I worked out the chords for about half of the first verse of "Charlotte Forever" by Serge Gainsbourg or it's possible that what I'm calling the first verse could be seen as two verses.
For the third day in a row I played my Martin acoustic guitar during song practice and video and audio recorded the session. I might have done about two takes of "Megaphor" and a few more of "Sixteen Tons of Dogma". I've got to be careful not to have too much fun while playing because I have to concentrate on not making mistakes while at the same time trying to look like I'm having a lot of fun. I think it was overall a pretty good session and some of the songs might be contenders for uploading to YouTube. Like yesterday I was on the second take of "Les sucettes" when the camera battery timed out.
I weighed 85.7 kilos before breakfast, which is the heaviest I've been in the morning in twenty five days.
I installed another guitar hanger in the living room, this time above the right side of the couch and hung my old Epi on it. I recently had the Epi repaired so it's playable again, so if I break a string on the Martin during song practice I can always grab it. I've got to fix up its old guitar strap as well.
At 13:15 I went online to enroll in this fall's courses. All of the Creative Writing courses gave priority to students who are taking Creative Writing as a minor. For Creative Writing for Performance I was entirely blocked but for Creative Writing: Literary Citizenship, Creative Writing: Poetry, Creative Writing Prose, and Creative Writing: Short Fiction I was told that I can enroll after July 28 if a course hasn't been filled up. I enrolled for now in an Advanced Studies Seminar on Gender and Sexuality in Medieval Literature. If I get a solid confirmation that I only need half a credit and if one of the Creative Writing courses opens up (preferably the poetry one), I'll probably just drop everything else.
I weighed 85.4 kilos before lunch. That's the most I've weighed at that time in eighteen days.
In the afternoon I took a bike ride downtown and back.
I spent about twenty minutes chiseling a rock that I found up at the north end of Keele Street in Kettleby. I mostly freed up an old seashell but I also chiseled and bruised my left pinky.
My next building neighbour came out back to complain that he'd locked himself out but the guy he'd asked in the Tibetan restaurant below him wouldn't let him go to the back so he could get up the fire escape to his place. Since they weren't being a good neighbour he says he'll never eat there.
I weighed 85.2 kilos at 17:30. It's been twenty six days since it's been that high.
I was caught up on my journal at 18:44.
I reviewed this morning's video of song practice. I made it all the way to the second verse of "Laisse tomber les filles". I might have gotten a chord wrong at the end of "Megaphor" and another at the end of "Sixteen Tons of Dogma". It was generally a pretty good session. Five more to go before I'm done recording for this year.
I tried to rip two more files of my song "Sleep in the Snow" with drums but even though it worked on the other CD with Windows Media Player yesterday, this time WMP ripped an empty folder. It could still play the files but it wouldn't convert them to MP3. I spent a couple of hours trying various apps. One that claimed to be able to do it online couldn't. Finally I downloaded Switch MP3 Converter and it worked. So now I have all seven tracks of Sleep in the Snow with drums. But I also have a CD with just drums for all the songs, so maybe there are separate drum tracks for Sleep in the Snow. I'll try ripping that CD tomorrow.
I grilled a striploin steak and two eye of round steaks. I had the striploin with a potato and gravy while watching season 2, episodes 32 and 33 of Petticoat Junction.
In the first story Bobbie Joe sings "If Ever Those Endearing Young Charms" for a music expert named Professor Lieberschmit and he says she has real talent but needs to go to New York for training. Kate takes her engagement ring to her banker Mr. Guerney to use as collateral for a loan. It is a real diamond but he needs to use a magnifying glass to see it. He doesn't have the heart to tell her that the ring is not worth nearly as much as she thinks it is and so he gives her the money anyway. But then Billie Joe gets an opportunity to go to Hollywood and work as a typist for Mammoth Studios and the job includes a screen test. So Kate has to ask for more money from the bank. Guerney personally lends her $100 but can't give her a bigger bank loan. There is just enough for both girls if they live modestly. But then Betty Joe gets the opportunity for a sports scholarship to a private school in New Hampshire and everything would be free but her transportation and clothes. Finally Kate tells her daughters that she's only going to be able to send one girl away. She goes through a painful decision process and still hasn't decided when the girls come to her and say that they've decided that since Billie is the oldest she can go and when she's a star she can send the money to Bobbie. Then when Bobbie is a success she'll send money to Betty. Kate arranges a going away party for Billie but she falls in love again and no longer cares about Hollywood. Kate thinks Bobbie will go but she says she's learned that voice lessons cost $15 each and she'd only be able to afford two weeks. She says to let Betty go but Betty says she doesn't want to go because she found out it's a girls school and she doesn't want to play baseball with girls.
Professor Lieberschmit was played by Sig Ruman, who studied Electrotechnology in Hamburg, served in the Imperial German Forces during WWI and then moved to the US in 1924. He became a regular in Broadway productions and then began to work in cinema. His first film appearance was in Lucky Boy in 1929. He was a favourite of the Marx Brothers and worked a lot in their films. He was also a favourite supporting actor of Ernst Lubitsch.
In the second story Joe invites a famous food critic to come to the Shady Rest. Then he tells Kate that her wood stove is insufficient for cooking gourmet food. He sabotages the wood stove by sticking an old rubber boot in the pipe, and the kitchen fills with smoke. He's already ordered a modern electric stove. But when the snooty Mr. Penrose arrives he is disappointed in the fact that Kate uses an electric stove. He had come to the country for old fashioned slow cooked country cooking. Kate gives him a wood cooked meal and he loves it but with her wood stove out of action she uses the wood burner of the Cannonball train.
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