Monthly Archives: October 2012

Can’t See the Forest for the Trees…

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Can’t See the Forest for the Trees…

To see the forest for the trees (idiomatic) To discern an overall pattern from a mass of detail; to see the big picture, or the broader, more general situation. As demonstrated by the example sentence above, it is used in negative constructions, often starting with can’t or couldn’t.

There is nothing so disappointing as realizing that someone in your life has given up, given up on themselves and everyone around them. What’s even worse is when they give up before you even really get started. It’s hard to sit idly by and watch someone you care about spew negativity out of their mouth. They spew infectious negative thoughts that affect everyone around them. I have absolutely no tolerance for people that give up so easily, people that embrace their negativity and spew it out like an infectious disease to everyone around them. What is it they say? “Misery loves company.” I for one refuse to be a part of that type of hyperbolic miasma. My thought is go away and stay away until you hear a big “POP”. That would be the sound of your head coming out of your ass.

With that I give you The Rolling Stones….

Halloween, A Time to Be Anything You Want….

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Halloween, A Time to Be Anything You Want….

‘Tis now the very witching time of night,
When churchyards yawn and hell itself breathes out
Contagion to this world.
~William Shakespeare

I love Halloween, it has always been one of my favorite holidays ever! It’s the one time of year you can dress up as anything and be anything you like for a few hours. I have no idea how many different costumes I have donned in 42 years, but I know that barring being sick I have dressed up faithfully every year. I have been a butterfly, a witch, Rambimbo (a female Rambo), an angel/devil, the Grim Reaper, a hippy and so many more that I can’t even remember. I think my favorite costume of all time was when I dressed as the Reaper, it was really scary because I wore a ski mask and blackened in any skin that was showing and no one could see my face at all. Halloween is the one time of year that children and adults alike are allowed to let their imaginations go wild and they get sweet treats for it. It’s a fun night for friends, music, sweets and fun, fun, fun! For an update on the band’s Halloween party last night go to EZ Street a Day in the Life for a full update. 

With that I am leaving you with my second of all time favorite Halloween songs, “Dirty Creature” by Split Enz, Happy Halloween everyone! 🙂

A Good Tired…..

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A Good Tired…..

The Bermuda Triangle got tired of warm weather. It moved to Alaska. Now Santa Claus is missing. Steven Wright

Boy am I ever tired. I have no idea what I am doing up so early other than I needed to send out thank you messages to all the people that came out to see us last night at the BoEx. I also wanted to send out thank you messages to all the band members and the owners of the BoEx. It is so important to me that people know how much they are appreciated, especially the members of EZ Street because without them none of this would be possible. My eyes are burning and I have some work to do today before we play tonight and I absolutely have to try to get some more sleep. The tired I feel today is a content and good tired. Things are going very well and I haven’t a complaint in the world! With that I leave you with the incomparable Ella singing black coffee….

Cold Weather….

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Cold Weather….

Winter is the time for comfort, for good food and warmth, for the touch of a friendly hand and for a talk beside the fire: it is the time for home. ~Edith Sitwell

I can hardly believe it! I drove to Boise to get some things for my mom the other day and there is already snow in the foothills! What’s up with that? I am not ready for winter and it’s cold, frosty mornings. I know for the farmers in our area the early snow is a blessing. It means more water for their crops in the spring, but I am still not ready. I bought myself a new coat last spring, on sale, and I am already putting it to good use. I have also bought gloves and a new winter hat, so I am prepared, but it doesn’t mean I have to like it. 🙂

With that I leave you with Foreigner….enjoy!

Bull in China

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Aquarius Horoscope for week of October 25, 2012

Verticle Oracle cardAquarius (January 20-February 19)
The Live Monarch Foundation made a video on how to fix a butterfly’s broken wing (tinyurl.com/FixWing). It ain’t easy. You need ten items, including tweezers, talcum powder, toothpicks, and glue. You’ve got to be patient and summon high levels of concentration. But it definitely can be done. The same is true about the delicate healing project you’ve thought about attempting on your own wound, Aquarius. It will require you to be ingenious, precise, and tender, but I suspect you’re primed to rise to the challenge. Halloween costume suggestion: herbalist, acupuncturist, doctor, shaman, or other healer. 

I am absolutely not that delicate. I am like a bull in a room full of china dominoes, thank you Rob B for that. I suck at delicacy. Now what? I am about as delicate as a clumsy woman in a field of flowers.

 

Leading the Lambs to Slaughter

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Leading the Lambs to Slaughter

“Believing with you that religion is a matter which lies solely between Man & his God, that he owes account to none other for his faith or his worship, that the legitimate powers of government reach actions only, & not opinions, I contemplate with sovereign reverence that act of the whole American people which declared that their legislature should ‘make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof,’ thus building a wall of separation between Church and State.” Thomas Jefferson

 I usually don’t have a lot to say about politics, but for once I am going to speak my opinion because it is an issue that bothers me deeply as a woman and as a Buddhist. I have difficulty in believing that Mitt Romney could even begin to keep church and state separate. I have spent my life around Mormons, my mother and my grandmother are both LDS, and I know first hand that Mormons are zealots and Mormonism strikes me as being almost cult like. Now I know I am going to get lambasted for saying what I think, probably most by Mormons defending their faith, however this is only an opinion.

How, I ask you, is a Mormon going to keep his extremist religious beliefs out of state affairs? Like many religions the Mormons believe that their views are the only “right” ones and that everyone else is wrong and if you don’t follow their path you are surely going to hell. Well this strikes me as no better than leading the lambs to slaughter if Romney gets elected president. We might as well throw the church and state policy that Jefferson and John Locke supported and brought into the United States consciousness right out the window. It is one thing to be a Governor of one state, it is an entirely  different issue to be the Commander in Chief of the United States. You have to be open minded and you also have to be able to embrace all nationalities, all religions, all genders and all people poor and wealthy alike. Romney is not a good fit. I truly understand that Mormons love to convert people of all nations, hell they put the M in missionary. One has to wonder about how they feel about people that don’t want to convert to their zealotry. 

Probably one of the most disturbing ideas that I can’t get out of my head is the way the Mormon men reflect on their women. Women are no better than chattel and breeding factories. They certainly don’t hold an equal status in a marriage. The whole polygamy thing is a disturbing issue in and of itself. Yes, of course they have laws against that now, thank goodness, however the men thought nothing of taking as many wives as they could get and used the excuse that the men were being killed off and there were more men to women so it was necessary to take more than one wife. That logic is simply disgusting. It’s an excuse for them to have sex with as many women as they want and for it to be deemed perfectly acceptable. Let’s not forget the excuse of making sure that the Mormon species survive by breeding and having 20 children with 5 different women. There are still some places in Utah and around the United States that practice polygamy in the name of Mormonism and against all constitutional laws.

I will not apologize for my beliefs to anyone. I am not the only one who feels this way. At one time I was baptized LDS, before I wised up and realised what a frightening, brainwashing,  zealous religion it is. My great grandfather was a polygamist and I am, to this day, ashamed to admit that there are Mormons in my family lineage. Mitt Romney does NOT represent me as a Buddhist and certainly not as a woman and he never will.  Just because I am Buddhist it does not mean that I don’t have an opinion.

Dalai Lama
“All the world’s major religions, with their emphasis on love, compassion, patience, tolerance, and forgiveness can and do promote inner values. But the reality of the world today is that grounding ethics in religion is no longer adequate. This is why I am increasingly convinced that the time has come to find a way of thinking about spirituality and ethics beyond religion altogether.”

“The Beauty Of Gray” Live

If I told you he was your brother
We could reminisce
Then you would go about your day
If I said you ought to give him some of your water
You’d shake your canteen and walk awayThe perception that divides you from him
Is a lie
For some reason you never asked why
This is not a black and white world
You can’t afford to believe in your sideThis is not a black and white world
To be alive
I say that the colours must swirl
And I believe
That maybe today
We will all get to appreciateThe Beauty of Grey

If I told you she was your mother
We could analyze the situation and be gone
If I said you ought to give her
Some of your water
Your eyes would light up like the dawn
The perception that divides you from her
Is a lie
For some reason we never asked why
This is not a black and white world
You can’t afford to believe in your side

This is not a black and white world
To be alive
I say the colors must swirl
And I believe
That maybe today
We will all get to appreciate

The beauty of gray

Look into your eyes
No daylight
New day now

Sleeping in the Wood

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Sleeping in the Wood

I don’t write a whole lot of poetry, when I write it is lyrics, so this is more like a song idea I have floating around in my head. I would love your thoughts on it!

Sleeping in the Wood-Jaz Fagan

He traded his love for a bag of gold

As she lay awake in the cold Earth

How many lives will be sold,

As she awaits her awakening, a rebirth

Time flutters by like a bird on the wing,

She awaits her love with baited breath

Where is my love, my kiss charming

She lies in the cold, not alive, not in death

The seasons change and the snow flies

Life comes and goes it quickly passes her 

She never lives and yet never dies

Suspended in time by the evil saboteur 

He’s finally here, he’s finally arrived

One look, one kiss and she is yet reborn

Broken the spell on which she thrived

No longer wanton or eternally to mourn

How You Treat Others

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How You Treat Others

I am fond of pigs. Dogs look up to us. Cats look down on us. Pigs treat us as equals. Winston Churchill 

How you treat others and speak to them is a direct reflection of yourself. If you look down on others and treat them with disdain what is this saying about you as a person? On the other side of the coin, if you treat each and every person with courtesy and respect what does that say? Recently I have had the experience of running into both ends of the spectrum. I have had one person that was so rude and short with me that I will never speak with that person ever again. This person treated me as if I was no better than a little bug under their shoe. On the other hand I have met some very sweet people that have been warm and inviting and in the end formed some new friendships. In the middle of the spectrum I have a friend who is incredibly self-involved and only seems to be focusing on their own current negative situation. They are so busy having a pity party that they are completely oblivious to the people around them and the difficulties of their friend’s situations. If you are hurting, this person is hurting 10 x’s worse. You know this person. Rather than focusing their energy on fixing the situation they blow their horn vociferously to anyone who will listen about their terrible situation and how no one is helping them. Part of the problem with this, beyond the obvious, is when a person does this their friends will draw away from them like pulling back from a hot stove. Truly, it is ok to tell people your situation, but always try to have a positive outlook and a plan on how you can fix it. No one is going to fix it for you. If you sit and cry to people all day, everyday, about your situation you are 1. wasting energy that could serve a better purpose and 2. Pushing people away from you as surely as if you were a hot, flaming coal of self-pity. No matter how bad your situation is it serves you better as a person to always keep in mind that your situation could be worse and you are not the only one hurting in this world. We all need to vent and let our friends and family know what’s going on with us, but it’s ultimately important to take the high road and if one avenue doesn’t work, explore other avenues. Eventually you will find the road that works, and never give up. No matter what, keep in mind that the things you spew out of your mouth can end up coming back to bite you and push people away. With that I leave you with the Beatles, have a peaceful day 🙂

Taking Stress in Stride…

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Taking Stress in Stride…

Its not stress that kills us, it is our reaction to it. Hans Selye 

As with all things in life there is stress. For the most part I am taking the stress with music, the band, the clients and people who come to see us play in stride. I admit that it does get a little overwhelming at times. Ok, I lied, it can be hellya overwhelming and really stressful, but I’m trying hard not to let it get me down. The stress in and of themselves are minor, but they culminate as a whole and at times push me into wanting to lock myself in my room, shut people out and just gel for about 2 days. Unfortunately I can’t. We have these intense financial worries and until I start work on Monday and see some checks start to roll in I am going to have that on my head. Our mortgage is due and we aren’t anywhere near having the money to pay it, we spent our last bit of money on gas to get to the gig last night. No one made any more than the gas money we had already paid in last night so Mike and I have got to go get a loan to get through the rest of the week. We really want to help Giuseppe out but he has to respect the fact that we need to be getting paid to play, a real paycheck, not relying on the kindness of people’s tips to pay our wages. After Halloween things are going to change because we have to be getting paid, unfortunately we don’t have the energy or financial resources to keep playing for free. I will find someone to take over for us as soon as I can so that Giuseppe can try to keep his business going but I have to move this band forward. We will keep it up as long as we can, but we have had offers from 2 different venues and I have to take them for our sake because the band members have made it clear that playing for free is ok for now, but not much longer, and if I don’t move us forward I am running the risk of the band falling apart before we even have a chance to get started. I am not going to sacrifice this band for anything, we have all worked too damn hard to see it go up in smoke because we couldn’t make a decent nights wages for playing our hearts out. Don’t take this wrong, I am not really bitching here, I am just stating the facts as they are and trying to express a little of the stress I am feeling so that I can get it out of my system and push us forward. With that I leave you with John Mayer, one of my favorite guitar players/vocalists

Beautiful Karma Award

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Beautiful Karma Award

“The best and most beautiful things in the world cannot be seen, nor touched …but are felt in the heart.” Helen Keller

I have been so busy the last few weeks and it’s been awhile since I have given out a Beautiful Karma Award so I thought I would take some time to acknowledge some of the bloggers that I feel convey beautiful karma in so many precious ways. I usually do one at a time, but with my schedule being what it is I am going to pick a few of my favorites. First up is Miss Bommie Bol,  she always has such positive insight, whether it be through her poetry, short stories or just quips about her family and daily life, she always has some positive nugget to share that reading her posts are a joy!

Next up is Bradley at You Jivin’ Me, Turkey?. I love this guy! He always posts the best music and I love his quotes from some of the most prolific figures in history! He’s an incredibly funny guy and you talk about a person who is so full of piss and vinegar you can’t help but laugh when he gets on a roll! To read him is to love him!

 Next up is Christine over at SOMETHINGVILLE. She is always putting out so much good, positive energy that I’m sure she is needing to duck from all the good karma boomerangs coming back at her. Duck Christine, here comes another one, LOL! 🙂

There so many here at WordPress that simply make my day with their writing, photos, songs and with their positive input to my blogs as well. Oh, I have one more to add to the list, I can’t forget Russel over at Russel Ray Photos. This man has been following my blog since pretty near the beginning and I love his photography. He’s one of the most positive people I know and it is conveyed through his photos and words. He’s very much a talented writer, photographer and friend and his wise old grandmother would be proud of him. Russel, thank you for camping out on my blog! You always leave the campsite so neat and clean!

Here’s your awards and song:

“The Dolphin’s Cry”-Live

The way you’re bathed in light
reminds me of that night
god laid me down into your rose garden of trust
and I was swept away
with nothin’ left to say
some helpless fool
yeah I was lost in a swoon of peace
you’re all I need to find
so when the time is right
come to me sweetly, come to me
come to me

love will lead us, alright
love will lead us, she will lead us
can you hear the dolphin’s cry?
see the road rise up to meet us
it’s in the air we breathe tonight
love will lead us, she will lead us

oh yeah, we meet again
it’s like we never left
time in between was just a dream
did we leave this place?
this crazy fog surrounds me
you wrap your legs around me
all I can do to try and breathe
let me breathe so that I
so we can go together!

love will lead us, alright
love will lead us, she will lead us
can you hear the dolphin’s cry?
see the road rise up to meet us
it’s in the air we breathe tonight
love will lead us, she will lead us

life is like a shooting star
it don’t matter who you are
if you only run for cover, it’s just a waste of time
we are lost ’til we are found
this phoenix rises up from the ground
and all these wars are over

How I Feel….

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How I Feel….

I’ve learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel. Maya Angelou 

My spirits are incredibly high. I have had some very good karmic payback over the last couple of weeks. The new band is going so well, and Mike and I have waited for a band like this to come along for so long. We have both been in bands together through the years but never quite this good. EZ Street is picking up gigs faster than any of us could have anticipated and for the band this is absolutely a testament to the chemistry we have as a band. We all have our financial worries, many of us have no full time jobs and these gigs are going to make the difference in whether we have gas or not, so this is a great thing for us all. If only we were independently wealthy. Fortunately I got my new position freelance writing for The Travel Council Magazine which will take some of the pressure off of Mike, not all of it, but some. These gigs are really going to help us out financially. I am happy and content, busy but happy. It didn’t even phase me this week when I was trying to get a promoter to help us get some of these bigger events and he was short with me and very rude. He treated me like crap and if he were to approach me tomorrow and say he wants to help us out I would basically tell him to get bent! The sad thing of it is is that I know this band is that good and he just screwed up and closed any door with us that he might have hoped to have in the future. To make matters worse the guy works with my producer in another local band. It’s sad that people have to pull that holier than thou, my poo doesn’t stink attitude. C’est la vie my friend, you just burned that bridge by your very attitude. It’s ok because I know that I am a strong enough person and have enough where-with-all that I can do it myself, I was just trying to take some of the pressure off of myself, but I will just keep on keeping on. 🙂

On that note I leave you with one of my favorite all time happy-happy, joy-joy songs by Jimmy Cliff, enjoy 🙂

It’s Amazing….

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It’s Amazing….

I’m amazed that things have panned out the way they have. I always say I’m so lucky, though my mum always says, “You make your own luck.” Orlando Bloom

That quote pretty much says it all. This has been an amazing week! The jam is going incredibly better than I could have ever expected, we have this amazing gentleman, Taduz Lemke, that is going to showcase with us. I got a new freelance writing position with a magazine, and our band has been asked to sit in on a 1/2 hour set at a venue that Michael and I had played years ago. This has the potential of blooming into a regular gig. This isn’t everything, we have been asked to play at a benefit for a premie baby named baby Maxwell and it is opening up doors to us that I never knew existed. This must be the week where I collect on some of my unspent karma points my friends. The band is doing fantastic and I am ever so proud of the progress we have made in just at 2 weeks together. We are getting ready to record some demos so hopefully I will have something for you to listen to very soon! With that I leave you with Sir Paul….

It’s My Life

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It’s My Life

This is the latest in a series of videos I have been working on for months now. I have been trying to get all of our studio work finished on YouTube and this is “It’s My Life” by me and Mike Fagan produced around 2007 I think. When we finally get into the studio with the full band you will notice a whole different sound. I hope you enjoy! 🙂

Freelancing….

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Freelancing….

Writing is a socially acceptable form of schizophrenia. ~E.L. Doctorow

I responded yesterday to an ad and no sooner had I spoke to a very nice man on the phone before I was told to contact another person about writing for their magazine. It looks like I am going back to freelance writing after quitting Knoji, previously known as Factoidz. I had been writing for Factoidz for 4 years and I wrote religiously almost everyday on a wide variety of topics. I loved it because I was free to write on whatever I chose, in fact I had created a Factoidz on the news called “News From the Muse” which basically discussed current stories in the news that were strange, or just downright bizarre. I also created a whole series on how to shoot pool, as well as articles on various public figures that I admired. When Knoji took over the pay scale dropped to such a pathetic low that I couldn’t justify wasting my energy and time writing a minimum 400 word article and getting paid 40 cents an article! So, in May I quit. I am so happy to be going back to my other love besides music. I don’t want to jinx myself and tell anyone what magazine I am writing for. As soon as I receive my first assignment and it is accepted I will then let the cat out of the bag and tell you which magazine I am working for. Yay Jaz!

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Very informative article!

LadyRomp

Catherine Pearson

Study after study has shown that alcohol affects women differently than men, but a new German paper finds that alcohol is particularly devastating for women who struggle with addiction.

Alcohol dependence, it concludes, is twice as deadly for women as it is for men.

According to the study, started in 1996 and published online Tuesday in the journalAlcoholism: Clinical & Experimental Research, the death rate for alcohol-dependent women was more than four times that of a sample of non-addicted 18- to 64-year-olds. The death rate among alcohol-dependent men was about twice that of the general population over the 14-year study period.

On average, the alcohol-addicted men and women were about 20 years younger than members of the general population at the time of their death, explained study author Ulrich John, director of the Institute of Epidemiology and Social Medicine at University Medicine Greifswald, Germany.

He…

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Negativism, Rage, Anger and the Internet

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Negativism, Rage, Anger and the Internet

For every minute you remain angry, you give up sixty seconds of peace of mind. Ralph Waldo Emerson

I think we are all guilty of it. At some point or another we have gotten on our FaceBook, or our blog, I know that I have, and just spewed out all the anger or rage or disgust we are feeling at someone or thing we have felt treated us unjustly. I have done it in moments of rage, hurt and anger. Did it solve anything, absolutely not. Did it make things any better, well, I might have felt better for like 2.5 seconds. At the end of the day I came to realize that spewing that kind of anger may or may not reach my intended target. What I did realize is that the many friends and family and people I didn’t even know saw that anger and rage just as surely as if I was standing on the busiest intersection in the world butt naked. Do I want people seeing this anger and hot rage. No! Sure, I may be angry, but spewing out a diatribe of profanity and rage serves no purpose other than to alienate people you know and people you don’t even know yet. It completely turns people off. My advice to anyone feeling this kind of rage and anger at someone is to confront the person that hurt you face to face, not FaceBook to FaceBook. Take it from someone who knows, it will only come back to hurt you in some unexpected way just as surely as a boomerang comes back to the hand that threw it. Be peaceful my friends, if you’re angry don’t keep it bottled up, confront the source, don’t spew it out there for the world to see. Once it’s out there you can’t take it back, nor can you take back the indelible impression you will leave with all those people that you probably didn’t even know were seeing it. Just my Buddhist thought for the day and on that note I will leave you with No Doubt….

 

 

Expectations…

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Expectations…

Aquarius Horoscope for week of October 18, 2012

Verticle Oracle cardAquarius (January 20-February 19)
“Dear Rob: I really enjoy reading your horoscopes. You feel like a friend I’ve never met. When I try to picture what you’re like, I keep getting a vision of you as being fat, short, and bald with a strawberry blond moustache. Am I right? – Curious Aquarius.” Dear Curious: It’s great that you’ve decided to do a reality check. This is an excellent time for all you Aquarians to see if what you imagine to be true is a match for the world as it actually is. To answer your question, I am in fact tall and thin, don’t wear a moustache, and have an abundance of long silver hair. Evil is boring. The universe is friendly. Life is on your side. Joy is your birthright.

Cynicism is idiotic. Fear is a bad habit. Despair is lazy. In fact, all of creation wants you to succeed.
Act as if the universe is a prodigious miracle created for your amusement and illumination. Assume that secret helpers are working behind the scenes to assist you in turning into the gorgeous masterpiece you were born to be. Retrain your senses and intellect so you’re able to perceive the fact that life always gives you exactly what you need, exactly when you need it.

I firmly like to believe that what I imagine to be true is, but more often than not I find I am let down by my own expectations of who I expect people to be and what expectations I have for situations. I have found, especially when it comes to music, that if I don’t expect too much out of the musicians and different venue owners I have to work with then I am less prone to heartbreaks because I was let down. This isn’t to say that I don’t set the bar as high for everyone else as I do for myself, it is only to say that people are fickle and I am grateful for  whatever little gems of light they have to give me. That is my only expectation, give me a tiny pin point of light and I will show you a sunbeam!

On that note here is our cover of “Come on People Now/Smile on Your Brother” by the Youngbloods. This was recorded by my husband and I about 3 or 4 years ago. Hope you enjoy!

 

All I Wanna Do…

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All I Wanna Do…

I found this image and quote quite funny! My days have taken on quite a dramatic turn. I get up in the morning, make my coffee and spend the next 5-6 hours working on band business. You wouldn’t believe how much there is. I respond to every Facebook response we have as a band and personally, I work on working lists for rehearsals and set lists for gigs and the list goes on. I love it and I am really doing what it is I love to do. I have found myself surrounded by some of the best musicians this valley has to offer and I am a very lucky woman indeed.  On that note I will leave you with Sheryl Crowe

Here Comes the Rain Again…

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Here Comes the Rain Again…

Sunshine is delicious, rain is refreshing, wind braces us up, snow is exhilarating; there is really no such thing as bad weather, only different kinds of good weather. John Ruskin

We had our first rain in months last night and what a blessing. Now, finally, the smoke from local forest fires may clear out of the air. For a vocalist the smoke is really hard on you. It makes you congested and affects your voice in ways that you would not believe. I feel sorry for people that have emphysema. For myself I can’t get enough clarity in my voice for the last couple of months and my voice wears out much easier. It makes it harder to sing, and singing is hard enough as it is. But, the rains, the beautiful cleansing rains, have come once again and there is a rainbow at the end of the smoke filled tunnel. I always love the smell of the Earth after a good rain. The air is so pure and unadulterated, cleansing and toxic free after a good rain!

Smooth!

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Smooth!

There’s an inherent thing in me where, if things are going too smooth, I’ll sabotage the hell out of them, just to make the music more of a sanctuary. Daniel Johns 

When things are going well it kind of intimidates me because it seems I am always waiting for the other shoe to drop. LOL. I know I should stop being a pessimist and cynical, but I think as humans we are all like this. Things in my life are going so smoothly that even a little bump in the road this week, a backstabbing by a so-called friend, didn’t even phase me. What is wrong with me?! The music is flowing well, by vocals are building back up to the level of playing with a full band again, and I am happy. We are all healthy and I really haven’t one single complaint. Money is tight, as always, but this is nothing new. So life is good. I will take the smooth road, thank you very much and could I have a large side of fries with that? 😀