Seen in the last couple days:

1) Driving down Wampanoag Dr. in familiar old Tualatin, I saw a kid sitting by the side of the road with a skateboard and a video camera. I tend to drive slowly in the presence of erratic preteens, which was a good thing, because this kid's friend came barreling down the hill from Atfalati park, being videotaped all the while; he careened out into the street and made what appeared to be very fake I'm-in-pain motions. He noticed that my Metro was waiting, bounded up, and I rolled past, probably being videotaped all the while. Kids!

2) Walking down Belmont St. this morning after a game of Scrabble in which Mr. Piuma finally vanquished me: I saw these vagranty types walking down the street, smell and backwards baseball caps and garbage bag full of empties. One of them paused at a mailbox, opened it up, and spat inside. People continue to elude easy explanation.

3) Same street, a couple minutes later: a man was walking down the opposite side of the street, dressed fairly properly (button-down shirt) except for the fact that he was carrying his shoes very properly in his left hand and walking barefoot, at 1 am, in the dim light.
posted by Jacob Anderson at 1:26 AM

Crazy crazy crazy weekend which seems to have stretched until Thursday; such are the joys of unemployment. Oh wait, here comes another weekend, with Alessandro from Best Kept Secret here and possibly Rob from Creepy Crawly Claw as well, plus garage-saling and an acoustic show tomorrow, and a trip to Ape Cave on Sunday? It is the summer that would not stop being entertaining!

Wild Ashland trip update! Let's start off with my account from Saturday morning:
So good morning and welcome to Ashland, Oregon, where I am glad to report that DRUNKEN TRIVIAL PURSUIT is every bit as great as one might have guessed. We (me and Karen) tried valiantly and were brilliant but the luck of the cards and dice were not with us, and besides, we were not exactly exhibiting good judgment in our choice of answers, so we all ended up on the center hexagons carrying six wedges and we were all besotted! besotted! and it turned out that Dave and Ann knew something about sports so they ended up winning. 62 fl. oz. of ale and lager, 40 oz. of which was Lucky Lager, which if they had the foresight to distribute in the wonderful Pabst-Blue-Ribbon-obsessed Portland area would completely kick PBR's ass because it is better! And 20 cents cheaper per 40-fl. oz. serving! So anyway we are at the big center table using our "morning voices" ("a half-tone lower than usual," says the astute Chris Piuma), and ridiculous innuendo and the word "fuckwad" are being thrown around willy! nilly! So anyway it's time to look up. More! Later! More later!

It kept going on like that. Chris and I went garage-saling on Saturday morning. I got a manual typewriter (big surprise there) and Chris found this great portable reel-to-reel that I hope he can get to work. The Minor Thirds played a delightful set on Saturday night, with a startling version of "Copacabana", Chris throwing down his guitar before "Yawning in Stereo" so as to stifle any comments from the peanut gallery, a charming version of their hit "Hot Sex Movie", so great. Then Celesteville played and it was pretty astonishing as well. Chris helped out on keyboards and I think we're going to try that again at the show at Tennessee Red's. I played "I Love You For Your Mounds", yes, the old RYL chestnut, by request even. I think I forgot one of the verses, but that's okay, since no-one could resist my take on the classic lyrics of b.s. I played "R.A. Montgomery", my song about the Choose Your Own Adventure writer, for the first time, and people were singing it drunkenly off into the warm Ashland night, and it was so nice. We drank the Lithia water which bubbles up natural and salty and carbonated and containing several odd minerals; there is a fountain at the town's central plaza and tourists watched, amazed, as I actually drank it. I mean, god forbid, how can it be any worse than, say, Mountain Dew Code Red?

We swam in Emigrant Lake on Sunday, totally beautiful even with my glasses off. I haven't been swimming in a lake in a long time, and I think more of that sort of thing will have to take place this summer. On the way home in the car, Chris, Ryan and I got into an extended conversation about Esperanto; apparently both of them have studied this fine language to some extent. And I played a sweet version of "O Tualatin", yes, the Yak Ampersand hit, in the back of the car just as we passed over the Tualatin River as part of my impromptu concert-in-the-car. It definitely made the interminable Salem-to-Portland trip much less interminable.

Tuesday! Joanie and I went to Tigard to hit the fruitful thrift stores there and it was so wonderful; we surrounded ourselves with thrift-store smell and it was pretty romantic. Many t-shirts were bought to sacrifice on the Tape Mtn. silkscreening altar, inside out. We bought cheap and wonderful Godiva ice-cream at the Grocery Outlet, sweated, came back to the house, sweated, it was warm and it was a good day to silkscreen shirts on the porch. Pugs and their owners passed by, OSPIRG canvassers came by and I told them that I had no money as I swiped the squeegee up-down-up-down; the sun went down and we drank the nice Portland Pale Ale I bought. It was nice, it was nice. Dan stopped by and we went to see William Hooker, which was totally transcendent, and Bill Horist's Greg Ginnish guitar was surprisingly pleasing. I think for that sort of improv situation it's better to reach for the rock-guitar-sky, try to graze the hem of Jimi Hendrix's celestial raiment, than it is to just wrank-wrank-wrank. And he did, and speaking of God, William Hooker made a convincing argument for being in touch with the divine. At Mr. Hooker's request, the lights were turned off arduously, one by one, and the drum trance began; he was at one with them and we, the audience, were in heaven, sweet and pure heaven.

So anyway: this weekend has been pretty productive if only because I now know how to silkscreen and I have plenty of Tape Mountain shirts. Why not buy one now?
posted by Jacob Anderson at 5:47 PM

Wow, what a fun trip to Bellevue I just had. I got to visit luv(sic), play drums and bass with them, and sing on a completely insidiously catchy version of the Seekers' maudlin and bizarre hit "Georgy Girl". It is paralyzing how infectious our version is. I also got to play Aerobie-golf, silk-screen some Tape Mtn. shirts (and yes! there will be many available for you! the public!), eat masala dosas--yes, mine and part of Steve's as well--and do six hours of Metro-driving! It was a real joy. As soon as I pulled up to my house on the way back, I heard a "psss" sound of air-releasing-from-punctured-pneumatic-tires and I thought: well, it's good that I didn't replace those ones, and that I didn't have to deal with that on the freeway. Thank goodness! When I got home I went over to Joanie's place and played her "Georgy Girl" and showed her the t-shirt and she seemed pretty enthralled. And she has a silk-screening squeegee, just randomly lying around! How fortunate I am.

Now I am off to Ashland with the Minor Thirds! Reports of drunken Scrabble are bound to ensue, so watch this page Monday for the complete details.
posted by Jacob Anderson at 9:31 AM

I acquired a copy of the Feelies' version of "Dancing Barefoot" via the magic of "file-sharing" and I would recommend that you do the same: it is unbelievably gorgeous. Glenn Mercer's guitar solo at the beginning is delicious and the rest of it creeps by with the same pleasing-familiar-chord sound that makes The Good Earth and Only Life such frequent visitors to my turntable. I think this is the second time I've mentioned the Feelies in this journal, but god! they are so worth it! Do not let them become any more obscure than they already are!
posted by Jacob Anderson at 9:52 AM

Well, well, well:

The Sunnyside garage sales were every bit as lovely as was expected; the day was cool and delightful and the garages, porches, and back yards were bursting with delicious fruit. Joanie was along with me and we stopped to smell the roses frequently, to smell the lavender and rosemary along the way.

Things acquired (by me):
1) music flash cards for use in future Tape Mountain projects
2) various audio/MIDI cables
3) unbelievably swanky pair of bowling shoes
4) Husker Du's Candy Apple Grey
5) The Best of Buck Owens, Vol. 4
6) Milan Kundera's The Joke
7) a glockenspiel
8) various magazines and zines
9) two Ultima games, worth far more than I paid (yes, I am an E*ay playa)
10) a beautiful, beautiful "Eaton's" manual typewriter in a fetching shade of mint-green, in a great tweed case
11) delicious chocolate-espresso brownies
12) some argyle socks

Joanie and I walked all over this lovely neighborhood and it was pretty great. Then we went back to her house, sat on the porch playing my glockenspiel and her bongoes, drinking lemonade, eating the brownies, watching cars go by on Belmont. The sun had come out. We ate pesto pizza at Murray's, saw Amelie at Cinemagic, so sumptuous! And it probably will come as no surprise to the reader that this several-week-spanning mutual obsession of two shy gentle bespectacled freaks finally blossomed into something that involves reading Little Nemo, taking long dusky walks, eating home-cooked vegetarian cuisine, laughing at very silly jokes, and, yes, the electrifying sound of eyeglass frames hitting each other in osculatory bliss--

Oh my god, it's actually some good gossip on this page! Alert the authorities!

I recorded a couple songs this weekend: one being the final realization of the poem "Kale Mood" (which may end up being the title of the new Celesteville record), and "R.A. Montgomery" (sort of about the notoriously left-wing author of many Choose Your Own Adventure books). I am currently proud of them.

And today I received a package containing the best item that anyone who happens to be me could receive in the mail: my very own Print-O-Matic stencil duplicator! The smell is pungent-ink, the machine itself is pristine, possibly never used, and it is ready for me to pollute with my wild mimeograph joy. Alert the authorities!
posted by Jacob Anderson at 7:59 PM

I've been poking around Microsoft's Terra maps here briefly and I found a photo of my childhood home. (It's the one on the bottom.) And it's weird how poignant it is just to see these dark smudgy blotches signifying houses and corncribs, different shades of gray signifying open farmland in April. Maybe it's just the sense of openness, isolation that just becomes super-clear in this photo. Anyway, I found it kind of touching.

Tomorrow morning is the Sunnyside neighborhood garage sale, which is very very exciting (check out my account of last year's festivities in the archives) and I'm going to go around and hike through the serene leafy streets of Southeast Portland not long after I get back from a Minmae show at Billy Ray's Neighborhood Dive, infamous crowded and smoky hangout (dive) on MLK. I've never been but the stories are stuff of legend and I hope I don't get shanghaied. Should be exciting.
posted by Jacob Anderson at 3:39 PM

Woke up this morning around 11 (after playing Scrabble and reading Krazy Kat until 4 or so) and the sun in Skypad was bright and hot. Attic rooms have their charms but not when you are leading a lost-years rockstar lifestyle of late-night comic-book consumption and word-formation, when the sun rises before 6 (not that I would know). Boy it's hot.

This morning, otiose/faineant/indolent (all good words) I rolled out of bed, made some toast-with-hot-ajvar, brewed some espresso and put ice and sugar in it, sprawled out on the sofa with Calvino's _The Baron in the Trees_ (which I've just resumed reading, and which is pretty joyful), and the Ah Club's _Kiss the Sky Goodbye_ loping through my speakers. What a great record--it is like a square wheel galumphing in summer heat, whomp, whomp, this voice is hesitantly saying wonderful things and these beats (made on reel-to-reel!) are catchy and ill-fitted. Quite striking. There are so many CD's on my shelves that I pull off once a year or less; this one keeps drawing me back, even after what, five, six years? And it's not as if it's one of those discography listens--you know, how sometimes I'll pull out even the most lackluster of Cannanes releases just to see if I get it--no, this one is the only non-cassette, non-compilation release they ever did or ever will do. And it stands alone like a pillar in the wilderness, waiting for you to discover it.
posted by Jacob Anderson at 12:53 PM

Plenty of double postings follow, and I apologize for that. If you know how to get rid of these pests, let me know...
posted by Jacob Anderson at 12:32 AM

So much activity! This weekend was absolutely packed with goodness and I couldn't even begin to describe it all. But here I go!

Thursday! We play at the Jasmine Tree, which is fun except for the fact that everyone in the audience except for maybe five people forgot to show up. Oh well. Parallax played 36-boom-box orchestra, and I wrote the following in my notebook:

Parallax: tape hiss! tape bliss! piano noises, talk radio, glorious tape hiss, the unmistakable clack and rattle of stop-eject-insert, our hero winds through an electromagnetic jungle. The instruments play themselves; he walks off to get a smoke, lies down in front of the stereophonic array; pianos make an atonal cloud; a tape clicks off; tape-eating sounds; the whine has a pitch and a hiss. He is recording this and he will hear a lot of keys clacking, bar talk, smoke rising.

(here Dan writes something in my notebook about Bugskull's Subversives in Our Midst, appropriate)

The 36-boombox piece was totally transporting! There was a young-man's-field-recording signalling "memory" and then the drone took over. At some point I saw a KUCI sticker on R4B's military-surplus PA and I was transported back to those days when I would sit, nervous and wiry, in the KUCI studios late at night, droney sounds all around and I was playing them, and I couldn't quite explain to anyone else why I was so excited by this, and then I lost the feeling, but here it is, back again.

Nobody showed up for the fabulous R4B and Moral Crayfish shows. Dan was depressed, understandably. Oh well. The Taken Girls premiere would have to wait.

Friday! We played at good old KPSU with ever-friendly host Angelo. I played through Brian's huge huge bass amp for the Celesteville set and I can only imagine how it sounded; I felt like I had bionic limbs and everything I did was a little clumsy. Still, a good set, and there were some kind of transcendent moments, especially my duet with Grace (on electronics and "rhythm den") on "Vast and Sad", a song I have played once in my life (on the recording) and that I might never play again. Rose for Bohdan played (in costume, and with plastic ball-pit balls all around, may I point out) and I was only beginning to feel exhausted.

Then we went home and I got ready for the first fete at Tape Mtn. HQ. Six bands were scheduled to play--Bronwyn, Celesteville, A John Henry Memorial, Minmae, the Minor Thirds, and Rose 4 Bohdan. We made nametags for everyone, Charlotte brought cheesecake and applesauce cake, coffee was made and beer was bought; everything was cozy. Then I drew names to see who would go in which order--and it really couldn't have come out much better. Sean Minmae started out with a solo set that was quite beautiful and intimate--very nice. Then Celesteville went on, with Sarah Bronwyn playing accordion alongside me in the little alcove in my living room. It was beautiful and Sarah was an excellent addition (and a good sport--she'd only played with me once before!). We played a gorgeous version of "Unconsumed", and "A Wren's Heart" came out beautiful with Sean on guitar. Then of course I had to go out and do my rockstar antics--I faded "Cloverleaf" away to the point where I could barely even hear it, but you could have heard a pin drop in my living room. Wow. And I closed with a version of "Let's Climb A Mossy Hill" in which I got all the lyrics right and ended the show in the middle of the room. So nice.

Whew. Still with me? Let's go on. Bronwyn were next and they were their usual stunning selves--maybe even more stunning this time since you could clearly hear their vocals. Richel sounded positively angelic. Sean played bass and guitar instead of drums and I must say: they sound even more full that way. Perhaps they should consider expanding their ranks, and of course I am always available should they need me. I am dutiful. The Minor Thirds came up next and had the audience in stitches with their bizarre variety-show take on their hit song "(Let's Not) Get It On", hilarious stuff and I can still hear Dan Cohoon laughing. Chris pulled out the dreamy ballad "Yawning In Stereo" as well and that was positively great as well. R4B followed, Brian on acoustic-guitar-and-screaming duty, Grace playing her array of electronics on the floor through my little Electra amplifier, and me playing floor tom, desk, walls, and typewriter as percussion. It was pretty crazy--I couldn't really hear Brian too well--but the audience enjoyed it, and it was definitely a set the likes of which I will not see again soon. Brian is a nut and don't let anyone tell you otherwise. Definitely a high-quality nut, but still nutty.

pause for breath A John Henry Memorial went on last. Of course, being a bit of a worrywart in such situations, I was worried about their volume, being as bassist/electronicist Glamorous Pat has been known to be volume-heavy, and being as it was 1 am--but they played acoustically and wonderfully, and it wasn't too loud, and man alive what a performer Davos is. He worked his bullhorn as if it were a hesitant potential lover, and worked the band and the audience as if they were a congregation. So, so great. I look forward to seeing them again.

Saturday! I can't believe I was up for another day of this stuff--I was tuckered out already--but I couldn't resist. The barbecue was pretty much more of the same. Mike Landucci had come up to visit, which I don't think I'd mentioned, because he was being more-or-less invisible, and this was because he was feeling depressed, and it turned out that he wanted to go home. "When do you have to be at the airport?" I asked. "In 45 minutes," he replied, and this was a problem because Brian and Grace had my house key, and they were at Safeway. Oh crap! Time to hustle over to Safeway in the Metro to find them. Fortunately, they were waiting for crappy Safeway deli food, and were therefore very easy to locate. Vroom, vroom, vroom. The little blue egg coursed through the grids of Southeast Portland, finding the quickest way to a green light, the fastest way back to my house, the fastest way onto the interstate, and then as we exited I-205 at the "Portland Airport" exit, there it was: a crack of lightning that looked like it was just next to the air-control tower. Emotional resonance and nitrogen filled the air. Mike and I weren't really talking; the thunder talked for us. I bade my farewell to him and drove back to the party. Fortunately, it cleared up pretty soon and we got to make corn and veggie burgers.

All the bands that played were good, a louder version of the previous day's events. The Celesteville set was notable because it featured a version of the Wham hit "A Different Corner", different lines from the song sung to each different person in the room. Glamorous Pat got "I should go back to being lonely and confused." * played and sang well, but the backing band didn't seem to gel as much as I liked--they were a little too skronky for his unstable, almost delicate? electronic compositions. I like these people and I've seen them do great things (Bryan, it is your duty to reform Beds and play with them again) but it wasn't so happening that night. Anyway: it was a long day and night and we were unable to play badminton, which was a little depressing, but so be it.

Noted: the presence of the previous weekend's garage-sale visitor Joanie at both house-rock-party events! Very interesting, very interesting. We got to hang out a fair amount (although it was greatly curtailed by my hyperactive gracious-host thing on Friday and my taxi-service and rock-service duties on Saturday) and I'm intrigued. Hmm!

Sunday! Sunday morning, our poopedness had reached new levels--but we finally got out of bed (Jordan had gone out of town for the weekend--up to the San Juan Islands!--so Brian and Grace got to use his bed--very kind) and went to the pleasant Cricket Cafe. I drank a gallon of coffee and lots of silly conversation was had about our elementary-school experiences. It is always a joy to talk with other overly-nerdy-bright individuals about their neanderthal elementary school educators. We headed up to Olympia a couple hours after we'd intended to do so, but it turned out that no-one was really there. However, Aerick Duckhugger was there, as were a few of his friends, and we got to drink Oly stubbies in the beautiful afternoon Olympian light, blackberries overgrown across from the porch, people reading Catsup Plate 7" Evading the Devil's Darts, and Grace requested the ever-ridiculous "A Hair On My Arm", and I played "Building A Grotto", both of which were on the Yak Ampersand cassette Flavor House (old skool!), and everyone was dancing silly dances, and so was I. It was great.

R4B's set was amped way, way up--it was our last show and we figured we'd go all out, and we did. Dan threw the balls out on the first song, so I was getting pelted with ball-pit-balls the whole set through. I've gotten good at avoiding them now! The trick is to never let your guard down, and to do lots of drumstick movement. Dan was really hucking them, too. We played harder than ever and it completely rocked. Brian was sweaty. The final song, "Dig Dug", was just perfect, a glorious slice of rock heaven in fading evening light in a tiny basement across from a crackhouse in Olympia, WA.

The Minmae set was no slouch, either. We had some power-supply problems, but we overcame! Josh's ex-girlfriend showed up and they seemed to be on pretty good terms, although it seems odd that a clearly low-maintenance person like Josh would have been with someone like Gretchen, who looked fairly high-maintenance and who was going to grad school for philosophy. But perhaps I am judging people by their clothes (fancy) and their majors (possibly more useless than linguistics). Anyway: "The Bastard" rocked harder than ever, mostly because I seemed to have traded arms with Satan for the duration of that song. I was throwing in twice as many hard snare hits, crazy rolls and fills; it really felt like I was a different person who just happened to be observing my own performance.

We drove home--a long way--but it probably didn't feel like that long of a drive to our Los Angeleno friends..

Monday! Our heroes Brian and Grace take off, and I'm sad about that, but I'm glad I got to see them, and, especially, play with them. What great kids they are. If you ever get the chance to see Rose for Bohdan, give them a hug for me, or for yourself; they will doubtless hug you back, and it will be genuine. Tonight I'm still dog tired, and it is times like these that I am extremely glad not to have a job.

Whew! That should just about cover it. Any more questions, you just go ahead and email me.
posted by Jacob Anderson at 12:16 AM

So much activity! This weekend was absolutely packed with goodness and I couldn't even begin to describe it all. But here I go!

Thursday! We play at the Jasmine Tree, which is fun except for the fact that everyone in the audience except for maybe five people forgot to show up. Oh well. Parallax played 36-boom-box orchestra, and I wrote the following in my notebook:

Parallax: tape hiss! tape bliss! piano noises, talk radio, glorious tape hiss, the unmistakable clack and rattle of stop-eject-insert, our hero winds through an electromagnetic jungle. The instruments play themselves; he walks off to get a smoke, lies down in front of the stereophonic array; pianos make an atonal cloud; a tape clicks off; tape-eating sounds; the whine has a pitch and a hiss. He is recording this and he will hear a lot of keys clacking, bar talk, smoke rising.

(here Dan writes something in my notebook about Bugskull's Subversives in Our Midst, appropriate)

The 36-boombox piece was totally transporting! There was a young-man's-field-recording signalling "memory" and then the drone took over. At some point I saw a KUCI sticker on R4B's military-surplus PA and I was transported back to those days when I would sit, nervous and wiry, in the KUCI studios late at night, droney sounds all around and I was playing them, and I couldn't quite explain to anyone else why I was so excited by this, and then I lost the feeling, but here it is, back again.

Nobody showed up for the fabulous R4B and Moral Crayfish shows. Dan was depressed, understandably. Oh well. The Taken Girls premiere would have to wait.

Friday! We played at good old KPSU with ever-friendly host Angelo. I played through Brian's huge huge bass amp for the Celesteville set and I can only imagine how it sounded; I felt like I had bionic limbs and everything I did was a little clumsy. Still, a good set, and there were some kind of transcendent moments, especially my duet with Grace (on electronics and "rhythm den") on "Vast and Sad", a song I have played once in my life (on the recording) and that I might never play again. Rose for Bohdan played (in costume, and with plastic ball-pit balls all around, may I point out) and I was only beginning to feel exhausted.

Then we went home and I got ready for the first fete at Tape Mtn. HQ. Six bands were scheduled to play--Bronwyn, Celesteville, A John Henry Memorial, Minmae, the Minor Thirds, and Rose 4 Bohdan. We made nametags for everyone, Charlotte brought cheesecake and applesauce cake, coffee was made and beer was bought; everything was cozy. Then I drew names to see who would go in which order--and it really couldn't have come out much better. Sean Minmae started out with a solo set that was quite beautiful and intimate--very nice. Then Celesteville went on, with Sarah Bronwyn playing accordion alongside me in the little alcove in my living room. It was beautiful and Sarah was an excellent addition (and a good sport--she'd only played with me once before!). We played a gorgeous version of "Unconsumed", and "A Wren's Heart" came out beautiful with Sean on guitar. Then of course I had to go out and do my rockstar antics--I faded "Cloverleaf" away to the point where I could barely even hear it, but you could have heard a pin drop in my living room. Wow. And I closed with a version of "Let's Climb A Mossy Hill" in which I got all the lyrics right and ended the show in the middle of the room. So nice.

Whew. Still with me? Let's go on. Bronwyn were next and they were their usual stunning selves--maybe even more stunning this time since you could clearly hear their vocals. Richel sounded positively angelic. Sean played bass and guitar instead of drums and I must say: they sound even more full that way. Perhaps they should consider expanding their ranks, and of course I am always available should they need me. I am dutiful. The Minor Thirds came up next and had the audience in stitches with their bizarre variety-show take on their hit song "(Let's Not) Get It On", hilarious stuff and I can still hear Dan Cohoon laughing. Chris pulled out the dreamy ballad "Yawning In Stereo" as well and that was positively great as well. R4B followed, Brian on acoustic-guitar-and-screaming duty, Grace playing her array of electronics on the floor through my little Electra amplifier, and me playing floor tom, desk, walls, and typewriter as percussion. It was pretty crazy--I couldn't really hear Brian too well--but the audience enjoyed it, and it was definitely a set the likes of which I will not see again soon. Brian is a nut and don't let anyone tell you otherwise. Definitely a high-quality nut, but still nutty.

pause for breath A John Henry Memorial went on last. Of course, being a bit of a worrywart in such situations, I was worried about their volume, being as bassist/electronicist Glamorous Pat has been known to be volume-heavy, and being as it was 1 am--but they played acoustically and wonderfully, and it wasn't too loud, and man alive what a performer Davos is. He worked his bullhorn as if it were a hesitant potential lover, and worked the band and the audience as if they were a congregation. So, so great. I look forward to seeing them again.

Saturday! I can't believe I was up for another day of this stuff--I was tuckered out already--but I couldn't resist. The barbecue was pretty much more of the same. Mike Landucci had come up to visit, which I don't think I'd mentioned, because he was being more-or-less invisible, and this was because he was feeling depressed, and it turned out that he wanted to go home. "When do you have to be at the airport?" I asked. "In 45 minutes," he replied, and this was a problem because Brian and Grace had my house key, and they were at Safeway. Oh crap! Time to hustle over to Safeway in the Metro to find them. Fortunately, they were waiting for crappy Safeway deli food, and were therefore very easy to locate. Vroom, vroom, vroom. The little blue egg coursed through the grids of Southeast Portland, finding the quickest way to a green light, the fastest way back to my house, the fastest way onto the interstate, and then as we exited I-205 at the "Portland Airport" exit, there it was: a crack of lightning that looked like it was just next to the air-control tower. Emotional resonance and nitrogen filled the air. Mike and I weren't really talking; the thunder talked for us. I bade my farewell to him and drove back to the party. Fortunately, it cleared up pretty soon and we got to make corn and veggie burgers.

All the bands that played were good, a louder version of the previous day's events. The Celesteville set was notable because it featured a version of the Wham hit "A Different Corner", different lines from the song sung to each different person in the room. Glamorous Pat got "I should go back to being lonely and confused." * played and sang well, but the backing band didn't seem to gel as much as I liked--they were a little too skronky for his unstable, almost delicate? electronic compositions. I like these people and I've seen them do great things (Bryan, it is your duty to reform Beds and play with them again) but it wasn't so happening that night. Anyway: it was a long day and night and we were unable to play badminton, which was a little depressing, but so be it.

Noted: the presence of the previous weekend's garage-sale visitor Joanie at both house-rock-party events! Very interesting, very interesting. We got to hang out a fair amount (although it was greatly curtailed by my hyperactive gracious-host thing on Friday and my taxi-service and rock-service duties on Saturday) and I'm intrigued. Hmm!

Sunday! Sunday morning, our poopedness had reached new levels--but we finally got out of bed (Jordan had gone out of town for the weekend--up to the San Juan Islands!--so Brian and Grace got to use his bed--very kind) and went to the pleasant Cricket Cafe. I drank a gallon of coffee and lots of silly conversation was had about our elementary-school experiences. It is always a joy to talk with other overly-nerdy-bright individuals about their neanderthal elementary school educators. We headed up to Olympia a couple hours after we'd intended to do so, but it turned out that no-one was really there. However, Aerick Duckhugger was there, as were a few of his friends, and we got to drink Oly stubbies in the beautiful afternoon Olympian light, blackberries overgrown across from the porch, people reading Catsup Plate 7" Evading the Devil's Darts, and Grace requested the ever-ridiculous "A Hair On My Arm", and I played "Building A Grotto", both of which were on the Yak Ampersand cassette Flavor House (old skool!), and everyone was dancing silly dances, and so was I. It was great.

R4B's set was amped way, way up--it was our last show and we figured we'd go all out, and we did. Dan threw the balls out on the first song, so I was getting pelted with ball-pit-balls the whole set through. I've gotten good at avoiding them now! The trick is to never let your guard down, and to do lots of drumstick movement. Dan was really hucking them, too. We played harder than ever and it completely rocked. Brian was sweaty. The final song, "Dig Dug", was just perfect, a glorious slice of rock heaven in fading evening light in a tiny basement across from a crackhouse in Olympia, WA.

The Minmae set was no slouch, either. We had some power-supply problems, but we overcame! Josh's ex-girlfriend showed up and they seemed to be on pretty good terms, although it seems odd that a clearly low-maintenance person like Josh would have been with someone like Gretchen, who looked fairly high-maintenance and who was going to grad school for philosophy. But perhaps I am judging people by their clothes (fancy) and their majors (possibly more useless than linguistics). Anyway: "The Bastard" rocked harder than ever, mostly because I seemed to have traded arms with Satan for the duration of that song. I was throwing in twice as many hard snare hits, crazy rolls and fills; it really felt like I was a different person who just happened to be observing my own performance.

We drove home--a long way--but it probably didn't feel like that long of a drive to our Los Angeleno friends..

Monday! Our heroes Brian and Grace take off, and I'm sad about that, but I'm glad I got to see them, and, especially, play with them. What great kids they are. If you ever get the chance to see Rose for Bohdan, give them a hug for me, or for yourself; they will doubtless hug you back, and it will be genuine. Tonight I'm still dog tired, and it is times like these that I am extremely glad not to have a job.

Whew! That should just about cover it. Any more questions, you just go ahead and email me.
posted by Jacob Anderson at 12:15 AM

(whoops: double posting)
posted by Jacob Anderson at 12:15 AM

Celesteville Update! We played at the Rip City House on Monday and it was a beautiful, beautiful thing; the living room was full of people who were at least willing to humor me, which is just fine; that's all I ask for, really. We played subdued pop songs and I ended up the show by playign the guitar by hitting the back of the guitar against my head, and Sean played the broken crash cymbal in the bathroom. Quite beautiful.

Brian and Grace Rose For Bohdan are here! We played tennis (doubles! with Cris), drank tea, played Odyssey^2 Basketball!, walked by the river, practiced the astonishing new Rose for Bohdan songs, and it is good and it is good. I can't wait to rock tomorrow with the Taken Girls and R4B at the Jasmine Tree.
posted by Jacob Anderson at 1:11 AM

Our garage sale yesterday was a rip-roaring success. I sold a lot of junk, gave away almost as much junk, met fascinating people in our neighborhood, bought lemonade from the kids across the street (who'd set up a stand to feed off our rip-roaring business), got to hang out with pals in the sunshine; it was nice. I got into a conversation about Alice Coltrane with John, a friend of my landlord's who plays drums in the basement, and a garage-sale visitor Tyrone; the sun shone, and the sky was pure blue. I was able to convince the girl who I mentioned yesterday to buy a Little Marcy record; we'll see what comes of that.

Afternoon came and sales were slow, so me, Brian and Jen (who were co-garage-sale-coordinators with me) and Chris and Charlotte and I sat around, playing Scrabble and Virtua Tennis and drinking a whole lot of Henry Weinhard's, and then we went and got completely stuffed on spinach pie at Nicholas's, and the sun went down and we were full and food and alcohol sloshed around in our bellies, and Brian and Jen and I went to Movie Madness (Jen's first time ever, despite being with Tualatin Movie Madness pioneer Brian for years now) and I rented _The Killer_ (which I haven't seen in years and years) but I was too tired to watch it when I got home; I passed out with the lights on and my eyeglasses dangling on the frame of my futon. Oh, it was nice.
posted by Jacob Anderson at 12:19 PM