I have nothing exciting to impart, other than that I was listening to Slate's Working podcast today, and they had an episode that I thought might be of interest to some folks who can read this. 

Working is a podcast about the typical workday of people who work in different fields- porn stars, perfumers, other professions that don't start with a P.  Anyway, they interviewed one of the guys from They Might Be Giants about the typical workday of a rock band guitarist.  Okay, that link sucks, because it asks you to log into Slate for a 2-week free trial. However, you can go to iTunes or wherever you get your podcasts and find it as well. 

I'm glad that either this guy has a guitar tech, or he chose not to go into 25 minutes of talking about pedal board setup and restringing.  His answer to the question, "How do you get up the energy to play Birdhouse In Your Soul/Don't Let's Start/Particle Man again after umpteen years of playing it?" made me happy. 

It's also interesting to consider that their kid concerts seem to be paying off in an audience for their non-kid-concerts that's younger than they expected. Maybe making a kids' album or two isn't such a bad investment after all. 

We were asked by The Dead Milkmen to record their new song with them. We said yes!  Here's a link to the backstory over on the Hot Breakfast! blog.

The recording process was live-streamed on YouTube for two days as part of Weathervane Music's Shaking Through documentary series. We recorded on Saturday, and all the mixing happened on Sunday, along with the listening party.

This YouTube clip (below) should open right to the portion of the video where we unveil the song. You won't hear any of the room noise; I believe the YouTube live feed was coming straight outta the board at this point.  (If the video starts from the top, then FFW over to 4:37:39.)  

That's me singing all three vocal parts in the "folky section" that starts the tune (and happens two other times in the song); Matt is playing acoustic underneath in those sections, too. (Matt sets up his acoustic guitars down around 6:44:00, and starts recording his parts at 6:55:00)  The Milkmen gave me the lyrics and chords, and I wrote the melody and did the 3-part vocal arrangement. They put a lotta reverb on my voice (though the song isn't fully mixed yet, so I think they're gonna take some out), but if you wanna watch me laying down the vocal tracks (for the most part, they were once-and-done'ers), here's a link to Saturday's session. (I record my vocals around 7:04:33 to 7:29:00.)

I still have to pinch myself when I listen to this. That's really my voice. That's really Matt's guitar. That's really the Dead Milkmen, who I've idolized since 1986. That's a long friggin' time. 

Damn it feels good to be a gangsta^H^H^H^H dork rocker.

10 - 60 sec plank before bed on the hard cold hotel floor

X - well I had one of those too damn busy days again - from oversleeping and rushing out of my hotel to catch a ride to work at 7am to walking in the door at 11pm I literally had no time/place to plank. I guess I could have found a spot in the airport, but it was pretty crazy. At by 11pm Planking was not a priority. Collapsing into bed was all I was up to.

10a - repeated 60s of day 10. My feet seriously objected.

11 - another 60 seconds, this time at the local park's playground - yes it is near freezing out, but kids gotta play. So we went out for some running around time. And I planked on one of the flat areas. And hey, with shoes on, it doesn't hurt the feet! Doh. 

12  - so I put it off all day. Afraid of the 90 seconds. I got me excuses - too full, no shoes on, gotta make swords, and armor. But yay! Just finished my first 90 second plank! Woot! I think I'll reward myself with my first beer of the year.

I'm feeling comfortable in my evening of rest tonight. Due to timing and tiredness, we decided against going to Guelph to sing Shape-note tonight, and that was OK. We decided against checking out the live music at our brand new closest bar, and that is also OK.

Just now walking Rover, I found where Comet Lovejoy is supposed to be, in the clear night sky, and there were faint stars, any one which might have been it. I don't have binoculars to be sure- and this, too, feels OK.

I've seen the amazing photos, and I have a good imagination. ... I'm remembering a year ago and the truly amazing skies from Hawaii, so I'm mostly imagining seeing it with the naked eye while standing on a beach in Maui.

I made a website and then I got really busy and just skimmed it. And then I noticed that there's a small community or two using it rather happily and not much caring if the rest of the world does. Interesting.

Hello, still-tuned-in members of said communities. What's working? What's not working? What might I do for you? I can see that the upgrades I did to link sharing a month or so back are a win, at least.

As for me: I'm planking and programming and dancing and pretending to learn to play the guitar all over again. I don't know how far I'm going to get with that last one. But this is awesome.

The Unicorn exists. 

8 done - 45 sec plank mid morning.

9 done - 60 seconds! In hotel room right before bed. I remembered! And didn't talk myself out of it!! Pat back.  My legs protested most durning, my gut nowprotests in the aftermath.  60 is hard, but still not as painful as day 2.

Car trips with my son always evoke interesting conversations, especially when my 5 year old shares his always interesting, usually unconventional opinions. He's been ill for the past few days, but today woke up chattering, as he normally does, which was all the proof I needed to verify that he felt much better.

We had a few errands to run today - bank, grocery store, parents' house - and I thought the fresh air would feel good. Even though the grey dawn arrived with  grainy tinkerbell-sized hail to slicken sidewalks and streets, by noon the slush piles outnumbered slidy spots.

My miniature orator had much to say today. This snippet is but one of his musings. *Recorded and transcribed by a Very Amused Mama.

Benjamin: "I think I'd like to be a scientist when I grow up. You know, a scientist who invents things. Like invisibility. I want to invent a way for everyone to turn invisible whenever they want. I think it would be really a cool thing if you could be invisible - or turn anything else invisible. And I could invent more light sabers, too. Because everyone needs a light saber, especially if they could turn invisible. Imagine a whole bunch of invisible people fighting with light sabers. But if I was a scientist, I wonder if I could still be a ninja? Sure. I could be a scientist ninja who invents things and gets to go around all invisible with a light saber and do spinjitsu. And then I could be like a crime-fighting ninja scientist who could turn good guys invisible so they could sneak up on bad guys and destroy them with their light sabers."

World problem #428 solved!

Had a terrific living-room reading of Wide Open Spaces (my thesis play) today. Now my head is hurting from all of the possible things which can be done with this play. My brain is just Really Full. 

It's a Really Good Thing to have friends who you can trust with "here is this thing I made that I'm not 100% sure how I feel about." 

"well, let's unpack it and give it a spin and see what happens. OH. There's your whisamaidit, and your doohicker. Hmm. Did you consider that the doohicker could be fragmented by that hawatchijig?"

"Um... no..."

"Because that's what's making your whoosis go all flickety."

"My whoosis goes flickety?"

"Yup."

"Damn, I thought so, but I didn't want to say anything."​

Right at the end of the discussion, I had a really clear image of a way that blocks can be moved around to make the play clearer and more streamlined, but it made sense RIGHT THEN and now it's getting slippery. so I'm going to go scribble on a legal pad for a bit. 

Feeling extremely grateful for such good, smart, supportive friends. 

Done, done (rest day) and done. Still planking on, up to 45 seconds.