The dogs are lucky today. Since I don’t have to work, they get to go the park and don’t have to spent the day alone. In fact, I think they get somebody home every day this week as we head into 2009. Assuming there is a 2009, that is. Things are (once again) looking pretty bleak in the Middle East. Oh well, at least gas prices are low.
I filled up my gas tank for less than $20. Can’t remember the last time I was able to do that. Too bad the truck isn’t up to speed on maintenance else I’d take a road trip to see some snow.
Today I was awakened by a cat, the dogs being too lazy and the grandchild having gone home. The house is quiet and a little empty….also pretty messy, so I guess I’ll have to remedy that later.
The D key on my laptop is not responding unless I use a great deal of force and since I have an extended warranty with Compaq I called them and they are going to replace the keyboard and reset the computer to its original configuration, thus wiping out whatever data I have. So I have backed up everything and printed copies of my email contacts, just in case.
I have decided that I will have everything that is not delivered by UPS, sent to Shelter Island as I have given up my quest to have Fedex actually get MY signature (not the driver’s version of my signature) before leaving things under the steps in Brooklyn. At least here he can leave things in the vestibule and there is not much threat of theft.
I guess I have surrendered. I will hang a white flag.
For a decade, Russian academic Igor Panarin has been predicting the U.S. will fall apart in 2010.
snip
Mr. Panarin posits, in brief, that mass immigration, economic decline, and moral degradation will trigger a civil war next fall and the collapse of the dollar. Around the end of June 2010, or early July, he says, the U.S. will break into six pieces — with Alaska reverting to Russian control.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123051100709638419.html
Civil war? He’s obviously not familiar with how lazy and apathetic Americans are.
Yeah, PJ, and who’s gonna want to immigrate here if there are no jobs and the dollar is worthless? Sheriff Joe likes to take credit for the decline in illegal’s here but it has more to do with the fact that there are so few jobs.
Speaking of new jobs…
:tap: :nana:
civil war?
the poor (98%) against the rich (2%)?
“bring it on!”
Nah, he just means the new Wii game that comes out next year called ‘Civil War’. I call ‘Pendejo’!
I guess I’m starting the new job next Monday. I’m spose to go in today for a briefing.
Hey you guys! I’m getting a blackberry for my new job! I’m in the big time now! And business cards with my name on it and everything.
Congratulations Krista! All I got was a t-shirt.
Freddie Hubbard :gate:
http://www.billboard.com/bbcom/news/jazz-trumpeter-freddie-hubbard-dies-1003925464.story
This is a tough one for me personally.The last gig I had as a jazz musician was opening for him at the Denver downtown club, Ebbett’s Field, 1973. Catch his fat tone and the stacatto cascades of notes on “Maiden Voyage”, “Dolphin Dance” and this smokin version of “Eye of the Hurricane” with Joe Henderson and Herbie Hancock. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ugiwizE5rYg&feature=related
Freddie was probablyl the hottest jazz musician in the US for a short few years and he acted on that but his band mates (George Duke on piano, Junior Cook on tenor, Ralph Penneman on drums) coulnd’t have been nicer to a bunch of clueless white guys in over their heads- especially one white guy.
It was a (now unheard-of) five night gig and we got to hang out, score pot for Junior and listen to the tape that Herbie had sent Freddie before it came out- “Headhunters”. The leader of my band, the useless vain and mediocre drummer Steve Getz, (son of Stan) had fired our horn section the second night of the gig but we finished out the week and then we all quit.
It was the end of my “creative” period.
The next year was spent playing CW music at the “Bird of Paradise” bar across from the Sandia Air Force Base in Albuqurqe
Okay, thanks for letting me indulge in some sad meaningless nostalgia.
“sad meaningless nostalgia.”
i beg to differ, it was a warm living tribute,
being a musician is a lot more than being famous or doing amazing gigs
or even not getting fired by the occasional asshole. it’s all about the love of music inside your heart and soul.
was a nice riff man, very nice. thanks for putting it out there.
Wow! I have a real job with keys and a security code and random drug testing! Man! You can’t believe how relieved I am! And I’ve already done ground work on a couple of clients. Nothing like living in one area for 25 years for networking. :yippee:
No Art, I love hearing about everyone’s younger days. It’s all good, man!
I love the faces people make when they play jazz. :tongue:
George HW Bush was the same, Kp. His boy Atwater loved Blues/R&B and had an inaugural ball based on that music that GHWB eventually showed up at and proceeded to air jam with them. Here is a picture of what he called making ‘monkey lips’ like the rest of the musicians.
What an asshole!
Hubbard was here recently but I didn’t go in to see him. I had heard he wasn’t doing too well musically and otherwise.
BTW, George Duke is a genuinely nice guy from what I hear. I was in a restaurant in LA once with a GF and her parents and as he walked by our table he looked down at me at our table and let out a big “Hi, how ya doin’?’ for no real reason like he knew me. I was a little surprised but they were very impressed.
You are lucky to have such memories, art. Thanks!
FH 🙁 :gate:
Warning – C&W, Nudie-ism, West Virginia content
Major correction! It was George Cables, not George Duke. (brainfart) Not nearly as famous but another nice guy as well. George Duke is, I believe, the first cousin of Dianne Reeves who lives here in Denver.
Sunshine Jim- thanks man for that. Your posts always live up to your name and you really bring a little spark of light everytime I read you. :nod:
I saw Cables last year at a club west of Denver. He looked in poor health. I reminded him that he’d given me a lesson and written out a chart of “Think on Me” I lost it years ago :fustrate:
Freddie got aligned with some producer who convinced him to record ballades with strings and lost his edge.
It was all for the better. I remember George being on the phone with his wife talking about his old Chevy that had crapped out. Here he was a brilliant pianist on tour with a top-flight jazz act and he couldn’t afford to get his car fixed.
Ahh, the life of a musician :40: :bong: :jerk: 😕
Re: 17
For some reason, I find it offensive that these wealthy, silver spooned fucks could be into the blues or even jazz. They don’t deserve it, they haven’t earned the right to like it. It looks to me that they are making fun of black folk and, basically, “slumming it”.
Don’t count out all silver-spooned fucks. Stan Getz used to fly to Thailand to jam with the King. (I hear he was pretty good).
Well, I try to take people as individual’s as much as possible. I’ve met a couple of rich people who are cool. But GWB is a silver spooned fuck through and through. And so is his son. They just don’t know any better and don’t try, as far as I can see.
Hey, I like Stan Getz.
Was that producer Creed Taylor? He was very successful with CTI Records (FH, Hubert Laws, George Benson…) which became a best selling force and brand in Jazz. However, I considered it the gateway to the dreaded ‘smooth jazz’ movement.
Cables had a liver/kidney transplant in the last year.
Lee Atwater was a dipshit smartass Southern frat boy. I grew up with them and around them and I can’t stand them to this day.
I like Stan Getz too, and I’m not even well versed on jazz.
Hey, KP — congrats on the job, but as for the random drug testing 😡 — that bull :crap: .
I was looking at a part-time weekend job at a nearby nursing home for a little bit of extra $ to pay of some bills and was basically hired until the HR person told me one of the conditions of the health screening was drug testing. Well, the only pee-in-a-cup job I ever had was for a Wall St company that ended up being bought out by a bunch of fundies (they like the pee in the cup snooping) an I had a really hard time with it but did it because I wanted the job — really humiliating — and the job ended up to be really horrible, but I did learn a lot.
So, when I was told by the HR person that the drug screening was agreed to by the Union (SEIU, of course — “union” is deceptive and that’s another long story — I also have a history with SEIU from early hospital days ala Clinton years) and was part of the “health” screening, I just told her it was morally reprehensible, indefensible and had nothing to do with “health” of employees. She got very defensive and said, but all they need is a urine sample, there is no blood or hair testing — which told me that they’ve been getting flak about this from other people also applying for positions with that company. No employer has any right to test any of my body tissues or fluids — wtf??? :fu:
One of the very few good things about going through the hell of nursing school & getting RN credentialing is that you can give the royal FU to asshole employers like this. Today, however, I worked a 12 hour day at the hospital, getting paid for only 8 hours because the CEO has said there shall be NO overtime and SO be it. Union is pretty useless because when this started there was no contract and now Gov. Patterson sez there need to be cuts to all hospitals & all “unneccesary” services. So I had to send 2 patients home with no clothes (Hospital gowns & blankets because we couldn’t send ’em home naked in 40 degree weather — warm today) — no resources here — If you are poor you are fucked. This “bad” hospital according to the NY Times, is the last safety net for the worst of the worst off people and there is no safety net left.
OK, sorry to get to a horrible day at the Miracle Center from random drug testing. It just proves George Carlin’s observation of the eternal truth that it is All Bullshit . But the Bullshit is wearing thin and some really really bad shit is beginning to come down for just regular people like us.
I hate this :crap:
:turkey: :turkey: :turkey: :turkey:
But I certainly don’t mean to rain on your parade, KP. I am really happy that you found work and wish you all the very best :pup: :pup: Always :love:
Yeah I think it was Creed Taylor .I agree- gateway to smooth jazz. The “White Rabbit” album for George Benson was the end of him as a serious jazz musician…, but it put money in the bank and I don’t begrudge any musician the money. That is, any talented musician.
NOT fucking Kenny G! :barf: :barf:
As far as producers, Rudy Van Gelder in his studio in New Jersey was a gold mine of great great music that’s still coming to light today- Monk, Miles, Coltrane, Bill Evans, Joe Henderson- practically anything made on Blue Note, Impulse or Verve. :bow:
The very admirable thing about Getz is that he didn’t ever rest on his laurels. He could have ridden the bossa-nova thing the rest of his life but when he was done with it after a couple of years he moved on, playing with the brightest young musicians of the day like Chick Corea, Gary Burton, JoAnn Brakeen. He was always pushing himself and trying to be better.
Yeah, I know, Granny, that’s how desperate I am to have a regular paycheck. And the random drug testing isn’t even the worst of it. I had to sign a paper allowing them to look at my CREDIT HISTORY! WTF does that have to do with anything??? I can sort of understand drug testing for a job that involves using a company vehicle, sort of. And, of course, insurance companies are mostly to blame for that. But, I have walked out on many jobs for the credit history thing. I felt horrible after that day, for sure. But pretty much everyone does it anymore. And I am that desperate right now, so, I had to bite my tongue and sign the damned paper. I couldn’t have done it for any old job, though. This seems like a real opportunity to me and a change to a career that is somewhat recession proof. I’m so tired of trying to make a living at art, you really need someone helping to take up the slack while you build your name and I just don’t have that. I’m completely on my own here.
Why are text books so expensive? :rant1:
I used the abebooks website and Barnes and Noble to save over fifty precent from what it would cost at the school’s book store. I just hope that I can get the books before classes start.