I have had a negative bank balance since Wednesday of last week. Valerie tried wiring me the money she owed me last Wednesday, but it hasn’t shown up in my account yet six days later. Meanwhile, I wanted to travel tomorrow to get to mom’s house for Thanksgiving, but I have no money for the bus. I have no money for food either, for that matter. I’m really stuck.

Better to move on to another topic rather than dwelling on my pressing problems. Writing is a good way for me to mull things over, so let me just move along and bash a few ideas around.

I have been checking out Facebook a bit more lately. I have stayed off Facebook for quite a while since thinking about it just made me more depressed. Essentially, the depression makes me avoid any kind of human contact, and that lack of contact just reinforces the depression. Now I’m taking some pleasure in checking out what others are doing and even in sharing some thoughts with the cloud. I’ve shared more posts in the past week than I have in the previous two years, I think. One of the reasons I have been hesitant to share things on Facebook is my awful habit of not wanting to intrude upon others. What dawned on me this past week is that I don’t feel others are intruding upon me when they post things regularly, so why shouldn’t I do it. In the end, I do need to be able to get myself out there into the world a lot more than I do. A LOT MORE, in fact.

As long as I am on a self-reflective bent, let me write a bit now about my musical practice. I need to be more disciplined about it. What I have been doing lately is to practice a tune or two for a bit, then browse the internet, and then get back to my tune or two. I need to be more focused and consistent in how I approach my practice if I want to improve to the level at which I think I should be. Let me break it down a bit.

  • Repertoire, Repertoire, Repertoire: This is the big one, and I need to put most of my energy into this. In the past I have given this very little time, and my playing really reflects it at this point. Just keep working on memorizing and developing the chord solos for now, and then move on to melodies and walking basslines for each of the tunes. Make sure to learn each tune in more than one key, and work out the melodies with some harmonization.
  • Ear Training: Just do some a few times a week. The Bruce Arnold CDs are incredibly helpful, as are his sight singing exercises. Just do it, as they say.
  • Composition: Get back to working my way through Schoenberg’s Theory of Harmony. Write out the exercises in several keys and play then at the piano.
  • Piano: Play the composition exercises from Schoenberg. Continue working with Bartok’s Mikrokosmos, and continue working on Haerle’s jazz chords.

Buckle down and get your ass into it. Set an alarm for early in the morning, get up, and plow through it. Don’t be such a fucking wanker. Practice!