Well, dear readers, yesterday was kind of a lovelier than lovely day and it was most appreciated. One simply cannot have enough lovelier than lovely days. That said, I did have some mighty peculiar dreams, including one REALLY peculiar dream that caused me to bolt awake. I did get eight hours of sleep, so that was nice. I awoke to a wonderfully wonderful e-mail that said eight projects were just approved for Kritzerland releases. It’s taken close to nine months, but it’s finally all clear to proceed. So, that was great. The helper came by and picked up some stuff, and then I went and had an omelet and a bagel for the meal o’ the day. I don’t think I lost an ounce from eating two calorie-free salads the day before and that is really beginning to bug me. Then I came home. And then the next lovelier than lovely thing happened – the second pension check arrived – yes, a week and two days it took, and the envelope was bent in several places and to me it looked like it might have gotten lodged in someplace and they just found it – I’d like to think my relentless calls had something to do with them searching for it and finding it.
I finished writing the monologue I’d begun and I think it came out pretty well. It took me a bunch of tries to find the way into it, but once I’d found that, then it came pretty quickly. I did many adjustments for personalizing the monologue for the person doing it, in other words, creating at least a modicum of a character. Then I worked on my song a bit more.
Then I got the chart for another one of my songs, and we spent a bit of time doing the fixes I found, but that’s another one done and off to Lanny. I also had a few telephonic calls during the day, all pleasantly pleasant. Finally, I sat on my couch like so much fish.
Last night, I watched the third episode of the new season of House of Cards – it was okay, slightly better than the first two. I began watching the fourth but Netflix became retarded so instead I watched the first hour of the new Blu and Ray of The Big Sleep. I really like the film a lot, but I can’t say the transfer bowled me over. It’s pretty ordinary. Then I did other stuff on the computer, made a better mp3 of one of my songs so Lanny had a good version of it, and that was that. Oh, and I uploaded a few more songs from Welcome to My World on YouTube. Here, for example, is the song Snacks. Sami loved doing this number.
She never thought the bag toss at the end would ever work. I told her it had to flip in the air but when she caught it the front of the bag had to be facing the audience the right side up. She tried and tried and couldn’t do it. I finally took the bag, showed her exactly where to hold it and when to flip it – she tried, it worked (to her astonishment) and she never ever missed. Here’s a song that the audience really seemed to enjoy. It’s called Fair-Weather Friends and we’ve certainly all dealt with fair-weather friends, haven’t we?
Finally, here’s I Want – I was tickled to write an I want song called I Want. As to the wants in the song – I had Sami send me a list of everything she wanted. It was a very long list, unwieldy, and I struggled with how to take the items and make a song out of it. And then one day I was sitting at the piano staring at the list and I came up with a vamp and then set the first two lines to music, almost as she wrote them. And then I continued to set the list to music, adding rhymes, cleaning up the words, making it scan, and making the jokes work. It was really fun.
Today, I will really just take it easy. I’ll hopefully pick up some packages, I have to do some banking, which I’ll do at the bank, and I’ll probably do a little writing and structure work on the LA show, but mostly I’ll relax until it’s time to mosey on over to The Federal for sound check. Then we’ll do our show, and I’m sure some of us will go to Little Toni’s after.
The rest of the week is meetings and meals, setting the date for my book signing (probably mid-April I’m thinking), and seeing a couple of things, as well as working on the LA show every day. Also, our Indiegogo campaign comes to an end this week – we’re currently at 89%, which is great, but we really must go all the way to our goal, so let’s buckle down, Winsocki and make sure we do.
Well, dear readers, I must take the day, I must do the things I do, I must, for example, relax, bank, hopefully pick up packages, and then it’s sound check and show. Today’s topic of discussion: LA is notorious for not respecting its past and just tearing down classic buildings to replace them with ugly crap. So, in the city in which you were born, what were the places you loved most in terms of design and what they meant to the city that are no longer there? Let’s have loads of lovely postings, shall we, whilst I hit the road to dreamland, happy to have had a lovelier than lovely day that was lovely.