Tag Archives: Dreams

Let It Down

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Woke up with a cannabis hangover though I haven’t smoked it in a week now. Perhaps it’s leaving my body, leaving me, well, just leaving me I guess with vivid dreams.

Last night was about someone, maybe Bill switching the tables on me, taking my table which this computer is on and giving me a table I used to have back in Riverview Avenue. It was maybe 2 feet tall and a lot smaller. Don’t know what that is supposed to represent if it’s supposed to represent anything.

I had to get up earlier than I’ve been since I scheduled a visit from PSE&G for this morning between 8:00AM and 12:00PM. I made some coffee and did my usual routine. Online I got an instant message from Vinnie, who I used to work with in the Wanker Banker days.

He asked that I call him as soon as possible and so I did. I contacted Vinnie the other day regarding putting him down as a reference. I was apprehensive since his mother has been sick and in the hospital and I hoped my timing wouldn’t be awful. It wasn’t his mother just came home yesterday.

He was surprised that I’ve been out of work since July and he’d be more than happy to be a reference. We had a good talk and he had a suggestion that I should look into taking a real estate license test, figuring I would be good at that.

Vinnie said if he was going to buy some real estate, he’d buy it from someone like me. The funny thing is, yesterday while ambling around Hoboken where there is a real estate office on almost every block I passed by an office with a sign in their window suggesting a change of career, try real estate.

I thought I might do good in that so it’s actually something I was considering and Vinnie saying the same thing seemed fortuitous. He’s really a good guy and I am glad to have him in my corner. I even sent an email to a friend of Julio’s who did the same thing, got her broker license and now works in real estate.

Who knows? It seems like a good idea right now. I wished Vinnie and his wife and kids a Happy Thanksgiving and made tentative plans to meet up for a coffee down the line.

Walked around a bit today and stopped by a stationary store that had a help wanted sign in their window. I went in and asked if it was an off the books job and it wasn’t. They gave me an application and I started to fill it out, then I said that I was running late and would fill out the application at home and bring it back.

I’m not going to bring it back. I was hoping for a situation like Farfetched but obviously that wasn’t in the cards, so to speak.

Ran out of Stevia and so it was off to the A&P where I ran into Clara a girl I used to work with at that video store almost 20 years ago. She lives around the block and I see her every couple of months. She’s a happily married mom now with 2 kids.

We were close at one point but as it happened we drifted apart after I got fired from the video store after being caught doing something I shouldn’t have been doing while in the downward spiral I was in in the months following my mother’s passing.

It was good to see her though, she’s still a sweet heart though time and rumors widened the chasm between us. It was a day where former co-workers from my past popped up.

And then there’s Harpy. He pops up like clockwork. While I’m writing, or eating dinner, Harpy invariably calls. I don’t mind since I love Harpy and I know he loves me.

Had a good talk with my brother Brian last night. He’s a good guy and I love him a lot. We went though a lot of shit together and being the brother closest to me in age, a lot of fighting which he almost always won.

But that was then, here we are now and I consider him not just a brother but a very dear friend. I’m sure he doesn’t understand things about me but I know he’s there for me and I am there for him, lending an ear whenever possible.

Played guitar today as well, learning some Paul Simon songs since if I’m going to be busking, it’s good to play songs that people know, rather than going for songs that maybe be cool to me, but unknown to most.

I mean, I’d love to play All Tomorrows Parties by the Velvet Underground and singing it like Nico would, but really, would the people walking by the riverside know what I was singing? More than likely not, so I’ll play Me & Julio by the Schoolyard or Kodachrome and be happy with that and hopefully get some greenbacks in my guitar case.

And with that, I will wish you all, or the both of you, a very Happy Thanksgiving. Don’t know when I’ll be posting, we’re heading upstate and if we don’t catch the 6:00 train getting into Hoboken around 9:00, we’ll catch the 9:00 train, getting into Hoboken around midnight.

So Happy Thanksgiving from me.

Rocky Racoon

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Well this day is just another day I suppose. It’s a Sunday, that much I know. And it’s been another up & down day for me. Last night I didn’t turn on the TV until the 11:00 news. I mainly sat in front of the computer and copied dozens of songs from the Rolling Stones to the Specials to Elvis Costello to the Cure to Elton John.

Trying to figure out the easiest songs to play. If I’m going to start busking for real, I should have at least 10 songs that I know inside out, songs that the passerby would know. I’ve loved the Specials for 30 years but never attempted any of their songs.

Turns out their songs are remarkably easy to play. I wonder if that was former head Specials leader Jerry Dammers doing? He’s always been the one to do things with the fans in mind. Rat Race, a classic Specials song is really easy to play and lot’s of fun.

Though being unemployed it has a different meaning as I want to be a part of the Rat Race. No more harboring dreams of somehow living my life and not having any part of mainstream employment. I want a job. A mainstream job.

I’ve worked in the music business, worked in magazine publishing, a Rupert Murdoch experiment. Not your average jobs. They were fun and definitely interesting, but the real jobs that I’ve had paid well and offered benefits and some relative stability. But of course as we all know, the stability wasn’t going to last.

But back to the music, Elton John songs aren’t that hard either. I’m no Davey Johnstone, but he’s no John Ozed either.

It was good not watching much TV last night. I did watch Saturday Night Live and was charmed by Joseph Gordon-Levitt. I loved his ‘Make ’em Laugh’ opener. Who wouldn’t be impressed by those back flips? I’m sure Donald O’Connor would have been.

Dave Matthews was meh, but I wasn’t expecting anything different. Just don’t get the whole Dave Matthews thing.

Due to my financial situation certain substances are out of reach. And since those herbs aren’t being ingested, oh the dreams I’ve been having have been quite weird. I guess they generally are weird, but I woke up this morning with three dreams that stood out.

One involved those certain herbs and how the buds were actually infested with spider eggs and when you smoked those buds, the spider eggs would explode leaving one’s face with a white substance. In the dream there were some buds laying there, and one of them started to move on their own.

Another dream involved my sister and myself somewhere in central New Jersey. We were arguing which is something we never do and never did before really. But I was spitting ice cubes at her, then I lost my clothes and was trying to make my way to a mall where I could by some clothes. It involved winding my way down some stadium seating and some farmland.

The last dream was me being at Tower Records in the Village for their closing sale and buying a container of tobacco but not having any rolling papers and being incredibly frustrated. Perhaps I’d have dreams like these frequently but they were usually suppressed from what I had smoked prior to sleeping.

It’s a good enough reason to resume ingesting those herbs again, but finances being what they are lately it’s not likely to be happening any time soon. That’s a drag, or rather the lack of a drag.

I did make it to Tariq’s studio this afternoon. I’m glad I went. I was surprised to see some accomplished musicians there playing bass, drums and guitars. Tariq once again encouraged me to play guitar but I was once again intimidated by actual musicians. The great Tim wasn’t there but he doesn’t intimidate me, he’s 15 years old.

Spying a Ensonic keyboard in the corner that no one was using I opted for that. I played keys for a friends band about 15 years ago, so it wasn’t that much of a stretch. I did my best to add some color and textures to what they were playing and did my best to emulate Alan Price when they played House of the Rising Sun.

When I play that song on guitar (another easy song to play by the way), I tend to imitate the organ in my phrasing. Hard playing towards the end on my part. I also like to think I added a Middle Eastern vibe to a Pearl Jam song they were playing.

I think it was called Black, but I don’t know any Pearl Jam songs so it might have been some other group. Anyway, no one complained or said ‘Get that guy out of here, he’s horrible’ so I would like to think I did alright.

Right now, Bill is watching Lawn Hors d’œuvre and I’m listening to the White Album on headphones as I write. Sort of like listening to music before I had my own stereo when I was living in my parent’s house. The White Album was released today, 41 years ago. So there’s a Beatles fact for you today.