Ode to joy

This past weekend was Artscape, the city's annual festival of the arts. It usually doubles as a heat and humidity endurance test, and this year was no different.

Normally, I try to avoid giant crowds of sweaty strangers whenever possible.

But we had seen on the news that morning that the BSO was hosting a musical petting zoo for kids. So we were ready to brave even a plague of locusts to let young Samson get his hands on some orchestra instruments.

And given the kind of day we had, I think I would have faced even the locusts.

Of course, he was a little overwhelmed at first. But once he got over being shy, he dove right in.

And he was all business. No goofing around or making funny sounds; he was (as you can see) quite intent on making some music. He seemed to like the strings the best.

He also seems to have figured out that musicians get to flirt with girls without being obvious about it. He kept returning to this one girl, extending his hands and smiling, saying "playit? please. thenkyu."