I did things worth writing about yesterday. I went to see Emily Mure and the Young Novelist at Pete’s Candy Store. I love when my world fits together like a jigsaw puzzle. I love Emily as a musician and a person. I love Graydon and Laura as musicians and people. I know the independently of each other but even though Emily lives in New York and the Novelist live in Toronto they are friends who love each other as people and musicians. To make it even better Laura and Graydon are staying with Dan and Anna while they are in New York. And they also know each other independently of me. Folk is a small world.
Pete’s Candy Store is one of my favorite venues, I’ve been there many times but I don’t believe I have ever been there with another friend on the audience. Last night in addition to Dan and Anna, Fred, Mike, Kay, Neha, and Marty were there. Kay brought her friend Tony. As she introduced us and I remember his name the next day that means I knew seven people in the audience.
I made it a day for socializing. I met Emily and her husband Don before the show for dinner and was going out for dessert with Graydon and Laura afterward. There are few things I enjoy more than socializing before and after concerts.
It was Friday so before any of this I had therapy in Harrison. It was an interesting session. We discussed my loneliness in the face of how many friends I have. I decided to deal with that in therapy instead of here but I you should still be apprised of my feelings but I won’t go into the details
I always enjoy thinking about how complex my commutes are. To get to Pete’s from the hospital requires taking the 5 bus to the Harrison Train Station. MetroNorth to Grand Central Station. The 6 train to 14th Street. The L to Lorimer Street, and then a walk. With all that I arrived just when I wanted to, about 3 minutes before Emily and Dom.
I’m going to take a detour to my being petty. When I got on the Metro North the only seats were available were the middle seats of three acrosses and window seats in the two acrosses. I went to the first two across and said excuse me to the person sitting there. They had some things on the open seat and a jacket hanging on the hook by the window. I expected them to just slide over. Instead they gathered all their things including the hanging jacket then got up so I could move inside. All the time there are people in the aisles trying to find seats who had to wait for all this to be done before they could go into the train and find their own seats. Then as soon as we got in our seats the person next to me complained that my foot was over the halfway point near the seats. I would have moved it anyway, I was still getting settled and was finding a place for my bag, but their feet were nowhere near mine and even after I moved came nowhere near mine. This was just about staking out territory. All this annoyed me.
I figured that the person wanted to make a quick getaway and I was right. They got up from the seat right after we left Harlem, the penultimate station, to stand by the door. Here’s where I get petty. I was happy when the train just stopped and we had to wait before we pulled into Grand Central. I enjoyed their having to go through discomfort of standing for more time. I got extra joy when we left the train and figured out that all the actions they took to get out fast, gained them all of 20 seconds on me. My plan for a fast exit is to sit near the front door.
Now back to fun friends and music. Our dinner plan was to find a place near Pete’s that would deliver since we only had about an hour. Instead I found a place, Jimmy’s Dinner that was only two blocks away. I couldn’t believe that as many times as I’ve been to Pete’s I never heard of it. We walked over there and it was one of the serendipitous discoveries. It’s a little hole in the wall with great food. We all had burgers. Dom and I got the Cowgirl and Cowboy burgers respectively. The difference is that cowgirls get guacamole and cowboys get bacon. Emily had the plane burger. The burgers were great but the tater tots were what made it special. They weren’t tater tots. They were mashed potato fritters. Few things aren’t improved by deep frying. The cherry on top was the great old-fashioned New York egg cream. Jimmy’s is now my go-to place to eat when going to Pete’s.
Better than the food was the conversation. Emily and Don are people I have conversations with I don’t have with other people. That’s always a plus. We get excited at the same things. They loved my idea of Elmo as a kickass martial arts expert beating up biker gangs.
We got back to Pete’s the same time that Graydon and Laura arrived. They had travel issues. They got ready very fast so the show wasn’t too late. All the people I was going to save seats for were already seated. When the band was setting up I said hi to all my friends. As I suspected Anna was on the same L train as me. There was a huge crowd of people between us so I couldn’t say hi and somehow missed her when we got off the train.
The Young Novelist on the road are an inventive harmony duo. That’s the only way I’ve seen them. When they perform near Toronto they are more of a progressive rock band. They can’t afford to tour with the band. But the sensibilities travel with them. Graydon plays the typical acoustic guitar but Laura plays the glockenspiel and melodica and usually bows the glock. It gives them a distinctive sound as does their harmonies. Their stage patter is just them being themselves, which to me is perfect. They are fun very intelligent people. They are geeks, Graydon majored in math and Laura in geoscience. Did I get that right? I know the subject but not sure on the term their university uses.
Emily was up next. She did mainly new songs. Either covers from her upcoming EP or unrecorded originals. Her sensibilities show the influence of her classical background, she’s an oboist and the quirks of her personality. I love that she wrote a song based on a love triangle on the sitcom Friends and I don’t like the show. I do love the attitude that she lets the inspiration find her and doesn’t worry about how others might judge the source. There’s one new song that if I didn’t know who wrote it I would have guessed was by Terre Roche. I had trouble telling her which one as in my mind it was the song that sounds like Terre Roche. It isn’t easy not having a brain. When she finally records it I’ll let you know which one and I’ll send it to Terre.
Emily was joined by a bass player I’ve seen before but sadly don’t remember his name. Dan and I both noticed that he was wearing a Dawes t-shirt. Dan loves Dawes and I hate them and we often joke about our disagreement. We weren’t sitting with each other but we thought of each other when we noticed it. She was also joined by Joanna Schubert, a singer/songwriter in her own right. I worked on remembering her name. To get her last name I think of her as unfinished. She reminds me so much of Rachel Ries in both looks and singing voice. As I love Rachel that gave her a leg up on me loving Joanna.
After the show Laura and Graydon wanted dinner not dessert and we all ended up going back to Jimmy’s. It’s just too convenient and too good to do otherwise. We being; Laura, Graydon, Emily, Dom, Fred, Mike, and Joanna. Unfortunately my digestive system was acting up so I couldn’t eat anything. I wanted to get a milk shake but knew that I’d pay for that. It felt like a mini-Crohn’s attack but I’m not ruling out that it’s a post-surgical complication. Whatever it is, it led to pain from the surgery on top of the digestive discomfort. That was what I was worried about. The incisions were subjected to internal stresses. They are still tender the next day. I’ll be taking acetaminophen before I had out in an hour.
By the time we were finished with the post-concert soiree the L train was running only once every twenty minutes and as I wasn’t feeling great looked for a faster way home. Laura and Graydon were driving up to the Upper West Side where Dan and Anna live and that’s right by a subway station so I asked for a ride. I have found that duos rarely have room for me in their cars but they had their van so there was plenty of room. I paid my way by telling them to avoid paying the Midtown Tunnel toll and go by via the 59th Street Bridge. That had the added advantage of passing right over Roosevelt Island where Emily and Dom live so I could point it out. Everything fits together. I’m guessing I saved at least half an hour maybe 45 minutes by getting the ride. Thanks for the ride guys.
Today I’m going to the New York Guitar Festival. I’m doing merch for Kaia Kater. As she primarily plays banjo this should be interesting. I love Kaia and don’t get to see her often, she’s another Canadian. In an ideal world I’d be able to teleport after the show to Pete’s Candy Store so I could see Steph Jenkins on banjo backed by Stephie Coleman on fiddle. I hate missing them. I know them well enough that they get a special plural, the Stephani. But as that show stars just as the guitar festival ends it’s not to be. Perhaps for the best as I could use the rest.
Tomorrow I will rest and spend the day binge watching Good Omens. The series is based on the Terry Pratchett/Neil Gammon novel of the same name and stars David Tennant from Doctor Who. This is a show designed just for me.
Wise Madness 