| j17 . j18 . j19 . j20. j21 |
Got up at 6:30 this morning to pack, make sure I had the right didjs in the right bags, and shower. I cranked up Steven Kent’s Family Tree on the stereo, then realized it was 6:45 in the morning and the neighbors probably wouldn’t approve! Oh well, too late now… My ride arrived 10 minutes late, just as I finished loading my backpack and didjs into the Jeep. I actually thought he wasn’t going to show up since we were out drinking last night – we’re all getting old now. Still, he pulled into the driveway at 8:10, looking a little the worse for wear and complaining of a bit of a headache. Gee, I wonder why? Got to the airport with lots of time to spare, checked my backpack and wandered around carrying two large Earthshaking Music didj bags on my shoulder and my Sony Vaio laptop in my free hand. If you’ve never flown with didjs before you need to try it sometime! It’s worth it just to see the looks people give you as you stand at the departure gate. You can almost see the thoughts going through their mind – “Is that a fishing rod? No, the bag’s too big. It looks like a GUN!”. It’s great fun. After what seemed like an eternity we boarded the plane and the obligatory rush to find space in an overhead bin began. Much to my amazement I found TWO empty bins right by my seat! I squeezed the bags in – the E flat fit with less that a centimeter to spare. I looked over to find a flight attendant starting at my quizically. “I thought that wasn’t going to fit” she said. “They normally fit, but this time it was pretty tight”, I replied. Sat down and listened to the usual rigmarole about flight safety. I know it’s important, but it’d be nice if they had an area of the plane for those people who can recite the entire dialogue from memory so that we wouldn’t have to sit through it yet again. Pulled out my MD player and cranked up DPII. It’s now up to Karl Kalbaugh’s Cabbage Patchin’. I like all of the pieces on the disc, but this is one of my favorites. I wonder if it’s because I now own the Earth Horn Karl used to record the track?
Another hour, another flight, another state. We should be landing in Boulder in about 40 minutes. Pretty uneventful flight, except that I had one of those karmic moments that you know you could never recreate in a million years. I was sitting lost in a reverie about something or other, and the flight attendant was next to me with the drink cart when a cup full of ice that she had put on the edge somehow fell over. She let out a squeal and it jolted me back to reality. Somehow I managed to catch the plastic cup as it fell past me, and every ice cube that came tumbling after it! They all just seemed to stream into the cup as I held it there. A good omen for the gathering? Time will tell….
Got picked up at the airport by Dave Crowder. We had to wait for an hour for John Madill, who had mysteriously managed to miss his morning flight and had to catch a later one. He arrived and we proceeded to Dave’s, then almost immediately left to pick up his friend Eric, a percussionist. When we got back, people had begun to arrive, starting with Julia Wilmerding , then in rapid succession Dave and Dottie Storer, Carmen, Michael, Natalie, Per and Eileen Hulquist and Kai. We ordered and wolfed down Vietnamese egg rolls and noodles, all the while didjing and drumming. It was a great night! We even found the sweet spot in Dave’s house – a brick corner out in the back yard. The party wound down around 10:15, and Dave, John, Julia and myself were left to sit and shoot the breeze about everything and nothing. |