08 october 2000
one week

sunday night's special
at least this once, tomorrow
brings nothing to do
geeku by me

My entire fucking body hurts ... not a bad thing, and I'll get to it later...

Friday night, I arrived home less than sober, surfing before bed, and I stumbled through a link to this "three way action" site. Feeling stupid as I was, I found myself captivated for a good fifteen minutes, reading all this schtuff in what is little more than a glorified posting forum run by the popular kids on the block, so to speak. And yet, before I knew it, I had registered myself and posted a warped sort of personal ad in the "introduce yerself" section or what-not.

Then I promptly drifted to unconsciousness. I've been wondering what prompted me to post something up there ... I haven't been online since.

Yesterday morning, I danced deliciously with the snooze button on my clockradio, and finally dragged myself into the shower at 10:30. By eleven I was shaved and dressed, and in the car for my four mile journey up Pacific Coast Highway to our next gig, the Big political fundraiser, a private party for about two hundred rich-and-stuck-up people who have shit that smells better than mine... but I digress...

The fundraiser was held at a hilltop ranch/estate, the property of one Doctor Marvah, a kindly Indian gentleman who likes to position the letter "M" prominently around his property, on gates, doorways, driveways, rose gardens, tennis courts -- I wondered why I was in such a mood for bite-sized and multi-colored chocolate candies within thirty minutes of arrival.

As with most of our gigs, this one turned into "hurry up and wait" very quickly. We set up the stage, and watched while the sound specialists worked with Wamba to get our instruments mic'ed and wired into the PA. One of the roadies found a soccer ball (futbol), and it turned out to be our saving grace. For a good hour, myself, Casanova, Mojo, Angel, and two roadies had a friendly three-on-three game. I felt unbelievably athletic, and damned good at the game too ... suffice to say I was very surprised that my skills were coming back to me so quickly.

(random piece of trivia: giorgio chinaglia was one of the first people to yell at me for smoking. him and his manager sat there and told me i could have been a professional soccer player -- i was stoned when they told me this -- they told me i threw a great career away, in favor of what? marching band? cigarettes? everything I've chosen for myself these past fifteen years? this "life" I'm leading now? yes, I know I could have been a professional athlete. I fucking hate athletes though. Who's giorgio chinaglia, ya ask? If you don't know, forget about it. (or click here) Suffice to say he was a pretty good friend of mine a long time ago, and he probably wouldn't recognize me today, almost two decades later.)

Anyways, I was doing damned well on the soccer field yesterday, holding my own against our Brazilian bassist, Spanish guitarist, and Italian roadies, when we were finally called to the stage to soundcheck. Same as always ... just a little less of the instruments, and a little more vocals in the monitors. That's all, thanks.

When we finally started playing, the set lasted about a half-hour. It all seemed so trite to me, workmanlike. Go up on stage, do your job, the get the fuck out. My voice was so strong I didn't even have to concentrate on making it better ... I almost liked it more when I smoked. Onstage, I found myself thinking about anything and everything but the gig, mind wandering, plucking random pepperdine students from the crowd for fast fantasy whatever, going over a site map for my job, making faces at Wamba, anything to keep my mind occupied ... the gig itself was boring the hell out of me, so I made it entertaining for myself. And before I knew it, it was over.

I can't even count how many people came up to me afterwards and told me how good we were. I wanted to say back "Huh? ... what show are _you_ talking about?" But instead I just realized that we, as a band, can just go up on stage and do a job, no emotion, and it still works.

I'm not sure how I feel about that ...

After the gig I drove to Long Beach to meet Jen for dinner. I picked her up, and she promptly locked her keys in her apartment.

I went to the bar next door, borrowed a ladder, put it against Jen's building, climbed to her second floor window, ripped the screen off, climbed in, and unlocked the door from the inside. I returned the ladder as Jen found her keys.

I was very hungry at the time. No time for a locksmith.

We ate at Benihana in Anaheim. It was tasty. Jen paid, despite my protests. She claimed she owed me. She was probably right, and yet I still have a problem not paying.

After dinner we became the graduate architects we are (well, actually Jen's a _real_ architect) and drove by Disneyland to check out the progress on the new California Adventure theme park construction. Yes, they're quadrupling the size of Disneyland, and it's looking pretty darned cool. The roller coaster itself is enough to entice me to visit on opening day, whenever that might be...

Today found me food shopping at Bristol Farms and barbequing at Wamba's. We watched "Still Crazy" and munched on baby back ribs and portuguese linguisa sausage. An incredibly relaxing day, punctuated only by a fierce ache in every muscle in my body, brought on by the unexpected physical exertion of yesterday's soccer match.

But then the physical exertion wasn't a bad thing, for tonight finds me one week (that would be seven days) without a cigarette, and it feels good, and muscle pain is cool too, because it feels like I'm actually starting to get in shape.

Too bad, I'd rather gain weight.

08 october 1998: : on a brief hiatus

08 october 1997: squeezing chutzpah : My usual inhibitions drowned in the first taste of last night's third beer, and the results were otherworldly.

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