3 Hours To Busk Before Rainfall

It's 9:20 PM on a Friday night.
I would be foolish if I just go back to the apartment with no money in my pocket to wait for the storm to come.

But, I'll probably have to walk all the way to the Lilly Pad, unless I find a buck on the ground between the Uxi Duxi and home; and I can already feel a tiny drop of rain, every now and then. I would be risking having myself and guitar soaked.

But, we're really not supposed to have "thunderstorms" until about 3 AM; by then, I could have 30 bucks in my pocket, hop the trolley home, and then hunker down over the next few days, through the storm.

So, I guess that's what I'll do; put this laptop to sleep and then walk the mile to the apartment, pick up the gear and then walk the 2 miles to the Lilly Pad, and play from like, 11 until maybe 1.
Yesterday, I went to Howard Westra's to watch the Patriots game.

I was pretty much broke and considered asking Howard for a little cash, but couldn't bring myself to do it.

He had gotten back from his cruise to Alaska, had presented me with the gift of a shirt that says "Alaska" on it, with some mountains in the background. He called it a "winter shirt," probably because it has sleeves that go halfway down the forearms, and is made of nylon.

I put the shirt on, under the Patriots shirt that I had worn there, and walked the mile and a half to the bus that runs all night.

I got to the stop right as the bus was pulling up; and before it stopped in front of me, I found 2 dollar bills folded together on the ground in front of me.

Howard had mixed reviews of his trip.
It was "alright," but he wouldn't have done it again. It was too much off-season for things like foliage and too foggy at this time of year for whale watching; you get what you pay for...

Had he coughed up an extra 100 dollars at one point, he could have joined a group of people who broke off from the rest and somehow got closer to Mt. McKinley and came back reporting that they had seen bears.

Howard didn't see bears, but saw a few whales, with one having broken water right by the boat, surprising and thrilling all.

He will be able to show me his pictures in a couple weeks, he said, when he gets them.

That's right, Howard took pictures on a camera that used old fashioned "film" and has to bring them to a photo place, like in Walgreen's to have the film developed, the old fashioned way.
He said that he took pictures of a light brown colored moss, which they had only encountered after having reached an altitude of about 9 thousand feet, I think he said.

He complained about how expensive everything was ($7 for a beer on the cruise boat) which gave me the impression that he hadn't gotten as rich off his stock portfolio, as some might have thought.
He said that his housemates, Ken and Berta, seemed to have been cold towards him, upon his return from the Arctic Circle, and had been "short" with him a few times at the dinner table.
It is a mystery to him why this is so.

"They kept encouraging me to go on this trip, but now that I have, they seem to resent me," said Howard.

I proposed that, perhaps they had gotten into a fight while he was gone, and were not so much being "short" with him, but rather trying to disguise the fact that they had been at each other's throats, while he was away.

Or that, they discovered that they really liked it when he wasn't around -perhaps it was peaceful in a way that they couldn't have envisioned, and really nice to not have to worry about what Howard was going to eat for dinner each night.

Or that, they, too had no idea just how rich He had become recently, since Donald J. Trump became our steward, and had been testing the waters by suggesting that he live a bit and go on the cruise. Maybe trying to see if he would say something like: "I might as well, I've got a quarter million dollars and when I die, I can't take it with me!," or something.

Maybe, now that they have seen that he had had enough to go on a cruise, they felt that he could have been a bit more generous towards them.
They might just have been upset that he hadn't sent them a post card, to let them know that he was alright,
I don't know Ken and Berta that well. Howard did say that Ken has "an alcohol problem," and can become belligerent when he is drunk, especially on Jameson Whiskey, and will say things that "aren't appropriate to say around a woman." Also, Berta had asked him to leave a few months prior, after he had become abusive, but he had refused.

But, we watched the Patriots game; I was invited back by Howard to see the next couple games that are going to feature the Patriots and told that I could also show up on any given Sunday, as Berta traditionally cooks a dinner on those afternoons, whether the Patriots are on TV or not.

But, I couldn't bring myself to ask him for any cash, as I had a couple dollars and change on me, left over from the 10 I had made Wednesday night, plus the 7 that Rose had paid me back.

Plus, I found the 2 bucks on the ground.

Earlier, I had found a sack of weed, laying in the grass by the trolley stop near Sacred Heart Apartments.

Harold the cat had enough food, as did I. I was out of cigarettes, but am getting sick of them.
Well, it's already 10, I had better get going if I'm going to busk.

Hopefully, tomorrow's post will be about me making 50 bucks in a couple hours, and then having just made it home to let a nervous Harold the cat in the house with me, before the first thunderstorm hit.
Open Shot Editor
I went ahead and put the Windows version of Open Shot on this hard drive, along with the GIMP photo editor, and did a quick video to see that it was working. If it works, then it is.
Since I've been too lazy to reinstall Linux on the newer hard drive, I might as well get the most out of this older one.
I'm happy about the sound quality that I'm able to get with just a mic up in front of me, playing guitar and harmonica and singing, like I do when I busk.
It took a bit of playing around with mic placement, equalization, compression and the right kind of delay and reverb.
But, I think the quality is good enough that all I need is a skillfully done performance, and my stuff will be CD quality.
After I overdub the fake bass, snare drum, plus extra guitars and backup vocals, I should be good to go...