Hi Blog. Miss me?

It's been a long while since I last blogged. Not sure if there is an acceptable reason for the hiatus or if it just happened due to lack of necessity and/or desire. Either way, I hope you didn't miss me, Blog.

Since the last post, I have been up to a lot. I think I'll start with music related stuff first.

It has been confirmed that I will be playing at RailFest in Gloversville this year! The date is August 7th. I believe that's a Saturday. I don't know what time I'm on or where exactly RailFest occurs, but I'm sure that info will come to well in advance of me needing to be there.

I wrote a couple of songs and have been playing for people. One is called The Girl is Already Gone, which I wrote after two weeks of attempting to connect with women in bars. The song is pretty straight forward and tells the story of waking up after a long night of trying to talk to a girl who uses and abuses the narrator by having him hold her purse and buy her drinks. The narrator just wants someone to talk to so, he "had a conversation with the Captain and coke" (Captain Morgan). He gets drunker and drunker and ends up not getting the girl's name or number. I hated the song when I first wrote it (this was after the first night of trying to connect with a girl at a bar), but became re-inspired the following week when I ended up holding a girl's purse for a good portion of the night while she partied with other dudes. I re-wrote the song the next day and now it is one of my favorite songs that I have written. I just need to get the right harmonica so I can add an instrumental part before the last verse.

The other song I wrote recently is called For the First Time and is basically about the spring time. It compares getting out of a smothering relationship to leaving the house when the warm spring sun starts to melt away the snow. The best line in the song is "The snow is melting and revealing/there is life buried underneath." It's a refreshing song. I have been getting great feedback when I've played this song at open mic. The general consensus seems to be that the song is good and it has "hooks," which gives it a sing-a-long/stuck-in-your-head quality. I like the song for various reason, but I'm most excited that, if recorded right, it could work on radio.

Besides the new original songs, I have been working out some new covers. Take Me Home Tonight may be the silliest cover that I'm working on. I have most of it down, but I need to figure out how I want to do the outtro. The chorus repeats about a thousand times, which works in a pop song... not so much in a folk rendition of a pop song. I have some renewed interest some other songs that I've covered in the past but never took the time to really learn. First Day of my Life by Bright Eyes is fun again. So is Friday, I'm in Love by the Cure. I'm also trying to get better at harmonica songs, such as Dancin' in the Dark. The best song that I've learned recently and absolutely love to play because it is a total rip off of my style is Just Breathe by Pearl Jam. This song is so wonderful that I will play the cover, listen to the original, play the cover two more times, and re-listen to the original all in one sitting. It's a beautiful love that song that doesn't use the word "love" in it at all. There is a strong sense of desire and yearning for more time with whomever Eddie Vedder is singing to. She sounds like a catch too: "nothing you would take; every thing you gave." Selflessness.

Currently, I'm lying in bed on Day Two of being home sick from work. I had a vicious sore throat attack me about a week ago and I thought I made it go away by gargling with warm water and sucking down cough drops and drinking tea. But, it came back with a vengeance this weekend. I was doing good again Monday and went to work, but after tearing the hell out of my throat with the salad I ate for lunch, I couldn't do a thing and felt feverish. I had a headache too and so I went home early. I went to the Doctor today and found out that I do not have Step-(spelling?)-Throat or Mono. Which is great! However, there is no easy cure for me except to keep gargling and having tea. (Ice cream is also soothing).

Now that it's dinner time, I am going to try to keep the soreness at bay by having something mushy to eat... I did okay with a peanut butter sandwich for lunch, but I was also hopped up on Ibuprofen at the time. Actually, I could just take another dose of that as well and have at it!

Right. Off to nourish myself.