Vaseline Machine Gun

"Men do not quit playing because they grow old; they grow old because they quit playing."
Oliver Wendell Holmes

Thursday

Long day and drop in with EH at the end.  They’ve settled LEW at 1:00 am, talked the client into a shitty deal but the lawyers are making out fine.  A cynical settlement and both JL and I comment that the judge should perhaps not approve.  EH starts it off slow, new trainer C plunks down beside me, she is a talkative sort and hope she can make it.  She is probably 30, big blue eyes and tattoos all over her back which I try not to notice as she wobbles in side plank next to me.

Friday

Long day, trolling downtown sf, feel like I should be in a short skirt and eight inch heels; a strange place to be.

Done by 4:00, and head in for late yoga.  Pradeep has two classes, 4:30 to 5:30, then 5:30 till 6:45.  It used to be 5:30 to 7:00 but hey, cut backs are everywhere.  The 4:30 to 5:30 is hard; very hard.  Bunch of core and push-up work and after 60 minutes drenched and fried.  Take a long drink and seriously consider stopping there, but don’t.  Class two comes in and he puts the hammer down for 60 minutes, then 40 minutes of release.  The 75 minute class stretches to 100, I don’t think he ever thought about the clock.  Thoroughly rung out; my towel and mat are soaked after 155 minutes. 

Go in Saturday am to drive Leo Kottke to the airport.  Leo is affable and we talk about his gigs, kids, skateboarding, scooters, emergency rooms, photo shoots in old porn studios, visiting prisons and being stuck.  He asks about why I am doing this; I tell him-he is impressed or at least amused saying simply: “that’s smart.” He shares his own stories of recharge and oh to be in one of those bars or hotel lobbies and have Leo come set up in a corner.  We keep talking at the white curb, he closes out with a story about being on a submarine driven into a pier twice and the noise it made.  It is clear he had fun too for 25 minutes and both of us left grinning.

Get home, Brigid planning for her teenage sleep over.  I stroll through a crowded Costo, multi-tasking in trying to download Vaseline Machine Gun to my phone.  ITunes has changed its licensing agreement.  Fifty five pages on an iphone screen, I press ok after the first and will hope for the best.  My credit card has expired and I am pissing off old folks who are buying Depends in volume, so I pull over in from of an Everest sized display of Honey Bunches of Oats so I can update my credit card info to download a tune I have not heard in twenty years.  I get Rose on a marsh walk late and watch White Tailed Kites hover over the mud listening to a makeshift play list of Leo, McMurtry, Gillian Welch and Steve Earle.  We get home and I help Brigid clean up.

Its 6:00 and I am warming pizzas for the masses thinking a VO2 max session, 25 minutes of snatches may happen.  Then I see the size of the teenaged boys coming in and quickly decide they are not leaving my sight.  Way too many hormones and way too much biomass.  There will be adult supervision; at least I will stay awake as long as I can.

Leo put Vaseline Machine Gun on Six and Twelve String Guitar which came out in the early 70’s.  I remember listening to it driving up Mt. Tamalpais when we should have been in school.  We rarely drove drunk, we were responsible truants if you look past the psychedelics.  I remember the cassettes I recorded from Nick Gill’s record collection in Berkeley 1982, staying up way too late with Leo and Lowell George (Thanks, I’ll Eat it Here).  I remember vividly plugging Leo into the walkman (they stopped making them last week) and skiing deep powder in the tight trees in the upper reaches of Taos Ski Valley in the early Spring of ’84, which is the last time I felt as beastly fit as I do now, though I would not last twenty feet in those trees today.  They are bigger and I am slower.

Truth is though, as clear as I remember it, as Leo says here: I don’t know that guy any more.  The music still sounds really good.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nF3kbVp23kk 

 

Travels with Brigid

"I had seen so many begin to pack their lives in cotton wool, smother their impulses, hood their passions, and gradually retire from their manhood into a kind of spiritual and physical semi-invalidism. In this they are encouraged by wives and relatives, and it's such a sweet trap."
John Steinbeck, Travels With Charley

Indeed.  I watched Weeds last night with Brigid.  Then we watched Buffy the Vampire Slayer, the episode where Dracula gets eurotrashed.  We shut that down and start talking, she is reading Of Mice and Men and loving it, then we move on to East of Eden.  We watched the movie a few years ago, and she was riveted and picked up the book.  First literature ever saw her read.  Not like Ian, who goes nowhere without a big book in his pocket.  I would have put that down to James Dean, but that did not seem to be it.  So an old copy of Travels With Charley has been floating around the mess that is the family room for about a year and she picks it up.  She reads about it and sees it won the Pulitzer prize for literature; her eyebrows go up.  "I'd like to drive around the country in a camper with a dog and you," she says.  I can't think of anything I would love to do more.  I ask her to read me the first paragraph which these days is my favorite.  She does, stumbling over "senility;" I say yeah, as in senile.  She lights up: "oh, that's funny then."  Uh-huh.  We chat a bit longer, and it's nearly midnight so I shut it down, she says "goodnight, love you Dad," starts to scamper up the stairs.  She stops, reverses course and scampers back down to snatch Steinbeck of the shelf like Barry moving in fast to snag the last cookie.  Slays me. 

Thursday
Flying all day and race in fast for V02 max, 15/15 x 52 with 16kg at 7 rep pace.
Friday
Also a busy day, hour long MH class.  Right shoulder mildly hinkey from prior snatchfest.  He starts of with a rap about a class at another studio, guessing full of Castro beefcake, where all the guys were doing multiple multiples on their chaturanga's which MH says wears down the shoulders; at 55 he knows and at 51 I believe him.  So he had them taking their five breath rest in plank instead of downward dog.  Folks groaned but he said (no Castro pun intended) "no, you can cruise in plank, really."  And you can.  If you are going out at 100%, dropping back to 80%  works to reinvigorate - just enough extra oomph over the lunch hour.
Saturday, shuffling kids, working in the pouring rain.  Giants improbable run to the Show continues; this town is gonna be a blast this week.  No sweat.
Sunday, more rain and looking forward to ct at 4:30.  Ian advises that he is going on a hike with his friend, she shows up with nervous mother:  "you will be here, right, you are not going anywhere ?"  Guess not.  Settle for late walk in marsh with appreciative Labrador.

Monday.  In really early, hit gym by 7:00:
5+5 x 2 pushups to renegade rows, 55lb dumbbells
5+5x2 sls, bodyweight first, then 35lb plate
Presses, 5+5 20, 4+4 24, 1+1x2 32
10 squat to press, 90lb barbell
3x, shit load of press work which I felt today
30/30 20 24kg swings x 10, few sets of assisted pull-ups at break
Horrible, sad dinner.
Tuesday
early evening, four miles elliptical, bunch of bu press work.
Wednesday
hit gym during the early part of the first game of the 2010 Series, goes like
20/20 10  push ups x 8
10 24kg gs
5 pull ups, 22lb assist
5+5 double 20kg squat to press, the 5+5 singles
3x, ten slow push ups circuits 2/3
5+5 20kg windmills, 12kg low
2+2, 1+1 24kg tgu
Coach Dos circuit, 16kg bottoms up on cleans and presses, save last on left, no mas.  Five minutes straight work each circuit.
3x
Brigid comes in on ferry, we head up to Yoshi's to watch game and listen to Leo Kottke.  Giants score 6 in fifth and win 11-7.  Kottke is a genius, and toward the end of the set plays Corinne Corinna, and Little Martha, which Leo notes came to Duane Allman in a dream.  Brigid is into Leo, but she is tired and worn down.  Face plant upon arrival.
Getting away would be a very good thing; we did for a bit after short-changing her this summer.

Night Owls

"And hand in hand, on the edge of the sand,
    They danced by the light of the moon,
          The moon,
          The moon,
They danced by the light of the moon."
Edward Lear

I am not speaking figuratively here.  I am not talking about my rotten teenagers, who stay up until all hours on the weekends, wallowing in the wasteland that is premium cable.  I am not talking about those clients who email me at 3:35 a.m. (I am told, by marketing consultant, this is a good thing:  "they are up, can't sleep, and reach out to you.."  Yes they do, but better to reach over to the other side of the bed and maybe get laid instead of billed . . .)
I am not even talking about Edward Lear, though B loves this ditty.  I am talking about Bubo Virginianis.  I am talking stereo Great Horned owls under a good sized moon.  I am talking the bird the size of a twenty pound cat that flew off the telephone pole, just as I got the flash up, just as I dialed up the shutter speed and maxed out the ISO to a tolerable grainy effect while Rose gazed over the deserted movie theater parking lot and had to be called "off" of the popcorn bag holding the promise of a few stray kernels.  The "off" cost me the shot, but it's a good memory.

That was Tuesday night.  Everyone off at a dress rehearsal; I get in at 7:50 with Rose looking hopeful.  I am tired and cooked from a long day and a 100's workout, (see below) but cave to her brown eyes by 8:50 and take her out alone in the dark in VFF with a 22 ounce Sapporo left over from the bluegrass festival.  Marsh is a noisy place at night.  Pockets of ducks are mumbling and the perpetually pissed geese are hissing.  Rose is chasing up Black Crowned Night herons which fly off croaking and and Killdeer shriek as we approach.  VFF make this walk an entirely different experience.  I can feel every rock pebble or twig; not in an uncomfortable way, just connected.  Am also MUCH quieter and when walking over the matted dead grass of the south side straight shot back hardly make a sound.  Our sudden appearance scares up few small rabbits but Rose stays off, night time is dangerous enough for these critters without having to flee from a good-natured tail wagging Labrador.  Coming back the owls start up in stereo and get a long look at the bird on the left; bird on the right is invisible, just low soft sound coming out of the black.  The place smells good too.
Nothing Sunday.  Raining and lazy.
Monday.  Pradeep class late.  His Monday class is a killer and I love it.  It is just the mat and sweat in a packed studio but the vibe he creates is remarkable.  The whole class is jazzed before and after.
Tuesday, 60 minute volume workout, totals like this:
100 push ups
100 body weight box squats
100 24kg strict mp
100 walking lunges with twin 35lb dumbbells
200 24kg swings.
That took an hour and was, conservatively, 38,000 pounds, weighted lunges talking to me today.  Hello ass, it is sore.
Rubber hitting the road with lending institutions all day and get in for MH late.  Sore but he makes me bring it.  Oh yeah, and the Giants won.

Sweet Emotion

"You talk about things that nobody cares
You're wearing out things that nobody wears"

Sweet Emotion, you know who. . .

In 1993 I listened to an interview with Mavis Staples who had just released a record, The Voice, produced by Prince.  She said that after about three minutes with him she knew she was in the presence of genius, which is saying something given her pedigree.

The same year he did a few shows at the DNA Lounge.  You can now stream them off of Wolfgang's Vault, which was what we, Ian and I, did this morning on our walk in the marsh; he is such good company these days.  The intro then rolling bass line then tight horn ensemble into You Sexy Motherf***er is fucking spine tingling.  Ian, who usually hates anything like funk, was totally caught up, though he was spinning so hard on his future plans that after Prince we did John Prine for two miles and he never complained.  Not through Sabu Visits the Twin Cities or Hello in There, or Bruised Orange.  That was a first.

This is a stressful time and need to stay and be present.  Notwithstanding the joy of throwing heavy iron balls around, the best thing I have done in the past three years is develop a consistent yoga practice.  Breathing deep and sweating it out on the mat is nothing but good and it is now essential.

So that was it Thursday.  Blast of a day mediating trust dispute, getting the parties to a settlement and saving the judge probably three days of trial time, having a ball.  Meet with client at 3:45 and finish late but enough time to duck into EH class; she plays the best music and lays me out.  Takes fucking 40 minutes to drive down Lombard starting at 6, erasing the glow.

Friday, in office by 8, bail at 4:15 and head in for 135 minutes of Pradeep.  Why one would go to a bar on a Friday evening instead of his classes is beyond me.  90 minutes in he has us in reverse triangle and twisting left to right, my weak side.  He hangs in and tries to guide but given cortisol levels and 90 minutes I am close to spent.  Give up trying to get the left hand outside the right foot, it is just a practice.  The other side is a cake walk.  Finish and roll down Market with clean-up calls onto the boat and north.

Get home and receive word that Brigid is at friend's house for night, after missing seven days of school with stress related migraines.  Over my dead body.  I call her tell her to be ready in 30, she sounds relieved.  Collect her and we watch Rush Hour II with B.

Today, she has tech from 9:00 to 1:00.  Drop her off, Ian and I spill into marsh with ecstatic labrador.  Listening to Prince and Prine his concern re Brigid is genuine and illuminating and very thoughtful.  We collect her, and head to Costco, they are thick as thieves and giggling.

He drops Aerosmith's greatest hits into the cart and at seven bucks I don't veto.  We head to Trader Joe's to complete shopping for the dinner Brigid says she is going to cook.  We listen to Sweet Emotion, Dude Looks Like a Lady and Love in an Elevator, which Ian seems to know a little too well.  We come home, unload the car and Brigid does face plant into the sofa and does not move for two and a half hours.  Ian helps put away without being asked, casting an occasional eye over his sister's prone form.

I am ready for a nap, but fuck that.  Go out at 4:30 like this:

10+10 28kg rows

10 20kg bootstrap squats

16/5 to 32/1 descending ladder, give up on the 16 after first circuit.  There is no point.  Move to 5+5 20, 4+4 24, 3+3 28, to 1+1x2 32.  The 28's go well, failed reps second circuit second 32 left, but fix it by third and it rockets up both reps.

3x

20 28kg swings to 1+1 28kg tgu x 5

30/30 20 swings 28kg x 5.

Rose is demanding ball play which we do till dusk.  Brigid wants to do dinner; I stay next to her, it is excellent.

Finish with Butch & Sundance after catching last two innings of NLCS; Giants victorious in game 1.  There will be a fall only over my dead body.

Balancing Act

"The only tyrant I accept in this world is the still voice within."
Mahatma Ghandi
 10/10/10, but I forgot Roses' sixth birthday on 10/9/10.  She forgave quickly as always.
Morning dog walk, cool to start but then hot fast so cruising Costco in a sweat-soaked black turtleneck, good look dude.
Into SF for first meet with Herr Krupp in years.  Supposed to meet Marina Green, but fleet week clogging up the north waterfront and eventually we end up at the playground on top of St. Mary's garage along with a large Chinese fair which meant a cheerful if quizzical audience.  He breaks out the clubbells, much work to do here if I wish to pursue.  We dial it back to flexibility drills and shoulder openers.  Tight shoulders are a continuing problem, which is one reason I want to pursue clubbells.  Casey is a master at breaking it down and we get my deck squats to a place I can work with.
Head up to CT class, what I remember went like this though probably not in this order:
10 mountain climbers.  Slow.  No momentum.
10+10 one arm downward dog to pump stretch, these felt really solid, much better than a few months ago
10 spider lunges
10 spider planks
10 dolphin to dolphin plank
10 deck squats
10 sls
10 shoulder stand crunches for five count
10 slow pushups, five count at bottom and top
10 20kg goblet squats, with ten count hold at bottom of each, by now dripping sweat and nearly losing handle.
1+1 x 5 24kg press, ten second hold at top of each
1+1 TGU's x 5  16, 20, 20, 24, 24
30/30 20 swingsx10, 20kg x 5, 24kg x 5.
Very very good class, boatload of work, little rest between and happily drenched at the end.  Northward text exchanges with 5 re 49ers really sucking.  They do, totally, it was worse than I could have imagined.
Monday, Indigenous people's day but really stressing 'bout Brig.  Drop Ian off and into marsh 7:40, by 8:45 multiple incoming, grounded in work.  Head into sf with Brigid, back to 3700 Cal. where have spent so much time.  The cafeteria smells exactly the same, the hallway feels the same.  Poor Brigid; much work to do.  Or is it adolescence preying upon the still voice within.  Stay tuned.
Into court Tuesday, feeling crappy in a bronchial way and just stressed.  Amazed looking back a year, how similar, except much stronger.  Done by 10:30, get the tax returns dealt with (finally) by 11:30, moderately lighter.  Leave at 4:00, think I'm gonna throw iron for 40 minutes, but the BART stars align and I can get to MH yoga instead.  Slow, easy class but just the right thing to do; iron can wait, breathing deep and hanging out in pidgeon drops my BP.  Client crises on the way up, but half hour of emails preserves status quo until am, then sit with Brigid watching Live Free or Die Hard, she is doing better I can tell.  Rose delighted to share sofa with me, 75lb puppy love goes a bit of a way.
Wednesday, grind, serious grind, all day.  Race home on 5:55, cook a really good dinner which is done by 7:30.  Out back in the dark and start throwing it down fast:
brief warm up, then 15/15, 7 rep pace x 50
25 minutes of straight snatches, the only potentially limiting factor is hand care but that goes ok.  Done by 8:05, and everyone is well fed.
It occurs to me that all is not exactly what it seems and reaffirms one of my firmest convictions, which is to trust my gut.  You are 51 and not stupid.

19 Pageviews From Bulgaria

 

"Life is mostly a good reason to go for a walk with your dog."
Robert Brault

It ought to be clear by now that I don't get around much.  Grew up on one side of the bay, went to school on another, and built a career on a third.  All within a radius of about thirty miles, probably less.
It's a sweet 30 miles to be sure.  Driving through Hayes Valley this morning, taking Grupo Fantasma to the airport, Gilbert E, trumpet player, after telling me about gigs in Iraq and all over, just said "man this is a sweet little neighborhood."  My feelings exactly. Though I did nearly tell him to stfu when he mentioned something about unloading his stuff.  Yeah it's a small world but I ain't your bitch and you could stand to drop 60 pounds.
Chill; earlier this week I noticed the statistics tab on Blogger.  I hit it and there were recorded 19 views from Bulgaria.  I don't know if there was a real body behind those views, just as likely some eastern european or wherever bot crawling for references to god knows what.  Kettlebells ? Labradors ? Rodney Strong Pinot ?
But I am amused that on the off chance there was a body behind those views, that person saw fit to scroll 19 pages of blather from someone who never gets out of his comfort zone.  I'm bettin' its the music links or Rose, she is the pretty one here, so above is a good picture of her as usual in the marsh as usual from this afternoon my Bulgarian bot friend.
Week went like this:
Monday
Pradeep class
Tuesday, training like
Burpees to three pushups to twin 24 suitcase deads x 5
10 GS, 24 kg
Press
5+5 16, 3+3 24, 1+1 x 2 32
5+5x2 sls bu 12kg second
Swings
15/15 10 rep pace, alternate 32 and 24, x 20
Wednesday, 2 miles am,
Pm, 60 min MH
Thursday, nothing, unless you count sprinting down market half a mile 
to catch boat after getting text that Brigid's blood pressure is scary 
high; stay tuned.
Friday, crazy busy, workout late
15 decline pushups, one foot up and switch
10+10 split squats, 35 plate
1-5 press ladder, 24kg
20 walking lunges, twin 35 lb dumbells
3x, decline pushups really strong, could have gone for more reps easy.
50 24kg swings
10 reverse pull ups off smith machine
5 neutral grip pull ups, 22lb assist
x3
Another 50 swings.
Pull ups good, just enough assistance to really focus on lats and form.
DOMS this morning; but 75 min yoga, very good class, then three mile marsh walk.

I like being here and walking my dog.  If you find that surf worthy, hang out.

Who Do You Do It For ?

"Money is a lot like shit:  you keep it all in big pile it smells bad and attracts flies; you spread it around and you grow something beautiful."
Warren Hellman, Hardly Strictly Bluegrass, 2002

Equinox has been raiding Urban Flow for yoga teachers and we are all a lot better for it.  Pradeep comes from there and so does this kid Austin who subbed when MH was out on Wednesday, celebrating his 55th birthday.  Lookin' awesome bud.
Part of the rap at the beginning of each class is "who do you do it for ?"  You get that in your head, then later, when they have you in an extended series, when your thighs are screaming and sweat is pouring out and after Pradeep says "I know, I know it's hard" they drop it:  "who do you do it for ?"  Instantly you dig deeper.  Very effective tool.
But it does raise some questions:  what are you "doing" and what is "it" ?  I don't think I am doing anything.  I could no more stop being physical than breathing.  I just am, and this just is.
Just keep moving and STFU lawyer man.

Wednesday, two miles then Austin's pretty good class.
Thursday, two miles on elliptical and CT 30 min session.  Good class, keep it moving too heavy with the 20 on the snatches; 8:00 pm is rough when you start at 6:00 am.
Friday, three miles am.
First day of HSB, haul Barry in for:

 Jerry Douglas, then an awesome set by Patty Griffin.

Patty's done and a bunch of hipsters are moving it.  I don't know the next band, Jenny and Johnny and I am wondering who all these kids are.  Now I know;
Jenny Lewis and Johnny Rice light it up.

They are hook happy with sarcastic lyrics and it works.  They break into a Jenny tune at the end called Acid Tongue, she loses the white shades and she goes from neo-indie-punk hot to serious songwriting chops.  The crowd is just laid out and she is up there, beautiful and belting it.  You Tube version: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kw8fmhYhbqo&feature=related  

Once she loses the glasses you can see she is no kid; 34, just getting into the prime of life with buckets of talent.
T-Bone Burnett burns it up with the Punch Brothers to close it out.

Up at 3:30 and into GG Park to save space.  Drop a tarp at 4:15 in the front row at Banjo
and back to the van and a sleeping bag on Fulton/22nd.  Sleep till 7:45.
Get up, hop on the 5 Fulton to downtown and in the gym by 8:20.  Wandering around, trying to get it started.
Keep it simple, cause foggy, under-nourished and don't know how it will go:
20/20 10 pushups x 8
20 slow box squats
10 double 16kg mp, to 5 double 24kg mp
10 slow deep box sqiats, 45lb oly bar over head
3x
10 32 kg swings to 1+1 snatch, windmill, tgu combo, 45lb oly bar
x5
then 15/15 10 32kg swings x 5
that went pretty good, not the longest workout but was there and did it.  As Dawn said: "hey, you're here now."
Back up on the 38 Geary with a large cup of coffee.  Driver says nothing, he got the don't fuck with me vibe.
Get off at 23rd and hit 25th and Fulton RIGHT as Ann and B are pulling up.  We catch half of Dry Branch Fire Squad, and its into Carolina Chocolate Drops and if that ain't the best set of the weekend it's as good as the best, here is Rhiannon kicking up her heels.

and Dom on the bones . . .

Then its Joan B, who is awesome.  Heartening to see sooo many young women really into her set.  The its Grisman who I have not seen since Humboldt in '79.  He is very gray.  Then to Gillian and David, who call him back out:

Their harmonies burn through the fog on Miss Ohio, here it is three years ago . . .  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TNUB56jwu-k

Next up with Steve Earle and the Dukes.  A little more country than the last Dukes show I saw, but as Steve said, the ladies cut the ugly outta the band:

Awesome day filled with music and B in his element.

Sunday.  This to be a rest day; no real way around it.  Sleep in 'till 8, that felt good, then off.  We head down to the Towers of Gold stage where we never been before.  Hot Memphis rock 'n roll band Lucero, the to McMurtry.

Kicks into Choctow Bingo halfway through the set, best family reunion song ever written.  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A_SakvKz3bM

Never having been down here before and learn that they run Star and Towers in tandem.  While McMurtry is setting up, Martin Sexton is next door, and they are piping it through which is great.  McMurtry is gruff and ugly, then Randy Newman hits stage.  They got a full Steinway grand up there, must of dropped it in by helicopter.  Newman is funny, getting more poignant with age; thank you thank you for an hour with a GREAT American songwriter.  Yes he wrote "You Got a Friend In Me," but he also wrote "You Can Leave Your Hat On," which gets him off the hook. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZNGgvpjtq0w&feature=related

He has 5,000 in rapt silence with Miss You.  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ow9mnmr5KP0&feature=more_related.  A cabaret guy up there alone in the sunshine.  They are getting ready for Costello on Star, he closes with a warm challenge:  "gonna give Costello something to try and follow, go listen, a great man."  It's this:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HsrN9OTBRSQ
We dry the tears and head over to Arrow and catch Keller & the Keels, YMSB, and it's time for the Avett Brothers which is so over the top after McMurty, Randy Newman, Keller Williams, and YMSB it's nuts.  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fDAicNrBIe8

Three days of a fucking musical orgy.  Who do you do it for ?  Like ya' gotta ask  . . .

Thank you Warren Hellman.  Peace out.