One year ago today: February 20, 2017, work to code.
Five years ago today: February 20, 2013, WIP
Nine years ago today: February 20, 2009, then prove it.
Random years ago today: February 20, 2008, beautiful St. Judes.
Please be patient. I may get photos for these blogs later, but I'm using the abbreviated Win 10 that seems to refuse everything I want it to do. I'll alert you if there are any updates. Here's that tard MicroSoft update screen.
Down town was -like-unMiami-like with some of the lightest traffic ever seen. This was a maintenance trip on my cholesterol, which has consequently been under control for years. To my overeseas readers, the reports you hear of high blood pressure problems and such in America are very true. It's the leading medical issue and I don't intend to go that way. If I live to be 70, I'll become the active leader of the resistance. What resistance? Well, I ain't sayin', but all I can say is Monsanto had it comin'.
Mid-morning found me in Hollywood, tearing around all business. I don't intend to hang around, I've got a bedroom to finish. Blood test show I'm somewhere in the realm of Olympic athlete, so how come I don't feel like one? I did not even stop for coffee since it was asking too much to get through Miami a second time without some kind of traffic tie-up.
I thought JZ had wanted to hit up that university pub, but instead he was watching colorized western reruns. This found me in the coffee shwiop, which is where youa re getting these WiFi posts. You know, I still don't know if "free Internet" and WiFi are the same thing or not. All the cool dudes and millennials around me won't (or can't) answer that question. What does that tell you about the wired in generation? Maybe they are wired in but their terminal screws are loose.
Next was a quick teleconference thing over the lady guitar player. The majority agreement was with me, that even if the situation is not ideal, the potential is there. The guitar coaching, a primitive approach, is still more effective than rehearsing the songs to death only to have them forgotten by the next week. Then it is agreed it is worth a try, to give her the equivalent of bass lessons. There are some formidable hurdles with that. But it's an enemy I know.
So, are we clear on this? The rehearsals end while we switch mode to guitar lessons. There's more than ordinary irony here, a non-guitarist teaching a seasoned guitar player. But hark back to my first bands, when I was twelve and thirteen years of age. Isn't this full cycle? Covering the same ground again a half-century later. Not because I have the time or inclination, but because others can't seem to get their asses in gear. The fact is, when it comes to what it takes to form a successful band, I've met only two truly professional musicians in my entire life. And I was fool enough to marry one of them.
The question arose again why give anybody in music a second chance? I point at the Hippie, who everybody told me was one nasty clown, and I gave him chance after chance beyond reason. I can easily point out that for his shortcomings, the guy did actually get to stage work. Can't say that for the majority of the rest. You can't fake or shortcut what it takes to make that quantum leap from sayin' to playin'. Anybody who makes it that far is to be taken as seriously as possible, even if they are otherwise useless.
From my point of view, I gave nobody any undue chances, it's only that since I moved to Florida,it was always somebody like the Hippie around whenever the comparisons were being made. (Amazing coincidence, innit?) If he, or any guitar player had simply listened to me, he'd have been in a successful band all these years. Instead, not one of them would even try, prompting me to wonder how old do these guys have to get before they realize playing in any band is better than the nothing dreams they cocoon themselves in? That is a sharp criticism, but allow me to point out that not one of the guitarists who failed with me ever went on to become a soloist or to front the band of their dreams. Or to become anything, really. Certainly, none of them retired at age 41, like I did.
Even Billie-Bill, who I tried to pay to learn a few tunes my way for a demonstration, failed. He's over sixty now and still plays at best a few free gigs per year at the odd bar, but it peters out after a couple of weeks. Nobody wants to hear that hillbilly old stuff, at least not all night long. The opposite of my presentation, but he persists in thinking he can play well enough to convert them. Not me, the music I choose and play has been instantly accepted wherever I've played it.
Last Laugh
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