What a week!

We were in New Mexico last week for Nick's highschool reunion. It was very interesting to meet all the people that Nick went to highschool with for the first time. I never could imagine what he was talking about when he mentioned higschool - but when I saw them, it was just like any other highschool. Well, maybe not like mine, where we had almost negative minorities. This one was very diverse.

It was super fun, though. We got to see a band called Stoic Frame play. Very very good band. Kind of latin rock band. The guy's voice sounded just like Sublime. They really were a great sound. I got a bit overserved that night. I hvae no idea where the drinks were coming from either.

They just kept appearing at the table. I made a bunch of friends with people from Nick's highschool that I didn't know while Nick danced to the band. It was a great time.

We had a show on Sunday night in Albuquerque. You never know what to expect with shows that you really don't know much about. But, somehow these always turn out to be the best shows. There were tons of people there and we got a great response. It was awesome - the sound guy from Burt's Tiki Lounge in Albuquerque (where we played on our tour last year) found out that we were playing this year and came along with a bunch of friends. Waay cool.

Super great thanks to Mark for setting the whole night up and a very happy 30th birthday to him!
Miko - - we promise to look you up as soon as we can afford to buy your wonderful art pieces. They are truly amazing.

Well, I am getting pretty tired. Yesterday with our travelling the entire day and our flight being delayed was just exhausting!

We're back now and things are running almost too fast for us to catch up again.

Work piled up while we were gone and now it's catch-up and get ahead time.

It was sad that we had to cancel the tour, but now it looks like we're doing a short 3 day tour just to minnesota and iowa, but hey - - we gotta get our cd out somehow!!!

Well - i guess i better head downstairs to hash out some tracks so we can get this damn thing done by the september shows!

Talk later!

L

A series of unfortunate events: Yesterday was just that. It's almost funny to think about it now, to think about all of the small things that added up to just an annoying day.

Yesterday morning I got up (actually peeled myself out of bed unwillingly). For some reason, I was really really tired, although I had gotten 8.5 hours of sleep, which is really pretty decent for me. I had a hard time getting any work done. Lots of distractions. I have visitors right now (my cousins and aunt) and it's a full house. As I work from home, you can see how this would be difficult.

We went to look at the condo that we want to buy at 2pm and decided that we were going to put an offer down today. It was perfect - EVERYTHING about it was exactly what we wanted. We came home excited and talking about our new purchase. About 2 hours later we got a call from the real estate agent. Oops - the listing agent had listed it incorrectly and there were no pets allowed. Well, that sealed the "no" and we had to move on. Fortunately, there is another one that will be built in September, but it's $4000 more just because the price of building materials has increased. Verdammt!

Anyhoo - then, I went downstairs just to find out that the kids had erased my entire memory card from DDR (I know, I know, but why ya gotta judge?)
So that's annoying. And of course, nobody will tell me what happened. Ack.

Then, we went to look at the other condo - and afterwards decided that the only option was beer time! We wanted to check out a new place called Muggles. It's obvious why it wasn't too busy. I, of course, got carded and Nick forgot to bring his ID. So they wouldn't let us stay. Seriously...Nick is 28! And he certainly doesn't look young for his age, either. It was just stupid. That's what I hate about our society. They pay employees to not have to think. Card EVERYONE - even the 98 year old white-haired lady. My mother got carded to buy Nyquil the other day from Pick'n'Save because apparently it's an ingredient in meth...that's just ridiculous. That's like getting carded to buy water - because I'm sure you use that too.

What is our lame society coming to? I got the raddest bumper sticker the other day. It says: "Operation Yellow Elephant: Because declaring one's patriotism is safer than enlisting in the military". That is so true - - I'll have to put it on my car to drive around conservative WB.
But I digress...

Where was I?

Oh yeah - then we went to the gas station to go to the ATM. Of course! There was no ATM, but she said if I made a purchase I could get cash back with my ATM card. Well, of course for my card (for some unknown reason) that doesn't work.

We then headed to Tastings, where they all know our names and we don't get carded. Shit - we forgot, Tastings is closed on Mondays. DOH. Games it is! The seediest bar in West Bend (Save the Bagg End). It was okay. We ordered drinks and I wanted to put it on my CC tab. Well - they don't accept credit cards...how can all these things go wrong. You see, none were too serious (besides the condo thing), but all of them together just secured a very very annoying experience.

Gott sei Dank - there was an ATM there. We got money. We got drinks - at last!! And my, they tasted good. So good that we stayed out until 1 am. Seemed like a good idea at the time.

Until I had to wake up this morning at 6am for morning rotary....Uggh. That was a bit harsh. But now I'm feeling much better. Caffeine really does wonders. I have made a rule for myself that I can only drink coffee or caffeine before 9am. That way there will be no issues with the whole sleep thing at night.

Today is a busy day. I have a ton of work to do before leaving tomorrow for New Mexico, I have to pack, I have to get a haircut in 20 minutes, I have a 2 hour senior center meeting for work and I need to buy a baby gift for my friend's baby and drop it off. So I guess I should get my butt moving then.

Happy Tuesday everyone - it's a new day!

und ich fuehle mich ganz gut!

Ltrain

Looked at condos today. We found one that we really want. It's right in our price range and brand spanking new. It's as big as most of the houses that we were looking at and 10 times nicer. Now it's just the question of finding a lender, and working out all that financial shtuff. Which, to be honest, I never have really thought much about. So, we realized that we really know nothing about it. It's weird, because it seems like the times have changed in the last 20 years. Almost nobody has the entire downpayment now - - so most people deal with all sorts of loans...it's just confusing and I wish our real estate agent could just take care of ALL that stuff! :)

The CD is progressing ever so nicely. We are happy with everything that has come along so far. I think there are still two songs that don't quite "have it". I hate that - - because sometimes you don't know what it's missing - it's kind of a, "i'll know it when i hear it" kind of a thing. Which can be very time-consuming. But, other than the two tracks, the other 9 tracks have come out better than we ever could have hoped. Very exciting! I think we're right on schedule as well. We have given a little taste to a few friends and eb fans, and the response has been wonderful. Thank you all for your honest comments and suggestions. We really appreciate it and have taken them all into consideration.

Keep posted on the website - because very soon a partial track will be available for your listening pleasure. Just a sneak peek of what's to come!

The tour booking is dragging along. Uggh...which just reminded me that I have to get on top of that this week. Yuck - booking. There was a time when I loved to do it, but the whole booking business just really burned me out. Too much in too short of a time.

Been working out a lot lately, to get my butt into better shape when I am going to teach this Fit for Life Class. I am not sure when I'll start, but probably in about a month or so. I also have been playing lots of DDR (please reserve judgement) :) - I know, I know. But, it's kind of fun and it's an excellent workout. I have been putting the game on workout mode and just doing it for a kickass workout.

The time flies by, and my disc has some pretty good music on it. Well - we had three pads before (one which never worked - DOA) and one good one, one crappy floor one. The good one worked for about a month. Then, the top button would only work 60% of the time, which is irritating, when you're trying to get better and keep getting a worse score as the thing deteriorates. Then, the floorpad's left one started doing the same thing. Basically, we stopped playing for about 8 months because the pads didn't work. Well, this week my little cousins came over and wanted to play. So I dug out the old pads and everyone was getting so annoyed that they weren't working, so we finally gave in and about $100 pads. They are awesome! Soft!!

Well - enough about that...I know what you're thinking..and I would have made fun of me too. But, it's just like my subscription to US Weekly, I'm not ashamed! :) anyways, why ya gotta judge me?

OK - fine...you're right, but I'm not changing.

[np - Sade - Lover's Rock]

I was going to start today with a bit of a political tirade, but it quickly got just too depressing. Allow me to sum up: The right citizens allows their freedoms to be stripped away (see USAPATRIOT act) to fight the bad guys. The left citizens allow their freedoms to be stripped away (see Supreme Court ruling on a journalist's confidential sources) just to score some petty points against Karl Rove. Jesus Christ, where are the thinking people in this country, the people that don't treat politics like a fucking High School pep rally? Anyone that says that they would never vote for a Republican/Democrat based simply on these ridiculously arbitrary labels is just a mindless drone, and you've got no one to blame but yourself that the this country is getting nastier by the day. And because of you, I'm stuck in the middle sucking on it. Thanks.

Ahem. I feel better now.

This weekend was both fun and productive. We caught Apraxia and All The Pretty Horses at Club Anything here in Milwaukee. It was my first time to the club, and it was actually a very cool place -- kind of made me think of what the Triple Rock would look like if Tim Burton decorated... Anyway, it was a really fun time, both Apraxia and ATPH rocked the shizzle outta the place. We also caught a cool Milwaukee band called Vera Deirdre -- dark, slow, creepy music. Reminded me of A Whisper in the Noise crossed with Goldfrapp... Good stuff.

And the "Sheet of Death" is weakening by the minute! We're down to just a few holes in the boxes. At 3am on Tuesday morning, I finished the first almost complete and fully mastered "smoke through it" disc. It's sounding pretty good, but it's obvious where the work needs to go... So, unfortunately, I have to add another column to the "Sheet of Death", marking whether or not I've correctly got the base gain and EQ structure in place... Ah well, another sleepless night tonight...

Anyway, that's me. Gotta do some work now.

[np: Aqua - Aquarium]

Yeah, I know. I need some happy brainless music. Aqua and my hero Alex have definitely brightened my day. Mad Photoshop skillz, yo!

The "Sheet of Death" for smoke through it is looking ever less daunting. We've been averaging about 2-5 X's a night, and the songs are really starting to shape up. I have yet to really start on any of the guitar work, but bass is down to two tracks.

Laura knocked out some tracks on Monday, with her failing voice and all. We used the gritty edge of her voice to our advantage. We got two really good takes of "Undone", our kinda-alt-country track, and I think between the two we can put that one in the books as done. Well, apart for some sweetener. She also nailed a one-take-wonder for our really dissonant trip-hop track "Just Tell Me"... It was awesome -- she didn't even really know the structure of the song and hadn't even looked at the lyrics in many months. But somehow there was some magic there, and it was an awesome performance. Haven't had one of those since the STATE4 days, when she bitch-slapped "Duality" in one take. I love these moments -- they really make the songs shine, because you can just tell that she was in the groove on the recording.

I've been in a different mindset throughout the recording of this album, and it's kind of strange and frustrating and exciting at the same time. As I'm listening to a track, I very quickly picture in my mind how I want the track to sound, something I never really did before. I always used to simply press record and see what happened. Now I'm getting irate when song doesn't have that edge I'm looking for, and it can get frustrating because it's often not clear which individual parts are at fault. It's making me a little nervous for the looming CD release dealine, because I don't want to release any song that I'm not 100% satisfied with. I forsee an assload of hours spent in front of the audio workstation... But I'm excited for the results -- this CD is gonna have the "groove".

Apart from recording, I've been playing a new PS2 game, "PsychoNauts". This is a game designed by Tim Schaffer, the guy that did Grim Fandango (only one of the top adventure games of all time). It's been an absolute joy to play. My #1 priority for games is creativity and uniqueness, and this does not disappoint. I can't even tell you how hard I laughed when the main character appears Godzilla-like in the fish city and wreaks havoc to the cries of "Oh my god! He just destroyed the orphanage!" and "Oh no, the pound! Who will think of the puppies?!?" and the occasion news broadcast. Genius. And very, very fun, if a little bizarre.

Anyway, gotta go throw a munch. Out.

What a show last night! It went very well. A huge thank you thank you thank you to all who came and filled up the Binkery Patio and bar. It was so grand to see all sorts of new faces and get some new addresses for our mailing list. We have been invited back to the Binkery to start out our "Smoke Through It" tour in August. More details to come...

Another big shout out to Gaytha for spectacular backing vocal spots. Gaytha pulled a cameo in Broken, Down, No Ordinary and Bei Mir Bist Du Schoen. She did an awesome job!

Today I barely had any voice left. We were originally supposed to play 2 sets of music (approx. 2 hours worth) with a short break in between. The crowd was so great that the owner asked what it would take for us to perform a third set. We played for over 3 hours total....I was pretty done after that whole ordeal.

Today was lovely. The weather was beautiful and the whole family was together. Katie and Tim came into town from Florida. They're only here in WB for the weekend, and then they head up north to hang out with Tim's family. A bunch of Katie's friends came over for a "Breakfast at Wimbledon" party. It was just like the old days...my dad made swedish pancakes, we had strawberries and cream and champagne. After we ate some breakfast, we headed outside to play some tennis. I must have played over 7 hours of tennis today, it was fantastic. I really started to get my serve and some of my shots back. I think my dad and I may look into a mixed doubles tournament at the end of summer. I really need a goal to make myself practice. I love it so much, but it's something that you can't really do alone (save a ball machine) and if you go to the club, it's way expensive. And it's just ridiculous that I don't play more, when it's so easy access to the court, there's really no excuse for me. Except for my sheer laziness!!! At least I can do it instead of running, as long as I play singles, it's a damn good work out.

I am pretty sunburned, which just had made me so worn out. I'm really trying hard to stay awake now, but I don't want to go to bed, because Katie leaves so early tomorrow morning. I think we are playing some texas hold 'em tonight. I'll most likely lose another 20 bucks, but hey...can you really put a price on fun!?? :)

I don't want to make this into a novel, I did promise I would write more, but I didn't say that my entries would be as long..this one is still a pretty decent length...so quit yer bitching!!! ;)

bis naechstes mal - -

dein

Laurinchen!