May 31st, 2002 10:10 hours CST currently listening to: "January's Little Joke" by The Trash Can Sinatras.

Rachel, you have the weirdest way of turning my day around and making it wonderful. I love you to death.

May 30th, 2002 08:35 hours CST currently listening to: "Katy Song" by The Red House Painters.

I've been listening to that song almost nonstop since yesterday around noon. It's so wonderful. Freakishly melancholy, which is why I think I was so upset last night. Which was just fucking stupid, really Rachel, I was my own therapist last night, so don't worry. The conversation with myself was basically like this: "Jackass, you said yourself that you thought it was cute. Stop feeling sorry for yourself or whatever the hell it is you're doing. It's pointless. Suck it up. You're overreacting. Sure, it's all a bomb waiting to go off, but when have you ever looked to the future on a scale larger than one day at a time?"

Heh. I'm pretty hard on myself when I need to be. The air conditioners got turned on again last night. I can't believe I had to install them over a month or so ago when we got that freaky heat snap. I've got to clean up my place tonight and do a truckload of laundry. My parents, sister and her boyfriend are coming up tomorrow for the weekend. I need to remember to go buy a new shower curtain too. Sorry, I'm rambling now. Isn't my day to day life exciting?!?!?

May 28th, 2002 19:45 hours CST currently listening to: "Athol-Brose" by The Cocteau Twins.

Well, I'm back in Chicago and the weekend was by and large and outstanding success. I met some fantastic people and am confident that once I find a bass player that stays with me, that airiel will be in the spotlight once again. I think the best thing for me to do is just go day by day here. WARNING: This is a looooong entree. Unless you're in love with me, or are stalking me, you might want to skim this.

Thursday: Hung around work and burned cd audio to my work machine while Dave actually worked. Hey, I'd already put in my 8 hours. Feh. I got to Midway around 7:30 and checked in. Got myself a Pottbelly and hopped on the plane. I unfortunately had to sit in the middle between two other guys. They showed Serendipity. As much as I love John Cusack, that movie sucked ass. I watched about 15 minutes before switching between my book and some mp3's I brought with me. Ben met me in the baggage claim and he looked great. He'd lost weight since I last saw him in Chicago. He gave me a big hug. Or I hugged him. Whatever. We made our way out to the car in the garage and tried several times to find an exit that wasn't closed. We finally got out and Ben made "quotable #1": which was "thanks for sucking my soul, parking lot."

We were talking so loudly and animatedly in the car that Ben missed the first bridge entirely and we continued 20 minutes out of our way to the next one. He said the Krispie Kreme place we were going to was in between them anyway, so it wasn't a big deal. The said Krispie Kreme place was enormous. The inside was closed but thank the stars, the drive through was still open. I was ravenous. And those of you who know me know how much hungrier I get when I'm near those deep fried rings of golden goodness. Ben and I split a mixed dozen, but I'm sure I ate far more than my half. I think he knew I would. We got back to his place and it was typical Ben Adrian style neighborhood. He always picks the dingiest places to stay. It's all financially based, really. The apartment where he lived was originally a warehouse and they divvied up the units and added rehearsal spaces to each one. Some had more apartment and less rehearsal space, and vice versa. I slept somewhat uneasily on the couch. Either it was because I was on a couch, or a couch that had obviously been well used made me a bit physically uncomfortable. But by this time it was 4 in the morning by my Chicago time zone and I was completely out of it. Sugar crash and all.

Friday: I met both of Ben's roommates briefly when they saw me on the couch half naked. Ben finally woke up and we watched several episodes of Space Ghost: Coast to Coast that Ben had on tape. Oh how I love that show. That brought us to "quotable #2": which was "Layer! Phonebook! Extrapolate!!!" Afterwards we drove to a nearby grocery and I got some lactaid milk and a big box of froot loops. Ben got pancake mix and syrup. We came back and had breakfast and setup the gear. I was so impressed with Ben. He knew ALL of the bass lines. I'm serious. We only had to go through each song ONCE. Not that I ever had any doubts that Ben would come through for me, it was just a huge weight off of my shoulders because I now knew for sure that things were going to go well. It felt so great to go through those songs again. I can't really describe it. We stopped around 3 and went to the airport in Oakland to pick up J-Me, Ben's girlfriend. I hadn't seen her since she lived in Indianapolis, and that had to have been about 4 years ago now. We all went to the same grocery where Ben and I were just a few hours prior and got veggies to make stir-fry. Ben whipped us up some really good stir-fry and we then loaded up the car to head to San Francisco.

I was a country mouse all over again. I was rubbernecking left and right. The view from the bridge was incredible. Seeing Alcatraz Island in the bay and further out, the Golden Gate Bridge in the fog. This was about 6 in the evening, and the weather couldn't have been more pleasant. We dropped J-Me off at her friend Jen's and then went straight to Rockin Java for the show. On the way there my old friend Eric called me on my celly. He lives out there with his partner, Brian. He called to say he couldn't make it and wished me luck. It was great to hear from him. Those little things are important. We grabbed a parking spot directly in front of the cafe and walked into Swallow's "Blow" album being played over the PA. THAT took me back. I adore that album so much. I met Jeremy True, the guy who set up the show for us and then also met Roger Anderson of Vaportrail, who was doing a solo electric set before us. I also got to meet Mark Kozalek of the Red House Painters, who is such a laid back guy. I wish I could have talked to him more, but I couldn't think of anything else to say besides sitting there and flattering him. So I moved on.

Summary of first show

Right before I picked up my guitar, Alyssa called my cell phone to tell me that she was just getting out of dinner with her parents and was going to try to haul ass up there to come see us play. It was her 21st birthday. Right in between two songs my phone goes off again, and everybody cracks up because I actually went over there to answer it!! She left a message saying that she was sorry she couldn't make it (props, sweetie) and to meet her at a place called the Cat Club. I met several incredibly nice people once we finished our set, including Dan and Heather from Clairecords. They were so sweet! It was their anniversary that weekend and they came all the way down from Sacramento to see us play. I was very touched. In fact, right now I kind of feel like crying over how nice everybody was and how much fun I had.

We packed up the stuff and I said my "thank you's" to Roger and Jeremy. J-Me, Jenn, Ben and I all drove to Ann's to drop off of the gear for the next night. Ann was the one hosting the house party. After that we went to Jenn's to freshen up and change clothes. I put on my rockstar getup (black leather pants and a black Dandy Warhols shirt that I ripped the sleeves off of). We found a parking spot right outside the club. Apparently I'm good luck. The Cat Club BLEW MY TINY LITTLE MIND. There is not a club anywhere like this in Chicago that's this cool. My head was spinning. There was too much to look at. EVERYBODY was attractive. Oh my god. We all got drinks and then I realized that they were playing "Boys Don't Cry" and I went to go dance. The threesome followed. Ben can't dance for shit, but at least he tried. HAHAH. I kept running around looking for Alyssa and I managed to spill gin all over her birthday present. Luckily I had wrapped it in this near metal-like wrapping paper and it was water tight. She found me while I was dancing and I gave her a big hug. She was absolutely glowing. She's unbelievably cute. We chatted for a bit and she introduced me to her friends which I had to be reintroduced to at least once more. I was meeting too many people! My little brain was hitting critical mass. I apologized left and right for forgetting people's names. A few names I DO remember where Mike and Ally, who came to see us play. They are friend of Ben and are fantastically nice. I talked to them for what seemed like forever. I danced some more and drank a lot more and just felt like I was enjoying myself 10 times over. I found Alyssa on my way out and kissed her goodbye. We were both sloshed. I think I may have tried to give her a real kiss, but she dodged it like a pro! Oh it was funny. I'm such a dork. Now, for those of you who know me, you know how bad I am at trying to "pick up" girls or whatever that's called. I left that club pure as the driven snow. I couldn't believe it until the next day. I mean, there was simply too much to look at and J-Me had to drill it into my head that I had somewhere between 10 to 20 different girls checking me out. I'm such an idiot. I guess I was just thinking about too many things. Like how I wished Deb and Rianon had made it up. Am I just a fool? We drove home and I went to bed feeling wonderfully dizzy

Saturday: I woke up rather un-hung over and made myself a couple bowls of froot loops and managed to keep them down. I got to met Hansi for real this time and he never stopped making me laugh. J-Me commented as she was getting ready for a shower how for an apartment with three guys in it, there sure were a lot of bottles of shampoo in the shower. Hansi immediately got defensive and had to lay claim to what was his, which brought us to "quotable #3" which was "Don't touch my pink stuff, I will FUCK you in the EAR!!!" I nearly spit froot loops across the living room I laughed so hard. Around 3:00 J-Me and Ben (pic#1) drove me to Chinatown. We realized that we'd taken zero pictures so far and J-Me took some of me at the gates to Chinatown. You can see me sporting my brand new Miss Mae shoulder bag that just been made for me the day before I left for San Francisco. pic#2, pic#3, pic#4, pic#5, and pic#6. I look like such a dork in that one. I know someone was taking pictures at the house party, so I'm waiting for those to show up in my email.

We dropped J-Me off at Jenn's and Ben and I went to a few guitar stores, a coffee shop for some tea and a sit down, and then to a book store where I found an issue of Mojo with a brand new interview with all 4 members of the Stone Roses. The girls met with us at this sushi place where I had what I think could very well be the best sushi I've ever had in my life. It was all served on little boats and was amazingly inexpensive. Even with my large bottle of Saporo I only spent around $15. We went to the house for the party and set up our stuff. We watched some Hal Hartley movie that had the most horrible acting ever. It was hilarious. All the fight scenes were just shoving matches. People started showing up around 10, and Ben and I got to it. I took a few pics of the view out the living room window of the place. Just to remember who different the city looks compared to my own. pic#7 and pic#8.

Summary of second show

A few people from the night before showed up, including Hansi who was such a fun guy to have around. He has no problems speaking his mind when he's drunk. Oh my god, he's funny. Several of us went to a diner nearby and got some, well, crappy diner food. Claudine, Sammy, Angie, and a few others who (duh) I can't remember their names were all there and we had fun conversations. We loaded up the car and were too exhausted to go out, so we drove back to Oakland and crashed. Hard. Hansi was nice enough to let me sleep in his bed, since he had driven his motorcycle in to the show and was too drunk to drive it back. He crashed at Ann's and I crashed in his bed. It helped a lot.

Sunday: Got up early and packed my things. Ben made me a copy of the "Superblast!" single by Lush, which he had been promising me for about a year now. J-Me got up and we drove to the airport. My flight back was nice. I stayed awake. I had the whole three seats in my row to myself and got to stretch out. I read the Stone Roses interview, watched Planet of the Apes, gazed at the snow covered Rocky Mountains and the deserts that followed them. Listened to Peter Murphy and thought of Amanda. Listened to the Stone Roses and thought of Alyssa and Rianon. I had such a wonderful time

I got back into my apartment around 9:00 and was wired. I tried getting in touch with anybody and struck out. I ordered a pizza, took my shoes off and stretched out on the couch and watched John Carpenter's version of "The Thing." Rachel called me around midnight and we made plans for breakfast the next morning.

Monday: Picked up Rachel after going to the grocery and we blabbed to each other while I fixed us some french toast. We camped out on the floor and watched an MST3K episode: "Cave Dwellers". We took a nap on my bed and talked about or current romantic interests. I drove her back home and came back to clean up my place a bit. I got in touch with Amanda, who came over around 9 or so, after getting lost once. Silly rabbit. It was fantastic to see her again.

Tuesday: I got back a few hours ago from seeing Alex's band, the Red Lights play at the Fireside Bowl. Rachel, Billy, and Rachel's new romantic interest Jamie was there. He seems like a sweet guy. And undeniably cute too. Alex kicked ass on stage. I'll post the pictures I took as soon as I get the redeye out of them. Yikes. I almost stole a pair of blue, lowtop converse all-stars until I realized that the guy who owned them was staring right at me. That's what I get for trying to be bad and spontaneous. I bought a Red Lights button for $1 and threw a fit when Yvonne gave one to Rachel for free while she was right in front of me. Grrrrrrr. Now I'm at home and listening to the Cocteau Twins' "Blue Bell Knoll" and sitting around in a pair of jeans. I had a busy day. Hopefully tomorrow will be a little less frazzled.

May 23rd, 2002 17:10 hours CST currently listening to: "Sharron Apple" by airiel.

In just a few hours I'll be on a plane to California. To play my first airiel show in two years. I'm kind of numb to it all. I was really nervous and excited last night. The same with this morning. I guess it's just that I have nothing to do now but sit at my desk until I get on a train at 7:00 to head down to Midway. I may just find a quiet corner to kick back in and read a book. Therefore depriving myself of an opportunity to be found and asked to do real work. Hah. Dave is still here too. I'm just going to sit on my ass.

Well, wish me luck folks.

May 22nd, 2002 08:10 hours CST currently listening to: "Aquila" by Closedown.

Oh lord, I'm tired. Got in at 2 last night. I went out with Krissy from Whimsical last night. Damn, she's just a super gal. I swear. There are some people that you just instantly feel comfortable around and completely non-awkward, and she's one of them. We went over to Wishbone for some food. I'd never been there before for anything besides breakfast. It was fantastic though. We talked about all sorts of stuff and have WAY WAY WAY too many freaky "I know a friend of yours" stories. I mean, this was just weird. We went over to the Beat Kitchen, which I had never been to before. It's a great little bar/venue. I met some of her friends and the threesome from Breather showed up. A bit awkward at first, and then we all opened up a bit towards the end of the night. The music was rotten. I mean, to the core. I don't even really want to talk about it, although I was glad when I realized that everyone else around me hated it as much as I did. Yikes.

We decided that we'd hit Nocturna, which is the goth night that they do over at Smart Bar on Tuesdays. Seeing as how I was wearing jeans and a yellow polyester shirt, I had to go home and change. I sampled some bands for Krissy that she hadn't heard before and she was instantly hooked. I love doing that. We met up with this giant group of people (same from the previous bar, but with some that I hadn't noticed in the dark) at Clarks over on Belmont. Lot's of weird and cute giggling and apparently the lead singer from Breather has an aversion to Ketchup bottles. Hah. Well, everybody but Mark, (Whimsical's guitar player) decided to bail. Shit, people. I knew I had to be up before 6 the next morning. What's wrong with y'all? Mark is super nice and I liked Smart Bar a lot. I'd never been there before and thought the layout was great. I didn't notice anyone from Neo, but it was still a sort of good crowd. None of us danced. I just wasn't in the mood. I got in around 2 and went right to bed. I still kind of smell like smoke. Yuck.

Tuesday was pretty bland. Although Rachel finally took me for a ride on her '67 Vespa Primi. Oh my god, it was so fun. I absolutely love the way she smells, and being behind her with her hair in my face was pure heaven. Oh stop. You know what I mean. It was just nice. The weather was sunny, but going that fast got my hands ice cold.

May 20th, 2002 08:20 hours CST currently listening to: "Moon" by Closedown.

My office for some reason, reeks of bacon right now. Oh my god I want bacon. Bacon bacon bacon.

I've got a killer headache too. I was reading on the train in to work this morning and got a tad motion sick. That usually never happens, but I probably owe it to the fact that I did next to nothing this weekend, due to lack of funds. What did I do this weekend? I went to Episode II on Friday night with Christian and Linsey up in Skokie. We thought we were going to an all digital theater, but it turns out we just went to the wrong show time for it. Oh well. I won't really comment on it, although I certainly want to see it again. I've certainly got my gripes about it though. But for the most part, I'm happy with the way it came out.

Saturday I ran errands for essential stuff. Picked up my Rickenbacker 330 from the Chicago Music Exchange. The neck was starting to warp and I had them work on it. I finally found another place that sells my hair glue. And these guys sell it at half the price from where I was getting it before. Screw Big Hair. They overprice that stuff. But then, their haircuts are like, $6 or something, so I guess they have to make there money back somehow. Anyway. I also got my hair cut. I went to Home Depot on the way home and got two plywood boards for my new pedal boards. I did however, forget to buy the velcro. Turns out that it doesn't matter, because I wasn't calculating the size of my duffle bag when I measured what I needed for the boards. They're too big to fit, so I'm just going to go without them for my my trip to California later this week.

Sunday was more low-key. I had some very therapeutic guitar playing. I like my new pedal setup. It's a keeper, I think. The weather was pretty nice out so I had all the windows open. I did laundry and made some death brownies. Watched the lackluster series finale of the X-Files, and ended up chatting the rest of the night. God, I miss that.

Ben emailed me around 2 in the morning and told me that the house party show on Saturday night is a go!!! I don't have the details yet, but I'll post them as soon as I do.

May 17th, 2002 13:25 hours CST currently listening to: "Then We'll Rise" by Chapterhouse.

I just had lunch with Betsy. She's working a temp job that's one block away from me. She only had a 45 minute break, so we wolfed our food down. My god, it was so good to see her again. I can't wait until she's relatively settled and I can just call her up and go get a drink or something. Or she can call me up and come over and play GTA or something. I'm kind of dizzy and jittery right now. Either it's from eating too fast or just me being a complete dork and my mind is swirling.

May 17th, 2002 08:45 hours CST currently listening to: "The Singing Arc Lamp" by Mahogany.

Well, I feel tons better. My throat is still kinda funny, and I don't have my singing voice back yet, but I'm 100 times better than I was on Tuesday and Wednesday. I ended up getting out of the house for a bit yesterday and went to Guitar Center over on Halstead and also to the grocery. I picked up a power supply for my XP-300 Space Station pedal and some 1' right angle patch cables. Ahhhhhh, making a new pedal board is so much fun. I haven't messed with my gear like this in a long time. I looked up the online manual for the XP-300 and figured out how to recalibrate it. Oh wow it sounds so much better now. Even though that pedal is a complete gimmick (and for most accounts, totally useless), it's my core sound on "Stratosphere", "Halo", "Swimming Through Us", and the live version of "Shirely Temple Tidal Wave". I had such a good time going through all my airiel material. It was very therapeutic. I have to go purchase the wood and the velcro to finish up the two pedal boards, and then I'm all set. I told Alyssa yesterday that I keep having nightmares that none of my gear is going to make it with me out to California next week. One of those horrible situations where the airport loses your bag. I made sure I had a nonstop flight just to avoid any complications. *crosses fingers*.

I got kinda bored just sitting around yesterday. I ended up starting a whole new game of "Devil May Cry". Holy shit, I forgot how incredible that game is. And her I am sitting at work finally and all I want to do is go home and play. Luckily I'm fucking broke until Monday, so I can't go out at all. I can only spend money on things I need; 2 pieces of plywood, a bunch of velcro, and hair glue. I'm out. Well, almost out.

In other freakishly phenomenal news....Betsy Rockett is now in Chicago!!!!!!!! She's going back up to home this weekend to pack up the rest of her stuff, and then she's here for good. I'm so excited!

May 15th, 2002 13:48 hours CST currently listening to: "Against The Glass" by Blind Mr. Jones

Well, I actually came into work. The fever that I developed yesterday got up to 102 last night. I haven't had a fever in well over a year, I think. It was terrible. It broke around 9 this morning. I was bombarding myself with ibuprofen. The most you're allowed to take before you get kidney failure. It did the trick. My throat is still horribly swollen. It really hurts to swallow. Dad thinks it might be a strep infection, which I haven't had since the 8th grade. That was before I had my tonsils removed. I feel a lot better, but I'm just worn out. I can't push myself too hard because my fever will come back, so I'm leaving here in 40 minutes. I had to come in to do the tape backups on the servers and run the logs because Dave is still on vacation. It's a wonderful day outside though. I decided to waste $10 and just drive in. The ride down the highway with my windows down and sunglasses on felt really good. I think Rachel is already sick with what I have, which is weird because I only saw her for about 30 or 40 minutes on Monday when we went to get burgers for lunch. But sure enough. It hit her out of nowhere today just like it did me yesterday. At least I'm getting this now and not next week right before I fly out to California. Speaking of... I don't think Rianon is going to go. She keeps teetering back and forth. She wants to skip the SF trip and fly out here in June for this Mod weekend thing. I dunno. That's not really my scene. I mean, sure I've got Rachel who I love to death, but there's a lot of pretentious crap going on with some of those guys that I'd rather just avoid. I dunno. I would also like to take this time to apologize to anyone if I a) got them sick, or b) whined a lot while I was sick. Last night was just one of those things where you just lie there and whimper because you hurt all over.

May 14th, 2002 14:03 hours CST currently listening to: "Crystal Wrists" by Peter Murphy

Not much going on today except that I feel like hell. Once I got to work, I got all achy and my throat is still killing me. I'm pretty sure the throat is just due to all the yelling I did over the weekend. Smoke-filled bars and clubs will do that to you. I just hope I'm not coming down with something. The timing is all wrong. I have too much to do before my trip to California next week. And what really sucks is that until Thursday comes, I have no option of even taking a sick day because Dave is still gone. Crap.

I made a bunch of little updates to the airiel site, including some gear that I'm selling and I updated the show information for Friday, May 24th. Go look.

May 13th, 2002 08:08 hours CST currently listening to: "Most Beautiful" by Frente

smit·ten (smtn) v.

A past participle of smite.

To affect sharply with great feeling: He was smitten by deep romance and emotion.

I had an outstanding weekend. Betsy Rockett showed up around 2 or so on Saturday. We hit it off in an instant. Laughed at the awkward silences that pop up when two people meet for the first time. Seven minute lull, as I call it. We played GTA3 and laughed some more. Hookers are a terrific thing. She can't drive for shit. HAHAHAHAH. I threw a pizza in the oven and we got all dolled up for Peter Murphy.

We bumped into some old friends of mine back from my days of DJ'ing at WIUS back in Bloomington. Nick Iverson and his sister Kasia. I hadn't seen either of them years. Nick keeps me entertained so easily. He was cracking us up. The show was mind blowingly wonderful. Peter still has it. Hell, he never lost it. He had so much energy on stage. Not that I should really compare the two, but this show kicked the living hell out of Siouxsie. Although Siouxsie had a better opening act, Peter Murphy just kicked way too much ass. His band was fantastic. I don't know if this was an aesthetic angle or not, but 4 of the 5 band members were bald. Not shaved head, punk balled, but older white males with perfect male pattern baldness. How odd! There were two guitarists, a bass player, and a violin player. Or was it a viola? Not sure. They did three encores. During the second one, they played "Cuts You Up" and I flipped out. During the third they played T-Rex's "Band A Gong" with Peter sporting a feather boa. Ok, and on the topic of appearance..... you all know that I love Peter to death and if I was going to have my first "real" homosexual experience, I'd want it to be with him........ but damn, he needed to keep his shirt closed. HAHAHAHAH. Peter, nothing but love for you, baby.

After the show we went to Neo, with a brief stop at a seven eleven for her to get coffee and me to get...... pop tarts. They had no donuts left. What was I supposed to do? Anyway, she loved Neo. I knew she would. Thanks to her I got to meet Roger, who is the ballet dancer that's there every damn night. He gave us some shaky news that the place got sold a few weeks ago and might be closing soon. Sure, something else will open up, but that place is a sanctuary. Betsy Rockett does this dance that just slays me. She is her own personal runway. Armed with a cigarette and a "you can't dance with me" attitude, she stole the show. We left around three and slept in late the next day.

I completely pigged out on the french toast I made. We watched "MST3K: The Movie" and one of the MST3K bloopers tapes I have. More laughing. It felt really good. We took a nap thanks to the carbohydrate overload and then walked around the neighborhood. It was a dismal day, but it was still nice to be outside for a bit. She left around 5 and I missed her immediately. I can't wait for her to move down here.

I spent the rest of the evening watching the TV shows that I had taped earlier in the week. I watched this weeks episode of ER and cried my eyes out. I knew that was going to happen. Hell, even Will & Grace was sad. I turned things around by watching the first half of "Drop Dead Gorgeous". That helped a lot. It was such a satisfying weekend. A weekend of firsts, laughs, playing dress-up, too many funny lines of dialog that I simply must write down, and I made a fantastic new friend.

May 10th, 2002 13:00 hours CST currently listening to: "I'm Not Your Mother" by The Blake Babies

I got home from work last night at 11:30. If their was any justice in this world, the entire Motion Team would be fondling my balls right about now.

May 9th, 2002 22:05 hours CST currently listening to: "The Drowners" by Suede

Oh my god, this sucks!!!! It's 10:00 and I'm still at work!!!!! These stupid server updates are pissing me off. The day that I don't have to do these anymore can't arrive too soon.

I had a fantastic Q&A session with Betsy Rockett this afternoon. She too was staying late. I finally get to meet her on Saturday!! I can't wait. She's all kinds of cool. We're gonna get all dolled up and visually kick the entire crowds ass at Peter Murphy Saturday night. You better believe it.

I'm really excited because my friend DJ just got hired here at my office. He's too damn funny. Jeff got him hired. I swear, Jeff is raking in the referral bonuses these days. DJ is the 4th person that has been hired by the company under Jeff's recommendation. Lucky bastard.

May 9th, 2002 08:15 hours CST currently listening to: "I'll Take Anything" by Blake Babies

I must be stressed out because my shoulder is back in full swing. Remember that weird shoulder problem I was having back in February? Well, it's back. I must be carrying tension in yet another part of my body. Good grief. I actually had a pretty relaxing night last night. The hot water was back on in my building. Woo hoo!!! And I did some laundry. The heaters were on in my place so I changed into some shorts and just walked around barefoot. For some reason it just felt really nice. I watched two back to back new episodes of Enterprise and made some soup.

I also started assembling my new pedal setup for my trip to SF. I've got an entirely new layout planned. No more giant pedal board with two tiers. I'll miss that thing just for the conversation piece that it is, but good grief, it's so unnecessary. I ordered a new Ernie Ball stereo volume/pan pedal to replace my Dunlop Mr. Crybaby volume/wah that I never ever use the wah part of. I need to get my VOX wah fixed. Hopefully I'll have the time to get that done within my cramped schedule these coming weeks. I've decided that I'm going to sell my reissue Fender Jazzmaster for a 2001 or 2002 '62 Jazzmaster. They have some great paint finishes right now and I want one. I've got the whole offset body set from Fender it seems. All in three color brown sunburst. A Jaguar, Jazzmaster and a Bass VI. Ben suggested I sell them all as a set. Hah. I couldn't ever do that though. But a Lake Placid Blue Jazzmaster is in my future. I can feel it. Once I get my tax refund back. Awwww yeah.

Dave is in San Francisco for an entire week and so I'm trying to find new and inventive ways to goof off while at work. Just some infantile response to lack of authority, I guess. I have to stay late tonight to do dumb server updates. I hate the fact that I can't even start those until 8:00. Somebody please call me and keep me entertained!!!

May 8th, 2002 08:45 hours CST currently listening to: "Pale Blue Sky" by Cranes.

And the Academy award for best actor goes to......... Jeremy Wrenn!!!!!!!

I had no hot water this morning. How fun. I haven't showered or shaved. I could have just sucked it up and taken a cold shower, but I had to do that all the time in camp as a kid. Screw that. People will just have to deal with my scruffiness and my wicked bed-head today.

They're still painting the apartment on the first floor of my building. I swear someone just moved in there last week. My whole place stank to high heaven last night. I was actually exhaling paint fumes. I was seriously pissed. After the dizziness wore off, anyway. If it still smells tonight, I'm going to complain like crazy.

Is it me, or is Tuesday on "That 80's Show" the most beautiful thing you've ever seen? Jesus Jones, I need a date.

May 6th, 2002 12:45 hours CST currently listening to: "Virgin" by Perfume Tree.

Nifty weekend. Went to see the Cranes on Friday night at the Metro. Fantastic show. They played all of my favorite songs except for one, "Tomorrow's Tears", but I'll let that slide. They opened with "Cloudless". I was in heaven. It was a great show. I bumped into Marty and Mary, two friends of mine from Bloomington. It was good to see them. Especially since I was there on my own. *shrug* My hatred for people who talk during movies has now transferred to live music settings. There were these two Hispanic assholes next to us with their girlfriends who not only "woooooo'd!!" after and during every song, but talked to each other at full volume during the songs. Everyone around them was trying so hard to ignore them. They kept putting their fists in the air and swayed back and forth while drinking their cups of beer. I think they thought they were in the Black Panthers or something. I finally decided to move after they shouted out album titles for the band to play, instead of actual songs. Fucking morons.

I moved to the other end of the crowd and bumped into Krissy from Whimsical. She is a peach of a gal. We'll get along great. She and her friends are all super cute. Her sister is the spitting image of her. The members of Breather where there as well. It will be a very cool group of friends to have, if I actually get a few hours to hang out with people. Sheesh. I was very surprised to see how much the Cranes used samples during their songs. They had an extra guy who came out on occasion to play bass. They had a max of 5 people on stage at one time and they still had sample tracks going on in the background. The show was at a good volume too. I had left my earplugs in my bag that I had checked in at the door. I bought a cool shirt too. Their second track is off the new album and it was wonderful! Very electronica. I was impressed with their change in sound.

After the show, Mary and Marty and I went to Pick Me Up for some french toast and then they came back to my place to crash. It was a good time. Marty and I played Tony Hawk 3, SSX Tricky and GTA3. Boys and their toys. Mary was passed out with a book on my papazan. The next morning we all did the cereal thing and then I gave them train directions to get to the art museum from my place. Oh by the way, if anyone wants a gallon of non-fat soy milk, there's now one in my fridge. Ick. I opened all the windows in my place because it was super lovely outside. Then I hunkered down and started working on my computers, because, well, I'm a creature of habit. I actually injured myself. Can you believe it? I pulled a muscle in my ass while sitting on the floor and leaning over to get behind a computer case. I pulled an ass muscle! While working on a computer! Oh the shame. So, I'm wincing every time I get up from my chair today and I've actually been limping around the office. At least I don't have to lift anything. I reinstalled XP on my Intel box and got that up to spec. Then I lounged around and played Tony Hawk 3 all day. I need someone to come over and rub my butt. Any takers?

I met up with Christian and Linsey to go see Spiderman up in Evanston. I was becoming increasingly irritated, having yelled at a driver on the way there and now had to wait for Doug and Alison to show up. I arrived at 8:00 and they arrived close to 9:00, WITHOUT TICKETS. So not only were we late, but they weren't even going to see a movie at this point. Gee thanks, guys. One word for you: FANDANGO. So we went to Heartland Cafe and had some really good food, then went light speed to the theater. We were all sitting in different seats on the far right side. Oh well. At least we weren't all crammed in the front. I gave the movie a solid B. I liked the first act more than the second. It had it's good and bad points. I love all the cameos. Bruce Campbell is a god. I hate Kirsten Dunst as a redhead though.

Sunday was very low key. Cathy hadn't called me to meet up for brunch until around 11, at which point I'd already eaten. So I was disappointed about that. Such is life. I took my Rickenbacker 330 to the Chicago Music Exchange for a repair job. The neck is bowing like crazy and needs to be adjusted. I wondered around Wriggleyville for a while and eventually went to Pick Me Up for a lackluster burrito. I ended up not going to the Turner Joy show, as was my original plan. Instead I stopped by the grocery and then camped out on the couch for the X-Files. I shall miss that. And why the fuck is Futurama not on anymore?!??! I know the assholes at Fox aren't renewing the series next season, but what the fuck?

May 3rd, 2002 09:20 hours CST currently listening to: "We Are The Pigs" by Suede.

Ok, the nair residue is burning the living hell out of my crotch right now. AAARRRGGGHHHHHHHHHHH. Damn, that smarts.

Last night was an odd night, to be sure. Three friends of mine went with me to see Salo: The Worst Kind of Unlucky at the Shakespeare Theater over on Navy Pier. I'm not adding the 2 major names here because this situation was very embarrassing and rather traumatizing. We decided to go downstairs of my office to Benigans for some food. Well, one of my friends said she wasn't feeling well, and got up to leave. A few moments later a waiter showed up asking "is there a **** here?" **** said "yeah, that's me." The waiter: "your girlfriend fell. She's asking for you." **** rushed off to se what happened. Dave and I sat at the table sort of stunned. A moment later, the same waiter returned. "Are you all together? She's hurt really bad. She may have lost a tooth." Dave stayed at the table and I ran to see what happened. **** was on his hands and knees on top of her and she was on the floor sobbing. I only saw her face from the side for a split second, but she had indeed lost her top front right tooth. I nearly doubled over and vomited I felt so bad. I had no idea what had happened. Me: "***, what do you need from me?" ****: "Go grab our coats. The ambulance is on it's way!" So I grabbed everything of theirs and the paramedics arrived. I went back to the table solely so that she wouldn't feel more embarrassed. The Benigans staff handled everything very well. They blocked off the area and had people directed to the bathrooms at the restaurant across the hallway. Dave did a very good job of keeping my spirits up. He's a great friend that way.

We decided to go ahead and go on to the play. We walked up Michigan avenue and it was a beautiful night. We commented on building architecture and just swapped all sorts of stories. Neither of us had been to the Shakespeare Theater before, and we rarely go to Navy Pier in general, so this was a sort of new experience for both of us. The play was outstanding. We were both really happy with it. Which was a relief, considering what I had witnessed earlier that night. I was glad that I could get my mind off of it. I left messages on ****'s cell phone and home voicemail. I ended up just taking a cab home. I didn't want to deal with CTA.

I heard from **** around 12:30. He was in a grocery, buying all kinds of Advil and ice cream and such. They had been in the ER for 4 hours. She said that she felt light headed and sat down on a bench in front of the restroom entrances. She stood up because she thought she was going to get sick. The next thing she new, she was on the floor. The people who witnessed it said that she dropped to her knees and then just went down face first. Her tooth had broken off and went through her upper lip. She has two sets of stitches and a giant bruise on her chin. They should both be at the dentist right now as I type this. I'm sure that everything will be repairable. It was just a horrible thing to have happen. We still don't know why she blacked out yet though.

This is odd. I just now noticed that my George Carlin desktop calendar is missing "Friday, May 3rd". What the hell is that about? George, what do you have against today?

May 2nd, 2002 09:20 hours CST currently listening to: "How Can I Apply?" by The Trash Can Sinatras.

If one more person bails on me this month, I'm going to go postal. How's that for a great first post for May? All the plans, the plane tickets, the scheduling, the motivation that was fueled by the idea of seeing one specific person may very well be thrown out the fucking window. Not to say that I'm not still going. It's just going to be vastly disappointing if she isn't there. Son of a bitch. This was not the kind of news I wanted to hear. Why can't MY plans work out anymore? I've been busting my ass for people lately. That's not to say I regret it at all. It's what I do. Sometimes, anyway. But it seems like when I try to plan something for myself, the other parties involved jet at the last minute. I wish someone would take me out to dinner. Or say, "hey let's go to a movie tonight. Just you and me."