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Monday January 10 Bill Forth left a musical message on my MS voice mail this evening. I believe he was playing an arpeggio of the 'Prometheus' chord into my phone. Sounded great. I did not hear this message until I got home from SGC rehearsal at 11:30pm, so I will call him back tomorrow to say hello. Last week I found a copy of the Michael Gira CD 'drainland' on EBAY for $8.00 -- today it arrived. During my drive to rehearsal this evening, Bill Rieflin told me that his friend and First World distributor, Joel Bergstrom was a great fan of this CD (which was recorded in Bill's house in 1994, and produced by Mr. Bill himself.) Tomorrow I will call Joel to arrange a meeting. I too am a great fan of this obscure, but remarkable CD. Soon, we may have more than a great respect for this CD in common. * * * By the way, Violet is my new favorite color. * * * For me, this was an orderly, but stressful day. I sprinted through a number of intense, somewhat surreal, futuristic, MS meetings during the morning and afternoon. This, followed by another Cyclops dinner in the evening with the growing BTV core team. A major new revelation in the unfolding BTV universe has appeared this afternoon. The fuel is now in the tank, the map has been drawn, and now the real journey begins. Official blast off is scheduled for January 26th. * * * My outlook express mailbox is sorting all mail that has come in since Jan 1st before all the mail in my inbox from 1999. Who says there were no Y2K catastrophes? * * * SGC rehearsal this evening was fun and spirited. My left arm is feeling stronger, but it is still not back to full power. I trust that by next week, I will be back in full swing before the upcoming series of high profile shows begins on the 22nd of January. Have I mentioned recently how much I enjoy playing and working with these people? At one moment, I looked over at Curt during "Vulcanization" and realized that I was not alone in my merry measurement of minor musical bliss that was in the air as we played. * * * Tomorrow, I move one step closer to my destiny. Better get some rest: the road is rough just ahead. * * * Tuesday January 11 Yeah!!! Looks like Dean has finally been sucked into the diary vortex... who says peer pressure ends after high school? * * * Another day full of wall to wall intensity. It began with difficult negotiation of the shifting sands at MS. Then, meetings out the wazoo with Curt/SteveE, Violet, Victoria, Liz, Joel. Then finally a long phone call with David Singleton, now in LA for meetings. Within all of this busy-ness (business,) it feels like I am preparing to take a very long trip to an exotic and far away place -- today, I am Bicycling to Afghanistan. Tomorrow, I will be on the Road to Morocco. Soon, I will be in a place which is very different from the place where I live today. I'm still packing and preparing to get on the boat -- but today, I discovered (decided) that the boat is leaving on Thursday morning. * * * Speaking of planning, I have to stop now to make a midnight phone call to Bill Rieflin to prepare for CC2K (CheeseCake2000) on Jan 26th. Should call Bill Forth back tonight too - but I'm sure it's already too late given his early morning rise time. Looking forward to comparing Dilbert stories and strategies for practicing at work. Tomorrow. Oh say can you see the dawn's early light? I'm afraid I may be able to by the time my night is done. * * * Phone call: completed. CheeseCake2000, initiated. Quote of the day:
* * * Wednesday January 12 I did: I went to visit a place very very far from my
home -- some one led me there, showed me the way. We had to make a great journey (via skateboard!) to get there: up complicated, winding, zigzag
up and around large concrete hills and ramps to get to this 'city' up at the top of this large concrete mountain. Everything was concrete on the way up the hill, but at the top, there were large grassy open areas,
blue skies, and lots of trees. Everyone was pretending like
everything was exactly the same as it had been before my vacation. I went on a date with my 'new' girlfriend, and
she had some serious problems with her face and speech. * * * Called in sick to work today. Felt sick all day. Still do. Exhausted, in fact. So, enough words. You fill in the rest. * * * Thursday January 13 Lord, have mercy. * * * Friday January 14 Quote of the evening by Steven Rhodes during dinner at the new Vietnamese restaurant in Belltown. Steven was describing his version of the four stages of loss:
We were talking about the fact that yesterday I dropped a neutron bomb, and announced to my closest co-workers at the borg that I was leaving. The bomb did not affect the buildings whatsoever - but it seems to have devastated a few of the people with whom I have been working for the past 3.5 years. This was a remarkably difficult process for me, as I generally make considerable personal and emotional investments in the people and surrounding the processes of my work life. On some level, it feels like I have just simultaneously broken up with thirty close girlfriends. On all sides, there is a very real sense of loss in the air. Not everyone knows about this 'break-up' yet within the borg. I am still struggling with my team and managers to come up with a viable plan for a smooth transition which will be announced next week. The good news: Bill Gates also resigned from his role yesterday, so my announcement was slightly upstaged. * * * Dinner with David Singleton, Curt, Violet, Steven preceded a visit to our new temporary office space in Belltown. Funky, but totally adequate for our work over the next three weeks as our real space is being evacuated and prepared for our coming habitation. The new space is quite inspiring. Location, location, location. And a great vibe. High ceilings. Nice lobby. 12K sq feet. Retail ready. And a sense of rightness that is difficult for me to articulate in my current condition. OK ~ guilty as charged. In the back of my mind, two magic words: secret cafe. * * * Yesterday, I turned a very real corner. Today, it is clear: the race has begun. A few weeks ago, in these pages, I described Mark Long's metaphor for beginning a start-up. Today I have stepped up onto the running machine, and the handcuff has been fitted over my wrist. The machine was already set to sprint. But tomorrow, the setting goes up at least one more notch. * * * Travis Metcalf is a guest in my house this evening. He is visiting Seattle to play with the Seattle Repertoire Circle and for some meetings about a potential new job in this area. I was very happy to hear practicing coming from the guest room this evening. * * * Saturday January 15 Up very early today, despite being up very late last night. No weekend for me this weekend. Visiting houseguest, Travis Metcalf and I went to the sitting at Curt's house. Travis will be relocating to Seattle in a couple of weeks. Something about a new job in the area. And he has never even seen my famous "couch of no return." Leap of faith on his part, I guess. And certainly no coercion on my part. But job offers help. Money (via a job) makes things possible that otherwise would not be possible. Duh. Money is simply a paper capacitor for social life energy. It is the standard currency we use as creatures to store and exchange society's potential energy. * * * A large sitting team this morning: Curt, BillR, Tobin, SteveE, Frank, Ingrid, StephenG, DerekD, TravisM, and SB. Full house. Felt good. I felt some contact with our friends in Germany this morning. At times I feel very alone. Not this morning. * * * Emergency white board acquisition this morning for an all day planning session, graciously hosted by Curt. Today was the day to herd in all of the insights and to begin to translate these into websites. Besides exhaustion, I am also still somewhat numb from my MS 'divorce' yesterday. Perhaps, I'm even in denial now. I still have to go back to complete a smooth transition, but I'm already scheduled to be on a plane to LA on Monday morning to close a BTV deal. Feels like I still have unfinished biz at MS. And I do. They want a complete brain dump to insure a smooth transition. Feels like I'm swimming while wearing two pairs of pants at the same time: awkward, heavy. Looking forward to wearing some shorts. * * * Went to my favorite Vegetarian Chinese Restaurant on Capitol Hill this evening with Travis and David. This restaurant was formerly the site of many previous excellent meals and meaningful dinners from a past life. Many memories here. Some make me sad if I dig too deep. Stop digging. * * * Saw "American Beauty" following dinner. A perfect distraction from BTV intensity, and an excellent film. Also quite sad. Tonight, in a great city, with good health, surrounded by good friends and a thriving new business, I feel slightly sad and lonely. Perhaps it was simply the film. Dark. Pessimistic. It was an exceptionally beautifully executed portrait of ugliness and despair. Hope it does not feed into my dreams this evening. * * * Sunday January 16 The morning began with a business breakfast with TravisM ~ some simple explorations and negotiations about money. I am beginning to see money in a completely different light than I ever have before. It is an enabling force. And it is hot wired to a primal human nerve. If applied in the right quantities in the right places, mountains may be moved. If applied arbitrarily or without care, villages may be destroyed. Not enough can be debilitating. So can too much. I would like to think that the seen or unseen architects of our culture have been applying and studying these forces for hundreds of years now, and that there is a great wealth of knowledge regarding the laws of money which guides the world toward success. It is clear that not much of this knowledge flows down to those who do not have access to these forces. Perhaps this is what they teach in business school? Some questions I have had to ask lately include: How much of this life force (money) do you need to survive? To be comfortable? To thrive? Some other ways of describing these three zones:
I'm not really expressing myself well with these ideas right now, so perhaps better to stop, and move on to something more coherent and less controversial. * * * Dropped off Travis at the new BTV temp office on 2nd Ave., then went up for brunch with Guy Whitmore, Tobin Buttram, David Singleton and Bill Van Buren. More scheming about possible futures. * * * Then another afternoon in front of white boards, drawing maps and schematics. Translating insights into websites. * * * Then, dinner with Tobin, David, Violet at Mama's Mexican Kitchen. Coincidence or fate? Frank and Kathy Cox dropped in and sat right next to us. I have not seen my friend and somewhat-legendary-Seattle-musician, Frankie Cox since I saw him in Teatro Zinzani almost one year ago. Yikes. Where did 1999 go? He just retired from that show (it closed recently.) We high-fived and celebrated our recent work changes. I met Frank a few years ago while working with the Lovemongers during their Rifff show on MSN -- Invited him to the upcoming Cheesecake party next week. Lovemongers have a huge and loyal fan base, and have the potential to be excellent BTV artists. * * * During dinner, David Singleton mentioned that he had tried to listen to the SGC CD "Twilight" which I had given him a few months ago, but that he could not make it all the way through. The sound of the Ovations drove him away. Some things to learn from this. But it might be an expensive lesson. * * * After dinner, one more brainstorm session with Liz Kiley, Curt, David, and Violet. Among other things, some excellent insights about the location for our cheesecake event. * * * I'm feeling really great about the team we are building here. So far: cohesive, capable, and committed. * * * Mounting stress about my travel tomorrow morning. Have to pick up David at his hotel at 7am. Hmmmm, 12:15 now... Time to sleep. * * *
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