It’s been a whirlwind few weeks.

I knew I needed to move. I knew I needed a new place to live. A new home to replace the one I owned and had to short sell. Not only was a long term relationship ending, so was the security they both afforded.

After a year on the market, finally, an offer. Months pass. A seeming eternity. We are in the home stretch to closing on November 31st.

I flew back to Asbury Park, New Jersey last Saturday (10/15). I was on a mission. Find a place to call home. I had one week to do it in. Thankfully my friend Geoff Hoover & his wife Tatiana let me stay at Chez Hoover for the week.

Sunday was spent combing Craig’s list, the Jersey Shore edition, and Rent.com again. Looking for new rentals. Made a few calls to try to set up appointments. Was really interested in a high rise apartment building called Munroe Towers. These apartments and the entire building were being renovated. One bedrooms were around $950.00 including all utilities except electric. Not bad! But in the end … no go… a firm No Pets policy. I did get a lead on a local real estate company, John Conover Agency. Continue Reading > > >

I’ve lived in the “Emerald City” for over sixteen years now. Even saw the Scooter and the Big Man. Here. Of all places! And maybe Dorothy has always been right … “There’s no place like home.” I’ve clicked my heals together so many times. All I have to show for it? Worn out orthotics and flat-ass feet! But I’m not here to complain. Really! The best thing? I got some new original music out of it all. Woo hoo!

I’ve had occasion to do a lot of soul searching in the past year. Between a relationship of eight years ending, having to sell our current home, my business drying up, little money, more ailments, and toying with the thought of moving back east. An awful lot for one person to deal with.

One of the things that has kept me going? My friends back east. In sixteen years in Seattle I can count my close friends on a few fingers. Sad. Seattle has always been a love-hate relationship … and I want out! This is what’s triggered the search for ‘home” … or what it is. Or what it really means to me.

Part of the rekindling of old friendships has lead me back to my roots in New Jersey. With the advent of Facebook so many relationships have been reborn and with any luck will flourish. And that my friends … is home. I will not mention names … but you know who you are!

It’s these friends, both old and new, and our mutual experiences that inform my future, my past, and always my music.

Continue Reading > > >

Cough.

Cough. Cough Hack!

Chris & I have gotten over our colds. Praise the Agnostic gods! Two weeks of unmentionable goo emanating from our collective heads. How can such mass quantities of this viscose gunk come from such a dark damp tiny place? Two boxes of Kleenex later ….

I felt bad for Chris. He had to go to work through all this. He trudged off to his workplace, and trudged home feeling equally as bad. I though, was able to stay at home and rest. Not that it did much good, other than not infecting any of my clients with this biological weapon that was my head. Cough. Cough. Hack! Continue Reading > > >

I’m fixing a hole where the rain gets in … and kept my mind from withering … from watching bad Monday night TV.

The rain was mighty. Seemingly much more mighty than the roof over our collective heads. There was a river torrent flowing down ‘Parking Lot Mountain’ into the storm drain. It was ‘east coast rain’ not the sort we are accustomed to in the Pacific Northwest. It was beyond a misting, beyond a drizzle. No. It was downright teeming.

Chris noticed the dripping on the window. I went over to look at the intruding liquid, and sure enough, rain water was leaking in. Now the oddity here was the outside of the window was dry as a bone. It certainly was odd, seeing how the window is six feet back from the edge of the balcony & protected by the overhanging roof. The roof extends to the edge of the balcony. So nothing on the balcony gets wet from rain … not even plants on the balcony! Continue Reading > > >

It’s a lazy Saturday afternoon here in Bridgehaven. Did I mention that most of the folks living here are senior citizens? That’s okay though. I’ve hit fifty. I’m slidin’ into senior citizen-dom myself. Crap! Did I just say that? Yeah .. it’s the truth. Hell …. my partner Chris was told he was ‘middle aged’ by one of his friends. Middle-aged at thirty-six? So I must be sliding into the home plate of cremation … or Cremora. Put that in your coffee!

Was hangin’ over the balcony chattin’ up the downstairs neighbor & her daughter. They were working on getting the balcony all gussied up for the spring planting & summer fun. I wonder if these citizens are party animals. I guess only time will tell.

The cats were wanting to leap off the balcony and check out the action below. Let’s hope that’s not going to happen …. EVER! Continue Reading > > >

Okay. It has been a while. Well … actually it’s been over a year. So much has gone on. So much has improved. But where to start?

At he beginning Joe. At the beginning.

It seemed like only yesterday … oye … already with the cliches. Okay it seems like it was only, 668 days, no 95 weeks, no, 1 Year, 9 Months, and 30 Days since my last confession or blog entry … take your pick. Break out your abacus & double check my math. Can people still do math in this country … can we?

Since those last entries a LOT of things have changed. First and foremost my health has gotten markedly better. My Sarcoidosis has been pushed to the back burner, there are very few, if any, signs that I ever had it. And believe me … I did & still do HAVE it. It’s like a bad toe fungus … you can make it subside, but it might come back. But I won’t linger on that thought.

Senior Pulmonologist Dr Spaghetti-Sauce has told me my lung capacity is back to “normal for a man my age.” I didn’t know whether to kiss him (no tongue please) or smack him … “a man my age” … indeed! Then Again I just turned the big five oh!!! Yup fifty big ones. No big thing.

Bought a new car. Yup. Traded in the gas-aholic 4-Runner for a tea totaling Scion tC. Chris & I moved out of Eastlake and bought a condo in the Pinehurst neighborhood of Seattle.

Never thought I could own a “home of my own” but here I sit. Though for the first month I didn’t do much sitting. I painted walls, made art, removed a wet bar … and it was all fun. It now looks like our home. Pretty amazing stuff … heady … if you will. And yes I will! Yes we will!