Here is a picture of the United Church I used to attend as a lad. Kudos to anyone who could possibly identify this location. Hint: it is now a craft store. See the room to the back? That is where I used to go to Sunday School in the summer. See how the church has a porch? Without it, anyone arriving during the frozen winters would let the blizzard inside. At around 11 years old, I played a service here one Sunday on the old pump organ. Another hint: it is at the corner of 50th Street and 52nd Avenue and the current population of the town is 274, around 170 fewer than when I lived there.I stumbled across this ancient picture upon noticing the very rare name of an old classmate on the Internet. (Rose marie Chimko.) This ties together several otherwise disjointed issues, so read slowly. I have always been against the publication of so-called “public information”, because there is no record of who uses it for what. The gun shop also does investigations. They have one massive setup for doing background checks. They may be looking for someone to operate that system, along with computer investigations.
As a test, I plugged in the obscure name of a school I once attended, and up came a list of almost every student who’d been there, including my classmate. Upon further reading the list, I notice I am practically the only person who was not on it. It was one of those Internet sites that publish everybody’s high-school pictures and information without asking permission. They charge money to “reunite” people. I’m with George Carlin on that one (when he says there is a reason some people have not spoken to you in forty years).
This led to further searches of the eight different grade schools I attended. These are widely separated, often thousands of miles apart. Interesting. The lists don’t contain any of the “brain set” of any of the classes. Rusty is not there, neither is Mitchell. Dan the psychiatrist, Sheila the lawyer, and basically anybody who moved on to some form of success are not even mentioned. It is probably coincidence and I am predisposed to look for the smart people and my old chums, but the fact is, they are not there. Perhaps this is explainable.
I’ve stepped up advertising for Jimbo’s Jambo-ree on the 29th. My comeback which labeled our single critic as an “unemployed interior decorator” was a classic! It generated a lot of fan mail and the all-important back and forth traffic. Jimbo’s was packed tonight, including two large groups of completely new people. They were aware the jam is next week but came down for a look anyway. Bar sales were right off the scale. The groups are larger and stay longer, roughly double in both measures. These were new people, not the Christmas crowd.My act has evolved to the point where it is more than unique. I fake the singing, which I am not ready to tell you how I do that yet, but I get mild sore throats from trying. While I still don’t dare to try anything along with or after a talented vocalist, I can fool a lot of the people a lot of the time. It is also certain I am going to learn a complete set of those plodding country classics by all the Hanks and double with Johnny Cash.
I’ve gone completely back to playing bass in my old West Coast solo style on every tune. It dominates the show and I figure I can always dumb down to a guitarist, that is, I don’t even pretend to sound like guitar accompaniment. By way of explanation, I play differently behind a vocalist by “off-timing” the chorus (Robyn never could figure out how I do that). The trick is to play “between the beats”. I discovered the technique because not many vocalists have perfect timing. Robyn did, and I was soon able to carry it off with others.
Did I say more than unique? Yes. Here is how it works. I leave a few handfuls of real karaoke microphones lying around the bar and with the staff. Since my set is 100% classic covers, anyone who wants to sing along just grabs a microphone. Think of live karaoke. I facilitate matters by telling them to just sing the parts they know, since they are the “house band”. What a riot. At first, I kept the volume low but I’ve learned to let them fly at it. They are no worse than the bad performers at a real karaoke show and a lot more crowd fun. That was another damn smart move and proves the value of the eight-channel PA. I am flush with cash and it is steak and lobster this weekend.
Give me variety or give me death. A French lady brunette tourist put the make on me last night. It was like old times back on the Pacific.
