Here is a nice camper on an old truck. Note the modern design, with all the familiar doodads, including the stepped roof and cab-over bed. This camper is not modern. It is a local conversation piece because it was built in 1947. The truck, I don’t know, but it looks like the camper will easily outlast it by a margin. Up close, the camper is no worse for wear, proving they knew how to built these things.
Stupid traffic lights. That is what Florida needs. You see, we already have smart traffic lights. They don’t work, except when there are just one or two cars on the road. At more than two vehicles, local drivers get stupid. So during rush hour it would be helpful if the lights became stupid., like the drivers. Why nobody has thought of it is just another thing that makes this Florida.If I dared to do it, a laptop is the way to go on stage. I borrowed a Toshiba from Mike to try the system and it works almost too well. That is, after allowing an extra hour to show up early and set the equipment up to test it live. It takes time to clown around with new gadgets. It is nice to see all the tunes on screen instead of scrolling all the time. But I don’t dare to leave an expensive computer on stage.
It was birthday time for Scotty and Claude. Harpman Garry was in, but he moved a week ago and can’t find his harmonicas. The barbeque man was in, working on the back grill. He says he is too busy at his job to consider doing any catering. So that is that. Too bad as he has a real culinary talent and my estimate is not swayed [by the fact that] because most food tastes better when somebody else cooks it.
I’m at a loss what to do with that weird Canadian lady who wrecks my equipment. Can’t throw her out because she is so thick in the head she doesn’t realize the damage she is causing. Now she has disabled my speakers, one of the trickiest repairs. You can’t say anything because she will swear you are the first person who ever spoke up. It is going to cost me an hour’s work to fix the system. A fool can break more computers than a wise man can mend.
Speaking of losers, that unbearable housewife was in today. Didn’t I tell you about her? Everybody in the shop cringes when she pulls up. Today, for instance, she didn’t want to pay the $425 bill for her new hard drive because we didn’t get her data off the old one. Um, lady, that is because the old drive was broken. When we shake it, you can hear little noises. And she didn’t think she should have to reinstall all her software either.
True, all that doesn’t sound bad, but let me elaborate. She used to be good-looking, maybe twenty years ago. She is constantly trying to get something for nothing, and can’t cease this behavior even though it has long since become trite and ineffective. It is the only way she knows how to operate and you can tell she has surrounded herself with people who put up with it. Every “question” she asked was to see if we would do something for free. This goes on for hours.
Thank myself that I’ve got a gig to unwind at. Not only that, I made excellent tips, which, while not enough to live on, is money I never saw playing with other musicians. Still, my act is wearing thin on the regulars, something I am self-critical over. That is why I have constantly added to my stage performance to the point where very little remains of my original show. Available time and space on stage is all used up, I am busy all the time, including between songs. For much of the new material, I am literally standing on one foot (playing the lo-hat).
Which brings me to the gig analysis. Tonight the show-stopper was my newest addition, Jim Stafford’s “Spiders & Snakes”. The original bass line was a little weak so I rewrote it with hints from “William Tell Overture” and that riff from “Neutron Dance” just before the vocals begin. The effect? Incredible. When I work in the lo-hat, it will become deadly contagious. Give me a couple hours because playing bass and lo-hat simultaneously is not a natural human activity.
Why, I might even put in the time tomorrow, after breakfast at Senor Café and shopping. All with gig money. For the record, I declare all my income, but I completely understand why 35 million Americans don’t. That is the official size of the underground economy. What is surprising is that underground no longer means underworld. The government never says it, but a lot of this must be ordinary people who dislike or distrust the system.
That is to say, pure tax evasion is no longer the sole motive to cheat. Face it, your tax return is not secret and everybody knows that. It is viewed as testifying against yourself, so I personally elevate those who protest to patriot. The Constitution makes it clear Americans have a duty to not just vote, but en masse to disobey unpopular laws. Put another way, to those who think “voter registration” is right, let’s just say people have devised their own secret ballot.
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