SUNRISE - July 11, 2011

July 11, 2011 Sunrise 5:52

 “Not everything that counts can be counted and not everything that can be counted counts.” -  Einstein

SUNRISE - July 9, 2011

July 9, 2011 Sunrise 5:50 a.m.

"It's never to late to become who you could have been."  - George Herbert


A new song performed live each month.  White Rabbit - Jefferson Airplane  last month and Spirit in the Sky - Norman Greenbaum


rlw

SUNRISE - June 18, 2011

June 18, 2011 Sunrise 5:41 am
Inside the Venetian in Las Vegas

“Do not spoil what you have by desiring what you have not; remember that what you now have was once among the things you only hoped for.” - Epicurus

Am experiencing pre-show concerns.  Playing at open-mic night in a few hours...no more practice today will make me any better than I am...hoping it is good enough.

I think I am a tiny bit better than when I started my final practice...so, off we go.  Will post clip if passable.

I only need 1,000 more hours of practice to calm down some.  Have four songs down (mostly).  Will start working on the next new ones tomorrow if I get through tonight satisfactorily.  Love the new song.

rlw

SUNRISE - June 8, 2011

June 8, 2011 Sunrise 5:41 am

So, just when you think you have put enough TIME (see, I got the 'T' word in early) in on earth and "been there - done that" (sometimes twice) and you think you have heard and seen everything, NPR (National Public Radio) comes along with an interesting bit of trivia that is now and forever, near and dear to my heart.

I have been a Classic Rock fan from the beginning - when it was new and not yet classic - and what budding bass player can not feel the beat in any AC/DC song (some naysayers have been overheard committing Rock Blasphemy - saying that all AC/DC and ZZ Top songs sound alike).  


And then you endure the years filled with semi-guilt, all the while, building up your record collection of all the great AC/DC songs, but half believing the claim that listening to them at full volume (my speakers only had a 10  on the volume dial, as 1-9 were mysteriously missing) would turn your brain to mush and make you go deaf (WHAT??  DID YOU SAY SOMETHING?)

So, getting back to NPR - on the radio today, they shared that when you play an AC/DC song through underwater speakers in the ocean (doesn't apparently matter which song, as they all sound alike) IT ATTRACTS SHARKS!.  Now that fact in itself, is totally understandable, as sharks obviously are attracted to good old rock-n-roll more than, say, jellyfish.

Here is the cool part of the new discovery (I can just see underwater scientists playing Mozart under water to attract whales and dolphins, attempting to communicate) and then they leave the set-up unattended and the hippie grad-student intern slips an AC/DC MP3 player into the system and cranks his iPod up to +30 (I am sure their investment includes much higher levels better than my +10 max speakers) to see what would happen.  In addition to scattering all of God's gentle ocean gentle creatures for miles, lo and behold, hundreds of sharks appeared for the impromptu concert at the reef. Here was their discovery:

AC/DC songs calmed the sharks down and reduced their aggressive hunt mentality:

"It shouldn't come as a surprise that great white sharks like heavy metal. But when Matt Waller, a charter boat operator in South Australia's Port Lincoln, played "Back in Black" and "You Shook Me All Night Long" by AC/DC underwater, he says the sharks become less aggressive. Some even rub their snouts against the caged speakers, which is adorable in a terrifying way."

Since I have has a somewhat wild and exciting ride in life filled with rock & roll, it is somewhat comforting to know in the sunset of my life that there is finally an acknowledged, albeit, heretofore under-appreciated, but understandably meditative quality to rock-n-roll that will soothe the savage beast - or at least the shark within us.

rlw

AC/DC - Therapy for Sharks,

SUNRISE - June 2, 2011

June 2, 2011 Sunrise 5:43 am

As a vaguely interesting side-note, I am required by well-intentioned doctors to take a lot of pills.  Every day. To keep them straight, I have these little pill boxes marked Sunday through Saturday.  Two of them.  There is a large blue rectangular box that holds my obligatory night meds for cholesterol, heart, and blood thinner meds, etc.  Next to it is a smaller white rectangular box that holds my required morning meds that includes a pill to settle my stomach down from taking all the other pills.

Note: these pill boxes conveniently stack on one another next to the two types of eye drops I take every morning and every night for Glaucoma.  I supposed if the Glaucoma issues deteriorate enough, I won’t be able to clearly see the pills I have to take – ha.  Just inches away, is the tube of chloride paste I have to squirt in my custom teeth molds and wear nightly to protect my teeth from the ravages of the radiation and chemo treatment for the Cancer treatments that precipitated my growing fascination with the extra gift of TIME and what to do with it in the first place.  

Every Friday, the boxes are empty.  A week has passed. TIME to refill the pill boxes.  A week of my life has passed. What did I do with it?  I find myself measuring the passage of my TIME in the weekly required pill - box refills – a glaring and unavoidable marker of precious moments in the rear view mirror.

rlw

SUNRISE - May 10, 2011

May 10, 2011 Sunrise 5:58 am “They say that time changes things, but you actually have to change them yourself” -     Andy Warhol

Started a very interesting activity recently...composing my own original music.  Actually, just the base line, but, it is a start.  I have my first song fairly far along.  Practiced a bit with my teacher - following along with a basic chord progression.  I am sure a drummer could pick up the rhythm fairly easily.  If we get it down before the next performance, I will add it to the mix..                 A small sliver of success - my music school is having an open house in a few weeks and my teacher asked if "my band" would reprise our performance of "Smoke on the Water" for the event...very cool.      rlw

SUNRISE - May 8, 2011

Mother's Day 2011 Bob & Sarah

Open Mic Night coming up for May.  

Mother's Day 2011 - Lise & Sarah

New songs on the block:


ZZ Top - Tush


House of the Rising Sun - The Animals


White Rabbit - Jefferson Airplane


Great Mother's Day - annual traditional picnic on the American River..a bit cooler and windier than in the past..five bites of sushi and packed up and finished in the car - great photos though.


A good use of time...

rlw

Mother's Day 2011 - Bob & Lise

"When logic and proportion have fallen sloppy dead
And the white knight is talking backwards
And the red queen's 'off with her head'
Remember what the dormouse said
Feed your head, feed your head?" Jefferson Airplane 1967

May 8, 2011 - Sunrise 6:00 am

SUNRISE - January 25, 2011

January 25, 2011 Sunrise 7:17 am

“Time flies and draws us with it. The moment in which I am speaking is already far from me”. Nicolas Boileau-Despreaux

I heard two Cancer stories today, I probably have heard similar stories for years, but until you are in the middle of the equations, the stories don’t seem to stick like they do now.  The first was how someone's relative was living Cancer free for five years post treatment when the Cancer came back with a vengeance and she was gone in about three months.  The second is an internet acquaintance on a Cancer forum – just passed the seven-year mark Cancer-free and going strong. 

Both stories involve TIME.  One got five more years and one received seven years and counting. 

Yesterday was 1111 days since Cancer diagnosis and the time has flown by.  Oddly, I do find myself measuring my allotted time in little innocuous ways such as how quickly the week passes because my weekly pill dispenser is empty and has to be filled again so soon. I think, between the time I filled it and a week later – what have I accomplished, what progress towards my goals have I made and/or what mark have I made?  Sometimes satisfactory - sometimes not.

Another TIME measure – my musical rock debut is in 95 days.  The last undone wish.  My 20 minutes of Rock-n-Roll fame. Practice - Practice - Practice.

Today’s gratitude:  the sense of hearing (should get even better when I get my new hearing aid next week) and love of music.  I have also noticed there are very few sounds (other than the distant freeway) at dawn.

rlw

SUNRISE - January 9, 2011

 “In just two days from now, tomorrow will be yesterday”. – shared by Pila of Hawaii

It is interesting how our undeveloped future, our events that have not yet happened, our magnificent experiences that have not been even imagined, all will soon be history, disappearing at lightning speed,  in our rear view mirror.

January 9, 2011 Sunrise 7:24 am

What do we choose to carry forward into tomorrow, like a wayfaring traveler light of burden, bereft of pack, with only the vessel of our mind and soul to hold whatever value we glean from today?  Tomorrow holds all the promise in the world.  All things are still possible.  It is the aura of the Christmas Eve of our youth when the Appaloosa pony and bright shiny skates were still achievable, our dreams neither dashed nor fulfilled; when we still believed.

The constant flow of time, like a surging river that will not be stopped as it moves unrelenting towards the sea, will have its destiny as it arrives inevitably at yesterday. Boulders, trees, bends and turns have interaction with the water’s flow, but not its ultimate destination. The seemingly immovable earth is sculptured, polished, or slowly ground into sand and soon, oblivion. 

Man is the rock.  Daily, the magnificent boulder or tiny stone that we perceive ourselves to be has an interaction with the flow of TIME, as its essence rushes over, under, around and through us, unrelentingly seeking tomorrow.  How do we use that moment?  The daily concert of our lives exposes us to a world premier of sounds never before heard by anyone else.  What do we desire to garner from the notes as they touch us?  They are not ours to hold, to possess, nor to own.  They are only ours to enjoy, experience, hear and to learn.  Do we choose to deny, ignore, disregard, or turn a deaf ear to the day by day message that explains who and what we are, how we came to this moment, and what we are to become tomorrow? When we listen, our soul is sculpted and polished.  Anything less grinds our spirit to sand [Sand n. Small loose grains of worn or disintegrated rock].

“How we spend our days is, of course, how we spend our lives”.  ~ Annie Dillard

SUNRISE - January 5, 2011

“Pick my left pocket of its silver dime, but spare the right - it holds my golden time!”  ~Oliver Wendell Holmes

How often have we/do we sell our golden time in exchange for  a silver dime?  The ultimate trick is to have a means of adequate ‘silver dime’ income to live by doing what you love enough to rationalize its depletion of your ‘golden time’, valued-moments bank account.

I am struggling with the concept of retiring – not because I have enough money – it is rather that I fear I won’t have enough TIME to finish all of my starts.  I have buckets of wooden ‘round to its’ strewn throughout my little kingdom.  I am desirous of getting to more of those little ‘round-to-its’, as they have no real value to anyone other than me. 

January 5, 20121 Sunrise 7:24 am

I am thinking that I would like to become adequate (seriously, just adequate would be a grand achievement) at a myriad of personal desires, such as, building birdhouses, large decorative wall clocks, Chinese brush painting and calligraphy to name a few.  To blog all day and play good ol’ rock–n-roll bass guitar all night would be a lovely path to follow, as I slide inevitably down to the cliffs overlooking the sea. 

  "Make the best use of what is in your power, and take the rest as it happens." – Epictetus

 [Note as it is my endeavor to post daily - i share that there was some dark wormhole in the internet universe last night and for the life of me could not get this to post.]

rlw