I like watching SNL via YouTube clip a day or two after the show.  I have been loving SNL super-hard since last year (along with the rest of the universe), but last night's Larry David /Miley Cyrus episode left me wanting. Weekend Update was great as usual, though.

I've never seen Curb Your Enthusiasm so I have no feelings either way about Larry David, but I felt like he didn't have much to work with this week.

I heard Miley Cyrus interviewed on Howard Stern and respected her-- she seems to have a good head on her shoulders and a healthy understanding about who she is and where her place is in the universe. I also think she has a powerful voice, and an accurate voice, too-- but the musician in me wishes her songs weren't so contrived and dumb, and I wish she didn't rely so heavily on "faux R-and-B melisma thinly veiled as passion and soul." Just fucking sing the song. (Then again, I wish someone would give her something better to sing... but then again, she is in her early 20s and maybe that's all she has to sing about right now.). 

Everyone's a critic, apparently.

My UPenn consulting gig is going well, though I really don't feel like they need me very much, though they use me a lot. I think they just use me as a sanity check/training wheels, but their own instincts are great and they don't really need my guidance. I'm happy to give them the extra assurance if it makes them feel better, though. 

Hot Breakfast is back in the studio and we've got two songs done; "Giants are Sleeping" which is a dream Matt had, and "Taking Care of Bobby" which is about someone who is taking care of a person ("Bobby") with a mental illness. Bobby was once a famous musician and now decades later he's become unwieldy and unstable and relies on the kindness of others until he wears out his welcome and is foisted on some other unsuspecting fan.  We're about to start recording our Meatloaf-esque epic song "Open Mic Night," which is an 8-minute monstrosity with skits and everything. I'm ridiculously excited about it.

I've been doing a lot of voiceover work lately. My latest project is that I'm the voice of New Mexico's health insurance exchanges (e.g., "don't forget to choose a healthcare plan under Obamacare" since open enrollment is HELLA SHORT this year and ends December 15th and the healthcare.gov website is closed Sundays I shit you not. (Fuck you, Trump.))   I'm also the voice of St. Francis Healthcare, which is a hospital in Wilmington.  It's fun to hear my voice in commercials when I'm listening to the radio in the shower. 

Yesterday Matt and I played in a memorial softball game for our friend Joel who died two years ago. Joel loved softball, so our friend Kevin Regan organized a game so we could do something fun on what would normally be a sad day. It was a gorgeous, crisp fall day, and we had fun.  I played catcher which means I did 73,000 squats, which means I can barely walk today.  But I did hit both righty and lefty which was fun.  Matt pitched really well, and also hit really well, too. A fine day out.

Allrighty, I'm gonna sign off-- got stuff to do.

I was in Wisconsin for 24 hours on Sunday into Monday-- Racine, to be exact.  My hotel was right on the bank of Lake Michigan, which is surprisingly blue... like Caribbean blue. 

Racine is like Wilmington in that it was probably a sad, falling-down place for decades until someone decided to throw a ton of money at it, and now it has a super-cute main drag, similar in vibe to Market Street in Wilmington, or maybe more specifically the Riverfront. Lots of shops, eateries, businesses, parking, people walking around, all that. And it's CUTE. 

Even th Milwaukee airport is adorable, mostly because of the people in it. Everyone is soooo friendly, inclusive, soft-spoken, quick to smile and say hello. Where the Philly airport (and every other airport) is LOUD with announcements, machinery, moving walkways, beeping carts, cops on Segways, yelling kids, and families whose default vocal conversation volume is SCREAMING, it's easy to get numb to the noise.  But Milwaukee is quiet. 

Always Get a Shoe Shine

I forget where I read it, but someone said in their list of life tips to "Always get a shoe shine by the old guy in the airport."

I may have only gotten two or three shoe shines in my life, and they were awesome, and my shoes appreciated it.   Two weeks ago I wanted to wear my ancient Doc Martens to work and Matt offered to shine them up, and I took him up on it. They look great! What a difference!  I bought those 10-eye black Doc boots from Buffalo Exchange (used!) in 1996 or so... so they're at least 21 years old. (My boots can drink!) After Matt got done shining them up, they look like new damn boots! I can't believe it!  I really need new soles though-- they are worn flat to the point where they are slippery and absolutely unwearable in the wintertime. 

ANYWAY, this post is not about my Doc Martens though, but instead about me getting a shoe shine in the Milwaukee airport right after I landed, shining a totally different pair of boots. My flight landed around 1pm, and it was gonna be about a 30 minute drive to Racine and I figured there was a good chance my hotel room wouldn't be ready for me by the time I showed up at 1:30, so I tried to take my time. As I wandered through the almost empty airport, I saw a shoeshine guy on the out-side of security... which seemed strange, but OK.  The shoeshine guy had a TV in his booth and he was watching the game, and I felt bad for interrupting him, but he invited me in.  As soon as he invited me in, I could tell something was slightly off... but I didn't care. He cheerfully and eagerly invited me in, and I was gonna stay. 

The old guy, probably in his 60s, looked much older. He was very shaky, couldn't speak clearly... but he managed to say that he had just had a stroke and was just coming back to work. In a moment, his son appeared and took over the reins, somewhat embarrassed for his dad. Once I assured the son that I was comfy with Dad and was happy to be there, the three of us had a great time. We talked about the stroke a little bit, and how Dad couldn't bear to stay cooped up in the nursing home with "people with no purpose no more."  He was a shoe-shiner, and he took his craft seriously... it was his life's work. Even though he couldn't wield the tools as adeptly anymore, his son helped out when he needed to, and they managed to give me a great freakin' shoe-shine in 30 minutes... and a great chat. We talked about traveling, weather, the 24-hours news cycle and how it's killing the country, and food that is unique to this side of Wisconsin. 

After 30 minutes of intensive work, they charged me $12 for the shoe-shine, and I gave them $40. 

My boots look damn fiiiiine, and my heart feels good, too. 

Swingin'...

In other news entirely, my favorite lunch spot in Philly is 30th Street Station, outside on the swings.  I get a cup of coffee and a bagel and/or a sammich/salad from one of the many shoppes inside, and plop my arse on a swing and all is right with the world.

They have two different types of swings-- one where your feet can touch the ground, and ones that are more like giant recliners where your legs are totally off the ground. So today there were people sitting on the big recliner swings, but their swing had stopped swinging... and since their feet can't touch the ground, they have no way to swing again. So as I walked by them, I gave them each a push and they both smiled and laughed. It made my day. :-)

Shut up and post this, Jill

Anyway, I think I'm just gonna post this, otherwise I'll just drag it out, adding letters but saying nothing. So... post!

I have a few things to talk about, but it's 2am (now 5:30am) and I'm now too tired... so I'm just going to leave videos of two songs from the Sunnyvale / Hot Breakfast!  house concert that happened in August in north Jersey.  (Huge thanks to Anthony Stramaglia for shooting and posting these!)

This first song ("A Thing to Get Through") is brand-new, and this recording was not only the song's very first "public" performance, it was also perhaps maybe only the 5th or 6th time we'd actually played/sung it straight through... Matt and I had learned it quite literally the night before.  It was a safe and friendly crowd, so I wasn't worried about making a mistake; I was more worried about crying in the middle of the song. (You can hear me start to get choked up a few times; you can just hear things tighten up and me make slight vocal adjustments to compensate.  Or maybe you don't hear it since I didn't use a mic, and/or maube you're not that anal about vocal mechanisms. Whatevz.  Anyway, getting choked up is normal and often happens when you lose a friend and you sing a song about the loss to a room full of people who loved him.)  Andrew (the songwriter and piano player) was Paul's (the friend who died) best friend, and they were VERY tight, and kept up their friendship via email since they lived on opposite coasts (Paul in north Jersey and Andrew lived in Portland, OR).  They are both gifted writers, and I secretly pray those letters/emails get published some day.  Heavy philosophy, social criticism, music analysis and theory, knowing thyself, etc.  

Anyway, the lyrics are below the video.

Below that is Video #2 for an old song ("The Job Song" a.k.a. "Get a Real Job") by our old band The Evelyn Situation. This song was written in 1992 for two women's voices and piano and guitar as an evil polka, and has been re-arranged over the years for 2 voices/one kazoo/two guitars/piano; then for one vocalist (me!) plus a 17 piece big band (the Industrial Jazz Group), all the way to this current stripped-down version of one voice, one piano (below).  The video for The Job Song is below the first one, and the lyrics (which are wonderfully clever) are below it.  (and yes, I was super-enunciatey. I didn't have a mic and I wanted to make sure everyone understood the words. I'd rather err on the side of over-pronouncey than mumbly. I hate when I can't understand a singer.)

A Thing to Get Through - - words and music by Andrew Durkin. (For Paul.)

Flying in to Jersey 
With the winter on my mind
I got angry at a stewardess 
Who was trying to be kind
My past was up ahead, and my future far behind
mm-mmm, mm-mmm, mm-mmm

If you had a fortune
Would you have been who you wanted to be
If you had a lifetime
Would you have used it to finally get free
If you had a second chance
Could you do now what you didn’t do
Or was life just a thing to get through

Some came from the beginning 
And some came from the end
Some I hadn’t seen forever
And some I might never see again
Help me, Jesus—is this anyway to treat a friend
mm-mmm, mm-mmm, mm-mmm

If you had a fortune
Would you have been who you wanted to be
If you had a lifetime
Would you have used it to finally get free
If you had a second chance
Could you do now what you didn’t do
Or was life just a thing to get through

Maybe you are laughing
From your attic in the sky
Maybe you’re that piece of clay
That finally learned to fly
Do you think we’ll ever know
What happens when we die
mm-mmm, mm-mmm, mm-mmm

The Job Song (words and music by Andrew Durkin)

This guy with horns said, "There's a cure for your financial state: don't do the thing you love, cause good things come to those who hate. I'm a powerful man, and though I think you're a slob, if you will flatter me, I'll get you a real job."

"Give up your dreams," he said, "Yes, that's the way to have it all. Look at your cousin Neil: he's young, he's rich (he's going bald). He may be dead in a decade or two, but he drives a porsche, and yes, you can drive one, too. Why don't you get a real job?"

Having just finished school, I'd never met his type before. "You're very kind," I said, "And yes, you're right, I'm very poor. But I don't see how your scheme could help me, And so I wonder if you might not tell me more. Why should I get a real job?"

"Well, don't you want to be like the people on TV? So bored and jaded and doing something that you have always hated? Just give in! How could it be a sin? The big machine must keep on rolling on... Why don't you get a real job?

For I have here in store each numbered casket for your generation: I've been waiting with anticipation! Truth, you'll find, is on the dotted line, so be a good sport. That's what life is for!"

Anyway. 

I have to tell y'all about the new consulting gig and Matt's music directing a show and me thinking about joining a christmas carol troupe for this holiday season to make a few bucks singing in malls, but that'll have to wait until the next post of One Post Wonder.

We (me, Matt, Kevin Niemi, and Joe Trainor) went to go see Yes (well, one of the two groups currently touring as Yes... the better one, in my opinion), and HOLY CRAP were they absolutely amazing. It was a five-piece band, and it featured an absolutely flawless (FLAWLESS!!) Jon Anderson on soaring, original-key, perfectly smooth and dead-accurate how-the-hell-is-he-73-years-old vocals, percussion, "acoustic guitar" (though his fingering rarely changed and we don't think it was actually plugged into anything) and celtic harp; Trevor Rabin on freakin' fantastic guitar, and the sparkly-caped Rick ZOMG Clearly No Arthritis Wakeman on keys and keytar. Since they had Trevor Rabin, the show had a bunch of songs off of 90125 and even "Rhythm of Love" off of Big Generator (and we all agreed that was the most we ever liked that song). The show was in Verizon Hall at the Kimmel Center, and it was so damn civilized! The crowd (with the exception of the one guy yelling "YES!!!") was super-enthusiastic but so respectful-- people didn't "woo" during quiet parts, and they clapped for good solos... and the Kimmel Center staff made you wait until between songs to re-enter the theater if you left to pee. (Of course, at a Yes show that could be 20 mins...) It was AMAZING and we are all still buzzing about it.

Little did we know a few hours later some fuckstick would be shooting a zillion people at a concert in Vegas. I can't wrap my head around it; I really can't.  I try, and I fail. I just can't make sense of this year. Whenever I see the phrase "President Trump" written, it seems like an '80s Bloom County joke where Opus, Steve Dallas and Milo are making fun of the 21st Century. 

Speaking of the 21st Century, we went to go see Blade Runner (the 1982 version obviously, but the Directors Cut, without the voiceover); Matt had never seen it before, and it'd been just under a decade since I'd seen it (though I was so tired during that screening that I slept through most of it). I really enjoyed it this time around. It was playing at Theatre N, which is a cute little auditorium in the Nemours building in downtown Wilmington. ​We ran into a zillion people there who seemed genuinely happy to bump into us, and it felt nice to feel liked. (Whatcha think? Is Deckert a Replicant or not?  Discuss.)

Get off my lawn

​​​​​​In other news entirely, I've decided there are some 21st Century things I just don't give a shit about, and I don't really want to learn about them or invite them into my life. The list (which is sure to expand) currently includes:

Any smart-home technology. My fridge does not need a fucking IP address. Neither do my lightswitches, lightbulbs, garage door openers, thermostat, etc. If I wanna turn a light on, I'll friggin' turn on the switch, thanks.  I trust GE to make a lightbulb; I don't trust them to have the expertise to lock down their products with the kind of internet security anything with an IP address needs today. And cars sure-as-fuck don't need wifi.  (Read the short article, and then scroll down for the related video from 2013 of a Jeep getting hacked while driving down the highway.)

Any voice-activated assistant, be it Alexa, Google Assistant, Siri, etc. Screw you, you can't listen in. If I need to order more Luna bars, I'll fucking click three things on my phone. 

Facebook Messenger. Fuck you, I will never, ever install it. Ever. You already know how I feel about Facebook. I am not gonna get swept up in its bullshit, whether it's positive or negative bullshit. It's a timesuck, and I already suck at time. Besides, I'm pissed off enough about Trump and life's injustices without Facebook. (And for the love of god, please stop thinking/worrying I'm judging anyone who is on (or even loves) Facebook. I am not judging. I'm happy you've found something you dig. You do you, I'll do me. Done.)

Spotify. Fuck you, I don't give a shit. If I wanna listen to music, I'll fucking turn on my iPod, or Sirius, or WXPN. I haven't used Spotify and I don't care to try it. It bones musicians so badly that I can't possibly contribute to it. And even if it treated musicians fairly, I still wouldn't be interested because I'm lazy and don't like new things, SO THERE. 

That new-fangled Windows XP. (I kid, I kid.)

​​​​In still other news...

Matt and I have gift certificates to sensory-deprivation float-pods in West Chester. This will either be the best most awesome thing or the absolute worst possible thing for someone with crippling anxiety, but either way we're eager to give it a whirl. We'll letcha know how it goes. 

And in yet still other news...

Work is FINALLY starting to pick up. Hey, it's only October, right?  I'll be at UPenn every Friday morning between now and October 2018, and the occasional Wednesday, too. Yay. Money. This Friday I'll be there all day. If you work near Penn, maybe we could get lunch every once in awhile? 

OK, that's enough outta me. 

Hi, troops!

Today is kinda my first do-nothing day since before Lizzie had tech week.  I'm currently sitting in the chair gettin' mah hairz did.

Takin' care of bidniss

We spent the better part of the last two weeks up at my folks' place because my mom had her cataracts laz0r3d out and replaced with a permanent contact lens. They only do one eye at a time, and only on Tuesdays... so we were up there taking care of things and just generally keeping their moods chipper and helping out with stuff.  Last week's visit was hard due to a shitty bitchy fight my mom and I had, but she sincerely apologized 20 minutes before we went home... and this visit was much more chill.  Mom's eyeball surgeries went very well, so that's super-good.

My dad bought a portable air conditioner for our bedroom at my folks' house (a sunroom, so it gets hella hot during the daytime), and it is awesomesauce. Thanks Dad! 

TMI

The Ladytimes decided to visit and completely obliterate me. I won't go into the literal gorey details, but suffice it to say I did three loads of laundry in 36 hours because of HOLY GOD IT WON'T STOP.  I spent all day yesterday in my bed at my folks' place curled up a ball with a heating pad, moaning, eating Advil until I gave myself gastritis. Good times. (OK, apprently I WILL go into the gory details. Sorry.)

Closing weekend of Lizzie redux

I don't think I ever talked about how the final weekend of Lizzie went. In a nutshell, it rocked. I was sad when it closed. The penultimate show (Friday the 12th) was our best show by far... and Saturday (closing night) the rhythm was off and a few of us fucked up little things that we'd never fucked up before... but that always seems to happen on closing nights, dunno why. The show is a VERY vocally-intense and challenging score for all four actors, and by Saturday's closing night we all wanted to go all-balls-out... but since we went all-balls-out every other night too, there wasn't anyplace farther/harder we could go. So, in my snobby professional voice-teacher opinion, Saturday night show sounded a little pushed to me... and I am guilty, too.  But daaaaaamn, it feels so good to just let it all go and hold nothing back. It's hard not to surrender to that feeling and get swept up, technique be damned... but good technique is what allows you to be able to sing balls-out night after night, so you can't really toss it to the wind. (Geez, I'm making it sound like the closing night show was a disaster. It wasn't! But after the Friday night buttah-like show, it was a sliiiiight disappointment for us actors.)

Someone recorded the awesome Friday night show, but they forgot to record sound (KHAAAAAAAN!!!!) so they recorded the closing Saturday as a re-do which was a wee bit of a let-down. So I have no desire to watch the recording because all I can do is focus on the three notes I sounded scratchy on and the one spoken line I butchered, so I can't enjoy anything ever again.  Buuuuuut, the girl who played lead guitar (Meghan, on whom I have a TERRIBLE crush, good GAWD) recorded the show on a tablet from her music stand (she was getting footage of herself playing to build her online portfolio of her musician-for-hire skillz) so we've been thinking about using her sound from her Friday night recording and laying it over the soundless camera recording.  The sound from Meghan's iPad is gonna be band-heavy, but at least it'd be something.  Anyway. That's a someday project, and it's something I'm hoping Sandler will do, because he's awesome like that. 

We interrupt this program...

Fuck, my cramps hurt right now. I wish someone would just agree to yank out my goddamn lady parts. ("YOU'RE NOT WANTED!!") But my girlie doc says "Uhm, we don't just go removing perfectly good organs y'know." Aaaaah, fuck you. Gimme some fuggin' nail clippers and some Everclear and I'll do it myself.)

House stuff

My house has so many things it needs done and I just ignore them. La la la, nothing to see here!  Things like:

Why does the basement smell wet all the time? It is not wet. 

When will I get around to calling the plumber and getting my basement slop-sink fixed?

When will I get around to calling the exterminator and making sure our house is more basement-mouse-resistant before it gets chilly and the mice move indoors?

When will I hire some nice people to remove the Big Gay Purple Shed (or when will I give Houser a sledgehammer and some rum  and a GoPro)?

When will I hire some nice people to look at Grandfather (our redwood tree, only 1 of 11 in the state) to make sure he's OK?

When will I hire some nice people to re-pour the cement slab in the backyard and maybe even build a fire pit or a patio or something that doesn't look shitty?

When will I find a new owner for The Barcalounger motorcycle that is in my other shed, surely with a gunked up gas tank by now since it's been stored with stagnant gas for god-knows-how-long?

When will I have Joe's car removed from our driveway? This has been the longest weekend favor evaaaar. (Though OTOH, it is nice making it look like someone's home by having a car in the driveway.)

The answer to these questions are all: Mehhhh.

Bye now

OK, my hairz are done, but the wifi here stinks, so I'll post this later.

(EDIT: It's later. Hello from THE FUTURE!)

Opening night of Lizzie (Friday night) went very very very well. I felt great. We all did. The band is AMAZING.

The show's run had been rescheduled several million times and we had agreed to play the Kennett Square Mushroom Festival which happened today... but that was before this weekend became opening weekend for Lizzie with a show the night before and a sold-out show the evening of this afternoon gig.  I praise the baby jesus every day that I have vocal cords of steel... and our one-hour set from 12:30-1:30pm went swimmingly (with a special super bonus visit from Tom and Roxanne! Wheeee!), and didn't affect my evening performance at all. Yay.

We went directly home and took naps and slept super-hard for a few hours, and were ready to rock tonight's Lizzie production. Did I mention it was sold-out? And WHEEE #2, we had special PhilaDel representation by Lindsay, Shellebot and Archerbot (how is he 6 feet tall?!), Jermatron, and sadly Laura's back couldn't tolerate the uncomfortable seats so she bailed at intermission. But I didn't even see them in the audience until the end of the 2nd act, but I was happy to spy them.  Got lots of huge love from friends and strangers, which felt really nice. I am really enjoying the show now, and it's an honor to be a part of it.

I have a vague recollection of someone on OPW asking to crash on my couch so they could come see the show, but I'm having a brain-fart as to who that was.  If it was you, please remind me!  I don't know about letting you crash on my couch only because I'm a shitty person on show days with my head solely focused on the show and nothing else, and I don't wanna worry about being a good hostess or having a clean house or being on good behavior, but I'd be happy to give you my Hilton points and get you a hotel. :)  And maybe you could go on a night when other OPW pals are going so they can be your chaperone.  Just a thought!

Anyway, I cannot express to you the relief that I feel now that we've opened and the show is rockin'.  

I am already starting to get sad that we only have five more performances.

A billion thanks to everyone listening to me bitch about the process, and a billion more thanks to everyone who came to see it and/or who is planning to come see it. I'm really proud of what we've done.

OK, must sleep now so I'm ready for our single matinee of the run.

Xoxo,

Jill-oooo

I wrote this Thursday, August 24th.

I woke up at 7am this morning crying my face off from a horrible dream where I was alone in a hotel room on a work trip, and it occurred to me that I was dying. I was actually mostly OK with dying, but I wanted to be with Matt and my parents, and I couldn't get to them. There's a lot more to the dream, but I'm typing on my phone here at the hospital... I'm currently getting my 2nd iron infusion, so I have a tube in my arm and today it's extra-pinchy for some reason.

Anyway, I have been on the verge of tears for 10 days. I don't know if it's that I've been in slightly more emotional situations lately, i.e., the house concert was great, but made us miss Paul; seeing Patty in California was awesome but her mom recently died and reminiscing was so, so good, but also really sad. The eclipse was happy and wonderful, but got me choked up. And singing just about anything makes me cry... if it sounds bad, I cry... if it sounds good, I cry.  I don't get it. Maybe this is the world's longest bout of PMS... but I've gotta figure out how to handle it, because I can't cry at rehearsal or during the shows!

Anyhoo, tonight I have my first Lizzie rehearsal since vacation. They moved into the theater while I was in California, so tonight I'll be seeing the set for the first time. I'm not gonna be able to sing tonight because my voice still sucks from this cold. Argh!

In other news, everyone here in the hospital chemo/infusion suite is extra-chipper today. It's a bright, sunny, 80-degree day today, and I think people are just kinda feeling the change of season starting. There are three other patients here right now (as opposed to last week where all 20 chairs were filled), and one patient is telling her cancer story-- she's a relatively new patient-- she's 37 with non-Hodgkins lymphoma. She said she had no idea she was even sick until someone mentioned she looked a little yellow. So she went to the doctor and he was like "Get your ass to the hospital NOW."   So hearing her story and the other patients talking about their chemo ports and yadda yadda makes me STOP BITCHING about having a dumb cold. (A crappy, tenacious cold with a lungmeat cough that is now here a week and holding my voice hostage... but whatever.)

We're taking our Billy Joel tribute to The Rehoboth Beach Bandstand this weekend, and we had to cut our 2-hour show down to 75 minutes. It'll be a quick but fun show. And when we get home we'll have a dogggggg. (We're dogsitting JD. Yaaay!) 

[...time elapses...]

Aaaah. My infusion is finished. They also gave me a steroid (Decadron), which, in addition helps prevent any potential death by anaphylaxis that iron infusing can sometimes (rarely) cause, will also reduce the inflammation of my vocal cords, so my voice should be back soon. 

August 28th Update

So it's a few days later and the Billy Joel show in Rehoboth was a smashing success... the guy who booked us said we had a crowd of about 1000, which is impressive considering the bandstand only has seats for 350. It looked like a sea of people out there, and everyone said that the audience was all singing along and dancing, which is cool. As usual, my damn mic barely worked and a zillion audience members complained to me after the show about it. I wasn't able to hear myself in the monitors so I crammed two earplugs in just so I could hear myself, and it was sub-optimal at best. Oh well.  

In other news, the ladytimes have kicked in, so at least I know why I was a crying hot mess last week. And hopefully it'll only last a week or 10 days so it'll be over for when Lizzie opens, considering we're wearing all white.  

If you're coming to see Lizzie, might I gently suggest coming to the second weekend if your schedule allows? 

In the last bit of news, we're dogsitting JD again. They've changed up his meds and he's a lot "doggier" now-- he's getting around better and seems happier, too. This is the best news.

HOLY  CRAP, the Southwest Air Eclipse Flight was awesome awesome awesome. Just so much fun! 

After we deplaned, a news crew from Channel 11 Alive Atlanta was interviewing people about their experience, and since I'm a whore, I jumped in front of the camera. Apparently I'm gonna be on the Atlanta news. Woot!

So if you watch this video, that's me at 1:36 in my ITMFA shirt kvelling. :-) 

The Channel 11 folks also asked us to write up our experience and email it to them with photos, so here's what I sent.

_____________________

Hi, Julie and crew!

I'm the Jill Knapp that Matt mentioned in his first email. I believe someone from your station grabbed a quick interview with me when we landed in Atlanta. (I have the spiky platinum-blonde hair with the blue streak and the big smile.)

We've attached some photos for you. 

We are an acoustic dork-rock duo from Wilmington, Delaware called "Hot Breakfast!", and we fly Southwest exclusively because of our earned Companion Pass status on the airline. (Companion Pass status allows us to perform all around the country in a buy-one-get-one-free arrangement, reserved for their most frequent flyers.)  

When we heard this flight was happening, we jumped on it specifically to see the eclipse from above the clouds!

Boarding the flight was super-fun-- the plane was decorated with a disco ball and colorful streamers, and the flight attendants were all dressed up with glittery wigs, glow glasses, alien antennae ("deely-boppers" for those of us '80s kids), and the pilot was able to bank the plane several times to let both sides of the plane get great views. Matt and I sat in the "LUV Seat," which is the exit row with only two seats in the row, so we had room to crouch down low by the window to see the eclipse, and we encouraged other passengers to jump in our row to get the great view, too! 

The vibe on the plane was so friendly, fun, enthusiastic. The Southwest flight attendants are always top-notch, but they went above and beyond today with custom eclipse-themed cocktails, eclipse and space trivia games, and glow-bracelets for everyone, and plenty of jokes and smiles. 

Sometimes the news will make you think that everyone is angry and there's no happiness in the world (and especially in our country). But this flight made me remember that people are almost all wonderful, curious, and fun. I admit, I needed this. :-)

This flight was absolutely everything we hoped it would be and more. 

Thanks for letting us report in!

Our very best,

Jill and Matt

Matt and I are SO FRIGGIN' SICK, like lung-meat death-cough no-voice-fever sick. Fun vacation. But right now we're sitting outside on Santa Monica Blvd drinking Philz Coffee, and a douchebag in a convertible drove by cranking "Life in the Fast Lane" and I've never felt more California. 

Life is good despite it... though I'm not looking forward to 43 flights in the next 24 hours with clogged ears. (But I am looking forward to watching the eclipse from the plane.)

So much for singing Total Eclipse of the Heart for Southwest Airlines. Can't currently talk. 

Boo.

OK, that's it. More later.

My friend Anthony Stramaglia (whom I wonder if Thomas Boutell and Jeremy Moskowitz know from the classic computing shows they've gone to?) attended this weekend's house concert, and was kind enough to tape all of the songs.  I am SO grateful to him for doing so, because in all of my prepping for the show, I totally forgot to set up something to record the happenings. Anthony is a life-saver and an all-around awesome guy-- he used to run a local BBS back in the day. (Epsilon Process in the hoouuuuussse!)

So this morning he sent out a link to the second Sunnyvale song of the evening; this one is called "The Enemy."  This song is an old Evelyn Situation song, and we retooled it for one voice, as opposed to the three voices that sang it back in the day.  We dropped the key a step because in the old days Danielle (top voice) sang the melody on the choruses, and now that I'm covering all the parts essentially, we had to drop the key so I could sing the choruses that lay a little higher, as well as the verses (which I always sang because they, like my balls, hung low).  (so classy.)

This song was always my favorite Evelyn Situation song. It was written from the perspective of a person who was left behind as their significant other decided she was leaving the "cold cold northeast."  (In case you're wondering: Yes, Jeremy knows the song was inspired by him, though he wasn't interviewed before the song was written or anything. Durk just sorta imagined that this is how someone in Jeremy's position might feel.)

Once again, I tried to be extra-dictionny with the words so you could catch them all.  In the event you can't, here's a link to the lyrics.  (Click "Lyrics" from the cutting-edge 1996 FRAMES web technology, and then choose "The Enemy."  (Huge apologies to Tom, whom I can hear cringing from over here! lulz))

If you want to hear what the song sounded like in its original Evelyn Situation format, click here.  Cue college-age Jill.  Good lord, how I loved that band like it was my only true, true love.  And daaamn, how I love how the voices end the song with Danielle resolving to the 7th of all places, because why the hell not.

God damn, I love music.

ps: I wrote this while getting my iron infusion today. It went well. I can already feel the difference. Tomorrow I will be really cooking with gas. I go for a second infusion next week because MOAR MOAR MOAR.