Long Time, No …
Gadzooks! It’s been over 2 years since we last spoke and you didn’t say anything! Sorry sorry sorry. I got sidetracked and between watching 5 seasons of LOST in a week and a half and facebook, well, we lost each other.
So, where do I begin? When last we spoke, I was Sleepless in Annapolis on tour with Peter Himmelman. That ended up being nothing if not unique (and eerie…as we speak, one of his songs just popped up on my iTunes!)
Aside #1: The “a” key on this computer is sick. I see I’ll have to come back when done and replace many. So, I’m going to try to use as few a’s as possible.
Aside #2: I cannot type a capital “z” Dunno. Just dunno. Marty Mac, my Mac guy, can’t figure it out. Says it’s software? Dunno
OK, so Himmelman…yeah….we’ll have to get back to him later. I just found my 2007 date book, so I’ll write about each incredible adventure as they resurface from my brainpan, like an aquarium air hose as it unkinks and the memories, as air, flow forth.
The studio finally got built and opened in December of 2007 and promptly closed down in December 2009. Apparently, there’s this thing called an “economy” and this “economy” is bad and it’s got it out for me.
And because I toured with Peter and because I was building my studio, I got fired from my job doing sound at the Tr•ct•r T•v•rn. I used to be in charge of sound scheduling and the such, but because I didn’t drink with the boss, I lost Most Favorite Nation Status. It got to the point where I was working maybe 3 or 4 shifts a month, down from 15 or more. So, one day I called the owner and asked for maybe 1 or 2 more shifts a month.
His reaction follows along these lines…”Well, I’m getting divorced and I can’t get this printer to work, so it’s time you don’t work here anymore!”
In hindsight, it makes perfect sense in the same way dancing for algebra does. Needless to say, I haven’t been there since. Probably blacklisted from Ballard Avenue anyway, me not being hip enough and all.
Oh, and by the way, you’ll recall from past entries here when I fell and whiplashed my entire musculoskeletal system at work a few years ago. So, 2.5 years later, I’m minding my own business (hell, I was asleep) and woke up (from said sleep) with an INCREDIBLE PAIN IN MY NECK. Think that maybe I slept badly (I mean slept well, because I know how to sleep, maybe not, but the point being that the act of sleeping was done properly, eyes shut, rhythmic breathing, dreaming of a Cuban woman, but maybe I slept incorrectly as in where my head was, angle-wise and the such). I asked my sister-in-law (whom I think is a massage therapist) to try to work the kink out. This was during the annual family pilgrimage to the Oregon Coast (Jo, do I need to capitalize the “c” in coast?). Everything she did was probably correct but it only made things worse. By midafternoon, I was in so much pain that chasing Vicodin with Vodka ended up being a waste of Vicodin and Vodka. I texted my friend Nicole (emergency room doctor supreme) and she replied “C6-C7.” I’m thinking, what the fuck do 2 different models of Yamaha Grand pianos have to do with this?
Partial Aside #3: We had a Yamaha C7 at the studio. It was built in the early 70’s so it was 7’4” not 7’6” as we know and love them today.
Right, so what she meant was that the C6-C7 disc in my neck blew ruptured herniated bulged and it was pressing on the nerve root that ran down my entire left arm, terminating at the index finger. I mentioned pain, right? OK, like on a scale of 1-10, 10 being hurts like hell and all, I was hitting mid 20’s. Didn’t sleep for 3 days. The drive home took twice as long because I had to stop t every rest stop in Oregon and Washington to try to stop the pain. The plus side of this was that Mifune got plenty of walks.
Longer story short, after x-rays, MRI, CT Scan, EMG (painful waste of 4 hours. When the doctor was done shooting electrical current through me and I asked him what he thought, he says “C6-C7.” Thanks…) a cortisone shot and much acupuncture, it looks like your intrepid reporter is due to go under the knife.
Film at 11.
Xmas looms it’s cheery head next week I’m doing sound in a shopping center for my friend Terry Morgan and then blasting down to the Oregon Coast yet again with Mifune for a few days to try to sandblast holiday music out of my psyche. Working at the Seattle Center New Years Eve. Something to do with fireworks and the rewriting of the constitution.
Don’t be a stranger.
Luck
pj