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my prescription glasses broke sunday afternoon. fortunately i have another pair, but they are prescription sunglasses. that’s what i wore monday morning at homer’s. i didn’t know what assumptions my customers would make since i never keep my shades on after walking indoors. however angela (left) usually keeps hers on when she orders her coffee and shot of espresso, so i asked if we could take our pic together. a few hours later dave (right) was taking his shades off when i said “put ‘em back on! i gotta get another picture!” ashley (not pictured) also took a pic of both of us wearing shades inside homer’s, but she hasn’t sent it to me yet.

last thursday exactly one week ago jenny & i woke up to the sound of beeping… at 5am. the culprit was our electric kenmore stove, and apparently something in that model can be triggered to flash “F-1″ and beep without mercy. the next day my guitar student and i switched out the electric stove for one that runs on gas. i found it on craigslist for $100. and then saturday i saw a fog machine at an antique mall for $20 and bought it for $15. i now own two machines that spew gas and fog… it’s almost like having another old car! extra special thanks to jim cameron for showing me how to safely attach a ventless heater to the gas line 5 years ago, without that experience i would not have attempted to hook up a gas stove.

two weeks ago i posted on this blog about a book of letters to and from groucho marx that i’m currently reading. last night i was surfing youtube, and saw a 54 minute video of groucho talking to dick cavett. 28 minutes into the interview he started talking about THAT book! groucho also sings “lydia the tattooed lady” on the show.

there’s an old twilight zone episode where an aging actress is so obsessed with her youth and movies from 20+ years ago, that she (spoiler alert!) literally escapes onto the celluloid. earlier in the episode one of her friends is trying to talk rationally about her unhealthy attraction to the past, and it reminded me of conversations i’ve had with myself when i spend too much time in front of the TV. this is my spin on it.

it all started when traci made a facebook post asking “what is this ugly bug?” traci was jenny’s RA in college. kafka’s metamorphosis was the first thing i thought of so i commented “gregor samsa?” we bandied a few comments back and forth and i concluded with a video from a film short where franz kafka’s story has a frank capra twist. after the man turns into a bug he sings “ah! sweet mystery of life.”

i’m almost finished reading 10 years of michael palin’s diary. he was one of the guys in monty python. i couldn’t wait to get to the part that detailed his first appearance on saturday night live: he sang and danced with seafood salad down his pants, plus two cats for good measure. next up: groucho letters!

i did a little recording in the living room today. first i laid down a track after tweaking a random kosmiche pattern from my smartphone. then i played my old casio over that. then i messed around with electronic drums for an intro. when people ask me what instruments i play, i usually don’t say keyboards because it sounds like this. the entire thing runs almost three minutes. i call it walk like a casio.

*this originally appeared on the homer’s coffeehouse blog. i was the main contributor for almost 5 years. no one read it, but i didn’t care. this particular post was a fake story for a featured drink: the citrus sisters. here it is from may 6, 2015:
wilma henderson gave birth to twin girls on a weekday. everything seemed normal until the doctor gave the routine spank to make them inhale. as soon the as air entered their lungs a glow filled the delivery room, and their skin changed color. wilma thought she was the only one seeing the strange spectacle of crying luminescent babies until she realized the nurses were shielding their own eyes. she named her girls neon and dionne, and after a rough childhood the sisters moved to california where they became successful recording artists. hush tang was their first release on a major label which consisted of lullabies for migrant babies in the citrus groves.

nixon was the first president i remember. elvis was the first rock n’ roller i knew about. i became aware of both of them in the 1970′s. however, the first time i saw this photo was in the early 90′s, and it kinda blew my mind. the story goes that elvis wrote a letter to the president expressing “concern for the country” because of the drug culture, hippie elements, black panthers, etc. nixon met with elvis because he was trying to win over america’s young people. two weeks ago i found out someone actually made a movie about this occasion.

last friday night in overland park it was grey, and a little cool, but people still came to salon kitch to beep on veggies, play the theremin, and transform their voices. it was the highest number of random people we’ve had during third fridays for beep goes the weasel.  one of the coolest things i saw was shay (not sure if that’s how you spell his name) giving beat box lessons to another pedestrian. he was making really cool sounds on the voice transformer, and a woman passing by asked “how are you doing that?” so he showed her.