Million miles an hour

I've been working through a lot of things in my head lately. Many of them have to do with financial troubles, as I feel like I'm sinking and I'm not sure how to get ahead. It may be that I have to bite the bullet and get another part-time job, but then I've got to do the band thing and the record thing and more. The thought of trying to do it all nearly cleaves my forehead in two.

Been thinking a lot also, lately, about what I want and don't want romantically. I have finally, for the first time in my life, gotten a somewhat clear idea of how I would like to be treated; I also have an idea of the sort of personality of the person who I would want, and how I would like to go through life if I were with this someone. For years I have known women who have very specific ideas about their ideal mate, and I scoffed because it seemed to me that all they were doing was turning away opportunities. Granted, many of them had "ideals" that would make me sick, but that's them, not me.

I am finally realizing that it is very important for me to stay true to what I want, now that I know what that is. It's a shame no one I currently know fits the bill. But I am happy in general, and I feel hope. I was out last Friday at Lambert's and was intrigued by many people I had never seen before; compelled by curiosity and attaction, and impressed by the collective IQ. I don't doubt for a minute that I will meet these people in the future. In the meantime, I need to make sure the projects that keep me the most happy don't fall prey to my rather frequent fits of melancholy and lethargia.

And by the way..about these new projects that keep me happy... my new band ROCKS! Dante was exactly what we needed to get things tied in place. He and I have been doing some co-writing as of late, and it's great to put my words to his inventive and evocative melodies. And he keeps on top of me for the guitar too, telling me when I'm being lazy. I love that. And we have practice tonight and I have work to do. It helps that when we were all at Nick's for his party on Satruday night, that Darren was gushing about my song. I'm glad he liked it, because this is so new to me that any bit of compliment and non-criticism is welcome. As far as this project goes, I do not want criticism so early on, even in the name of art.

DB Harris is in Nashville working on the harmonies for "It's Later Now"-- he is in touch with Mario to make sure the tracks are in place and they're loading the files to .ftp for ease and efficiency. It looks like my idea to make "It's Later now" a male-female duet might be possible, even after the fact ! This Thursday afternoon I'm meeting with Brennen Leigh to have girlie time and go over the songs on my album to see where she would fit in (and she's definitely doing mandolin on 'Daddy's Girl").

Mario is working withthe horn players and other soloists, as I have given him carte blanche to make "Threshold of Heartache" sound exactly like what he is envisioning. If it sounds totally Spanish, that's just fine with me.

And I am recording with Jim Stringer on November 14th. Besides the engineering, I think he's going to do some straight steel on a couple of the songs; maybe male harmonies too. We'll see how involved he wants to be. I am working on finding a good pedal steel player to record here in Austin. Mario said he'd make sure Carlos paid for that, and all I have to do is nail down a price and let Mario know.


Things are coming together, that's for sure! After mid-November, my main focus is to work on the album design, the liner notes, and get some good photographs taken. I also need to talk to my stylist girlfriends to see if one of them could make my hair look like Loretta Lynn ca. 1970, for the photo session. I'm going to need an awful lot of fake hair for that!