goofball on a train

This post covers the weekend.

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FRIDAY

I was up at 5:30am to have coffee and breakfast before my 7:45 doctors appointment (a 20-30 minute drive away.) Tried the new mini Keurig and it was very nice.

The appointment was standard and boring and took all of 30 minutes, 20 of which was waiting. While I don't like to spend money on this ($160 when you're uninsured, fyi), I have to be grateful that there is nothing to actually see a doctor for at this time.

Afterward I went to the dry cleaner to drop off the opening night outfit as I hope to wear it on a date with Jameson next week. Then back to the grocery for ice cream and Italian ice (I'd wanted to get these yesterday but the freezer was broken at the Publix I'd gone to.) Back home Jameson was up and grading for his teaching job. I dusted the house and wiped our pool deck furniture, ate lunch and practiced trombone. Had a little chill time reading a book. Jameson had to leave to attend a Disney Event Group event; he helped to book the band and DEG wanted him there to observe as he's never seen one of their events before. He texted me small details throughout. It sounded like someone had a very exciting and fun Disney-themed party! How cool that Jameson was part of the creative team for it :)

Meanwhile I finally received my secondary Disney MyID, which is a username that you can use to log into CastLife and view pay stubs and such. Normally an employee would only have one MyID and PERNR, but I've been allowed two, one for the theme parks and one for the tour.


I got it all set up, but when I tried switching back and forth between my theme park account and tour account, it got weird. Their digital infrastructure definitely seems not to be set up for someone to have two accounts. But anyway, I have more access than I did before. And after my Aunt's visit I'll call IT and see if they'd like a crack at smoothing things out.

That was pretty much my night, and then waiting for Jameson to get back from the party (Which he did around 1:30am, exhausted but excited and happy for what he'd just experienced. I love that he's enjoying life right now!)

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SATURDAY

Woke up at 8:30am feeling low-key anxious, which is very common when A) I've got something exciting and new coming up (in this case a relative visiting,) and B) when I think that I need to be "productive" but there is not a single thing that needs doing. A free, relaxing day should be something I'd look forward to, but it's definitely not.

Breakfast and once Jameson was up I went for a walk. At 9:15am it was already 85°F (29.4°C) with a "feels like" of 102°F (38.8°C.) And it will only get hotter. Although I'd like to be working at the parks, it is absolutely brutal to be an outdoor employee right now.

The walk was fine, just very sweaty. I cut it short to save energy for sweeping the front sidewalk and back pool deck. By the time that was done I was totally soaked and disgusting. A quick rinse and an hour of bass trombone practice. Finished my book while Jameson gamed. He ran our little RC-car pool cleaner...I shouldn't call it little, it's actually pretty big!


Around this time we noticed that the AC was only cooling to 80°F and got a little worried about it, but the heat index topped out around 106°F so that's honestly probably why. Our AC is at least 10 years old and can only do so much.

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SUNDAY

Was up at 6am because it's a long commute to Whole Paycheck, and if I go early I'll have more time to do other things that need doing before my Aunt arrives. Breakfast and started driving around 7:30. Since it was Sunday traffic was way better than usual. I made good time, got everything that I needed, and was back home by 10. 

Made the dill sauce for the salmon and cooked some bacon because I've been craving BLTs lately. Did one last round of the guest bedroom and bathroom to get my junk out of there and make sure everything was clean. Ate lunch with Jameson, and it was time to go get my Aunt!!


This is a picture of us from late last year :) My Aunt is my favorite relative. So happy she's here! And a bit nervous because I want to show her a good time! We chatted on the drive back to the house, then I got to introduce her to Jameson for only the second time ever (the first time was nearly a decade ago and was only for one meal.) Then a quick tour of the house, and then it was time for me to get going on dinner! I made sous vide salmon with dill sauce, lemon orzo, and grilled asparagus, which I've made many times before but never for guests. I was nervous but Jameson volunteered to grill the asparagus and my aunt helped with the orzo while I was searing the salmon, so everything came together very well. Cooking for others is kinda scary for me, but this was great! Especially because everyone helped :) 

We relaxed for a bit afterward, then my Aunt wanted to check out the pool so we all went for a dip. Jameson and my Aunt are both different kinds of teachers and this meant that they had a lot in common to talk about. I mostly listened and that was really nice. 

When the sun started going down we went inside for dessert, showers, and winding down. Jameson has to work tomorrow, but my Aunt and I are free to do whatever! 

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Monday: A hopefully-relaxing morning followed by a little time at Epcot, dinner at the Mexican pavilion/pyramid with my Aunt and Jameson.

Tuesday: I didn't make plans for us except maybe going out for dinner. I bought vodka seltzers and wine, cut veggies and other easy little snacks, hopefully my Aunt and I will enjoy relaxing by the pool for a big chunk of the day a la staycation. If we get bored maybe I'll take her to Clermont or Celebration for window shopping.

Thursday,

EPIC STUFF

I was up early of course, and since our sets were an hour later this week I was able to visit Whole Paycheck to get my favorite Lemon Pepper Tofu Bites :)

At the park everything was normal except there were two trios there today! One set of us was there to work as usual, and the other was there to train our new subs! So of course the subs were there too and we got to meet them all. It was so cool and strange to have FOUR female trombonists sitting across from me in the breakroom! And I am very glad that our third party managed to find them. Hopefully they'll have fun at this job.

We had normal sets all day, with larger crowds than usual which was nice.
For one of the middle sets the subs came out to watch. The trombone ladies put themselves right in the center and cheered for basically everything I did, which was both flattering and terrifying haha. I didn't want to make any mistakes; I wanted to set them a good example! One tongue-in-cheek thing that I did for them was during the clarinet-heavy number. I have a lot of boring sustained notes in that piece, so I took one and popped it down an octave to make it sound big and fat. They REALLY cheered for that! Fun trombone nerd stuff :p

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JAMESON STUFF

Meanwhile Jameson was on his third day at Disney corporate. He updated me during his lunch break to say that things were going very well although he was insanely busy, basically doing introduction meetings all day long. But he is very excited about the projects he'll be on, and I am so happy to see him engaged and enthusiastic for the first time since covid. Thank god! He's needed this.

Here's the cruise ship he'll be "producing" on for a week at the end of this month! In the Bahamas! Lucky dog!

(photo courtesy disneyparksblog)

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EPIC TEA

Another interesting tidbit from today: apparently the queue for the Ministry of Magic ride has been so ridiculous (often a 5 hour wait!) that Universal decided to try opening the Wizarding portal an hour before all the others so that the queue could form early. We weren't on the schedule that early, but when we came in everyone was talking about how the queue had wrapped around the entire park TWICE...

...and the wait time was EIGHT HOURS.

(stock artistic rendering)

The ride went down shortly thereafter, causing people to give up on waiting and "reducing" the wait time to "only" 5 hours...but either way, who WANTS that? That's LITERALLY the whole day spent waiting for a 4-minute ride!
I mean, Monsters Unchained is also a dark ride with a similar design, it actually works most of the time, the visuals and tech are just as incredible, and the queue is average for a new ride (2 hours or less.) Eh, whatever. I was blown away by how nutty things have gotten surrounding MoM. I know it's great but...c'mon.

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POOL DECK STUFF

After work I got home and Jameson and I caught up with each other.

Sadly, the guy who sealed our pool deck did mess up after all (I had suspected something was wrong but he's the professional, so...) He fully admitted the mistake, and spent several hours this afternoon scraping and chipping the bubbled-up hardened sealant from between our pavers. I felt very bad for him, but also grateful that he is fixing the mistake instead of just screwing us over. He'll be back again next week to finish scraping.

Last few activities before going to bed included submitting my last transcription job,
taping up my trombone and equipment to ship to Schenectady tomorrow,
and drafting "thank you" emails to both Universal and our third party management for Epic Universe.

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Friday,

LAST DAY AT EPIC UNIVERSE STUFF

I was up extra early so I could load up the car and be at UPS right when they opened to ship my tenor trombone and equipment. Hopefully it all arrives on time and intact. From there I drove to Walmart and bought a bunch of treats for the other members of Place Cachee Jazz as a thank you/going away gift. I got full-sized candy bars, mini KIND bars, and assorted sweet and savory mini bags of crisps and cookies.

I was in for a surprise as well. When the boys arrived later on, Joe (clarinet) presented me with a small box.
Inside was this beautiful rose gold-colored Parker pen.


But even better than that, and very touching, was that most of the cast and management had signed the box!


On the other side of the box was this lovely quote that almost brought a tear to my eye. Goodness.


Working for Epic has not been easy. We essentially learned our show in a construction zone.
We were there before the buildings were painted.
We dodged cherry pickers while learning our choreography.
We yelled our lines to be heard over jackhammers.
Our very first audiences were the construction workers (and they were a great audience too!)

It was intense, stressful, and exhausting.
But the hardships were all worth it in many ways. I got to meet all of these wonderful, professional, hardworking musicians. I got to learn how to act for the very first time. I got to see the birth of a theme park...how many people can say they've been a part of that?!


I'm grateful for what I learned, and still amazed that I got to do this and be a part of something so rare and special.
And now, it is finally June. The time has come for me to close out my chapter in this story.
It has been fun, and I am grateful. But to be honest...I have QUITE the adventure ahead of me now, too!

The rest of the day was normal. We played sets for decent crowds, I made sure to say goodbye to as many people as possible, and wrote and sent "thank you" emails to both Universal and third party management. I received many wonderful compliments and well-wishes, which I don't totally feel I deserve as my heart was never here to begin with (Friends Only people, iykyk). But still...these are great people, and I'm very proud to have worked here. It was a perfect last day for me.

The best part of all was that as soon as we started our final set of the day...it began to rain!!!
We cannot stay out in even a light drizzle when Plume (our expensive animatronic creature) is with us, so the set was immediately ended and we got to pack up early! Wheee! What a great Last Day treat for meeeee! I hugged the boys goodbye, took one last look around...and walked out.

Thus ends my time with Epic Universe (for now at least.)

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Saturday was very chill. I got up too early, answered some emails, and didn't get much done at all until before lunch when I went to get ingredients for dinner. While Jameson was at a massage I practiced bass and finally started packing "for real," which at this point mostly means packing clothes and kitchen supplies. For dinner I made basic spaghetti with bolognese and a salad, and for dessert we had Good Humor Strawberry Shortcake bars because they're nostalgic and I'd wanted them.

That's pretty much it.

Oh, I wrote a big long blog post asking readers to do this-and-that when it comes to tour tickets/visits and avoid this-and-that when it comes to interacting with me. You might think I'm neurotic, but try putting yourself in my shoes for a minute. My lifestyle means that this is NOT a normal blog. Try to imagine what I see when I open my LiveJournal.

I learned some hard lessons when I joined the circus and my blog suddenly got HUNDREDS of readers. Every day, all day, I had messages and questions and ticket requests to respond to, usually from complete strangers or long-silent acquaintances who crawled out of the woodwork to beg for freebies. These interactions are the reason why I now have all these pet peeves around my writing. There are a lot of amazing and good people in this world, and I'd like to continue interacting with those. But there are also a lot of selfish, thoughtless, hateful, and creepy people, and I need to take steps to protect myself from those.

Ultimately the TL;DR is that I want to be treated like a human being on LiveJournal. I am not a TV program, a ticket dispenser, an AI chatbot programmed to answer endless questions, or a soapbox for others to stand on. I'm a real person, just like you, writing about her life. It's a weird and exciting life, but I'm still just a woman that eats and sleeps and cries and gets annoyed like everyone else.

Anyway there ya go.

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Sunday, up too early again. It is hard to sleep when every time I wake up in the night my brain whispers about Beauty and the Beast.

When Jameson got up we went for a walk together. Talking about this and that, but mostly about our hopes and dreams for our new jobs. Jameson's grandmother passed away a few nights ago (they weren't close) so he'll be flying home after I leave for the funeral. Mariah (trombonist at Epic) is looking for a new car and is interested in using mine in the meanwhile, so I'm gonna research how we can make that happen. Just things going on with our lives.

We got back and cleaned up and had snacks. I packed a little and practiced for a scant 30 minutes.
I'd thought to use today to go shopping or clean, but this is essentially the last day that Jameson and I will have fully together, so instead we just chilled quietly in each others' company, ate pizza and my much-loved air fryer wings, and watched the Tonys.

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Monday and Tuesday: Jameson has partial and full days at Disney respectively, so I will be using these two days to do my final tour prep. Cleaning around the house, doing some final shopping, packing, tying up lose ends.

Wednesday: Flying to Schenectady. Holy crap!

Monday, Memorial Day.

We didn't do anything to celebrate, except try to relax. Which is hard right now because Jameson starts his new Disney Producer job tomorrow!! I am so excited for him!!

He still had work to do, so while he did that I drove alllll the way out to Sprouts and Whole Paycheck. Now that Epic is open going to those grocery stores before or after work is out of the question. Got misc favorite things like Koia shakes and Mezcla bars and tofu bites, and a few low-cal sodas for Jameson, and some bulk candy for my Snack Pod. And ingredients for dinner tonight. I also recycled my old bricked iPad at Walmart using a weird ATM in the Money Services area. It prints a QR code for your device, then you drop it in a little drawer that looks like a scanner.

Dinner was gonna be unauthentic pork satay skewers with peanut sauce, so after lunch I got to work making the marinade for the pork. Practiced trombone, rested, threaded the pork onto skewers and Jameson grilled them up while I made the sauce on the stove along with coconut rice and peas. The pork was great, tender and flavorful, but the sauce was bland. Next time I'd like to try a different sauce recipe.

We watched LEGO Masters, I worked on Foodie Finds and planned what to do while Jameson's gone tomorrow.

I washed and refilled Snack Pod! This week's treats are chocolate mint cookie bites from Sprouts, Runts knock-off candies from Sprouts, Gushers, plain M&M's, Cheerios, and dry roasted edamame.

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Tuesday we were both up early, excited for Jameson's first day at work.
After he left all I could do was cross my fingers for him. I'm sure he'll have a great first day!

While Jameson was gone I went out for bagels and groceries, picked up a shirt from the tailor, and sneakily snuck over to Disney's Property Control to shop :D I'd asked Jameson if he wanted to go and he seemed disinterested so figured this was a good time to check it out alone. Property Control is where castmembers can shop overstocked park merch at a discounted rate. It's not just the stuff found in gift shops...it also includes overstocked FOOD, dishes, uniforms, and setpieces! This time I didn't find anything that I could use, but it is always fun to look.

Back home I cooked some leftover turkey to get rid of it, packed my Epic meals, ate lunch, swept the garage, filed down my bass mute corks some more, and practiced bass and tenor trombone. I'm really dreading this upcoming Chicago tribute band gig, but too late to get out of it now.

In the afternoon I got an invite to join the Beauty and the Beast tour WhatsApp group. Joined, and then used the opportunity to message management about allowing my Foodie Finds invite to be distributed. I sent screenshots and a link to the Google Doc for the first city of tour. Not sure if they'll approve it, but I think it doesn't hurt to ask.

Halfway through the day Jameson messaged to share photos of his new office.
On the desk you can see cookies. His boss made them!

Monday, up early again for transcription. It was raining hard and looking like an all day rain, which is wonderful as we've been in a drought.

I transcribed and had breakfast, then shot over to Walmart for cough drops for Jameson and some special ice creams that we've been waiting to appear on shelves! Pop Tart ice cream sandwiches, and Butterfinger bars!


We have also been waiting for Rice Krispy Treat ice cream sandwiches and Eggo Waffle ice cream, but those have not been forthcoming yet :p Ah, it's good to be bad!

Back home to show the haul to Jameson. He was in the process of getting more info from Disney about his new job. He'll receive a work-only cell phone and a work laptop, his choice of Mac or PC. They are also working on setting up a music studio for his use. How official! How awesome!

The rest of my day was just plugging away at transcription. I was able to get most of it done, but even with going at it for 6-7 hours today I'll still have to spend 3 hours on the review and edit tomorrow. Argh. Didn't get to go for a walk or practice or plan dinner. We ordered taco salads and tried the Butterfinger bars. They are very good and were worth buying.

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Tuesday, up at 6am to finish transcribing and start the review process. I hate to get up so early on one of my few days that I COULD sleep in, but there is so much that I should be doing BESIDES transcription, and I need it out of my face.

So, coffee and an hour of typing followed by breakfast and almost four straight hours of poring over text and audio to catch errors. With breaks to pee and stretch and chat with Jameson, I finished it all at 11:30 and submitted the one job that's due 48 hours from now. The others I'll submit on one of the Epic days.

That out of the way, still a lot to do. To the grocery for dinner ingredients, then lunch. Packing meals for Epic, practicing for an hour, taking down my listings for my old trombone stuff and dragging said stuff out to the curb for bulk pickup tomorrow.

In the middle of all that I got a nice notice from LJ, about having won a year of professional service from participating in the LJ Birthday hashtag thing:



This is very nice, and I'm grateful :)
Because I'm American and can't pay like I ought to, I'd hoped to win, and put significant effort into the entry.
Just wish that I could pay and not be a leech, and not have to worry about it!

For dinner I made us a buffalo chicken recipe from Half-Baked Harvest that Jameson likes a lot.


He startled me several times today by laughing, humming to himself, openly smiling, and generally being chipper.
It's been so long since he's been actually happy about something that I forgot what it's like!

That makes me sad. But that's clinical depression.
Long-term. Hard to break out of. Always lurking, even when by all appearances things are going well.

He basically hasn't had employment-based validation since the pandemic.
And on top of that, his body has been betraying him these past few years (kidney stones, hernia, arm muscle atrophy and surgery.)
And on top of THAT, constant job rejections and interviews that led to nowhere.
All of this led to this depression in him, that has lasted for YEARS.

Like Jameson, I also get a lot of personal value from my work. Unlike him, I can glean validation from most any TYPE of work as long as it's useful to society OR I am appreciated on some level by bosses and colleagues. But Jameson has specific expectations of himself, or needs more specific validation...I don't fully understand, I just know that he needs something that he hasn't been getting since 2019.

For now, I'm grateful to have The Real Jameson back for a bit. I hope he sticks around longer this time :)

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Wednesday...

7 DAYS UNTIL EPIC UNIVERSE IS OPEN.

It seems like just yesterday we were crowding into orientation, excited and nervous, wondering how we were gonna memorize all that music, shocked that we were also being asked to ACT and do CHOREOGRAPHY. In just a few days this park will be officially complete and open; the rehearsal period will be over, and a new phase will begin.

It's been an amazing journey. I'm so grateful to be a part of this massive, exciting new theme park!!

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I drove straight to Epic and practiced bass trombone.

Right as I was wrapping up, Jameson sent a picture of his official offer letter for the position of Producer with Disney Event Group. He'd gotten it, and a contract to sign, this morning.

(this is the logo used at the top of his offer letter.)

Just a few hours after that, I received the American Federation of Musicians official contract for Beauty and the Beast.
Took a picture and sent it to Jameson. Signed it and sent it off.

Wow.
Life is SO STRANGE.

We are so, so fortunate.
Not only do we get to experience these monumental career highs...
...we also get to do it at the same time, and with the same company!!!

No matter what happens next, no one can take this moment away from us :)

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My day was normal otherwise. It was hot and sunny, we did all of our sets without the cart or Plume. The cart is supposed to be back with us by Saturday, so that's good.

Partway through the day Universal announced that they'll be livestreaming a special Grand Opening event on the night of the 21st, starting at 7pm EST.


We knew that there was an event planned; I'd already been scheduled to work that day and was asked to stay and perform three additional sets for a bit of extra money. So I'll be there for whatever happens, though I won't get to see much because I'll be working. YOU can watch the whole thing, though! I hope whatever-it-is is really cool!!

Additionally, I got a detailed route sheet from Beauty and the Beast. It's a document that shows which hotels we'll be staying in on tour, whether we'll be taking buses or flights between cities, and other small details like rehearsal days and some venue info.


I need this info to complete my Foodie Finds, but also to help plan whether or not to take buyouts and book my own travel or housing. And also, receiving this kind of detailed info really locks you into a tour; they only give it to people who WILL be traveling with them. It's a huge security risk otherwise. So, all of this makes everything REAL. It's really happening! I know I keep saying that but it's been so hard to believe without a scrap of paperwork.

(Regarding tour buyouts: When on tour, the production company books hotel rooms for the entire traveling company, but sometimes people want to visit with relatives, save money by pooling on an Airbnb, rent a car instead of riding the company bus, etc. To accommodate this, the company offers what's called a buyout, where you let them know that you want to book your own shit in X city and they give you the money that they would've spent on your housing or travel. It's really convenient!)

There are a few things in this BATB info that tells me this tour will be different, in a good way.
One of those is that we MIGHT get our own storage boxes that will travel by truck!!
That means I could bring more than what fits in my luggage! What a luxury!

The other thing is that nearly all of the hotels are EXTENDED STAY.
That means REAL REFRIGERATORS!!!!!! OH MY GOD!!!!!

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Thursday: Another day at Epic.

Friday: Jameson and I celebrate our career success with a day at Hollywood Studios!

Saturday: Lots to do, but hopefully catching a little bit of rest too.

Sunday: Day with Disney and the Main Street Phil :)

Up early again for Epic.

This time I went to Sprouts before work, because they have Spindthrift sodas and it turns out Jameson likes them :)

From there it was a normal morning, I was able to get a full hour of bass trombone practice before our sets which made me very happy.

The sets were all normal, but...there is already some pretty crummy behavior going on.
Universal is more of an "adult" park, which in some ways is a good and fun thing...and in some ways, opens the door to a lot of potential unpleasantness.

Today we had good crowds, but for the first two they were like TV audiences.
That is, we looked out onto a sea of phones. I felt like I was at a press conference or something.
And when we tried to interact we got no response or blank stares from most people.

Usually by the end of the set, if people stuck around that long, they'd start to warm up and clap and dance and whatnot. But not everyone stays that long; a lot of people take a quick video clip and leave. We're an ATMO band, which means we're supposed to add to the ambiance of Place Cachee, and make people feel like they're in 1920s wizarding Paris, and give guests an experience that they can't get anywhere else. But if you never once look up from your phone...what exactly did you pay for when you bought your ticket? You could have stayed home and watched videos of the park online, and saved some money. I guess that makes me old but, it was my thoughts today.

We had more questionable guest behavior in the form of a drunk guy who came running up to me during our performance and started yelling at me in Spanish. He didn't seem aggressive, just seemed to be acting stupid, but he was much bigger than me and got right up in my personal space. Our handlers were apparently too timid to do anything about it. The other two musicians immediately stomped over to "suggest" he step back...politely, and still in character. But they shouldn't have to do that in the middle of a show. We shouldn't have to stop a show to "handle" guests, that is what a HANDLER is for.

This stuff is only going to happen more and more, so we'd better get used to it and our handlers had better step up. I would hope that at some point we'll have training on how to handle negative interactions...but I won't hold my breath for it. I will simply have to watch out for myself. If I see that help is not forthcoming, I will act to protect myself...i.e., I will simply leave the set until the problem is removed. In the event that I can't leave because someone is trapping me or grabbing/touching me...let's just say I'm grateful to be holding a trombone. Which can be a VERY effective weapon. Which I hope no one will ever have to experience.

But you know. FAFO.


Aaaanyway, that was the excitement. Otherwise it was good sets and good crowds.

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I ate dinner in the break room and then drove to Will's for what was likely my final bass trombone lesson.

Chatted with him and his wife a bit, asked questions about his recent heart surgery which he said went really well, he's just a little sore and is recovering nicely. This is our first lesson in I think 3 weeks, and I was very gratified when Will exclaimed over the noticeable difference in my playing. I don't always practice as much as I should or work on all the areas that I should, but I do practice regularly and have worked very hard to be more comfortable with the bass, and it showed. I could feel it myself in the lesson, remembering how I'd sounded with Will previously. I'm still not as good as Will and probably never will be, but that's ok. I'll get better with time, and will continue to do my very own best :)

Back home the routine of unpacking and cleaning myself up and splatting on the floor.
Jameson had his last gig at Epcot tonight, and is tired but overall positive about his first performances post-surgery.
We will see how his arm feels over the next 48 hours.

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Friday I was up too early. Coffee and typing this and breakfast, trying to figure out what to make for dinner and settling on a cheeseburger fusilli bake that we both like. Got the ingredients for that. Did not practice, didn't feel like it.

Had an exchange of information with the upcoming tour management, and that made me feel relieved although they still haven't given us much. Now I've got flight and hotel bookings for rehearsals in Schenectady. What I REALLY want is onboarding paperwork and the dang music. But, gotta be patient.

The rest of the day was slow, I just did research related to touring, worked on foodie finds, and read my book to relax a bit.

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Saturday, up early for no reason again. I guess this is my life now.
Slept poorly too because had eaten too many acidic things all day yesterday, and felt mildly heartburn-y and nauseous all night. It happens.

Jameson had a playdate with friends this AM, so after he left I drove out to the nearest Michaels to look at foam inserts for my bass trombone case. The case is heavy-duty, but the padding inside is not the greatest so I need materials to cushion the horn further for transport.

$80 later I had some chunks of foam, some dark grey felt (they were out of black), two sheets of black craft foam, two foam cones, a small cushioned black case that was maybe meant for glasses(?)...and these adorable post-its, because they're fun and life is short!


Back home I chopped up the foam and put a chunk in the bottom of the trombone case to cushion the trigger mechanism, which currently is touching the hard side of the case and could be easily damaged as-is. I think the foam is perfect to protect it but we'll see. Additional foam in the more narrow section that houses the tuning slides. There was a lot of leeway for motion there that is greatly reduced with the foam.


The black craft foam, I cut a piece to put in the bottom of my mute bag to help muffle sound. I like to start packing up mutes before the show is over where possible, and this will help me not to make noise while doing so.

The foam cones are to be inserted in the trombone bells, to protect them from being crushed during transport. They extend slightly beyond the edge of the bell, which allows them to take impacts instead of the bell itself. The bell may still receive damage sometimes but odds are greatly reduced by using a cone (this is why my bass trombone's bell got crushed during shipping to me, because the idiot who packaged it did NOT follow my directions and did NOT use a cone.)


The small black case is for one of my small tuning slides on the bass, which must be removed for the instrument to fit in the case. It will probably also hold my mouthpiece once I get an appropriate sheath to protect them from clinking together. For the time being I cut a bit of the dark grey felt to go in there and provide extra cushioning, and threw random things in there like a mouthpiece brush and tape and spare trigger gummies.


More of the grey felt will be put in front of the bell-and-cone, just to snug it in there more tightly. I was very satisfied with how my little plan worked out here.

I practiced a bit but wasn't feeling great, so mostly tried to rest.
Later on we drove down to Colonial Ave to see a Queen tribute concert.
We've seen this band before, our friend Allen (whose nickname is Shrek) was a sound guy on the circus and now exclusively tours with this tribute band. It's good money for him and he absolutely loves it, plus they come through Florida once or twice a year and we get to see him! We had dinner together and got caught up, then Allen got us our tickets and took us backstage to meet some band members. Everyone was pleasant as always, and since Jameson is both a keyboardist and Queen fan he always has lots of nerd-stuff to chat about with the lead singer and the keyboardist :)

The concert was lots of fun. The theatre is old so it was warm and stinky, but that also made it feel, I guess "classic!" Like, this was a common live venue setting back in the 80s and 90s. Few people were looking at their phones or even recording...most were really interacting, cheering, and having fun. I feel like that might be a rarity any more.


After the show we said goodbye to Allen and thanked him for the tickets, and left so he could get started on loading out.

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Sunday, my brain finally allowed me to sleep through the night AND stay asleep until 9am.

This was partly because it was raining! It was darker than usual so I think my brain didn't know what time it was.
We have been in a drought here in Florida and BADLY needed this rain.



It also gave an excuse to have a nice slow morning.
I still feel kind of like, on the verge of having a virus, though I feel better than yesterday so that's something. I had an electrolyte drink, and waited a while before practicing bass, and then Disney stuff on tenor. After practice I had lunch with Jameson and then took a coffee grinder I'd sold on Ebay over to UPS so I won't have to worry about it on Monday. Then Jameson and I rested. He gamed and I watched Aladdin for no reason other than I felt like it. Maybe it's just comforting while I'm feeling under the weather.

Before dinner I cleared out the areas under the guest bathroom and kitchen sinks, and after dinner I did the master bathroom. Tomorrow we are having new sinks put into the bathrooms and new faucets in all three. Opened each box to make sure all parts are there and nothing is broken. We've had terrible luck with contractors and getting ripped off and/or paying for services that do not get completed, so please cross your fingers for us that we will just be able to get these installed without drama or issue.

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Monday: Three faucets and two sinks getting installed early in the morning. The rest of the day should be free. I'll probably practice and pack for Disney. If I'm feeling better I'll make something for dinner.

Tuesday: Rehearsal day at Disney.

Wednesday & Thursday: Working at Epic.

Monday, after breakfast:
     - Ran dishwasher
     - Mailed off the sold trombone accessories
     - Went to Lowe's to buy 2 bathroom sinks and 3 faucets, and schedule installation of those
     - Did laundry
     - Made grocery list
     - Chatted with step-grandma about how her first Easter went without her husband there
     - Responded to misc social media comments on my posts (this takes significant time so I list it with chores)

After lunch:
     - Folded laundry
     - Practiced bass trombone
     - Made Reverb listings for my digital court reporting stuff that I need to sell
     - Reached out to schedule a possible visit with an American trombone craftsman in July
     - Cheered for Jameson as he got the call for his second interview with Disney!!

MAN I really hope they consider him seriously this time. He's been told it's the final round, and he's never made it that far in the interview process. I hope so strongly for a good result for him.

Also some Epic coworkers sent me a few more nice photos that a professional photographer took on Saturday.


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Tuesday, breakfast, then
     - packed lunch and dinner for Epic
     - washed tenor trombone because I want to start practicing doubling
     - grocery for dinner ingredients

After lunch,
     - put chicken in a marinade for dinner
     - went back out to get pickled ginger at Walmart since they hadn't had it at Publix
     - solidified an appointment with the trombone craftsman up in Chicago for July
     - packed more stuff for Epic (clothes, trombones, music, etc)
     - put music for an upcoming Chicago tribute band on my iPad
     - went BACK out because I'd ordered some photo prints at Walgreens and they were ready in like 2 seconds

...and took a rest, which I hope is acceptable.
Meanwhile Jameson worked. A pretty normal day for both of us.

Here is my framed show photo.


Jameson has a few framed photos of live performances, from when he played with Mulch, Sweat, & Shears at Disney. His parents have some too. It's not something that I would've thought to do myself, and will be a nice memento especially years from now.

For dinner I made a spicy sesame chicken ginger salad from Half-Baked Harvest.
Shredded Napa cabbage, romaine, flavorful marinated chicken breast, mandarin oranges, pomegranate seeds, wonton strips, avocado, roasted peanuts, green onion, cilantro, and a soy-honey-ginger-orange-gochujang dressing.


I was surprised that Jameson actually liked it, and enough to go back for seconds, so I'll be making it or some variation of it again for sure.

As we were winding down our evening my stepmom called to catch up (I'd emailed her over Easter.) She's in Delaware with friends. I was glad to hear that as she has glaucoma, is legally blind, and is from a rural area, which all means she's dependent on others for even short trips. She's doing well, and we made plans for me to possibly come visit during one of the tour layoffs.

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Wednesday, up early and after doing "Phillipa hair" and eating breakfast,

     - shipped an item that I'd sold overnight
     - stopped at Whole Paycheck for a few things
     - got to Epic, put away my food, got makeup and costume on
     - dragged my trombones to the stairwell and practiced for an hour

I did 45 minutes on bass followed by a 15-minute review of my Place Cachee Jazz music, because remember last week I was disappointed with how I'd played. It was a busy week and I was tired and stressed, but that's not an excuse especially when we are constantly being recorded and watched by management.

Thankfully, today went a LOT better. Gave myself a little pep talk and did just fine all day.
After one of the sets we were mobbed by people wanting selfies with Plume (our puffskein). About four groups were able to get photos before our handlers intervened so we could leave. Moments like these are always hard because we'd truly love to stay and let everyone have a photo! But we also have just a short time to prepare for the next set, AND we need to clear out because other atmo performers also use that space (Cosme the wand shop owner, but also the aurors and wizarding school students.) Hopefully people will be understanding just as they are with meet-and-greets.

Otherwise it was a normal day, and I hope to have another just like it tomorrow.

In closing, HERE is a review of the musical offerings at Epic Universe which of course strongly features us.

TL;DR:


And here is a recent performance clip with me, Joe (trumpet sub), and Adrian (clarinet)

Watch on YouTube

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Thursday: Day at Epic

Friday: Day off. Housework, practice trying to sell more junk.

Saturday & Sunday: Also days off. Cooking...maybe I can convince Jameson to eat out once too...

Monday, up at 6:30 to finish my transcription job. It did turn out to be an interesting one, but I can't really share details. The person applying for asylum in the US was Russian, and that made it interesting.

Then breakfast and some errands. Got my hair trimmed because it's getting long and I don't want any more flak from Epic about whether or not I should have a ponytail. If I keep it too short for a bun that settles the issue.

Next, bagels for the week and Walmart for dish soap and wet wipes.

Back home Jameson was at physical therapy so I cleaned our bathrooms, ate lunch, and practiced bass.
I finally got through the whole Australian-tour-music-trombone-part, making some new timestamps for practice purposes along the way. Finally playing through the whole part was...emotional. Without sharing what show I'm doing (STILL, omg could they hurry up with casting so I can spill the beans!), the music has a huge emotional connection for me. If I'm getting chills and tearing up just from practicing the stuff, I might actually CRY the first time we perform the show. Note to self, bring tissues to the pit...

That playthrough actually took a large chunk of the day. Had a snack and rested while Jameson worked.
Today was the last day of March. April is about to be extremely busy for me, and temperatures are climbing here in Florida so outdoor work is gonna become harder. I am trying to extend grace to myself, to rest and sit still for 1-2 hours on days when I CAN.

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Tuesday, up at 7 to review transcription and send any questions to my supervisor.

Jameson left for the gym, and I

     - picked up dinner ingredients
     - practiced bass trombone for an hour
     - ate lunch
     - packed meals and clothes for Epic
     - practiced tenor trombone.

I have two new tenor gigs coming up, one of which has jazz improv, EEW, so I will have to work extra hard on it. Urrrrgh that was not a fun practice.

After that I was damn tired so hopefully it's excusable that I rested for an hour before prepping dinner.

Dinner was "Moroccan"-seasoned chicken thighs roasted on a sheet pan with sweet potatoes, cauliflower, carrots, and onions, then garnished with pistachios, cranberries, pomegranate seeds, cilantro, and feta cheese bits. Drizzled with a lemon garlic yogurt sauce. It turned out quite good, next time I will cook the veg and chicken on two separate pans so the veg can crisp up a bit more but otherwise no complaints.


(stock image from Ambitious Kitchen)

Tomorrow, back at Epic to dance around in the heat.
It feels like forever since I've done an Epic show...hope I remember everything!

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Wednesday, up at 5:30. Coffee and spending 30 minutes doing my hair in the way that they want, then breakfast and the long commute to the park. I remembered how to apply the makeup at least.

Waiting for me was this cute puffskein keychain! Mariah (trombonist) found them in one of the shops and bought a bunch. I Venmo'd her. Honestly not sure where this little guy will live, but he was 50% off with the Universal discount and he'll make a nice memento of our own animatronic puffskein who performs with us, and whose name is Plume.


We finally had our prop back, including Plume, so I had to remind myself what the script is like when we're interacting with our puffskein. It wasn't hard; that script was DRILLED into us during rehearsal! 

It was a hot humid day, but all of our shows were well-attended. I remembered to hydrate and cool off between shows. Since we third party employees are allowed to enjoy park previews this week, we saw several people we knew throughout the day and that made the shows even more fun than usual :)

After work I braved traffic for Whole Paycheck, but the hot bar was picked over so I got sushi instead.
Back home I did not at all feel like practicing, so instead packed breakfast, lunch, and dinner for tomorrow, and packed everything I'll need for my bass lesson (I'll have to go straight there from Epic), downloaded my 23andme data since apparently they're selling customer info to someone I don't know, and enjoyed watching some anime.

Oh, and the music coordinator for the tour I'm doing texted to ask for my musician's union info!
My hopes are up that we might get some paperwork soon, oh my goodness!!

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Thursday: Performing at Epic, bass trombone lesson.

Friday: Day off. Maybe more transcription? Practice, chores, errands, blah blah.

Saturday: Jameson and I get to go explore Epic Universe!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Sunday: Last day off for a while, so I'll likely use it to chill.

Monday was a "day off."
I was supposed to be at Epic, but someone somewhere messed up our schedule and we ended up with two PAID days off. Whee!!

Jameson was up early for physical therapy, so I got up early too to finish transcribing.
I started off strong but after Jameson left I decided to vacuum, dust, touch-up clean the shower with bleach, then finally bit the bullet and went shopping on macofalltrades.com for a refurbished iPad.

I use my iPad for most gigs. Musicians can easily airdrop music PDFs to each other, and it's easy for me to upload big Dropbox folders to ForScore. Right now I have all of my Disney music on my iPad, plus my Easter gig music and Steamboat Lillies gig music, all of my bass trombone stuff, and a load of show music and ancient Real Books that I don't want to lose.

My iPad is an ORIGINAL iPad Air! It's so old that there have been no updates for it for a long time, and I have to keep it in Airplane Mode otherwise it will freeze up. But lately it's been freezing up anyway, and the battery barely lasts a full day anymore, and I can't even sell it on trade-in because nobody will buy it. Time to ditch it before it crashes and I lose everything.

Anyway, spent $$$ on a 13" Air, and was trying to go back to transcription when I got bombarded with texts from one of the musicians on the upcoming tour I'm signed with. She was having a freakout just like I had a few days ago!

Had I heard anything new?
Why don't we have music yet?
Have I tried reaching out to anyone?

I was delighted to hear from her! See, I'm NOT an overreacting Karen after all! Three months IS far too long to keep your employees in the dark, and I'm not the only one who thinks so.

I was able to share with her all of the legwork I'd done recently, and though there was little to show for it at least there was the text from the Music Coordinator saying that I'm "confirmed" on Thursday. After chatting with her I also decided to message the trombonist who's currently doing our show in Australia to ask him for a pdf of my part. I didn't want to have to do that, but feel like if we musicians don't scrounge these parts ourselves, we won't see them until a week before the gig when management finally gets around to it.

After that it was time for lunch, then I had to cook some beef I'd thawed, then pack lunch and dinner for Disney tomorrow. Then I FINALLY got back to transcription, but it just took so much longer than usual...it's a different type of case so there was a lot of terminology that I had to look up because it was new to me. This is why you can't assume a shorter case will be easier.

Somewhere in there, my "church eggs" arrived from Zimmerman's in Pennsylvania!


There were 18 eggs in total (I'd expected 16) and there were supposed to be 2 or 3 of each flavor from 2 different churches.
Somehow we ended up with 8 peanut butter eggs, 7 coconut eggs, and only 3 buttercream eggs (which is a big shame because those are my favorite!), and from 4 different churches to boot!


I am definitely NOT complaining! What an adorable grab bag of eggs. The woman gathering the eggs for me had sounded excited and flustered over the phone, so I think she lost her mind a little bit and just started throwing eggs in the box :) I was impressed that they all arrived intact, and after a bit of time in the fridge to firm up they'll be ready to enjoy. I made sure to write the store a good review on Google. This is the first time I'll have real "church eggs" for Easter since I was a little girl, and I'm so grateful that this person was willing to send them to us.

Even after dinner I had to continue transcription, but finally completed it (there is still the audio review to do, sigh.)

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Tuesday, rehearsal day at the Magic Kingdom!


For a rehearsal day, I'm not filling in for anyone, so the day is based around any music that needs to be worked on or any practice that I want to get in on any aspect of the gig. We start with a 10am play-through of lesser-used pieces. Today we had two new ones which our boss wants to incorporate into the parades, "Heigh-Ho" and "You Can Fly." They were quite easy and after the play-through I decided to focus on memorizing them by the end of the day. I more or less did that (will have to solidify it in my head over the next few days), then went up to watch one of the band's sets, then filled in on the second parade for Keith.

I used the lunch break to practice bass as well, and that was very nice! Will was working today, so he kindly gave me pointers...I essentially got a free lesson!

After that, I decided to have a Small Adventure.
I've never walked the whole of the Utilidors below the Castle before. Why not give it a try!


(photo from pinsacrosstheworld.com)

The Utilidors are one big loop around the castle, probably about a mile long, with a central corridor cutting directly under the Castle. Also, did you know that guests can tour the Utilidors? It's called the Keys to the Kingdom Tour.

Anyway, I walked for what seemed like a long time but was only about 10 minutes. Did not see much except the utility tunnels, storage areas, a lot of engineering rooms, lockers for custodians and other types of essential staff, and lots of signage telling you where you were and where you were headed. There were some boards with general announcements, about castmember events or health screenings or what-have-you that you might see in any workspace. I reached the midpoint/corridor that slices below the Castle, but passed it and kept going.

This next part of the circle was much the same as the first, but part of it broke off into a sort of attached rectangle with some interesting offices, like Retail Merchandise Design or the fire alarm control systems for the Hall of Presidents. Here is where I found a huge chunk of hallway devoted to rare enamel pins! Specifically, hidden mickey pins.

(sample photo)



Hidden Mickey pins are NOT sold in the parks.
They are given to employees to give to guests during pin trades.
Since they are harder to get than the regular pins and a limited number are released each year, they are rare and highly collectible. And apparently, under Cinderella's Castle in the Utilidors, they keep the last several years' worth of hidden mickey pins on display!

I'm sorry I couldn't take photos, but rules is rules.

Additionally, there were many old black and white high-def photos of Walt Disney. Walking around the park, meeting with developers, waving to guests, hanging out with costumed characters, stuff like that. One of the funniest things about these photos is that Walt smoked, and was often holding a cigarette or cigar when these photos were taken...but in most of the photos they've been edited out!! I did find one, however, where he was holding a cigar :)

(photo courtesy Snopes. I couldn't take a pic of the one I saw, sorry.)

There was other stuff too, little memorials to Disney's Fire and Police/Security staff, and some blueprints and robotic parts for Tiki Room birds, stuff like that. I'm really glad I went exploring...there were some MAGICAL things to be found in the secret tunnels under the Magic Kingdom!

I left before Flag Retreat, ate dinner in the car on the way home, and caught up with Jameson before buckling down to set up my new iPad. Look how much bigger it is than my old one! I can't wait to be able to SEE my music!!


I transferred all of my music PDFs and ForScore files over...and just as I was doing that, the Australian trombonist who is currently playing the new version of the show I'm gonna be on, sent me a PDF of his book! Awesome! I can't wait to get started on it!

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Wednesday, finished my transcription job and sent it, then continued working on marking my music (highlighting mute changes, writing in cuts and edits given in emails, bookmarking pages for quick access during practice.) After lunch, grocery for dinner ingredients. I didn't practice because the next thing I had to do was watch a bootleg of my touring show and add timestamps. Without an official recording to practice with, a bootleg is the next best thing, and with timestamps I don't have to navigate a 2-hour video to find the one song I want to work on. It takes a lot of time now but is worth it.

Dinner was butter chicken meatballs, which I've made before, served with brown rice and peas.
After dinner, blowing more money on a decent saute pan. I recently bought us a cheap one and got what I paid for, the bottom is warped already. And then a case for the iPad too. As though to make up for my money flying away, our scheduler for Epic wrote to say that he needed me to cover an extra day in April. Yay!

All that aside, a quiet night. Jameson has been in a mood lately because he's covering for his boss at work, plus doing a special project, and he pulled something in his arm and it's hurting him. And he hasn't heard back from the Disney job he interviewed for last week either. Again. As usual. I'm upset for him. I don't know how to help him.

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Thursday: Lesson with Will. Misc chores and practice.

Friday & Saturday: Days “off.” Should receive more transcription work, will practice and cook.

Sunday: Disney day.

I woke to find that it has finally happened.
Our cover has been blown. In THIS article.

Aah, whoops. I forget that people don't read any more and I'm supposed to spoon-feed information.
TL;DR:


This is the first-ever official Universal mention of our band.

Next week are family and friends previews, and from what I've heard they're planning to drop the photo restrictions (NOT video, though if they allow the one I feel they can't prevent the other.) So, I will STILL not share any more details than this, because of the NDA and because spoilers are likely to start coming in a week or two.

(Artistic rendering of a strolling violinist, who also tells scary stories, in Dark Universe. This was one of the events that we were taken to see during our rehearsal period...all of the musicians did a fantastic job, and I'm excited that they'll have real audiences soon too!)

Well, back to Thursday.
It was a day off and I hadn't really scheduled myself anything to do, just the lesson with Will and packing for Epic tomorrow. And I was feeling extra-tired. So, a nice slow breakfast and when Jameson went to the gym I watched anime, meal-planned, made a quick trip to Wawa to see if they had seasonal Irish potato candy (they didn't,) got bagels for the week (egg, rye, French toast, cinnamon raisin), and was practicing bass when Jameson got home. I also turned in my transcription work, worked on Foodie Finds, packed my food and clothes for Epic, and received a crappy trombone I'd gotten from Goodwill Auctions for us to use at Epic. With shipping and tax, it was only $186.


I bought it based on photos, obviously couldn't try it in advance when buying from an online auction. But I was lucky. It's not great, but has minimal damage and will be usable for our purposes. I gave it a bath and will bring it with me to Epic tomorrow. Talking with the other two trombone ladies, we'll probably have both junk trombones serviced in coming weeks. A bad, scrape-y slide makes them much harder to play, and dropping a little cash to help us sound slightly better seems reasonable.

After dinner I had my lesson with Will. Got to meet his wife this time, she's also a musician and happened to be on a gig during my last lesson. She seems awesome, I'm hoping that she and Will and Jameson and I can have a couples night of some sort, but with ALL of us musicians it's very unlikely!

The lesson went well again, I was once again flabbergasted at all that I do not know, but think I learned some more things about how I should be shaping my embouchure and moving air through the horn. Will gave me breathing and buzzing exercises to do, so I will try them tomorrow. Once again we went over by 30 minutes, neither of us complaining. There's a lot to learn and an hour honestly doesn't seem to cut it!

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Friday, up very early for Epic.

TMI warning:
my intestines have been a mess since yesterday, I don't know why but perhaps too much dairy lately, or something else indigestible. It happens from time to time but is very uncomfortable and stressful when you're trying to perform in front of people but are mildly nauseous and crampy and gassy.

Anyway, our prop is still broken meaning I could bring my own, good trombone to play as I wouldn't have to set it down on the prop. I also brought the Goodwill trombone, and ALSO kidnapped the frankenbone so that I can take it to be serviced and cleaned (as I mentioned wanting to do a few paragraphs above.) Also, to thank me for A) bringing trombones for us to use and B) volunteering to drive all the way out to Pat's to get one serviced (he lives an hour away), Andrea called Pat up and paid for the cleaning in advance! This is why I love working with these ladies! I get the sense that the men would NEVER be proactive like this for each other. Mariah has been at a wedding this week or I'm sure she'd have pitched in as well (she's also very young so I had zero expectations, let her save her money.)

The day went just fine, nothing to report except that my character's hairstyle was thrown into question because my hair has grown out a bit since I was given hair/makeup criteria. I am still amazed at how much scrutiny we are all under from day to day--is the length of my hair really going to contribute in any way to the success of the park?--but considering that all of us represent the Intellectual Property (IP) of high-value brands like Nintendo, JK Rowling, How to Train Your Dragon, etc., I suppose it's understandable.

After work, Whole Paycheck for shrimp to make po'boys and a few other ingredients.
It took over an hour to drive the 16 miles home. The tourist traffic around here is only going to get crazier.
Jameson and I caught up, I practiced bass, and received a new transcription job and set up the formatting so I can begin it easily tomorrow. We watched Traitors, went to bed. The usual.

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Saturday I slept poorly and was very anxious for some reason. Assuming it's because my guts are bothering me. Such things make me think of how my mom died, and I am her age, and sometimes my subconscious latches onto that and freaks out.

Coffee and transcription for an hour.
Jameson woke up to find he'd been offered an interview with DEG (Disney Event Group) on Tuesday, so we will begin crossing our fingers and toes for him right now.

When Jameson went to his massage I took a break from trancsription to make tartar sauce, go get po'boy hoagie rolls (for some reason Whole Paycheck has stopped selling demi baguettes), and practice bass until lunch. Then more transcription and a small break before whipping up dinner. I make grilled shrimp po'boys about twice a year, they're easy and tasty and failsafe.

We watched Traitors and Severance, and I binged Beastars for a while (should I be embarrassed about that? Unsure.)

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Sunday I was able to sleep a little better. It was very gusty, the tornado-filled storm system that's been moving across the Southeast US has reached us. It's passing north of Florida but will clip us a bit.

Transcription. A little about that for those interested below the cut.

( Transcribing immigration cases )

Well, so, I did transcription for most of the morning until I was nearly done. The sooner I finish the more free time I can have for other things. After lunch I practiced trombone until Jameson left for Universal, he's seeing a concert there tonight with a friend. After practice I washed and changed our bedsheets, took myself to a new pho place for summer rolls for dinner, stopped at a hardware store for a pipe joint for trombone breathing exercises (someone is ABSOLUTELY going to think it's a bong), then hit a liquor store for no reason other than it's a new one and I've never been in it before. They didn't have much that I was interested in, but did have Underberg which I've thought about often since trying it in Salt Lake City. So I got some of that to enjoy, and some mini bottles of peanut butter whiskey for Jameson.


Back home, much chilling. I felt very lazy, but maybe that's what's needed.
Summer rolls and leftover tofu and veg, peanut butter whiskey and a carrot cake muffin for dessert.

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Monday thru Wednesday: more days off! (From Epic lol.) I don't really know what to do with myself. Goals include practice, sweeping the pool deck, walks, cooking meals, depositing savings bonds, transcribing, and catching up on sleep. Oh, and taking the frankenbone to be cleaned.

I was up at 7 and finishing my transcription, submitting it, and planning dinners by the time Jameson got up. When he went to the gym I cleaned the bathrooms and briefly practiced bass...my first lesson is tonight and it's an hour long, so I don't want to overdo it. Then lunch and to the grocery for dinner ingredients.

I did a lot of cleaning last week on my day off, and it felt strange to not have a laundry list of To-Do's.
I felt restless without something demanding my attention. That, and I was nervous for the lesson later in the evening.

For dinner Jameson wanted to treat himself to Taco Bell, so I said ya know what, I'll treat myself to Chinese!
(I don't like Taco Bell, and Jameson can't eat Chinese because the MSG makes him sick.)
I enjoyed steamed seafood with veggies and char siu ribs. There seemed like enough food for like eight people so I'll be eating that for the next 3-4 lunches.

Then it was time for my lesson. I drove to Will's house and was greeted by his 5-year-old Italian greyhound whose name is Baci because that means "lots of kisses" in Italian, and Baci loves to give lots of kisses! We started with Will examining my bass trombone. I think it's a good horn, but wanted a REAL bass trombonist's opinion. He absolutely loved it, especially the slide (which to be fair any trombonist bass or not would agree that it's a good one.) He'd never played a Minick-modified horn, so now I think he understands why they're so sought after. That guy knew what he was doing. (Read about Larry Minick HERE if you like. It's his obit, but it does explain why his work was/is so prized.)

That done, we started with some basic warm-ups and exercises so Will could see where I'm at. I was nervous and internally cringing at how poor I sound compared to Will...but also, that's why I'm taking lessons, you know? To learn and to improve, on an instrument that I don't normally play. There's no need to be embarrassed about that.

I learned a great deal from Will in that short hour. About how tenor players need to have a faster airstream, but to play bass you have to slow it down and spread it out...like fogging up a window with your breath, as opposed to blowing out a candle. I learned that I've been playing some of the pedal note positions in the wrong spot, not knowing any better. It was actually fascinating and exciting, finding out all of the stuff that I didn't know. We will have another lesson in a week, which is excellent because it'll hold me accountable. I can tell right away that taking lessons was the right thing to do, and am excited for the progress that I could make with Will's guidance!

We went overtime but he still only charged me for an hour, so next time I'll bring him some Dragon's Milk beer.

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Friday, I managed to sleep a bit later but was still up before 8.

Missions accomplished:
     - Load of laundry.
     - Mixed up some garlic butter for garlic bread later.
     - Practiced the new materials on bass. I can tell a difference already just from the one lesson!
     - Clothing donation drop at a thrift store.
     - Food donation drop at a food bank.
     - Back home for leftover Chinese lunch.
     - Ran the dishwasher.
     - Ingredients list for tomorrow's dinner.
     - Dug through my storage bins for stickers to put on my bass trombone case.
     - Worked on Foodie Finds.
     - Finally washed and vacuumed my car. Ever since the mouse invasion there have been remnants of nest materials, dried droppings, and that faint yet distinctive Small Animal Smell floating around in there, plus I've been eating meals while driving for over a month. Now it's nice and clean.
     - Small impromptu funeral for my beautiful firefly petunia. RIP. This little plant brought me so much joy, and I hope to own another in the future when I'm not tearing around the country every few months.

At it's brightest:


And now, the poor thing is completely dead. The green things are weeds.
I am sorry, dear flower, but we'll meet again.


For dinner I had planned to make us this upscale chicken parm sandwich...but Jameson had recently shared with me a TikTok of someone making dino nugget chicken parm, with each little dinosaur draped in it's own little blanket of provolone...and it was just so cute and fun. And he's been struggling mentally this week, so I thought, let's be kids tonight. Let's pretend we have no worries other than imagining our vegetables are trees while biting the heads off our dinosaurs and watching junk TV.

Chickie parm NUGGOSAURS with "trees" and a garlic "land."


Some dinos had provolone blankets, some had mozzarella pillows, and some had both. All had marinara and a sprinkle of parm and herbs. The garlic butter is homemade, on store-bought ciabatta.

Fun and delicious. What's not to love?

Right before bed I received a new transcription job, this one is 3 hours instead of 2.

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Up around 7 on Saturday for coffee and transcription, breakfast, and when Jameson left for the gym I made "Big Mac sauce" for our burgers and formed the burger patties.

Then packed lunch and clothes for Epic, ate lunch, and procrastinated on practicing because I didn't feel like it but did ultimately get 1/2 hour in. Some is better than none. More transcription, then had Jameson show me how to start the grill so I'll know how to operate it without help in the future. Working with open flame scares the eff out of me, but like anything else it just takes safety precautions and getting used to. Sadly our burgers crumbled on the grill, but I was able to salvage them by bringing them inside and cooking them in a pan. The flavors were great but mine was essentially a sloppy joe!

Calm night of watching Severance, gaming, watching anime, working on Foodie Finds.
There are people in the vacation rental next door making a huge racket at time of this writing, but I'm gonna hope they quiet down by midnight.

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Sunday, up super early for Epic.
I was startled by the oven clock reading 4:30am...and then remembered that it was daylight savings. No wonder I felt extra tired.

It was a hot day so we did not have to wear our costume jackets, thank goodness.
There were about 5,000 people in the park, we were told (throughout all five worlds, not just ours) so we had decent crowds. It felt close to what it might feel like when the park is open, with people waving and asking us questions and actually gathering around to watch us perform (usually they just keep walking.) All in all a very good performance day, aside from being very sweaty!

I tried to do transcription between sets but they've changed our schedule. We now leave earlier, but our breaks are a bit shorter and too short to get actual work done. I don't mind, but I will have to plan for more transcription on non-Epic days from now on.

Getting out earlier meant I had time to actually pick up dinner for Jameson and I! Whole Paycheck for sushi and a few small things. Back home Jameson was feeling nervous; he got called to do jury duty on Monday, and he's afraid it'll interfere with his physical therapy. He will find out more tomorrow morning, hopefully.

I wanted to practice but Jameson seemed to need company, so instead we ate dinner together and watched two episodes of Traitors. I am annoyed that I didn't get any transcription OR practice done today...but have to remember that making plans doesn't guarantee they'll happen, and that life sometimes directs one to do other things like be there for one's partner, and that's ok.

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Monday & Tuesday: Days off. Lots of transcription, more chores, a visit to the bank and listing items that I don't use for sale online.

Wednesday: Epic rehearsal/performances.