This Yellow Taxi Cab In Which I Ride

I started a new job today. I, like, just got home from it -- my first day. Wow. So far, so good! Although, I was a little worried when I reported to where I was supposed to report at 8:30 this morning and at 8:35 took this picture of myself... ..because there was no one else there at the time, and I was definitely wondering if I wrote down the wrong day, time, or place. Then, just as I was putting my phone away, the training people came in. "Sorry, we're late!" they said. ------- Yesterday, my pilot dad took Stephanie and I up for an aerial look at the foliage. We really weren't expecting to see much color, as it is still quite early for fall foliage, but... ...there was actually some beginnings of reds and oranges. Though, there was not much yellow. The sun was in the eyes of co-pilot -- or something. Before we took off, Stephanie was quite entertained by the helicopter that was practicing landing. ------- I found out recently that Robert Jordan (author of a particul...

Last night, some friends came over and we played Balderdash , a very fun and funny game where you have to fool people by making up fake descriptions of things. All I have to say now is: a death ray was created to stop the marauding green space chimpanzees who often release killer bees on Rose Wilder during torrential blizzards. Such a description did not succeed at fooling people, though it did succeed at making everyone laugh. A week ago, some of the same friends and I were looking for something to do, so we decided to play Scotland Yard . Wicked fun. I used to play this game all the time when I was younger. Although, we always used to argue, because we all wanted to be Mr. X. This time, there was no argument as my friends had never played it before. Thus, I was Mr. X. Next time -- if there is a next time -- there will probably be an argument. Yesterday, I took a walk (instead of a drive) to do some errands -- well, mostly one errand. Then, I stopped off at the park to read. Reading o...

Last night at Lena's open mic, the list was short. Which meant: it was a very rare three song night! Wowweee. Whenever the list is short enough and the host (who was Gary Moon this past week) makes a judgement call, performers get to play three songs instead of two. However, this rare phenomena can garner strange results. For example, some people see fifteen minutes as a huge amount of time. I can understand, when I get up there on a three song night, I feel like it's more of my own show. I can say more in between songs (because there are more songs so there is also more in between songs). Some people, then, tell their life stories and the host can sometimes feel that he made a bad judgement call. Still, last night went fairly well, and most people stuck to their fifteen minutes. I snapped a few camera phone pics of Bob Redman, Phil Drum, and Dave Scheffel -- who went on before me, which meant I had to play after a band, which can suck when you are a solo person. Let's face...

I feel like crud -- which isn't something that you really want to feel like. My allergies have been on the unbearably itchy and painful side, so I have been taking Benadryl at night and Allegra in the morning. Benadryl works wonders on allergies, but it destroys my energy. I am just so tired, I can barely make coherent thoughts. This exhaustedness has caused a couple of funny moments for myself. For example, the other night at Lena's (I don't know why I didn't mention this on the other entry), I sang the last verse of Road to Nowhere when I should have sung the second verse. Then, when I actually got to the last verse, I thought: "This really sounds familiar... like, 30-seconds-ago familiar... ." I laughed at myself with the hope that I was the only one. Still, I am in a really bad mood about this Benadryl induced stupor, in which I find myself. And it's cruddy. ------ It is official -- barring failure of the background check -- I have a new job. I won...

I attended open mic night last night. I played Endless and Road to Nowhere . It was a good night overall, as everyone played great songs. I had a little bit of fun experimenting with my new Razr (which is a cell phone and has picture and video capabilities). Here I am in the side room. The Caffé Lena "house" guitar is behind me. These next ones are of the backroom when I was warming up (the camera has a timer on it and if you lean the phone up against something, then you can take a picture of yourself). Phil Drum solo. Another of Phil; this one with Stephanie in a close up. And Bob Redman, with Phil Drum, Dave Scheffel, and Willie the Moak. Then, this one is of Rik Kent from last week. I forgot I had taken it. I took some video last night, too. But I am unable to post it yet, as the phone takes video in some weird format that nothing else can read. At least, nothing else on my computer can read it. I have to get something that can change the format to an mpeg. Then, I'll...

I haven't been doing much on the music front lately. I have certainly had other things to attend to. Still, I am glad for the break. If you do something for too long without taking a break than it becomes work-like, which is definitely not what I want music to become. Even so, last night I attended open mic at Caffé Lena. It was a slow night as far as attendance goes, but sometimes slow nights are nice. It is more intimate. When I got there, I wasn't sure if I was going to play or not, as I have been -- and still am -- suffering from some major allergy issues. I decided to play, however, and I did Sink or Swim and Rainy Day , which I had not done in what seems like forever. To help me sing -- because my allergy issues were coming from my throat -- I bought Slippery Elm from the Four Seasons health food store on Phila Street. I have had the stuff before and I remember it being quite soothing to the sore throat sufferer. Now, when you read the name "Slippery Elm," do ...

I am finally home after being on a honeymoon for a week. I had a great time, though the camera has vanished. I am positive it will turn up, however, because if I were to find a lost camera I would do everything I could to find the owner and return it to him or her. Anyways, before I went away I put another video up on YouTube, but I didn't have time to post it here. It is a cover of "Jessie" by Joshua Kadison. Someone already watched it and rated it. It got two stars, which isn't too good.

I saw Stardust . I am still unsure of what to think. I enjoyed the movie -- I can certainly say that. I hope that others go to see it because I think they will enjoy it too. It was silly at times. The humor was definately not typical comedy humor. It was more that it was so absurd and so random that it took you by suprise. There was also the subtle love story. It was by no means a dumb romatic comedy. The romance part of it was totally acceptable (there are plenty of movies that contain unacceptable amounts of romance -- these movies should be destroyed). There was also a whole lot of adventurous aspects to the story, which was pretty cool. Overall, it was a really good movie. Stephanie, who is not an over the top Neil Gaiman fan like me, loved the movie. I, of course, am more than familiar with the story of Stardust as I have read the book at least four times. Thus, the changes made for the movie version pre-occuppied me every once in a while. I tried to ignore it and just enjoy the ...

Tonight, I'm going to see Stardust ! I'm pretty excited about it because the movie Stardust is created from the book Stardust , which was written by Neil Gaiman, who is my favorite author ever. I'm quite prepared for the movie to not reach the same expectations that the book did, so as not to be let down. Still, I think it will be a pretty great movie. Also, if the movie as a whole isn't just-like-the-book, some of it will be. Those parts will be exciting to watch, to say the least. On another note, I'll be doing some cell phone shopping. I'm hoping to upgrade to something that has mp3 capabilities -- not because I'm a tech savvy cell phone geek, rather, I simply want to listen to music at random times and I don't want to carry around a cell phone and an mp3 player. Finally, I need to get a pair of shorts for the cruise that I'll be leaving for next weekend. It's a honeymoon. Wow. I'm getting married in a week!

I attended Caffé Lena's open mic night on Thursday -- time out: is it mic? or mike? the debate rages on. You see, to spell it as m-i-c would be a slap in the face to the English language (which, if you ask me would be fair, as the English language constantly slaps its users in the face with ridiculous rules that make very little sense to anyone aside from those who study it and, thus, accept it). M-i-k-e should be the proper spelling, as is so eloquently described by Samuel Bayer , a warrior in what I can only say is the most pointless war since the Iraq one (Yeah, I said it). Many open mic goers prefer m-i-c because it looks right, being that "microphone" is first spelled m-i-c, not m-i-k, and "mic" is short for microphone after all. I tend to side with the m-i-c people, because as ridiculous as this debate is, I need something to blog about. Also, the first time I saw it spelled out, it was spelled m-i-c, not to mention the fact that "Mike" is a dude...

I put another video up on YouTube. I had intended on uploading "Endless", however the length of the video is five minutes and two seconds -- which, YouTube tells me, is two seconds too much. So, I'm going to have to cut it a little to fit it in. Of course, that will take a little time, and I just don't feel like taking that time right now. Instead, I uploaded "The Road to Nowhere." ----------- On another note, I just spent the last two and a half hours listening to new age Celtic music. I'm trying to find a really dynamic and modern representation of traditional Celtic music. Why? Long story. Trust me, don't get me started. At any rate, do you think I could find a decent collection? Just one? No. There is a lot -- I mean, A LOT -- of new age Celtic music out there, but it all seems so compressed and repressed. It's all too "nice." What I've listened to is mostly on the verge of elevator music. There are no highs and lows; it's a...

Insomnia -- I have not been sleeping too well. Pretty much since I started teaching summer school, I have been over anxious and my typically high level of anxiety has skyrocketed. Basically, this is caused by uncertainty -- something that I often write about in songs. I'm uncertain as to if I will succeed as a teacher. I'm afraid to do the wrong thing -- an unfounded fear, as I have been well trained to teach and I, for the most part, know what I'm doing. But, for some reason, I think that I don't know what I'm doing. Which, if you think about it, is quite rediculous. I should just get some confidence and stop worrying... but, I can't. It's 12:03am -- which is just after midnight in case you are one of those people who can't figure out if 12:00am is midnight or noon -- and I'm at my computer because I'm not tired. Even if I was tired, I know I wouldn't fall asleep for at least an hour if not more. I got home from Lena's about 15 minutes ...

Last Thursday was a great open mic night at Lena's. Some friends, whom I have not seen in quite some time, were there. We shared songs and stories and got caught up. It was really cool. One such friend suggested forming a songwriter "super group," in which I replied, "Like the Eagles?" I'm not sure if the group will ever be more than just a dream, but I'm hoping to at least rehearse some songs and play them randomly at each other's solo gigs. I have been kind of stale -- as far as song writing goes -- for a while now. I'm not sure of what my deal is, but I'm trying not to worry about it. I went through a similar stint of what might be considered writer's block a year or so ago. I was afraid, at the time, that I was at the end of my inspiration and that I might not be able to write anymore. However, I eventually broke out of it and wrote a pretty decent song. Anyway, I'm looking forward to branching out a bit (for example: playing in ...

I have finally had some good fortune in the realm of music. It may be not seem like a big deal, but after all of the failures that I have been having, it's good to at least accomplish something. A few weeks ago I took some video of a few songs. The sound was bad for some reason, and the picture was quite dark. I tried again yesterday. The video turned out well quality-wise; however, the beginnings and endings needed to be clipped (I had to turn the video camera on and off myself, and before singing I took a deep breath and cleared my throat -- something potential viewers didn't need to see). This caused a problem when I tried using MovieMaker. For some reason the sound became distorted when I imported the file. I thought this was going to be another failure for me. Luckily, however, I was able to import the files back into the camera and clip them appropriately. The only thing that is mildly disappointing is that it doesn't fade in and out, and there are no titles or credit...

I decided to make some updates on my website. Some of them are quite obvious to the keen observer; most of them, however, are behind-the-scenes type updates that are going to make my life much easier should I need to make any major changes to the site. First, and probably most obvious, is the home page. I changed the layout a little and added a little journal/blog entry teaser. I got the idea for it from neilgaiman.com -- the webpage of my favorite author. He has a pretty famous journal, which many of his fans read often. It is quite entertaining. Anyway, I liked how his home page reveals a few sentences of his journal as a teaser. I tried so hard to replicate it for my own site, but was failing miserably. I couldn't get the right code to work with the set up that I had. A lot of the code that I was finding was way more involved than I needed it to be and, thus, quite cumbersome to figure out. So, I decided to email Neil's site administrator to see what they used. The next day...

Do people even read the titles of blog posts? Hopefully not. My friend, Bill -- who attended my show at MochaBlend last week, and who took pictures and video with his digital camera and cell phone -- sent me the aforementioned pictures and video. Here are a couple that Bill took with his cell phone -- Verizon, I think. The rest of his pictures, as well as the ones that Stephanie took, can be found here . Unfortunately, the video didn't come out too good. While it certainly depicts me playing and singing and generally looking like a hip, confident rock star -- something I am most certainly not -- the sound quality is rough. I could only stand to listen to it for a minute or so before I turned the volume off. I may decide to cut and paste bits and pieces of it into a brief showcase video, where you can see/hear parts of a few songs. If I do decide to do it, it will be under a minute in length.

While in Lake George this past Saturday night, we were stopped by a random person and asked for some information. Wayne, as he later introduced himself, was from Staten Island and was looking for something to do. As an "adult" he needed to be where there was "adult" stuff happening--music, dancing, clubs, etc--not family stuff. I pointed him in the direction of the bars--although, I regretfully informed him that I didn't know of any clubs--after which, he told us that he was staying in an area that had nothing but "water and trees," and that he drove until he found some lights. Which is where he was when he found us. It was quite an entertaining conversation. Stephanie and I played minature golf at Pirate's Cove (twice--two different courses) and got ice cream at Bob's Ice Cream--the go to place for ice cream in Lake George. We also had dinner, earlier in the evening, at Jitter's Cafe in Saratoga. ------ On Friday, we had gone to Fresnos af...

Last night was the MochaBlend Cafe show in Troy. Overall, things went pretty well. I had a great crowd that included a bunch of friends and some casual listeners--pretty much all of whom gave me nice compliments on their ways out. MochaBlend is a great cafe. The seats are incredibly comfortable and plentiful. It's a small place, as most cafes are, but it doesn't feel crowded. The performance space works quite well; I was able to play to everyone. Unfortunately, I wasn't feeling too great while I played. Earlier, I had hurt my neck. I'm not even sure how it happened, but I pulled a muscle pretty badly. Badly enough that I went to the chiropractor for help. Still, during my set, I was in pain. I played two sets with no set list. The first set was a little iffy, as I was trying to save my best songs for when more friends came. My second set started out pretty good. I played some of my more upbeat songs at first, then I tried to slow things back down. For some reason, I cou...

Last night at Caffé Lena's open mic the task of hosting fell up on my shoulders. I have done it a couple of times before when the normal host needed a day off, but it has only been a couple of times and each time I do host, it is still a new experience. Hosting is difficult. You must be entertaining and engaging. You have to keep the listeners listening and be sure that they give all levels of performers their attention. I got some nice compliments regarding my hosting skills, so I must not be too awful at it. This is a jpeg of the list of performers. It is all scratched up because many people switch places and some decide to leave as the night progresses. ------ Tonight is the MochaBlend show. I am quite excited about it. My friend Maurizio lives near the cafe and told me that it is a great place to play. I am listed in the Times Union's Preview, which is a section of the newspaper that lists events in the area. It's very exciting to see your name in print, even if it is j...

We had a crazy hail storm here the other day. I took some video of it and edited it down to less than two minutes. It was pretty crazy and a little scary--as can be discerned by Stephanie's statement in the video. Here is a picture of a "golf ball sized" piece of hail. It's kind of amazing how hard these things actually are. A careful inspection of the photo will also reveal some of what we occassionally eat here in the James Frederick residence. ------ Last night I attended the Fulton Book Company open mic and stayed for the featured performer, who was no other than my neighbor Bill Ackerbauer . He does an old-time folk, blues, country style. Some of the songs he played were from songwriters whose names I hear often at Lena's--Mississippi John Hurt, for example; all, really rootsy stuff. And played quite well. I played "Endless," "Walking; Standing Still," and "Sink or Swim." Bill gave me English teacher points for using the key...