While eating chicken enchiladas

“What was that?”

K: “?”

“Sounds like they’re exploding stuff again.”

K: “Oh.”

“Sheesh, I wonder how long they will be doing this.”

K: “Well, they have been doing a lot of blowing over there.”

“???”

“They always say that some white guy did it.”

That’s Miles.

Last night I played BeBop Coffee House. It was an Andy Armer production, so there was plenty of creativity in the air. Or, maybe the bass player had hot dogs for dinner. I like playing with Andy, because he listens. We can take a standard tune that has been played thirty gazillion times, and turn it into something never heard before–and will never be heard again. Andy and I have been doing this for years, and it never gets old or tiresome. Here’s a shout out to Randy, a young tenor player in the area–thanks for your kind words last night. I have listened to many players that made me want to drop everything and run home to hit the shed. If my playing had that effect on you, I am honored.

Friday night was Slick Side Down at Vino Mercato. Usually we pack the place, but Friday was pretty quiet. Perhaps worthy of note–this was essentially our first gig to really hear what our new phallically-inspired sound system can do in a club setting. (I guess we did play a party with the systems last week, but it was in a basement and it wasn’t a very good test.)

It went surprisingly well. The main thing I am trying to get used to is the way I hear myself. I am going into my system dry without effects. It sounds great, but it exposes every nuance of my playing. It will take some getting used to.

Tonight I am playing alto in the infamous Betty Berger Big Band. Every once in a while, I get called to sub in Betty’s band. It is a rag-tag group of generally good-natured jazzers playing all the old school big band charts. I play this gig because it is always good for a laugh, and it is good practice trying to read the often indecipherable charts on the fly.

Experience enables you to recognize a mistake when you make it again.
Whatever.

The good morning sneeze

K: “Good morning!”
Yours truly: “Goo-bleiatchhhiaewpffthhhhhdmuethhhhepfwhaettchdl!”

Dog blame.

Meet our 2 year-old border collie, EB.

Border collies are known for being very agile, smart, highly stressed, obsessive-compulsive, neurotic, and overly serious. It has been said that people resemble the dogs they choose. Whoever said that obviously has no clue.

She has been with us for about a year. When we first met her at the Humane Society, she had been turned in for typical problems associated with bored and stressed border collies. She was a chewer. In fact, rumor had it that EB had chewed up the seat on her owner’s Harley (probably serves him right for keeping her in the garage). Little did she know that her misdeed would result in the best thing that ever happened to her–a chance to live with us! She was so sweet at the shelter that we decided to give it a go. One test was to see how she acted with the girls, especially little Amelia. When we introduced EB to the girls, she got down on her belly and inched her way up to Amelia, just wanting to gently nuzzle her head up to a new little friend. K and I both melted, and that was that. It has been a lot of work, but she is just about the best dog imaginable.

As you can see, she has some serious hops. And she didn’t even do any of her really big jumps that day. I have always wanted a frisbee dog. It did not come naturally for her; I worked very hard for the first couple of months just to get her to track and retrieve a ball. But once she started to catch on, she just took off (no pun intended). I have had some inclinations to enter her in some competitions. The Skyhoundz regionals are usually held in Spokane, and I am considering taking her next year. She is still younger than most dogs who compete, but she is developing some major skills.

These dogs can be a lot of work. They need a job to do, and they need to be kept in check. I have worked hard training EB. The last couple weeks I haven’t been playing frisbee with her as much as I should. It started out with some bad weather, and I fell out of the daily routine. Time to get back into it.

Welcome to the family EB. You are one of us now, like it or not.

(Credits to my friend John for the photo. It isn’t the clearest, but it wasn’t a planned photo shoot or anything. We were just out at the park one day and he was snapping a few shots with the family camera.)

Work can wait another 30 minutes. There are more important things to do. Like throwing sticks.
Whatever.

In the beginning…

I would normally make a big deal about starting something new like this. I might spend lots of time blathering on about this and that, and it might be really fun for a while. But soon my enthusiasm would probably dwindle as I become preoccupied with other things. So without fanfare, funny jokes, clever anecdotes, or dancing girls with lots of feathers, here is my blog. And it is actually even more disparaging than it sounds so far. You don’t know this, but this isn’t even a blog yet. I’m just typing in Microsoft Word, and I don’t have a registered domain name, and I don’t have any software. So there.

Better late than never, I guess.
Whatever.