As the Standing 8s, Riley and I put on our Halloween Show last night, and it was fun! I went as a priest, Riley in her devil outfit. We opened with "(What A) Wonderful World," the old Sam Cooke song which starts, "Don't know much about history..." and did all covers until the end when we played 2 of our own. We even delved into our old band's material, playing "Always" by Shea Seger, "American Girl," and "With or Without You." We did a lot of jazz stuff, which was very different but very cool ("Baby It's Cold Outside," "You Don't Know Me," "Dream a Little Dream"). Riley sang some Janis Joplin, we threw in some Everly Brothers, we even gave a nod to Bryan Adams (the "Cuts Like a Knife" guy from 4th grade... er... whenever). Doug Davies won the costume contest, dressed as what we called a "Junior Executive" (he actually just came from work). We wanted him to win the contest because the prize was a 50s-style flip-haircut wig. He looked hilarious in it, and the photo is on the front page of the Standing 8s website. I'll have some photos of us up there soon, too.

Riley and I are performing our Halloween show tonight, and we had our very first rehearsal last night after a busy day. I think we're going to manage to have it thrown together by 9 pm which, I hope, is when it starts.
The reason the day was so busy: well, it began with going to work after waking up, going for a quick run, eating breakfast and so forth. Then, I left work early to go near Burbank on Cahuenga to "try out" for the Hollywood Squares game show at the suggestion of my friend Brian. I get there, and Lynn Tully, Brian and Karen's former neighbor who used to cut my hair, is also there via Brian's suggestion. We both made it through to the end, so maybe you'll see us both on TV soon. Anyway, neither one of us have ever actually really paid any attention to the show except for one moment last year -- when Brian was on it.
Some of the folks I met there scared me. There was the high-strung lady who knew just a little too much about game shows and the whole process of getting on them. There was the girl who was there because she needed "a new car -- RIGHT NOW." There were many folks who had insider opinions on Bob Barker, on the "Weakest Link" application process, on whether or not a new version of "Scrabble" could make it. And then there was Lynn and there was me, two people who had no idea what the "bonus round" was or that there was such a thing as a "five-square win," but I had a rehearsal and she had a dog to feed, which reminded me that I needed to go feed Brian and Karen's cats...
It was a day of regular folks -- the Air Force cook, the college student, the event coordinator, the elementary school teacher -- all under a microscope in a room in an office building near Universal City, all seeking the approval of production executives, and most were made irregular by all of this (not in a gastro-intestinal sense, thankfully), like when you see your reflection in a funhouse mirror. I'm pretty sure this is the type of thing most actors have to do around here, go around feeling like they're in the funhouse. Or a nuthouse.
Well, luckily I'm in the sane, good ol' regular-guy music business.

Went and had food and drinks and saw the movie Red Dragon tonight. Good movie. Enjoyed the drinks. I haven't gone and had a good stiff drink in a while. I recommend them for occasional use. I doubt that this advice is reflective of, say, step #9 or whatever, but I stand by it.

I must have hit "snooze" five times this morning. I've gotten into the habit of using the cell phone's alarm clock feature (all the ticking from my various clocks finally got to me), so it plays the Popeye song to wake me up -- not the "I just ate spinach" song, but the one you hear in the background when he's just sailing or whatever, before Bluto knocks back a few pints of whiskey and proceeds to slowly, hand-wringingly think about maybe doing something to Olive while he makes grotesque evil-laugh noises. Popeye falls down a lot and gets the crap beat out of him before he remembers -- Hey! Spinach! Right here in my pocket! -- and then the steamboat appears in his bicep...
Anyway, it never gets that far, because I only hear the sailing music.

Los Angeles rocks. Went to a party at Karlyn's tonight... she had an early-halloween throwdown, and Karen, Brian, Greg, and I were the foursome from Seinfeld. Yep -- I was George! Homemade fatsuit and bald cap with peripheral hair glued on. Fatsuit was actually just a pillow... my core body temperature probably reached 104 degrees tonight. We were kind of an amateur/absurdist take on the gang. I'll have photos up soon. Karlyn was Dorothy (Wizard of Oz) -- including hand-designed red-sequined "ruby red slippers." Amazing. Riley was there (as a she-devil) and so many other folks, too many to mention... very fun. Plus, 'Bama killed Ole Miss this afternoon. Great day. Gotta get some sleep...

Got up a little earlier than usual... went by a friend's who has been very ill and we walked up to Jamba Juice for some breakfast & a smoothie. I still think that, when a plane lands at LAX, smoothie-toting LA natives should be in the terminal like the lei-bearing greeters on the Honolulu tarmac, except instead of "Aloha," they should say "Welcome to L.A.... here's your smoothie!" Anyway, it was a great way to start the day.

Every study that comes out about "the worst place to live" or "the stickiest summer" or any other negative report always has Alabama near the top of the list... but not this one! On behalf of all of the residents of my former home state, I would personally like to thank the state of Michigan -- especially that Upper Peninsula with its meat pies! -- for keeping 'Bama out of the top ten of "Least Healthy States." Here's the list:

1. Mississippi
2. Texas
3. West Virginia
4. Kentucky
5. Tennessee
6. Illinois
7. Michigan
8. Missouri
9. Louisiana
10. Arkansas

Still haven't left work. I think I'm going to have some soup before biking home.

I started thinking of songs for Riley & I to do at the Halloween show... don't want to give anything away, though. But I thought I'd ask for suggestions. Anyone? (E-mail me to the right, under the photo.)

More later...

End of a day at work here. The usual sort of day... you know, dealing with volunteers who come in and use the network to download porn. The regular dose.
Riding the bike home today (it's cold & dark, so I'll break out the flashing red light). Will try to write more tonight.

Hello, all. I'm trying out this new Blog thing after getting complaints that the journal page on this site was not getting updated often enough (Nov. 3, 2000 is apparently "not current" to some people!). And seeing as I've moved twice since writing that last entry, and as I've changed jobs since then, and that a lot has happened on the music scene since then, and as I have a nephew now and so on and so forth... anyway, I guess it is safe to say that the journal wasn't really serving its purpose. So... here goes.