November 27th, 2002 14:52 hours CST currently listening to: "Catch Him" by Blueboy

Hey there. I know it's been two weeks to the day since I've last updated this. Some of you have been writing to me asking what's up and I haven't responded. I just wanted to let you know that I got really hurt, but I'm recovering. It's going to take a while and I'm trying very hard to just be my normal, optimistic self right now. But I'm having a lot of sleepless nights still and I'm losing weight from the stress. I suppose that the latter is a good thing. I'm below the 180 pound mark, which I've wanted for a while. It just came about the wrong way though. Thanksgiving vacation is coming at a very opportune time. I just hope that my family doesn't make me depressed by "over-caring". I'm looking forward to sitting in front of a fire in my parents living room and getting out of the city for a while. So, that's the very vague story for those of you that are concerned. Trust me, I've noticed. And thank you.

November 13th, 2002 11:00 hours CST currently listening to: "Almost Gold" by the Jesus and Mary Chain

Last night, airiel had it's Chicago debut. It simply could not have been a better first show. Oh my god. My head is spinning. Lisa fucking rocked. I could tell that she was concentrating like mad, but throughout the entire show, she still had this sense of "play it cool. rock the hell out." Oh man, it was great. I was tense for a little bit, during each song. But I felt so comfortable. I mean, here is a packed bar in Chicago, and I'm talking into the mic without feeling like a fucking idiot! It was fun. 70% of the crowd were people that I didn't know. And that's really cool.

I was really not nervous at all. I slept like a rock the night before. No anxiety dreams. Lisa was taking care of that. She had the dream that I used to have all the time where you realize that you have a show in 20 minutes, and you're 3 hours away or something. Ick. Things started a bit late. Some of the Quiet started a bit late and had some technical flubs. It was hard to say if Christian liked the performance or not. Lots of talking during their set, but lots of head bobbing too. I had no idea that I would be mingling that much at a show. It was like Lisa and I were hosting some huge party or something. We only got to talk to each other about 3 times before we played. I chatted with Scott Cortez for quite some time. I might be playing with him in Astrobrite next month. That could be fucking insane. He wants to find a live drummer. And you better believe, if we do find one, I'm stealing him or her for airiel.

So many people showed up. It was great to have Jeff there. He's pretty much been my guardian angel ever since just before I moved up here. In fact, he wrote me an email this morning talking about how last night made him remember when he and I were in a Dunkin Donuts one morning, over 2 years ago, going through The Reader and finding apartments for me. I was so glad that he was able to finally see me play. It was important. I feel now like I've proved myself to Chicago. I came here in October of 2000, had a horrible corporate job, got laid off, dropped 25 pounds, didn't really date anyone, Jeff got me a job at Getty, I start meeting people like Rachel and The Chris's, and now Lisa, and now I've got my band back. Good things come to those who wait.

After the show, Lisa grabbed Ben and also Adam from Tracer and we all unloaded the gear at Owen's. Man, that goes faster when you have more people. We went down to a bar in Wicker Park that I can't remember the name of at all right now. Lisa had one beer while Ben and I shared, I think, 4. I felt pretty icky when I got home. Hadn't eaten in about 8 hours at that point. Anyway, while we were there, 2 different songs came on the jukebox that Ben and I loved, but had no clue as to who they were. We have to go back there and find out. It got us talking about Swervedriver. I swear, Ben is the only person besides myself who thinks that Raise is their best album! He actually swooned when I told him that. How funny. The bar was pretty busy. Especially for a Tuesday night. But that's Chicago. Bars stay open until 4 am. It fucking rules. I totally have that feeling where your eyeballs are on fire because of all the second hand smoke. Bleh. Oh well. Last night was worth it.

November 11th, 2002 08:40 hours CST currently listening to: "Bernadette" by Brief Candles

Crazy weekend. Friday night I met up with Rachel on the train. I'm so happy that she's working downtown again. It's nice to have the option of seeing her on a more regular basis. I stopped at home real quick to grab my staple gun (which I can't seem to find now) and then I got back on the train to meet with her and Hans at Earwax. Had a relatively decent ham and cheese sandwich. We flyered for a while. Went to Quimby's to put up flyers and realized that the girl there was the Liz that I was emailing all the time before I moved up here. I had placed an ad in the Reader for musicians and we emailed a whole bunch. We lost contact after I moved. How funny that after two years, we finally meet. She seemed excited about the show on Tuesday. I bought the first Red Meat book. It's not as funny as the second one, but it's still my favorite comic strip right now. We came back to my place and watched "Rejected" and a few Young Ones episodes. Hans left his glasses in my living room. I thought they were Rachel's at first. Mighty effeminate glasses for a boy to wear, but then hey, I own multiple pairs of stretch pants.

Saturday I eventually slept in late. Did a lot of tossing and turning the night before. Had a REALLY sloppy band practice. Lisa and I made pizza's and I programmed drums for a particular cover song that we're going to play tomorrow night. I'm glad she got me to do it. It sounded great at practice. She was blowing up cars and killing gang members and pedestrians during most of this.

Sunday. Ate a buttload of french toast. Hadn't done that in a long time. My kitchen is a mess. Practice went well. We hammered out a set list. Wow, it feels good to be making set lists once again. We actually have too much material! We've already cut at least one song. We were unanimous on it, actually. Sorry, "Stratosphere". We picked up Ben and went to Pick Me Up. He had two completed press kits for us. God DAMN, those look fantastic. We dropped him off and went to the Riviera to see Sigur Ros. It was a beautiful show. Packed, too. This was my first time at the Riviera. Lisa and I spoke about how wonderful it would be to play at a venue like that. Some day. Some day. They played a lot of material off the new album, which I don't have yet. I may go buy it today. I lent my only CD to Lisa and now I want to hear it! We saw Krissy and Katie. Hell, they're hard to miss. Lisa couldn't see shit the entire time. She's so short. I noticed how tall I was and suddenly felt bad if I was blocking someone's view. She went back a bit and found a step for the last few songs. Their video component was just as cool this time as it was when I saw them last year at the Vic. My back is killing me from standing around last night. I'm gonna go raid the office kitchen for some ibuprofen. Later.

November 7th, 2002 08:20 hours CST currently listening to: "the blanket" by Brief Candles

Yawn. Morning, world. My mom and aunt Janet are in town today for my cousin's swearing-in ceremony. She becomes a lawyer today. They're going to swing by and pick me up for lunch. I haven't seen any of them in quite some time. It will be nice.

I'm really getting excited about my first airiel show in Chicago. I can't believe it's now less than a week away. I'm getting nervous. Luckily Lisa never reads this thing, so don't tell her. Haha.

Andrea is supposed to be in town today from Seattle through Sunday. She better call me this time.

Rachel got a job! I'm so happy for her. It's at a court reporter office. Whatever that means. The best part is that it's just a few blocks from my office. My Rachel is downtown again! This means we can go ice skating and get lunch all the time. I'm happy.

Got my hair cut last night. I love how much smaller my head looks when I get it cut. Hah. I'm a member of the big head club.

I like writing in short thoughts now.

Picked up the 2nd Ladytron CD yesterday. It's already receiving regular rotation privileges in my MP3 list. It's a bit more mature from the last one. A tad more melancholy, and a bit less poppy, with the notable exception of "Seventeen" which is a wonderfully addictive repetition. I hope to see them live at some point.

November 4th, 2002 11:05 hours CST currently listening to: "il dynamo de luce" by Mahogany

What a weekend. Friday was pretty much dead at work. I got a lot of reading done. Pssst. Don't tell Dave. I came home that evening, threw a pizza in the oven, and played Grand Theft Auto: Vice city all night long. I actually managed to get to bed before midnight, but just barely.

Saturday was more GTA:VC. I did manage to stop and clean my bathroom and stove top. Didn't make it outside until around 6:00 when Lisa came over to go to dinner at Lula. Folks, I'm officially a red wine drinker. I've sampled it a few times this last year, and I'm now hooked. I've always thought that there was something romantic and highly sexual about red wine. I was originally turned off by the temperature of it, but there's an attraction to it that I can no longer deny. We split a bottle that Emily had bought her and we got buzzed really quick. We were laughing a lot throughout dinner. Got all dressed up again for Jeff and Kim's Halloween party and took off.

Jeff and Kim's was a huge success. They had been wanting to have a party ever since they moved in together and this was it. Sadly, I didn't get a picture of the bathtub. It was filled with dry ice, with hands coming out of it. There were also bloody hand prints on the tile. It was Jeff's creation and he obviously had a good time doing it. The turnout was huge. Jeff was actually worried that there would only be 10 people showing up. Pishaw. Here's a breakdown of the few pics that I managed to get:
Kim, the hostess from within the trees. Drinking, of course.
Kim's coworkers.
Lisa looks friggin scary as hell in that getup.
"It's DJ, the slack-jawed, Jedi!!!!
"I'm going to use the forth on you"
"Hold still, ya little bugger"
despite the cool pose, why does it look like DJ pissed himself?
Natalie, with the biggest Genie bottle I've ever seen.
Jessica and CJ Burg.
Phil, downed pilot and Bill, drunken skipper?
Jeff, obviously excited that there are "more than 10 people that made it to the party".
He should have this as his drivers license photo.
Jeff, using his evil mind powers.... oh wait, there's a string holding that disco ball up.

Sunday was band practice, which went pretty well. I was cheering for Lisa when she tried to throw in the bass fills during the end of Halo. Ben was there too and he took lots of pictures. Can't wait to see those. Went to the grocery and spent enough money to go over my balance for my checking account. Hooray. Wait, I mean shit. The holidays are coming up and my paychecks don't seem to stretch as far as they used to. Really good food from Leona's followed by more GTA. Life is good.

November 1st, 2002 14:25 hours CST currently listening to: "discotraxx" by Ladytron

You're paper, I'm glue

Halloween is officially over. Can't say I was all that happy with it but certainly could have been worse. I tried and tried to get my hair to look like Jack Osborne's, but I just have too much of it. With my three coworkers, we managed to win the best group contest award. We each won a $25 gift card to Marshal Fields, which I just spent on buying lunch for me and Ben. DJ, Jeff and Mary were al wearing old western clothes. Jeff and DJ were cowboys (DJ even had bad buck teeth) and Mary was a saloon girl. They even decorated their cubicles to look like a saloon. It was funny as hell. Especially with DJ being in character all fucking day. We walked to Chipotle' together and he kept making eye contact with people and tipping his hat saying "ma'am" or "sir" to everyone. It was beautiful. The guy never ceases to make me laugh.

I ate like a pig. Cereal in the morning. Mini candy bars all day. Burrito for lunch. Pumpkin pie around 3:30. I felt like crap on the inside. I took off at 5 and met up with Lisa at the Boulevard Cafe around 6:15. Snagged a quick meal (a salad, thank cheebus) and she took off to go round up the volunteers for Red Moon. The All Hallow's Eve Festival wasn't as bad as last year, but still didn't give me the jaw-dropping response that the 2000 one did. Ending it with Drum Tree was a terrific idea. That rocked my world. I was freezing to death, but Rachel and Hans were there to keep me company with their poorly fitting vampire teeth. I swear, if those two looked any more cute than they did then, I would probably shit my pants. Managed to find Christian afterwards and tried to find Lisa. My cell phone died and it wasn't until 10 minutes had gone by that I remembered that I now carried a spare battery. Found her via Christian's eyesight and we all went to Small Bar. This is the place that is a block away from my place. It's really nice inside, but horribly ventilated. My coat and shoulder bag absolutely reeked of cigarette's this morning. That's a major disappointment.

Wednesday night was a trip. Practice was a little short and then I went over to Dave's place for the unveiling of Grand Theft Auto: Vice City. It was beautiful. We were killing people and crashing our cars into the ocean in record time. I love the voice work so far. Ray Liotta has a really cool voice, for some reason. And I can resist my man, Tom Sizemore. I so far have no plans tonight, so I'm going to play that until my brain cells are humming the theme to 99 Red Balloons as they die.