Too many...

I don't know how many of your minds work like this but do you ever just feel like you have so many things you want to do that you can't figure out what in the hell to do next? This happens to me on a grand scale and miniature scale. It could be my life's aspirations or it could be the mountain of household tasks/errands that tend to pile up.  Incidentally, this is exactly why I plan so meticulously. I make to do lists, I allot time, I schedule, I execute, all so I don't have to think about what to do when it comes time to do it.

On an evening like this though, I made a last minute decision to stay home and not go out to yoga for once. As a result, I found myself with a huge chunk of time I don't normally have, during which I could do a number of things both big and small or I could do nothing. Nothing is planned. All I know is that I had several thoughts on the way home, and on the way in the door, that inspired me, each one knocked out of the running by the one after it, as though they were all sentient and had been waiting for this free time to vie for their position.

It's insane.

One was to plug in my keyboard and learn how to play a riff from a song I can't stop listening to. One was to play guitar with my friggin' amp plugged in for a change (read: loudly). One was to actually riff and come up with a song, perhaps recording some ideas and playing around with them in Logic. Then, my mind drifted toward my laptop and how I had written down that I needed to clean up some folders on it that have been in need of that for some time now.

But some of my laundry is still hanging up and is ready to be folded. Also, damn, I'm hungry and maybe if I cook dinner early I can get to all that other stuff later, if my mind isn't completely drained by then. But I know myself and I know how I'll feel after eating dinner...with Netflix waiting right there to suck me in to something that, let's face it, I've probably already seen before.

Then, I decide again to resist the temptation to become a sloth. I was looking at the Instagram posts of several other gluten free types and even earlier had read about a medical study seeking newly diagnosed Celiacs. Both of these ideas brought back to the front of my mind a genius idea I came up with almost a year and a half ago now. One that I should be starting on any day now. I want to create a YouTube channel for newly diagnosed Celiacs on adjusting to the gluten free lifestyle. Eventually, I've thought it could become a travel show for people with Celiac, or even food allergies in general, centering on the question of how you survive while traveling with these disorders and diseases.

This isn't just in the spitball stage either. I've scripted. I've amassed equipment. I've done screen tests. I've gone back and forth about questions of production style and quality. I've researched. I've gone back to the drawing board and rescripted. I've even considered that with such a vast undertaking I'm going to need a producer and perhaps a team.

So I've repeatedly shelved it to focus on...wait for it...the novel I've been writing. Yes. I'm going to keep it shrouded in secrecy for now and will be publishing it under a pseudonym. You'll know soon enough.

Suffice it to say that it's been by far one of the most enjoyable of the things I devoted my time to lately and I keep coming back to it with renewed eagerness...ask Amy about my random eureka moments. Ideas flood in regularly and I'm connected to all these apps that allow me to take notes on my phone and then access them on my laptop later. I never miss an idea. I keep telling myself that I'm fully in the editing phase now and I've almost got it locked and loaded. But then, I start to realize I don't want to rush the editing phase. As I've started to flesh out some chapters and scenes and add new ones in between, looking back, I've discovered that the novel has grown so much. I would be insane to prematurely declare it done.

In the process, I've even come up with several ideas for other novels, some of them sci-fi. I realize I'm pretty early on in the process of thinking of this like a career and thus, it's still fun. Trying to get this thing published and marketing it may yet break me. But right now, being a writer is a pretty attractive idea to me. Seriously. And not to diminish my other endeavors. I just find myself really enjoying creating this way. I'm drawn to it.

That leads me to the reason I'm sitting down writing this instead of doing any of the things I just mentioned. I recall reading an article about a year ago (I'll try and find it and link it) that basically said busy for the sake of busy was bullshit and no way to live.  You should only really be making time for the things that you truly enjoy doing. That you shouldn't be destroying yourself to do everything you think of just because you once thought it might be cool to do that thing. That was the upshot anyway. And maybe that means one thing at a time or maybe it means I'm a novelist and haven't been much of a composer for a while. I tend towards the first interpretation. The novel is what I'm having fun doing right now and what I choose to conserve my mental energy for. I have momentum there.

Anyway, I won't be writing the novel forever. Then, once it's done, I don't have to start the next one right away. And when I do start it, I can still be doing other things, and decide freely when I switch tasks. The only slight urgency with any of these endeavors is with the Celiac channel and that is that someone might scoop my idea and do it better before I can. Maybe someone already has. But hence the research. With every blog or video I see, I keep thinking of ways to do it my own way and make it unique. I think it'll be fine. It probably doesn't matter. People will always be getting diagnosed with Celiac and I have no shortage of topics to cover there.

At any rate, I keep saying I would want to do it only when I have the time to make it really good. And that's not right now. And it doesn't do any good to be motivated to do it because I just thought about it or I saw a bunch of people being Celiac on the internet and I envisioned myself doing it and already being at the finish line. This has failed me many times. I used to call it rock out envy. I'd be at a show watching a band perform that I was really into or I'd find live footage on YouTube and think, "I need to be doing that again!" The problem is that this doesn't actually motivate you to do the things you need to do to get there. Write stuff that actually inspires you, record it, meet musicians, find the right ones, collaborate, find a rehearsal space, pay for it, book a gig, get people to come, repeatedly. Some of that sounds fun but but whether or not it doesn't, every one of those things take time. Time I could find, sure, time I probably have and don't realize but remember, I still have to fold my laundry and make dinner.

And this all comes after a co worker asked me if I had any New Year's resolutions and I said, without missing a beat, "I want to start a band." Maybe I will, maybe I'll take it one step at a time. Maybe I'll make some new musician friends. Maybe I'll finish the novel first. Maybe nothing will come of it. But I think the important thing is to have fun doing it. And right now I'm having fun writing this blog about it.

End.

Boston and the Lily Pad...

The show went great last night. And getting there from the bus station was no problem either…although there always has to be some element of uncertainty, preferably introduced at the last minute.

Tania and I were riding separate buses and texting each other back and forth the whole way up, trying to guess who would make it to Boston first.  I won.  When we met at the bus station it was only slightly after 4pm and Tania had to eat and run some errands in Boston before the show.  I was going to accompany her but time, as it usually does, was dwindling.  So, Tania was reconsidering her errands which included heading to Staples to make some copies, but decided last second to jump off the train (okay, not off but out of and not jump but run) a stop or two before me and do what she had to do.

Then I was off on my own and though I had hopstopped the directions (multiple times) to the venue, I couldn't quite remember which bus I was supposed to take from Central Square to Inman Square.  The first hop stop directions told me exactly what I wanted to hear but I didn't save or write down the information and every subsequent time I did the same search it kept telling me to go three stops further on the Red Line and travel back in the opposite direction on the bus.  Or it would tell me to walk up Prospect Street instead of taking one of three buses that I knew went down that street.  Instead of fumbling with my phone, hands already full of three heavy bags, though, I decided to do things the old fashioned way and just ask the bus driver "hey does this bus go all the way up to Cambridge Street?"  I received a precursory nod and a "yep" so I figured that was good enough.  Following on the map app on my phone I punched the stop request button just at the right stop and as soon as I turned the corner, there was the Lily Pad.  Not bad, eh?

Okay, so it really wasn't that hard to get there.  When I arrived there was only one guy there and not the audio guy that I had emailed with but someone else who works there.  A nice guy who was sitting around while he had the place to himself practicing the piano.  We had a nice chat about music while I was setting up.  He didn't seem to really know his way around the mixer fully but thankfully, I do. For the most part.  I had everything hooked up but I was getting very faint sound though I had the faders up and the gain "potted up" as they say and had troubleshooted everything else I could think of.  Then I remembered what the Pad buttons do on the top of the channel strips.  They give you a boost in audio gain.  Exactly what I needed…but incidentally, not what you want all of a sudden when you have everything else already turned up and audio going through the speakers.   Good thing the other guy had his ear plugs in…I, however, did not and was pretty startled by the sudden feedback.  Luckily, no one else was there except another of Tania's friends who had shown up while we were waiting.

Tania was stuck in traffic at this point and calling me with instructions of what to tell the audience members who were waiting for the show.  She really only arrived about ten minutes late or so, I guess.  I wasn't really paying attention since I had my setup all finished, usually the most intensive part for me.  The venue was slowly filling up with people and I was comfortably imbibing a Harpoon Cider (when in Rome) and chatting with the bartender, another musician who plays in a psychedelic rock band called Quilts.

When Tania arrived, since I was already set up, the concert started fairly promptly.  I turned pages for the Kapustin piece she played and then we proceeded to do some improvisation, her inside the piano and me with electronics.  I won't say much more about this because we will be doing something similar on Thursday and I want all of you to be uber curious and come to the show to see what we'll be doing.  After that we played Moon, Tides, Cycles and I feel like it went fairly well.  One of our best performances yet.  Of course, some in the audience said they thought the electronics were too quiet…might have had something to do with my fear of feeding back again.

After the concert, the photographer, Jack  Dzamba, whom I had met before the show and with whom we were staying, drove us to where he and Tania were doing a photo shoot.  Also something about which I will not speak as the details shall be revealed at the show on Thursday night!  Luckily, though I was hungry, I had new friends to chat with as Jack's assistant had brought along some of her friends.  We passed the time looking at my Google Skymap app on my phone and trying to find the super moon.

Thoroughly chilled, we dropped the girls off at Boston U and went on to have dinner at Trident Cafe and Bookshop on Newbury Street.  These guys were really great about my gluten intolerance as they take allergies and the like very seriously.  The manager personally dealt with it and asked the cook about everything I ordered just to be safe.  It was great.

Jack put us up at his girlfriend's house in Newton and we each had our own room in this beautifully kept cottage style house.  Coming in late at night, I really didn't get to see the outside that well and had no idea how big it was until we started to wind our way around the house and to our rooms.  His girlfriend's kids no longer live at home so the house was empty except for  her and Jack and four amazing cats, the names of which I cannot remember now.  So, where I almost didn't go to Boston for this concert and originally thought by agreeing to come that I was condemning myself to a night on someone's couch or floor, I found myself in an unlikely but extremely comfortable situation instead.  It was nice to meet new friends and receive their hospitality.

This morning we were dropped off at South Station with about a half an hour left to catch our bus, bought food in the depot and boarded the bus just in time to head back to NYC.  Now, back, shoulders and arms sore from all the walking and lifting, I sit here blogging and preparing for the show this week.  About to send out some press releases and personal messages to some friends and hopefully stay awake long enough to make some progress on the film score.

I had a rock star nap this afternoon after indulging in some Bare Burger at the Park Slope location on 1st and 7th Avenue.  All my cousin has to do is say the word burger to me once after a long weekend of travel and I'm sold.  Anyway, back to it.  For kicks, and before I go, check this out, we're in Time Out NY!

Gluten Free for almost two years...

2:38am.  Tired.  Will soon be rubbing sleep out of eyes.

Spent a nice weekend in NC and didn't even think to blog about any of it until now.  Trips to see the family and friends back in NC are becoming scarcer and more significant.  We managed to coordinate (for the second time in a row) getting everyone out there (I mean all 15 of us, from my parents and siblings to significant others and kids) and despite the cacophony of having that many people in one place, the whole weekend was pretty relaxing.  And I ate.  A lot.  And laughed a lot and played with the kids a lot.  I even had to pack a whole extra bag full of presents and leftover food which prompted me to take a cab ride from the airport…something I rarely do.  But it was much needed what with the weight of everything I was carrying.  Thankfully, I'm at a point where taking a cab in the city is second nature and I know how to avoid getting screwed over.  The cab ride was well worth it, too, because it got me home with time to spare before work.   Yes, straight into overnight after my vacation…that's just how I roll.  

Today (meaning yesterday at the point when this is posting), instead of diving back into work on all the projects I have going on, I sat around the apartment for most of the day getting situated and organizing my thoughts.  Also fixing random things.  The cylinder in the front door lock in my apartment had come loose and I had to take it apart to tighten it up.  Plus a piece of one of my presents (a rather nice mandolin slicer from my brother-in-law Jim) fell off and broke in my bag during the flight so I super-glued that back together as well.   

All in time to make it to another Celiac meetup in the Village.  A maker of gluten free rolls was having a launch party for her new line of bread rolls called Free Bread.  So there was free bread there (plus rolls for purchase).   And they were having buy one get one on all gluten free beer…which was pretty much Redbridge but that was cool.  I brought a friend with who was not Celiac but she didn't mind.  The venue was 116 Macdougal, a cool basement level bar with stone walls and a sense of history about it that I have yet to look into.   There was also a jazz band entertaining us called The Pendulum Swings.  5 horns, bass, drums and keys and one rather eccentric lead singer.    

After the meetup, my friend and I tried to go to Pala Pizza on Allen Street for some more gluten free goodies but found that it was closed this week only for renovations.  So, we hopped a cab over to Risotteria to satiate that gluten free need of mine.  Risotteria is always a winner as far as I'm concerned.  I'm pretty sure tonight was the first time I got to try their pizza, though, as every other time I've gone there I've been compelled to eat the risotto as it's something you can't get anywhere else.  The pizza was damn good though.  Expensive but good.  

It's one of those things though that you just kind of come to expect.  Everything is going to be expensive when it's not in high demand.  All specialty flours and gourmet ingredients.  It costs more to make sure it's gluten free and not cross contaminated.  I'm going on two years since I was diagnosed and despite all this, the expensive food, the difficult social situations and the constant worry that I'm going to end up eating the wrong thing or that I'm unknowingly ingesting something I shouldn't be, I'm feeling pretty confident about it all.   It's not hard to go for days without the worry of getting gluten-ed.  I have my routines, I have my go to foods when I'm in a pinch and I have nothing with me.  And I can handle social situations, especially where drinking is involved, rather easily now.  

The trick to a lot of this is that the information is out there, the advice as well.  It's just a matter of having the right attitude to not despair and say, "I'm going to figure out how to adjust to this."  It took months of not feeling better, going back on gluten and then getting rediagnosed this past March for me to come to that but there it is.   I basically went through all the stages of denial back in 2010 (granted, I did so a little out of order with acceptance coming first with the relief of knowing what was wrong, followed by grief at the loss of all my favorite foods and beverages, but then denial and anger setting in when I started to feel worse and ultimately bargaining starting when I decided that maybe it wouldn't be a big deal if I just ate sprouted grain bread instead of crumbly gluten free bread).  So, this past March when I heard the bad news from my new doctor, I felt bad for half a day but then I talked myself out of the despair.  I thought, "I'm going to approach this totally different this time."  It was my instinct that going through all those stages again was not going to help me at all.  I had a choice of how I was going to look at the diagnosis.  A curse?  Or just my lot.  There are a whole host of other auto immune disorders that are far worse and a dietary change is not the hardest thing in the world to cope with.  I wasn't going to go listing all the things I'd have to go without when I could think of what I can eat and how to be proactive in finding the best ways to acquire those things as inexpensively as possible.  And just get on with living my life.  

And that's that.  Another thing that helps?  Actually going to these Celiac meetups and meeting people who have the same thing I do.  It's about solidarity.   Hopefully, I'll be going to a lot more of them soon.   

    

Blurb #26

We're moving out.  We decided this Friday night.  I came home with the letter drafted and planned on showing Katrina but before I could get through the finer points of what it said as far as our terms, she says, "I think we should just move out."  I was actually pretty excited having thought I would need to do some convincing.  I guess mushrooms in your ceiling are about as convincing as things can get.  I guess that's one thing that's turned out the way I had hoped this week!  That and I heard finally that the Celiac Disease study payment is on its way!

Anyway, I redrafted the letter and Katrina and I spent the rest of the evening on our laptops scouring padmapper.com and our other resources just to get started with the apartment hunt and discussion about our preferences this time around...which include no slumlords.  Anyway, more chronicles of the third New York City move will certainly be forthcoming.  For now, I'm off to the DUMBO Arts Festival with my friend who's visiting from Chicago.  We're headed to brunch at Superfine in DUMBO first.  See ya!

Gluten Free Meetup #1...

Went into the city early before work today to, first, pick up the payment from Mohammad for the film score and, second, go to my first gluten free celiac disease meetup.  I've been putting that last one off for too long.  We were to meet at a Vietnamese restaurant in the Union Square area called L'Annam.   10 people RSVP'ed to the event and 9 showed up.  We were only short the organizer who was sick and couldn't make it. 

Overall, it was a great experience.  The menu itself was a designated gluten free menu that even had instructions on how to order certain dishes gluten free (i.e. "request no soy sauce," or "request Nouc Cham sauce"). One of the people in our group, I learned, was responsible for getting this establishment to write up the gluten free menu. On the table, as well, were bottles of gluten free tamari soy sauce.The food was great and came out piping hot in most cases, and I was able to enjoy a hot sake with my meal along with some pretty classic Asian menu typos (which always set me laughing).  In fact, one such typo motivated the decision for my entree...the red chile sauce on my beef was sold to me as "red child sauce."  Love it!  It was down to that and the "Steamed Grandma recipe."

What was more memorable than good food and even better typos, was actually, for once, getting to meet real Celiacs.  Ever since I've been diagnosed I have yet to meet someone with my disease, save for my new doctor at Columbia University.  Only people who I wind up talking to about it seem to have a wheat allergy or a wheat intolerance to some degree.  The implications of such things are similar but some of these people can still have spelt or slip up and not have to worry necessarily about destroying their body's ability to absorb nutrients.  I can't even describe the feeling I'm getting now, knowing that I have friends now who know exactly what I'm going through.  Conversations throughout the evening, while not always about the disease and its effects, often centered on how we were diagnosed, how we adjusted and how we were doing now.  And of course, where to find good gluten free food and imbibement. 

After the meetup, I took one of my new friends to Risotteria for a gluten free Bard's beer.  It feels good to be able to share something like that with someone who can appreciate it on the level that I do. 

So, feeling pretty stoked about life in general, I'm sitting here at work, having just finished my first "final" mix for Mohammad of the trailer music.  I think we're both pretty satisfied with it and if he approves it should be up on imdb.com by the end of this week.  Look for it!  I'll most likely inform via the blog when this actually happens.  For now, I'm going to go and take care of some work. 

I did it!

I actually slept past 2pm after an overnight shift!  Even despite hammering outside my apartment that woke me up at around 1045am, I still managed to finally sleep it off like a rock star.  It takes a rainy day, with the lack of direct sunlight to make the conditions just right for uninterrupted sleep.  Simple fact of the matter though is that I'm not sure how much longer I can do this.  Although an odd schedule like mine can be conducive to creating sometimes, having the apartment to myself when I'm off work at odd times, it sort of drains you.  And being drained is not conducive to creating.  I can't keep my focus and I start to get a little bedraggled.

This has all kind of gotten me thinking about success and how you measure it.  I harp on a theme on this blog a lot, that I often forget, or that often moves to the back of my mind.  I have already accomplished a lot just by moving up here and sometimes it can help me when I'm feeling overwhelmed to remember this fact.  But I can't stop at that obviously.  Sure moving up here was an accomplishment but there's still more to be done.  I'm semi-comfortable in my routine and am happy with the individual things I've done so far but I'm always trying to get to the next step.  And sometimes, figuring out what that next step is can be a step itself.  So, I find myself at a bit of a crossroads.  Or maybe it's more like a river crossing.  I can see the other side.  I just can't quite find a way to cross over yet.

Specifically, I'm trying to get from a place where I know confidently that I can do the kinds of jobs that I'm after to a place where I'm able to prove that to the people who might hire me to do those jobs.  I've met people who are doing what I want to be doing and I'm getting the impression that I'm not far off.  The thing I keep hearing is that I just need to keep working.  Writing every day.  Networking.  Working on my web presence.  Etc.

I guess I just need to keep my head up and accept that it's not the kind of thing that happens overnight.  It's good to check every once in a while to see if I am, in fact, on track.   I've done a lot this year.  But next year I want to do way more.  I mean way more.  I've already got designs on performing my electronic music and I'm getting closer to logistically being able to do that (learning how to make Mainstage do what I want it to do and buying that one last piece of MIDI equipment that I need).  One place I'm wanting to increase my activity even more, though, is my contemporary music.  Tania is sure to be performing more of my pieces next year and we may even be doing Moon, Tides, Cycles again in the fall.  My goal is to write more not just for her but to get one of my new chamber pieces finished and performed.  Specifically, the one with electronics.  This will be an undertaking of mass proportions however.

On top of all that, the most important goal of mine is to score more films.  And I realize that that one requires more networking than anything else.  I could apply to scoring jobs online until my face falls off but when it comes down to it I haven't done all that much and I'm up against so many other candidates who either have or at least look like they have done way more.  So I have to work on making the kind of connections that I've made with George and Mohammad and bank on the recommendations from the work I have done.  Once I build up work like that, then I'll have a more bloated and impressive portfolio that I can use to apply to jobs with directors that I don't know yet.  That's the idea anyway.  I think I've spoken before on here about breaking things down into manageable steps.  Step 1 in this case would be network.

Funny enough, I'm going to a Celiac Disease meetup next Monday and while I was trolling around meetup.com, it occurred to me to look for filmmaker groups.  Found a few and joined but not all of them have meetups scheduled, nor does it look like they've even been active recently.  I'm already a member of the IFP filmmakers group on Facebook but I've yet to make use of that membership.  Either way, over the course of the next few weeks, and once the music for the trailer for Sides of the Track is finished, I intend to be networking like gangbusters.

If I can get some sleep. Speaking of Facebook, they've been doing this thing lately where your status updates from this day in whatever year appear on the sidebar.  The one from this day in 2010 said something about sleeping in until 5pm and that I guessed my body needed it.  Sort of puts in perspective how long I've been enduring such a crazy schedule.  It'll be two years this January.

Update to the first paragraph of this blog.  The hammering was coming from the apartment above.  They're finally working on fixing all the water damage.  The woman who lives above me wanted to show me all the work they were doing because her apartment was in shambles, all her furniture moved out into the main room while in the bedroom the walls were completely stripped of plaster.  She was complaining in broken English about what an upheaval it was.  Let's just hope that I don't have to endure the same thing in a week.  Why?  Because I'll be sleeping all day again.

Goings on and other fun things...

I've really gotta catch you guys up don't I? I've been hard at work on the film score for a while, mixing and remixing, recorded the oud player the other day and we may do some more recording, plus things are really ramping up with Lacy and we've been playing more consistently at open mics and working on her new stuff and some covers (We just played "Anthem" by Leonard Cohen at this week's Bar 82 open mic). So, things are crazy. I've kind of been trying to build up things to talk about in the next newsletter, which, get excited, is coming up soon!

In the past week, I've had some fun times though in addition to all the work. Monday night, the 4th of July, I went to a cookout at my friend Kirsten's, whom I know from undergraduate days and with whom I reconnected at the Unitarian Church last spring. Met two electronic musicians both named Phil while there and hung out most of the afternoon and all of the evening up until I had to go to work the overnight shift. Some of the Unitarian folks were there too and we all got talking about going to see a concert in Prospect Park, most likely this one, and doing other cool Brooklyn summer things (God, I love this borough!).

Tuesday nights are always fun when I go to Adriana Rizzolo's yoga class at Abhaya. Wednesday night, Lacy and I went to Bar 82 to play the open mic as usual. We did a new song of hers and the Cohen tune, which went over well. Our organizer, Wayne, was highly complimentary of our performance. The rest of the open mic got a bit rowdy but we stuck around until the end. Now, I'm really wishing we hadn't because my very good friend Crystal Bright was in town with her band Crystal Bright and the Silver Hands playing not one but three shows. I stupidly didn't look at the second Facebook invite she put out which announced the three shows as part of her band's whole tour. The first Facebook invite only mentioned the show last night which was at Pete's Candy Store. There was one Tuesday at Pianos and one Wednesday at The Delancey. Man, what a good show at Pete's though. She plays accordion and keys at the same time while balancing a musical saw between her knees and a Ugandan stringed instrument on her nose and occasionally drops it all to pick up a drum she got from Argentina...all with a spectacular backing band. If any of you anywhere ever get the chance to see Crystal's band, go see them, or else! You won't regret it. I had a great time and the other band headlining were great too, Tin Pan. Check them out as well. They rocked the place clean in half with their raucous 1920's style swing. They even sing songs about pirates and toss used CDs at the crowd if you answer pop culture questions correctly between their songs. I caught four.

The ride on the G train home and subsequent walk through downtown Brooklyn because the G wasn't running all the way to Park Slope, was worth it.

This evening, while tired, I'm excited because Tania and I are getting closer and closer to the show we've been talking about for months. I won't give away too much yet but we're working on getting more press on the event. Here's a link to a Daily News blurb about it. We're meeting tomorrow to discuss rehearsals, etc. The show itself is on the 27th of July, a Wednesday night at the Metropolitan Room in the heart of the Flatiron district. So please come all you New Yorkers...and you too mom and dad. I know you'll be up here in the city!

Other than that, some exciting news on the health front: I just had my first appointment with the Celiac experts at Columbia U and I am happy to report that this is the best doctor I've had since both moving to NYC and being diagnosed with this disorder. I spent about an hour and a half there and an hour and fifteen minutes of that was spent talking to the doctor. So, I'm happy about that, especially since I left with Dr. Peter Green's expansive tome on Celiac which is more informative than anything I've read on the subject. Happier days are on the way.

That having been said, I must get some sleep.

Blurb #19

Was reading a little bit more on Kombucha. Apparently I don't have to worry until about the seventh day if nothing is happening and it also doesn't matter whether the culture sits at the bottom or floats at the top. This is the current state of my Kombucha. Sitting pretty at the bottom and not bubbling yet. It'd be a terrible waste of all that organic tea and sugar, not to mention the SCOBY I spent $10 on (probably could have gotten a free one if I'd waited).

All that aside, thanks for indulging me my anti-Celiac disease rant earlier. I'm happy I made my decision and after a long hard day at work, I'm sitting here chewing on some organic concord grapes (damn, these are the best grapes ever, even despite the inordinate amount of seeds!) that I got from the Park Slope Food Co-op. I'm joining next week I've decided. I was in there the other day with Stephanie and I really took a look at all the prices and decided I couldn't justify waiting any longer. It's going to be so much cheaper and it's all good quality. One 2 and 1/2 hour shift per month seems totally reasonable.

Anyhow, I had an opportunity today at work to meet a new musician friend. A co-worker and friend of mine who does the jobs report on NY 1, Asa Aarons, introduced me to a Bulgarian pianist on whom he did a report, or rather, whom he met while doing a story on a unique job fair in the city. She seems really cool and has a lot of acclaim so far. She's played Carnegie Hall, and tons of other locales in the city. But Carnegie Hall sort of trumps all of them, ya know? I'm sort of hoping we'll be able to collaborate but we'll see. She's headed back to Bulgaria for a while to be with her family.

For now, though, listening to her live CD which she gave me has got me on a piano composing kick. So, on top of practicing voice over in the next couple of weeks, I'm going to be making it a point to sit down at the piano daily and improvise. A new piece is born. For now, it's late and I should be sleeping...why do I always end my posts like that?

A slight post script, I've been bad about posting pictures. I may or may not have mentioned a trip to Red Hook to see an outdoor film on Valentino Pier ("Splash" with Tom Hanks) and a subsequent trip to this cocktail bar.

Red Hook is Awesome (Best Shots)

Next, these are shots from the East Village and the Charlie Parker Jazz Festival in Tompkins Square Park from last Sunday. Also a few shots, okay a ton of shots, from some of the community gardens on Avenue C.

Charlier Parker Jazz Fest and East Village Community Gardens

Lastly, Stephanie and I went over to Pratt to see the outdoor sculpture gardens there on Tuesday evening. Even peeked into the steam plant for the whole campus. Pretty intriguing. Read about it here. Apparently the guy who runs the steam equipment does a show every New Year's where he takes all of his equipment out and plays music with it. Sounds cool...I must know more.

Pratt

Coolest thing? I took these with the camera on my Droid and it records locations with the GPS so it can tell you exactly where I was when I snapped them. Too cool. And I realize now that this is way longer than a post script and that this blog is way longer than a blurb. Deal.

A year's worth of...

One more week left in Sunset Park. When I look at it like that, this finally feels like a year later. One lease, twelve unlimited monthly metro cards, and a year's worth of Time Out New York magazines. 8 months of job uncertainty, and 4 more of adjustment to a full time schedule, 11 months of amazing food in NYC and, after one near earth-shattering diagnosis of Celiac Disease, one month of grieving over the loss of Joe's Pizza, Rocco's Pastries, Magnolia's cupcakes, Ruthie's bagels and Amy's Bread. Three trips back to Raleigh, two to Upstate NY, countless train trips and bus rides, even some long harrowing walks in strange neighborhoods trying to find better ways to get home at late hours when the trains weren't running on time...I even estimated that I've probably spent about a week out of the past year waiting for the train in the West 4th Street/Washington Square subway stop and another week waiting for the train at 9th Avenue in Brooklyn.

What a year. How about a year in pictures?

Best of NYC

I feel like I've gotten one hell of a start here, though, I've been thinking about my current path and next steps and that sort of thing lately. It seems like I've gotten a dozen different directions I could go in next and I'm feeling more and more like the answer is not in which direction to go but in how many or how to incorporate them all and still satisfy myself. I've got my electronic music side project baking but also my contemporary music...which more and more I'm wanting to coincide with the electronic project. I know I need to revamp the website and I'm thinking more and more about ways to make a little cash on the side through selling scores or trying to license some of the music I have written and have yet to write.

I've even been thinking about reigniting my interest in starting some kind of voice over work...I've yet to use the word career with this yet because I don't know if I have the energy to simultaneously do that, music and my full time and freelance gigs. But enough people lately have commented on my voice (it's really deep, it's resonant when I want it to be, some even say it's soothing) that I think it's certainly worth considering and I think I would even enjoy doing this kind of work...Plus, the idea occurred to me today that it's something I could incorporate into the business of writing music for people. Why the heck not? Here's the pitch: I can provide voice over and music for your corporate videos and advertisements. Your one-stop shop for creative services.

Sound all right? Anyhow, that's what's on the drawing board at present. But not to distract from the musical stuff. I regret to say that the pressure of finding an apartment and moving have, at least for the moment, have distracted from any kind of progress in that arena. Most importantly, once I get settled I think I'll get to work on the website and also make new business cards. Will probably get new head shots done soon as well. More on that later.

For now, I'm going to bed. There's nothing that'll tire you out like the prospect (not even the act) of packing your things in anticipation of a move, however small.

Gluten...

...Rasputin, Vladimir Putin, Pollutin', Darn tootin'. That's right. I found out the other day that I can't eat gluten. Shouldn't eat gluten, I should say. I could go on eating gluten but it wouldn't be excellent for my health. See I have this thing called Celiac disease. Read the whole wiki article there, if you're interested because I won't get into the nitty gritty of what the disease would do to me if I didn't stop the gluten altogether.

I had an endoscopy done on Wednesday afternoon, the final step in diagnosing the disease, after which the doctor was certain that it was as he had originally assumed from the results of my blood work (that showed a Vitamin D deficiency and the presence of the antibodies typically seen with Celiac disease, two other dead ringers for the disease). The endoscopy was an interesting experience, well, I should say the anesthesia was. I don't remember the procedure because I was out. This was the first time I had ever had general anesthesia and man, was I doped. I don't remember falling asleep but I remember waking up and thinking that I had missed twenty minutes somewhere in there. I felt pretty stoned afterward and, only when that started to wear off did I start to notice the pain in my abdomen from the procedure.

That subsided though within a day thankfully...and gave way to a whole new kind of pain. A bittersweet sort of pain that I experienced the height of in the beer aisle at the grocery store. Yes, that's right. If you read that whole article you'd've seen that barley is in the same family of grains as wheat, Triticeae. Ergo, I cannot drink beer. Hence, I do not see the point in keeping my beer brewing equipment. Thank god, I can still drink wine. And also, thank god that they do make beer with different grains, sorghum mainly. I hear it's a disappointment to say the least, but I'll have to try it.

I think the main point for me to realize is that there are so many options out there beyond beer brewed with some obscure grain that doesn't have gluten in it. Thanks to the wonders of social networking, all I had to do was post a blurb about having to go gluten-free and the flood of resources from my savvy gluten-free friends came, well, flooding in. I'll post some of the best, mainly for you, mom, when I come home next week and you're wondering what to feed me besides potatoes and rice.


Non-Gluten Grains

Gluten free flour substitutions

An article about Oats not necessarily being gluten free.

Trader Joe's list of gluten free products
A Gluten-Free online store
A store that sells gluten-free products here in NYC

The list could go on forever. I even have my eyes on some books that I'm going to buy off of Amazon.com. This is the same sort of fervor with which I attacked my IBS diagnosis, years ago. It's ironic because I felt I had almost gotten those symptoms under control and now this. I'm determined however not to let it bring me down. The trick is going to be looking at this as a life-changing thing but not necessarily a bad one, or the end of anything. I may be cutting things out but I'll be trying things I'd have never thought to have tried. Quinoa. Millet. Flax. Almond Flour, Chickpea Flour, brown rice bread, sorghum beer, different kinds of exotic rice, for crying out loud. The list goes on.

At least I won't have to give up chocolate, wine, coffee or many of the other things that I enjoy. Sure pizza, cookies, muffins, bread, cupcakes, other baked goods, might be a problem but not impossible. A new friend of mine here, who is also gluten-free, (noticing a trend here..gluten-free friends coming out of the woodwork) noticed a gluten-free pizza bakery on 23rd and Park in Manhattan. Then there's these: Risotteria, Baby Cakes, which will make my life easier.

All that having been said. What else is new? Apartment hunting is progressing. We saw two more Park Slope apartments tonight with the fellow who showed us his apartment at 5th and Union the other night. Between the three that he showed us I think we're leaning toward the first, though it was the smallest. It's actually in Park Slope proper, whereas today's shows were down in what I like to call, Sunset-Park-Slope. 20th street and 4th avenue. Almost as shady as my neighborhood. Beyond that, though they had likable qualities i.e. size for the price (both were at $1650 and had decent sized rooms), these apartments were a little further removed from Park Slope proper and even from the closest R train stop than we'd like to be. One was also a railroad layout with the smaller room being a bit too small to fit a full bed into without blocking the door to the other bedroom partially, and not to mention simultaneously filling up every bit of floor space in the room and leaving no room for any other furniture.

Oh, the joys of city living. We're seeing another apartment tomorrow in Astoria and we'll probably make a decision next week. Will keep everyone up to date on that. For now, I should probably get some rest. Early morning this morning and I've been sluggish all day. I have to spend Sunday on finishing the music to George's picture once and for all. Wish me luck with that.