culver city, whiskey and an odd church

Howdy! It is Sunday evening in Culver City California. The job hunt is still on but I'm feeling good about something happening soon. I get a strange feeling that I'm not the only starving artist out here looking for a job...crazy. I haven't been up to speed on these blogs so I've got some catching up to do. So...i did move to an apartment in Culver City. My roommate's American name is Mike Harrison-but I later found out that his real name is Moshe Hajimshe? Somewhere in there on that last name...anyway he is a really great guy from Israel, so I'm working on keeping things kosher in the kitchen. When I moved in he offered me a sun dried banana and a shot of champagne as a welcome! Kosher champagne is delicious! I will also be playing at the Whiskey a go go on Friday as my first gig in Los Angeles. I'm doing my best not to flip out that Jimi has played there as well as Zeppelin, the Doors and quite a number more of my hero's. So I'm sure I'll have a story or two from that night.
Last night I went to a bar-b-Q at one of my mom's sorority sister's houses in Pacific Palisades. I had to take highway one up around Santa Monica and Venice...which made it amazingly hard to concentrate on the road. The Pacific Ocean was shining like a National Guitar! Everything was great! The food, the company, the pink margaritas. I feel like I had some California parents stuffing me with good food and sending me home with leftovers. Thank you Jan and Bill if you happen to be reading this!!!!
This morning I walked down to a church I had found online that was within walking distance(about a mile or so) only to find a law office in its place...a good thing was it was next to a local park and community center so I walked around watching softballers, skateboarders, walkers and joggers through the sounds of Son House on my iPod. After walking around a bit I did find a church that started in the next 10 minutes! Great! It was...a bit odd I guess. I'm not sure if any of the other 20 to 30 people caught this but the piano player started playing “Memories” from the musical Cats to start the service...interesting. We sang a few hymns and then they then lit a candle for each of the world religions including Buddhism, Hinduism, Sikhism, Judaism, Islam, Christianity and one for all Indigenous religions. I was a little confused at this point. We then read from scripture John 14:6 “ I am the way the truth and the life...” the pastor then went on to talk about the power of the phrase “I am” and the power of our conscience selves being one with the universe and backed up her thought process with teachings from Buddhism and meditation on ourselves. while all this is going on the windows are open and the sound of mariachi accordians can be heard in the background. She closed by having us close our eyes as she read a poem she wrote about the service. Now...I realize I'm from the Bible belt...and I don't really want to be closed minded about things out here but that seemed a bit strange and fairly contradictory to me. Why would you go to church to meditate on your own self? I kinda think we probably do enough of that throughout the week anyway. I dunno, I guess I'm just more of a Jesus kind of guy....aaaannywhoo-after that I went to an interview at a gym in Venice where the job hunting continued. As for now I'm gonna break into these leftovers, play some guitar and call it a night!

ups and downs

I'm approaching being here a week now...and so far it's been full of ups and downs. I tend to get a little stressed out and overwhelmed by everything...do I get a job first, then an apartment? Or the other way around? Why is there so much traffic? Where's my buddy Moses? What if I don't find a job a place to live? What if what if what if....on the other hand- we have different fingers...AND it's REALLY exciting! On Friday I was scrolling through jobs on Craigslist when I saw something about being an extra in a horror film...hmmm....so I called the agency and and made an appointment for later that day-which was actually about 2 blocks down the street. I went to Kinko's printed some head shots and went on my way. I got there at 4pm to meet the agent. I signed in and got a script to read to the agent when they called us in. pretty funny scene-sitting there watching everyone reading over their script silently in their heads. Anyway- I get called in and talk to the lady a while and do my little reading...i was supposed to be a guy whose back was going out! Ha! She asked for more head shots and a resume for their system which I guess I take a good sign. After finding out I played guitar she asked if I was fluent in french-she was looking for a guitar playing french guy in another movie. Dang! I shoulda said we! Later that evening, after walking down sunset strip to buy groceries, I went to a place called the Hotel cafe where singer songwriters play their tunes. It gets so quite in there! I had to whisper to the bartender for my drink. “psst....can I get a Guinness? Shhh!” I chose Guinness due to the fact that it would take me a while to drink that meal in a can. It was all really cool stuff.
On Saturday my friend Emily got me a ticket to a small concert on a vineyard in Malibu...it was every bit as cool as it sounds! Can't really even describe how pretty it was! I got to meet a lot of great people who were all excited that I had moved here just the other day. I got lots of “Welcome to California!”s and got to hear a lot of other people's stories that started out in a similar fashion. We then joined the band to a house party where the bass player was DJ-ing. The house turned out to be this huge mansion in the hills over looking the city...i kinda had to keep pinching myself. It was a nice welcome to the city! Of course I then had to come back to the reality of needing to get a job and real place to live. Like I said ups and downs. Anyway-tomorrow is another day and I can't wait to see what it holds!!

out in LA

I made it! I'm at a pay by the week motel on Whitley ave. around the corner from Hollywood blvd. I got in pretty late last night after a long drive from Flagstaff. I was planning on being quite a bit further down the road than that but a sand storm held me up in Winslow Arizona-it was such a fine sight to see. So...I 40 was out of commission and I began debating whether or not to get off course to try and go around the storm. If someone is reading this that doesn't know me very well...i am absolutely notorious for getting lost in even the places I've been dozens of times before, let alone new places in new states. Against maybe my better judgment I try to sneak around the storm...and of course I go about 40 miles in the wrong direction...typical. Actually I went the right direction just past where I was supposed to turn which was Lake Mary Rd. off of 87 south. Anyway- I'm in this motel for the next week. I've emailed some people about apartments and spent most of the day trying to get familiar with the subways and buses. For the most part I feel a bit overwhelmed. What did I just do?!?! I don't know what made it sink in that I am in a crazy place...coulda been the shaman/medicine man named Moses I had a conversation with in the lobby, or it coulda been the lady yelling that we're all gonna f-ing die, or it coulda been the girl next door giving a guy very descriptive directions on how to get to the gay and lesbian bar. Oh well...we'll see what tomorrow brings!

From Gallup

I'm sitting on the bed of a sleep inn in Gallup, New Mexico watching 24 and strumming some tunes on my favorite Taylor guitar...by the way my favorite guitar is the one I'm playing right now. Right now it's the Taylor-yesterday it was my uncle's Guild. After my insane week with 1st graders my mom and I went to our farm in Nacogdoches, Texas. I've written quite a few songs sitting on the swing in front of the red house. The songs “Indigo Blue” and “Old Guitar” come to mind. I do love the farm. It was cool to walk around the front pond with a chorus of bull frogs, tree frogs, crickets and probably quite a few other critters joining in with lightening bugs leading the way as the sun set. They all produced the great white noise of the swamp! After that we came back, I packed up and headed out on this little journey/adventure/life experiment of mine. I stopped by my Dad's and then to my brother's to see the fam! Then a little farther west to my grandparents house in Altus, Oklahoma. This is where I played on my then favorite guitar, the Guild! I love Altus! I always get some good guitar lessons from my uncle Jeff. My other uncle Lee did the artwork on the album which I think is way cool! Some very memorable Christmases occurred when my first acoustic guitar showed up next to my stocking and a few years later when I was lead on some what of a treasure hunt to find my first electric guitar. I remember stepping on a small box while passing out presents. I felt bad because I probably just ruined whatever was in the box...but it didn't have a name on it so I moved on. When all the presents were handed out there was still that one crushed up sad looking little box. I asked my dad who's it was and still felt bad about stepping on it. He said he didn't know but to just open it and see what it was. To my surprise four guitar picks came out with directions where to look for something to use em on. What a day!! Now I just need some directions on how to get to California! Ha! I've been on I40 for about 8 hours today and I think tomorrow looks about the same. It's a really pretty drive though... After having to fight the wind in west Texas....other than that its been awesome! Gonna try to get some sleep before continuing west. GOODNIGHT!!!

obviously i haven't gotten myself in the habbit of writing in this thing. a lot of cool stuff is going on though. got the album done, artwork done, website is almost done. i'm packing my stuff and cleaning my room getting ready to head west to california. i keep getting called to do some substituting though. i figure its a good way to get a few more bucks in my pocket before going. that was until i accepted a job to do a week in a first grade class while the teacher was administering the taks test. i walk into the classroom and the first thing that happens is one of the little first graders greets me with a karate chop to my balls...the week kinda went down hill from there. to get the kids out of the school while the oh so ever important taks test is going on, we went on a field trip to the zoo. me and the first graders actually got the zoo security called on us...wait it was actually them that got the zoo sheriff out but because i was wearing a school shirt and badge i kinda got in trouble for it. i always liked it when we had subs in school but i'm not too keen on the other side of the equation. anyway...these kids got two parrots to start fighting by doing the "fight! fight! fight!" chant. of course i don't really know any of their names so its kinda harder for me to get their attention and get em to stop. we had the zoo patrol follow us the rest of the day. i'm just glad none of the kids had an "accident" at the alligator pond. needless to say that week persuaded me to get my stuff done so i can go to california and persue my dreams of making music!