"The Stump" it's what we call the double necked guitar.

 We keep learning that it isn't ideal for kiddi punkrock shows. 
It doesn't ride on the bike very cleanly and all of it's tones compete with Olive's sound. 

The big gutstring I play everyday truly is perfect for the job. But when I'm alone with The Stump, it's all math prog rock. 
The Stump is as complicated as I am.
 I don't play covers but I always hear Rush influence (ala A Farewell to Kings) as well as Yes, David Gilmore,  and occasionally SRV blues sounds.

The Stump is for scoring videos and personal enjoyment. 
For the kid act, it's all about Trigger. On the Gut string I'm more in line with Willie Nelson.

 I named that guitar "Trigger" after Willie's guitar. That ax sings with Olive's tones perfectly. We can do old school country, ska, blues, rock, flamenco, jazz, boogie woogie all the way to stuff that sounds like The Kinks, Black Flag, The Clash and The Ramones. Trigger also perfectly fits on my bike with the amp, books and mic stand. 

I don't jam with people so I try and keep the gear solo act friendly. 
 I never thought I would dig doing a kid act so much but it has all my favorite sounds including the kid crowds howling and laughing. :) It's a great town to be a clown.

I love what spellcheck thinks I'm trying to say with the word "Keistered"

I just had to inform a stranger that "Keistered" does NOT mean intoxicated. It's my favorite part of living in a town with trains and drawbridges. 

Bike traffic jams are a party at best and a meaningful conversation at least. Thanks to that freight train a young man will now have many less confused people as re recounts his last nights libations.

Portlanding the Esplinade

Kid:"fuk", Parent:"It's truck, tell O&D you want a truck balloon.

Kid:"fuk", Parent:"It's truck, tell O&D you want a truck balloon.", 
K:"fuk" 
P:" it's truck!"
 k:"fuk pees" 
p:" say truck, it's a truck, cmon, use your words."
 k:"fuk, fuk, fuk, FUK!(now crying) FUUUUUUK!" 
Cafe denizens are starting to look up from laptops. 
(exasperated) P:" (to Olive) please, my son would like a truckin fuk please." I
t's a riot hearing kids get language together. 
What they are saying and what we hear are very different. 
Our favorite is when a kid asked for a "Taco Doctor". 
He was asking for a helicopter. 
We all cried a little inside when he outgrew that phrase.

In high school my favorite class was the 2 hr. a day Navy officer training class.

In high school my favorite class was the 2 hr. a day Navy officer training class.
It was like being a Mexican kid in Spanish class.
I already knew Naval history from trireme days to cold war era. I could tell you the difference between a Messerschmidt and a Spitfire from the sound of the engine.
Coming from a town with a huge Navy base I not only knew the names of a lot of the ships, lots of us townees even knew where they were. I loved the parts of the class where the Master chief petty officer instructed us in Soviet propaganda.
Now-days I see lots of those tactics being used in our country. Fox is the worse by far. Especially the feedback loops, repeating of disinformation ad nausium and farming confirmation bias.
The part I remembered most was the teachers telling us over and over "The president is the commander in chief but NOT the king.
It's our duty to make sure the leadership is serving their boss...the American people."
I was shocked that they laid it out like that. I made an oath to that Master chief and the flag to look after the country against foreign and domestic threats.
I never wanted to be a military guy but I did get a uniform once.
A soldier on leave from Iraq came to a few of my Open Mic shows. Before he went back he gifted me his entire uniform.
He said, "You thanked me for my service, now I'm thanking you for yours, thanks for fighting for our country Dingo" That was a momentous honor.
It was also a trip owning an outfit I could never wear. It fit me but I wouldn't rock that suit any more than I would copy the local gang colors. Bad idea.
I parted the uniform out to homeless friends and wore the boots until they wore out.
It's everyone's patriotic duty to be hard to fool.
Politicians aren't sports teams.
Vote for policies and voting records not talking heads and personalities.

SE Sunday parkways fun.

Thai tea with the Wifee on Hawthorn then a quick stop at McNuggets for $20 worth of Super Silver Haze

Thai tea with the Wifee on Hawthorn then a quick stop at McNuggets for $20 worth of Super Silver Haze ($17 with the "Portland hookup" discount).

Counting man purses.

 Olive went into the grocery and I stood outside guarding the horses and counting cutoff cargo pants. 31 people rocking them. I had to give mine up when we started our relationship 10 years ago.
 "No woman this century actually wants to see her dude in those ugly things." 
I tried to put some on recently and Olive quickly gigs me. "Chill out on the man purse there Pearl Jam...is that? Eyeliner? Start over dude." Fashion is frikkin brutal.

My computer has never seen a pronograph,

My computer has never seen a pronograph, never bought anything and never downloaded a game.
I'm freaked out about malware.
Then the creepiest thing was the anti malware notices that come with the computer.
They tricked me into buying $40 worth a "protection" that i already have.
Then of all places I log into club penguin hoping to connect with my 12 year old (that sometimes plays on a website for 7 year olds.)
Then suddenly I have a new browser and no clear path back. Boo!
Took me a while to remove all that mess.
To be honest I did open a porn site just now.
I was so curious what it would do if I typed in the search term "banjo". It wasn't pretty.
If you like banjos I don't recommend.
My own banjo has had more sexy adventures than people doing gross stuff to and on them. :)

My kid (Robin P, E.M.T.) was having supper with us and talking about a Doctor she met.

 She was talking about the conversation they were having as she assisted him in sewing a man's ear back on. 
I say "wait, what? How did his ear rip?" She said "he fell" and went back to talking about talking (to the doc) I had to interrupt. 
"He fell?"
 Please tell me that part of the story (I'm all ears). 
She said the old codger had a stroke. When he woke up in the hospital he discovered he couldn't afford that hospital. 
He escaped back to his house intent on going to the V.A. hospital the next day. Then he immediately had another stroke and fell to the floor of his kitchen where he remained...for 3 days. 
The fall ripped his ear but Robin P says he was jacked up all over his body. She went back to talking about the doc. I interrupted again. "How could you have light convo with the old dude freaking out (as I would be). She said he was sedate, calm and into the convo too. 
Right on vets! 
Inspiring that he took care of himself even when the country he fought for refuses to take care of him. He shouldn't have to run away from a hospital. 
The VA is amazing but the politicians who don't fund vet programs create lots of problems. 
If regular health care wasn't such a monumental rip off then every hospital would be a V.A. hospital.

Olive got some pillows at the thrift shop.

 I quickly hopped into bed to try them out. "Don't lay your sweaty head on that pillow" I was confused. "What are we s'posed to do with them?" 
She said they were decorative pillows "They are for show" Now I'm really confused, last I checked we are both reclusive.
 "Who are we showing them to? each other?"
 She said "Yes." 
 Fair enough.
 So after this quick post I'm gonna ask my mate on a date to watch pillow for a while. :)

In the early Zerozees I was a line cook in this Alberta street restaurant.

It was Indian/Burning man themed and it was run like a business conceived at Burning Man with the primary goal of liquidating a trust fund.
It was a very entertaining job and a lot of the employees were already folks I cared about.
Eventually the entire kitchen crew started coming to work dressed as pirates to express our open revolt against the management.

On my cig breaks I would stand out here and look at this building.
The paper plate shaped decorations intrigued me. It wasn't as pretty as it is now.
It was white with trim the color of despair.
I would smoke my smokes and wonder how long I would have to support my family and clown habit by punching a clock.
I was thinking about those times yesterday.
We had a bar gig and a birthday party on Alberta street.
It's great to reminisce as I rolled around with this rascal.
The place I worked at quickly went under.
It was actually fun to ride it to the ground.
I had no idea it would be one of the last time clock jobs I ever had.

We are life rich but often cash poor.

Today was the day we divest from BOA (they fund a lot of oil pipelines) and put our little monies in the credit union. Before going we went into a cafe for a coffee.

The lady in front of us was all smiles. She said (to the barista) I wanna buy Olive and Dingo whatever they are ordering. Our ears perked up and the other patrons looked up smiling.
We were only there for chi and coffee but she was a big fan of the choco cream pie. The nice lady got me this sweet pie and coffee.
People were super nice to us everywhere we went. The Bank people were so friendly we could even use the NO DAPL speech I came up with.
Lots of folks yelling encouraging things at us and honking.
All that makes the last thing so epic. We pass a couple of dudes having lunch outside a bistro and one of them points at us and yells "That's the stupidest f-ing thing I ever saw, I hope you fall!"
That is music to my ears.
It's helpful to keep me from ever becoming "full of myself" but it's also amusing.
Y'see when you yell something that pointlessly negative at a person everyone else is smiling and waving at, guess what atmosphere that creates after we pass?
I hear it's a lot of stink eye. LOL!
I'm guessing %70 of the people like us, %10 hate us and another %10 didn't see us because we move real fast. Human nature is an amazing thing to observe.
The haters actually bolster our fans.
It's surreal to see the various reactions we get.

like what we do? :)

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