Urgh.

What I’ve been up to, dot points:

• Knitting. This pass-time is not only fun and rewarding for it’s quiet-time value, but also, at the end of it, I’ve got a good gift to give to someone that’s nice to me.
• Practise. Despite last night having dreams about noise complaints, I have to say, I’m enjoying my practise. As I was talking about in my New York blogs, I’ve kind of been reminded of the innocent fun in making and playing music. My practise currently includes: extended techniques, articulation, tone, incorporating fourths into my playing, transcribing Wessell Anderson, learning new tunes and …I think that’s it.
• Jamming. I’m trying to have three jams a week, including one a week with someone new. The second part of the plan has proven to be difficult, because “new people” are a bit more busy, and also I keep getting attached to current line-ups and finding things that are interesting within them. In the end I’ll probably have a jam every bloody day.
• Painting: I’ve been working on another painting. It’s ok. I don’t think the idea is really that good, so this one’s a bit of a work in progress exploration.
• Singing: I’ve been sight singing every Friday morning, and I’ve got to say, I’m so excited by it that I feel as if Thursday is the new Friday in terms of anticipation. Last week was a challenge as The Lou was absent, leaving Sass, Berish and myself, but fuckit it was good for me.
• Seeing gigs. I’ve been checking out as many gigs as I can. Lately, I’ve been supporting fellow friends music, like local jazz dudes, or Canary or Lisa Salvo and stuff like that. This week I’m seeing Bernie McGann and my New York teacher, Joel Frahm! All set to be a beauty.
• Teaching. Doing my usual sporadic amounts of that. It’s hard to have any progress with all these little jobs where I pop in. It’ll make a difference when I’m actually in a school for a bit. I’ve also handed out my CV to some local schools and am about to join a CRT agency at the recommendation of a new Canadian friend of mine, Tyler.
• Gym. Working out n tha’.

Things I’d want to improve:

• More Practise: I wish that I could practise more at the extremities of the day, but am unfortunately I am limited to rather restrictive hours (when you factor in teaching, gym and other things).
• More teaching: Working on it. Also, Matt’s talking about working at Monselvat, apparently there’s a cool hospitality job he could walk into and get me into as well. That’ll cover the upcoming school holidays.

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