Progress

Close to nailing the melodies of two songs on chromatic, What Is This Thing Called Love? and Sentimental Journey.

Once I get a few melodies down, the real work begins, learning how to improvise around them!

This is a great place to do something like this, lots of time and very few house chores. Nothing but time.

And the novel crawls forward as well. So far, so good.

Great challenges ahead! I like it.

Cool down

Our considerable heat spell is over. Relief.

Plan to check out the local farmers market today, if Harriet gets up in time. She is a very late sleeper.

Chromatic practice is front burner now.

Lazy afternoon

Morning perk

Jeff R, DJ actor director friend, who directed Tom S and me in ZOO STORY in 1970s, says SODOM, GOMORRAH & JONES is "the best title since ZEN AND THE ART OF MOTORCYCLE MAINTENANCE."

Nice to wake up to.

Plugging along

A little work on the novel ... a few tunes on the ukulele ... practicing scales on the chromatic (C, G, F at the moment) ... a snail's pace but progress.

The Heirs

Christmas at the Juniper Tavern

Love (Abridged Edition)

Karaoke Tonite!

Deconstructing Sally

Remembering Tom Shaw

BJ Perry

Progress

Busy all day, writing, reading relevant to novel (research), plus home chores, one of those days I want to clone. See how the rest of the week goes.

Still damn hard getting the tone right but progress, after all, is all that matters at this stage. Onward.

Barely

Very difficult going on the novel. Haven't found the right tone yet for the retirement community section. A struggle, more so than usual.

Which outs my life in a mild funk. No progress lately on downsizing. Harriet still not into it. I need to bite the bullet and just do it myself, despite her displeasure as a result. We are held prisoner by all her belongings, 90 percent of which gathers dust and costs us storage money and has no other function that I understand.

Doing the best I can. Feels like it's not enough.

And still not back up to speed on ukulele. 

Sunday bread

Granddad (Charles L Deemer), 1950s

Footage of building Passdena patio, designed as navigator's compass. Details in my 1969 short story, The Thing at 34 degrees ...

Aunt Billie (Bache), 1950s

Keeping busy

Lots of necessary auto chores done this morning, but not all. Ended up exhausted, got a second wind after lunch and did some work on both novel and home movies. Been some good days in a row. Harriet on new medication, which seems to be helping her attitude. Onward.

Great morn

Terrific progress on novel. And fish tacos on lunch menu!

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Afternoon delight

Progress

Slow but sure progress on projects and downsizing. Taken over latter. Only way to get it moving.

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Busy day

...editing video. Back to novel tomorrow.

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Nature Wins: Part Three

Nature Wins: Part Two

Part Two

Should be online today.

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NATURE WINS Part One

Here Comes Artie Rainbow!

Yes!

ARTIE RAINBOW

Rendering 10 min. short of brother's antics, which I edited summer 1966. Still cool. Here when done.

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Good friends

Growing up in the 1950s

Sketch

...woke me up to go out. Now I'm awake. Hmmm.

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1950s Christmas in Pasadena

Home movies

Beginning to go through them. Made clip for cousin, her parents before she was born.

20 pages into novel.

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Celebration

The new novel is in three parts: The Big C, Sunnyside Village, Camp Thanatos.

In the last section will be a celebration of life, a challenge but also a joy to write.

Finished draft of part one. Short. This may be a novella.

1stPatriot1

1stPatriot2

1stPatriot3

Delightful day

Rewriting ... Video editing ... Cool jazz ... Great weather ... Mariners win in LA... Yes.

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I love rewriting

Silence

Love the hours before sunrise. So quiet. Not even Portland's occasional traffic noise here. Did some work in Photoshop, making titles for video. Last night prepared historic photos. Bringing back skills I haven't used in almost a decade.

Rehesrsal

Video turned out well. Be doing more of this.

Challenge

In home grown video, it's always sound that is the challenge.

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Video

Rehearse July 4 play and will tape it. Going to get into video again big time

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Home movies

What a experience, seeing them again. Will put highlight vid online.

Rhythm

In a good writing rhythm ... Best in years. Man it is fun to write about CJ
He is so much like me ha ha. Has become very good time of life despite certain complications. I love it here.

Entrance

Progress

Working daily on new novel.

Home movies

Digitizing my dad's movies from 1950s. Exciting.

ER

30 hrs in hospital. Dizziness. Not a stroke. Probably dehydration.

Mental work

Having complex project good for my attitude.

Test

From phone ...

Jacked

New project! CJ! Complex, difficult!

Retirement

The devil made me do it.

CJ

A sequel in mind. Exit song, farewell wake. AMERICA, TRUMP & JONES.

Brooding time!

Score card

Challenges:
...living with H memory loss
...managing finite money in place with skyrocketing costs
...retaining faith that my journey was worth the sacrifices
...aging health issues

Battery chargers:
...baking bread
...making buttermilk
...cooking, eating breakfast
...Sketch
...ukulele
...readers' theater here
...revisiting favorite literature music
...a few friends who are left

Bottom line:
...hangin' in like Gunga Din

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Hanging in

Should be better than that. Not yet.

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Relaxing Monday

Breakfast

My demise will happen when I can no longer make my own breakfast. It's my great battery charger.

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Big show

Today is the day.

Scrapple for breakfast

Yum!

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Breakfast

You'll never find this here: ground turkey and mushrooms, turkey gravy, eggs, bacon.

Traditions

Ducks and Bruins eliminated.

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Blah

That kind of day. My actors are falling like flies. Preview?

WCWS

UCLA, Oregon and Washington in the 8 team series.

Memorial Day

Softball WS

UCLA gets first ticket. Oregon and Washington still alive.

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Update

Good rehearsals this week.

Slow week

Zzzzz

Another gray afternoon

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Gray gray

Again. Feeling under weather. No energy.

Moon

... from window, setting.

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Yep

Back to normal

Gray damp chilly sucks weather. Portland.

Bread for my cousin

Photo by Robin Deemer

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Poem

I love living
on a day like this
filled with sun
filled with warmth
a perfect day
to count my blessings.

let me die
on a day like this
filled with sun
filled with warmth
a perfect time
for permanent sleep

Poem

Nature takes a break
today, no storms
no ferocity and revenge
but a smiling warm day
filled with reminders
of how much we lose
when we piss off
Mother Earth

Hanging in

... on a gray damp gloomy stressful day.

The sun, the sun!

Print ready

Have the script in order.

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The Soul of Playwriting

Guest at blog.

http://playsubmissionshelper.com/the-soul-of-playwriting/

Hmm

Found this

http://www.doollee.com/PlaywrightsD/deemer-charles.html

Poster image

What is missing here

Eggs, scrapple, hashbrowns, toast

Rye

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Morning

My best part of day. Baking bread, make breakfsst, morning Ms game ... then to get through rest of day.

Night

Stressful day. Glad it's over. Bake in morning, try to get grounded.

Eager

... to start rehearsing the script. Doing something I know how to do (for a change).

Celebration

Finished draft of NATURE WINS last night. Polish and time it today.

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Killer breakfasr

Scrapple and eggs. Nothing better.

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Sun

The sun! Really energizing. But rain tomorrow ...

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Poem

my fragility frightens me

I who has weathered storms
now crumble at a mere sneeze
of resistance

it's as if my will
has given up

as if Camus were wrong
and the struggle itself
will not fill a man's heart

it's as if all the questions
without answers
were not worth asking

and no ending justifies
anything

Update

Feeling good, despite kinks in my smoother goals. Ukulele progressing superbly. A project to create and rehearse. Busy with something other than the household mess.

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Project

Found 2 others ready for a theater project here. Will now make it happen.

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Poem

Let my old age
be filled with wonder

first at Nature
in all variety

next at ourselves
the human contradiction

creative and cruel
our own worst enemy

It was Pascal who said
our troubles begin
because we can't sit quietly
in an empty room

Amen

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Poem

How did old age
become so different
from all the ways
I imagined it?

Was it too extreme
to fantasize a quiet
life as a respected
old writer?

Nowhere in the fantasy
were the feelings
of irrelevance
of neglect
of impotence
that I feel today
in the picture.

How wrong I was.
How invisible I am.
I am not even here.
You are imagining me.

Good morning

Sketch's chair.

2 new tunes

Soldier's Joy and June Apple, both a hoot to play. Getting good!

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Soldier's Joy

Close to nice ukulele version.

Test

Trying a morning exercise class.