FOXNews.com

"Otherwise, the VMAs were the usual sad, illiterate affair, full of yo's from a bunch of yo-yos. 50 Cent and Beyonce looked confused among their June Taylor-type dancers. Nearly all the music sounded like it had been made up on the spot, although even host Chris Rock looked impressed at the end of Coldplay's song. Combining elements of The Beatles, Travis and Radiohead, Coldplay's Chris Martin performed the only actual song of the evening with a melody, harmonies and a hook."

-- FOXNews.com

I'm so glad other people see the ridiculousness of the MTV culture. David and I watch it in disbelief (when we actually *watch* MTV)... it's like watching a car accident. You can't help but stare in awed horror at the absolute stupidity of these artists who can't even speak English. Yeah, I know. I'm old. But the above quote says it all.

I'm really tired of hearing about the Britney/Madonna/Christina thing. Total publicity stunt. Maybe if they'd make decent music, y'know, sell a few records that way... well, but what do I know. Hey, maybe I need to take some lessons. If we cause enough controversy, then we won't have to write good songs anymore. That would make my job as an artist so much easier! Why didn't I think of this sooner?

I'm eating a Krispy Kreme hot glazed donut right now with my morning blog quad cappuccino. Starbucks and Krispy Kreme... life doesn't get any better than that.

Tonight shall be movie night at the Martin house. David rented "Gangs of New York" and "The Two Towers." I'm looking forward to seeing "Gangs" just because my girl Maura O'Connell is in the movie as a street singer. Man. I love Maura. What a stinking GREAT voice she has. David and I fell in love with her "Stories" CD... and in my opinion, it's right up there with Mary's "Babes in the Wood." I could get lost in those two CDs for years and never get tired of them.

Our friend Michael Bartelle gave us Damien Rice's CD. It's really beautiful. There are pieces of David Gray, Ryan Adams, Van Morrison, and even some Tom Waits in there... I freaking LOVE the Irish. That's where all the good music comes from, y'know? That's it. We're moving.

I need to get on the September LJG newsletter... We have tons of stuff going on suddenly! This is a good thing. I think we may even have a radio interview on the 11th... still have to firm up a definite time with them, but I'm pretty sure it's on.

Today David and I are going to work on some new cover tunes. The ones we've been doing for 4 years now are, well, stale. So we're gonna ditch them and replace them with new ones... any suggestions? I love doing unexpectedly weird ones, like I think we're going to work up Poison's "Every Rose Has Its Thorn" or something really random like that. Maybe I'll pose that question to the Message Board crowd and see what they come up with.

NP: Damien Rice "volcano"

Golly ned, has it really been almost 2 weeks since I blogged? I'm such a loser! Such a loser! It was nuts there for a couple of weeks, and then I was unable to get online for like a week, so there ya go. Anyway, okay. Ummm.... let's see. School has started for Punky. I have been freaking out. That's pretty much the gist of my life the past couple of weeks.

I spent this week setting up my home office and getting organized, ready to launch this new CD and season of promoting and selling it. Suddenly there are gigs everywhere. I booked 5 this week... really am happy about that. There are all sorts of "best kept secret" sort of places around town that need to be discovered. We *do* have listening rooms in San Antonio. That's encouraging.

So it's felt good to actually have office hours and have a job again... the album is nearly complete... all we're waiting on is art... and then it's off to the duplicators. The art should be done in the next few weeks. That means that we're there! I can see the finish line (finally). I can't wait.

Mars. Have you seen mars? It's cool... although I'm sure much cooler with binoculars or a telescope. It just looks like a red version of Venus to the naked eye. Or, as they say here in Pipe Creek, the nekkid eye. Is it me, or does it sound more nasty when it's pronounced "nekkid?" I have never liked that pronunciation. Texans are funny.

Playing tonight with David Kauffman. He's doing lots of liturgical music right now, and, not being Catholic, it's all foreign to me. But since it's new to me, it's also very fresh and very inspiring. I felt refreshed and fed after I left rehearsal last night... good for the soul. His music is really very soul-reaching. Nice change.

So anyway, I'm outta here but I will blog more. More is coming. Things are happening. And my blog mascot, Bob the Alien, who sits on my desk and stares at me with his big black alien eyes, won't let me off the hook very easily for missing 12 days here. Yeah. Be back later.

Papa Smurf is evil.

Leather-bound librarian provided 'sadistic, yet caring' services online.

Y'know, I wondered why our website was getting so many hits lately. Unfortunately, this woman's site comes up when someone does a search for us, and I hate that, knowing how many young teenagers we have as fans. *cringe*

But this article is pretty funny. She's been outed. heheheheheh.

I'm very tired... just got back from the coast. I'll type more about it tomorrow when my brain and fingers are working in conjunction with each other. I had trouble just now as I was typing "conjunction." Time for bed. Will blog tomorrow.

Didn't see any dolphins this time. Waaaaaaaaahhh!

"You know there's an old saying about a wannabe cowboy: all hat, no cattle. Well, with George W. Bush I think it's all hat, no jobs. All hat, no healthcare. All hat, no clue."--Dick Gephardt

Do these people realize how amazingly stupid they sound? Can they not string together one intelligent zinger for Bush?

Good one, Dick. Wish I had thought of that.

God Coffee

This is wrong on about 6 different levels.



Canned coffee? From a vending machine? Called "god coffee?" In different flavours? Geez! What is wrong with people?

Umm.... I missed yesterday because I was all wrapped up in microsoft hell! It was ugly. I somehow contracted the msblaster virus, and I figured it out on my own because I somehow missed all the hullabaloo on the virus. I noticed it when I was working Monday night on Kazaa (probably where I got it!) and I got a very "official" looking XP window that said, "Your system needs to shut down." and it counted down from 30 seconds and then shut down my computer. Hmmm... so I restarted, went to Windows update to try and fix whatever was wrong, and windows update told me that my serial # was wrong and that I couldn't download the service pack I needed. Long story short, I finally got around it by updating my Norton, editing my registry, and downloaded the patch.

Which brings me to my next point: MICROSOFT SUCKS! I want a Mac. I have always been a Mac person and I settled for a PC. Macintosh doesn't release crappy products that have to be fixed after you buy them... Microsoft makes a habit of it. Macintosh doesn't crash every 32 seconds. Macintosh doesn't have a "blue screen of death." Mac doesn't have nearly as many viruses...... Anyway, yeah... next computer is gonna be an EMac.

I made Peanut Butter Drop cookies last night... and I'm sick because they are so good and can't stop eating them... but they are so rich. They go well with coffee. I'm actually having my afternoon quad cappuccino right now, so there.

I am SO READY for autumn! It's so nice today... mid 80's, no humidity... it's just a tease. A terrible, terrible tease, I tell you. Next week it will be 300 degrees again. The low temps put me in such a fall mood... and then my hopes get dashed because we still have like 3 months of hot, horrible weather till it decides to become winter. THAT is what I miss about Nashville. Mmmmmm, seasons.....

FOXNews.com

Sunshine Days II

London Hits 100 Degrees.... poor, poor Europe. Really. It's been so stinking hot here, but in Texas in the summertime you expect it to be hot. Still, I complain and whine and if my car A/C doesn't cool off fast enough for my liking, I'm whining more. But London hit 100 for the FIRST TIME EVER! and it's so bad that they are warning people to be careful and take lots of water when they get on the Tube ("mind the gap and take your water")... no a/c down there apparently. And most folks don't have a/c anyway, because it just doesn't get hot there. The stoney beaches are not exactly "lay-out-and-surf" type beaches over there, yet they were jam packed this weekend. Poor London.



Played the Boardwalk Bistro Friday night... I usually get the TurkeyWorks sandwich, which is really good, but since I've gone Veg I got the PitaWorks which was fab. Loved it. Our friend Chris Taylor came out and played with us, which is always fun, and it was especially good this time because my cello was out of commission that night (the bridge snapped in half literally as we were walking out the door for the gig). I played mandolin, and that was fun. But OH MY STARS was it hot. Like so hot we might as well have played outside... it actually would have been cooler. Customers were sweating. Their a/c doesn't ever work in the summer, but especially not Friday. It was bad. Despite the heat, though, it was a super fun gig. My brother came out and it was good to see him. He actually came back home with us and spent the night, which we really need to do more often... we agreed that it's stupid that we never see each other now that he lives like an hour and a half away. Stupid!

Yesterday was the 17th (!) anniversary of my dad's passing. I dunno, but for some reason I was really bummed out by it this time. Usually the day passes and I think about it but it doesn't affect me much anymore... it's been so long... but it just really got under my skin this time. Ed (brother) and I talked about it for the first time ever, I think, and maybe that's part of it, but no, I was funky about it before that too. Maybe because this summer in particular, for some reason, that period of my life has come back to visit me... friends that I haven't talked to in years that were with me through that time... all the youth group stuff I've been doing has reminded me of being in youth group that summer that he died, etc. It's just weird what triggers things in you, and you think you're over something, and then there are sharp reminders that this is just part of who you are and will always be a little burr in your psyche. Odd.

This is the first day in a week that I've had decent blog coffee! Friday, when I posted last, I was drinking really REALLY bad coffee... because I was out of my espresso and just really couldn't go back to just tea. So I rooted around in my cabinet and found a can of coffee (there was my first mistake... I NEVER drink coffee that comes from a can. UGH!) that I swear must have been part of my Y2K stash (and yes, I did have a Y2K stash, I'm embarrassed to say)... or at the very least was on reserve in case we had a second annual 150 year flood. At any rate, it was very, very foul. Now if we had been flooded in, okay, I might have drunk it with a smile on my face, knowing that at least there was caffeine to be had, but because it wasn't a true emergency, I just couldn't find it in my heart to be grateful for this abomination that was loosely named "coffee." It was more akin to burnt antifreeze that one might lick from the third rail of the London tube, and such an experience might actually be more pleasurable than what I had to endure in this cup of coffee. Which is why I gave up on my blog after my computer crashed... I just didn't have it in me. But it's dang good to have my usual quad cappuccino with Horizon Organic Milk again. Life is good.

Alright then. Must be off to work on my website and make it purty.

Green tomato pie is nice.

Sunshine Days

I just spent like 45 minutes typing a new entry, and then my computer freaked out and shut down explorer and I lost the whole stinkin' blog entry. And it was good. As I was typing it I was patting myself on the back for my early morning wittiness and brilliance and then *poof*.... all gone. Serves me right. Now I don't even want to type another one. I used up all my wittiness. Very frustrating.

It All Depends on What You Mean by 'Have'

It All Depends on What You Mean by 'Have'. This is a great op-ed piece from the NY Times. Written by Steve Martin. I love Steve Martin.

Morning Pages

Nothing important happened today.

Ran out of coffee. It's my own darn fault. But I'm out of coffee and so I was only able to have a double shot of plain espresso this morning, which was okay because it did sort of wake me up. Now I'm hungry. The prospect of having my normal apples-and-peanut-butter fare for breakfast today doesn't thrill me, but I'll get around it. Not sure what I'm gonna do today, except clean and do laundry. Punky is going over to his grandma's house to go see a movie, so I'll be a free woman for a few hours this afternoon. I do have some booking phone calls to make. I do have some credits to write. I do have to figure out how the heck I'm going to pay for a trip to Ohio in a month... not sure how that's going to work out. I really want to go, but dangit! We are broke musicians! I dreamed we moved to Austin last night... well, actually, I moved to Austin first and David was going to join me in a couple of weeks, and I was checking out all the cool venues to play and was going to get a day job to help us afford the more expensive housing up there. It was a pretty fun dream, all in all... my friends Jean and Elinore were showing me around and showing me places that famous indie artists owned -- venues -- and I was feeling like finally I could play in Austin. My brother is currently IM'ing me. Be back later. Okay, so maybe later with my free time I'll indulge myself in an X-Files fix... it's been awhile since I've indulged in my guilty pleasure. Mmmmm. Got a wedding to go to on Saturday... and I have nothing to wear. Because I never dress up. I'm truly a hillbilly Texas grrrrl now. Okay, this stream of conscience thing ain't workin' for me right now. Be back later.

Morning Pages

Coffee. Blog coffee. Blog morning pages coffee. I have to type fast because Punky is still asleep but I feel like he will probably wake up pretty soon, knowing that we're going out with Flo and Amanda today. I just painted my toenails and they are still wet, so if I stand up, they will get yucky. Many changes are coming down the pike beginning this fall. School starts and that always marks the beginning of a new "life season." It's looking more and more like I will be doing an orchestra program with the school... I just have to talk to the administrator about specifics. The new CD will be finished around the first week of September and then we will go to press with it. So that means I have to get my crap together regarding radio and gigs and release parties ASAP. Eric and Sarah are going away to Dallas, which means our youth group will be getting a new youth pastor, which means that that whole thing is going to change and I'm not really sure to what capacity we will be needed... but I'm sure that means that in the next month or so we're going to be really busy filling in the gaps and such. But I'm excited to see what all unfolds this fall... I've been ready for a change... the past year has been such a holding pattern and I'm ready to get busy doing the things I have been called to do. I'm ready for David and I to start gigging again. I'm ready to GO! I made Indian Dahl last night... very very good. Totally vegetarian... lentils, onions, garlic, tomatoes, and lots of jalepenos, curry, and cumin. Man, I could have eaten the whole stinking pot. It was fabulous. I really don't miss meat... I have eaten just a tiny bit of meat the past week or so and I just haven't been real crazy about the experience each time... I'm just enjoying my veggies too much. I just don't want to become one of those militant vegetarians... I don't care what other people eat and I'm not vegetarian because of "poor moo-moo" and all that. I just think it's healthier and I've lost weight because of my new food habits. It's really hard to type morning pages in a blog... how many lines constitutes 3 pages? But I haven't done morning pages in so long and it's really hard to start up again because of the whole desire to edit myself, especially knowing that other people will be reading this. So is this true Morning Pages or just rambling, bad writing? See, there I go editing myself again. But who cares just flow flow flow. It's all good. Pause to drink coffee. We had 5 cars on our property... 2 of which didn't work at all and have been sitting here for like 8 years. We had them towed yesterday... It's so nice to not have 5 cars on our property anymore! It was sad to think about letting go of the Honda though... it was such a good car and it was the first big purchase David and I made together and we were so happy when we got it and it was such a miracle that we even got it. But it had to go and it was nice to get rid of all the dead weight. And now I have like 8 bags of old clothes that I have to get rid of. I can't wait for fall and for fall clothes and for cold weather. But that won't happen here till like November, so there you have it. I can't believe that it's been a year since Laurie's birthday... that was a long time ago and yet a short time ago. Where does the stinking time go? We are I have nothing else to type just rambling and there you go. Supposed to meet with D. on Saturday... we'll see if that works out with his schedule but that would be really cool to see him again since it's been a year. I have to upgrade my instant messenger. I want to go to a poetry reading. I want to write again. Oh yeah, that's the whole purpose of morning pages to get the flow going again. There you have it but I have to get into the zone and just go with it. Not happening the way I like it to right now. Today is the anniversary of the bombing of Hiroshima... what a weird and different age that was. No one thought of consequences and political correctness and it was just different. Now it's like we have all the anti war peaceniks who think we're still living in 1969 and then there's the right wingers who want to bomb everything and we're just a more diverse, enlightened people but is that really a good thing? Yeah, well, I want to stay away from talking politics because I know how I believe but not many others think the way I do and it's very uncool because well, blah blah blah. So where is oh there is my instant messenger. I have a lot of people on my buddy list. It's sorta funny... I don't really IM people that much because it's like getting stuck on the phone and I think others see it that way, but so what's the point of a buddy list except that you're just spying on your friends and can see when they sign on and how long they're on. But other than that it's pretty useless. Funny. 8:40 I can call the salon in 20 minutes and try and get an appointment. Hope I can... my hair is very very bad right now. My stylist is going to crap her pants when she finds out what I have done to my hair this summer. I am rambling about nothing nothing nothing. I want to travel. I have nothing else to say need to go take a shower and eat apples and peanut butter not in the shower and Lynn Eastes is back at Belmont and they are doing Antigone AGAIN! I can't believe that! We did that play every single year when Kathy and I were there, and now they are doing it again. Still. 10 years later. That is so amazingly stale. Yes, okay. Im going to the beach yeaeeeeeeeah in one week and 2 days and I cannot wait. That will be very much fun.... One more fun before school starts and Punky will be so happy. I have to go now do not hate me becaus I ramble these are my morning pages the end.

So I'm really just "showing up" here because I'm killing time before I have to put Punky to bed. Summer is close to being over. I am supposed to get my hair cut on Wednesday. Yes. I haven't had a haircut since, umm, well, I think it was the end of January that I went with Flo and the girls. Poor hair.

So we went to Sea World and it was a lot of fun, although very VERY hot. Punky loved it. We got to go backstage at the white whale show and Punky and I both got kissed by Martha the Beluga Whale. It was very cool. Beluga whales look very much like the Pillsbury Doughboy, and it was more of a head butt than a kiss, but hey, who cares. I decided that I missed my calling and I would like very much to be a dolphin trainer or a marine biologist.

What: Mob Scene. Who: Strangers. Point: None.

Here is the flash mob phenomenon again. This time in Berlin. Made the New York Times.

Dude, I'm SO there.

FOXNews.com

I want the COCO Joe.... But really, I'm pretty sure you just shouldn't mess with coffee.

I don't have my glasses on, so it's going to be really hard to type accurately. It may actually end up lookin like ;lasdkfoiwehf;masdfiewo because, honestly, I just can't see what I'm doing. Hmmm. BRB.

Okay, I'm back with sight. And see... I spelled "looking" (above) like "lookin" and that wasn't intentional. So what? Life is good... I have my glasses and my morning coffee. My blog coffee. Eeew... that doesn't sound very good. The word "blog" is still funny to me and sounds like something gross.

So I worked and worked on getting our mailing list updated and cleaned up, and then my computer wigged out and sent out our newsletter twice. I HATE IT when that happens. I am so conscious of people's tolerance for spam and junk mail and really don't want to bother them, and I just feel, when something like that happens, that people are going to freak and unsubscribe. Actually, that was what used to happen. We send out emails once a month, but if we had to send out an extra one for whatever reason (like if a gig got cancelled -- y'know, sort of important to let people know about that), we would get all these unsubscribes. It used to really hack me off... because I do care and because I don't want to bug people, and because I go out of my way to not bug them, and then they get all mad and act like I'm the spammer sending them Viagra ads every day. Can't win for losing. Our current list has been with us for several years, so I think we're finally down to the people who really want to be on it, although when I made the list transition I lost about 300 names because they were no longer good email addresses. That hurt! I hate losing that many people. I can't think about it. But we have a really good core now, and I'd rather have 800 really strong names than 1100 and have some that just really don't care.

Wow. How did I get off on that? That has to be the most exciting reading EVER, that last paragraph. I guess that's the whole deal with this daily journal thing... you get the good, the weird, the bad, the funny, the stupid, and the really boring. You know you love it.

School starts in 23 days. 3 weeks. I can't believe it. I have been asked to consider starting a string program at the private school. Me? Ummm.... okaaaaay. It would be a very big undertaking. It would be a challenge. But I think it would be cool and I know that God would not open up an opportunity for me if He wasn't going to equip me to handle it. So I'm considering.

Oh... I just realized that I need to get a poster put up on the website for our Sept. 7th date. Okay. Gotta go. Plus I have to get ready for Sea World. My mind is all over the place today. I dreamed about guinea pigs last night.

AltaVista's Babel Fish Translation Service

Lady Jane Grey in Engrish
Lyrics of the week

"We should not rely on never"
(a.k.a. "Never Should Have Trusted You")

Something the ash, as for end me of the diamond my reliance which should pay the ash dust to the death of my innocence everything, like the pearl being handed by my heart cover which with the feet of the hatchet throws my dream, as for me whom it gives as for me never should not be relied on, me the truth thing where I have known that it can do my your lie was loved, but, you knew that I never should not rely on the fact that now I have known? I being cruel, until unusual control was given, to see, waiting, to reach the wall of the handcuff and your fraud where therefore patient you the jail of lie are sweet so in my mind as for sweetness and resonance me whom you sing that here where me it cannot do thing by any means and is restricted we want I whom you think now leave, I have known, as for me it is not possible to wait for another day

Ohmygosh... it's AUGUST! What the heck?

I had every intention of going outside and work, work, working today, but I got stuck behind my computer. And here I sit, wasting time, typing another blog entry.... but it's really pretty fun. And it's really hot outside. Maybe I'll have a smoothie and then go out later. Yeah. Later.

So I'm back on coffee... did I mention that? I LOVE COFFEE. I LOVE COFFEE! I'm not all crazy like I was before (6-shot cappuccino in the morning, 4-shot in the afternoon), but man, oh man, it's so good to have it back.

Still eating veg as much as possible... although I was really bad and had a pizza last night (and regretted it today very muchly)... but I'm just happier and feel better eating veggies. We're supposed to go to some friends' house for dinner tonight, and that's always interesting trying to manuever a veg diet around steak and chicken and fish. But we'll see what happens. More than anything, I don't want to make anyone uncomfortable or feel weird. So maybe I'll just suck it up and eat the meat.

Taking Punky to Sea World tomorrow. He's been DYING to go since school let out. It's just so DANG expensive. But he is absolutely in LOVE with dolphins (so am I), so I'm really, really excited about taking him there. I have a feeling we'll just spend all day in the Shamu show and the Beluga whale show. And that's pretty alright with me! If I believed in reincarnation, I would come back as a dolphin. Or a marine biologist. Or a dolphin who is a marine biologist. Anyway, Punky doesn't know he's going, and if we can pull it off, we're just going to go and see (sea) the fun little surprised reaction we get. I love that stuff. He's so cute.

Okay, so I'm feeling more and more like a loser sitting here smelling like "OFF" (from being outside this morning) so I need to go and get the heck on my tasks. Maybe I'll have some coffee first though. Can you tell I'm a procrastinator?

Haircuts are our friends.