Just Thought Of Busking

and the other one is by a lowlife and about living a sort of low-class, conniving, life than about any kind of music-making. -Alex in California, former(?) blog reader

Low class hangout

It just occurred to me that it is Saturday night and a tad after ten at night and the temperature is an OK mid fifties, like playing in the refrigerator.
I had reached a milestone in that I was stressing out very little indeed, upon waking up with 47 cents and no wet cat food in the house on a day that had promised to be a little warmer than yesterday, when with exactly 50 degrees showing on the smartphone, I called off the venture of busking.
I didn't think that many people would want to pause for the few minutes required to listen to a song, I told myself; adding that that wasn't just an excuse.

When I had finally shaken off the sleep, wrestled with Harold and then checked my phone there was a text from Jacob.
He would be at the Uxi Duxi and had assured me that he could cover a half shot of kratom, were I to show up. And that I should be further motivated by the fact that sound files were ready to be transferred back and forth between our laptops.
I was at peace as I left Sacred Heart Apartments.
I had been smoking off of a huge cigar that I had found on Royal Street, a low class move, that. By cutting and grinding at the thing, I was able to put together a pile of tobacco which I further ground by hand then rolled up, including putting a filter on them, and smoked.
This I would recommend to people who are serious about trying to quit smoking.
You smoke the thing, and you are getting your nicotine, but you are also getting the reality check of: "Really?"
I cut off more than an inch around the area where the probably rich and up to date on his shots person had put, probably his, mouth.
I remember the thought process I was having at the time when I saw it, riding my bike towards the Lilly Pad the last time I played, when I had made ten bucks. It was something like: "I'm not going to buy a pack of American Spirits, even if I have a sixty dollar night..."
And then, there was the cigar, label facing me proudly.
And of course there was a person around to see me and label me perhaps low class for picking the thing up.
But this was a situation where, if I submitted myself to the flow of life and didn't resist the machinations of an intelligence that had controlled my birth and would control my death, then I might pick up the cigar right when that guy sneezed...
Smoking the crushed up cigar through a cigarette filter is akin to just putting instant coffee in your mouth and letting it dissolve. You are going to get your high just the same.
There is such a thing as a sugar high. This theory, I have been putting to the test all too much lately.
I am becoming more "secure," for lack of a better word.
But, it is just a feeling. As in, instead of freaking out upon waking up with 47 cents and no wet cat food, now, by following the principles outlined in the self-help dialogues, I am not sweating the very same situation that used to have me almost "scared" in a way.

So, then I went to my mailbox and there was a letter with the familiar handwriting of my mom on it.
In it was a Christmas card with fifty bucks stuffed in it. It is a few days short of Christmas and it was weird how I was able to go from knowing I was flat broke but not being anxious over it, to suddenly having fifty bucks as if I had known through telepathy that it would be there, or something.
At the bar at the corner, I was given a couple cigarettes by a young lady whom I had offered 47 cents to for one of hers.
This was after having looked in the ashtray in front of "everyone" and having found that I had been beaten to the skeeze by some other ashtray skeezer.
I need to make a Youtube Video on ashtray picking.
In Mobile, I would pick a tray outside a tall building wherein were well dressed people.
I would always conjecture out loud about how I was using the ashtray as an economic barometer. "When people start smoking them right down to the filter, that's a sign of economic uncertainty and a bear market..." or something, I would say.
I noticed that I was ready to whip out the fifty dollars and say something like: "I have kind of a long ride to where I buy cigarettes and I ran out last night and just want a few drags off one..."

That is just the kind of ego driven behavior that makes people become slaves to houses and cars and clothing...
There is now a spotlight on the little bush where I used to pee sometimes. Luckily a cop just walked by on his way into The Beachcorner and said "Good evening, sir" to me, and that for some reason, took away the urge to urinate.

I promise to catch up on this blog by putting in some back-fill in the way of stories from the past. The venomous comment left a few days ago, instead of opening a can of worms, has reminded me of some good stories.

Most of these stories have songs that go with them.
I had all but forgotten my "Shauna Era" songs, but Jacob's studio would be a perfect place to dust some of them off.