Caravan Sans Martin

Sunday: Moved Leo the cat down into the basement bathroom. Then back to sleep. Back to check on Leo. Morning practices. Shower. Someone had puked in front of our house. Hosed it off, while checking in with my mom, who was driving up from CT. Drove out, dropping stuff off at the dry cleaner and picking up a couple things at the music store. While paying, MB called to say that Martin was quite ill, and could not participate in the show. Such a shame. And quite a little poser for us, as he was pivotal to several parts of the show.

Back home, mom had just arrived. I made some quick food, leftover Chinese and cheese toast. Shawn arrived. I ate, then changed strings on the electric. Down basement and ran a couple of things. Packing. Gave my mom directions to the space. And then off we went.

Connecting wires and so on for about and hour. A huddle to work through details, and figure out how to rearrange things to cover for Martin's absence. Shawn sang in the Embroidery, and sang a song at the end of the first set. I sang the drunken philosopher's song with Alex, who looked into a book for his crib notes. Victor played bass on Eye of the Needle. The twinkles got reassigned. Jessica led in during the Feynman piece, and so on. The show went quite well. About 28 people showed up. A splended time was had by all. Plenty of fumble fingers on my part. Getting excited, still causing problems. I almost tanked Bicycling, but we recovered somehow. "The World Blind" sounded great. The success of the event can be attributed to MB's skill at social organizing... That and a generous audience, and some semi-skill performers willing to be a little foolish.

One thing I noticed tonight: My new guitar allows me to be more expressive, which gives the music the opportunity to more fully express itself. The music being more fully expressed, inspires others to be more expressive. We are in a different world. Change one part, and you change everything.

After the show, cake (for my birthday!), cheesecake (per RF's recommendations) a brief circle, lots of undoing what we had just done a few hours earlier. Wnd gave Shawn a ride.

Back home, unloading. Nursing Leo. Ordered a pizza from the only place open. Over there to pick it up. And salads from a fast food place. My mom joined us, and ate pizza crust. Freezing cake. Down basement, and straightening books on shelves. Email.