Tag Archives: Rome Neal

Add It Up

It’s now a Wednesday. Last night was quiet. Just watched TV. Bill came home from seeing his mother. He’s making a point to do that at least once a week. He’s also seeing his cousin and her family at that time so it works out well for everyone.

I was home, a bit tired, after getting ready with Greg Stevens on his move. Not hard work but the trucking back and forth wore me down. I watched TV, O & RM. Bill came home in time for Rachel. I had enough news at that point but Bill wanted to watch it so we did.

Then at 10:00 I put on the Heroes episode from Monday night. Still lacking in luster. And of course, the last minute or two was cut off. Sort of like, ‘And the murderer is…’ Stay tuned for the Jay Leno Show! It’s happened so often that it’s become a joke around here.

Bill was busy getting some things ready for his friend Rome Neal’s one man show about Thelonious Monk called Monk. I’ve seen it a few times. Bill has been Rome’s trusted stage manager for the show for a long time, but the next show is in Rochester and Bill can’t make it so he’s been transferring things to CD’s so Rome can take them on the road.

After the 11:00 news I put on a recording of Scrubs: Med School. It takes place after the original show with Turk and Dr. Cox as well as Bob Kelso and the Todd reprising their roles. JD & Eliot have made appearances before. It’s OK. Not totally in love with it, but then I haven’t been following it much. Bill didn’t know anything about it so it was a kick for him.

He went to bed after that, wearing the sleep apnea mask which was great. A nice night of sleep. Of course there was the weird dream involving an old friend of my Simon Paterson. He was a special friend. Had many late nights with him.

A strange relationship though. Haven’t seen him in years and I don’t think he’s seen me in years either. At one point in the dream he produces some powdery packets and offers them to me like back in the old days, but in the dream I was saying that I don’t do that sort of thing and that the glasses he was wearing made him look like Bobby Womack.

It was a dream that probably had references to another friend, no not that type of friend, just another party person from the McSwells days. I ran into him, known as Midday since that’s when he usually got out of bed.

We were both waiting for the bus and comparing our lives. He’s been married for 10 years, me and Bill will have been together for 10 years in September. He used to party in much the same way I did and just like me, he doesn’t anymore. That conversation probably popped into the dream.

This morning I was up and started making the coffee when the phone rang. It was Brenda from back in the Wanker Banker days. She saw via one of the social networks that I’m on that I have a job and asked how it was going. Surprisingly I was able to answer her questions coherently without any coffee.

She was at her job and couldn’t talk much so we ended the call with me promising to call her back, which I haven’t yet. Had some breakfast when the phone rang again, this time it was a follow up call after the phone interview from the other day.

Tomorrow I have a face to face interview. This time with some guy named Tom. It’s at 10:30 so after that in a suit & tie I will supervise Greg Stevens move. I of course got worked up about the interview. I always think that I have the job.

Then I realized that I do have a job lined up and if the interview doesn’t go well, well I still have that job on Monday. Saw Stine and Alexander on the way to the park. Walked them over and played with Alexander for a few minutes.

Stine looked great and Alexander was the boy wonder, climbing over everything and ignoring me. I did get a high five and when I left I said Bye Bye. Stine couldn’t get him to do the same but when I was 20 feet away I heard a Bye Bye. Then at 30 feet, then at 50 feet. Each time I turned around and saw Stine laughing as I waved back.

Spoke to Bill about the interview tomorrow, me making a big deal out of it. Spoke to my brother Brian which was really good. His eldest daughter is looking at college. Yikes! By the time I made it to Greg Stevens office he was off at the Racquetball Club.

I don’t think he plays racquetball though, just the gym and sauna. I packed some boxed and got other things ready for the move.

Spoke to Bill again and told him I realized I was making too big a deal out of the interview. Now I’m home, watching the Simpsons ‘Mr Scorpio!’ and that’s about it.

Rest in peace, Howard Zinn.

Dig It

Well this is the second attempt. Lost the first set. Word Press being difficult. Last night watched Bananas by Woody Allen with Bill.

It was ok, I had seen it a few times already. Bill liked it a lot, having seen it only for the first time. It left me wondering if a movie that was funny in 1971 be funny almost 40 years later?

It did have it moments but overall it doesn’t hold up. I can see why Woody Allen wanted to make movies that were different than that.

After that I went to bed since I had to get up early for a trip to Sandy Hook with Annemarie. I made arrangements with Julio to get my beach gear back. I’m sure Julio would have liked to go but he has familial duties for the next 20 years.

Anne and I were on the road after I made some sandwiches and it was smooth sailing until we got to the bridge on Route 36. They’re making a new bridge and everything stopped for major merges.

We did make it into Sandy Hook at 11:00 after leaving Hoboken at 9:00. We would have been earlier if it wasn’t for the traffic.

It wasn’t too crowded when we got to the last beach, but it soon started filling up. All day long people were trickling in.

We had plans to see Bill sing at Joe’s Pub in Manhattan at 7:00 so we left the beach at 4:00. We certainly did not expect the traffic on the way out of the park. For an hour, we inched towards Route 36.

We were soon on the highway to the Parkway to the Turnpike. Approaching the Holland Tunnel it was more bumper to bumper so I navigated Annemarie through the streets of Jersey City.

We were going to get back to my apartment, change clothes and take the Path train in, but by 6:30 that seemed highly unlikely. I suggested we just head right into the city.

Anne was a bit mortified at wearing the beach clothes to a nightclub but I assured her that it would be ok, and it was. She followed my directions for driving across town on Canal Street and then up Lafayette Street.

We found a spot on Lafayette a block away and found a cozy corner in the club just as the compère, Rome Neal was making his introductions.

There were a few excellent singers, but of course we were there for Bill who sung 2 beautiful songs. Anne and I split some brushetta and I had 2 Stella Artois to Anne’s 1.

We even made it to the party after the show, enjoying some banana pudding that Rome Neal made and satisfied our hunger.

Now Anne is back in Garfield, Bill is in bed and I’m writing this for the second time. I’m at least glad I was able to take a shower and change out of the bathing suit I had been wearing for the past 15 hours.

Now it’s time for sleep. No pics tonight, no time. I will post the beach pics tomorrow and also post 2 videos I shot from the show tomorrow on YouTube under the log in johnotoole99.