I got a lot earlier start today. Mainly, instead of doing these things before heading out, I did 'em the night before, such as wash head/hair thoroughly, polish shoes, pack packages, round up trash to go out, etc.
So I was out of here at around 2:30 or so. I went to Whole Foods and got chicken and a near beer and then a coffee, and hopped the bus over to Sunnyvale. I got more stuff at Han Kook market including some beef that might be really good, and some paper towels that although they were in separately wrapped rolls, are as cheap as I've been paying at Walmart.
I even lucked out on getting pretty quick buses both ways. The way out it was a regular #22 but the driver must have been in a hurry because he was really gassing it. On the way back I got talking with an acquaintance and he was taking the #522 so I waited and got on that one with him.
I'd also shipped 4 FedEx packages at the FedEx that's not too far from Whole Foods so that's a useful thing.
On the return trip, I of course stopped at the Amazon place to pick up bubble mailers. I've been doing this for a few years now and at one point an employee, a nice Filipino guy, even offered to save them for me. He was not able to, but the offer was very nice. All the others didn't care one bit. The mailers say right on them to recycle them. So today there were two Firsts. The first time I've seen a black employee there, and I was made to notice this by said black employee leaving the counter to come over and harass me about taking bubble mailers out of the trash.
I said I'd been doing this for 3 years now without a problem, and he said he'd never seen me before and he's been working there 3 years, himself. (I'm thinking, Bullshit.) I said I've never seen *him* before. He then said something about my obtaining the addresses of buyers and I said the only addresses that show up are the ones for the Amazon locker there and I peel the address labels off. He ended up saying, after I said I'd never seen him before, that he "must be new here" and pretty much shut up.
Certain people get given just a little bit of authority and become little tyrants over their microscopic domain. I just hope he keeps hassling people because (a) it loses business for Amazon which I'm in favor of and (b) it will get him fired which is good because he most he should be allowed authority over is a push broom sweeping the streets for Groundwerx.
At least back in Hawaii I won't have to even pretend to like popolos which is what we call black people, and while whites commit a large number of crimes, popolos are in a whole 'nother league. No one pretends to like them there. I remember when the George Floyd business was going on, Asians showed up in large numbers at the protests and in return the blacks declared open-season on Asians.
I did a final visit to Nijiya for market things and then back here. Now I can take it easy to morrow and stay comfy outside while it rains outside.
Also, the weather warming up and St. Patrick's day sneaking up on me has got my thinking of busking. So I've only got 6 months of the year when it's worth it to go busking, from April 1 to October 1, but April 1 is only about 10 days away.
I am nowhere near ready for busking with the shakuhachi yet. It's not just that I'm playing a plastic flute; after all, I just got some wood stain and I'm pretty sure I can make that thing look an awful lot like actual bamboo. It's that I don't sound good. I'm "puffy", and I was there long ago on trumpet and it didn't sound good on trumpet either. And I have nearly zero repertoire.
So if I want to get some extra money in, it's either pick up the trumpet again, or, I thought today, I have a plan that might make some sense. I may have sold my fancy flute, but I have three others that seem to be perfectly serviceable. And while I got into grinding away on practice routines in the Trevor Wye book, going to the shakuhachi club meeting was a bit of a revelation.
There were no exercises other than doing scales to warm up and not "we'll stay in otsu because you're all beginners" nope, it was all the way up to the top and back down and then again a time or two. No excuses, you will play the full scale. And then on to songs, and if you couldn't get this or that note to sound, well tough because that's what we're doing.
I might have kept grinding away on silly exercises for a year before going as far as we've gone in two meetings. In flute and in shakuhachi, I feel I was in a rut. But not with old Rinban Sakamoto, Here's the Jodo Shinshu repertoire, and we're gonna play it. Try to keep up!
And it struck me today, that yes I can get a decent sound on the trumpet but what if I got out of my rut on the flute? Forget old Trevor Wye and his 1600s Elizabethan tunes, I'm never going to be a concert flutist anyway.
I realized I have my Complete Flute Player books, all 4 of them, that use popular music like Beatles songs from the start and all through. Things a busker can play and people will know. And I'll still be using flute-type breathing that won't be at cross purposes with playing the shakuhachi.
My left shoulder not liking the playing position is an issue, but I'm thinking that with some simple exercises I can solve that problem. I might be able to get out there when the busking season starts with the month of April.
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