Today I decided to pump up the volume and make mistakes. 

I confirmed a theory, which is that my left pinky finger is rubbish. When I was ten, I accidentally cut part of my left pinky finger off in art class, with a giant, brand new pair of Fiskars scissors. It's never been the same. The tip, where the skin graft is, is extreeeeeeeeeeemely sensitive, so I've learned never to touch it. The problem is that my finger looks 100% normal, unless you look very closely. So I forget about it, and nobody notices, and then something stupid happens. 

It seems as though what has happened is that I've learned to compensate in such a way that I never use the tip of my pinky finger. I type pretty fast, but with only three fingers on each hand. I gave up learning to play ukulele, guitar and bass when my pinky said nope.

it doesn't hurt my pinky to play piano, but it's weak. Right now what I'm learning involves left hand chords with major thirds (?). So I have to retrain my left hand to use my thumb, middle finger and pinky, all at the same time. My brain and my muscles are NOT amused. It's the simplest thing in the world, just pressing down with those three fingers at once. And yet, it's as difficult as trying to write with that hand. I can feel it all the way up to my elbow. My muscles have no memories. 

Mayra (next door) was blasting her dumb music early in the afternoon, and the crazy lady across the street was blasting WOGL-FM (Worst of the 80s) later in the afternoon, so I cranked the keyboard volume up to 11 and played a left hand bass C scale for 30 minutes. 

Then I played Ode To Joy really badly. And loudly. When Tom Petty wrote, "The Waiting," he loved that intro riff, and he knew his neighbors could hear him practicing, so he played it incessantly, just to piss them off.