Monthly Archives: March 2018

monday morning chloé showed me the cover of KC Studio. it’s one of the local magazines that covers kansas city’s art scene. the march/april issue features a rocket grants project: alter, which on the surface looks like a party that never stops. according to the article, “calling it a party is a way to trick people into looking at art.”

a couple of days ago the good folks at the johnson county makerspace posted a creation made with laser engraved corian tiles. it popped up on instagram about the same time i got my first make magazine in the mail! jenny got me a subscription for christmas. now i know how my make my own  running shoes from old tires!

there’s really nothing new to write about. i’m just trying to be productive while waiting for something to happen, like a call from the library saying “you’ve got the job!” or a buyer for the jeep. if i could reel in either one of those fish it would be a good day. in the meantime i’m gonna work on church music, third friday music, & beep related stuff. maybe if i act like i don’t care, the fish will bite.

last sunday warren brought andrew over for another guitar lesson. afterward we ate pizza & salad. for dessert andrew said “let’s eat bean boozled jelly beans!” apparently these jelly beans have good and bad flavors in identical colors, and you don’t know what’s what until you start chewing. for example a yellow jelly bean can taste like buttered popcorn or a rotten egg. i bit into that one (popcorn) after spitting out a white one that tasted like spoiled milk. andrew got 3 bad ones before he chewed on a strawberry banana smoothie flavor. it was either gonna taste like that or dead fish according to the back cover of the box. warren got 3 good ones before he bit into the barf bean.

jenny & i saw this statue in a ritzy part of kansas city saturday night. i said “hey honey if you stand over there and make a shocked expression, i’ll take a picture.” here is the fruits of our weird labor.

songwriting can be treacherous… like playing with a cat that might draw blood if you tease him enough. sometimes the words and music to a song are like the contents of a shaken soda can– they just spew out, and you hope you can catch some of it before it fizzles away. here is something that chris mull & i caught friday afternoon:

You don’t need four wheels if you’ve got two feet
On Santa Fe or 80th Street
There’s art on the walls, songs in the air
If you want something cool, you can find it right here

We’re all lucky… to be local
on third Fridays in Old OP

If it’s warm we’re outside, when it’s cold we go in
we did it last year and we’ll do it again
Penny paints trees, Kitch carves them up
the veggies go beep and sometimes it gets rough

but we’re lucky… to be local
on third Fridays in Old OP

We go from strangers to friends in this part of town
we drink the same coffee, we walk the same ground
I’ll look out for you you can look out for me
when I’m walking to work down the same street

When the traffic lets up it’s time to go home
we put stuff away and turn off the phone
but in a month we’ll be back with something new
I can’t help but smile when I think about it too

We’re all lucky… to be local
on third Fridays in Old OP

the following illustrations were drawn by my nephew, reggie herman. his original description on instagram said “Here’s a sort of weird comic I’ve been working on during my lunch breaks this week.” i think it’s an inspired piece of work, and i’m proud to be his uncle.

recently my cousin’s son andrew told me “if you find an indian shooting a star on your tootsie roll pop wrapper, you can exchange the wrapper for a free tootsie roll pop!” i said “what???” andrew just turned 10, and he likes to tell jokes. then warren (his dad, my cousin) said, “yeah! apparently the tootsie roll company has been doing this since the 1800′s. andrew always trades his ‘indian star’ wrapper in for a free tootsie roll pop. he hasn’t had to pay for one in a long time.” i checked a few sources online… there is no promotion. my little cousin is probably getting free candy because he’s looking up at store clerks. he’s pointing at the indian on his wrapper. he’s saying “i get a free one of these now, right?” like a little kid who firmly believes it. well played andrew.

matt hawkins and his son henry jammed with me after a wednesday night church service yesterday. henry used to bang on a toy guitar, and pretend to play with the church band when he was 5 or 6. now he’s in middle school & banging out chords for real on a keyboard! the song we’re going to play sunday is up above my head by sister rosetta tharpe. we had a blast practicing, but then i told the guys, “that song is gonna be stuck in your head for the rest of the night!”