Crushing Krisis

Comic Books, Drag Race, & Life in New Zealand

day in the life

Spring Thing: The American Helicopter Museum

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When I first began my stay-at-home time with Little Miss last year, Lindsay recommended that we check out the local library’s selection of museum passes, to which I replied, “huh and the what now?”

As it turns out, many library systems have passes to local attractions like museums, aquariums, and zoos that you can request and check out just like a book! After Lindsay carefully explained it to me as if I did not speak English, I checked out our library catalog.

Lo and behold, they had tons of passes cataloged – and, not just obvious stuff like the zoo or the Franklin Institute, but smaller, local museums too – places that probably benefit from the foot traffic generated from turning up in the library search!

One such place that struck my fancy was “The American Helicopter Museum.” I might not be a guy who digs a lot of heavy machinery and I’m the farthest thing you could meet from a mechanical engineer, but I am certainly not going to turn down the chance to see a few dozen helicopters up close!

I filed the museum away in my head for future use on a rainy day. Luckily, most of our Adventure Days in the past year haven’t been rainy – and, when they were, we hit one of the city museums early before they could be packed with school field trips. I never had to pull the Helicopter museum out of my bag of tricks.

Then, a few weeks ago, EV6 and I were at an impasse in our weekly Adventure planning. We had fallen into a bit of an Adventure rut of hitting the same places repeatedly (please, no more Please Touch Museum, I beg you), and neither of us were too excited for a repeat. Struck by sudden inspiration, I asked her, “Do you like helicopters?” (Noise aside, what kid doesn’t?) When she nodded in assent, I showed her the photos on the museum’s website. She was instantly sold.

As it happens, yesterday was not a rainy day at all. It was a stunning bombshell of gorgeous Spring t-shirt weather when we pulled up to the museum. It’s located at 1220 American Boulevard, West Chester, PA 19380 in an otherwise unassuming office park, but it’s easy to spot due to multiple helicopters parked on its lawn. [Read more…] about Spring Thing: The American Helicopter Museum

lime popcorn and how I nearly died

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I nearly died yesterday, due to a combination of popcorn, caffeine, and my remarkable skill and poise in professional presentations.

Allow me to back up for a moment. Last year E and I sent our spit to 23andMe so we could receive genetic profiles. Mine revealed many interesting things, including that the fact that my body metabolizes caffeine differently than most people.

Anyone who knows me could have told you that without the benefit of a state-of-the-art genetic test. Where a 12-ounce coffee makes most people perky, it turns me into a jittery, speed-talking demon that cannot operate touch screens or complex machinery.

It was with full knowledge of that potential outcome that I grabbed a 20-ounce soy chai latté on the way into an informal client presentation, figuring that I needed at least a slight edge of insanity to get through my fifth meeting and subsequent all-nighter of writing.

You would think I would be too traumatized by the events in this post to want to eat the popcorn ever again, but it was actually really good. I mean, there are worse ways to die than to asphyxiate on a delicious snack.

Fast forward to the meeting.

Slightly high on my caffeine buzz, I am at the head of a conference table filled with my clients, one of whom made individual bags of lime-tinted popcorn for each of us.

Things are going well. I have a rhythm down: gesture to slide, explain, solicit feedback, eat two kernels of popcorn, respond, repeat.

On the umpteenth repetition of this ritual, I finish explaining, solicit questions, and place the first of two pieces of popcorn into my mouth. The question is brief, and I inhale sharply to fuel my answer.

My first piece of popcorn skitters back across my tongue and lodges itself firmly in my windpipe.

“Excuse me,” I wheeze, patting my chest gently to expel the rogue kernel.

It does not expel.

I try to gently cough it up without causing a hugely gross scene in the middle of my presentation. and discover that I don’t seem to have any air to do the coughing with.

My entire client group is now staring me down as I slowly asphyxiate in front of them. I hold up one figure in a gesture to them to wait a moment and try again – with slightly less tact – to cough up the kernel, still lodged in my windpipe.

Nothing seems to be happening. I am acutely aware of the inexorable passage of time, both from a biological “I need to breathe” perspective and a business “this is kindof a long pause in a presentation, even an informal one with popcorn” perspective.

The entire client team continues to look on, now in mute horror, as my thumps to my own chest become less and less delicate. Finally, now nearly half a minute having passed, I turn to my left to one of my clients and in the barest of whispers state the following:

“I think I might require your help.”

Said client solemnly rose to his feet, walked around my overstuffed chair, and thumped me solidly three times in the back.

The kernel popped out of my windpipe, and I promptly swallowed it before it could wreak any further havoc. I re-took the inhaled breath that got me into trouble to begin with, and plunged forward.

“Now, as I was saying…”

something like life

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I’ve got this elaborate editorial calendar telling me what to write and when to post, but if I just stick to the calendar that sucks a bit of the me out of the blog, eh?

Life continues to be a non-stop whirlwind of communications and music, which is exactly what I’ve always wanted it to be, so yay for the continued status quo! When not in actual rehearals I’m writing songs (for the soundtrack to Eric Smith’s novel), a novel (for NaNoWriMo), and a blog (just because, and for NaBloPoMo).

As it happens,Gina is also writing songs (at the moment, as a soundtrack to Boardwalk Empire), a novel (she’s the one who convinced me to do NaBloPoMo), and a blog (she is not the only one of us who exerts peer pressure).

I think this is pretty much what I imagined our adulthood would be like as a seventeen year-old, except for I’m married to someone way hotter than I imagined and Gina is engaged to a lawyer.

Speaking of: Elise, who has the same hectic rehearsal schedule as me but less of the writing, has starting painting the house in approved non-vomitorious colors. I think it’s very “nice” that she’s painting, which is to say I think painting (and, in general, decorating) is something people with too much money and spare time do to occupy themselves.

The only photographic evidence of us as Lucas and Corey from Empire Records, courtesy of our friend Tina, who was such a perfect Rachel Berry that it was a little disturbing. Note E's gold star, awarded from Rachel.

(Lest you think I am debuting this sideways insult of my wife here on the blog, she’s been hearing it for years. I’d wager she’d be happy if I just blogged about it and stopped whining about it in the house.)

As someone with neither money nor spare time, the whole process is perplexing to me. She had to use special gray primer on our dining room walls, which took an entire day to paint on and when she was done I was like, “Awesome, it’s gray, can we leave it like that?” and she had to explain that it was just the primer.

I’m all about gray. I think grays are totally exempt from every being vomit-inducing. Now the dining room is cranberry. I hear that’s supposed to aid in digestion, so I stood in it while I was eating raviolis before rehearsal last night. I ate them pretty quickly, but I think that’s just because I hadn’t eaten anything for about 22 hours. I’m not sure about the digestion angle.

The one downside to my constant flurry of words and sounds is it doesn’t leave a lot of time to interact with people I’m not writing or rehearsing with (or for taking things out of the dryer, but that’s another story). I think my next availability for a dinner with friends might be in December.

A snapshot of the last ten days of my life: Saw three concerts (one in New York), rehearsed three times, started three new songs for my soundtrack to Eric Smith’s book, tried to find a way to post three times daily here at CK (still working on that), wrote almost 7,000 words for my NaNoWriMo novel, and dressed as Lucas from Empire Records for a Halloween party.

Oh, and occasionally ate, slept, and watched 30 Rock.

If you did more than that in your last ten days then I want to know what else you could have possibly fit in and kind of vitamins you are taking.

Please note: methamphetamines do not count as “vitamins.”

28 years, 51 weeks: pt. 5

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Friday, September 16, 2010. 28 years, 51 weeks, 4 days.

I awoke early and energized on Friday.

Our gig was good, if lightly attended, things at work were under control, and I had a Filmstar rehearsal in store for me in the evening. The only challenge would be leaving work early enough to pick up my repaired bass before the shop closed.

I tried to get to work obscenely early for some uninterrupted time at my desk, but had to burn another disc for our charity campaign – this time for another talent show rehearsal I was running on my lunch break. The damned thing crawled at 4x speed on my 48x burner. I dressed fussily, yet time still remained. I packed my guitar, in case I needed it at the rehearsal. Time crawled, still.

Finally, the disc ejected. Into my bag it went, guitar over shoulder, mic stand wielded like a quarterstaff. The walk to the trolley wasn’t nearly as challenging as it had been on Thursday, but I was already considering the hike back to the house with all that gear plus my rehabbed bass.

Work was exhilarating, although I think those are the days my co-workers probably can’t stand me at all. The disc I burned turned out to be a CD-RW, explaining the sluggish speed. A co-worker working on the same freelance gig as I was rang me to talk about our assignment, and reminded me that the real deadline was Monday – three extra days to write!

At that point I was feeling pretty swell. Regardless, I was double and triple booked at every turn, but still managed to finish up every little thing I had meant to do, even if it meant pushing ten minutes past my Outlook appointment proclaiming, “If you don’t walk away right now you will miss the train and have no bass for rehearsal.”

What’s ten minutes, I thought? I just had to travel down 38 stories, walk three blocks, and buy a train ticket. I could work for ten minutes and still grab the bass. I’d be fine.

Well, it was a near thing, but I beat the train to the platform by an entire fifteen seconds. I’ve decided to chalk that one up to good project management rather than procrastination.

I ran into a new client on the train, chatted merrily, disembarked at the station, picked up my bass for twice the estimated cost, and trekked home carrying laptop satchel, acoustic guitar, and electric bass. It was a mile and a half, but it felt more than double that – surely as punishing as my old commute home when I’d jog it. I had to stop every half block to switch the bass to another hand.

Rehearsal was, in a word, unfortunate. The different action on my bass was tripping up my fingers and a week sans rehearsal meant I had forgotten my nifty new transitions.

Oh, and the earplugs. I had vowed to start wearing them sooner or later, and after our first song left my ears ringing I decided the time was upon me. I donned them and suddenly I was rehearsing underwater ballet, my notes lingering a hair behind the rest of the band.

After the first song in our second set I pulled them out to hear the room booming with my final strike of the E string. “Was my bass that loud for the whole song?” E just glared in return.

Things were not going well. I pressed the earplugs back and managed to get my bearings for our second set of songs, but it was still my weakest rehearsal since joining as the fill-in bassist almost two months prior.

At the end of rehearsal E declared that the three permanent band members had to discuss the bass situation and I was summarily dismissed from the room.

(It should be mentioned that E and I are not couple-y at all when we’re in any kind of performance situation together. We’re both a wholly separate brand of perfectionist, and in many instances those two brands might as well be oil and water. I think I’m typically more attuned to Filmstar’s drummer Zina than to E at rehearsals.)

The situation was pretty straightforward: my contract was up at the end of the month, the band had rehearsed twice with another bassist who sounded more than competent, and it was time to start booking fall gigs and recording a new EP.

I walked through the smoke-tinged halls of the studio and out into the cool air of the parking lot. Based on my lackluster showing at rehearsal, I was pretty sure I wouldn’t be that solution.

I peered through the windows into the rooms in the front of the studio. No one was wearing earplugs. Who wears earplugs? Who wears earplugs for the first time when rehearsing on a bass with new action on the night their band is going to decide whether to keep them or not?

I hope you enjoyed your last rehearsal, I mused to myself. Of course it had to be this awful one before the band decided what to do and not my fantastic showing from the prior week.

Before I realized it I had paced three times around the row of parked cars. I forced myself to sit down on the bumper of our Matrix. I fussed with my phone, scrolling through Twitter without really reading the messages.

Oh well. Being in a rock band had been fun, but that’s my life.

I looked up to find E peering down at me. “I wondered where you got off to. Come on, we’re done.”

I followed E back through the labyrinthine halls of the rehearsal space, neither of us uttering a word. I supposed they wanted to let me down together, so it would be official – and maybe a little kinder than if E did it on her own.

Back in our rehearsal room Zina and guitarist/songwriter Glenn were making small talk while they packed up. A friend of Glenn’s had just texted him – could the band play a surprise gig the next night? It might be a good warm-up for recording to play some of the newer tunes in a bar with the new lineup.

E smiled. “Oh yeah, you’re still in the band. Do you want to go out for crab fries?”

I almost demurred, considering my freelance assignment, but then I remembered I had the entire weekend to knock out that final two thousand or so words. We adjourned to Chickie’s & Pete’s, each ordering a basket of crab fries, texting friends about our secret gig the next night, and talking about upcoming time in a recording studio.

That’s my life. I finished my freelance assignment with no issue many hours ahead of deadline, I made it to work on Monday at ten of seven to kick off our charity campaign, we had a rehearsal with Arcati Crisis + Zina on drums last night where we blasted through “Dumbest Thing I Could Do,” and tonight is the first night of rehearsal in my renewed run with Filmstar. I even found the time to mow the lawn.

Today I turned 29. I spent it at home from work, mostly napping. I would have rather had the sleep interspersed in the week of nights that proceeded today, but if that’s what it takes to be a successful professional in good shape with a happy marriage, an evening music career, a well-kept home, and writing gigs on the side then I’m game.

That’s my life.

28 years, 51 weeks: pt. 4

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Thursday, September 16, 2010. 28 years, 51 weeks, 2 days.

When I packed meticulously for our gig I wasn’t considering the half mile walk up slight hill to the trolley.

Well, I was considering it pretty hard when I set foot out the door with my guitar, a canvas beach bag of clothing, a display box of free discs, and a boombox loaded with my voice exercises.

That’s my life. I mused it as I dragged my belongings uphill to the trolley line, and I mused it again nine hours later while singing my vocal warmups in an empty office while rain started to obscure my view of the city.

Backstage @ The Tin Angel, 9/16/2010

It felt a little odd to be singing my silly warmups at the office – they aren’t meant to sound good, and I was nervous that some late-working colleague would think I was actually a horrible singer despite all my crowing about voice lessons. By the end of the tape my voice felt good and sure – a welcome relief after being allergy-ravaged the day before.

Maybe the gig wouldn’t be so bad afterall.

Being me, I timed it perfectly – my voice tape would end and I’d have five minutes to pack up and catch a cab to our sound check at the Tin Angel.

So, of course, literally the second the tape finished our building’s fire alarm began to sound its klaxon. Between ear-splitting rings, a calm voice intoned, “Stand by for instructions. Do not use elevators.”

Do not use elevators. I was carrying 40+ pounds of personal belongings 38 stories above the ground. Stairs were not so much an option.

I sat on the ground in our elevator lobby, festooned with guitar, beach bag, display case, and boom box, as the klaxon rang on. Three minutes. Five minutes. Ten minutes. Surely if it wasn’t a drill I’d be dead by now. [Read more…] about 28 years, 51 weeks: pt. 4