How can you stand it, I asked a grocery store staffer. It annoys me, and I only have to be here for a little while.
He shuddered and told me they started three days before Thanksgiving. It's driving him batty.
How can you stand it, I asked the guy at the register as he bagged my groceries.
He tried to stay focused, he said. He just ignored it the best he could, concentrated on what was in front of him.
You'd think, after establishing strict child labor laws and a five-day workweek, unions would be able to ban all-day Christmas music in supermarkets.
I can sort of understand blasting "White Christmas" at customers in other stores. We're potentially buying presents. Maybe the management figures it can whip us into a spending frenzy by reminding us of when we were kids and anxiously awaited Santa's arrival. Or something.
But supermarkets? People buy food because they need food. It's not a seasonal thing. As far as I know, people don't shop for gifts in the frozen aisle.
I can strategically avoid most retail until December 26. I cannot, however, stop eating.
It's going to be a long month.
Monday, November 30, 2009
Friday, November 27, 2009
Substance abuse, part II
Today has been the last full day I'll spend at the parental homestead before jetting back to Tucson. Know what I'm going to miss?
Well, the family, sure. It will be a while before I see them again.
Also the vast blocks of time where I'm free to do nothing at all.
But you know what else?
I'm going to miss orange juice.
My first vocal coach, during my first voice lesson, gave me a list of all the items I should not consume before singing in public: Sugar. Dairy products. Alcohol. Caffeine.
At first I thought this wouldn't pose a problem. I hardly ever drank alcohol. I never drank coffee. Avoiding sugar or dairy would be a pain because of chocolate, but I tried to do chocolate in moderation anyway. I could go without it from time to time.
Then it hit me. No sugar meant no orange juice. Which I consumed on a very regular basis—at least one of those cans of concentrate a day.
I'd had a perpetual dry cough for years. Was orange juice the reason?
I stopped buying it. The dry cough didn't disappear entirely, but it got dramatically better, very quickly.
So now, the only time I drink orange juice is when I'm on vacation. I can justify it then. It's not like a last-minute gig will pop up when 1,400 miles separates me from my keyboard, our speakers, and Ron the Drummer.
About 14 hours left to drink with impunity.
(Cough.)
Well, the family, sure. It will be a while before I see them again.
Also the vast blocks of time where I'm free to do nothing at all.
But you know what else?
I'm going to miss orange juice.
My first vocal coach, during my first voice lesson, gave me a list of all the items I should not consume before singing in public: Sugar. Dairy products. Alcohol. Caffeine.
At first I thought this wouldn't pose a problem. I hardly ever drank alcohol. I never drank coffee. Avoiding sugar or dairy would be a pain because of chocolate, but I tried to do chocolate in moderation anyway. I could go without it from time to time.
Then it hit me. No sugar meant no orange juice. Which I consumed on a very regular basis—at least one of those cans of concentrate a day.
I'd had a perpetual dry cough for years. Was orange juice the reason?
I stopped buying it. The dry cough didn't disappear entirely, but it got dramatically better, very quickly.
So now, the only time I drink orange juice is when I'm on vacation. I can justify it then. It's not like a last-minute gig will pop up when 1,400 miles separates me from my keyboard, our speakers, and Ron the Drummer.
About 14 hours left to drink with impunity.
(Cough.)
Wednesday, November 25, 2009
Showing off for the nephew
"Aunt Susan!" Sammy says. "Show me how to do stuff on the piano."
The family has gathered at my parents' house for Thanksgiving week, and everyone speaks kid except me. They delight in entertaining my sister's boys, six-year-old Sam and four-year-old Ian. I'm the lone adult who doesn't talk to them in singsong tones. Someday when they're older, they'll appreciate this. I'll be the cool aunt. For the time being, I'm not that interesting.
But now I follow Sammy into the sunporch. Finally, something I can do.
He wants a lesson. Sort of. His current technique consists primarily of pressing most of his fingers and part of his hand onto random keys. I demonstrate playing one note at a time with one finger at a time. He hits random keys. I demonstrate experimenting with different notes to produce more pleasant chords. He hits random keys.
I follow his lead, not pushing the instructions on him. If he really wants to change what he's doing, he'll let me know.
Then he teaches me a game he plays with his dad.
The rules go like this. Sammy closes his eyes. I play a note. Sam opens his eyes and tries to hit the note I played. To narrow it down, I place my hands on each side of the note at a 90-degree angle, about an octave apart.
He gives this a couple tries. Then he plays a note for me while I cover my eyes. Before he can surround the note with his hands, I plink it. He sees it's the right one, and he finds this ... maybe not impressive, but possibly amusing. He's smiling, anyway.
I close my eyes again. He plays another note. Plink. Again. Plink. We repeat this once or twice until my parents tell us it's time for dinner.
Perfect pitch is generally not a skill I get to use in day-to-day life. Bet it's another ten years before anything like that happens again.
The family has gathered at my parents' house for Thanksgiving week, and everyone speaks kid except me. They delight in entertaining my sister's boys, six-year-old Sam and four-year-old Ian. I'm the lone adult who doesn't talk to them in singsong tones. Someday when they're older, they'll appreciate this. I'll be the cool aunt. For the time being, I'm not that interesting.
But now I follow Sammy into the sunporch. Finally, something I can do.
He wants a lesson. Sort of. His current technique consists primarily of pressing most of his fingers and part of his hand onto random keys. I demonstrate playing one note at a time with one finger at a time. He hits random keys. I demonstrate experimenting with different notes to produce more pleasant chords. He hits random keys.
I follow his lead, not pushing the instructions on him. If he really wants to change what he's doing, he'll let me know.
Then he teaches me a game he plays with his dad.
The rules go like this. Sammy closes his eyes. I play a note. Sam opens his eyes and tries to hit the note I played. To narrow it down, I place my hands on each side of the note at a 90-degree angle, about an octave apart.
He gives this a couple tries. Then he plays a note for me while I cover my eyes. Before he can surround the note with his hands, I plink it. He sees it's the right one, and he finds this ... maybe not impressive, but possibly amusing. He's smiling, anyway.
I close my eyes again. He plays another note. Plink. Again. Plink. We repeat this once or twice until my parents tell us it's time for dinner.
Perfect pitch is generally not a skill I get to use in day-to-day life. Bet it's another ten years before anything like that happens again.
Tuesday, November 24, 2009
Lost and found
I have a love-hate relationship with Facebook
On the one hand, some of the features are confusing. The "conversation" is disjointed, as we're not all talking to the same people. The little apps for quizzes and games are annoying. And I can't figure out how to put music up on our band page, once again in production after my first attempt vanished into the ether.
On the other hand, it's the best lost and found I've encountered since Google was invented.
I've been paying some attention to my long-ignored Facebook account, adding contacts to it. In the process, it occurred to me to look for Megan and Vanessa, a couple of musicians I'd lost touch with. I found them instantly. In Megan's case, I discovered I'd been spelling her last name wrong all this time.
They friended me back within 24 hours. One of them sent a personal message saying she'd been thinking about me. I'd half wondered if she would even remember who I was.
They're not the only ones. I've reconnected with people from high school, grad school ... in some cases I hadn't known if they were alive or dead.
Funny thing is, I've been hearing buzz about how Facebook is so over because of its lack of exclusivity. If your grandmother is friending you, how cool can it be? For me, though, that's its biggest strength. I can go elsewhere to find the small groups of people who share my esoteric interests. Facebook is where I reconnect with friends I've known in real life.
It feels good to know that people from my past are still alive, still doing OK.
On the one hand, some of the features are confusing. The "conversation" is disjointed, as we're not all talking to the same people. The little apps for quizzes and games are annoying. And I can't figure out how to put music up on our band page, once again in production after my first attempt vanished into the ether.
On the other hand, it's the best lost and found I've encountered since Google was invented.
I've been paying some attention to my long-ignored Facebook account, adding contacts to it. In the process, it occurred to me to look for Megan and Vanessa, a couple of musicians I'd lost touch with. I found them instantly. In Megan's case, I discovered I'd been spelling her last name wrong all this time.
They friended me back within 24 hours. One of them sent a personal message saying she'd been thinking about me. I'd half wondered if she would even remember who I was.
They're not the only ones. I've reconnected with people from high school, grad school ... in some cases I hadn't known if they were alive or dead.
Funny thing is, I've been hearing buzz about how Facebook is so over because of its lack of exclusivity. If your grandmother is friending you, how cool can it be? For me, though, that's its biggest strength. I can go elsewhere to find the small groups of people who share my esoteric interests. Facebook is where I reconnect with friends I've known in real life.
It feels good to know that people from my past are still alive, still doing OK.
Monday, November 23, 2009
Detached observing
Just before I skipped town to hang with my family, I got my hands on some Cinder Bridge footage. Chet Gardiner of the Earthlingz set up a video camera and shot all the performers at the Single Payer Band Jam. He was nice enough to make us a DVD of our 50-minute segment.
Having seen the video, I wish we could get someone to record us every time we play out. Watching Ron and me as if I were a member of the audience is highly educational.
For instance, I've always disliked my head voice. (If you're unfamiliar with the jargon, head voice is the falsetto you sing when the notes are too high for your regular range.) Listening to myself here, I realized that it ... wasn't that bad. I've learned to better sing around my weaknesses.
There were moments in our playing where I thought, hmm, I could've done that better. I'll work on tightening that up. (Just me. Ron was awesome, as always.) Those were subtle, though -- not anything the audience would notice.
So I sing better than I thought. Unfortunately, I talk worse.
Don't get me wrong. My little speeches about ME/CFS and other invisible illnesses didn't go horribly. I said what I wanted to say. Just not as articulately or smoothly or entertainingly as I would have liked.
Entertainingly is important. If you're going to use the stage as a bully pulpit, you'd better develop a stage presence and keep people interested. A normal audience -- one that hadn't come to raise money for healthcare issues -- would have lost patience with me.
So I need to practice the speechifying. I also need some role models. If anybody knows of performers who are good at advocating for a particular cause, let me know. Maybe I can educate myself via YouTube.
Having seen the video, I wish we could get someone to record us every time we play out. Watching Ron and me as if I were a member of the audience is highly educational.
For instance, I've always disliked my head voice. (If you're unfamiliar with the jargon, head voice is the falsetto you sing when the notes are too high for your regular range.) Listening to myself here, I realized that it ... wasn't that bad. I've learned to better sing around my weaknesses.
There were moments in our playing where I thought, hmm, I could've done that better. I'll work on tightening that up. (Just me. Ron was awesome, as always.) Those were subtle, though -- not anything the audience would notice.
So I sing better than I thought. Unfortunately, I talk worse.
Don't get me wrong. My little speeches about ME/CFS and other invisible illnesses didn't go horribly. I said what I wanted to say. Just not as articulately or smoothly or entertainingly as I would have liked.
Entertainingly is important. If you're going to use the stage as a bully pulpit, you'd better develop a stage presence and keep people interested. A normal audience -- one that hadn't come to raise money for healthcare issues -- would have lost patience with me.
So I need to practice the speechifying. I also need some role models. If anybody knows of performers who are good at advocating for a particular cause, let me know. Maybe I can educate myself via YouTube.
Thursday, November 19, 2009
Bank robbers and Facebook users
"Could you take off your hat, or turn it around?"
I looked up from my deposit slip. "Huh?"
"It's to prevent robberies," the teller said apologetically. "I know you've been coming in here for years, but it's the policy; we have to apply it to everyone. No hats, no dark glasses."
I pondered the implications as I stuffed my hat into my purse. Bank robbers concealed their identities with baseball caps and sunglasses? Really? I'd always assumed they wore a mask that covered their entire face. Granted, they'd probably attract a bit of attention while standing in line ...
According to the teller, a lot of people have recently robbed banks using the less stereotypical mode of disguise. "It's impossible to tell what a person looks like with a hat and dark glasses," she explained. "The cameras don't pick up anything. You can't see their eyes."
After declaring Myspace obsolete, People Who Think About Such Things are speculating that Facebook has become a victim of its own success. Now that everyone knows about it -- now that your grandmother can friend you, and probably will -- Facebook isn't cool anymore.
Under normal circumstances I'd find this bit of cultural news only mildly interesting. Unfortunately, it may be relevant to my life. I was finally getting around to constructing a band page for Facebook. (Actually started it a few weeks ago, but everything I did vanished, and the feature currently appears to be fried.) If our target audience stops using the site, we'll have to think of some other way to promote our gigs and sell our CD.
We're already on Twitter, but I don't use it very often. It's hard to engage in meaningful dialogue 140 characters at a time. While I don't feel all self-conscious about it like Norah Jones does, my tweets are nothing to write home about. They haven't resulted in any CD sales.
Neither, come to think of it, has this blog.
Because my brain is weird, the bank robbery thing got me thinking about the social media thing. I knew all along that getting the band noticed through social media would be difficult. How could it not? My friend DeppityBob describes it as being like "screaming 'I'M IMPORTANT!' in a sea of ADD people yelling the same thing."
Standing out from the crowd is nearly impossible. To achieve anonymity, all you need is a cap with a visor and a pair of cheap sunglasses.
I looked up from my deposit slip. "Huh?"
"It's to prevent robberies," the teller said apologetically. "I know you've been coming in here for years, but it's the policy; we have to apply it to everyone. No hats, no dark glasses."
I pondered the implications as I stuffed my hat into my purse. Bank robbers concealed their identities with baseball caps and sunglasses? Really? I'd always assumed they wore a mask that covered their entire face. Granted, they'd probably attract a bit of attention while standing in line ...
According to the teller, a lot of people have recently robbed banks using the less stereotypical mode of disguise. "It's impossible to tell what a person looks like with a hat and dark glasses," she explained. "The cameras don't pick up anything. You can't see their eyes."
* * *
After declaring Myspace obsolete, People Who Think About Such Things are speculating that Facebook has become a victim of its own success. Now that everyone knows about it -- now that your grandmother can friend you, and probably will -- Facebook isn't cool anymore.
Under normal circumstances I'd find this bit of cultural news only mildly interesting. Unfortunately, it may be relevant to my life. I was finally getting around to constructing a band page for Facebook. (Actually started it a few weeks ago, but everything I did vanished, and the feature currently appears to be fried.) If our target audience stops using the site, we'll have to think of some other way to promote our gigs and sell our CD.
We're already on Twitter, but I don't use it very often. It's hard to engage in meaningful dialogue 140 characters at a time. While I don't feel all self-conscious about it like Norah Jones does, my tweets are nothing to write home about. They haven't resulted in any CD sales.
Neither, come to think of it, has this blog.
* * *
Because my brain is weird, the bank robbery thing got me thinking about the social media thing. I knew all along that getting the band noticed through social media would be difficult. How could it not? My friend DeppityBob describes it as being like "screaming 'I'M IMPORTANT!' in a sea of ADD people yelling the same thing."
Standing out from the crowd is nearly impossible. To achieve anonymity, all you need is a cap with a visor and a pair of cheap sunglasses.
Wednesday, November 18, 2009
Social media advice for Norah Jones
Like many artists these days, Norah Jones has a Twitter account. She hasn't posted anything on it, however. From Entertainment Daily:
People following her: 4,371
People she's following: 1
For the Twitter-impaired, that means 4,371 users are reading her tweets (or would be if she had any), but she's only reading one user's tweets.
Norah Jones, if you're reading this (which you're not, but whatever), here's some free advice:
If you want to use Twitter like a giant megaphone, you're doing it wrong. The idea is to follow the fans who follow you and listen to them at least as much as you talk to them. Engage in some kind of dialogue ... inasmuch as you can have dialogue 140 characters at a time.
More to the point, this will cure your virtual stage fright forever. Once you see what most tweets look like, you will never worry about coming off dorky again.
“I stared at that web page for about two weeks, every few days. I feel like a total dope. Everything that I want to say sounds dorky, and everything that I don’t want to say sounds totally contrived.”Hmmm ...
People following her: 4,371
People she's following: 1
For the Twitter-impaired, that means 4,371 users are reading her tweets (or would be if she had any), but she's only reading one user's tweets.
Norah Jones, if you're reading this (which you're not, but whatever), here's some free advice:
If you want to use Twitter like a giant megaphone, you're doing it wrong. The idea is to follow the fans who follow you and listen to them at least as much as you talk to them. Engage in some kind of dialogue ... inasmuch as you can have dialogue 140 characters at a time.
More to the point, this will cure your virtual stage fright forever. Once you see what most tweets look like, you will never worry about coming off dorky again.
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