Marty’s blog

Twice in the last week, two different people pointed out to me my inability to stick with one thing.

Lately, I’ve been trying to resume my music career after it has been laying semi-dormant for more than a decade of raising kids and all the stuff that goes along with families and responsibilities and all that.

One dismissed me as being in the throes of a mid-life crisis. For sure! I have several of those a year.

Both used the phrase “Jack of all trades, master of none”. They’re probably right. I have always tended to flit from one thing to another, and back again. Often to the complete frustration of those around me, and to the total confusion of many friends.

Have I ever mastered anything? I don’t know. I think that’s for others to say. Anyhow, have most people?

Several days of self-examination later, I realized an upside: Because of my various involvements, I have friends from many walks of life and very diverse interests. That’s absolutely the best part of my life! (I guess I have to stick in the usual disclaimer: “besides my family, of course”.)

Friends from the music world - are a few of my longest friendships. Unfortunately, many were older when I met them, and many are long gone from this world. But musicians are a weird, unstable group. True to stereotype, musicians can be often irrational. In younger years I dated several. Never would have married one. Are you kidding!?

A lot of egos there, (mostly unjustified). Interesting, in ensembles, how many musicians can come together, like in a symphony orchestra, to achieve a common goal. To express your most personal emotions abstractly in music, to use you hard won skills, and to suppress your enormous ego, for the good of the whole, for the composition - it’s pure communism. And then everyone just packs up and goes home, and you don’t even know the names of most of the other players.

Construction friends: very hard working, honest — no time or energy left in the day to be otherwise.

Several friends and acquaintances are in journalism - met most of them because I’m always good for an irreverent quote, and don’t mind getting into the fray of controversy. (My wife hates that most of all! She would always gets so mad when I didn’t hold my tongue and someone (mis)quoted me.) A well read bunch of friends, and often wonderfully subtle wits and senses of humor.

Teachers and professors. An odder bunch than musicians.

Architects, many odd, very diverse. Some big egos in that group! Some sophisticated minds, difficult to penetrate. Very imaginative, and a surprising number are also amateur musicians (my favorite kind!) and patrons.

Of course, a large number of my friends are also like me. Kind of floating, surviving, staying alive, learning - probably most giving and sharing more than me. Thankfully to my benefit.

I think when people ask: “What are you?” I should just answer “Master of none.”

My buddy Ken was over today. He talked about taking a pass on a business opportunity to spend a couple of days in Mumbai. Very depressing, he was told; people ready to hand you their children - “…please take my baby back to the U.S with you…take her away from this place!”. The majority of the almost 17 million people in Mumbai living on the streets — sanitation, not what even the worst off American would envy. Use your imagination, or just read about it — plenty of sources on the Internet.

Which made me think, as I was Googling it. The Internet has brought the whole world together. Those in India, Pakistan, Afghanistan, South Africa, Iran, Iraq, Palestine, Mexico, Turkey - at least those individuals with access - can read a blog like this and wonder over all the petty things we go on about. Things totally outside of their own realities.

Our petty problems, complaints about this and that, about gas prices going up - though we still drive cars, about food prices going up and then complaining about not having enough money left over to buy this or that gizmo or plasma TV — when most of us have clean running water, and our life expectancy is more than twice many of theirs, and our standard of living - even the worst off Americans, is astronomically higher than many of theirs…

And many of them now have access to the Internet, many speak and read English, and surely many visit some of our web sites (at least my stats say so). So what do they think of us? Do they think we live in fantasy world? Is it a world they wish they could inhabit, or is it a world that they despise? Are we a people that they despise? I really don’t know.

We’re disgusted by their poverty. Are they disgusted by our greed? We think we’re a virtuous people - a virtuous country, proud to be who we are…Americans. How dare any politician, for example, or any politician’s wife even mistakenly imply that she has not always been proud. We’re the best! Aren’t we?

They can see all this in Mumbai, or read about it, thanks to the magic of the Internet. Do they think we think we’re better than them? In India, they have a culture heavily based on class. Do they resent our arrogant pride? Or do they respect it?

I really have no idea. I just wonder what the rest of the world thinks of us when they read our silly blogs? I think of how frivolous to most of the world’s population blogs would seem.

Speaking of gun bans, and the Supreme Court overturning them, and the 2nd Amendment and such. I can tell you, folks out here are just as happy as pie!

A neighbor last week, not one to gossip - she says - kept me standing in my front lawn while I’m being eaten alive by terrorist mosquitoes, giving me the latest on all the neighbors. Among other complaints about the local village government, she was telling me how long it would take the police to get here on a call if there was ever an emergency. Twenty minutes, at least! (we’re still semi-rural)

“Got to have a gun to protect yourself”, she says. “Do you have a gun?”

“No”, I answer.

“But you’re from the city (implied: where all those black people live), aren’t you?”

“Yes”, I say.

“But don’t most people there have guns to protect yourselves?”

“No”, I say.

It went on. More mosquito bites. I was thinking, I will soon die of more mosquito induced blood loss than any bullet could produce. So it seems people like her are seriously afraid of one of “those black people” breaking into their homes at night and doing some bad things.

At night! ” that’s hilarious! I have to mention, it’s pretty dark out here, and without street lights. Often when I get home at night and out of my car, I can’t find the front door of my own house. I can’t even see the house unless someone happened to leave a light on.

The reason the police response is so slow is that there is little of the types of crime that most people irrationally fear - especially at night. Not by any virtue, particularly. There are just less people, and at night, it’s just too damn dark. The popular myth that adding more street lighting helps cut down crime is pretty silly. Somebody can’t burgle your house or murder you in the night if they can’t find you. Anyhow, if you look at the statistics, most break-ins and burglaries happen during the daytime when people are not home, and are crimes of opportunity � open garages, unlocked doors, etc� And, statistically out here, the crimes are not committed by people with dark skin - say, darker than white.

Anyhow, I thought it was time to mention the “R” word. Not in an accusatory fashion, but like, “you know, that sounds kind of racist, and if I didn’t know you better and what a good Christian person you were…”

But truly, nobody here uses the “N” word - no racism out here, by golly! All good Christian folk. No, we just call them “blacks”. All 2.5 of them that live in these parts. Well actually, it’s usually “those blacks” — or “the blacks”.

As opposed to…?

Finally, it looked like she was headed over to not gossip with another neighbor. But she had one more question.

“I heard from [another neighbor] that you play the violin.”

“Yes”, I said.

“Can I ask you kind of an impertinent question?”

“Sure”, I said, “ask away”.

“Are you Jewish?”

“Well, no”, I said. “Why do you ask”?

Yeah, the left hand again.

Was manually closing the garage door for the painters and the middle finger got pinched between two panels. Split the skin and tissue open on the inside of the joint. Three hours in immediate care and four stitches later. Luckily, nothing is broken — I had bone surgury on that finger several years ago after a table saw injury. Totally fucked up my music career for a while. Now just have to watch out for infection.

I keep telling the Frau I want to stop doing this kind of work. But then more work comes in, and the music work doesn’t so fast…and there you are.

Looks like no violin for two more weeks. And I just took it out again this morning for the first time in months! Crap! And it’s hard to type this without that finger too!

On the other hand…ha, ha, ha…here’s the good news. The painters put on the first coat of the stucco color. Cool.

Some of a younger generation have a better handle on things, and are often wiser, than most of us stupid old farts. This from Nicest Girl…:
Hey, Obama, WTF, DUDE!?

It wasn’t supposed to rain until this afternoon. So I set up my woodworking tools outside at 7:30 thinking I’d have at least five or six hours. 10:00 it started to pour and a big rush to pile all the tools and half milled wood into the garage!

And this is what unhappy painters look like.

Time is money for these guys. They showed up at 8:30, set up drops and ladders and after 1/2 hour they’re grabbing all their drops out of the rain.

Looks like an early lunch!

Only this guy seems to be happy.

Singin’ In the Rain is my all-time favorite movie, and Cyd Charisse in it….oh my! I would always watch an old movie, good or bad, if she was in it. Life was good to her, and she was good to it.

Is it really possible to have legs that long?

Today’s Real News

By Myron Hacker, for the Midwest Herald Times Courier Review Journal

As hundreds of same sex couples across California rush to get married, religious conservatives and others warn that the institution of marriage will become meaningless as a result. And in fact, heterosexual married men across the country are now cheering because they can now abandon their wives without any feelings of guilt or regret — and then they can blame it on homosexuals.

In the wake of flooding throughout the Midwest, developers are buying up land from homeowners who bought houses in floodplains and wetlands from earlier developers, and are weary of being flooded out of their homes every year. The Floodplain Developers Association predicts above average profits next year as a new crop of unwitting buyers flock to buy new houses on the banks of major rivers and tributaries.

The president (Bush) has been touring Europe, likely to be his last visit during his presidency. They hope. At a press conference Bush said what a wonderful country Europe was, and that once they solved their healthcare crisis, especially in France and England, citizens of Europe would begin to see the same economic prosperity that was now taking place in the U.S..

Dick Cheney growled at reporters in response to all questions, and therefore there are no quotes or news to report about the leader of the free world.

In Senate hearings Carl Levin is leading an investigation into the mistreatment and torture of suspected terrorists. In his opening statement, Levin said that he and other Democrats were finally waking up from their five year nap, and that “it was going to take time to catch up with the events of the past several years…yawn.”

Following a short visit to the hospital for a terrible headache that he thought might be a brain tumor, Joe Lieberman was diagnosed with a rare multiple personality disorder. To respect Lieberman’s privacy, they would not elaborate or describe any of the symptoms or actions that made him suspect.

And finally, a block of suburban middle class white voters are starting a campaign to have Barack Obama officially declared white. That way they can vote for him and they don’t have to feel bad about electing a black guy.

That Al Gore is will support Obama.

That Obama leads in women’s support.

That the Bush administration lied.

More than once.

That the economy is in the toilet.

That more flooding could occur along the Mississippi.

That the Taliban is having a comeback in Afghanistan.

Because the Bush administration completely mismanaged the war.

That many good people in the military had mentioned the illegality of the mistreatment and torture of prisoners, but were ignored by the administration.

That many, like Kucinich, think Bush has committed more impeachable offences than any other president in history.

That many, like Kucinich, think Cheney has committed more impeachable offences than any other surrogate president in history.

That gay and lesbian couples are rushing to get married in California.

That there is inflation and wholesale prices are going up.

That both presidential candidates are against same sex marriages.

That it would be political suicide if Obama did suppoet same sex marriage.

That religion is finding its way, more and more into politics and government in an alarming way, and it will not stop for many years.

That there is long term energy crisis that has nothing to do with Mideast oil or drilling in ANWAR.

That McCain supports drilling offshore along our most beautiful coastlines.

And that’s just some of today’s news that isn’t really news. I don’t know why I even bother opening the morning paper!

Crap! CRAPCRAPCRAPCRAPCRAPCRAPCRAP. This is what happens when I don’t follow my own advice!

I spent most of the day digging to install a retaining wall next to a portion of the stairs leading from the upper to the lower deck. The idiots who installed the deck back-filled and covered the base and the wooden support structure with dirt. and everything was starting to rot. Fucking idiots.

But that’s not what I’m really bummed about. What happened was that I was dog tired after digging for six hours, but thought I would get a little more done today. So I replaced an outside spigot that froze last winter. Got it done in about an hour and turned the water pressure back on. And suddenly lots of water started coming through the dining room ceiling! Lots of water.

Long story short: The changes in pressure, turrning on and off the water, were just enough to agitate a weak point in the cold water supply pipe to the new bathroom ustairs and a pinhole leak opened up. Don’t let the word “pinhole” deceive you. Water was pouring through the ceiling and flooding my new wood floor in the dining room. Even though we caught it quickly the floor got wet enough and is starting to buckle. Good news is that once it dries out, it will probably shrink back again with little or no damage to the finish (I hope!).

The advice I didn’t follow (my own) was that I should have installed all new copper to replace the cheaper stuff that they used when they built the place. But to save money, we decided not to replace the 3/4 inch risers to the upstairs. Well, it was the riser for the cold water that sprung the leak.


So most of the drywall is down where the plumbers can get to the pipes to do the repair on Monday, and it’ll probably cost me about $400 to $500 to fix the plumbing plus two days of my own labor to repair the drywall, tape and mud it, texure it and prime and paint it again. It’s a bummer because I was already installing trim, some of which will now have to be removed.

Crap. And now I’m always going to be worried about all the other older pipes we left in and didn’t replace in this piece of shit house!

In other news - not that I’m in the mood anymore - the painters are moving along.