Tag Archives: Jim Mastro

Working for the Clampdown

It’s Tuesday again. Today I sent a few resumes to different staffing agencies. I won’t work at a staffing agency again but if they can find me a gig somewhere that would be nice. I’m sure they’re inundated with resumes.

The staffing agencies used to have resumes piling up by the fax machines when I was working for Staffmark and Golden Staffing and things were relatively good then. Haven’t heard anything yet, but maybe tomorrow. All I can do is continuously check the email.

I felt October would be a good month so here goes. I have been checking out jobs on my own for a while now, so if the staffing agencies want to take me on, they’ll be doing all the searching. I’m ready.

Last October, while I was still employed I think I had the Swine Flu or the H1N1 virus. I had never been as sick in my life as I was for that week and a half last year. I was so sick that I wound up going to the emergency room and left with a prescription for anti-biotics, which knocked the flu out of my system 5 days later.

I do remember when I came out of it, that I had turned a corner in my life. And I believe that was the Swine Flu. And I’m not getting the shot since I had never gotten one before.

Today I heard from Andy, an old friend of Chaz. Andy was at the National Equality March on Sunday and I might have seen him but wasn’t sure. He mentioned that several of his friends say that all the time.

That Andy, has such a familiar face and body type that other people get mistaken for him a lot. Such is the life of a bear and I’m glad I am a wolf.

Also heard from Kathe, Chaz’ wife. She’s back in Jersey City with Chaz but is heading down to Florida to help an aunt who has Alzheimer’s disease.

I was on the phone with Kathe for about 40 minutes. It was fun. I really hadn’t spoken with her since she left Jersey City a couple of years ago. We made tentative plans on gallery hopping next week.

I’ll try to steer the hopping in a different direction and perhaps see some art that I hadn’t seen before. There is that Dennis Hopper photography exhibition that I’d like to see that I missed last week with Harpy.

Juan stopped by last night. Always good to see him. He was looking good. No computer or TV so he doesn’t know what’s going on. His broken heart has healed and he’s happy about that, things back to the way they were, shuttling back and forth between Trenton and Ocean Grove.

I may even see him later in the week when he returns his mother’s car which he borrowed since his own car went kaput. He was only around for a couple of hours, before Bill came home.

Bill told me the other day that he will be singing the National Anthem at Madison Square Garden again for the fourth time, this time, singing before the NY Knicks basketball game on December 20. Very exciting news indeed. Something to look forward to.

I watched the Love Guru this afternoon. A certain someone said it was really funny and I listened to her. But man I had never seen a movie as bad as that since I don’t know what. I do like the way Romany Malco shaves his goatee. That’s about the only thing I ‘got’ from the Love Guru. I don’t think I can pull off his goatee though, literally or figuratively.

Today while wandering around Hoboken in the afternoon, I stopped by the Guitar Bar to say hello to Jim Mastro. It seems every time I’m walking around I stop by and say hello to Jim. He’s a nice guy.

When I stopped by on Saturday he was very busy which was good for the Guitar Bar so we didn’t have much time to chat. But we chatted this afternoon.

He mentioned a guy was in the store earlier today, talking to Jim and saying that the revolution will be coming and suggested that Jim get a gun for the upcoming insurrection. Jim is an Obama voter, which the tea bagger didn’t know.

Scary times and a bit unnerving to say the least. What the hell is going on with this country? Why do they hate Barack Obama so much? I disliked Bush intensely, for myriad reasons but still I never fomented revolution.

Is this the road we are headed down? Or are they just loud mouthed squeaky wheels making the most noise?

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Saturday Gigs

It’s 5:55PM on Bill’s Mac and I’m tired. It’s been an out of the ordinary day. But first a recap of what happened before. Watched Bill Maher last night, he was very good, Lincoln Chafee, Cornell West and Richard Belzer were the panel, Bill Frist (intelligent jerk) was the opening interview and Sarah Silverman was the final guest with the panel.

Her video on how to solve world hunger was the tops. A simple idea. Sell the Vatican, make the Pope super popular. He would be a superhero of sorts since he already has the cape and any Vatican involvement with the Holocaust would be forgiven.

With the proceeds of the Vatican sale all the billions of dollars could be spent solving world hunger. It would be the christian compassionate thing to do. Sell the house which is a city, take some of those proceeds and make a condo for the Pope and his friends.

It was as irreverent as only Sarah Silverman could be.

I recorded it so Bill could watch it, it was that good. I stayed up watching Craig Ferguson who really is the funniest guy in late night television. Then I went to bed, Bill sleeping under his apnea mask. At some point he took the mask off and started snoring, but by then I was pretty much far gone in slumber land to really notice.

I slept really well, woke up to find Bill about to go out and get the paper and some bagels. The laundry I did yesterday was still damp which required another day of it hanging around the kitchen.

He came back and hurried about trying to get ready for his stage manager gig for Amiri Baraka’s birthday event tonight. Not being much of an Amiri Baraka fan, I just made myself a nice breakfast and read the paper.

Bill was soon on his way into the city. I farted around, ran some errands and argued with strangers online about Barack Obama winning the Nobel Peace Prize. A lot of people are against it, but mainly these people who were against it, never gave two shits about the Nobel Peace Prize before.

In fact one of them brought up how Nobel invented dynamite and what an odd fact that is. Of course anyone with an inquisitive brain knew this ages ago. But there they were arguing their ‘Obama wasn’t born here’ ‘the Socialist president’.

I had read somewhere that the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame Annex in Soho was free yesterday and today for John Lennon’s birthday yesterday. That’s seemed like a fun thing to do so I got my act together and headed into the city on the Path.

Swung by The Guitar Bar where the ever lovin’ Jim Mastro was back from England. He was the guitar tech for the Mott the Hoople reunion shows, having played with Ian Hunter on his solo gigs here and abroad.

The shows were a success, and Jim met both Jimmy Page and Mick Jones from the Clash backstage. Page was a contemporary and Mick was a Mott the Hoople fan from way back in the day.

I anticipated that the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame Annex might be jammed since it was free but it was only a 15 minute line outside and a 10 minute wait inside. Overall the experience was underwhelming.

The main exhibition was John Lennon: The New York Years and seeing his personal items was nice but no photography was allowed. And I thought that to be very odd. The final part was a paper bag behind glass, containing the clothes John was wearing when he was brutally murdered 29 years ago. But then again it was free so I really shouldn’t complain.

Now I’m back in Hoboken, tired and a little bit hungry despite having just eaten a bagel from this morning.

I have to get up early in the morning, like around 4:30 to be at 7th Avenue and 33rd Street at 6:00 for a 7:00 bus to Washington DC. It’s Bill’s suggestion that I get there an hour early since it’s sometimes a mess queuing up for the Bolt Bus.

And since Bill is almost always spot on regarding matters involving buses I’m taking his word. So a nap is out of the question. I’ll figure something out I’m sure.

Since I’ll be en route tomorrow and without internet access, you might expect a very late posting, which will more than likely be done on Monday.

one illegal photo

one illegal photo

two illegal photo

two illegal photo

three illegal photo

three illegal photo

the last illegal photo before they stopped me. James Brown live.

the last illegal photo before they stopped me. James Brown live.

I think Bowie is right. The Rock & Roll Hall of Fame is bullshit. There are tons of great, fantastic bands that will never make it into the Hall since it’s mainly all about who sold the most. And that’s not Rock & Roll!

And tomorrow is National Coming Out Day, so come out of the closet whomever, wherever you are!