Melissa Ferrick

Melissa put on another great show last night at Neumo's, and I picked up her new album In the Eyes of Strangers. As usual, the place was packed with women and maybe a dozen or so men including the bartenders, bouncers, etc. As I get older, I wonder if my appearance in these venue's makes me look like a serial killer or something. It was an all-ages show, so at least I was in the "drinking section" instead of hanging out with the teens. Besides, it was hard enough to find a place to stand that didn't block people on the 'adult' side of the room.

Anyhow, the new album has a number of songs she played last time she was in town that I'm glad to have a copy of now, and as usual my favorite song is another sad one: Stuck, largely because the performance is amazing. Her cover of Dayna Kurtz's Miss Liberty is also excellent. She's a great lyricists, but mostly her performance is what blows me away--the sound sucks, but here's a You Tube clip of Miss Liberty.

In some past performances, Melissa has looked like she was on the edge of a breakdown, but this time she seemed to be in a much better place. She had a band along instead of playing exclusively solo, and last night was the last gig of the spring tour and they were putting a lot into it. Drive with a violin and a trumpet was a bit strange, but she's got to keep herself entertained about a song the audience would be up in arms about her not playing. Personally I was happy that she played Burn This Guitar from her 1998 album, and I'm clearly just not lesbian enough to find Drive the end-all-be-all of MF songs.

Flooring Project #3: Kitchen & Utility

The floating hardwood floor was over a much larger area, but the prep work for doing the vinyl flooring is a bitch compared to pulling out carpet, carpet pad, and carpet tacks. I have to pry up about 250 crappy vinyl tiles, then use an adhesive remover to clean up the subfloor, remove all the moulding, and disassemble the door jam and counter-top kick boards to really do all the prep work correctly before putting down the new floor. At least I'm comfortable with taking apart a door jam that I built in the first place--the old one was breaking apart, and the new fridge wouldn't fit through until it was ripped out--and I already practiced my technique on the much smaller 30 sq ft of bathroom floor.

The flooring install itself should be reasonably straight-forward, although managing the seams and working with 12' rolls is finicky. Good thing I didn't try to take this on before the housewarming, and that I can afford to eat out while my kitchen is basically unusable.

At least I can do the kitchen and wait on the utility, which frankly I have to do since the fridge, stove, and some other kitchen stuff has to be somewhere while I work. I'll also need somewhere to shift the washer/dryer into later.

The good news is that it should really improve the look of the kitchen despite having older slightly stained cabinetry and countertops, and it should be perfectly serviceable for a few years until I have the finances and gumption to take on Todd's more elaborate renovation plans.

Flures

Having purchased a home from a gardener, my yard is basically a mystery yard. Every week, something new pops out of the ground and often it isn't a weed. I have no idea what it is, but clearly they planted a lot of bulbs last year or the year before.