Checking out the forecast.

Good day/night and hello.

It seems like it’s been a week since we last met here, and gosh, what a week it’s been.

Because I’ve been slaving away on the elevator project and not playing in the least I just have a few items of note.

Firstly, I should remind folks who might have an interest that the Made Custom Bike Show is a mere three weeks away;

There will be more fancy bling there than a person could shake a bespoke stick at.

I had planned on being there for opening day but it’s come to my attention that one of my favorite bands, The Bronx is playing at a tiny hole in the wall here in town, so I will be making my way to the PDX just as soon as I’m finished getting my punk on;

Photo via.
Holy mother of all that is right and good, am I excited for this.

Their 2007 performance at Los Vegas’ Double Down was the show that inspired the Underbike parties that followed;

I wasn’t able to see them live for another five or so years after the above clip was shot, but it still to date is one of the top five best shows I’ve ever seen.

Moving on… Besides narrowly avoiding cutting off my fingers and/or nailing them to the wall on the job site this week, there have also been very exciting developments in my own personal camp. For their first time in about three decades I have secured an off-site studio in which to work.

Minus the two pieces of sheetrock mounted on the left wall, it started out looking pretty much like this;

Although after days of furious moving, and prowling thrift stores, and the like, it now looks a bit more ready for action;

I’m not gonna say exactly how much I love my little fold away sofa thing, but I will note that it’s somewhere in the neighborhood of to the moon and back.

I’m currently on the hunt for a cheap Persian rug (something to tie the room together), and as you read these words am building a little painting table to sit over there by the red cart.

This is a huge deal for me. I lived in my studio from 1996 to 2006, then I moved to Santa Cruz for eight years, and had my studio in my garage, then moved back to Oakland where my studio was in my basement until I was invited to leave my marriage two and a half years ago.

Since then I’ve been begrudgingly working in a spare room in my flat that also serves as AHTBM merch storage and a woefully inadequate shop space.

To say I’ve been resentful about life’s developments would be an understatement, but with the help of about eleventeen different forms of therapy, (somatic, neurofeedback, and hypnotherapy for anyone who might be curious) I eventually got to a place where I could find a degree or two of acceptance, which maybe opens one’s life to possibilities.

It’s not the sloped-roof cabin studio in the woods by a creek with my cat that I’ve been envisioning for years, but it beats a poke in the eye with a sharp stick, and now that I’ve gone pro, maybe it’s time I stop making shitty work.

Baby steps first, and maybe I should start by getting that rug…

Finally, in closing, as I’ve done here for weeks, and weeks, and weeks, I offer you the brand newest episode of Revolting;

In it we tell tall tales and travel stories, and I’m exhausted, and Robot is as effervescent as ever. Exactly, mostly what you’ve come to expect.

It’s like having a little bit of sun all week.