood from a 300-year-old pear tree that had come down in the storm :) Ireland is such a small place!!
 
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