Sunday Bloody Good Sunday

Slept in a bit today after playing at Gizzi's last night and then hanging around Koffeeokee with friends until they rolled up the sidewalk and called it a night. We had a better-than-average gig turnout as a result of my new shameless band-pimping-via-email and friends telling friends to come and see us do our thang. Also, I've put us on this website. Not sure what compelled me to do so, but it was fun creating the page. Carlos is busily mastering three tracks we've recorded for a demo CD, and once we have that we can shop it around locally to find some more gigs, and the music can be uploaded to the afore-mentioned site. I guess the logical next frontier will be MySpace. Everybody's doin' it... pickin' it and chewin' it... thinkin' that it's candy, but it's snot.

[ok, the tracks are mastered and two of 'em are available for listening/download on the site]

Casey surprised me by singing harmonies here and there in the verses during The Weight last night. She was so good, I nearly stopped mid-song to tell her. She's very cool...

So, back to today.

I drove to South Miami to spend the afternoon with my good buddy Jeff who was once my vet, then a member of borderLine and has become a trusted and valued friend. He gave me this for a ridiculously low price:

the pic's from google; I'll take some photos of my actual amp ASAP

Jeff's such a nice guy that he wanted to give it to me gratis, but I'm insisting on paying him for it. Hopefully, he'll wear me down and I'll lose my resolve on that issue.

After hanging with Jeff and his critters, amp safely in trunk, I headed back north to Hollywood to see if my friend Bill Burns was playing his Sunday gig at Universe Cafe. Seems he had the day off, so I stood around and watched TV as Roger Federer beat up on James Blake to win yet another tennis tournament. All the players say that Federer is a really nice guy and a humble champion, but that's never been how he comes across to me. He seems incredibly arrogant, and unfortunately has the talent to back up his assertions of tennis greatness. In post-match interviews, he generally says something along the lines of "I played magnificently" and "I made some incredible shots" and crap like that. Most other players are at least somewhat self-effacing ("I got some lucky breaks") and tend to compliment the opponent, but not good ol' Rog. I think the first time I've heard him actually take the time to climb down off his pedestal and acknowledge the guy across the net was after this year's Wimbledon final, when Rafael Nadal ("Vamos, Rafa!!!") took him to five sets and very nearly took the match.

After losing to Novak Djokovic ("Who?", you ask. "Currently #3 in the world" is your answer) in Montreal, Federer dismissed it as an "insignificant loss". Of course, Djokovic had beaten Andy Roddick a coupla days before and world #2 Nadal just the day before, so I'd say it was pretty significant to Djokovic. In fact, it was the first time anyone had beaten Nadal and Federer in the same tournament since they became #'s 1 and 2 in the world, whenever that was. I think it may have been the Eisenhower Administration. The way I see it, Djokovic deserves his moment in the sun. Roger's got a deep enough tan by now. Metaphorically, he's the George Hamilton of tennis.

Federer's taken to wearing a white sportjacket and white pants to his Wimbledon matches. The only thing missing is a top hat. I didn't dress that nicely to go to the prom. I'm just waiting for him to start playing matches wearing a Superman outfit and cape.

But I digress... chronically.

With Bill Burns nowhere in sight and money still in the meter, I stopped into Trader John's Book & Record Exchange, a place where I recall Mike and I hanging around many, many moons ago. Gabby and I were also there once years back. I picked up a copy of Peter Singer's book Animal Liberation, which I've read about but never read. I referenced it a few posts back on the author's birthday. I also picked up a vinyl copy of Bruce Springsteen's The Wild, The Innocent & the E Street Shuffle. I'll add it to my collection of albums I can eventually play on the turntable I have yet to buy (my b'day is Friday *cough, cough*). I also had a nice conversation with a 6o-ish British woman shopping in the store. She was astounded that a person my age would even be looking at vinyl (I had a copy of a Dionne Warwick/Bacharach-David LP in my hand at the time. Tasty...), so we talked about music and pop culture. She wants to come see the band, which should cure her of any affinity for music that she currently has.

From there, my next stop was Sublime in Ft. Lauderdale, where I treated myself to a yummy vegan feast and read some more of Bill Bryson's A Short History of Nearly Everything. Bryson's one of my fave authors who can, and often does, send me into gales of laughter with his dry-as-kindling wit. ASHoNE isn't really meant to be funny per se, but it certainly has its moments when it's not being informative. If you've not read anything by him, I'd suggest A Walk In the Woods or I'm A Stranger Here Myself or The Lost Continent for starters. Actually, screw that. Everything he writes is worth reading.

Here's an excerpt from the opening page of The Lost Continent:

I come from Des Moines. Somebody had to.

When you come from Des Moines you either accept the fact without question and settle down with a local girl named Bobbi and get a job at the Firestone factory and live there forever and ever, or you spend your adolescence moaning at length about what a dump it is and how you can't wait to get out, and then you settle down with a local girl named Bobbi and get a job at the Firestone factory and live there forever and ever.

Hardly anyone ever leaves. This is because Des Moines is the most powerful hypnotic known to man. Outside town there is a big sign that says, WELCOME TO DES MOINES. THIS IS WHAT DEATH IS LIKE. There isn't really. I just made that up. But the place does get a grip on you. People who have nothing to do with Des Moines drive in off the interstate, looking for gas or hamburgers, and stay forever. There's a New Jersey couple up the street from my parents' house whom you see wandering around from time to time looking faintly puzzled but strangely serene. Everybody in Des Moines is strangely serene.

I don't yet have his memoir, The Life and Times of the Thunderbolt Kid. Have I mentioned my birthday is Friday? *clears throat*

Last stop of the evening before coming home: Barnes & Noble, which for some reason I insist on calling Barney Snowball. I took it easy and just bought the current issue of Uncut...

On the way home (aren't you glad I'm including nearly every minute of my day here? Careful... falling off the edge of your seat can be dangerous), I was listening to the Night Train jazz program on 91.3 WLRN, the local public radio station/NPR affiliate. Ted Grossman was playing some scorching swing by legendary trombonist Jack Teagarden recorded live at Club Hangover in 1954. I noticed the 30-ish guy in the next lane was rockin' out in his car, drumming on the dashboard and doing the "car dance"... in perfect rhythm with what I was listening to. Suspecting he might be enjoying the same song as I (Muskrat Ramble. Wanna hear it? Go here and put the cursor over the music symbol next to the track), I turned my radio down so I could hear his and found that he was also listening to WLRN. I motioned to him that we were listening to the same thing, and he rolled down his window and said, "NPR?" I said, "Yeah, these guys are unbelievable!" We continued driving up Oakland Park Blvd. and then both got on 95. We passed each other a coupla times and gave each other the thumbs-up while grooving on the rest of the Teagarden set. It was kinda like car-flirting, only it was about music and I don't think either of us are gay. Ok, well prob'ly not him anyway. Or me.

Just as Shirley (my new bookstore friend) was impressed with my vinyl proclivities, I was impressed that two guys in their 30s, with CD players/satellite radio/MP3s/DVDs/M-O-U-S-Es available, would choose instead to listen to public radio and groove on music that came out at least a decade before they were born...

And now I'm home. The laundry's done, and so am I.