'Round The Block Band

Yosemite

2012-01-30T22:44:00.000-08:00

This is overlooking the Ten Lakes basin in northern Yosemite. I got my Wilderness Permit today for backpacking in July 8th for a week. I've good at getting what I want. No children of mine this year (like last year) but what the hoot. I got into because I liked it. It's a great way to beat yourself up and feel proud about it afterward. Gonna be an easy trip this year. My two buddies want a base camp and time to fish and day hike. I'm bringing my watercolors. If God is anywhere, she is up here.

I'm happy too because I was turned down four times in the permit application until I finally got it right. I've never been turned in eight years of doing this.

NoHo Dine Out

2012-01-27T22:53:00.000-08:00

We played here on Friday night. It was fun, not quite the crowd shown above, but there was a decent turn-out and people listened and we got applause and more tips than we got at the Swap Meet the previous Sunday. We arrived, just Craig and I, with the sound and there wasn't a soul there except for one food truck. A banner hung out from, announced we were in the right place and a banner next to it said: "Made possible by funding from the Valley Church of Scientology" We were a little nervous, but it all turned out ok. No recruiting for joining any religion.

This was what it looked like from the back of the lot before anyone came. The restrooms were in the Radiator Shop next door. Nancy called in sick and and Norm & Oleeta came. No one else could make it.

It was ok practice.

Bill

2012-01-17T22:52:00.001-08:00

HelloThe song is so much better than his version of it here

Craig's Harmonica

2012-01-16T23:05:00.000-08:00

Craig

2012-01-16T22:27:00.001-08:00

I Promised you Craig- Here he is in shyness with his nieces. Actually it will be be a great song once we orchestrate it,

What We're In For- What We've Been Turned Down For

2012-01-13T20:41:00.000-08:00

Name	Status	Last Updated	Next Update	Actions
The Down and Out Bar (Dec-Mar '12)	Submitted	1/10/2012	4/1/2012	Details \| Archive
Industry Showcase at Genghis Cohen (Oct-Jan '12)	Not Selected	1/8/2012		Details \| Archive
Leakworthy.com - Music Worth Leaking From Unique Artists	Not Selected	1/4/2012		Details \| Archive
JT Presents: Live at the Lounge (Sep-Dec '11)	Not Selected	12/26/2011		Details \| Archive
Rusty's Surf Ranch - Santa Monica, CA (Sep-Dec '11)	Submitted	12/19/2011	1/21/2012	Details \| Archive
Levitt Pavilion Pasadena - 2012 Summer Series	Submitted	12/14/2011	6/1/2012	Details \| Archive
Roadtrip Nation: Music Needed for National TV Series Submitted Song: Little Sister	Submitted	12/14/2011	9/15/2012	Details \| Archive
The Indie Music Video Show	Submitted	12/13/2011	2/6/2012	Details \| Archive
Rock the House Series November 2011	Not Selected	12/8/2011		Review \| Details \|Archive
TRiP (Oct-Jan '12)	Selected	12/6/2011		Details \| Archive
maurices Hometown Sound Band Search Submitted Song: Little Sister	Not Using Submission Tracker	12/5/2011		Details \| Archive
Venice Beach Music Fest 2012	Submitted	11/29/2011	1/31/2012	Details \| Archive
Band Boot Camp Showcase (January '12)	Not Selected	11/14/2011		Review \| Details \|Archive
House of Blues New Music Nights	Not Using Submission Tracker	11/11/2011		Review \| Details \|Archive
Renaissance Hotels presents RLife LIVE!	Submitted	11/8/2011	1/24/2012	Details \| Archive
Live Oak Music Festival 2012	Submitted	10/28/2011	3/30/2012	Details \| Archive

SonicGigs

2012-01-13T20:28:00.000-08:00

http://www.sonicbids.com/epk/epk.aspx?epk_id=325911

If you haven't seen the SonicGigs site, check it out. I just spent the evening fixing the sample songs on the site because they were too large for the site's player to handle them. We were turned down by a promoter because he couldn't hear our music. These files are ripped audio files off the videos I've been making of the band, They are not the normal MP3 files you'd find on a CD. Found a cool little freebie converter called FormatFactory that worked ok, once I figured out how it worked. We are in the contest and have gotten one gig off the site so far. I have us in for some other stuff- some you get- some you don't

2012-01-12T23:18:00.000-08:00

How many musicians (besides Keith Richards) read 18th Century lit) It's actually a fun read. Read most of Goethe's prose, I can highly recommend this- it's a coming of age - a 1700s version of Hemingway's "A

Movable Feast" Someday I will read Faust, but this is the last of Goethe's prose for me. It's modern in the sense that it's leaving those Renaissance pastorals way behind. What Don Quixote and Robinson Crusoe did to the romance novel, this did the same. Imagine yourself a boho in a wig and nickers.

Craig

2012-01-12T23:01:00.000-08:00

The rather bad photo above is a still from the die-hards of Rhubard who will play any time- any where. Me, Nancy and Craig. Craig is playing at Boulevard Music Sunday night. You should come if you are in the neighborhood. If you are not, I will try to get the video for you here. Craig plays harp like an angel. Also plays a lot of other things. I'm trying to encourage him to share his original stuff. He played a Harmonica little sonata last thing at the swap meet, during the band break. It was quite good.

2012-01-10T19:45:00.000-08:00

Still reading (and writing prose). About 100 single spaced pages into the new first draft novel, though I've stopped posting up parts of it here because the narrative has jumped around a bit and I've left unwritten parts to be filled later with only a few notes, so that the narrative is a bit choppy now, so it may be that no one will see it now until 2nd draft stage. I just finished this today. Great read about a life as a oyster man around Long Island Sound and the things one did as a working boat man through 50 years. Jones has written: "Driftin" "Short Voyages" & "BackWaters" which all rate up there as just as good or better than William Least-Heat Moon's books. (But those are great too.) Recommend him as great fun.

Vote

2012-01-09T23:23:00.000-08:00

So: http://mauricesmusic.sonicbids.com/BandDetails.aspx?b=30121

To vote for the band's first original song. We want the PR and the perks this brings. Please vote. Every day. What else you gotta do? You are not only helping, but you are ridding the world of those negative folks that continue to channel to me in remarkable subtle ways, that I cannot write a song.

I'm a sensitive sort. I believe in those folks around me. If they say I can't, I will process it until I convince myself that they are wrong. It's a painful process. The saving grace is that I get applause. The first time I sang "There's not a Bird A'Singing" maybe ten-fifteen people applauded. The band doesn't get much applause usually.

2012-01-06T21:38:00.000-08:00

David & Roselyn Check out their site

I found them playing the Venice Boardwalk in the 80s with a couple of little kids dancing around them. It's nice to know they are still cooking. I still have a cassette of theirs from that time. But I just ordered two of their CDS. This was a time in between serious relationships for me, and sometimes on a weekend day I would start out early with breakfast a The Sidewalk Cafe in Venice and spend the entire day walking alone from Venic to Santa Monica and back.

What We're Doing- Part 2

2012-01-05T19:43:00.000-08:00

Open Mic with Carolyn and Nancy

When

Wed, January 18, 7pm – 11pm

1411 Lincoln Blvd., Venice CA 90291

You have to go early to sign up and get a spot.

What We're Doing- Part 1

2012-01-05T19:23:00.000-08:00

http://www.jackandlounge.com/

Norm, our fearless guitarist, will be appearing in the firstepisode-
Premier ofthe webisode Jackandlounge.com New date is Monday Jan. 9, 2012. Make sure yousee it!! Next Monday.

Woody's 1942 New Year Resolutions

2011-12-31T17:27:00.000-08:00

Washing teeth if there are any, is a good one.

2011-12-31T16:14:00.001-08:00

Jerry Jeff Walker - My Old Man - For more funny movies, click here

Gonna have a jam here tomorrow afternoon- decided I'm going to learn this and we can try it out. Come by if you're in the neighborhood

What I found for $4.00

2011-12-29T23:05:00.000-08:00

What I found today at a Thrift Store in West LA. There is a method to my madness

Just In Case You Don't Know It

2011-12-28T18:19:00.001-08:00

Do I look like Woody?

2011-12-28T18:05:00.000-08:00

Well, I've written my first protest song- in the fine manner of Mr. Guthrie, who would steal melodies and write new lyrics on top of the old song. "This Land Is Your Land" was one of those. This melody he stole for "The Great Cooley Dam" Anyway, it's fair, because this melody is public domain now. You probably know it as Wabash Cannonball. It has been stolen and been rewritten several times, Roy Acuff and The Carter Family. I've used some of the original words from this version above. The song above is really just an advertisement for the railroad company. Here's mine:

WABASH REVISITED

G C
When Acuff sang this song, folks were living in Hoovervilles,

D7 G
Shanties by the tracks named for a President that didn’t care,

G C
Now they’re camping out on Wall Street and down at the city hall square,

D7 G
You’d think they’d give up dreaming or wanting their fair share.

CHORUS

Now listen to the jungle, the rumble and the roar,

As she dashes through the woodland and speeds along theshore,

See the mighty rushing engine; hear her whistle ring out,

As she speeds along forever on that dreaming western route.

From a rocky bound Atlantic to a mild Pacific shore,

From a fair and sunny southland to an icebound Labrador,

There’s another name on the shingle, another name over thedoor,

Have we forgotten why we’re singing or what we’re singingfor?

CHORUS

What happened to the mighty engines, the speed and rush inthe night?

The moving on to vast horizons, and the dawn’s early light,

What happened to the trains that would carry us to Gloryland,

Or all those dustbowl stragglers out there looking for ahand.

CHORUS

2011-12-26T09:17:00.000-08:00

This was after my band played at TRiP on Thursday night. These two are buddies of my kids. The band after us cancelled, so the sound guy put these two up. They played for an hour- really great jazz. It sounded a whole lot better than this. This was recorded on my son's phone.

Learning how to do this

2011-12-24T07:27:00.000-08:00

T

This was the best song on an hour and a half set that my son filmed for me at TRiP on Thursday night. The rest were way off to my ear, anyway. You also couldn't see Craig or the bass player Richard and there was only a peek of Betsy. The sound was way off. Norm's guitar was too loud, Oleeta and Nancy's vocal mics were too low. Craig and Betsy couldn't hear the rest of us. This is a learning curve. I'm going to start now standing out front to hear where we are before we start each time. The sound guys we will encounter won't know what our strengths and weaknesses are or who's going to do what in the songs. Had Ben been there, he probably would not have been heard over the wrong balance of things. You couldn't hear Betsy's solo again.

2011-12-23T15:55:00.001-08:00

R

Rhubarb at TRiP last night. Hope everyone has a great holiday!

We are playing here on Thursday Night though

2011-12-20T15:52:00.000-08:00

Thursday
Dec 22, 2011

8:00pm

Honeybear, Rhubarb Meringue Pie and more

We're on at 9:00

2011-12-20T15:43:00.000-08:00

Well, in a moment of weakness, I submitted the band to this place. You've probably heard of it. We won't get anything, no doubt. We are still playing songs off music stands. No one practices and we only rehearse once a month. We got a ways to go. I like the Swap Meet because it feels like we are rehearsing live. I've decided I need to start memorizing the songs. Ah, we can dream can't we?

Its Just A Song

2011-12-15T22:25:00.001-08:00

It's just a song. A little thing really.

Still Working on this One

2011-12-15T22:19:00.000-08:00

Green Eyes By Kate Wolf

C#m                                E               B                           E
Every night we light the candle that stands beside our bed
       Cm                                                   A
But sometimes the flame's too much to handle
                            E                                B                            C#m
That's what you said. That's what you said and you should know
                       A                                                   E
Because you built a fire in me and you made it burn
         A                                                E                             B
You followed me, watching every move, matching every turn.

CHORUS
   E                                                    B
Your green eyes they don't miss a thing
          C#m                                     A
They hold me like the sun going down
   F#                                     B                       C#m   B Cm
Warm me like a fire in the night, without a sound

C#m E B E

You were waiting till I heard, just as patient as that lovelight in your eyes,

E B C#m
You never threw away a word or ever talked in disguise, I ought to know

A E

You were a beacon to a sailor lost at sea

A E B

I saw it in your eyes when you looked at me, so openly.

CHORUS

C#m E B E
The first time I ever saw your laughter break loose inside and tumble out to me

Cm A

My heart knew it had found what it was after

E B C#m

And it came so easily, we should know

A E

After all the years of the hard and lonely times

A E B
Now our days go by like best friends story lines, yours and mine.

She removes the second line out of the second verse. The meter is all over the place. And that C#m makes me only play four strings and leaves the high G string out there all alone. Ah well, if you don't stretch, where will you go. Nancy sings it well. The song is a great woman's song about being really loved. Not too many of those around that mean something.

We're going to try to do it at TRiP next Thursday night- Our First Club Date!!

The Second One

2011-12-12T21:48:00.001-08:00

The second one- They put obstacles in your way to doing this and sometimes its your friends. Thank you god, for these folks and their support for letting me do this.

Copying the thing

2011-12-11T22:04:00.001-08:00

Years of watching television late at night with the sound off has lead me to believe that there are a thousand scenarios for any scene presented. This could be a couple being married confronted by a angry suitor, or a couple being married by a alien, or a couple being married by a gay woman priest that had been a man in a previous life that that been married to the woman here. It all works. Perhaps the same is true with melody. Here is the mythic depression, the wants-bes of the 60s wishing they were struggling in the 30s. Woody Allen pretending to be a wanta-be that wanted the 20s in Paris.(The Streets of Paris, the latest movie) Bobby (Dylan) wanted to be Woody Guthrie. George Harrison, etc s, wanted to be Roy Orbison.

I found this recently:

THE GREAT ROCK-ISLAND ROUTE by J.A Roff 1882

Dedicated to The General Ticket & Passenger Agent

G                                                                             C
From a rocky bound Atlantic to a mild Pacific Shore
D7                                                                                     G
From a fair and sunny southland to an ice bound Labrador
G                                                                                                                 C
There’s a name of magic import and tis known the world throughout
    D7                                                                                         G
Tis a mighty corporation called the Great Rock Island Route

CHORUS

Now listen to the jingle and the rumble and the roar

As she dashes through the woodland and speeds along theshore

See the mighty rushing engine, hear her merry bell ring out

As they speed along in safety on the Great Rock Island Route

CHORUS

All great cities of importance can be found along its way

There’s Chicago and Peroria and Rock Island so they say

With Davenport and westward still is Council Bluffs far out

As a western termination of the Great Rock Island Route

CHORUS

Now let music soft and tender in its mysric power reveal

Praises to the Great Rock Island that the heart can onlyfeel

And to swell the mighty chorus comes the glad re-echoingshout

That for safety time and comfort take the Great Rock IslandRoute

This is the original of Wabash Cannonball that morphed into something totally different.

Wisdom from the Comments

2011-12-11T16:24:00.001-08:00

This was left as a comment on Friday night's post :"It may not seem like it at times, but you're on the right track. Let the others get their songs first, then they'll be more willing to work on your material." Today, short handed because of illness, I had to sing for two hours straight. Oleeta did great , but the third voice was greatly needed. Anyhow, this is indeed where we are. Craig, in sort of a break period played this incredible hamonia thing that was amazing. He wrote it. I'm trying to encourage all of them to give us what they have. Its a scary thing, being in front of people. We need to listen and listen again. There is a generosity of spirit that we all have, that can create amazing things. (As long as you ARE NOT an old man that thinks he's right.)

Empty chairs

2011-12-09T23:53:00.001-08:00

What a feeling when people that have filled your evening get up and leave. We rehearsed. Got a gig Sunday at the Melrose Trading Post Swap Meet for 2 1/2 hours. Missing three tonight. I always worry about people getting disillusioned or that their needs aren't getting met. They all want to be the star. Well, I do too, but I know I'm not going to be. I want to get my songs up and I want to play and sing. I will share with all. I don't have to the center of attention. I just want room to express. Norman wants us to rehearse twice before the Thursday night club date. We should and those that want will. I really need to start memorizing songs. It quiet here now. Sweet dreams children.

First Club

2011-12-06T19:36:00.001-08:00

Well, our very first club - Come by if you are in the neighborhood. We get an hour

2011-12-05T23:17:00.001-08:00

There's songs that are you. I've been playing thus one for five years now. And only sang it once in public.

Wayfaring Stranger

2011-12-04T19:39:00.001-08:00

Another Sawtooth video. I've been playing this behind Sean at the Nursing Home for about a year I think. I used to whistle it to myself when I was hitch-hiking across the country in the early 70s. I find myself still wanting to whistle when I play it. It was on a Michael Parks album when I was a teenager. Maybe it's time I tried singing it. Wonder if I can whistle in tune?

2011-12-03T17:06:00.001-08:00

Here's my friends, part of the Saturday morning jam at the park. Ray on upright bass, Sean on guitar & vocals and Ted on Banjo. These guys were happy and friendly when I showed up barely able to play my thing. I still can't play, but who cares. A great tight little group. All great musicians. We're doing a week of Sawtooth.

Freight Train- Our Version

2011-12-01T22:00:00.001-08:00

More Nancy

2011-12-01T19:50:00.001-08:00

Places I Applied Today for the Band

2011-12-01T19:29:00.001-08:00

The Santa Monica Airport Antiques Flea Market

The El Monte Tet Festival (where else to sing ugly american folk songs)

Paint: Lab on Main Street in Santa Monica

Paint, Wine and Cheese

Friday & Saturday nights from 6:00 – 9:00pm

Unwind from your busy work week…. Let’s get creative!Uninstructed.

RESERVATION REQUIRED

$30 + Canvas Purchase

(lab fee includes paints, wine & cheese)

* Come paint with us!! Invite your friends!! *

“Last Fridays” Paint, Wine and Cheese include LIVE music

and go until 10 PM! The next one is on November 25

Well, why not? It might be fun.

You just throw it at as many walls you can find and you hope it sticks.

Been back at the novel as well finally

2011-11-29T22:17:00.001-08:00

Thanks for the tip on the C#m whosever you are. I like this place for chords:

http://www.musicopedia.com/chords/5-banjo.php

I feel like the little boy banjo is growing every day. I keep thinking back to sitting here, playing Oklahoma Hills over and over to learn the D chord.

I keep throwing our name in for things. Other Swap Meets, Farmers Markets, Night Clubs The Venice Summer Fest, the LA Marathon, Keep it moving.

Daydee has confronted the bad guys- (look back for episodes from the first draft in the blog, the first 70 or so single spaced pages are there)

Went to see Kermit play his banjo in the new Muppet Movie. His left hand moved this time. He's slowing down like the rest of us. He used to play so fast, that it looked like his hand didn't move at all.

My kids grew up on the Muppets and Fraggle Rock and Sesame Street. I grew up on the Muppets.

The Real Banjo:

Saturday Morning

2011-11-28T22:31:00.001-08:00

We played at Edgewater Home in Long Beach on Saturday morning. An hour and a half. Great audience, great fun playing with these guys. I did Freight Train in its original slowness. Even thought of playing my banjo upside down:

Last Night

2011-11-28T20:55:00.001-08:00

Went to visit the "Songmakers" Hoot on the 4th Sunday in Santa Monica. Everyone is my age of course, or older. Thousands of guitars and one fiddle, one flute, one little vibe set, a piano and me. The only ones that play throughout all are the ones that can just hear the music and play it. No beginners, just a good size group of singers without instruments. They go around the circle. If you are lucky, you get two turns for a 4 hour stay. Nice folks, but I want to play more and learn. The leader sez its not good to have your head stuck in a book all the time. I was talking about trying to do original music with a band. And a random lady sez 'Well, you know, its hard to play to some else's sensibilities.' Isn't that what you do when you play a cover of someone else's song? A lot of the old chestnuts were sung. Probably won't bother going back. The open mics and the other Santa Monica group that meets once a month amounts to the same experience: 4 hours and two songs and a lot of so-so mixed in with good stuff and no one learning a thing. Nice folks though.

Back to embedding from YouTube

2011-11-25T23:03:00.001-08:00

Believe it or not, this is exactly the same file as the one posted in the first square in the earlier post. I guess I go back to doing it this way. Upload to You Tube and then embed the video back into the blog. It works better in Facebook this way as well. Weird.

2011-11-25T21:18:00.001-08:00

I'm trying this again, to figure out what version I should be uploading- the first couple I tried, didn't present the picture clearly. Usually I just upload to YouTube and embed it back into the blog. It's another one of Nancy's songs from her performance at the The Talking Stick.

2011-11-24T21:50:00.001-08:00

Nancy singing "Green Eyes" by Kate Wolf last night at The Talking Stick. The band is picking this up. It has a C#m that leaves me banjo out in the four string limbo, but I willing to do it. I'm open to good sounds and she has a voice, don't you think.

Hope you all had a great Thanksgiving day. I cooked straight through from 8:30 to 2:30 and we had a remarkable meal. I love doing the gourmet thing when it's just mine. I'm for hire. I could do a holiday for $300.00 plus expenses, or for nothing if I love you.

Been Buzy

2011-11-22T20:40:00.001-08:00

Been busy running around. Playing cards, going back to yoga, Really practicing the banjo. Getting back on the schtick. A band mate sent a sheet for a song called Devil's Dream, which I haven't ever heard before so I found it in my Fiddlers Fakebook Songbook and then went on You Tube to hear it. Then I decided to see if there were words to it- when I didn't find any I went my curious "Favorite Songs & Hymns" published 1899. Didn't find it there, but did run across this:

The words made me think maybe I'd found a cool song that could maybe express what a soldier in Afghanistan on watch might be feeling (with a little rewrite) So I went looking for it performed,

Found this:

It sort of sounds like one of those automated music mp3s thingee you run into when you look for old old melodies. Not the guy, the music.

This is our author: John Braham (c. 1774 – 17 February 1856) was a tenor opera singer born in London, England. His long career led him to become one of Europe's leading opera stars. He also wrote a number of songs, of minor importance, although The Death of Nelson is still remembered. His success, and that of his offspring in marrying into the British aristocracy, are also notable examples of Jewish social mobility in the early 19th century.

Definitely Public Domain song. Got a melody and some words, needs a bit of work Probably not.

(This is what I do these days instead of real work)

2011-11-19T00:25:00.001-08:00

This is probably this closest version to what I do with my low voice. It's this tempo. We had rehearsal tonight. Ben, our guru, was in in an odd mood. But he wanted to do this one. He wanted to add guitar and fiddle and fix it up. This was the first one I brought the first time I went to the Saturday Morning Bluegrass Group, Betsy's group. I was proud of myself, because I knew all the chords. She asked me if I had a tuner. It took me a half hour to realize that I was out of tune. Nice lady- one of the best.

Heard at the last Square Dance

2011-11-18T13:49:00.001-08:00

Been busy with the Mama Bear in the hospital. All is done now, cards at home instead at UCLA

Enjoy- Listen to the your children

2011-11-14T22:48:00.001-08:00

The Very First One

2011-11-14T21:56:00.001-08:00

This is the song of mine that the band has been playing for a while. Gail loved it, thank god. It was the first one that I wrote. It was really a failed poem that had never worked The band embellished the chords a bit and I edited it down. I played it for the first time at Doug's house jam in Long Beach. And there was silence after I played & sang it. I announced it as the first one, after. Hell, I know what I got, no matter how raw. I'm thinking maybe, this is what I was supposed to be doing all along.
Little Sister Words Dan McNay,
Music Rhubarb Meringue Pie

You remember her; you saw her long ago,
Out in the lobby in a crowd and all alone,
With her hand outstretched and her face aglow,
As if your change would buy her fare to heaven.

She was born in a big house, had big house ways,
She had everything she could want or need.
Then Daddy fell from a window in a drunken daze
And they had to give up everything they owned.

CHORUS
She will always follow the good looking guy
With the beard and the twinkle in his eye,
The one who talks of wisdom and then who sighs
And brings her on his own bus if she doesn’t cry.

She went to college to run away from home,
But she was always fat and always alone,
She didn’t want to marry, didn’t want to roam,
And she would pray in secret late at night.

She was an angel in Monterey
Who gave a poor boy her smile
She said I had a very old soul
As old as the hills we climbed

So what did she find in the Krishna dance?
What was real in the fog of the old sweat lodge?
The guru was the knight of the last chance,
And all of us just want to arrive

CHORUS

Repeat first stanza

So, Song Lyrics

2011-11-14T21:19:00.001-08:00

For My Lost Daughter – Dan McNay

G EM

I would write a song about dust

G D7

The dry clay summer dust

That runs through your fingers like silk

But adheres to the touch

G EM

A clap of hands sends a cloud

G EM

Swirling in sunlight and settling

On the grass and weeds

C G

And brittle leaves scattered about

CHORUS

G EM

I carried her down the stairs

C G

With her head on my shoulder

And handed her over to be strapped in

C G

To the car that went away forever

G EM

I would write a song about dust

G D7

Because the scar on my heart remains

And aches each day I think of you

Though you dissolve in the glare

G EM

Leaving empty air as still as death

G EM

Words once said are silent as sand

And I want for a young girl

C G

That dust and sand are a way home

CHORUS

G EM

A mound becomes a cake, twigs for candles

G D7

A smooth spot, a place to draw

All that matters can be managed here

Sand can be easily carried away

G EM

In the bottom of big pockets

G EM

Or in shoes emptied before going in

And I would pray she dreams

C G

Always of sand and shovels and pails

CHORUS

This one is pretty much just me putting a poem I already wrote to music and adding a chorus to break your heart. It is the best one I've written me thinks. Haven't really performed it too much. But come January I'm doing three of them with a little accompaniment at Boulevard Music.

Recommendations

2011-11-11T23:04:00.001-08:00

I'm in love with these two- ah to be young. There's a double album out, apparently
Mandolin Orange @UNC-TV from David Huppert on Vimeo.
">
Mandolin Orange @UNC-TV from David Huppert on Vimeo.

Are We Looking Old?

2011-11-11T19:54:00.001-08:00

I was looking through the playlist. A lot of the songwriters are dead. I forgot this guy:

The Judds are still around- the youngest is Ketch Secor who wrote Wagon Wheel.

Oh well, I guess we are old.

I just asked the Boy Scouts and the Girl Scouts in LA if they want free Americana music for fundraisers. I think I'm brilliant,

The Growth of The Playlist

2011-11-10T21:28:00.001-08:00

In the beginning there were four or five of us at work and we decided we would sing for our Director who was retiring. So we came up with Aloha, Hit The Road Jack and something else I can't remember. We had three uke players, one guitar and my banjo. After that, we decided to come once a week at lunch and practice and play. I found four easy chord songs and passed them out: Roll In My Sweet Baby's Arms, Wabash Cannonball, Ring The Banjo & Tom Dooley. Barden offered up a Marty Robbins song and Wayne offered up Back Home Again and MTA. I invited Craig from the 12th floor. We moved to my house and everyone dropped out but Wayne & Craig & me. I invited Marla and Gail. I injected This Little Light of Mine and Gulf Coast Highway because I was already playing them. Marla threw in Daniel (which is no longer on the list) We were doing open mics at Boulevard Music in Culver City and only had enough for time for three songs so we worked up based on that. Gail brought songs and we learned them but only played You're Sixty in performance I think. Then we got the pancake breakfast. We had 2 hours to fill. I threw a bunch of songs that Wayne & I had been playing at the Saturday Morning Bluegrass Meetup in Long Beach: It Takes A Worried Man, I'll Fly Away, etc (I Aint Gonna Be Treated This Away, Pallet On Your Floor, and Fair & Tender Ladies are from here) Then I thought, I'm writing all these songs- why not do them- We ended up doing one because I let them rewrite the melody and Gail loved it.) I gave everybody all of my originals and Wayne gave everybody every song he had ever sung. That ended up the problem.

I'm the organizer, so we were doing the playlist just in Alphabetical Order, because that seemed the simplest thing to do, Wayne and Marla said we should think up something different, but they would never work on it. So as I was compiling this new list, I threw the ballads in one pile and the quicker songs in another and then tried to combine them in some entertaining way.

The whole idea now is just to keep a movement forward. The singers get to pick what we want as we all learn and then replace things. But we still have 2 1/2 hours of stuff. The instrumentalists get to pick the things they want and we will showcase those as well.

I'm not really attached to half the songs here. MTA, Roll In My Sweet Baby's Arms, Wabash Cannonball, Freight Train, Worried Man, This Little Light, Cotton Jenny, I'll Fly Away, Country Roads, can all disappear. I'm ready to move on. But we need to move on together doing things that everyone wants to do.

I need to give Oleeta and Richard and Nancy more songs to sing! I want fiddle tunes and banjo that Betsy and Renata and Ben can sail away with! I think we're on to something!

So This Is The Playlist For The Band

2011-11-10T21:26:00.001-08:00

Play Me Some Mountain Music

I’ll Fly Away

Freight Train

Fair & Tender Ladies

Green Eyes

Going Down That Road Feeling Bad

Oklahoma Hills

Don’t Make It Rain

Cotton Jenny

Three Little Words

Worried Man Blues

Both Sides Now

Jerusalem Ridge

This Little Light of Mine

Wabash Cannonball

Love Can Build A Bridge

Country Roads

Little Sister

Hallelujah

Pallet On Your Floor

You’re Sixty

Gulf Coast Highway

Roll In My Sweet Baby’s Arms

MTA

Summertime

San Antonio Rose

Lay Down Beside Me

Blue Moon of Kentucky

Back Home Again

This Land Is Your Land

If You See Her

You Ain’t Going Nowhere

Streets of Laredo

Wagon Wheel

Daydream Believin'

2011-11-10T08:43:00.001-08:00

I signed up for this Sonicbids Service since it looks like some venues want you to subnit through these folks. I put us in for a Festival in Santa Barbara this way. I get these "Gig Of The Day" emails. There's a few that are just contests: pay your money and win for your song or whatever. Those are just vanity things to take your money. But these- boy, can a boy dream, can't he?

2011-11-07T20:39:00.001-08:00

It's hard to resist

Me Again

2011-11-07T19:48:00.001-08:00

More of me playing at the Visitation School. It was a good day. I went back later in the evening to see my friend Mike play and filmed him and a boy scout on piano that I know. (The food wasn't too great for us blood suger challenged.)

One more

2011-11-06T22:25:00.001-08:00

One More for the Road: Oleeta singing "Blue Moon Of Kentucky" at the Vet Day Stage. The Marching Bands had quieted down for a moment.

2011-11-06T21:38:00.000-08:00

This was sweet Martha's response to my email after the Vet day thing. She hired us (at no pay) because I called her to ask about a non-profit vendor booth (for $10.00)- I thought we could just pay the $10 and play all afternoon. She asked what kind of music did we play and I answered with the right group- "The Kingston Trio, etc" She asked us to play the stage. One of my band mates today said she didn't think they were too organized or too aware of what they were trying to do. (Martha has asked me to rent the generator and she'd reimburse me, but I had no idea what I should be getting- so they supplied it.)

Dan,
You are brilliant! that is an idea that has a lot of merit.
I will keep you in mind for next year; this year was excellent.
I will spread the work about your group.

Thanks again for all you did to make our event a success.

Martha
P.S. Next time you perform out doors and need a generator...
a 2000 volt one is what you need. It worked yesterday.

> Date: Sun, 6 Nov 2011 04:18:05 -0800
> From: mcnay@mosis.com
> To: msthuente@hotmail.com
> Subject: Parade
>
> Marthe,
>
> Thanks for having us. We had fun.
>
> I had a thought about next year. If the stage was set up at the far end
> of the vendor area, with it being close to the food vendors, it would
> afford us being able to play better without the noise of the marching
> band leaving the staging area and we could attract more people to be
> present at your award ceremony. Give it some thought.
>
> Thanks again. Keep us in mind for next year or anything else your group
> might be doing. Memorial Day?
>
> Dan
>

Visitation School Today

2011-11-06T21:27:00.000-08:00

It poured down all morning. I called the school and they said it was on. We'd be under a canopy even if it was pouring. About 10:30 it just stopped, by 12:00 the sun was shining. And us three that will go anywhere anytime showed. This was the next to last song we did. First time out in public, and only one rehearsal. (But I've been playing this song by myself for two years now.

Vet Day

2011-11-06T05:07:00.000-08:00

Vet Parade Stage Day

Well, I'm back. We played the stage before and after the award ceremony. This is a picture from last year. We had the back half of the stage. It wasn't quite what I expected. We really didn't have an audience until just before the awards and only a couple of people afterward. I suggested the stage be moved for next year, away from the marching bands staging to start the parade and next to the vendor fair, so we could attract an audience and they would have more people there for their award ceremony.

Still working out all of the kinks and all of the sound and how we do this together. Anyway it was good practice for the real thing, when there's a real thing.

Time Off

2011-10-24T14:58:00.001-07:00

I've decided to take a break from writing this blog. Please check back December 1st, to see if I decide to go on with it.

Adventures In Band

2011-10-10T22:45:00.000-07:00

Posted this to Craiglist today. Got Stand up Bass & accordion player interested same day.

Now I'm Scared. Told my wife: I'm creating band that will not want me as a member

Old Folks Folk/Bluegrass Band Looking (West LA)

Date: 2011-10-10, 4:02PM PDT
Reply to: comm-evkxr-2643017368@craigslist.org ^{[Errors when replying to ads?]}

We have a folk/bluegrass band that has been playing no money gigs around West LA. Usually play once or twice a month. Currently at Fairfax High Swap Meet and Brentwood Art Fair this month. Generally rehearse once a month at private home near LAX. We're looking for a stand up bass, a squeeze box or accordian player and maybe keyboard. Must be willing to show up and play for free. No prima donnas please. We all have input on material. Average age of group is 60.

Location: West LA
it's NOT ok to contact this poster with services or other commercial interests

PostingID: 2643017368

She marched with these guys

2011-10-10T22:17:00.000-07:00

She walked with these guys. She said there was one guy that would just run you over, if he didn't like your look.

The Road to The Bear

2011-10-10T22:12:00.000-07:00

This is the road up to the VA Home in Yountville where the bear is doing her internship. We treat our Vets correctly at least- at least to our ultimate incompetent ability to do anything right. She's doing it right.

Daydee- nearing the end of what I've written

2011-10-10T22:03:00.000-07:00

She took the lunch out to the cemetery and found Jack’s truck parked before the office. There was a hammering noise coming from the shed. She thought he must be having trouble with the mower. She turned the corner and found that he had moved the cemetery’s backhoe near the shed and was hammering away at its bucket, or at least at the bolts that held it in place.

“Hey,” she hollered.

He jumped and then stood up slowly to face her. He had a sheepish look on his face.

“What’s up?” she asked.

“Well, I’ve been having problems with the back hoe, so I thought I’d move the bucket to my hoe to make the opening and closing go easier.”

She looked him up and down. There was something wrong with this picture.

“You were going to ask me?” she asked.

“Well, it’s not like you even know how to operate it.”

“If I did learn, how was I going to use it or hire somebody else to use it if it has no bucket?”

“Well, I can’t even it off. The bolts are rusted permanent,” he said.

“So you are going to try to break it so no one can use it.”

“Why on earth would you say that?” he asked. “Haven’t I been doing a good job for you>”

“Jack, I overheard you and Edward and Winston in the parking lot behind the restaurant the other day. None of you saw me.”

Jack turned crimson.

“You want to tell me what’s going on?’ she asked.

He looked a lot like Winston did. Lightening had struck.

“Well? This was getting a little scary.

“I guess I’m out of line,” he said without looking up. “Maybe you should find someone else to work the grounds for you. I’ll stay on until you can get someone.”

“That’s not even what we’re talking about. If I described the conversation to Susan, would she know what it was about?”

“You leave her out of this!”

“Tell you what. You’re fired. Get the hell out of here. “ Daydee told him.

He picked up his hammer and screwdriver and started toward his truck. He turned back and stared at her.

“You-“

“I fucking know, asshole! I gotta get out of town! Take a flying leap!”

He turned and climbed in the truck and drove off like a robot. And this was the fucking minster! What the hell was she going to do now? She could cut the grass herself and water- how hard would that be? It was a riding mower anyway. And it’d be good exercise for the baby. It was running the backhoe that was the problem. She remembered her father’s lunch still sitting in her truck.

She walked it out and didn’t find a trace of him other than the shopping cart. She left it and walked back trying to figure this one out. Maybe there was a manual in the office for the thing. She went back and searched and finally found it. She sat down in the office to look at it. It told you what all the parts were and what levers did what, but nothing about what sequence to do it in. It was still early afternoon, so she took the book and went out to the machine. They had just left the key in the ignition. That was going to change. What would stop them from coming out here and driving it away? This was getting real scary, And the women she had gotten to know didn’t seem to have a clue about whatever it was that was going on about her and the goddamn football team. That was the connection! They had all played for Winston at the same time! Back just before she ran away. There had to be something valuable about the estate that she didn’t know about that they did. What other reason would they have?

The book said to let the machine warm up. She turned it on and gave it gas. It purred. Now would be a good time for a cigarette, but she had quit for the baby’s sake. Or at least was trying to. She lit one. It was the first of the day. It was easier not to in the morning when she was sick. She rubbed it out on the side of her tennis shoe and stuck the butt in her shirt pocket. That was another reason to quit. It was getting unconvertible to bend over like that. And she couldn’t just flick the butt out on the grounds. She was afraid that she might mess up the grounds by hitting a lever wrong, so she drove it down the little lane to the back of the property where she had first found her father. A hole back here wouldn’t hurt anything. She played a little with the two big levers and figured out how to lift the bucket and stretch it out in front. But when she started it down the entire cab leaned forward dangerously. She stopped, the sweat dripping off her forehead. Jesus Christ! Now what? She studied the book closely, hoping that the whole thing wouldn’t pitch over before she got it figured out. The stabilizers! She worked the little levers in front and the two stabilizer legs went down and straightened the cab out and up so it was level. Trying again with the bucket, she kind of made a motion that looked like it would scoop the soil up, but she had somehow missed the ground, She tried again and scrapped up the weeds. The third try actually made a shallow trench in the ground, but she dumped the earth back before she could get it off to the side. She spent another half hour playing with, trying to make it work like she imagined it was supposed to. She’d have to come out and practice every day, before she was ready for a grave opening.

By the time she was actually scooping dirt out and laying it aside she was exhausted and wet with sweat. She took a break and climbed down to stretch her legs. Her back and arms were aching. This was hard work. She started with another cigarette, but talked herself out of it and put it back in her pocket. There was something in the dirt. She walked over and looked under the shadow of the arm, It was a human skeleton. The skull and ribs and backbone were all uncovered. Another scoop and she might have broken it apart. Down a couple of yards in her shallow trench was another skull.

She lit her cigarette now. Jesus Christ! What was her mother doing? Emptying out the graves and selling the plots again? Murdering people? Was this what Winston and his boys were scared that I might find? She walked back to the office as quickly as she could and called the sheriff.

The sheriff came out by himself. He looked exactly the same as last time. She wondered if he had only one uniform. There wasn’t a trace of a woman about him. His fringe of hair had been trimmed recently. She thought of the old men that had come across her live- not one of them had a women to tell them to clip their nose hair.

“What were you doing over here anyway?”

“I’m trying to learn how to use the back hoe. This looked like a good place to practice.”

“You had a falling out with Jack?”

“Jack no longer works for me.”

“What happened?”

“Maybe you can ask him.”

“I thought you were coming to church and all.”

“Well, to be honest sheriff, Jack and Edward and Winston seem to be hell bent on getting me to leave.”

“Why would they want to do that?”

“You really should ask them. They won’t tell me a thing.”

He wrote a note in his little notepad. Then he stepped down into the little trench and bent over the skeleton. It looked like was bending over was as hard for him as it was for her. He walked up to the skull.

“You’ll need a special heavy equipment license to drive that out on the street,“ he told her. “Well, I’m afraid I’ve got to ask you not to touch a thing until we can take a good look at all of this. I’m going to call in the request in a minute and we’ll have the forensic folks out here, but there’s no guarantee they will finish up today. You don’t need the back hoe right now?”

“No.”

“You have any knowledge about your mother’s activities that you haven’t told me about?”

“None. We hadn’t talked in twenty years. She only found me because I sent her a Christmas card a couple of years ago. We exchanged a couple of letters. That was about it.”

“You involved in any activities that you want to tell me about that might be against the law?’

“What?”

“You seem all right to me. I’m a pretty good judge of character, but there will have to be a trip to the office for you to make a statement and allow us to question you further.”

“Sure.”

“Nothing you want to say about anything?”

She shook her head.

“Nothing about that accountant of yours?”

“Mark?”

“He’s left town. There’s a bunch of gossip going around. “

“What kind of gossip?” Her heart sank.

“I’ll leave that up to you women. But the more I know, the better for everyone.”

“He was married, wasn’t he? What does his wife say?”

“I’ve not talked to her yet, but if I do, it becomes an official investigation. You understand that?”

Daydee nodded. Shit!

“So I can trust you not to touch anything?”

“I usually just go for a long walk this time of day.” She suddenly thought of her father down the hill. What if they found him? “I’m going for that walk if you don’t need me.”

“Ok.”

He went back to his patrol car. She started off in a slightly different direction and planned to circle back to her father’s shopping cart as soon as she was out of the sheriff’s sight. And now Mark! She hoped it wasn’t about what she figured it was.

There was no trace of him. The lunch she had left earlier was untouched. She pushed the cart down further into the trees until she was certain it wouldn’t be seen unless you were right on top of it. She dragged a couple dead branches over and propped them up against the side of the cart. It was getting harder and harder to do anything physical now. She was sweaty and out of breath. It was really like carrying a bowling ball around with you.

She walked further into the woods, thinking she might spot him. What the hell was she going to do with if she did find him. It’s not like she could make him understand to stay away from the cemetery. Or would she be able to entice him out and away. She thought a trail of French fries might get him to follow her a little way, but even if she got him as far as the truck, there was no way he was going to get in. She wasn’t sure why it was important to protect him from the cops. They would just hassle him and shoot him if he gave them trouble, or if he didn’t, they would take him in and then let him go the next day downtown. She wasn’t sure he would be able to find his way back out here.

How long had he been out here? How had he lived before she appeared? She sat down on a log. This was pretty pointless. This whole thing was turning into the biggest mess anyone could imagine. It was too overwhelming. Now the cemetery was going to be investigated. And they’ll book her for whoring even though it was just a little make-believe tea party. And she had this goddamn baby that she hadn’t even been to the doctor about yet. What if was going to just be a lump or worst, some kind of monster? She thought she could do this. She thought she could handle anything. So why was she sitting here bawling her eyes out? She drew her knees in and rocked herself. She was trembling.

“Deedee making babies.” Her father said from behind her. “It’s hard hard work.”

She jumped and then laughed.

“You’re damn right its hard!”

He patted her head. She was afraid to turn and spook him.

“Did you see the sheriff?” she asked.

“Sheriff invibable. He see ghosts and not ghosts. Lots of nots. Nots and nots. He doesn’t like.”

“So you stay away?”

“I stay at home.”

“Sure,” she smiled, drying her tears with the backs of her hands. “It’s too bad you don’t make sense. “

“Deedee stay home.”

“Sure.”

He withdrew his hand. She missed it already.

She stood and turned. He was standing right there. She put out her arms. He came to hug her ever so gently, as if she were made of brittle twigs which might snap if squeezed. Then he backed away.

“Thank you,” she said. Was this really her father?

He was nodding his head as he moved off into the brush. He was gone quickly.

Up In Smoke

2011-10-06T15:46:00.000-07:00

This was my life from age 15 to 19. We were brilliant. Read famous books behind our school books. Played chess (and Martian Chess), made up Civil War battlefield games using the actual battles. Read all of Steinbeck one summer. Drank homemade wine and hung out in between working in a college restaurant and pretending to go to college. I can still smell the cigarette ash. You couldn't play chess or write poetry without lighting up. She would stick her burning cigarette in the strings of her guitar near the top of the neck when she played.

Believe it or Not

2011-10-06T15:14:00.000-07:00

Believe it or not, I've actually played this game. The pieces were not this fancy. They were little wooden blocks with pictures drawn on the top of them. The board was a hand colored piece butcher block paper.

A childhood buddy and I had read all of Burroughs' Mars books and so we created a working set to play. It plays a little weird if you know anything about real chess. There's a link below, if you want to learn how to play.

http://www.chessvariants.com/other.dir/jetan.html

We are just in time for this:

Jetan

The recent explorations on Mars have not yet uncovered a chess variant that is played on this planet. While it seems unlikely that the Pathfinder will discover such a game, author Edgar Rice Burroughs (well known for his Tarzan books) describes a form of Martian Chess.
Burroughs wrote a series of adventure (science fiction) books that play on the planet Mars. In the fifth of these books, called The Chessmen of Mars, a game is played, and the rules are given. This `Martian Chess' is Jetan, the game whose rules are described below. The game is very playable and entertaining according to Gollon.
The game represents a war between a yellow and a black race of Martians.
Here you see the cover of the book where the game appears. You can also view the cover in more detail (file of size 221K.)

There are two places in Burroughs' book where the rules are given: 1) they are summarized at the very end, 2) they are also presented in the Chapter 2. It seems that very few people paid attention in the past to this chapter 2 which contains some interesting and unique informations.
Jetan has been described in several books and many places on the web. However, the given rules suffer from different interpretation of the somewhat minimalist text from Burroughs. Even worst, some wrong interpretations have been re-taken by other authors with more errors. The rules given hereafter are the results of going back to the original source (that you can check yourself). Play-testing with Zillions software has also been very useful since it has definitively shown that the end-game rules had to be revised.
See also

The Rules of Jetan. By Larry Lynn Smith.
The Rules of Jetan: link2.dir/jetanrules.html. By Larry Lynn Smith.
Tommy's Toys has a shareware program that plays Jetan. (Link.)
The complete text of the "Chessmen Of Mars" from E.R.Burroughs .
Everything about Barsoom you don't know yet

Catie Curtis

2011-10-05T21:12:00.000-07:00

New Album Out- Gonna be at McCabe's on October 21st.

More and More

2011-10-05T20:57:00.000-07:00

So she would go out every day at lunch time with a bag from McDonald’s. She bought him two lunches and that way she wouldn’t feel guilty about not bringing him dinner as well. She wasn’t sure she wanted to be out at the cemetery at night with a crazy man and a tagger than was still out there and had some kind of axe to grind. He seldom came up to the office and she would go down into the pasture to find him. For a few days she didn’t see him at all. But she left the bag on his shopping cart and the next day it would be eaten. She carried the trash out if she could spot it. Other days he would be sitting there waiting. He never looked at her, but did keep on mentioning Deedee from time to time. Did he even realize who she was? The tears on the first day made her think he did, but there wasn’t any way to really know. There was troubling talk about people snipping him or poisoning him. He seemed to like popping about, that was the only was she could explain it. He would just leap up and then settle down in a different place. She never went very close. He would move off if she did. She would tell him things about her life. None of it sunk in,

She was stymied about what to do with him. She could have him committed somewhere, she supposed, but she didn’t think that was a great option. Somehow that would make him hate her, she thought. She kept thinking that perhaps she could coax him into her car, take him home and give him a bath. That once he was inside and cleaned up, he might settle down and be lazy about being schizophrenic. She knew that would never happen, but if he was willing to follow her, she might give it try. He wouldn’t follow her. So she was going to just him be until something changed. The winter was still far off. He was surviving, as he had done for the last twenty years, without her help. And now it was probably easier because she was at least feeding him. She was going to go to thrift store and bring him back some better clothes by the end of the week. This could go on for a while. At least until the owner of the pasture realized he was here and the sheriff would probably show up and run him off. She needed to find the owner and head that off.

Her lunches were her rambling on about New Orleans. She had grown to love the city, and all of its excesses. She left out the trade, the way she made money. She talked about the Saturday afternoon strolls through humid run down neighborhoods. The old black men that were all forever gentle and kind. The food. The rain that came for just an half an hour every summer day right after lunch. Mardi Gras. The church bells, the streetcars and the music. The way everyone talked so slow and patiently. The alcohol that could make an evening glow like real romance. The snails on the sidewalk after the rain. The big porches and big windows that you could walk through. The way leather would turn green if you left it in a drawer too long. The Hurricanes that always seem to miss the city. The antiques you could find everywhere. The odd little places you could live that were sheltered by moss covered trees. And you could be a lady 24 hours a day and that was fine because it was the south. The old while men with their moustaches and white hair and suits the color of ice cream. And canes. And they might even call you missy, if they were sweet on you. She wasn’t sure what had started this pouring forth of the things she missed, but he seemed to sit and witness her while he ate, even if he didn’t hear what she was saying.

She knew it couldn’t go on forever.

The morning sickness didn’t go away. And it got worse.

The day of the shower came quickly. Her new friends seemed to rejoice in putting this on. Susan came early with a couple of trays of hors d'oeuvres. She helped tidy up the place and arrange chairs out in the living room. She had even brought a bag of fold-up cardboard baby shower decorations, which she proceeded to tape up on her walls and across the front window. Everything was pastel yellow, pink and blue. Another lady came with a cake and baby shower paper plates. Sarah brought a couple bottles of Champaign. The other women she didn’t know, but it soon became apparent that they were from the same church. The wife of her sharecropper came, who she hadn’t seen since that first night when they had laid claim to furniture and knickknacks that had belonged to father and mother. One even brought her three month old baby. And they all brought presents for her. They ended up with ten women coming. Daydee was lost at sea.

“So how did it go with the bank?” Sarah asked her as they were arranging the food out on the coffee table.

“They gave me a three month grace period. No payments, nothing.” Daydee told. “I didn’t think banks acted that way.”

“John said that night that he hadn’t Edward that mad in a long time. He stormed out and slammed the door.” A woman said, that Daydee guessed was Sarah’s friend whose husband was on the board.

“Thanks everyone, for everything,” Daydee told them.

They opened the Champaign. Susan passed out pieces of yarn to everyone including to Daydee.

“Okey, the idea is to tie a knot at your guess at the length of Deidre’s tummy measurement. And Deidre, you get to do it too. You won’t win.”

They all were holding their yarn up, eyeing her waist. It had gotten larger in the last two weeks, but she had just been telling herself she was getting fat and it was too early to show. But now she realized that she was showing and they were all happy about it. So then she had to stand up as each woman got to try out their yarn around her waist. Daydee’s was way too short. There were two that were very close, so she had to be re-measured to decide on a winner. It was her sharecropper’s wife. She won a box of chocolates. This prompted stories about when they all started to show. One woman claimed she didn’t until the last three months. They all agreed that they didn’t like strangers walking up and touching their bellies. But they thought it was expected so they let people do it. Daydee had never seen anyone do that to a pregnant woman- maybe the culture was different in the south. It was a little worrying, knowing that she’d be expected to let people touch her. Maybe she wouldn’t.

The next game was sort of a ‘who’s got the needle’ with a diaper pin. Daydee had to go out of the room and when she returned all the women had their hands together up in front of them like it was a prayer circle. Daydee’s job was to go from one woman to the next and ask them by name if they had the safety pin. The answer was replying to her by name and telling her no. Daydee was supposed to find the safety pin by reading their faces. The hard part was remembering their names and being embarrassed by having to ask again. The ladies took it stride. There were a couple who tried to act as if they were lying when they said they didn’t have it. The rolling of eyes or the giggling was just silly. She knew before she got to Sarah that she was the one that had the pin between her hands. She tried not to let on that the game was too easy. The Champaign was being passed out freely and the group was definitely getting tipsy. They were having fun trying to tell her the truth.

The next game was where you tried to pass a cucumber held between your knees to the person next to without dropping it. The women were turning red and laughing hysterically. Only one who did it successfully was Susan, Jack’s wife. The women collapsed in their chairs, exhausted and flushed. Daydee hadn’t rubbed up against so many women ever in her life. She hated to see what else there was to come with this group. Over cake and drinks, they began to get sentimental and each had their own story to tell about childbirth and raising their children and the early times before the kids entered school. Daydee was feeling her age. They had all had children in their twenties and early thirties. By the time, she could trade stories like these she would be fifty. Most of the party was a little younger than she was right now. She doubted if she would be able to play the cucumber game at fifty. It turned out that this was as risqué as they got.

Then came opening the presents. There was an abundance of things. Clothes and a diaper bag and a bathing tub and bottles and diapers and more clothes. She found herself getting overwhelmed by their generosity. She tried to ooh and aah like she thought she was supposed to do, but soon found herself choking up and near to tears. This only seemed to endear herself to them more. She got hugs then with each present. She didn’t know how she would be able to come out of this.

There had been a time in her life (most of it actually) when she would have had to get up and walk out of the room and not come back. She had hated and mistrusted intimacy that much. How dare anyone give her anything. Only the johns were allowed to bribe her, because they were all so many blubbering idiots anyway. Friends, in the world she had come from, were only hardened cases like herself, who might loan an aspirin after a long hard night or distract a barfly for a minute so you could make your escape. But that was it. You didn’t ask for anything. They didn’t either. There were moments of kindness from total strangers- that was enough. A funny little bookstore clerk with an Amish beard who asked you if you were all right. A wino who winked and waved and hollered that you were as beautiful as always and never asked for change. The hotel security guard who called you ma’am. And the waitress that called you honey, even though she called everybody honey. And one old drunk printer who had ink stained fingers and who tried to make you laugh and paid you and could hardly ever get it up.

Perks of the Job

2011-10-03T13:30:00.000-07:00

Working where you have to deal with export paperwork, you get all sorts of interesting stamps. I'm taking these to a Boy Scout I know that collects such things. I used to when I was a kid, but in Bloomington Indiana there were not a lot of foreign stamps- at least of the mail that I saw. My first roommate as a single adult male gots lots of stuff from India and Uganda, but by then I no longer cared. Wonder what happens to old stamp collections?

The things I don't know

2011-10-02T21:15:00.000-07:00

A lot. Learned how to use a nail gun yesterday afternoon. We were building a stage for an elementary school in the Marina as a Eagle Project for a kid about to turn 18 soon.

Got feedback from our new expert musician with the band tonight- Feel bad that I'm not better.

Went to jam at the old band expert's this afternoon. Glad I'm not a sixty year man who is playing songs I played when I was teenager. It's like spending your time looking at old photo albums, its cool to do occasionally, but I wouldn't want to live there.

I don't to live where any of my band mates live. I don't mind helping them out occasionally.

Hell of a Day

2011-10-01T21:22:00.000-07:00

This is me singing, I'm afraid I have no pictures. We arrived, had to fight to get to a place to unload, One of the ladies were late and we waited and she arrived. We got there and I had a pass to unload and then leave. If I did that I would have had to leave them and take a half hour to get back. A very young cop helped me find a place to park the van ( I had passes for tickets to the Greek Theater that night which I passed off to him) and then our brilliant guitarist walked in at the last minute. We couldn't hear each other and the timing to my first fast song was horribly slow. And then we had ballads and then we had to cut the whole thing short. We did a rotten rendition of Wabash Cannonball and finished with Wagon Wheel which works. The ladies all went off to brunch. I went off to work on an Eagle Project that one of the boys did in my Boy Scout Troop. And I explained Wayne to the group on the way back. I'm convincing them to move ahead. There is nothing scarier than a crazy clown.

Heavy Lifting

2011-09-29T19:13:00.000-07:00

So the one fund-raiser I did before the 200 stuffed mushroom one was a music, food, silent auction at the school which I pretty much did myself with not a whole lot of help. I recruited and solicited donations to the auction, stood out front of every parent meeting to try to get the parents to donate. Sent out a mailing. Recruited The Harmony Club, a group of retired studio jazz musicians, two different parents and the school Jazz Band to perform- all for free. Talked the Music parents into doing food and selling it. Got party tables donated. Got the cooking class to donate pies. Tried my damnedist to get people to attend. No one from the school staff actually attended. They handed the keys off to me. I had to hire a Security Guard which was the only expense of the entire evening. I had to smooze with the school custodian to get a piano outside and then back again inside at the end of the evening. Ran the Silent Auction pretty much by myself, except for my dear wife and a few other hardy souls. Luckily there was an unauthorized basketball clinic going on in the gym, so I picked up some business from the passerbys for the auction items and the food. Had some kids to help. The cooking teacher came to check me out, mostly so she could report back to the older parent group that didn't like me cause I talked back and didn't fit in. The reason I had the Friends of LACES blessing, was because a good friend had become President and she told everyone to let me do my thing. I would have preferred some help. It didn't look like a great turnout- the space was large, but I guess we did all right. At the end of the evening, as I was stacking the tables up to be picked up, I was told it looked like we did 10k. We did.

Emmylou Harris Last Night at The Greek Theater

2011-09-28T21:19:00.000-07:00

<p>&amp;amp;amp;lt;p&amp;amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;p&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;p&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;br /&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt; &amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;br /&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt; &amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;/p&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;/p&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;amp;lt;/p&amp;amp;amp;gt;</p>

Scored two tickets to the Greek Theater to watch her sing and play. Patty Griffith opened for her. She sang this, but its a Gillian Welch tune.

Well, They all came back the next night

2011-09-28T21:04:00.001-07:00

Adventures in band. The first night, Sunday evening, the new guitarist, the two new ladies (Lost & Found) and the fiddle player from San Fran and me and Craig started over basically. There was a set list for the gig on Saturday morning coming. We went through the songs. We were crazed. Trying to go through 10 songs with a group of people who haven't played much together, is like pulling teeth. We worked however. It was decided by all we'd come back the next night for one more try. The next night was very cool. We fooled around. They were all going to leave at 9:30. We got up to leave about 10 and then spend the next hour outside my studio door in the dark on the sidewalk showing each other yoga poses and holistic stretches. Craig can balance on one foot and point forward. The guitarist was demonstrating how to bend over and rise slowly to loosen the back up.
I showed them this:

which I've been able to do since I was 22. I worked as a printer's devil on a big two color printing press in New Orleans and you had to get into this position to clean the bottom set of rollers. The guitarist and one of the ladies hit it off and they are going off to some holistic healing thing in Santa Barbara.

Here are the two ladies. I filmed them and put them up on You Tube. Hope there will more
So far, this band has now lost 6 members along the way.

What Just Happened?

2011-09-25T22:59:00.000-07:00

We just spent 3 and 1/2 hours rehearsing for the Saturday morning thing. I am so out of my depth. But I sing and I get gigs.

The Very Last Fundraiser

2011-09-22T16:33:00.000-07:00

A success story

There was one fundraiser I did before this last one, but I've never ever done anything in order. The two older bears were graduated from the high school. The youngest one when off to France her sophomore year -and she was in the LACES school which is a Magnet School and you can't really leave a Magnet School and come back after a year and get back in easily. However, they liked her and we were active, so they kept her on the roll for the year she went off to France. I felt like I should do something to show my appreciation and benefit the school, so I volunteered to do the food at the Silent Auction thingee. One of my bear's friend's mother and I partnered up. We got the cooking students to make lasagna for hundreds, we got donations for salads and asked parents to bring desserts and whatever. Got the grocery store to cough up script that we used for supplies - and I made 200 stuffed mushrooms. We worked our tails off all evening with heating and refilling the lasagna and salads and we had students serving things up and carrying out the mushrooms. I was also good friends with the bartender, who kept supplying me with rum and cokes all evening, that I think to this day that kept getting stronger as the evening went on. At the end I was flying higher than a kite in a hurricane. My wife dragged me out before I fell over. It was all great fun.

The Truth

2011-09-21T23:59:00.000-07:00

You realize, of course, that I am writing my midnight thoughts to you, Lamont, Rex, ROSALIENe, Jan, and the two of children that read this, and of course a certain woman that gave me a hug at the keyboard and those others of you that may be out there.

Performance Anxiety

2011-09-21T23:46:00.000-07:00

Performing: When I started I had to practice playing by myself for fifteen minutes before I could play with two other people at lunchtime in an isolated room in our place of work. I couldn't finish a song for my Alzheimer's mother over the phone without screwing up. This is what I wanted. So you start out in the back, afraid of getting too close to the microphone, then you slowly move forward. I went to a new group of folks last night, totally screwed up the first song, did a little better on the second and a little better on the third. However, now I can sit with a band and play for two hours in front of fifty people coming and going and get applause and hear it and enjoy it. Most of the folks I've met all have the same problem- it has nothing to do with talent, or ability or exuberance, it has to do with level of comfort. There are folks that will never leave their garage or porch. There are people that will never leave their jam with 10 or 20 people. There are people who have enough ego to stand up in front of 50 people and perform, but don't feel important enough to stay there. The real advantage I've got, I think, is that deep down inside, I don't give a fuck. I don't really care what most of everybody thinks. I want that little one pair of hands clapping back there somewhere in the crowd. That is more important than everything else.
What I want to hear. Ellen, a odd little lady that hosts a open mike in Venice, came out from the dining room in this house last night, sat down beside me and and said she had heard me from the dining room, and thought the song was wonderful. My dead baby song. It invokes a response. I played it at a jam in Orange county and a sweet guy, Doug, came and said I had a lot of guts to sing it. I said, well that's the idea. I enjoyed that night in particular, because my best buddy, Wayne, who hates all my original stuff, was shaken, noticing the reaction in room. This is a dead baby song. If I can get it out there, it will be noticed. That's the frigging idea.

Daydee once more

2011-09-21T20:13:00.000-07:00

The new lawyer was a nice guy. He showed up on time to the appointment at the bank. The loan officer seemed ok. She outlined her plans to rent the apartments and to put the apartments up for sale and hoped the bank would help her do that. She made it clear she was firing Edward. That was in the letter, in writing. The bank guy acted surprised but didn’t say a word. The new lawyer even offered to meet with Edward to make sure all the records were handed over properly and that he understood he was being dismissed. Daydee was happy not to have to confront him. He would have dismissed her. The loan guy at the bank told her that they would review the particulars and get back to her by the end of the week. There wasn’t much else to do.

She went to shop for shotgun shells at the Walmart and went home.

She parked out front, but was worried that the tagger might come back. She wasn’t sure what she could do. She couldn’t stay up all night and watch. She might get hit any time. A week from now. She thought about trying to park the truck a few blocks away, but it was a small town and it was an old truck. Everyone knew it was hers.

She had bought a few other things at the store and was in her bathroom putting in a new shower curtain and rugs when the door bell rang and made her jump. She came out. It was Susan, the minister’s wife. She invited her in and immediately began picking up the living room. She was still sleeping on the couch and she hadn’t done dishes in a day or so. She apologized to the woman and offered her some lemonade. They sat down to visit. Why did she know this was what was done?

“So, I thought I’d just come by to see how you were doing,” Susan told her.

“I’m doing ok. I’ve been running around like a chicken with its head cut off. This estate thing is a mess.”

“How’s the morning sickness?”

“Getting worse,” Daydee laughed. “You would think that it would help you lose a couple of pounds, but I’m gaining.”

“Soda crackers and chamomile tea seems to work the best.”

“I have the crackers.”

“You have to just ignore Mrs. Burton, she’s Mrs. Prim and Proper around town.”

“Did she say something to you? I had just come to check on everything. I thought the service would be over.”

“She says something to everyone. The town knows to ignore her. If you aren’t sure about someone, give me ring. I can steer you the right direction.”

“Thanks, I’ll remember that.” Daydee wasn’t sure she wanted advice from this busybody.

“So, I know it’s none of business, but is the father-to-be in the picture?”

Daydee wanted to tell her it was none of her business. But this was all new ground. She needed everyone in town to think she was on the up and up. She also realized that by telling this woman, the entire town would know. Did she lie?

“Not right now. If you promise not to tell a soul, I’ll tell you what is going on.”

Susan nodded.

“Well, he’s in prison in Louisiana. He doesn’t know he’s a father to be. He was a printer by profession, did fancy fine art prints. He and a couple of buddies decided they could make some extra money by robbing a bookie in the French Quarter. This is a man that never broke a law his whole life.” That wasn’t exactly true, but she knew to play the wronged woman. “Anyway, I was going to write him when I was sure. I guess I’m sure now. He’ll be out in a year and a half. It was his first offence ever.”

“You poor thing.”

Daydee shrugged at her.

“This is your first?”

“Yep,” Daydee said.

“Well, I’m here to help.”

“Thanks so much.” Daydee thought she’d go for broke. “Is there a tagger in town that folks are aware of?”

“A tagger?”

“Someone that goes around spray paints things at night. Like gang members or young punk types.”

“Not that I know of.”

Daydee proceeded to tell her the story, without mentioning the word that was written.

“I’d call the sheriff right now and let him know.”

“The police in New Orleans don’t seem to care, unless they stumble across the guy in the act and then they would arrest him.”

“The sheriff might even know who it is.”

“All right, I’ll call.

She had one more thing on her mind.

“You know, everyone has noticed you don’t have a wedding ring.”

“ I took it off and threw it at him when they came to arrest him. I searched high and low and never found it. It stupid, I know. You can let everybody know I have a license to prove it. You want to see it?”

Susan laughed.

Daydee was sure she did want to see it, but now all she could do was shake her head. They were having fun. Susan now thought she had the inside scoop. The whole thing was a lie. She and John had never lived together and had never married. It did happen that way to a working girl she knew in the quarter, though.

“Would you mind if a bunch of us throw you a baby shower? We haven’t had any new moms to play with in about a year. I’ll do it all. All you have to do is show up.”

Daydee told her ok, but she was nervous. What was she supposed to talk about with a party of other women?

“There will be games and things to do?” She suddenly felt like a little girl being invited to a birthday party. Nothing she ever got when she was little. They were white trash. They didn’t get invited into other people’s homes. And her parents were strange.

“It’s all very silly. But you get things you’ll need for the baby. And guidance.”

Guidance seemed to be the scary part.

The Sheriff did drive over after she called. He was what she had expected somehow. Short, in his fifties, balding, overweight with a belly hanging over his belt. Rumpled shirt. He looked at the traces of the paint across her front door and examined the side of her truck. Wrote down her information. He had probably been Sheriff there for twenty years. This was something she would have never done in New Orleans. They were the enemy. You had to lay it out for them to get off. The worst were the young bible cops that thought they were helping society by getting you off the street. This guy was harmless and not very bright really.

“Can’t say when we had this kind of problem here. Usually it’s just the boys from the high school just before graduation.”

“What should I be doing?”

“Well, just keep at look out. Try to get a license number. I’ll have the night car pass by here a bit. That will probably scare them off.”

“Thanks,” she shook his hand and he held it for a moment too long.

“So, you back for good?”

“Looks like it,” she said.

“Jack says you visited the church. You like it?”

“It was nice.”

“Don’t know that we ever had a McIntire come to services.”

“Well, there’s always a first time.”

“That there is. Nice to meet you.”

Andy Griffith was still alive, she thought as she waved at him as he left.

So she went back early in the morning two days later. She purposely dressed in jeans and the flannel shirt she now loved . She was ready for anything. Even bought herself a pair of tennis shoes for walking around in the high grass. She had heard stories about dealings with crazy people. She left her jewelry at home. Getting the spray paint off her truck that night had cracked a couple of her nails so she had to trim those back. Her hair was under a bandana. She didn’t want anything for him to be able to grab. Not that he ever had grabbed her, if it was really her father. She half-expected to get there and find no trace and then realize that she had just dreamed it. She had probably just dreamed his aged face on to an old bum’s and then scared herself. She parked by the office and walked over slowly. She didn’t want to scare him off if he was there. She wanted time for a reality check.

It was an overcast day, with thick clouds that looked like they might rain later. The grass was high and wet back here, away from the cemetery’s golf course lawn. Jack did take good care of it. Maybe she should confront him about that conversation behind the diner? Somehow, she knew he would just lie. She came back to the spot by the trees where he had been. There was a crumpled down spot all right. Someone had been camping out here. There was no trace of the shopping cart. There was a an empty potato chip bag. Nothing else. She stooped to pick it up and folded it and stuck it in her hip pocket to throw away later.

There was a trail that led off in the grass. She followed it. It was wide and wandered down across a meadow and toward a fence and another grove of trees. This seemed a little impossible to push a shopping cart all this way. Especially for a little old man. The fence had been torn down in one spot ahead and there stood the cart. She didn’t see its owner. She walked up slowly. No sign of him. She looked all around. Should she wait for him? He might be gone for hours or days. The cart did look like it was left here for safekeeping. You couldn’t see it unless you were almost on top of it.

“Sos, youse come explorating?” a voice asked.

She didn’t see him.

“Where are you?”

“That’s for youse to know.”

He was sitting in a tree branch above her. It was dark up there. She couldn’t see him well enough to decide anything.

“You hungry?” she asked.

“You have poison,” he told her.

“Not me. I was going to bring you lunch. You want to come down and have lunch with me?”

“You can have it. Right there.”

“I have to go get it. You be here when I come back?”

“No.”

“You like McDonald’s?”

“He had a cow.”

“And hamburgers.”

“No.”

“You can come up to the office and meet me there when I come back.”

“No.”

“You used to like strawberry milkshakes, you still do?”

“No.”

She headed back across the field, trying to remember if she saw a McDonald’s some place. There had to be one. She went back to her truck. The walk seemed longer now and uphill. This was stupid. He was obviously crazy. And she felt like she was kidding herself. Her father was in the ground. She drove toward the main highway, figuring there had to be one out at the edge of town, maybe next to the Wal-Mart somewhere. She found it and drove through. How long had it been since she ate this stuff? No one in the French Quarter ever bothered. There was so much cheap food to be had everywhere that was better than this. She wished that she was sitting in Ruby Red’s right now, with her heels in the peanut shells on the floor and a real hamburger that you have to take home the half you couldn’t eat. That world was much saner than this one. All that was expected there was a smile and a nod to some poor snook’s sad life.

When she got back, he was sitting on the front step of the office. God. It was her father. He was looking past the truck somewhere. He couldn’t look at her when she climbed out of the truck.

“He was such a porcupine that he was porcupining all the time and they had to give a haircut, snip snip snip.”

She started over to bring him his bag, and he jumped up. So she stopped. She held out the bag and inched a little closer and sat it down on walkway between them and then she backed off. She didn’t want to scare him off. He ran and grabbed it and took it back to the front step and pulled everything out and began stuffing his mouth. He dropped fries on the step and quickly grabbed them to stuff in his mouth. The lid and straw were discarded and he drank it up, with some dribbling down his chin. Tears were running down his cheeks. Daydee sat down on the walkway and pulled out her hamburger.

“So,” she said. “How you been?”

He was nodding his head to the tree. It looked like he would have to finish eating before he could talk.

“I was in New Orleans all these years,” she told him. “Mama died. That was the reason I came back.”

He was licking the inside of the cup and then looking through the bag for any crumb left. She got and offering her French fries approached him again. She felt this was like trying to get close to a squirrel or a wild bird. He reached out his hand and accepted the fries. He really smelled bad. She retreated back to her original spot and sat down again.

“You’re really very crazy, aren’t you?”

“They snipped snipped and his pants fell down!” He laughed.

“I wonder how long you’ve been here.”

“When hell freezes over!”

“I don’t suppose I could talk you into a bath and a bed?”

“Deedee knows lots of stuff. Lots of stuff. It came out of her bear!”

He jumped up and ran off back across the cemetery.

Half A Life

2011-09-20T23:28:00.000-07:00

I was given this last Christmas by a friend I respect and admire. I know it's supposed to express the angst of the mixed raced displaced people of the world and their wandering about without a real sense of home. And I know he won a Nobel Prize. This is the second one I've read. The problem mat be that I know too much about him and he has a rotten personality and hates women which is very apparent here. It is a good read read-sort of- it sucks you in, but then you wonder why you are continuing to read, other than its short and I hate to quit a book no matter how stupid. So what? Our hero escapes his culture, goes to England to study and follows a woman to Africa and leaves her at the end of the book "to find himself" He's a twerp. It's also got some real clunky transitions and no redeeming literary style. America has a long tradition of these kind of books. Boy leaves home and little town stilted culture, goes off to big city and finds himself and succeeds or fails and will kill someone (An American Tragedy) or bite off someones' ear (McTeague), reach a rich peoples haven and be adopted (Valley of The Moon), become friends with a gangster (The Great Gatsby) or fail and spend the next ten years writing endlessly about going back to his little stilted home (Of Time and The River and on and on) - Actually, now that I think of it, this book has a lot in common with Henderson the Rain King and The Dharma Bums or Beautiful Losers and on and on- all of the above books were better written.)

Did I mention I finished this? Hell of a lot more fun read. Not as good as Orlando and The Waves and To The Lighthouse. All very English of course. But one should, don't you know. Patterson is next ( William Carlos himself) - actually, I've already finished the first book- quite good in places - quite very very obscure in others, but they thought that generation was being brilliant when you couldn't understand them- sort of like Bob Dylan lyrics.

Dead Letters

2011-09-19T15:53:00.000-07:00

Well, the band is being rebuilt again. It's just as well. It was getting close to me quitting my own band. Pity the ones that don't realize that "it ain't never gonna be perfect." I've come up with a new catch phrase: Bottom-feeders. Those that join a new group and want you to change dates and locations and sing 5 minute songs. They also hate what you like and love that which threatens to make you gag. Or the ones who want you to do 5 of their songs when they know they are quitting. And won't help you do yours.

Bath Tub War Games

2011-09-15T19:29:00.000-07:00

Was I the only child to use toiletries as toy soldiers in the bath? In my childhood, they had names, ranks and a personal history. Some couldn't swim and they would drown. The Monitor and the Merrimack fought in the suds for the river. My mother would wonder why I spent so much time in the tub. I suppose it would of been easier to bring my real toy soldiers in the bath, but where's the imagination in that. I also recall scaring myself by imaging faces hidden in the knotty pine of the bathroom door. That was earlier. It got painted later, which made it a whole lot easier to go in there.

Robert Louis Stevenson took his to Samoa with him and had them set up in a special little barn where he could act out famous European battles.

Kinda looks like it would be more fun. One of the things I was gonna do when I grew up was build a miniature replica of Cape Canaveral in my back yard with real working model rockets and one of those huge rolling launch pads (in miniature, of course) that would roll out the Saturn 5 out of its bunker for launching the Apollo missions. We had a Museum of Miniatures here in LA when the kids were little. It was an impressive collection, but they couldn't keep their doors open.
Ah well:

More Daydee Again

2011-09-14T21:20:00.000-07:00

Daydee spent most of the next day recoating the red letters until finally you had to know where they had been to find any trace of them. In between coats, she showed the apartments and signed one more tenant up. She got a referral from Mark for another lawyer and called and hired him. She made an appointment with the bank to talk about the mortgage and then called the new lawyer back to have him come with her tomorrow to the bank. She finally sat down about four in the afternoon to work on writing the letter she was supposed to be writing that fired Edward and hired the new guy and was supposed to be sent to the guy at the bank as well as the probate judge that had her mother’s estate.

This was the hard part. She had never finished high school. She didn’t know any of the rules. She found a letter from one of her mother’s credit card companies and decided to use it as a model. She would have to write it out in long hand and then drive to cemetery to type it up there, since the only typewriter was there. This would take a while. She didn’t know how to type either. She was certain that she was going to make a mistake that would make her sound dumb. She was tempted to call Sarah, but already felt obliged to her and she certainly didn’t want to appear stupid in front of the closest thing to a female friend she had ever had.

Why hadn’t she taken night classes or something? Did she really think her looks were going to last forever? A part of her had thought that maybe there might be some rich old guy that might come along and take a fancy to her. Well, there had been one guy, but his spindly legs and little pot belly was too off putting. He might have been worth something had she encouraged him. He was some kind of professor as well. He’d write her a letter. She thought of Mark, but it was too late in the afternoon now. He’d be going home soon. The first draft sounded like she was copying the credit card letter. So she started over just trying to write what she wanted to say. That was a little easier. An hour later, she had a couple of paragraphs that she thought sounded ok. She grabbed her keys and purse and head out to the cemetery.

It was dinner time, so not a soul was out. She parked by the office and noticing the new mound of earth over the new grave, she reminded herself that she still had to order the marker for the grave. She unlocked the office and went in. The typewriter was electric at least and after playing around with discovered it could backspace and erase her mistake. What a wonderful thing. It was still time consuming. Her spelling had never been good, now trying to hunt and peck for the letters on the keyboard and at the same time remember how to spell the word correctly was too much. She had to stop and check the dictionary in the desk a couple of times as well. She wasn’t able to find any carbon paper, so she was stuck retyping the same letter four times.

It was dark outside by the time she finished the last copy. The cemetery had no outside lighting except for a porch light over the office door, so the windows that had provided such a great view were now all mirrors, reflecting her at work. The dark glass didn’t show any age or wrinkles. Nice, she told herself, as she stretched when she finally got out of the chair. Not bad for an old broad. She found a folder for the letters and some envelopes to take with and sat down again to look through the family’s file for what kind of marker to order.

A car door slammed loudly outside. She jumped. An engine gunned and skidded out the gravel drive. She hadn’t heard anyone drive up. This was scary. She went to the closet for something to use if she had to protect herself. There was an old rake. And a shotgun. Shit! She grabbed it. She knew nothing about guns. She had no idea of how to look to see if it was loaded. She ran and flicked the lights off inside and out, and after a moment went out. It was dark and she couldn’t see a thing. Reaching in, she turned the porch light back on. There was no sign of the car she had just heard. She walked out to look around the corner of the building. There were taillights about a block away. What was that all about? She turned toward her truck. There on the side was those letters she had just painted over on her front door. ‘Whore’ in red spray paint again. God damn them! There was a hose coiled in front of a spigot by the office door. She put down the shotgun and turned the water on and dragged the hose over to the truck. She sprayed the hell out of it. The paint was still wet and a lot of it washed off. She scratched at the remainder with her fingernails. You couldn’t tell what had been written there, thank god. She went around to the shed for a rag or towel to rub it some more and found some dish soap as well and went back to work on it some more. Most of it was coming off.

At this point, she was as wet and soapy as the side of the truck. She checked the other side. They had been quick and not thorough. She worked some more to make sure there was no trace left.

“And it wasn’t over there, it was over here,” someone said behind her.

She turned. There was an old man, in rags, and as dirty as sin, sitting on the front step with the shotgun in his hands. He seemed to be looking at it. He didn’t seem too interested in her or what she was doing.

“Hello,” she said.

“It wasn’t much to lookee see,” he was saying to himself.

“That’s my gun.”

He cocked his head as if listening for something. He gently put it down on the stoop and stood up slowly. It was an effort to get to his feet. He looked very old and rickety. He wouldn’t look at her.

“Here is over there,” he said to the night and shambled across the drive and started off toward the back of the cemetery

“Did you see who tagged my truck?” she yelled after him.

He turned but not all the way. He was talking to the mound of earth nearby.

“Just a lookee see, little dede, just a lookee see. No harm no runs no hits.”

He disappeared into the darkness. She picked up the shotgun. She got it open to find it had two shells in it. But they were probably real old. How long had it sat in that closet. She removed them, with the idea of buying new shells. She would need them to figure out what to buy. Were there lessons on how to shoot a gun? She was sure any one of these guys around here would be willing to show her. Frank, the sharecropper would love it, so he could demonstrate his superiority. She took it back in and replaced it in the closet. There weren’t any other ammunition for it. She threw the shells in her purse and gathered up her paperwork and the folders on the marker. She’s figure it out at home. It was too spooky out here by herself. She found a flashlight in the desk. She was afraid of turning on the lights again and making herself a sitting duck. She locked up and put walked out with the dim light. It needed new batteries. She put everything in the truck and climbed up.

Something struck her as she was about to start the engine. She pulled the key out. The old man had called her little dede. She climbed back out and started off across the cemetery on foot, following the direction that the old man had gone in. This is real stupid, she told herself. She found him about fifty yards beyond the back boundary of the grounds. The was a little grove of trees and bushes that was never mowed and the weeds were high. He was sitting on the ground next to a shopping cart full of junk, cardboard and plastic bags filled with god knew what. He had an old smelly blanket on the ground and another wrapped over his shoulders. The flashlight was barely working now. He really reeked. He smelled like roofing tar.

She put the light on his face. He looked away and hid under a hand.

“Just a lookee see, for god’s sake!”

She didn’t know what to say. She was afraid to be wrong or right. She was afraid to say it.

“Father?”

“Oh nooo, No god here, no over there, no god here. Oh nooo.”

She watched him. He hid under the blanket and she moved the light away from where his face had been. She needed to get out of here and think this over. The flashlight would die and she would trip and stumble in getting out of here.

“I’ll come back,” she said and turned to flee.

She wasn’t sure at all. If this was her father then who was buried in the ground with the marker? She hurried back to the truck and left as quick as she could. Part of her was afraid he might follow her back out. God, she hoped no one tagged the apartment again while she was away. Shit!

Dead

2011-09-14T21:14:00.000-07:00

This is the one I'm learning right now.

Helpful hints you'll find no where else

2011-09-13T20:06:00.001-07:00

More and more and more

2011-09-13T20:02:00.000-07:00

The next morning, after throwing up her breakfast, she made herself drive down to the hardware store where the guy had been nice and bought paint to cover over that word. She thought of buying soda crackers. That was supposed to help, wasn’t it? The diner where Winston had taken her for breakfast was on the way to the grocery store, so she decided to stop for some soup and see if their crackers would help. It was almost lunch time, if you were up early. There weren’t very many cars in the lot. She figured this was a safe haven. It wasn’t the sort of place where the women of the town hung out. She got out of the truck and immediately heard Winston’s voice from behind the building. He was angry.

“I won’t do it, goddamn it!”

She walked over to take a peek . He was standing back there with Jack and Edward. They all had cigarettes lit and were puffing at each other.

“You don’t have any choice in this!” Edward told him.

“I quit! You two can go hang yourself!”

Edward grabbed him by the shirt collar.

“You shut up and listen! You have liabilities. You want to see your missus in a lot of pain?”

Winston shoved him off.

“You son of a bitch!”

Jack got between them.

“Listen, both of you! Calm down. We are clever guys. We can figure out ways to get her to leave. Think, you’ve both been with her. Is there anything we can use?”

Winston stopped himself from saying something.

“Out with it,” Jack said.

“Let me think about it,” Winston told him.

“I can get the bank to foreclose on the apartment building,“ her lawyer said.

“That’s a start. Let’s talk tomorrow. You two need to keep calm,” Jack told them. He started out toward her. Daydee hopped back into her truck and hid from him. He walked right by her without even seeing the truck that he knew well. There was a huge scowl on his face. What the hell was this? Edward came out next and got into his car and left. She got out again when he turned out of the lot. She went back to where Winston was standing by himself. He looked at her frightened.

“What the hell was that?” she demanded.

“I don’t know. You need to leave Paris!”

He rushed by her and ran for his car. He drove away without looking back.

Daydee went back home without her soup. They had been arguing about her- that was obvious. But why? Was she sitting on something she didn’t know she had? They wanted her out of the way for some reason. She tried to imagine what. The only thing she hadn’t seen was what was in the locked garage at her great-grandmother’s house. There didn’t seem to be any mysterious paperwork or deeds or bank accounts. Maybe there was oil under one of the properties she had inherited and they wanted her out of town so they could drill without her knowing about it. Or maybe there was something buried out at the cemetery they didn’t want her to find. Those were two places she would have to root around in . She’d break into the garage and take a close look through the cemetery office. She got out the paint and began to cover the lettering across her front door. It was going to take more than one coat. This got her angry. This had to be one of them. If it was Winston, she would kill him. And she had invited him to dinner and had gone to church with him. Of all the goddamn nerve. What was worst, she had been conned. She hadn’t believed that there was a man in the world that could pull one over on her.

Sarah pulled up out front with a couple in the car with her. Daydee quickly opened the front door of her apartment so that the middle of the red word couldn’t be seen. She moved the ladder she had up with her can of paint on it to hide one side of the door jam. They got out of the car and came up the walk. The couple were young and probably newlyweds or at least boyfriend and girlfriend.

Sarah introduced them as Mark and Amy.

“They are interested in an apartment. I told them about the first month free promotion you had going.”

“Sure. Let me get the keys.”

She came back and showed them the first one that was next to hers. They wanted to move in tomorrow. The rent was agreed upon. They would come back tomorrow with their belongings and sign a lease and take possession. It was like falling off a log. They wanted to look around the apartment some more and take some measurements. Daydee wondered if they were going to go buy furniture that afternoon.

“The kids were concerned that you might care if they were married or not,” Sarah told her. “I told them you could care less.”

“That’s right,” Daydee told them. “Just back over when you are done. I need to talk to Sarah for a minute.”

They left them there.

Daydee had never ever gone to another woman for help in her life. She might elbow a fellow hooker and share a look or a joke, but she had never relied on any of them. There were quite a few that she saw almost daily in the Quarter. They knew not to ask her for favors because she never asked. But now she was at wit’s end and this was the only soul she knew that might know enough to help.

“Sarah, I appreciate you helping me out with finding me renters.”

“You’ll get my commission invoice.”

“Sarah, there is a favor I need to ask you. I barely know you. Your ex is going to get the bank to foreclose on me. I don’t honestly know why, other than he’s just a bastard and he doesn’t like me.”

“What makes you think that?”

She told her what she had overheard at the restaurant, but left out the argument part. She wasn’t sure why, other than she still felt a little loyalty to Winston.

Sarah looked thoughtful.

“There are some things he didn’t like about your mother, but that doesn’t seem like much of a reason to sabotage you.”

“You think I should talk to the bank myself?”

“That wouldn’t hurt. You know, you should write Edward a letter to fire him, send a copy to the bank president and then go in with another lawyer to pay them a call. I’ll call you later to give you the names at the bank. You want another lawyer’s name too?”

“Sure.”

“I know the wives of two of the bank execs. Let me see if I can grease the wheels a little. You, of course, will need to sign over your first child to me.”

“I don’t know if I can do that,” Daydee said smiling. She found herself touching her belly. Stupid.

“We’ll work something out. I’ll keep you posted.”

The young couple was walking back.

Another Summer Gone

2011-09-12T21:59:00.000-07:00

Every year the Boy Scout Troop ends the summer with a Monday night bonfire at the beach here. And almost every year, I don't want to go but I do. And I stay and talk and enjoy it. Saw a Dad I worked with over on USC campus before I changed jobs. Saw the wife of the band member that died. Saw good ole Joe and his wife. And Palmer, one of my hiking buddies and Richard who's son is now 25. And the new Dads I've gotten to know. It's been a good summer- we had two graduations to start things off- a trip to the Grand Canyon and to Yosemite, music gigs and our first real Square Dances. and a birthday jam. And kids all leaving again.

So what was promised? A Merit Badge here. A bike ride there. A video and a book to a friend. A get together to jam a little over original songs.

What is there to add? May the autumn be as blessed.

Me Singing

2011-09-09T20:38:00.000-07:00

I put up six of the band's songs on Myspace -You can even download them for a buck a song

Find more Rhubarb Meringue Pie songs at Myspace Music

The Saga of Toxic Wars

2011-09-09T16:57:00.000-07:00

We have hornets / bees that want to live in our house. It used to be crickets when we first moved in- once a year the crickets would sing to us from the attic and the air ducts, but some time ago they left and didn't come back. I don't know why. The first family of bees to come tried to set up housekeeping in a crack in the stucco above our back deck. I bought some foam spray installation and sealed them in forever. The second family arrived about a year later and set up housekeeping in a bird house hanging off the back eve of the house. That one was easy, I rolled the trash can under it, and cut it down.

This last time they have found another eve at roof level and moved in big time. I tried the foam installation spray a couple of times, but they keep finding new entrances. It turns out that there is a secret interior door to their home that lets them into my studio, where they fly against the glass of my windows and butt their heads until they die. There were about 50 of them there dead when I first tried sealing them up outside. Then when they found another way out of the roof to the outside directly, they quit coming in. Except for the one or two that come to buzz at my lamp late at night when I am trying to practice banjo.

I also tried spraying poison sprays into the holes in the shingles on the roof -about 10 cans so far. And spraying the whole area down with the hose, but that only managed to leak in and water stain my ceiling tiles inside.

I've been stung about three times in this endevour.

So, I had the idea of soaking rags with the spray poison and draping them over them atop the shingles and weighing them down with bricks. I tried to do this early in the morning and they attacked me, got in my loose hair and stung my scalp about 3-4 times and got me behind the ear and on the arm. (On the arm where it rubs the edge of my banjo drum as I play) I ran in and took a shower and left a couple of them on the shower floor. So I tried again late at night. So far none are coming inside the studio. I now have three rags soaked in poison spray up on the shingles and I don't see very many of them. I've been re-wetting the rags every night. Will let you know if this has worked or they are just hiding out waiting for me to come look again. Anyway, I think I've created a Super Fund Toxic site and will probably be unable to sire healthy children again ever.

I'll tell you about the bees another night

2011-09-08T23:02:00.000-07:00

This has been a drama in itself over the last few weeks, but I'll write about it later. There is a little phrase from Swan's Way (Proust) that says that when he dies, he will wrap himself up in his dreams and carry those dreams into oblivion with him (to keep him warm on oblivion's cold nights) That made Swan's Way worthwhile. I've still not read the other four. There is a song I've discovered- I've discovered a whole live of music and songs in the last four years that I missed. I've posted it here before and will probably post it again at the end of this. The phase "and I will sing a song of my own" makes it the same touchstone for me and brings the same meaning to the confrontation of death. (Which everyone agrees that I've been creating against since day one.) There are secrets that one can never tell, out of love, out of respect, out of realization that the moment the secret was created it was yours, it was the other person's and it belongs there forever in the emotional fiber of one's existence. What was said when my children were conceived. What was said in a moment of confession to my children. What was said in the destruction of marriage. Or on a deathbed watch. Or on a walk on the beach with a friend. There is a urge to find the secrets, to expose them, to tell the world what the real truth is. But it is what fiction was designed for: to expose them in the settings of their creation. The nuance of words spoken between two people that have a connection can only be expressed in a setting of emotional history and physical textual settings that conveys what it meant at the time. So to blurt them out does them no justice at all. Remembering words can invoke a devotion that can last a thousand years. So we create the lie of fiction to make those confessions we can make no other way. And I will wrap myself in them when the last "ding dong" of history takes me home. (Ding dong was in Faulkner's Nobel Prize acception speech)

Well, I been helpin' the poor and needy (and myself)

2011-09-07T23:03:00.000-07:00

No pictures today.

I have spent the last two days- The Monday holiday, mind you, doing the band's business. I had a hour and a half of video from our playing at the Swap Meet in August. (I have a cool little phone looking video camera that cost a whole $125.00 that will work for a couple of hours and will auto load to Facebook and You Tube- though rather slowly) The problem was I had video and the only faces you can see are Wayne & I. Everyone else is hiding behind their music stand. So, I decided I would just steal the audio off the recording and make a CD to give away at our next performance on Sept 18th. The software for the little device is pretty cluncky for a super long recording so I looked elsewhere. Well, Quicktime Player has a neat little Audio or music cutter that will slice your stuff up and I found a little freebee thing off the net that will convert video to audio or whatever.
So anyway, I made a CD of the band from the live stuff and all of its imperfections.

Then I had to make a presentable cover for the jewel case, which took another evening.

Then I've recruited these two women to join the band, and to work with me to work up my original songs separately from the band, because the band won't help me with the ten songs I've written now. (because absolutely none of them practice- so how could they possibly learn something they did not know.)

I'm putting their performance at a local dive up to You Tube, so they will work with me on my own sings. All I'm trying to do is get the songs up somewhere for someone to notice, but I am not musically skilled enough to do it on my own yet.

Anyway, its an adventure. I've never been the manager of a band before.

Skills will get you places -I just have more skills to flatter folks egos than what I really need.

None of them read this, or I would probably be in deep shit.