Shots from the Lip

There are three-12 hole harmonicas on my desk (2 chromatic, one diatonic).  Over the past three days I have actually picked each one up and started playing.  After writing this, I plan to play again......how nice it is to start with music again!!!!!   Not this week but either next week or the week I intend to start going to some open mic nites - simply to observe.  How much time can I have?  What can I do vis a vis a screen and projector to add Powerpoint as part of my gig?  I'll find what to do with the video part of things as I write for the second gig but I do know how I want to end the script:  with the 5 IRS/Someone to Watch Over Me slides - this is too strong to abandon - if I can do the Powerpoint, then this is how I will end it......... And I will start the gig with the chromatic harmonica, using it as Jack Benny did with his violin - never quite playing it....but........ Subject to change - the six songs I am now practicing:  Someone...

 It was sunny and 19 degrees at 7:50am this morning as I left the house for an hour of bike riding.  It was overcast during the entire ride at the beach but the sun returned as I rode downtown Santa Monica.....and it felt warm as I rode past Tartine on Arizona St. The temperature, at least according to the weather app, projects a high of 25 degrees outside today.  This is a 'nice' temperature that I'd enjoy  living in  year-round.......but with the trade winds constantly coming in off the ocean, it always feels cooler than that. We'll go to Sawtelle today.  Nijiya Market has 20% off every 29th of the month and today is that day.  I'll go to Nina's for huevos rancheros lunch while Katherine does Panda Express. Tomorrow we go to look at antique jewelry in Beverly Hills.  We'll travel, again, on the Metro 720 bus but be on the lookout for bus detours as that really screwed us up the last time we ventured into Beverly Hills. And on Wednesday?  No...

 -  and Japanese bread at home on Saturday  Katherine had an injection reaction on that kept her in bed with a low-grade fever for a couple of days.  So I did Fromin's for a pancake breakfast on Thursday.......and I over indulged with both an onion bagel smothered with cream cheese and a bialy (thrown in, complimentary, by the owner).........if I keep this up, I'm going to get fat again..... 26 degrees of separation??     Bill Evans is my favorite jazz pianist.  He's most famous for My Foolish Heart.  The song is the title of a movie starring Lois Wheeler.  Lois Wheeler married Edgar Snow in the late 40s.........and Lois and family became friends and clients in the early 1980s..... Yesterday, for the first time, I sketched directly with a pen on watercolor paper.....and later I watercolored in..........this is how I hope to eventually sketch......but still primarily from photos I take......will I sketch from watching instead of watching ...

Katherine ordered WD-40 from Amazon.  The can was defective and pressing the button on top did not function so, at 7:15pm last night I brought a bag with a defective can to Whole Foods for refund prior to going to a comedy show across the street from Whole Foods, at O'Brien's bar 2 blocks from our home. The Amazon employee at Whole Foods verified that the can was broken but because of the low price ($8), there was no refund...we don't want a refund - we want a WD-40 can that works!!!! I passed by O'Brien's going back home, carrying a smelly WD-40 bag, to call Amazon Customer Service.  The bar was empty - was there a show to go on???   If there was, I never made it as I spent a half hour trying to get Amazon.....no success - I could not find a number to communicate with them.......dammit!!  Ah well, a show was not meant to be.......what I do have to go to, first, to observe and after to participate is open mic nights.  There is one in Santa Monica on Monday ...

 Thursday morning - a chance to sleep in a tad bit later because unlike the prior two days, there is no morning class, live, in the Emeritus Building, downtown Santa Monica today......... ....And with Katherine still feeling the results of a medical appointment at St John's on Tuesday, I went to Fromin's for two buttermilk pancakes, two strips of bacon, two cups of coffee and one glass of orange juice.  All prepaid off of the discount payment in advance card!  I am now home and, after reading the day's news, will start working off of my calendared tasks for the day.  I will end, though, with a walk of two blocks to O'Brien' s and local comedy - I need to see how the whole system works - shows, open mic's, et al......before figuring out if I really want to be a night club comic!

So.....I cancelled my photography class on Mondays and added History of Comedy on Wednesday mornings.  John Achorn, the old time actor who acts through the literature he reads in class, is also teaching this one in addition to his Tuesday morning American Novel class. Gertrude Berg - Molly Goldberg - the first woman power both in front of and behind the camera was the topic and we watched a really good documentary video.  There were 60 Zoom attendees and 11 of us in this hybrid class.  Five of us were men....... And then I went for lunch and a movie - Tatami - at the Laemmle Royal.  It was a good film but not, in my opinion, worth the accolades that preceded my watching it.  Still, how can one possibly complain with a $7.00 admission price??! Other than that, it's been, more or less, a lazy day...... Tomorrow night I will walk two blocks to Wilshire and see some local stand-up.....and meet the promoters???

There are 73 Zoom attendees for John Achorn's 6 week summer session SMC Emeritus class.  And there are 13 of us (5 men) who attended this morning. John, an 'oldtimer' at home with his Emeritus class attendees, is an actor who still acts through his reading of the works he covers in class. There is a difference between seeing him on a Zoom class and being in his live classes! True, I don't enjoy the comments of attendees (both live and Zoom) who relish the opportunities of hearing themselves say something, no matter how inane or innocuous what they say.  Such is life........... Over the next four weeks, we're going to read and discuss Carver's book, Short Cuts.  Robert Altman, the film maker did a movie combining his selection and adaptation for film of a bunch of Raymond Carver short stories.....I've already read three of the ten (plus a poem).  After those four weeks, we'll end the summer session watching the Altman film. Tomorrow, Wednesday, I start an...

We started early today.  Katherine has her volunteer services workday at St John's and I went downtown to refresh our transportation Tap Cards and adjust my six week summer session at Santa Monica College.  I am dropping my Monday afternoon digital photography class.  It concentrates upon Photoshop for more than just starting users.  I would be a starting user who has no desire to truly learn that software......so I have (more or less) decided to change my M10 to monochrome mode  and use it - at least once a month - on an urban photography photoshoot.  It is a wonderful camera with the most phenomenal lens I have ever used.  Alas, it is too fucking heavy and I have eye strain focusing with the rangefinder - age has its camera-user problems........   But the CL, with autofocus and a weight light enough to take the camera with a neck strap for a day, is now my primary schlep along......and I am quite happy with that!  I have a wide angle a...

 On a balmy Santa Monica Saturday, after bike riding and handling that which was on my calendar for the day, we went to Montana Avenue once again (#1 BBB to Lincoln where we caught the #18 BBB) regarding Katherine's earring repair.  Going home, we started with the 18 and then Katherine took the #2 BBB at Wilshire to go to Whole Food.  I went home, catching the #4 Metro because it was, in essence, an express bus trip this way. After taking care of 'essentials', I joined Katherine at Whole Foods and then Trader Joe's, walking home to drop off our purchases prior to catching the #1 to Sawtelle where we'll go again on Monday afternoon for a late lunch.  Only I will go one short block south of Santa Monica Blvd on Sawtelle where Nina's, a small Mexican canteen where I had chili rellano last week.  Katherine will take the #17, going to Olympic Blvd and just south of Olympic, Panda Express where she had fond memories of eating a generation ago at Fashion Square in Sher...

 I am a volunteer!!!  St John's Hospital is across the street from our home.  We take advantage of the senior citizens 25% discount at the cafeteria......and I've 'taken advantage' of its nearby emergency facilities where I've been a few times, once as a prelude to a four-day hospital stay. Yesterday, from 10:30am through shortly after 2pm, two of us, one a high school student who will get school credit for volunteer service - and me, a geriatric (but still very much alive) fart who has time to volunteer.  Katherine went through the first orientation on 17 May (while I prepped for my Improv gig later on that day).  There was another orientation on Friday, 30 May, the day after I returned from Japan - and I was in no condition to sit through a five hour orientation that day.  And then there were two of us left - we did the orientation yesterday in the 4th floor conference room, comfortable when Katherine and 21 others did it on 17 May......cold as hell with ...

 It's Wednesday in a week with no classes.  The Spring Semester ended last week at Santa Monica College and the Summer Session - 8 weeks duration - begins next week......only I have no idea what classes I am actually enrolled in......... The school screwed up with my submitted enrollment application for the summer and I lost the papers I had that I subsequently submitted, correcting them.  I think that the classes I should have are all Zoom classes this summer so I will await email notifications - no notification/no class.......it's only 8 weeks, anyway.......and when 14 July comes, I will make sure that I have back up to the paperwork I submit for the Fall Semester at SMC! Today - more or less catching up on all the small shit that's accumulated around here - and starting anew - and very, very seriously - upon editing and expanding the stuff from my Improv stand-up gig.......and as I write, I will mumble to myself during my afternoon daily walks, looking like a homeless ...

I stayed in bed until 8am.  By 8:20am, dressed and ready for the day, I did my morning walk......and after going out a second time (during which I got non-fat milk by mistake, not non-fat Greek yogurt from Trader Joe's), I am now, at 10:32am, just shy of 4,000 steps......not too shabby at all! Yesterday I finally stopped for lunch at Nina's Cafe, a Mexican restaurant on Sawtelle, half a block south of Santa Monica Blvd, where I had a wonderful chili rellano plate - now, if I only knew how to transfer photos from my phone to this computer, I would include them on the blog.....some day....... It was an exceptional day out - temperature was 26C and I walked through both Hashimoto and Yamaguchi nurseries after Nina's, on my way, first to Daiso (sketch pads!!!) and then Nijiya Market for octopus balls and desserts to take home on the #7 bus, another block +, south.   Good afternoon for photoshooting!!!

 Yesterday was the day after a whole lot of citizenry came out to let the world know that they were peacefully going to show their beliefs.........but will those who are currently blatantly violating the US Constitution pay any attention? What happens next? Regardless, I was in downtown Los Angeles yesterday, prior to taking one additional Metro train one additional stop to get to the Music Center area.  I was planning to do a photoshoot......everything was cordoned off and other than a walk along balmy 27 C Grand Avenue, there was not much to take pictures of.  The opera, Rigoletto, was great! Los Angeles Opera is in trouble.....San Francisco Opera is in trouble..........there's not enough money to go around and as a result, opera is suffering.  Will opera die out?  Yes, eventually.......everything changes - that's life.  Do I really care what is available for public consumption in the future?  Hell no!  I care about now and my lifetime.....and w...

 The temperature is projected to go up to 27 degrees today.  I biked this morning, riding under the sun on a simply beautiful day to be out and about! I have a ticket for the opera today - Rigoletto - last of the 5 operas for the current season.  Next season there will only be 4 operas plus West Side Story. Next season I will also go to the AMC 7 in Santa Monica for a monthly morning opera live from the Met. Yesterday we went to Montana Avenue and walked the shopping district.  I've ridden Montana over the past 19 months but, amazingly, Katherine has never been there before.  We went to a jeweler referred by one of my SMC instructors and had trifle as an afternoon dessert from Sweet Lady Jane. We took the #18 BBB on Lincoln. It turns on Montana and goes east.  We went in the opposite direction going home.  At Lincoln and Santa Monica Blvd, we transferred to the #1 bus to complete the journey home.  If one has the patience to wait for a bus, then p...

 My radio station of choice is WQXR and on this Saturday morning, the Metropolitan Opera's annual competition is on, live from the Met - nothing but popular arias for the next 90 minutes.....I like that! I do not get either Dodger or Angel games - local black outs apply....but I get the other 28 MLB teams and games - this is the best at 10:21am in L.A, And obviously, I am writing now.....! Last night, finally, I went to the Broad Stage for an evening performance:  the Spring Recital of the vocal classes at Santa Monica College.  This was held, not in the Broad Stage building but the classroom building next door where there was a small (250 seats??) theatre in which a 'graduation' gig, similar to the one I did for stand-up at the Improv, at which 21 performers, ranging in age from 18-19 year-olds through a few who definitely were in theur 60s, did their thing.  Community education here offers one the opportunity to get involved in ways I never anticipated prior to com...

 True, the weather at 7:30am in Santa Monica was sadly, typical of what we've had since we arrived at the end of September, 2023:  lousy in the mornings; lousy when I most want it not to be lousy so I can enjoy bike riding in a warmer, sunnier atmosphere.......... O.K., so it looked dismal outside this morning - but at least I got a picture to draw and paint later on today..... I looked at the movie schedules this week at both Laemmle theatres I go to and the Santa Monica AMC.  With the new afternoon discounts at the AMC and the $7 tickets at the Laemmle Royal, my afternoons will be permanently changed (as long as the low prices stay in effect) by going to one, possibly two movies a week.  Next week?  Possibly next Wednesday at the AMC....we shall see..... They've cancelled the LA Phil concerts this week because of the proximity to downtown LA and the 'riot patrolled areas'.  As of today, Rigoletto on Sunday afternoon is still on......and tonight I plan to ...

 The rent and maintenance are too high in Santa Monica so this bargain does not exist at the Santa Monica Laemmle which, in its favor, still does have a favorable discount ($13) compared to other entertainment downtown AND does show other selections so as not to be in 'competition' with the Royal, its West LA member in this wonderful art house chain of movie theatres. $7 for seniors for the 1pm first movie of the day.   And since it is a BBB bus ride away (and near some good alternative restaurants - if one happens to be in that area) I will henceforth and forevermore keep following the Laemmle Royal, next to Blick, for whatever it is showing......and the chances are I will be there once, perhaps twice a week, adding this one to my list of activities in my area....I like this!!!!! Last week I saw a French romance/comedy:  Jane Austen Ruined My Life.  Yesterday I saw Bad Shabbos.  Both provoked belly laughs..... And here's one more:  There is a vocal co...

 There's a riot going on here in L.A. County.........L.A. County is a big fucking place!  If one is taking place, going on and about the things I normally do or places I go to, I'd never know that something is happening.....Hey, I'm currently oblivious to baseball - I lost interest and soon am going to have to re-kindle it..........NBA?  I have absolutely no idea........but I am keeping track of NPB! I have opera tickets for Sunday, the 15th.  Will it be cancelled because the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion, while on Bunker Hill, is virtually next to DTLA where there have been 'events' this past week.  Send in the army and things will get out of control - I experienced this in 1968, 1989, 2019 - I was 'acquainted' with the smell of tear gas - and then, on the 14th, the day before the opera (which also happens to be on Father's Day), there are the parade in DC and the protests around the country - what will this do?? Have fun, my friends, we most definitely are...

 John Achorn, a veteran teacher, actor, invited one of his former students to today's final class, The American Novel, where we read, compared, contrasted and enjoyed John's acting through Huckleberry Finn and James. The friend:  Domnic Hoffman, the narrator of the audio book James.....who was paid a flat fee prior to the book's publication and even though he's won awards, does not partake in any royalties.  Hoffman also did audio for James McBride's Heaven and Earth Grocery Store where he learned mid-European/Yiddish dialects for 13 different characters.......Hoffman is black, not Jewish........and a writer who has had to hustle throughout life in a world where fewer and fewer read - and what they now read comes from new genres. He was a four actor ensemble that just did Henry Johnson, a new David Mamet play that ran full house for 42 performances and was made for film:   henryjohnsonmovie.com Rental is $10.  I will watch tonight  

 No time yesterday - could not do any blog writing......and now I have limited time until I have to leave for my first class of the week/last session of the semester of this, my first class of the week. Drawing. Did I learn much from the syllabus of what should be accomplished for a first time drawing class?  No.  was I motivated to find what I want to draw/how I want to draw?  Absolutely, yes!!  I 'discovered'  Saul Steinberg and whimsical line drawing.......and while I do not religiously adhere to any one particular format for doing a urban sketch journal (or a journal at all, for that matter!), I recognize that I do not want someone looking over my shoulder, were I to sketch outside.......and that I am happy to be taking out my cameras again and hope to do so virtually every day in order to find pictures I want to draw on either of two sized sketch pads or good watercolor sketch paper.......... So......very soon off to my first class of the week - a bus ...

 My calendar for today (as with every Friday, Saturday and Sunday) starts with a bike ride.  Only we slept in late - like to 9:20am this morning - and how absolutely delightful a morning it was! Yesterday I was supposed to bike ride - Katherine thought I did - I did not.  I went on a photoshoot, walking westward on Santa Monica Blvd from Sawtelle in West LA to Bundy.  I passed Talay, a Thai-Chinese restaurant where I returned later the same day to go to the Laemmle Royal, next door to Blick Art Supplies. I intended to go to see Bad Shabbos, an art house comedy reviewed favorably in the NY Times.  I made a mistake and found myself in the wrong room of the three screen theatre - I started seeing the French-English comedy Jane Austen Ruined My Life. Hey, it was a great mistake because it simply re-kindled an interest in going to the movies again - especially where I can take advantage of Senior Citizen discounts ($7 for first show of the day at the Royal for old fa...

 Yesterday morning I charged the batteries for my M10.  This morning I took it out on a photoshoot......and it felt good! True, this Leica is a heavy motherfucker but I have a Samsonite, stap over the head and shoulder carrying case and while one can feel the heaviness, it is tolerable and I MUST start using this simply phenomenal lens again far more frequently.  Obviously, I cannot take this out all the time - both this and the CL are big and bulky enough (aside from the weight) that if I have anything else to carry with me at that time, I have to forego carrying the camera. I gave Joanna my old Leica D.  I gave TianTian my Leica X.  These are remarkable point and shoot cameras and light enough to take with them frequently - if there is any photography interest.  If not?  Such is life......I like taking pictures!  I like street photography!  I like sketching and drawing from the pictures I take! And I like 'discovering' that the Laemle next ...

 Yesterday I sketched Jingu Stadium, today I've started on a picture I took of our dining table, loaded with liquor bottles (actually, four bottles plus flower holder ain't much!).  I then re-charged and set up my M10 to go out on a photoshoot.  That camera is a heavy motherfucker but the pictures generated from that lens are the best I have ever taken - continually.  I also re-loaded a complete M10 guide on my Kindle. The Jingu sketch, if nothing else, captured stadium stands with lighting atop.......I could not expect more.  I penciled my sketch for today....got to ink outline it next.  This is more of a drawing than a sketch yet I do have the ability to do something like this fairly rapidly and this portends both being able to do more and being able to do more better because I am practicing - so far - every day.   Can I eventually do cartooning this way, too? Last night I started watching MI 1 on Netflix.  Over the past couple of years I'v...

One of these days we're finally going to have help to get pictures taken on my iPhone transferred to my Windows machine with the capability of showing them here on the blog.......and whoever helps me to do this will, perhaps, also show me how to pair up my phone to my Fire so I can be online with the Fire, too!!! So - is there any help out there for this technophobe?? Tim and Doug were over and Katherine set up a wonderful afternoon food table to go with all the conversations.......a fine time was had by the four of us.....but since I am already late for class, it looks like I will not write this up - perhaps next time.....such is life.....off to school! 

OK  Here it is, Monday morning, the first true day that I am back from vacation and now that I'm back, I have to program myself - invigorated with music and art goals......with stand-up thrown in as well! This week and next are the last weeks of the Spring Semester.  I have my drawing class this morning and I have the instructor, Stephanie Donon, to thank for both discovering and buying Saul Steinberg's All in Line and Danny Gregory's An Illustrated Life......and for assisting me in discovering that urban sketching with enhanced watercolors is what I want to do!!! Freddie will help me in coloring.....Stephanie found a way to take pictures and draw from them..... Starting 23 June, I 'replace' drawing with photography.....

 I lost a few days:  barfing at LAX while waiting for my Uber was not the greatest feeling in the world.  Yet the discovery that requesting a wheelchair had fringe benefits of being able to go through Customs without a wait! That was the afternoon of 29 May.  It is now mid-morning on Sunday, 1 June.  I went bike riding this morning - first time in over 3 weeks - and it really did feel good! I am now ready to start writing funny again.  On 17 May I did my first stand-up gig.  It will not be my last gig!  I was invited that night (but wisely turned down, not even anticipating that I'd be sick) to do three shows this week.   I'm not ready yet. For the 17th, 8 jokes worked - and wow - does it feel good to hear the belly laughs!!!!!  Four are in need of work - timing?????   And 4 did not work at all and have to be replaced. For those of you out there who, perchance, are reading this, perhaps you are old enough to remember Jack ...