"Black Friday"

 208th day sober. I slept in until 3 because I'd been up all night, a bad habit that's creeping back. 

I did not practice last night, which is bad because I have to consider my miserable existence here to be merely a support structure for what practice I'm able to get in. Let's say one day I wake up and I can play like Wynton Marsalis. Or even like Bobby Shew. I'd be able to travel the world on that. 

I think "Wedge Breathing" is something some players arrive at on their own, for instance it's easy to see Louis Armstrong is using at least something a lot like it in the short film "Rhapsody In Black And Blue" which shows him in his prime. But even the mighty Maynard Ferguson had to go study with yogis in India to get it right, then he taught it to Bobby Shew. 

This is why I really don't care if I do any Christmas carol busking. Building my technique up from the bottom is more important. I liken what I'd been doing up until now to trying to maneuver on my bike but not pedaling nearly hard enough. 

When I used to ride with the Western Wheelers, there was one guy whose name I can't remember but he was a ham radio guy and also led a lot of minor rides. There was one ride where I was the only one to show up. He was big on knowing all these little trails that linked streets together, and he took me up this sandy uphill trail between streets. We were both on skinny-tire bikes of course, and he said, "No matter what, keep pedaling!" and I did, and while my bike did sink into the sand a bit, I got through and came out the uphill end just fine. He was really proud of me, and told me he'd taken this other guy, a European, I think Italian, guy in the Wheelers through there and the guy couldn't do it. Even I was surprised that by keeping on pedaling, my skinny tire bike could get through that sand. 

Take a guy like Harry James, his parents had him playing trumpet in their circus since his age was in the single digits. And Woe unto him if his missed a note! He developed something like wedge breathing out of sheer self-defense. He was the only kid who ran *away* from the circus. Trumpet was survival for Louis Armstrong too. Other than it, his employment opportunities were about as limited as those of a "haole" in Hawaii - a very unenviable situation. I guess if I'd stayed with trumpet in high school, I may never have been in a situation where the whole purpose of my life was to scoop poops and wash floors at the Blue Cross Animal Hospital. 

After coffee and so on, I packed about 8 small things to go to the post office (since larger things can go by FedEx on Sunday) and left at 5 to take those. On my way back, I decided to try something different at the chicken place and got a hamburger. The hamburger was pretty good, actually, and came with a ton of fries I ate maybe 2 of. On my way back here I had the bag of fries hanging off my handlebar, with the plan of leaving them out for the birds here, when I noticed a pretty large and elaborate "fort" built on the sidewalk and thinking about what a cold night it's going to be, stopped and offered the fries to its proprietor, who turned out to be a slight black gal with a nice voice. I hoped they helped her stay warm! 

I checked for foam at the circuit board place because it'd be good to know what's waiting for me on Sunday, but there was none. But, behind another place I found tons of really neat flat little boxes that held stacks of 2021 calendars, and spent some time there slitting the plastic wrapping with my pocket knife, then dumping out the calendar cards, and closing the boxes back up to stack nicely. I had a large plastic bag with me to carry them all in. 

I got back here and ... no Ken. But he showed up about an hour later, dropped off boxes and things to list but had forgotten his check book. He'll probably be by tomorrow though and can take care of my check then. I said not to worry as I'm not going to the bank until next Thursday, but he really wants to move things around and get out of one of the three storage units he has now. 

We sat and talked for a bit, and then it was time he got going so he left. There was a late night visit from the truck-taking-apart-scavenger-guy, and that was it for excitement tonight.