Brother Frank | johnozed

A pleasant Monday after a weekend of birthdays, none of which were mine. That would be in September which some of you knew already. It was a beautiful day weather-wise and as I write this clouds hover overhead letting me know that it will rain again if only for a few minutes.

I think I tried too hard on Sunday to duplicate the good feeling of Saturday’s posting. I know I did attempt it. Kind words from Annemarie and bhikku did the job of trying to polish too hard. Still I rallied and posted and hopefully it wasn’t too painful to read.

Girl Talk is still buggin’ me out. It’s so good and it’s driving me crazy. Little bits and pieces of other songs play and I usually start laughing when I hear it and then I rack my brain trying to figure out where that little bit came from.

Hopefully you went to his myspace page and followed the link to the free download. I got one continuous track, and paid the 10.00 fee so I will get the official cd when it eventually gets released.

I also got in the mail today, a previously viewed copy of Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story. I still love this movie even though I hadn’t seen it in months. If you’re a music geek like me, I think you will enjoy it so very much.’Get out of here Dewey! You don’t want this!’, that’s all it takes for me to giggle. Worth checking out.

Work was really quiet today. Just me and 3 other people in. It was fine, I knew it was going to be like this. I ran a few errands, wandered around midtown. Lot’s of tourists in town and a lot of workers off for the week, due to the holiday weekend coming up. Even the commute in and out wasn’t so bad, meaning it was not as crowded as it’s been, only 8 people standing instead of 14.

I read the New Yorker from last week, a very funny Shouts and Murmurs by Simon Rich. I just ordered his book, Ant Farm through my library on the http://bccls.org system. Hopefully I’ll get it by Thursday.

Tonight I am meeting my brother Frank at McSwells for a secret gig by the reunited Feelies. They’re opening up for Sonic Youth on Friday, a Fourth of July show at Battery Park which is sold out. The Feelies are also doing 2 ‘practice’ shows tomorrow and Wednesday which are totally sold out, so tonight is for friends of the band.

I’m not a friend of the band, but Frank is friends with Stan Demeski the drummer who put him on the list with a plus one, which is me. So it should be a good show if not an interesting show. Who knows who will turn up? Who knows who was invited? Who knows if Frank got the correct night? All these questions will be answered in a few hours.

So that makes this the early edition. Tune in later I suppose for the rest of tonight’s saga.

It’s hummus out once again. Much like sitting in a sauna, wearing a damp wool sweater that itches. Today was the day of Bill’s birthday. Bill is 44 today and at heart he’s 14. Which is a nice position to be in sometimes.

Last night Bill stayed at his mother’s apartment in Stuyvesant Town, he’s been keeping an eye on her since her supposed leaving the apartment the other night and getting lost on 14th street. Bill was able to take his mother to church today and then they had a nice lunch, finally dropping her off at the apartment.

Bill and I made plans to go out to Garfield for my niece Meghan and her husband Rob’s first wedding anniversary, so a BBQ was in order. I made arrangements to have Meghan’s sister Cory pick Bill and myself at the train station, as well as getting a ride back to Hoboken.

Everyone was there excepting Annemarie, Rex and Earl since they’re stuck in Northern California much to their consternation? Dismay? Rotten luck? And it’s smoky out there, no sun which a 50 degree average temperature.

Unbearably hot and sticky here with intermittent rain showers that make the humidity worse. Much like it is now. It was good to see most of my family again, Brian and Karen with their three kids, Hillary, Brian and Cassie. Brian’s got summer school this year which is something both his father and I could relate to.

I told Brian how I used to have to go to Hackensack High School my junior year for summer school, usually hitchhiking up Essex Street. I was able to get a ride a few times with no bad results and I eventually passed the class somehow while my parents went on vacation to Disney World without me. Brother Frank was there of course, with Elaine.

Brother Brian mentioned to me that he sometimes reads this blog of mine which was a trip to hear. I guess he knows about it, he sends me emails to johnozed, so perhaps he took it a step further and did a search, or more than likely I told him about it back in 2005 while we were both getting our drink on at his wife Karen’s 50th birthday party. I didn’t think he would remember it, but here he was telling me about reading it. I mentioned that he should write a comment about it, which is what I tell everyone.

Everyone was in good moods and having a good time. All very pleasant, no heavy drama and just a thunderstorm that lingered for about 15 minutes before turning the Field of Gar into a swamp once again. Excellent cake by Elaine as well a great grilled food by my nephew in law, Rob. Bill enjoyed the cuff links I got him and I told him about the tickets, but not actually showing him our access to Xanadu.

Bill brought up that when we watched a clip of the show on TV, there were people on the stage sitting there. Originally he thought that it was a chorus, but then noticed that they weren’t singing. He asked me about that and I decided to tell him that was we were going to be seated.

On stage, watching the show from behind the performers. He got super excited about that, and I have to admit, I am super excited about it too. That’s next Sunday, something to look forward to.

Tomorrow is back to work, a full three day work week, how horrible. Boo hoo.

Does sarcasm translate online?

Time to chill out for the evening. Bill’s coming back later with some things from his mother’s apartment so I have to wait for Bill to ring the bell so I can go down stairs and help him up with whatever it is that he has.

Here are some snaps from todays festivities. Have a good week and Happy Pride to all!

The birthday boy, farty far this year.