152nd day sober. I guess I skipped posting yesterday. Not much happened; the night before I'd sorted and labeled the last of a big box of ICs and listed those, and last night I got some large things and a bunch of stuff out of this one box of small seals and bearings and stuff like that, listed.
Ken didn't come by last night, and when I called "I forgot" he's had this tiredness for the last couple of days, he said. I asked about his drinking and it's not been enough to make that happen. I told him sometimes these things come and go, like the headache I had where I had to stay in bed. So he's coming over tonight.
Practice last night went, I'd say, super well. A couple of days ago I watched a video by the Harrelson trumpet guy, Mr. Harrelson I guess, and he talked about how, for him, it was all a matter of aperture. Low note = bigger aperture, and higher note = a smaller one naturally. Aperture not pressure. I can see how this works - cramming the mouthpiece into one's lips might artificially make a smaller aperture, although as I know well, it really screws things up.
So I practiced last night with these principles in mind, and I was ripping high C's and higher quite easily. It's a matter of training those muscles to make a small aperture without mouthpiece pressure as a "crutch", and that's where free buzzing (buzzing w/o the mouthpiece) would be a good exercise.
I also worked out "What A Wonderful World" in-tune with the way Louis Armstrong actually sings it on the radio. The version I'd been playing for years is lower, and it's time I played the proper version.
I got up around 2:30 today and had coffee, packed one more thing, etc and got going at about 4:30. I got to the downtown post office just in time to mail the things there, then went over to Lee's for some chicken on rice which I ate over at the college, then stopped by the Amazon place to pick up some printer toner and coffee filters. True to technology's progress, I had to sign in, or be signed in, 3X and to do that, had to be insistent that I indeed had a couple of packages to pick up. I did get them, though.
After that I rode over to Whole Foods and after using the bathroom, set up to play. There's been a change though. They've piled pumpkins in the area I used to have my tip box next to, so in effect people going in and out have to walk past lots of pumpkins and I guess, get the idea of buying one. It makes it trickier for me, though. I have to set up on the corner of public space that's formed by the sidewalk next to the bike racks, up next to the driveway where cars go in and out. It probably looks like I'm hoping to get tips from people in their cars.
Instead, I got tips from a few people, but mostly they just walked on by. Going fast in and out, so I don't know if I'm too early or too late. Maybe they were more relaxed an hour earlier (I'd started at 5 to 6) and maybe they'd be more relaxed an hour or two later. As it was, I felt kind of like an idiot out there and not only that but this weird thing happened where I try to make a high-ish note and the note just won't come out at all. I have to wonder, am I fated to just play the same handful of songs over and over, striving to get better but in reality not progressing?
After almost an hour I got the idea I'd try over by the Old Spaghetti Factory. Maybe people were taking their kids there and so on. So I took the $12 I'd made and took off, and rode over to San Pedro Square. It was really dead, and I didn't have the enthusiasm to set up and play regardless, perhaps catching a "late" crowd (8-9PM is "late" for San Jose).
I just rode on home. It was a warm evening so there were plenty of zombies around, too. So I had to dodge many of the undead as I made my way back here. Lots of zombie nests or whatever you'd call those clusters of shopping carts festooned with everything from tarps, pallets, tables, etc down to all kinds of small litter, not set up to sleep or live in, just ... there.
So the Old Spaghetti Factory is out, as a busking location. I could try hopping on the train and going up to Mountain View, or I could just put up with the pumpkin nonsense and maybe do alright after all, or I could play it cool for a month or two, through this period between the kids going back to school and the first of the Thanksgiving leftovers, and then play Christmas carols, by then backed up by a small forest of Christmas trees.
No comments:
Post a Comment