Michael Lerner

            On Friday morning there was a continued improvement in the condition of my left arm. There was slightly less pain during yoga than yesterday, which had felt better than the day before. 

            I finished revising my translation of “L'année à lenvers” (The Year in Reverse) by Boris Vian. Tomorrow I’ll run through singing and playing it and then I’ll upload it to my Christian’s Translations blog to begin preparing it for publication. 

            I imported to Movie Maker all of the 100 images that I’d collected for my “Notre Derniere Chance” Movie Maker project and then placed them in sequence onto the video timeline. Tomorrow I’ll start carving out the duration of appearance of each image in relation to the song. 

            I played my Martin acoustic guitar during song practice for the third of four sessions and it went slightly out of tune a couple of times. 

            I weighed 87.1 kilos before breakfast. 

            Around midday I went over to the hardware store where I bought 3.64 liters of latex primer, a kit with a tray, two rollers and a brush; a heavy duty drop sheet, and some compressed air. I’ll probably start painting the bathroom on Sunday. 

            I weighed 87.2 kilos before lunch. 

            In the afternoon I took a bike ride downtown and back. I think my saddle on the Surly dropped a bit and so I raised it some. My Allen key was stripped but I found another in my bag of Allen keys. 

            I weighed 86.15 kilos at 18:00. 

            I was caught up with my journal at 18:55. 

            I worked on the Movie Maker project to create a video for the studio recording of my song “Paranoiac Utopia”. The concert video continues to drag behind the studio audio and so every few words I have to delete some of it to bring it forward. In the final chorus I managed to synchronize the concert video with the studio audio for “doesn’t”, “share”, “our”, and “hell must be the devil they believe. Each”. 

            I reviewed my song practice performances of “Eliza” and “Coiffure by Eliza” from October 9 to 14. On October 9 I played “Eliza” on my Kramer electric and the final take sounded okay. On October 11 and 13 I played it on my Martin acoustic. On October 11 the last take was good. On October 13 the final take was okay. On October 10 I played “Coiffure by Eliza” on the Kramer and the final take didn’t sound bad. On October 12 and 14 I played it on the Martin. On October 12 part A of the video is corrupted. On October 14 the final take wasn’t bad. 

            I compared the video of my September 9 acoustic performance of “Eliza” with that of September 11 and found that September 9 has a better quality video. I compared September 15 to September 9 and I think I play it better and it looks better on September 15. I compared September 21 to September 15 and I look and sound better on September 15. I compared September 25 to September 15 and September 25 is quite good but I think September 15 is a little better. There are five more to compare. 

            I had a potato with gravy and a chicken leg while watching episode 10 of The Brady Bunch.

            Bobby watches an adaptation of Cinderella and is affected by the idea of the evil stepmother because he recently acquired a stepmother in Carol. It doesn’t help when she asks him to clean the fireplace, which was Cinderella’s job. He thinks that it is logical that a step parent would not love a step child as much as their own. On top of that he feels left out by his siblings. His brothers go to visit a friend but don’t say goodbye. Marcia and Jan go to a movie but he can’t go because it would run past his bedtime. As the youngest brother he doesn’t get as many new clothes. Carol picks up on his problem and asks Bobby’s father to come to the bicycle shop with her. They go to Oscar’s Cyclery although in the credits the proprietor is named “Jimmy”. They find a great bike for Bobby and even get his name put on it but then they realize they are trying to buy his love and ask Oscar to hold onto the bike for a month when they’ll get it for Bobby’s birthday. They go home to discover that Bobby is packing to run away from home. Mike talks to him and tells him it’s alright for him to leave if he’s not happy. Bobby struggles down the stairs with his suitcase and Carol is waiting for him with her suitcase. She tells him she’d like to run away with him because she doesn’t want him to go alone. He now realizes she cares for him and he decides to stay. 

            Oscar was played by Michael Lerner, who had a Masters degree in English Drama from UCLA. He studied at the London Academy of Dramatic and Musical Art and lived in the same building as John and Yoko (He appeared in Yoko’s film “Smile”). He started in theatre. In the 60s he worked with the American Conservatory Theatre. His TV debut was on Dr. Kildare in 1963. His film debut was in Alex in Wonderland in 1970. He co-starred in Eight Men Out, Harlem Nights, No Escape, Godzilla (1998), and Poster Boy. He was nominated for an Oscar for his supporting role in Barton Fink. He co-starred in the TV series Clueless.