On Friday morning I worked out the chords for the first two lines of "La Dernière valse" (Final Waltz) by Boris Vian and the first verse of "Quoi" by Serge Gainsbourg.
I weighed 85.5 kilos before breakfast.
In the late morning I cleaned the rack that sits on the back of my toilet, and the containers it holds: the teapot that contains my combs and brushes, the mug where I put my cleaning brushes, and the copper tumbler for my toothbrushes. I found the two piece black rack on the street years ago and rigged it up with two chains to support one part hanging from the other. I guess I never washed it before because when I did today all the black paint came off and it's a white rack now.
I called up John at L'il Demon Guitars and he said my Kramer will be ready on Tuesday. He had first said it would take a week, then when I called him after a week he said it would be ready by the middle of this week. I'm not impatient but if he'd just said in the first place that it would take three weeks I wouldn't have flinched.
I weighed 84.8 kilos before lunch.
In the afternoon I took a bike ride downtown and on the way back I stopped at Steve's Music. Someone had called me from their number and so I knew it was about the guitar strap they'd ordered from Montreal. I looked at it but it's not nearly as wide as mine. Maybe I should try to get one custom made.
I weighed 84.9 kilos at 17:15.
I was caught up on my journal at 18:08.
I reviewed the videos of me playing "La jambe de bois" on June 23, 25, 27, and 29; and "The Wooden Leg" on June 24, 26, and 28. There was either too much traffic noise or I got one chord wrong in the early verses. It's weird that it's mostly in the first verse that I don't hit it right. The recording of "La jambe de bois" on June 29 was one of the best until I fumbled the words at the end.
In the Movie Maker project for creating a video of my song "Instructions for Electroshock Therapy" I synchronized the concert video and the studio audio when I sing, "For details on injections of..." But it goes out of synch for the rest of the line when I sing "... amytol and other drugs". I have video clips I can edit to extract either a syringe being prepped or an injection being given. I'll work on that next time.
I scanned a few negatives from the 80s. There was one colour strip of my friend Tom Smarda busking with his electric guitar at the corner of Bathurst and Bloor in the winter.
Most of the rest were black and white shots of my cat Siva on the roof behind my place on Widmer Street.
I saw my upstairs neighbour Sean on his way home and he stopped to chat. He's studying to be a social worker. He said he hears me singing in the morning, told me I'm pretty good, and said I sound "contemporary". I told him I have some stuff on YouTube and he wanted to know the address. It's youtube.com/ChristianCChristian. I had to look it up so I invited him into the living room. He says my place is twice as big as his for the same price. I told him that I wanted to organize a tenants association and asked if he'd come to a meeting if I organized it. He said he'd come to listen. I still have to talk to Shankar and then I'll email Cole about coming to speak with us.
I had a potato with gravy and some pork ribs while watching season 8, episodes 6 and 7 of The Beverly Hillbillies.
In the first story a New York conman named Honest John Shafer arrives in Silver Dollar City. He tries to get a room in Shorty's hotel and thinks Jane in her bird watching uniform is the bellboy. He says his name opens doors at the Ritz in Paris, The Rochester in London, and the Palazzia in Rome. Jane says, "Apparently you come from a family of doormen". He tells Shorty he bought the hotel, not realizing that Shorty is the owner. Jethro is impressed that Shafer is from New York and offers to let him stay in his room with Jed. Shafer blows him off until he hears that Jed has $85 million. Shafer goes looking for Jed.
Matthew Templeton returns and tells Granny that his family that Jed invited will be coming later, including his wife. Granny is shocked that he has a wife since she heard him say he'd be proud to marry Elly May, and since then Elly has already been fitted for a wedding dress. He explains that he still would be proud to marry Elly since he's a preacher and marries people all the time.
Shafer convinces the Clampetts to come to New York. Granny asks if there are eligible bachelors for Elly there. He tells her that any man that wears a hat in New York is eligible, and that's why they call it Manhattan. He says he owns some prime farmland in the middle of New York that he is willing to sell to Jed. They head for the nearest airport and catch a plane to New York.
Meanwhile Drysdale returns to Silver Dollar City from Bugtussle. He just nought the Bugtussle Bank for $50,000 so he can keep Jed's account but then he finds they've left for New York with a conman and he faints.
In the second story the Clampetts and Shafer have just landed in New York. Shafer explains that he has a strong relationship with the New York police and that they always want to talk with him. He says that when they enter the airport the police will probably crowd around him and want to take him somewhere to help them. If they do, he says for them to take a taxi to Central Park and he'll meet them there by the statue of Daniel Webster. At Central Park Jed is already there when a police car pulls up and lets Shafer out. A cop says, "We're giving you 24 hours". Jed asks Shafer what that means. Shafer explains that usually New York closes at 21:00 but the police have arranged just for the Clampetts for it to stay open all night. They see some muggers grab an old lady's purse and want to go after them but Shafer says it's just a New York game and it's not a real robbery. Jed asks what Shafer wants for Central Park and Shafer asks what he has on him. Jed pays him $5000. Then Shafer takes Jed on the Staten Island Ferry and sells him the boat, the Statue of Liberty, and the island it's on. Jethro approaches the two muggers and asks if he can play. They hit him over the head with a big pipe and a big chain. Jethro knocks them out. Jethro takes all their weapons from them but Jed thinks that's unfair and takes them back. He bends to pipe straight again and when they see him do that they run. Shafer also sells Jed the Empire State Building, the Brooklyn Bridge and the Algonquin Hotel. Jed likes the idea of the Algonquin Hotel being a place for First Nations people to stay when they are in town. Shafer sells it all for what Jed has left, which is $4000. But the Clampetts trust Shafer so implicitly and consider him such a good friend that he starts to feel guilty about fleecing them. He gives them back all their money and immediately gets into the back of a police car.
Shifty Shafer was played by the great Phil Silvers, who started out entertaining at the age of eleven. He was hired by a movie theatre to sing for the audience whenever the projector broke down. At the age of thirteen he began singing for the Gus Edwards Review and this led to him becoming a burlesque comic on the vaudeville circuit. In the 1930s he started appearing in Vitaphone short films and then he appeared on Broadway in Yokel Boy. His first feature film was Hit Parade of 1941. In 1942 he wrote the lyrics for the hit song "Nancy With the Laughing Face" for Frank Sinatra. From 1955 to 1959 he starred as Sergeant Bilko on The Phil Silvers Show. He co-starred in the Carry On film "Follow That Camel" and at 30,000 pounds was the highest paid actor up to that point for a Carry On film. He co-starred in "It's a Mad Mad Mad Mad World", and "Forty pounds of Trouble". After a stroke slurred his speech in 1972 his acting career was limited. He coined the phrase, "Gladaseeya". His production company co-produced Gilligan's Island. His first wife was Miss America in 1942. He won two Tony Awards. He was nicknamed The King of Chutzpa.
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