Major crunch time at work. I’d wanted to take a summer Friday but I had to work. I was waiting on another developer to check in code most of the day, so at least I was able to get a couple things done anyway. I worked over the weekend (a few hours only). Hoping to take this coming Friday off. Lots of stuff backing up. Finally got the Mustang out for a ride on a sunny day, but still haven’t gotten to the body shop.
Major crunch time for origami too. The convention is just two weeks away. Been folding lotsa new stuff and diagramming too. Made a bunch of cool tessellations last week, including a nice version of my penflower and also a true Penrose tessellation. Did another one I call the pent-hex tessellation, but I’m not sure how to finish it, and created a new one I’m calling the pent-pent. Both are fractals. Pictures soon. I finally got my book contract signed, and went out and bought a new camera.
Working on some animals. I want to do nice versions of my Fox, Narwhal, Armadillo and Turkey, since they’re all new models diagrammed for the upcoming book, and I’ll need to photograph them soon anyway. So I went and inventoried my paper supply and started thinking about which model will go well from what paper. The big problem is that three of these model have a color change effect, which relies on the back of the sheet being white, and most of the high-end papers are single color. So I’m thinking about custom making some sheets, or maybe forgoing the color change. If I get done with those, I still have some polyhedra I want to do, plus a new Zeppelin, and working out my Space Shuttle.
Among my random tasks I booked the first legit gig for my group. It’s at the Beanberry café, where we played last year, coming up in July. Two sets, two hours of music to get together. Meanwhile I’m continuing to play open mics to develop my originals. I played another gig at the Purple Crayon Friday night. Jeannie and the girls came out, and Jen was there too, and we all hung out afterward, so it was a good time. I played Get on Back 2 U and debuted Heat Wave. Good response. GOB2U was my second time playing it, and I’d gotten over the hump of worrying about screwing up the piano part and so was able to relax and concentrate more on delivering a performance, and on the vocal phrasing. Heat Wave is just on the edge of my ability to play, but came across strongly. The response was really positive, and a good boost to my feeling like its worthwhile doing this. A couple other piano players there (who were really good) came up to me afterwards. One said it was really refreshing to hear songs that use 7/8 and whole tone scales. The other asked if Heat Wave was a Zappa song, and was knocked out when Erik told him I wrote it. So my music has an appeal to at least some people. Hopefully next time I play it Heat Wave will be further along the not-having-to-think-so-hard continuum.
Meanwhile Michelle sang in a production of Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dream Coat put on by Young at Arts. The show was really good. Lizzy was helping out backstage, and is her own show next week.
And finals! And the kids have crazy half-day schedule coming up. Oy!
