GREAT weekend...

A flurry of activity, as usual, but not the usual gotta-get-it-done kinda stuff.

Friday afternoon, my dad drove into town. After a semi-business trip (just enough to make the trip deductible) she decided to head back to Kansas from Jersey via Michigan. Makes perfect sense (?!?!??). Anyway, she pulled unto town Friday about my lunch break. We headed out to National Coney Island for a bite and catching up, since I was working both jobs that day.

After working the Blockbuster evening shift, I went home via AJ's Coffee Shop in Ferndale to catch an old high school friend Amy (Smith) Petty perform for a few minutes. This gal is an absolutely AMAZING talent! Her live version of her song "Broken Record" is positively jaw-dropping. She has a fantastic wit and raport with her audience and a voice so beautiful it'll make you weep. Her style is basicaly modern acoustic folk, a la Indigo Girls, if one were to draw similarities. I could only stay for a couple songs, but I am in awe of her abilities and was pleased to see so many faces from my high school days that I hadn't come across in years. I only wish I had the time to stay and chat with some of them.

Unfortunately, I had a BIIIG day ahead on Saturday. Sonya & Leigh were heading out at the crack of dawn for a breakfast with their garden club and to set up the end-of-the-season festival at the community garden. I was expected to be in Flint at 11:30am for a gig at the Applewood Fall Festival with my quartet, and needed to make some progress on the house before I left, as we had a family birthday party for Courtney on Sunday.

So the morning was a whirlwind of getting the kids up, dressed and fed, living room tidied, cat box cleaned (yeech), meeting with my dad, dropping the kids, and then heading to Flint with my dad in her car. All of this, plus the never-ending construction that ALWAYS seems to be at its worst on Saturday afternoon, meant we got there JUST in time for the gig, but no warm up.

The gig was wonderful, as always. Wonderful weather, beautiful scenery, friendly people, appreciative audiences, and some GREAT cider. We sounded great with our substitute bass, Jack Day. Again, he's no Dave Conrad, but he's by far the best second we could hope for. I have a few pictures (courtesy of Lou's finace, Linda, and my dad) on my Flickr page. I'll have a couple video clips up on my YouTube page soon.

From there, we all headed to the local Red Robin for lunch and had a great time talking barbershop, the financial market, retirement (a foreign word to me), and stuff. It was a great end to a great afternoon. Then my dad drove me home and I headed to Blockbuster for another shift.

The party on Sunday went off without much of a hitch. We just had a simple barbecue in the backyard, and a fire in the fire bowl to let the kids roast their own veggie dogs. All of my close family came: my mom, dad, sister, grandfather, and Courtney's Auntie Leigh. It's a once-every-several-year occurrance to have my mom and dad in the same locale, so it was nice to have the family back together, if briefly. Courtney loved seeing her Nana, Grandma Paula, and Grandpa O, and, cof course, her gifts. She got a Disney Princess Sing-a-long toy from Grandma Paula, a sparkley rainbow rump rope from Grandpa O, and a My Little Pony from Nana. She also got a Bratz doll, but the wife and I aren't keen on that line of toys, so we may convince her to exchange it for something else - maybe another Barbie (not that she needs 10th Barbie, but better that than a Bratz doll).

I was able to meet with my dad for coffee before she left on Monday morning. It was such a joy to see her. Throughout my life, my dad has been my most consistent, honest, and non-judgemental supporter. We can have coversations is few words and know that we both understand. This was a great weekend, and my dad was a huge part of that.

(for those of you confused about my pronoun usage in this entry, my dad is transgendered. Let the curious questions begin...)

A Schedule Tighter Than A Gnat's Ass...

I actually updated my Google Calendar yesterday - and it kinda scared the piss outa me. Not because I can't do it, but I got to see laid out in front of me how overbooked I can get. Pretty much any gaps in my schedule are commute time between obligations. This week's not exactly typical, but not off by much. Tonight is (unexpectedly) a bit free, but the later evening is filled with learning track stuff. I have to try and get the last 2 or 3 songs done for this quartet so I can now do another one for a fellow chorus member.

I was supposed to have quartet rehearsal with our substitue bass tonight to prep for our surprise gig this weekend at the Flint Applewood Fall Festival. This is our longest-standing regular gig. We've done this for the past 3 years running, along with occasional other gigs there for the Ruth Mott Foundation. We adore this gig. It's basically 3 hours of strolling around the beautiful grounds, singing what we want for small crowds of very appreciative patrons and volunteers. It's low pressure, gorgeous surroundings, friendly people...and a good paycheck.

This year, I started e-mailing our key contacts at Applewood about June, saying that we were booking up fast (a slight exaggeration, perhaps), and they should drop us an e-mail with the details soon so we can plan it in (yea - between opening for the Rolling Stones and our whirlwind sold-out European Tour). Anyway, 3 monthly e-mails went by with nary a peep from our favorite clients. I figured we'd been dumped due to budget issues. They usually start asking for us by July at the latest.

Last week, I get an e-mail from one of our contacts asking for names to put on the checks! ACK! With our regular bass out of town and a week to try and figure out how to cram this into my schedule (which is already packed in tighter than sausage meat in a casing), I sent out a flurry of e-mails and texts to the guys to see if we can do it. Luckily, we were all just free enough to fit it in. Being our best clients, an excellent opportunity to pass out business cards, a truly fun gig, and some much needed dough, I didn't want to pass this up.

I found out yesterday that our ringer bass can't make the only night I was available for a rehearsal this week, so we're going to do this one dry. I'm not worried. Our set list is mostly chorus songs we know backward and forward and we're so much tighter - even with a ringer bass - than we were a couple years ago, we'll still sound great. The trick is, this gig comes right in the middle of an extremely rare, semi-impromptu visit from my dad, and I want to try and fit in time to visit.

So I'm laying it all our in my Google Calendar yesterday and it goes like this:

Wed - 7:30: kids to school
9am: work
6:30: home, make dinner
8:30: kids to bed
9pm: Blitz-clean house
10pm: learning tracks
Midnight: bed

Thurs - 7:30: kids to school
9am: work
6:30: Home, dinner, family 5th birthday celebration for my baby girl
8:30: Kids to bed
9pm: Blitz-clean house
10pm: Learning Tracks
Midnight: bed

Fri - 7:30 kids to school
9am: work
6:30: work at Blockbuster
10pm: stop by AJ Coffee House to catch a friend's performance
11pm: home
Midnight: bed

Sat: - 8am: get kids up and dressed while Sonya head to a Garden Club breakfast
9am: MAJOR blitz-clean of house
10:30am: Meet with dad and head to gig (nice convo on drive)
11:30am: Meet with the quartet to warm up

Noon: Gig at Applewood Estates, Flint
3:30pm: Lunch with dad and quartet

4:30pm: Drive home
6pm: Work Blockbuster
10pm: Home

Sun: - 8am: get everyone up and moving, clean up, set up birthday party (Keiser Edition)
Noon: Courtney's birthday party for my side of the family

The rest of Sunday will be visiting with family and subsequent clean-up. Gonna be a FULL weekend.

Outa time. Gotta head to work. (deep breath)

Okay...let's DO this thing!!

Have I mentioned…I LOVE THS QUARTET!?

Once again, Coda Honor graced the Applewood Estates in Flint with our glorious presence this past Saturday and had a great time singing for their annual Fall Festival.

The Daves and I headed up about 10:30 and met Lou and his girlfriend Linda at Haloburger for a bite before the gig. We sat around and talked about convention, tunes, and such and did a couple of songs for the employees before we left. After arriving at Applewood, we started in with our usual stuff, strutting around the grounds and ringing chords for the folks.

The thing I love about singing for this organization is that it's almost always a strolling gig. There's no pressure or spotlight. We just wander around, enjoy the festivities, and sing what we want, when we want. The thing I like best about the low-pressure environment is that we can play around a bit.

I've always wanted to be in a group that can woodshed (lingo for "improvise") really well. We only have a solid repertoire of about 13 songs, and repeating them over and over can get awfully dull after a 3-hour gig. I usually bring my ukulele to fill out the song list a bit, and inevitably, the rest of the guys will join in whatever song I'm singing and flesh out the sound with harmony. It's great fun. Even better is when we get requests for songs we don't know and try them out. No music, no arrangement, just us doing our best and relying on our ears and instincts to come up with full harmonies and avoid doubling parts.

We headed to the barn on the estate where the livestock are featured, sang a song or two in the larger of the rooms, and were met by a request to venture into the stables to sing for a couple special ladies. This lovely girl in a wheelchair and her sister, who we sang for at this event last year, wanted to hear us again. We wander on back and greet them warmly, eager to brighten their day with a song. We figure the most chipper and uplifting song we knew was "Keep Your Sunny Side Up", so we start into that one, ringing very well against the hay on the floor and cement walls.

Oops…

As we went through the song, and came up onto the end of the first verse, we realized the lyrics go, "Stand up on your legs, be like two fried eggs…". The gal is in a wheelchair. Singing this song almost on reflex, we caught the impropriety just ahead of the lyric and all somehow mumbled the words, getting through them quickly. Crisis (sorta) averted.

Nope.

The second verse has the phrase, "Stand up on your feet, give the world a treat…". CRAP! Same tactic. Mumble the lyrics, get through the phrase quickly, and try to stick the hell outa the tag!

We regroup and quickly go into "Zippidy Doo-Dah" to cover. They then request "Sing A Song" from Sesame Street. Not in our musical arsenal. I look at Lou, who says he knows the words. A quick glance to the other guys and we start singing. We get through a verse or 2 fairly well, just to appease the lovely young ladies. They then request "You Are My Sunshine". Again, not something we have sheets to. Once again, we start singing anyway and sound pretty good! I love this stuff! Nothing cooler than saying, "We don't know that one, but for YOU…" and busting out someone's favorite song.

Later we're in the garden by what was once the chicken coup of the estate, and we sing through "Whiffenpoof", which has references to being "poor little lambs" and "little black sheep". We sounded great, but a volunteer pipes up with, "but you're in the chicken coup, not the sheep stables!" With a smirk, I huddle with the guys for a second. We then turn around and sing "Wild Irish Rose", clucking and bucking like chickens.

We had the audience laughing as we finished and I turn to the guys and say in a loud steady voice, "Sorry guys, but I think that one laid an egg". Not missing a beat, with equal syrupy sarcasm, one of the listeners counters with, "Yea, that was pretty FOUL". Not to be outdone, I retort with, "Well, we'll wipe the egg off our faces and sing something else". And so the next few minutes went with pun after pun being thrown back and forth. We take a bit of a break to compose ourselves, laughing the whole time.

Yea, dad. That's your influence all the way.

This is why I LOVE doing this gig. The patrons are friendly and appreciative, the volunteers are helpful and chipper, and it's just plain FUN! THAT'S what I got into barbershop for!

…That, and the checks always clear.