Shook Me All Night Long

It was a little hard keeping the Man’s van on the road today…

The Muskafa’s did the Sunday OTR thing again and Mr.O was there to supply me with some ‘red’, his favorite wine of choice. Add a few rum and cokes to the mix, a late night get home, a missed alarm clock (not too bad though) and you have the makings of a ‘drag your butt around’ day. But it’s all good.

It’s like a little bit of summer this week anyway …the temps are supposed to be well above normal for a while which gives me some time to get some last min. yard stuff done. Storm windows (groan), maybe sell my little yellow car that’s taken up residence in the lane for the past year (does that spell white trash or what!), clean some eve-troughs (yea! …?) and maybe even get out and finish off some books/articles that I’ve been neglecting as well. Songs too of course. Add some rehearsals and some tune learning, and by this time next week who knows ….maybe it’ll be a week later!

Here’s King Muskafa’s AC/DC for ya’ll. And yes …it’s all about the money kids

Arts On The Ave

According to their website, AOTA is a “community based, grassroots initiative engaged in developing 118th Avenue as the Community Arts Avenue of Edmonton” …and one of their ways of developing 118th is by presenting a music festival! That makes sense

The new festival is called Kaleido, and I had the pleasure of playing there with Tilo’s latin jazz quintet. It was a little chilly, which is not so good for the bass fingers, but the sun eventually snuck out for a few of our songs and things went along fine. For a new festival (and taking into account the weather) the crowds were a little small – but a good time was had by those in attendance, and the FOH sound, from what I heard was really good. I mean, really good.

Here’s a little sample (via my small mp3 recorder placed in a poor position on stage – not indicative of the show sound of course!) of the song ‘Obsession’ from the Latin Jazz Real Book. It seems to be one of Tilo’s favorites as I remember playing this song at least 8 or so years ago. It is fun though, and I haven’t got to play it since then ..unlike a LOT of other latin stuff I happen to come across.

Alessandro Cortez Lara

new tune…

It’s blues, it’s trombone and it’s sexy and ugly at the same time …can that be good? Details on the Music (NEW) page as usual.

Fall …but I didn’t

The nice thing about biking in the Fall is the lack of bugs.

They were still around, just not in the annoying numbers you might expect.  That, and the promise that slightly colder weather is not only going to free up the trails from all little flying creatures, meandering people and of course the leaves, but that the pre-winter ride is going to be more comfortable …not so sweaty that is.  No small waterways mucking up your recently cleaned bike, and trails that will be a tad bit grippier.  These are all good things.  Until the snow arrives that is.  Yeah, I said it.

The bike worked great though!  Small little problems might be the soft front shocks (luckily adjustable) and the flat tire I just gave myself.  I’ll blame it on a rut …but it was a slow leak, so I won’t complain.  I did fix it though, and while I was at one of the local stores, I got a chance to chat with a guy about being ‘old school’.  I guess that’s me, or at least my bike that is.  I explained to him how it rides great, feels great and I can do all I like to do with it – but he convinced me that I’m only happy because I haven’t tried anything new.  And I think he’s got a point.  Dual suspension bikes have come a long way from when I remember them, and you can cater your equipment to the needs of the terrain with the quick flick of a switch/knob.  The components are better, and as he says – until you try one out, you really don’t know what you’re missing.  So I’ll take him up on that one of these days.  It seems they have some bikes you can demo over a weekend with …promising not to thrash them of course.  So we’ll see. The problem is if I like it, will I easily part with over $2000!?  That’s my car dammit.  And as much as I like biking …how often will I realistically get out?

miles of trails in Edmonton's river valley ...just like this!

Moab and stuff

Breakin’ Away …that’s the new song from Eric, coming to a Top 400 playlist in your area

I like it.  I’m not gonna share it with you cause I haven’t asked him, but I think it’s one of his more ‘accessible’ pieces.  He could use an anti-cave vocalizer to help things along sound wise – but overall the mix was neat.  Pedal-stealy!

My ears are slightly ringing as I just got in from an America Rosa gig.  It was Chilean Independence Day today (or the party was at least) and we seem to have done this gig for the last 4 or 5 years or so.  I was fun.  Too many cumbias though.  I actually like them, but I don’t think this band does them justice.  They’re simple, but deceivingly simple – and I think we have a tendency to over-play, which can be just as bad as playing the wrong thing.  I think I had too much sugar too, but that will happen when you tote along 3 boxes (trays) of those chocolate/vanilla/strawberry wafer cookies with you.  Of course I shared cause I’m a great guy, but I still had a bit too many.  I also had me another Chacarero too …yummmm.  Chacarero!

I was up early this morning and bought myself another Schwinn Moab.  This one was a step up from the one I currently have (lx/dx hardtail with Judy T2 shocks, avid breaks and a Kore headset) and I spent the day transferring parts between the two to eventually come up with something I think I’ll like.  Not that I didn’t like the other Moab, but this one is a 16 in. frame, which for my body size is perfect.  I remember having a 16 in. Stumpjumper a few years back that I just loved to ride.  It gives you that bmx/mtn. bike combination feel that for me, makes me more confident.  And to celebrate, I’m gonna head out for some trails tomorrow.  Fall is in the air, so maybe I’ll bring the camera along.

That reminds me …recharge the rechargeables.

middle of the road

It was one of those longish days today.

Work for the man this morning, work for John in the afternoon and then back to work for the man in the evening. So, when I was taking the recyclable stuff out to the back lane tonight, I found it kinda strange that I felt like running on my way back to the door. Maybe it was the McDonalds I had a few hours earlier? Mmmm.

Anyway, I decided I might as well get it out of my system and go for a short 5k (21 min.) run. When I mentioned this to the roomie, he let me know about his run a few hours earlier. It appears he was cornered by two german shepards on his way back …had to scramble up some railing and scare them away, started running again and they decided to come back for him. It seems they were on their own (sans owner) and out for a good time of sorts. He scared them away again and of course made it back.

And so here was I, running at almost midnight, jumping at every sound/rustle I heard in the bushes as I went. My route was, as usual, through the river valley trails – and at times pitch dark. I didn’t come across any ravenous dogs or anything …maybe a few startled rabbits or squirrels or something, until I got to the LRT footbridge that crosses the river. As I round the corner to get onto its straight section, I came across an obviously homeless guy laying dead center of the cement path. He was curled up like he was sleeping, his hood over his face and his hands/arms bundled in his thin jacket. His clothes were dirty, and he simply laid there. I stopped, and kinda expected him to notice me, maybe tell me to screw off or something, but he didn’t respond. I saw he was breathing because his arms/chest were moving, but he was definitely out of it.

As I bent over and was about to shake him up, I heard a voice about 100m further down along the footbridge. “I called the police already, they’re supposed to be on their way”. He had to yell this a little, but I could hear him no problem as there wasn’t any traffic around. I stood up, and continued my jog over to this other guy. “Yeah, I saw him already ….I think he’s high on something. Anyway, I called the police and they should be here pretty quick. You know, out of the 20 or so people that have passed by, you’re the only one to actually stop to check him out!” – “Yeah, it looks like he might be passed out or something. He’s still breathing, that I know” I replied.

I started off on my run again. I glanced at my watch though, noting the time (12:05 am) because that guy I just talked to didn’t look that ‘regular’ either, and I figured I’d make a call to 911 when I get back home just in case. As I got off the footbridge though, I heard a siren. I looked back across the river and saw an ambulance pulling up to the other end of the bridge …I guess he did call the police.

What was weird though was the fact that nobody stopped to see if the guy was ok – at least according to the person I talked to. I mean, who would normally lay themselves down in the middle of a concrete running/biking/walking path in the middle of the night!? If anything they’d pass out in some bush or something …someplace away from people. Not in the middle of a trail. Maybe that was his plan though …he was feeling that something was wrong, and decided that being in the middle of a busy trail would assure him someone would see him. Someone would help him.

And someone did …eventually. So that’s good. And I didn’t get eaten by dogs either, and that’s just as good. Unless you’re a hungry dog that is.

If it calls, I deny.

If it calls, I deny.
If it rushes in my ear,
and haunts between
counterpoints -
I still deny.
If it bathes me in dull
light and hides my skin
from age -
I deftly deny.
If it paints a trail
in reds and yellows
and nests them
comfortably,
speaking the obvious
in soft tones -
I again deny.

I deny loudly!
I deny with full breath and
laugh …unconvincingly -
behind pale words,
pale in structure and
remiss in voice -
I deny I cry!
I deny!

To the end of all I take that chance,
for the end of all …a stance. A stance!

jesus and/or buddha

In Chapter 7 of Gods after God (titled ‘Christ and the Tao; Stephen Mitchell on Jesus as Zen Master’), Richard Grigg (summarizing Stephen Mitchell) essentially separates a church ‘embellished’ Jesus from one that is more of a holy man or guru of sorts …pulling apart supposedly added material by the Christian Church when the gospels were created – much as Thomas Jefferson earlier concluded …”in the New Testament there is internal evidence that parts of it have proceeded from an extraordinary man; and that other parts are of the fabric of very inferior minds.” pg 97.

Controversy aside, when he parallels Jesus with the Buddha or Zen Masters, Griggs discusses the idea of ‘no self’. No-self, roughly described as the abandonment of attachments by dispelling the ‘isolated ego’ as an illusion and therefore freeing us from our suffering, is the goal of the Buddhist. The Zen practitioner seeks a similar ‘satori‘ …a letting go of the “egotistical need to categorize things and to control them. One simply is, and one sees the things around one, not as entities to be fit into one’s own plans, but rather in their simple ’suchness’. One finds Nirvana within oneself and without, in the world of nature. All things are in Nirvana from the beginning.” pg 100. Freeing ourselves from our suffering is the ultimate goal of this ‘oneness’ or ‘no self’ as proclaimed by a Zen Master/Buddha/Jesus, but something from a further statement that Mitchell makes catches my attention…

“When Jesus talked about the kingdom of God, he was not prophesying about some easy, danger-free perfection that will someday appear. He was talking about a state of being, a way of living at ease among the joys and sorrows of ‘our’ world. It is possible, he said, to be as simple and beautiful as the birds of the sky or the lilies of the field, who are always within the eternal Now. This state of being is not something alien of mystical. We don’t need to earn it. It is already ours. Most of us lose it as we grow up and become self-conscious, but it doesn’t disappear forever; it is always there to be reclaimed, though we have to search hard in order to find it ….Entering the kingdom God means feeling, as if we were floating in the womb of the universe, that we are being taken care of, always, at every moment.” pg. 104.

In this, he describes that oneness we seek as nature itself. Nature, I suppose, would be anything that hasn’t attained human awareness – that is, anything unlike human self-consciousness or realization of sorts. This troubles me because it isolates or ’specializes’ this awareness, and assumes that the ability to become self conscious/aware is strictly a human trait/accomplishment. But isn’t presuming that ability in itself, selfish? We make the egotistical assumption that our experience is unique, ‘above’, or somehow distinct from the natural world. We place ourselves apart from it – then under the guise of attaining an elevated status of ‘no self’, we return to that from which we came. We construct the parameters of our own fulfillment. You simply can’t abandon the ego, because the ego itself permits this situation. Nirvana implies an ego, and without it, there could be no nirvana. Yin & Yang I suppose. Furthermore, to presume that we lose something as we grow-up seems a necessary convenience of this way of thought …otherwise you might argue that an adult who cognitively functions as a 3 year old is living in nirvana. Maybe?

Nature is not in us – it is us, and not something to be had, then lost, and then found again. Suffering too is nature. Dealing with it, it seems, is the human mind at work …making itself unique while at the same time creating elaborate systems to handle its unknowns.

*that’s not such a warm and fuzzy statement*

Zap!

Being a fan of all things ska, I just couldn’t resist sharing this with you – lol. Thanks for the link Karen

LHC (Large Hadron Collider)

The LHC has gone fully operational it seems – and it also appears there are people worried about the world being swallowed by a black hole. My only problem with that, is the fact that I won’t be able to see anything anymore. I mean, life in a black hole is going to suck …a LOT! Everyone is going to have to wear little night-lights on their heads so they don’t bump into things …as well as keep their lights on 24/7. That’s not going to be cheap either …I already pay enough for my electricity bill as it is. Driving will be fine because cars have headlights …same thing with watching my favorite reality shows. But getting around during the day is going to be tough. I think I’m gonna go stock pile some batteries right away.

I’ll probably store them next to my Y2K supplies.

Some neat 3D tours from the LHC site ...wait - something's unplugged! AHHHHHH!