Dec 30

Well, there's another year down the drain. Only managed to acquire ONE guitar this year. Boo hoo.

The Station 52 jam is on holidays for three weeks, just like last year. I sure am grateful to have that jam, it's nothing but fun. When we get back on the 19th of January, it will be my third anniversary as host there. Yippee!

Speaking of jams, it seems that Mr. Herman has put some effort into bringing a few players out to Sidestreet tonight, so we might have a bang-up jam there! Might be some competition for the annual end-of-the-year jam at the Palm Pub.

And one last thing- I'm very happy to say that after six years I'm getting the chance to visit with my son Jesse!  He's coming down to the Hat with me today.

So despite $2400 transmission surprises, the usual booking foul ups, and my chronic sinus problems (we're thinking now it might be a mold allergy) I have had, and am continuing to have a fabulous year! Hope you feel like saying the same.

See you in 2006!

Dec. 25

Merry Humbug! I have to write my blog on Xmas day because Rhonda told me to. Hope you got everything you wanted. I just want antihistamines. Lots and lots of.

It's been a great year. Thanks for being under my welkin. Go look it up.

Dec.21

Well, that got a rise out of her.

Now the Airdrie gig is back on. I'm gonna get dizzy here.

Dec. 20

Is it the winter friggin' solstice yet? We could use more daylight.

Rhonda is now my blog-nazi, so I'm writing under orders. The news is, I guess, that almost as soon as I got the Airdrie Hotel gig confirmed, they cancelled all of their January entertainment. Oh, well. Gives me more time to work on my tan.

So far for Xmas, I've gotten three bottles of whiskey and probably two boxes of chocolates and it's still only the 20th. Yikes. Good thing I've sworn off beer.

The blue guitar is now intonated and plays like ringin' a bell. Yippee!

Can't write anymore, Rhonda said something about sex...

Dec. 12

Time flies...

R.I.P. Richard Pryor-thanks for the laughs, man.

Blackfalds was a blast! Of course we weren't having as much fun as the people who got sent packing for lobbing projectiles thru their window in the room next to us...Yippee!!!..??

Got to witness the great Scott Fooks in action at Aussie Rules last night- what a knucklehead! We had the MCC XMas party there.

Oops! Gotta go get some shopping done!!!

Dec. 3

HEY MY NEW GUITAR SHOWED UP! YIPPEE!!!

It came in the mail yesterday- yes, it was folded up to fit in the box, Smartypants- and I fired it up on stage last night. It's great! And my horn showed up after being mauled by teenagers for a day or so. There's a picture of it one the "guitar" page. Maybe I'll get some more pics of it soon if Santy Claus brings me a digital camera...

Dec. 1

Hey ,come to the jam tonight- I won't be there! Ask Matt where his bicycle horn is. I think his prepared response will be "Yippee!" Anyhoo, I'm in Cochrane at the hotel for the weekend with my henchmen, so Matt Beatty is filling in as master of silliness at St. 52. He hired me to play the acoustic Wednesday at Trappers last night and we had way too much fun. Trevor the bartender ain't too good at math and every time we ordered a drink, our tab got smaller! Go figure!

Nov.25

Added a link to the ClammyAlienBrothers website. Sounds appealing, eh? Good jam last night! Even had the lovely and talented Lance No-Last-Name -Please, I-Have-Creditors show up and hammer the kick drum around for awhile. Apparently he's playing with a bunch of pups called the Sellouts, but they don't have a website up yet because Saskatchewan is waiting to get the internet. They had it for three weeks two years ago but then the guy who they were bootlegging it from in Lloydminster forgot to pay his phone bill. Now they're collecting pop bottles and saving up. Again.

Who says Ralphie is the only a-hole alienating other provinces around here?

Nov. 23

Gee, I forgot somehow to put the Sunset & Vine gig on the schedule, but thanks to Bruce's keen eye, it's up there now. Which is good, because we actually had friends show up at a gig after checking here to see where we were playing. And we didn't even owe them money!

I've borrowed the Audioslave Live In Cuba DVD- it's good, but the concert we saw here in Calgary was better. Sorry Fidel.

Nov. 18

I got my Boogie .50 Caliber back. Boy, I missed that amp. I got Bob Shepard to install an onboard tube screamer in my red Strat. I bought the thing on Ebay. It doesn't so much scream as mumble, so far. Oh well...

Nov. 9

I have to apologize here to Lonny Sterling. When the site went down in June it seemed to me that for whatever reason he hadn't paid the renewal fee. As it turns out it was the webhost that dropped the ball. At the time it looked like the opposite, and I blamed Lonny. But I was wrong. Sorry, Lonny. You deserve more consideration than I gave you.

Nov. 7

Well, the site's back up. Don't know what was going on, but I whined to Hostcolor and here we are.

I had a blast in Medicine Hat, as always! I sat in on lap steel with Doug Riley and Neon Moon at the Royal on Saturday, a couple of sets at the jam and the a few more that night. I got a lot of experience at putting all the mistakes in the right places. Also, I booked a date at the Redcliff Hylton in January with Tim Herman where we'll be the duelling singles. Yippee!  And it looks like Barry "Rob" Frey will be sitting in on guitar at Sidestreet with me sometime soon!

Oh, yeah! I bought a guitar on Ebay! It's blue- I needed a blue one. Really, I did! It's an Ernie Ball Silhouette. Go look on the guitars page, I just put a picture of it on there. Should get it in a week or so.

Hey, the blog page has been up for a year. Time flies when you're lipping off!

Oct. 29

Wow! This Thursday's jam was insanely busy! Holy cow! Thanks to Mike Karastas, all the City Parks Dept. people got together for an end of the season throw down, and the place was bursting at the seams! Yippee!

Oct. 27

Time flies when your sinuses beat the crap out of you twenty-four-seven. Went to Judas Priest last Friday night. They were excellent! Glad I got to see them! Then last night Rhon and I saw Grady and Thornley at Cowboys. Grady is Gordie Johnson (Big sugar) and Chris Layton ( Stevie Ray's drummer). They were great! And Thornley is Ian Thornley from Big Wreck, and they rocked too. Johnson is louder than any three other guitar players. Sure has the open tuned blues thing down.

Willie told me tonight he is on the honour role at school. Ain't that cool? I wenta school wonce, ya know.

No gig this weekend, where will I pop up? Hmmm....

Oct. 14

I never thought of it until I was talking to Bruce today, but I need to post an announcement here that Bruce's bass and guitar were stolen recently from his garage. So if you see a Strat that looks like this: or a Fender Jazz bass that looks like this then give me a shout by email here, or phone me at 403-901-0755 or 403-923-6671 or call Bruce at 403-520-8083 and say, "Hey! Look what I found! You want I should beat this guy up that has your stuff? What's my reward? You didn't actually play this bass in public, did you? Where people could see?"

In other news, apparently the Bowness Hotel gig is still on, so what say we start a pool to see whether we get paid for playing that weekend? Roll them dice!

Oct. 9

My head is spinning. We were gonna go to Kelowna for Thanksgiving, then I decided I shouldn't go, then Rhon decided she shouldn't go, so then we said we'd go to Shannon and Kevin's and then they realized there weren't enough dead birds around so then we were gonna have Chinese except Rhonda kept muttering about prime rib, but then Eric found out that Rhonda wasn't going to Kelowna and they did a head count and figured there was enough poultry carcass to invite us last minute but then Shelby is gonna be in Rockyford and Rhon has to work until five but supper at Eric and Karen's is at six way up in Citadel so if I have to pick Shelby up then I'll have to get her five minutes before she gets there and I think we're gonna have baloney sammiches.

And what the Hell is going on with my font?

Oh well. Had a blast with Dale again. We even pulled out some Sabbath, Doors, and even Terrible Ted Nugat! I talked Dale into doing my jam at St. 52 on the 20th. Oops, better phone Alida.

We're in Cochrane at Rickles with Neil Gorrie this coming weekend. Might see if I can get Jeff from the Cardboard Heroes to shoot some video. Seriously, I need to make some phone calls, go find something else to do.

Oct. 3

AUDIOSLAVE ROCKS!

That was an absolutely AMAZING concert last night! I thought the roof was gonna come down at the end. If you see me, speak up, my ears will be ringing 'til March.

We got moved! We got everything moved into the new house except for the odd wandering sofa...anyone want a wet couch?

The band is back in Donadeos this coming weekend with Dale Weins on drums again. We had a ball with him in Coaldale a few weeks back. Too bad the Chevelles took all the crowd away. Don't know what they missed.

Sept. 18

We just finished two weeks in Airdrie- one weekend in Shacks where we had a ball- great place! The second one was in the hotel with hardly no people at all but since Neil Gorrie was sitting in on drums Bruce and I had a great time. Thanks, Neil, you're a helluva guy!

The Bowness gig has been cancelled. And then not. Maybe. I'm confused. One last chance for the Starkraving to be a pain in the ass.

Well, I'm on the verge of packing this infernal machine up and moving to the new house in Strathmore. We have the keys and I just have to pack up at the old house here. So if there's a lull in the blah blah blahing on this page it's because Shaw doesn't think the new place exists yet. Might even have to switch to Telus...of course even if the internet is hooked up there I have to figure out how to use a router. Ick. Maybe I'll just play cards alot.

Stay tuned!

Sept. 7

Ick! I've been stuck in automated telephone menu hell all day getting addresses changes done. Oh well. Sure looking forward to living in Strathmore with Rhon and the kids- including Willie! Things are sure changing.

I happy to announce that I've agreed to play New Years' Eve in Sidestreet in the Hat. Maybe Marty will actually hang around 'til past midnight...

Aug. 30

Well, lots of news! Rhonda and I have found a duplex in Strathmore to rent so I'll be moving there the first of October AND my son Willie will be living with us! Lots of changes and adjusting to do.

Tim Herman is threatening to come sit in this Friday in Sidestreet, so that'll be a gas.

Got some new dates on rather short notice thru Mr. Westerbeek, so Sidewinder will be playing in Shack's in Airdrie on the 9-10th of September, and then we're gonna give the Old Hotel there a try again. Hopefully my luck from previous days there has changed.

Keith Dalrymple is filling in on bass this Thursday at St. 52. See ya there?

Aug. 24

Wow, time flies! The boss told me to change the sign- I mean blog- so here goes.

Guess I might as well brag, first off, about the Mellencamp/Fogerty show- it was great! John Fogerty ran around the stage like a MUCH younger man and played one killer song after another for over an hour. He hasn't lost any steam at all, and his voice is just as strong as ever. Mellencamp's show was a little more relaxed but still great. My thanks to Doc and Brit for the ticket.

We had Ryan Herzog play drums this last weekend and had a blast! Sundre was slow, to say the least, but Stolos was really busy and Ryan's a great drummer and a really good friend. Thanks, man.

Of course, these two gigs were not listed in advance on my schedule because they were both last minute. I appreciate the help from Rob Westerbeek with Sundre. As for Stolos, I don't see why the guy books last minute- he has a crowd that wants to enjoy a good band, he should look after them. Oh, well.

If you're reading this and want to make Gene Strandquist feel loved... or old... we're gonna put on a bash for him at St. 52 on the 8th of September. His 52nd birthday is the next day, so as of midnight that night, he'll be 52 at 52! So come on out and chip in, we'll buy him a walker!

Aug. 11

Hey, I'm back! I've been a busy boy lately. Willie and I had a great visit, going to the Hat and Kelowna and I got to see Jesse, my younger son on Sunday when we took Willie home. Hope to have Jesse for a visit soon. Think I'll put a picture of Willie and I up on the pics page. There's a new one of Al Himor's lap steel on the "guitars" page.

Sitting in with Rob Hudec was a blast! I'd like to do it again sometime. Thanks to Rob, Troy and Jason. And thanks for the CD, Rob, it's really good! Got one from Muleshoe as well- maybe I should put my own together since I keep snagging ones from my friends.

Bought a new computer, so I've been busy moving files and finding new things to wail about. Had to get a new Frontpage program, and somehow managed to work out whatever bugs that had fouled up my mp3's on the "Downloads" page. Wish I knew what I did right...anyway the songs are back up if you want to go listen.

Ryan Herzog has the drum spot tonight at St. 52 with his new drumbs, why don't you come by and spill drinks on them?

July 23

Well, things are going so great! Finished up Stampede with a trip down to do the jam in Black Diamond last Sunday at the hotel. Thanks Sandy! Then on Thursday we had a great jam with a few of the usual suspects, then I drove straight to Edmonton to play another breakfast for Lundgren and Young insurance, their first annual Klondike Days event. Didn't get much sleep, but at the end I had my son Willie with me- we haven't seen each other in almost six years! So far we're having a blast. We're going down to the folk festival today to see David Lindley, Bill Frisell and a few others, and we'll end up in Medicine Hat for next week. Thursday I'll be sitting in with Rob Hudec at the Buckle while Geoff Hogg rides herd with Gene and Alida back home at Station 52.

Got an email saying that Long John Baldry died- what a loss. I wish I had made time to see him while I could.

Hope you're feeling better soon, Rick Lustig, thanks for the gigs.

July 16

Tonight I have the good fortune to be sitting in with Matt Beatty and his henchmen, collectively known as the Hot Tamales, at Dickens Pub, 9th and 9th downtown. Come on down if you haven't had enough Stampede fun yet! The pandemonium starts around ten.

July 6

My good friend Randy Meads and Melody, well, her name is Meads now- got married in a meadow in Kananaskis country on Sunday. It was a perfect day and I'm very happy for both of them.

July 3

I landed a Stampede breakfast subbing for my good friend Rick Lustig on the Wednesday in the middle of Cowboy Halloween. Starts at 7 AM.Yoiks!

I'm adding a link to the Cardboard Heroes' website. Go look!

June 29

Tim Herman's got hisself a website! Go look! On the links page! 'Cause this stupid thing won't let me put a link in here! Compac 1, Jim 0!

June 22

Hard to believe I could go this long with nothing to say, isn't it?

June 9

Happy 90th birthday Les Paul! Yippee!

June 5

Holy cow! That's what you get for depending on others. Went to check the site on June 3rd with a big ol' hangover and there it was-Gone! I guess Lonny needed the money I sent him to renew the site hosting for something important. F***ing dink. Thanks to Hostcolors, I'm back up and running in no time.

Well, the birthday was a blast! I think Blair is about the best guy I could hope to deal with every week. He always treats us really good, even when the jam is quiet, and he and everyone else made me feel like a million bucks on Thursday night. Paying the deposit on Friday was kinda rough, though. Oh, well.

Really good to hear from you, Willie.

June 2

Hey! It's my birthday! Come to Station 52 and buy me a drink! And while you're at it, get up and sing and play guitar for me!

Getting old ain't so bad.

May 18

Oops! I got ambitious and have managed to delete all my music downloads rather than do what I wanted to do. Hang tough.

May 18

It has come to my attention that as many as FOUR people may be reading this on a semi-regular basis. The vast responsibility of keeping these poor souls on the edge of their seats waiting for a new installment makes me incontinent with performance anxiety.

We had a FABULOUS time in the Hat on the weekend. Friday night in Sidestreet was stuffed and I picked on everybody. Rhon got to meet all of my hillbilly relatives-well, there, that takes care of some readership-and they all got to meet Rhon. Lucky them! I'd like to go on record as saying that Marty is one of the coolest bar owners I know. Thanks, Man!

The wedding on Saturday was perfect. It was great weather, no bugs hardly and DREW CAREY was the minister! No shit! A warm congratulations to Don and Karen Baxter.

Popped in on the Herman Bros. later on and then went out to Redcliff to break strings on Rob Hudec's guitar. Oops. Thanks for getting me up, Rob. That Jason Hellman sure can groove.

Oh, did anyone remember to get me Stones tix for my upcoming birthday? If you forgot, apparently they're going for $1700 a pop on the net. YIKES!

May 6

Hey, the jam was a blast last night! Good to see the Doc back in the house. Mucho thanks to Mike Karastas for subbing for Alida on drums. Great job, Mike! Sorry, I forgot to mention beforehand that you have to sleep with Gene to get the gig. I hope Alida's having fun in Florida.

Thanks to Al Hennessy for buying my Yorkville sub that has done little but take up space in the garage for the last year.

Also, thanks to Rob and Sandy for shooting a new DVD for us. I hope to get some clips from it on the site soon.

Come on up to Stolos this weekend, we'll have a ball!

May 3

Well, Grampas was fun! Hope those folks get enough nicotine in their diets.

Doug Charters turned fifty on Saturday, but he doesn't look a day over 49.

Sure have been seeing a lot of last minute gigs pop up lately. Just booked this weekend at Stolo's Pizza today. That's the old Kidders if you know the place as that. Sure nice to get more trio work. Now I need a bass player for the Saturday night- Bruce is booked with the Lionel show.

If you're a resident of Medicine Hat, don't forget, next weekend (the 13th) I'm playing Sidestreet Pub. It'll be a blast even more than usual as my brother Don and Karen are getting married the following afternoon, perhaps with hangovers!

April 22

Never a dull moment around here. I'd like to thank some useless people with no ethics or consideration for others who have recently wasted my time by telling me I could count on working at their establishment when I actually can't. I don't care whether you own or manage a pub, your word should be good for something.

At any rate I have had the good fortune to find other work on extremely short notice to cover this and next weekend. Don't expect to find the likes of me ever making noise in the Airdrie Hotel, however. A big thanks to Ronnie Kerr and Mike Lynch for their support.

I am at the end of my tenure hosting the Sunday night jam at the T&C Hotel with Kate Lewis. It's been fun and I'm glad to see I have helped to foster another good jam but it's time for me to move on. Thanks to Kate and everyone else I've worked with over the last six months.

I'm thinking I'd like to find an acoustic gig to sharpen my skills next.

I have a few bargains to announce. I have for sale: a Lab Series L3 guitar amp; a Crate 2000 watt power amp; two Crate 18" subs; and two Peavey SP2s. Everything is in great shape and reasonably priced.

April 12

The April 29-30 date in Paparazzis is cancelled.

April 8

Ok, that was an interesting day yesterday. Looked at a cool amp- still have the itch of wanting to buy something- and then had the decision of how to spend my money taken care of when my van wouldn't start. The ignition switch disintegrated. Ka-ching! Four hundred bucks gone. Oh well. At least the stupid thing gave out in my garage instead of halfway home from Kelowna in the middle of the night. Bruce came and saved my bacon- Thanks again,Bruce!- and we got the jam started only a little late. And wow, what a great jam! Good to see Bill Blayney, Keith Dalrymple, Mike Lynch and everyone else and the bottom of too many beer glasses...hey, I didn't have to drive, gimme a break!

And thanks as always to Gene and Alida for making Thursdays one of the best parts of my week. You guys are awesome!

Come out to Station 52 for the blues night tomorrow night with us guys if you get a chance!

April 2

Hey, it's spring! We had a great trip to Kelowna. I found a Labseries L3 amp that I just had to buy. Found a cool blues club out there, might try and get a gig there.

I've added an additional picture page just for guitars. The link for it is on the main "Pictures" page. Go look! You have time, go ahead!

One of my students, Jenna, got to see Les Paul play in California. I'm so envious I'm speechless.

...

...

...Really, I have nothing to say, I'm pouting.

Mar. 26

David Wilcox was awesome, as always! He didn't make it to my jam, though. I guess I shouldn't complain, I was hardly there myself. Thanks to Gene and Alida and of course Bruce for keepin' it rollin' while I played hookie with the High Sheriff of Hell. Bob Kitt wandered in and played some bass- Good to see ya, Bob.

Ran into Bill Eaglesham playing bass with Gibb Monk last night, hope I can snag him for a gig soon. Gotta keep these other guys on their toes...

Well, I'm off to Kelowna for a few days with Rhon and the kids. Should be a ball! Planning on getting in a swim with Ogopogo- he doesn't hibernate, does he? Then next week Sidewinder is back in Stavros. I'm salivating about the food already.

Mar. 19

Happy birthday, Alida! Go ahead, get drunk!

Thanks once again to Tom for the nod to get us into the Border Crossing. Too bad it was so quiet. We had fun as always.

Heard from my long lost friend Ken in Wyoming today and he sent me pics of the lap steel he just bought. It's super cool! Go look, there's some pics of it on the pics page. He should pack it up and ship it to me before he hurts himself, I think.

Well, Bruce is just the nicest guy on the whole planet, I'd say. Really, I'd say that. Look- I just did say that. Well, okay, I typed it. But why would I say that? Because he volunteered to cover me on Thursday at Station 52 so I can GO SEE DAVID WILCOX!! YIPPEE!! I'm a happy boy.

Mar. 13

Hey! Sidestreet was a blast, as usual. Thanks to Trevor for comin' to hang out, and bringing the other folks including ...Randy Rhoads?...

Forgot to put the next Sidestreet date in until now for some reason. It's on the 13th of May and we'll be celebrating my brother Don and Karen's wedding which will happen the next day. And Blair is getting married too. YIPPEE!!!

Mar. 10

SHANNON HAD HER BABY! SHANNON HAD HER BABY!

...Where's Kevin?

Mar. 10

Gee, it's been a while since I've blabbed on here. Not a whole lot new, I guess. Played Paparazzis in the Hat last weekend. I had a lot of fun, the people were great. Someone actually requested Hoyt Axton. Almost had some gigs in the Royal, then they were gone. Long story. Tomorrow I'm in Sidestreet and it's Carol's birthday, and it was Marty's birthday yesterday, so watch out for falling drunks!

I'm getting some blues tunes worked up in anticipation of playing Station 52, which should be April 9. "My woman left me and I got holes in both my shoes."

I'm gonna put a link in to CKUA as long as they okay it. Don't know why I've never mentioned them before on my site, but CKUA is one of the most precious things in my life since I clued into it about five years ago. GO LISTEN!

Feb. 28

Well, actually it's March 1, but I haven't been to bed yet. Still traumatized about the whole Wilcox thing.

Funny thing happened on the way home from Geoff's- I walked into the Border Crossing pub to try to drum up some work, started talking to the owner and there's Thomas Allen Ross shaking my hand all of a sudden. He's there painting a mural on the stage and they gave me a date on his word right then and there. Cool, eh? Thanks, Tom! You're a whole bunch of guys.

Feb.26

Well, I just checked David Wilcox's website hoping to see if he's headed this way anytime soon and HE IS! Only he's playing at the Back Alley on a THURSDAY! I HAVE TO WORK THURSDAY! I CAN'T TAKE THE NIGHT OFF! AAAAAAUUUURRRRGGGHHH!!!!!!!

So I sent him an email and lipped him off. Actually I invited him to the St. 52 jam. So you'd better come in case he's there! You'll feel really foolish if David Wilcox comes to my jam and you miss it, won't you?

I think I have further news about the postponed St. 52 gig, but I'm keeping my mouth shut for now.

Oh, hey, I just had an idea! If you're a club owner looking at this because you're checking out the site to see if you want to hire the band, give me a big fat gig for Friday or Saturday or both the last weekend of March! Then I can tell you all about the Wilcox show! OK?

Feb. 22

The March date in Station 52 is postponed.

Feb. 20

Onward and overboards! Looks like we're going to play the blues night at Station 52 in March, which will be my first blues gig ever. If anyone needs me, I'll be holed up trying to sing like Christina Aguilera. Yeah...that's it. Should be fun. I'm looking at working up some Muddy Waters, some Louie Jordan, maybe even Robben Ford!

We had a great time as always in Donadoes- well, that's the way the pen says it's spelled. Thanks to Rhonda and Steve- you're whacked, don't go changin'!

It's a long weekend, so you have no excuse not to come out to the T&C jam tonight. You might just find out if Kate has ever heard of Thelonius Monk. AND IT STOPPED SNOWING!!!!!

Feb. 13

Holy crap! Took me a long time to figure out that screw up! Well, now I have a whole new pictures page up. Jimmy Smith died on Tuesday. Apparently only me and Don Jorgensen give a rat's ass. Of course, Don would never use such a vulgar expression.                                            Bought a new mixing board, so bring your surround-sound multi-timbral contra bass kazoo synthesizer module, I have extra channels. At least you'll have the ILLUSION of being in the mix.                                               Geoff Hogg has an absolutely exquisite Yamaha thinline guitar he should just give me before anyone gets hurt.                                                                                                I'll think of more stupid stuff to say later.

Jan.27

A little more fiddling and now I have three songs on the downloads page as well. Also, the Tequila clip is now accessed by launching your media player instead of appearing right there on the site. Amazing what happens when you read a bit of tutorial, eh?                                                          Just hired Ray Duhaime to fill in on bass for the February date in Stavros. Looking forward to it!

A little later on Jan.25

Hey! The thing worked on the "downloads" page so there's now a short video clip of me playing "Tequila" REALLY badly. More bells and whistles! Everybody together now-YIPPEE!!! Now I just have to get some of the better footage that Rob and Sandy shot on Nov. 11 loaded from the DVD onto my hard drive, and then probably hours and hours of frustration will ensue.                                                                                          Oh yeah, the other thing I forgot to mention is that Alida used her recovered Yamahas on Thursday for the jam. They sounded great. It was also my second anniversary hosting the Station 52 jam. Cool, eh?                                                                                                  On a sadder note, heeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeere's to Johnny.

Jan.25 

Well, where to start? It's been a while since the last installment. I got rather distracted with trying to pick up the pieces of the sky falling in Gilmer's world again. All to no avail. The Jan. 24-29 date in the T&C was cancelled and Bruce and I find ourselves with lots of time to measure the circumferences of our respective thumbs.                                             Oh well, once again I have affirmation that if I want something DONE...                                                                                          Had a good weekend in the Hat. Always a pleasure playing Pink Floyd for Marty. Got to see some good friends like Greg Herman and his henchmen, James and Ray- where's he going with your wife, Greg?- and managed to land another room to play in the Hat thanks once again to Tim Herman! So the first weekend in March I'll be debuting in Paparazzi Pub there. I bet Mom is filing down the dice as I type.

Also, I got to see Rob Hudec doing his gig in the Palm pub. Excellent! Good groove, nice backdrop...what's with musicians wearing burglar toques these days?

Jan. 12

Blog, blog, blog. Ok, spellcheck doesn't recognize the word blog. Or spellcheck, I now see. Computers is stupid.

How the Hell are ya? Doc Rock is missing his appendix, apparently. If you see it, don't touch it, it's all icky. Glad he didn't expire in the wilds of the Peace country.

For all of you whose panties are in a bunch, the Station 52 jam isn't toast, it's just having a nap, ok? We'll be back at it on the 20th of January which will be my two year anniversary of infestation there. Which is longer than I lasted in most bands and way longer than any particular segment of my nearly forgotten (I wish) marriage. How come spellcheck doesn't have a problem with THAT word?

My inky dinky Samson-not Samsung, Samson, Kate- wireless has completed another cross Canada tour, and might even work this time. Now what about the mic?

Jan. 5

Happy birthday, Rhonda! I love you with all my heart!

Jan. 2

Why am I listening to William Hung? Sidewinder has gone through a little change and I'd like to thank Keith Dalrymple for the big fat groove and the fun and the enlightening tidbits of minutia over many gigs. Good luck, Keith. The next logical step is to welcome Bruce Boehler as the new director of bass clef operations to the fold. That's BASS clef, Bruce, stop trying to make it ululate up there. Ok, I know you all want to go look up minutia and ululate in your reference books, so ta-ta!

Jan. 1, 2005

Happy Gnu Year, ruminants! Hope you had a blast last night and didn't end up in jail or anything stupid like that...

Just heard from Holger Peterson on CKUA that Son Seals passed away on the 20th. He was the first act I ever saw in the King Eddy, which is also part of the past now. I always remember his guitar case- it was more gaps and holes and tape than anything else. He and his band were great, though. Hope this doesn't just end up being an obituary page. Oh, well. Think I'll go have a turkey sammich.