It is currently 1:49 on a beautiful Sunday afternoon in Duluth.
I’m still in bed.
I got up at around 7:00 to feed the cats, then got back in bed. Haven’t moved since, except to throw a load of laundry in the washer…and to move it to the dryer a half-hour later. I’ve watched three and a half movies, surfed the web, scratched a cat’s head, and finalized plans to get my taxes done.
Don’t tell me I can’t work from home. I get more done before I get out of bed than the Army gets done before 9:00. Or something like that.
I have a rehearsal in Rome, GA, this afternoon. It’s about two hours away and I’m not all that gaga about the band (a very amateur brass band), but I told them I’d play a concert with them next month and I can use the extra practice. That became painfully obvious yesterday, when the Georgia Brass Band had one of our weekend rehearsals (ramping up to NABBA) and my chops were complete shot by the time we’d finished. I have one section in one of our championship pieces that calls for me to play a very high and very loud obligato. I think I cracked every other note the last time through it.
The GBB played a concert with the Georgia Youth Brass Band last week, which went pretty well. It was the first time we’d performed “The King of Elfland’s Daughter” (NABBA obligatory piece), and we didn’t have any serious train wrecks. I did get completely lost during an early solo part and had to stop playing and look at the director with “I’m clueless” eyes – but the piece is so ungodly twentieth-century that nobody in the audience would have known just how badly I choked. The judges on April 14th will be a different story, but I should be a tad more comfortable with the part by then.
We found out the other day that we will play second in the Honors section – right behind the New England Brass Band, which won the section last year. The general wisdom in brass band circles is that the GBB and the NEBB are the top two bands in the section, so it sounds like the competition might be decided very early in the day. Unfortunately, we won’t get to see them play because we’ll be preparing to go on next, and they won’t get to see us play because they’ll be whisked off for photographs, interviews, etc.
If you’ve never been to a brass band competition (and I’m betting you haven’t), it’s an interesting albeit extremely tedious thing to watch. Every band in each section must play one mandatory contest piece, which is usually quite difficult – to play and to listen to. They can do this piece at any time during their concert, which is limited to (I think) 23 minutes. The contest piece is also usually pretty lengthy, so a band’s performance will quite often consist of just two pieces. The OTHER piece is the one that’s fun to listen to and makes the whole competition bearable. I mean, how many times can you listen to a Charles Ives work before you go insane?
Things are still up in the air at work, and I’ve started looking for jobs online a bit more seriously, although I still have no idea what I want to do. I found out last week that an assistant manager at Quik Trip makes an average of close to $50K. I could do that. Don’t laugh….I could do that.
I’m actually in a “line up potential jobs” mode, but have no intention of taking another gig at this point unless it’s just absolutely amazing. BellSouth/AT&T pretty much has everyone over a barrel at this point. We can hang in there until the end and get a pretty nice severance package, or we can find something else and hope it works out. I’ll tell you right now – I’m not leaving without the package.
A tree fell over in my backyard sometime during the past couple of months. I have no idea when, but I suspect it was during one of those monster rain storms we had in January. Shows how much time I spend in the yard, huh? Anyway, I’ve been meaning to get out the chainsaw and hack it up for the last week or so, but just haven’t. Today would’ve been a good day to do it…but I’m still in bed as I’ve mentioned, and I’ve enjoined myself from starting a chainsaw in the house.
Cy called the other night and told me that she and “T” will be at Ahmic from the 7th to the 21st of July this year, and that Chris and Jamie will be taking up all the available space from the 14th to the 21st. So I’m thinking I’ll probably take the first two weeks of July off, which allows me to use the 4th, get some camping in somewhere, and then spend 5 or 6 days of the second week at the lake. Looking forward to it, but I haven’t decided where to camp. Maine is on top of the list once again. I haven’t been there in two or three years and I want a lobster.
Speaking of driving 8 billion miles, my car has been acting funky lately. It likes to stall when I push in the clutch. Probably need my injectors cleaned, but that’s expensive…and the mechanic that I’ve been using for the last twenty years recently closed the shop. I’m 2000 miles overdue for an oil change and I have no idea where to get it done. Maybe I’ll do it myself. Assuming I get out of bed. Which is where I am.
That’s about all. Hope everyone is warm and happy and looking forward to March 4th. That’s Vermont statehood day, you know.
TWD