23 December
Jesus wept, is it cold!
I mean, isn't this Los Angeles, land of the green Christmas? I mean, if it ain't 80 degrees, it ain't Christmas, by me, and here it is, below freezing at night, and I've got the blankets over my head because my nose is so cold.
Yeah yeah yeah, it's colder in New York, it's colder in Chicago, blah blah blah, I'm cold here! I'm cold now! I'm not supposed to have to wear sweaters these two weeks!
Yesterday was all social and stuff.
First of all, I met my friend Joan from the Randy Newman mailing list for the first time. You see, I needed to record my second song, "Feels Like Home", for the cd our group is making, and the sheet music was so terrible that I couldn't record it with Nik on the piano, so I asked Joan if she could do it with the guitar.
And not only could she record with me, she even had a place to record! We drove way the hell out to West Covina, of all places, to this club where she performs at Open Mic nights, and we did it there.
I ran through it in the key on the music, which I could deal with, though it wasn't exactly the key I would have chosen, but Joan suggested tuning her guitar down half a step, something that never would have occurred to me, and it was much better that way!
After I sang it for the first take, Joan said that if Randy couldn't get Bonnie Raitt (who sang the song on the Faust album), that I was just as good! I thanked her, "But," I said, "It would take much longer to tuned a whole piano down half a step!"
Joan suggested that perhaps Randy, having written the music in the first place, might find it easier to transpose it on the fly than she did.
Anyway, the recording went great, except for the fact that we ended up having to trash half of the takes, because they gave us a recycled tape, and the recorded-over sound bled through. Lesson learned? Always get a new tape, for crying out loud.
Also, I got to listen to the rest of the songs for the cd, and remember how I was worried because of all the tape hiss on the song I recorded with Nik? That everyone else would just be so professional?
Um, no longer a worry.
After I got back from recording with Joan, John had called at last, so I went out to his house.
This is John from The Company That Must Not Be Named, who just packed up and moved to LA with his partner, Mindia, and I didn't have a phone number, but he had my Mom's number, so I had to wait for him to contact me. Which he did at last!
He has a really nice apartment in Hollywood, and the three of us went out for Mexican food, and John ate around the tortillas and beans, prompting me to ask "Are you on Atkins?" Which he is.
A couple of on-line diarists are on it, and John told me about two people we work with who are on it, too, and did very well. I had already decided to go on it in January, when I get back to NY. I mean, I'll really miss Pepsi and potatoes and rice and my sausage biscuits from McDonald's, but I really think I can do this diet. And it really appears to work!
I told Cynthia that I was thinking about Atkins, and she said that she had watched a Quincy rerun on A&E where a girl died on a high-protein diet. "You need to watch Quincy more often! You learn important medical facts from Quincy!!"
Anyway, John.
I didn't have a present for him yet, but neither did he have one for me, he's so broke from the cross-country move, and he doesn't start working until after the holidays. It was really weird seeing him in LA.
Today's horoscope:
You may feel torn between a steady, dependable position versus risking something new and exciting that may have greater payoffs.
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Last Updated Tues 27 December 16:01:09 1998