October 16, 2003
Traveling is a lot of work, especially on a three-legged trip like the one I just took. I want to report to those of you who don't already know that airport security procedures are far more efficient at Atlanta's Hartsfield Airport than they are at Seattle's Sea-Tac Airport or Indianapolis's Weir Cook. If you get impatient in Atlanta, you'll lose your mind in some of our other cities. I also had the interesting experience of having an immigrant who spoke absolutely horrendous English check my identification at the security point in Seattle. The irony of that deal was sharp indeed.
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The purpose of the trip to Seattle was to attend a small private viewing of the Microsoft Art Collection that is housed at the Microsoft headquarters campus in Redmond, Washington. It lives in the Microsoft Conference Center, the Executive Briefing Center and Future Home: 64 works displayed in the common areas of the building's 35,000 square feet of space. The collection has its first curator,
Michael Klein, who has assembled a compelling and eclectic array of works in various styles and materials. The first work anybody sees is displayed on a tomato-red wall at the lobby entrance: Six Silvers, by American-born artist
Beverly Semmes. Six huge 7-feet tall, long-sleeved, long dresses made from crinkled silver lame fabric that were stapled, one by one and side by side, to the wall. As folks walked past, the full skirts rustled with the breeze. My thought as I viewed all this silver lame was, "Those things will probably fit me one day soon if I don't quit eating all this fabulous Seattle food!"
This corporate art collection will eventually encompass all of Microsoft's locations, not just the buildings on the home campus, but worldwide. That's a lot of art.
All the artwork is by beginning or mid-career artists, from America as well as around the world, nothing before the early 1980's. Klein said this reflects the corporate culture of Microsoft itself, innovative and futuristic. Imagine how excited an artist would be if he or she got a call from Michael Klein!
There is a big chunk of Russian concrete covered with colored German graffiti, part of the dismantled Berlin Wall. This honker had to be placed on reinforced flooring and bolted down so it couldn't possibly brain anybody. The unusual offering was a gift to
Bill Gates from Daimler-Benz in 1996.
Microsoft also features an Artist Lecture Series, which began in 1999 and is designed to introduce employees to the character of this unique corporate collection and the remarkably diverse artists collected. As this is a corporate collection, Klein avoids anything religious or nude.
You can learn more about this wonderful collection by visiting
www.microsoft.com/mscorp/artcollection. It was quite a tour.
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We were in Indianapolis to attend a countdown party and a very elegant wedding. At the countdown party the night before the wedding day, Hoosier barbecue was on the menu, along with all the trimmings. It was casual and dinner was a self-serve buffet. There was one of those wedding cakes that looked like the skirt of a Southern belle on the table, right beside several bottles of barbecue sauce. I was standing in the kitchen talking with folks when my husband came rushing out of the dining room looking for some paper towels. He said he'd had a little accident with the barbecue sauce. That didn't sound too serious, so I stayed where I was and let him go fix the damage. About that time, a woman came out of the dining room with a bottle of barbecue sauce saying, "There's frosting in the barbecue sauce!" Then, another man came into the kitchen, eyes wide, and announced, "Somebody threw barbecue sauce all over the cake!" By then, I was bent over double laughing so hard I couldn't breathe. I hope my old college roommate was able to soak the barbecue sauce out of her husband's grandmother's crocheted tablecloth, which, of course, we cannot replace. Ron felt awful, but our hostess graciously promised to forgive him. The bottle was gooey and just slipped out of his hand, did a header and sauce flew everywhere. Good thing it wasn't the REAL wedding cake!
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Travel is fine, but coming home is so much better. My deer friends have enjoyed the yard while we have been gone. They've nibbled the ivy that is growing up the trees as far as they could reach and eaten the impatiens and hostas. They do not care for the chrysanthemums and so far, the asters are safe so the garden is still pretty. Camellias are beginning to bloom and the sasanquas are full blown.
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Our chocolate Labrador, Clover, was happy to see us. She doesn't do plane flights. I have had a request to run her photo, so this is for you, Mary Jane. Clover has gray hair like her mother. She was reluctant to pose for this glamour shot as she has learned the digital flash is pretty fierce and she probably sees spots for the next two hours.
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Hope all is well and thanks for reading.
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