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17 may 2000
----- Above ... the City of Angels, downtown LA, somewhere in there, seen from seat 3D, monday morning. Where does the sky end? Where does the smog begin? ~~~ Rented "Dogma" tonight. I read the script years ago. The movie was much different, but the message stayed the same. It's all about faith. That's a good thing. Kevin Smith needs to keep making movies, and the Catholic League needs to get a clue. ~~~ Left my bedroom for a glass of water last night. I opened the door and heard a scream. "No ... Chuck ... don't come out! I'm naked!" "Too late, I'm already out ... don't worry, I'm not wearing my glasses." And she just stood there and laughed. And I took it in, being only four feet away. All I could say was "Damn girl, you're gorgeous." An embarassed giggle. She ran back into the bedroom and stuck her head around the door. "I thought you said you couldn't see." "No, I just said I wasn't wearing my glasses." "Could you turn the heat off?" "No, you come back out and turn it off." An evil smile. "Just kidding ..." "Goodnight." "Goodnight." I realized two things last night. One, I'm gonna miss my roommates dearly. Two, that was the first naked woman I've seen in six months. ~~~ Due to the geographic location of my office, it was on me to pick up the video of our last gig so the band could watch it at practice tomorrow night. Of course, I couldn't resist throwing it in the VCR for a couple of minutes... It kind of devastated me. It wasn't the band's performance that got me down, it was just me. It's been almost a month since that gig, and not one person told me how out-of-tune I sang on my new song. Either most of my friends are tone deaf, or they just didn't wanna hurt my feelings. My roommate's friend, a professional singer, was there when I played the tape. She's heard me sing before, and all she could say was: "You couldn't hear yourself on stage, could you?" And she was right. She said that even the best singers will go off key if they can't hear themselves. Strangely, it was a bit comforting to hear, but not enough to dispel my retroactive embarrassment. I got on the phone to IceDog, Angel, and Wamba, and explained to them that I refuse to sing the song at the next gig for fear of making the band look bad, unless they can get me a decent vocal monitor mix. I told them we can go with my other song, which I'm already comfortable singing, to the point that I could actually stay in tune without hearing myself. They told me not to worry, that I'm my own worst critic, which I guess is true, but it doesn't stop the song from sounding like shit. They haven't even heard the tape yet. To top it off, Music Connection comes out tomorrow with a review of that last gig. I can picture it now ... "The band sounded great, with the exception of that keyboard player, who should learn to sing in key. But aside from him, everything was fine." Hmm, maybe I'm just being pessimistic. Tomorrow will tell. My first stop in the morning is to pick up the magazine. Of course, it would be even worse if they panned the entire show. ~~~ I'm almost recovered from the Boston trip. Thanks go out to Don and Sarah for doing my journalling for me while I was there. Don got me to the airport at 5:30am, just in time for me to confirm a seat in row 13 on the flight to Phoenix. Once at Phoenix, I was to proceed to gate A13 to catch the connecting flight to LA. Too many 13s on my boarding passes, I thought ... but then I was too tired to be superstious. I had fallen asleep five minutes after boarding, crunched up in a little ball. I was woken up by a tapping on my shoulder. "Excuse me sir." It was the flight attendant, holding a boarding pass stub. "We've got a seat up front for you." Ah, a last minute upgrade. Sometimes, it pays to be on standby. I grabbed my bag and shuffled up to first class, and settled back to sleep in a much larger seat. I managed to sleep for almost half the flight. Landing in Phoenix was interesting. Floating over the desert, the ground getting closer, the runway in view. I stuck my face to the window, listening to the quiet, awaiting the feel of solid ground beneath me. It was more like a bounce. I thought it was a very light landing, but the engines revved, and the plane started vibrating, and the next thing I know, we're taking off again. The captain came on a minute later... "Well folks," she said, "we kinda missed the runway there ... seems there was another aircraft in our path and we're gonna have to circle around. We'll have you back on the ground in about 13 minutes." "13 minutes." Nice. I've never seen so many passengers with their faces glued to the windows before. But then I got back to LA safe and sound. ~~~ My car is back. I've missed it very much. I picked it up on monday. This morning, I took it for the 30,000 mile tune up. I've thrown almost $1000 into this car in the past three days and it's running better than ever. Now, if I could just say the same about my bank account balance.... Running out of steam ... I could sit here for a while thinking up the perfectly clever end to this document, but I won't. Sleep sounds better. 17 may 1999: didn't write : 17 may 1998: conking out : And I wonder where that sense of adventure has gone. It must have been killed by my desire to live a safe, "happy" life, planning for that future which never turns out the way I expect it to anyway.
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