The Power Struggle

• Electric Company Set To Cut Us Off
• Mom Calls
• Ear Infection

Leslie Bongo Jam (click here to hear)

The above is the last recording which I made Sunday night, after I had broken off from Leslie in the quarter and gone to the house without him, where I set up the Snowball microphone and was messing around with the quintessential New Orleans song, When The Saints Go Marching In.

It was not long before Leslie entered the house carrying his bongos.
Finding me at work, he joined in, adding bongos over what I was playing, and dashing any hopes of my being able to use any of the tracks constructively; as, the bongos are fixed in the mix of guitar and harmonica.
At least they don't dominate, as he was sitting in the opposite corner of the room as he played. I don't think he could have stood up and played them for very long, given the state of intoxication that he was in.
He can be heard uttering one of his catch phrases: "What do you want me to do now?"
Mom Calls
My mother responded to a message which I had left on her phone on Thanksgiving Day, telling me that she had been in Vermont (where she hails from) and that she doesn't carry her phone around "like a lot of people," and had just gotten the message, 4 days later.
She said that she would be in touch with me before Christmas.
She added that I may be doing a good deed, by being Leslie's housemate; him possibly being in need of a "caretaker" of sorts.
She chuckled over the thought that I could possibly be the "reasonable" one, of the two of us; or out of any two people anywhere at any time throughout history.
A Dark House?
Had I known that Leslie wanted a caretaker, I might have stepped in, earlier this week after he was paid almost 500 dollars and before he squandered it foolishly without having paid the electric bill, which was already overdue.
I couldn't have stopped him from ordering 2 large Meatlovers pizzas to the tune of 31 dollars on Sunday afternoon, because he placed the order on his cellphone on the way to the house.
We could have eaten much better using the combination of the Canseco's Market up the street and his oven and/or stove and the 31 dollars.

A 10 Minute Walk From Leslie's

Pizza is laden with soy oil and, if his intention was to treat me to a meal; his generosity was misplaced. I still ate a few slices because I was starving and drunk; and I have had swollen glands and dry skin lately as payback.
Ear Infection
Plus, I have contracted some kind of ear infection which has my left ear ringing and every sound seeming to emanate from the right side of me.
I went out and played and sang Sunday night in such a condition and the difficulty that I encountered would be understood by anyone who sticks a finger in one ear and then tries to sing on pitch.
Ironically, at least a couple groups of people stopped to listen, and after I made the excuse about my plugged up ear said: "You sound good"
One group threw 3 dollars and the other, 20 dollars; and I was on the last bus out of town, headed for Leslie's bearing the gift of beer, after just one hour of playing but not hearing myself.
Johnny Bavono (which, I finally learned is "The Clean Guy"s name) has been giving me a certain kind of ear drops, after I had run into him and he had told me that he had had the same kind of ear problem: stuffed up and ringing and full of the most sinister wax that Que Tips have ever encountered; kind of an orange-rust color and with a strong acrid odor of deafness to it.