goblinbox

In which there are two good things.

Good thing the first is that yesterday I signed an NDA and a contractor’s agreement and filled out a W9, and Monday I start breaking software for money. Yay! I know no details at all about the project’s expected longevity, but who knows – I might get lucky!

Good thing the second is that today is the Bronze Blues & Brews festival in Joseph, OR. The festival ends at ten, and Coyote Kings (featuring: me!) will be the only band playing in town tonight. We’ve already invited tons of the musicians who are booked at the festival, and it should turn out to be the Best Jam Ever.

In which I had a really great gig this weekend.

Saturday, I joined the Coyote Kings at the Pastime in Ritzville for the 17th annual Blues, Brews & BBQs festival.

It was a fantastic time. Great people, great weather, great music (and a fully-stocked green room, so I didn’t have to starve or beg someone to buy me food), and I met tons of great musicians.

I’d write a big fat descriptive post about it, but I’m lazy and I have a movie to watch. (In a nutshell: I rode up with Curt & Shelly, gigged, had some drinks, ran around, got mildly sunburnt, drank gallons of water, met players, and rode back with Frank.) If you want moar you can click the picture for the photo set!

Tomorrow’s to-do list: 1. Get paid for the gig; buy groceries and pay the Internet bill. 2. Work on NLW’s little data entry project. 3. Call the unemployment office and be all, WTF, OVER? WHY DID YOU SEND ME AN EB APP WHEN I’VE ALREADY BEEN APPROVED FOR EB? WHY WON’T YOU GIVE ME ANY MONEY? DO YOU LIKE THAT I’M LIVING ON LENTILS AND RAMEN?!

In which I tell you about my weekend. And the crazy fluctuations in my state of mind. (Seriously, watching your mind do whatever it does is EVER an exercise in weird.)

Friday night I went out and got drunk for no good reason. I hadn’t intended to get drunk, but I was sitting at the bar having a really nice conversation with one of the regulars and Amy kept pouring the way she does, and, well: shit happens. Saturday I had to get up about three hours earlier than I usually do and if it was a little rough, well, that was my own damn fault, wasn’t it!

Curt & Shelly came and picked me up and they gave me an egg biscuit and hash browns from McDonald’s the very minute I sat down in their ride (and OMG I srsly LOVE THEM for that). The drive to the Benton Franklin County fairgrounds was uneventful; we didn’t need to be there early because it turned out there wasn’t going to be a sound check after all. I was, hangover-style, a little agro that I’d had to get up when I did. We milled around aimlessly instead. Steve bought me a coffee. I love him, too.

At noon, Romagossa Blu kicked off the festival with a bang, and then Vaughn Jensen went up and smoked. Coyote Kings went on at 1:30 and three songs later I went up and joined them.

Playing festivals is great. The stages are huge, the crowd is way into what you’re doing, and there are actual professional sound people at the board. Monitors! Lights! No schlepping!

There was a wedding on stage directly after our set. I got to sing ‘At Last’ for the happy couple, then bluesman Billy Stoops officiated the marriage of (our friends and fans) Nancy and Steve right there in front of everybody. It was cute.

After the set I changed into comfy clothes and promptly started drinking the free beer from the craft services tent. I spent most of the day backstage because I could (UnTapped doesn’t take your VIP pass away after you finish playing, like other festivals sometimes do) but I did wander around enough to have seen absolutely everything. UnTapped has tons of beer and wine makers and lots of food and a scattering of other vendors. It’s a really cool festival.

A few of the NW players I met told me they’d heard of me, which was, as you can imagine, immensely gratifying. I was encouraged to move to Portland; I was encouraged to start my own band. In short, I got a lot of ego stroking, but – because the mind is a terrible thing – I somehow managed to feel self-pity anyway.

I know, right? WTF, Mush? Fun blues festival, stage time, free beer, beautiful weather, good friends, and my internal dialog is fux0red. This is what happens when one doesn’t deliberately choose the upside.

My (admittedly not accurate) perception was that the musicians got younger as the day went on. In the early afternoon we had guys pushing 60 but the kids in the headliner’s band all looked like they were still on the fresh side of 30. I was having, in the back of my mind, one of those completely negative “since I wasn’t headlining at 26 it follows that I suck” thought processes. Why? It’s stupid, but lemmie tell you what: all that crap about the negative psychological effects of unemployment? Appears to be true. After not getting yet another job, I’m having a glass-is-half-empty crisis in the form of a really insidious “I’m totally mediocre” mental litany.

It doesn’t help that this is my second long-term bout of unemployment in the last five years, either. Stupid job market!

I met a metric ton of musicians, including the superawesome Miriam (of Portland band Miriam’s Well) and her bandmates; Chicago tenor player Eddie Shaw and his son Vaan (who is a really cool dude); trombonist Ed Earley; and the headliner, Hamilton Loomis (who was not only a smokin’ musician but a really, really nice person), to name a few.

Loomis’ set was not at all what I’d call blues; his has been described as a “blues-rock-funk-groove-soul band,” and he did charts that broke down into funky Stevie Wonder grooves, charts that were pure rock, charts that were pure soul. It occurred to me that from here on out, it’s all meta. Every song will contain shades of every genre that’s ever gone before, and descriptors like “R&B” and “pop” and “blues” will go the way of the dinosaur. Listeners will be expected to understand music from a global perspective that spans the whole of recorded music.

In other words, it’s so meta it’s actually like this: I have some cheesy pop in my library that features a raga in the bridge, house with a gypsy violin in it, and funk with a banjo solo. There’s really no reason I can’t do R&B-soul-blues-jazz-rock and still get booked at blues festivals, that’s all I’m saying.

Applying this meta concept to the idea of “work”, I’m realizing that my bad attitude is stupid. I’m online all the time, so I know that very little can truly be monetized. All this free information on the Internet is there because people want to do it. They try and try and try to monetize and the vast majority of them fail; overall they do this shit for the love of it. Free ebooks, free TV series, free how-to videos, free games, free lessons, free recipes: some people manage to be offering the right thing at the right time and they break through to monetization, but most of them don’t. And that’s okay.

I do what I do for the love of it: I sing, I take pictures with old film cameras, I publish thousands of words online per year, I share recipes, I comment on tech. These things are fun, and I don’t need to feel guilty – or mediocre – about not turning them into money.

I have this belief that life is structured like this: there’s this job thing you do, and it pays your bills. You do not love it. You’re very fortunate if you like it. It takes up much but not all of your time, and it subsidizes the other things you do. Some people get paid a lot to play at whatever they play at and they don’t have to do the job thing. They are rare and special, and I am not one of them.

That’s my job meta. I don’t like it, but I don’t think I’m eligible to transcend it because it seems that if I was I already would have. So, I believe that I need a job, and I don’t have one, and it’s messing with my head. Since I can’t through any amount of effort on my part cause a job to exist, I need to do something else meaningful to structure my time.

Tomorrow I’m going to visit the WorkSource office and find out what options are available. I’m ready for some options. I’m a displaced worker, I guess, since there aren’t any ISP support gigs around here and I’m 41. I think I might be eligible for grants and scholarships.

I think I’d really like to go back to school. I’d much rather be in class than on the job market since the endless rejection, poverty, and uncertainty is, um, starting to bug the shit out of me.

I mean, sure: I love having nothing but free time. Who doesn’t? I like eating when I want, sleeping when I want, playing guitar when I want, going out when I want: it’s fun. I read all the time, I can meditate whenever I want, or do push-ups and crunches when the mood strikes rather than when I have to. The freedom is great, but apparently I just can’t stop worrying about what will happen. What will happen when my benefits run out? What will happen ifone of the minimum wage jobs I apply for actually offers me a position I really don’t want?

Anyway. Sorry about the digression. All the pics from the blues festival are here, if you want to check them out.

My next gig isn’t until July, but we’ll be playing The Pastime at the Ritzville Blues Brews & BBQs festival, which should be a total blast.

In which there’s a YouTube video. Sorry.

Okay, I’m obsessed with this track right now. It’s musical brain crack, as far as my musical brain is concerned.

This is only the second time I’ve ever embedded a YouTube video here ever (and the first time the video was of me). So it’s not like I do this very often, since verily I don’t like blogs full of YouTube videos, and even then I kinda feel bad about it.

Anyway, the day before yesterday a friend linked to this from Facebook and for some weird reason I actually went and watched it. I’d downloaded the track from iTunes within minutes and have played it 23 times so far. I’ve watched the vid at least half a dozen times. It’s just so freakin’ wonderful.

Behold! Tightrope by Janelle Monáe ft. Big Boi:

Groovy choreography, great voice, great beat, fantastic costumes, weird freaky hair – it’s just freakin’ AWESOME. (Apparently the track is part of a concept album about androids, even. Can I get a hell yeah?)

In which there’s a barely organized ramble to get you up to date.

Health

I relaunched “Operation: Quit Smoking” on the 25th. It sucks and I hate it.

All I want to do is eat and sleep and never go anywhere or do anything that reminds me of smoking, because nic fits suck, but of course that’s unreasonable. I was miserable between sets at Saturday’s gig because every cell in my body wanted to go outside and smoke, and no the nicotine gum didn’t help AT ALL.

Seriously, though, in spite of my words my attitude is pretty good… I just want to complain because quitting is hard. Here are my notes on the process. There’s a link to my daily diary if you’re interested in that level of detail.

Did I mention that it SUCKS? Good. Because I hate it! Rar!

Help

My band has entered into a contest to play at the Crossroads blues festival in Chicago this September. It’s all very exciting.

If you could, please click here, register for an account, and vote for us. Every day, if you can. I totally want to go play blues in Chicago for my birthday!

Other

I’ve seen the Wolf a few times since we broke up, and he’s been totally cool about it. I’m both grateful and relieved.

Want to add some music to your library? Apropos of nothing, I posted a lovely mix here this morning. Have at it!

The Curse^™ has arrived.

I still don’t have a job.

It’s totally spring here.

In which I somehow manage to fill my days but I don’t feel like I’m actually doing anything.

Just a few rando things before the video:

1. My netbook is all better after the rebuild. Yay!
2. I sorta-kinda have a boyfriend, but we never see each other because we both gig, he’s on a pretty committed night schedule, and neither of us can entertain in our places of residence.
3. I’ve gotten a response from a job application! Unfortunately, it’s for a part-time support job on the other side of the state and it only pays about a buck an hour over minimum wage.
4. I ran out of business cards for my rockstar persona, so I ordered more today. I figured I needed them, since I’ll be doing about five blues festivals with Coyote Kings this summer. VERY EXCITING!
5. G’ma won’t stop buying Purina; it’s cheap and I think she objects to paying twice as much for dog food. I object to Purina because it’s essentially non-digestible (the “crude protein” on the label is ground up non-food animal parts) and does weird things having to do with elimination to my dog that you really don’t want to hear about. I am now buying Iams myself and leaving it lying around in an effort to keep Bindu’s colon from falling out of her ass. (Yes, I fed and bought food for my own dog for over a decade; I just don’t get the opportunity to do so any longer.) I did get G’ma to quit giving Bindu canned food every damned day, though!
6. I had my acrylic nails removed last week, for two reasons: I feel guilty paying for fills when I’m unemployed, and I wanted to maybe play a little guitar. My nailbeds still feel REALLY WEIRD.
7. You should check out this picture of my breakfast.

Okay, since you’ve all been such good boys and girls, now we can watch some television!

Last Saturday, I played with the Coyote Kings at the Ice Harbor brew pub in Kennewick, WA. Below is some footage from the third set of a song Rob wrote for me to sing, called “You Don’t Like (What’s Goin’ On)”:

I sound all right, for a pudgy Irish chick, don’t you think?

In which I drop by briefly on my way to a gig.

The co-op finally emailed Friday afternoon: they thanked me but declined, deciding instead to hire from within.

I am having a full-on romance, complete with poetry and chocolates and necking and stuff. It’s awesome. We’re apart this weekend, though, because we’re both gigging in different towns.

The only work interest I’ve gotten appears to be a recruiter for a 3rd tier support gig. The pay sounds too high to be legit, though, so I suspect it’s crap.

Windows Update killed my netbook; a system restore seems to have solved the problem.

Played the Parkade in Kennewick last night; fun little bar. Tonight we’re at Dax’s in Richland.

Oh, I really need to be in the shower about five minutes ago! Ciao!

In which I had a great time on New Year’s Eve at Pub 21 with the band.

Load-in was at 4:30, but I was late because I had to take a paper copy of my resume (and cover letter and references) to WorkSource to apply for a job.

WTF? Why wouldn’t they let me email it to them? Not only did I have to drive over there in the snow to deliver three pieces of paper, but they scanned the documents to send – one assumes electronically – to the employer; somehow they couldn’t use the DOC and PDF format copies I’d helpfully brought along on a thumb drive, and they wouldn’t let me email the items in the first place! The mind boggles. It’s like it’s still 2002 at WorkSource or something.

Anyway.

We finished setup and did a sound check and still had three hours left before the gig. The weather was crap – snow and freezing rain – and the streets were treacherously icy in a pickup with no weight in the bed.

I went home and changed my pants (it turned out there was a hole in them) and read Makers in the interim.

The gig was a blast. People started dancing during the second song of the first set, and danced most of the night. The substitute bass player – the regular guy had another gig – did a fantastic job. (So fantastic, in fact, that I gave him a big ol’ bossy lecture about how “you only regret the things you didn’t do” and why he should move to a city and actually play for a living.)

Bob gave me a couple of glasses of wine for free because I was in the band. I gave out a bunch of business cards so people could get free downloads. My friend Sheila came and I danced about twelve bars with her and Shelley. Rob sold a bunch of the Kings’ latest CD.

Since I never make New Year’s resolutions, I made none this year. Yay! I’ve already averted much fail by simply doing nothing.

Speaking of doing nothing, I was supposed to be back over at the venue at one o’clock the next day for load-out, but The Curse^™ had arrived and I slept all damn day instead. I suck. I’m lucky anybody ever hires me.

Today, I need to find a job to apply for (ideally via email, fer chrissakes) and I’m going to read a bunch of Cory Doctorow’s Little Brother on my Kindle.

In which I have a fairly rotten cold. And a lot of fun, too, but the fun sure ain’t helping my cold any.

Thursday, I was pretty much wrecked at work because I’d decided to party the night before, but it turns out that I’m actually even better at phone-based IT work when I’m exhausted: it makes me talk – and think – more slowly and most customers really respond well to me when I’m half crippled.

The Dog Park and Two Bars

Friday, Bindu and I went to the dog park with our new friends J– and Turbo. Here is a fuzzy picture of Bindu and a couple of random Labs:

I met the cutest two-year-old English bulldog bitch in the entire world. The thing was built like a flat-faced toad, was totally friendly, and had the most hilarious underbite ever. I laughed every time she looked at me.

After that, J– and I went to the pub and had sweet potato fries (after intense deliberation I have decided that I do not like them) and built this awesome fire and talked our faces off and OMFG ARE WE HILARIOUS:

Then we went to the Red Monkey and hung out with Becca and Adam. I took this picture of my drinkin’ buddies shortly after we’d entered the “You are so cool, I fuckin’ love you, man!” phase of our evening:

We went to after hours at J–’s house on Stateline when the bar closed. I slept on the couch; J– slept on the floor because some other dude had passed out in his bed.

Around eleven the next morning I went home and slept in my own bed until I had to get ready for the gig. I coughed for, oh, about three hours straight. Stupid cold. Stupid girl who stays out all night with a cold!

The Gig!

Saturday night was the Mega Jam Blues Slam at the Kennewick Jack*son’s:

There were four bands. The Coyote Kings went on second; I fronted their last 3 songs for them. I had the dance floor COMPLETELY PACKED while I was onstage, and did a little “Lemmie get a hell yeah!” “HELL YEAH!” thing with the audience that really amused me. The crowd was really superlative and the joint was packed. This pic was taken while we performed a cover of Delbert Mcclinton’s Shaky Ground:

I’ve been coughing my face off for a week now, so I’m relieved I only did a few songs; I don’t think the voice would have lasted much longer than that.

Walking around the venue after getting off stage was fun because most of the people in the crowd were blues society members; one entire table actually started clapping when I walked by, and a couple other people just full-on hugged me. I gave out a lot of business cards and decided that I need to buy one of these and get a bunch of old live cassette tape recordings into MP3 format so people can have more free downloads.

There was supposed to be a jam at the end of the evening, but there were two more bands doing sets after ours and most of the Kings just didn’t want to hang out. Since Becca and I had ridden to Kennewick with Rocket and S–, we went with them over to cute little biker bar Dax’s in Richland and listened to a set from the Seattle rockabilly band, Guns n Rosetti. Then we went home because no one – the bass player, the drummer, myself – was really interested in going all the way back over for the jam… I wanted to go, sure, but mainly I was congested and tired and needed to go home to bed since I had to work the next day.

Sundays are mellow.

That next day is today. I’m at work. The volume is really low and frankly I’m wondering if I’m going to get rescheduled or simply laid off or what. Anyway. Behold the office Xmas tree:

I wish I could get sushi for lunch, but I think they’re closed on Sundays.

There’s something deeply satisfying about just getting drunk with people and hanging out; my only regret is that this week’s opportunity to do so coincided with so much snot. Snot, snot, snot. I’m snot-locked.

In other words, I’ve had a lot of fun. But I also have a deep, wracking cough that probably wouldn’t sound like this if I’d not done the drinking/smoking/standing outside in the cold/staying up all night bit. I believe that barring a call from Mick Jagger wanting to party on his Lear jet I’ll just go ahead and take the next week off and act like a mundane: bed rest, herbal tea, dog cuddles, and no staying up all night again until the cough is gone.

In which I review my weekend.

Thursday, I was on the cover of the Marquee. Considering the lame interview I gave her, my girl Sheila did a really fantastic job on the article! I sound totally interesting!

Friday, I fronted the Coyote Kings at Merchants on Main street. The place was packed. People started dancing about four songs into the first set, and danced all night! My dad and Rocket’s mom were in the audience. We rocked the house and I had a metric ton of fun.

Saturday I lounged around during the day, and went to dinner at my aunt’s house with my dad and my brother. We had a nice dinner, and then I heard an awesome story from my uncle about how he got his head smashed at work up at the airport one day and nearly died.

Sunday I knitted, did laundry, watched streaming Netflix videos and went to Walmart with G’ma, where I bought some shoes. Later I made a bunch of Indian food for this week’s bentos.

Today I woke up late and barely made it to work on time.

Tomorrow is my birthday! Send me presents!

In which I’m a little worried about my instrument.

I’m playing the Rally In The Valley – a biker rally, natch – tomorrow night. Outside. At night. It will most likely be both damp and chilly: not good conditions for a weak voice.

Then I’m supposed to play a chichi benefit gig on Saturday afternoon in the Tri-cities.

Both of which are awesome, of course, except for the fact that my instrument did not respond well to being used during band practice last night. I sang for less than an hour, and not even in full voice, and today woke up sounding like a bullfrog.

I have enough voice to talk on the phone at work, but I (a) don’t think I’m going to make it all the way through the gig tomorrow night and (b) will probably be utterly voiceless on Saturday.

This is bad because I want to do a good job at these gigs and I want the money.

I haven’t had a voice-related problem not concurrent with an upper respitory infection in twenty years, but I have been through it. The only cure is time and liquids and rest; and if I don’t do those things the instrument will just drop out completely and there’s nothing I can do about it. With gigs to do, the whole thing is just bummin’ me out.

In other news, my dad is arriving in town on Friday, and my mom is arriving on Saturday and they’re both going to expect to be able to hang out with me. (They divorced when I was 13 so it’s pretty amusing that they’re both showing up the same week; I haven’t seen either of them in a few years.)

Query: is it possible for your parents to give you laryngitis remotely?

In which I’m planning my weekends.

I agreed to work 5 hours tomorrow from 8 to 1, so I’ll not be going out tonight. (Not that I would have been anyway; I just wanted to sound like I have choices!) I’m thinking of watching Mad Men (season 1, episode 7) and doing some knitting for a swap that I should have completed, like, a month ago.

There might also be some Mexican food, or pizza, or something decadent along those lines because I have basically been eating really, really well and want to splurge.

This weekend, I need to get my nails done and clean the bathroom and do laundry. Next weekend I’m busy: I’m playing the Fair on Friday night, have a hair appointment Saturday morning, and a winery gig Saturday afternoon.

The weekend after, there’s the Rally in the Valley (blues for bikers! w00t!) on Friday night, then my mom arrives (I haven’t seen her in, like, a couple of years) on Saturday afternoon, and right after I have a benefit gig in the Tri-Cities. Sunday I’ll probably be inundated with aunts, which will totally rock.

So THIS weekend? I’m gonna be mellow. And knit!