Biking and Sailing....

Got into a cleaning frenzy today and all that could stop me was the prospect of finally having some time ride my bike. So, I just got back from a round trip to the library in Grand Army Plaza, up Prospect Park West and back through the park. It feels so free to ride your bike in the park, even with the idiot pedestrians (sorry, if you're a pedestrian) wandering diagonally across the path. I still don't understand this behavior. And it was starting to rain as I was heading back, though not pouring. It was just right.

Anyway, I took today off work so I could make it to see a concert, part of the First Acoustics series at the First UU Brooklyn. The Bob Cunningham Trio will be playing and I'll be taking a friend from work. The same trio is actually performing with the choir tomorrow morning as well for our annual jazz service. Should be fun.

I'm culminating this week with one part disappointment and two parts accomplishment. The disappointment was that I was so close to buying a Middle Eastern Oud off a guy on craigslist out of the budget from the film but the guy backed out last minute. His wife wouldn't let him sell it. But we (both Mohammad and I) are on the hunt for something else. It's looking more and more like I'll be the one to play the part on the recording. Which is totally fine with me. I'm, in fact, excited to do so.

I've gotten most of the work writing the rest of the music all but done. And that's one of the accomplishments from this week. I just edited together the beat I was working on with the subway sounds sample and the Muslim call to prayer sample mixed together and (I think) it sounds awesome! I just laid down a loop of some Darbuka playing to lead into that part as filler until I can actually lay down the tracks for the Oud part. It's all coming together!

The other accomplishment is that I sat with my VO mentor (I'm officially calling her that now) and asked some questions and got a clearer picture in my head of what my next steps should be. I've decided I'm going to keep up applying to jobs on voice123.com (even though I've had no luck) because I'm getting incredible practice out of it. Another thing she brought up is that the order of the cuts on my demo is not the best it could be, i.e. my best read is not up front. It is now. I just edited it together and cut out a glaring mispronunciation that was in one line of a museum audio guide script I read (I should be ashamed of myself). Miraculously the edit that cut out that mispronunciation somehow worked with the background music so that it doesn't sound disjointed at all.

Anyhow, I could stand to take a nap or clean more or eat dinner and I have no idea what I'll do. The sun is back out again and I have half a mind to go back out and soak it up. If only it had come out while I was still at the park. I don't get up there very often, in fact, I went the entire winter without wandering further west than 7th Avenue in Brooklyn. Sad. It's also a bit sad that I let the first three weeks of May pass without taking much advantage of the opportunities I had to get out and do things in the city. (!) I was planning on the Statue of Liberty (booked until September), the Guggenheim (missed my chance to with a friend because I was too busy that week), a boat ride of sorts (didn't have the money at the time for a Circle Line Tour at $36 for the 3-hour cruise around Manhattan) and countless other things. The boat ride keeps coming back to my mind, though, as the next fun thing. Mainly this time around because I just heard about my dad's little sailing adventure out on the Outer Banks of NC where he went to help a friend pick up a boat he had just purchased and sail it to where they were getting the bottom of the boat painted. I got a little jealous but mostly just enthused. I don't know where this desire came from. I think I've wanted to learn how to sail for a long time now, probably ever since the first time I looked on New York Harbor and saw all the sailboats out there in the summer time the first year I was here. I was talking to one of my yoga teachers about it before class the other day because there are always boats going past in the East River while I'm in class and I just struck up a conversation about it. He mentioned to me that there's a volunteer program where you can learn how to sail at the Seaport Museum by South Street Seaport, where two schooners are docked, the Pioneer and the Lettie G. Howard.

I'm going to have to look into this further. Sounds like good times. Anyway, I gotta get some dinner ready here and get ready for the concert tonight. Happy Weekend!