'I feel the earth move under my feet..'

Ditmas Avenue in Brooklyn is one of those open-air stations over the street with facing platforms. It's pretty laid back, there's not too much traffic; but when two trains arrived at the same time, I could feel the section of platform beneath my seat start to shake. It's fair to say it's unsettling.

I chose this station with the original intention of playing a doubleheader here and at Ditmars Boulevard station in Astoria, for no other reason than that both stations seem so nondescript, given the names of the distinguished families - and the two names are often connected and shortened in the same family - they commemorate.

While the Astoria stop is named specifically for Abram Ditmars, mayor of Long Island City in the 1880s, the Ditmas Park area in Brooklyn is apparently named after the Dutch Van Ditmarse family who farmed the area in the 1600s. Anyway, enough geography. I just always found it odd that the two areas and stations were so far apart yet their origins must somehow be connected.

It was a quiet afternoon today, not much foot traffic, and so nothing to show for the effort; but I used the relative quiet to try out some slower or more mellow songs I don't play that often.

Today's songlist:

The Longer I Run - Peter Bradley Adams
After The Goldrush - Neil Young
Two Good Reasons - John Gorka
One Safe Place - Marc Cohn
Mexico - James Taylor
Things We've Handed Down - Marc Cohn
Keep It Loose, Keep It Tight - Amos Lee
People Get Ready - Curtis Mayfield
There Is Power In A Union - Billy Bragg
Message In A Bottle - Sting
Chance - Big Country
Land Of The Living - Lucy Kaplansky
Secret Garden - Bruce Springsteen
Tonight Will Be Fine - Leonard Cohen/Teddy Thompson
Blooming Heather - Frankie McPeake/Kate Rusby



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I went to "Irish Heritage" night at the Brooklyn Cyclones tonight.

It's always a fun night out at Keyspan Park, but there's a part of me that wishes that maybe just once, in addition to the midget leprechaun, the "corned beef and cabbage toss" the green t-shirts sponsored by Budweiser, the pipe band and the "potato throw", that perhaps the team could take the field wearing shirts bearing the names of Irish literary giants?

What a line-up this would be:

LF: Yeats
CF: Synge
RF: Sheridan
3B: Heaney
SS: Shaw
2B: O'Casey
1B: Joyce
C: Swift
LHP: Wilde

Warming up in the bullpen: Beckett, and the rookie, Hugh Leonard.

As each batter was walking to the plate, the announcer could read a passage from one of their famous works.

Just once.