June 14, 2005

10:06 p.m.

Hot Stuff, Buddha, and the Blonde

We returned from Texas last night after two rather delayed flights that miraculously still came into Hartford on time. It was a good trip in many ways; we stayed with another Reiki master, so I'm thinking there'll just be one every time we tour now. The band had some conversations about how we so often get bent out of shape when the day doesn't go the way we expect. Then we expend a lot of energy being pissed, only to find that things work out fine anyway. I mull over the possibility of being more flexible to begin with.

The Kerrville Folk Festival is big, famous, and lasts for 18 days. It was our first time getting booked there, and though we were on the alternate stage midweek, we were still pretty jazzed about going. It wasn't as much of a hardship as I thought it might be. I'm not very good at staying up all night any more and most of the music actually happens around campfires and song circles in the wee hours. I did all right. It was hot but often overcast so we didn't get fried. We met some new songwriter friends and got seen by a few important folks, one of whom is the President of the Folk Alliance, at which conferences we showcase every year. I wonder if any of this will get us any closer to Prairie Home Companion. We've had a few people who claim to be on the inside try to get us in front of Garrison Keillor, but so far no one has spanned the moat.

Our other gig was at the Unity church in San Antonio. We stayed with the minister for two nights and got to know them a little bit -- she's very exuberant and full of fire. They're a mixed-race couple and her husband was the Reiki master. We had a very good talk late Sunday night; he answered a few questions I had, and told me some stories.

They also had a pool, a round, above-ground affair that was about waist-deep. The first night, we created a water ballet that was very Monty Python-esque. It included a move we called "The Guffman," named after a certain swan-move in a certain Christopher Guest movie. Just about laughed ourselves silly, and got in a little exercise to boot.

I arrived home about 11:00 or so last night, and guess what? We'd had a heat wave in CT, and my apartment was 90 degrees. I'm not exaggerating; I have a thermometer. Ninety degrees. The cilantro in the kitchen window had completely died. Everything else survived but was pretty dry. I don't know if the wines went bad or not. I managed to cool things down by 1am enough to sleep with fans, but this morning when I awoke and it was 85 again, I took Dar's advice (and his credit card) and went out and bought two little air conditioners. Then, in the sweltering Africa that was my third-floor flat, I installed them both.

I've spent the rest of the day in the cooler parts of my pad.

The two a/cs don't affect the whole apartment; the long kitchen and bathroom are still hot, and I have yet to figure out (by going into the dark, spooky basement with a flashlight) exactly how much amperage I have up here, so I have not run them both at the same time. I suppose it would be good to know, soon. This is an old house with old fuse boxes -- I don't even have circuit breakers -- so I don't want to push it.

Anyway it's supposed to get down to 70s again the rest of the week. Meanwhile I'm submitting Dar's name to the Pope for sainthood, as he has, once again, saved me from an existence full of suffering. He's kind of like Buddha's handyman.

Tomorrow I have the day off, and then we're recording for a couple of days and then away for a couple more days. I have to practice one of the new songs I wrote last summer which we've never worked up yet. I just don't feel like getting out the guitar and sweating all over it. For yea, though I have installed the conditioners of air, lo the humidity persisteth, and things are still wicked sticky.

One other Texas note -- we stayed with our friends at Neverlandia again, just for one quick overnight, and it seems every time we see them we fall in love the more. They're really our best friends and we love and admire them so much. It looks like they'll come to visit us in August, which is even more cool as they rarely go anywhere. We had a farewell dinner and Jonnie had bought these two cards for us, only she printed out a group picture from a previous trip and cut out all our heads and placed them on the figures on the cards. Now, I believe that people are born with specific talents and this is clearly one of hers. Here is what she gave me:

I, of course, am the blonde.