Things in CD land have slowed down this week after much excitement the previous seven days. We pressed hard in order to be ready to release two new songs and also to be prepared for our live radio interview and performance. The whole week was extremely gratifying. There is always a wonderful sense of accomplishment when you fulfill a goal and we did that last week.
The only trouble is … we’re not all the way there yet.
After our CKXS adventure last Friday, I was right back into action in my CPT Entertainment duties, spending the entire day Saturday back at Delaware Speedway as an announcer coach/consultant. I then spent a good deal of the following day (Sunday) compiling my “reports” after the fact. Next thing I knew, it was Monday again and time to get back to business.
It never stops, friends. Not if you want to accomplish something out of your ordinary.
The process of finishing the whole “No Schedule Man” CD is pretty much in KG’s hands now. Everything is recorded except for some piano parts he may choose to redo. We are officially in “post production.” I have a lot of work to do in completing the artwork and other behind-the-scenes activities, but for the most part it’s up to KG (Kevin Gorman) to deliver us to the CD duplication company prior to our deadline.
I went to see him Tuesday night and it was immediately clear that neither of us had much enthusiasm for doing anything new. We were both tired. He had worked for a few hours on the song “Awake (But Not Alive)” so we listened through that, chatted, and called it a night. Our feeling was that sometimes the best way to reach a goal is to leave it alone. I know Kev is working at it through the week. But as I’ve stated in this space many times before, KG and I are not professional full-time musicians. I own an event and media management company and Kev is a full-time producer, teacher and man of all musical trades. We both have many other people and projects that we must report to in order to make our living. The “No Schedule Man” CD is a labour of love. That means we love it. But it’s also labour. You don’t always feel like doing the work because the time to do it is primarily in the evening or on weekends. Or, if you have to take some time out of a “regular” work day, then you darn well better make up for it. For in the world of entrepreneurs, you either do the work or don’t get paid. Everybody should have to be an entrepreneur at some point in their lives. But that is another opinion and story for another day.
With KG and me, we’d just been pushing ourselves so hard to obtain our goals that we’d finally worn out.
And so it goes.
So now we ramp up for the next run: completion of the CD and rehearsal for the first show (June 12 at the London Music Club) and all of the shows that come after it. That’ll be fun.
The other thing that I’ll look back on and remember from this week is a debilitating pain on the left side of my lower body.
In short, I’ve got a tight butt.
Laugh if you like, but it’s horrible. I have been doing my best to overcome lower back pain for the last four years. Much of it has to do with stress I’ve brought upon myself and the accumulation of some less-than-productive habits. I have been working to get in better shape and to that end I have good days and bad. But I have never felt anything like what I’m fighting through this week.
It has been diagnosed as a pinched sciatic nerve (aka “sciatica”) on the lower left side of my body. It means you’re in discomfort from your lower back right down to your toes. At the start of the week, I could not function without some Advil in my system and I was not pleased about that. I’ve been working hard to put fewer toxins in my body, not more. The discomfort prompted me to finally do what my doctors have been telling me to do for three years: go get massage therapy treatment.
I went for my first massage yesterday. All I could think about was George Costanza in Seinfeld, when he got massaged by a guy and later said to Jerry in a panic, “I think it moved!” Well, I didn’t care if a guy worked on me, a girl or if they drove a bloody truck over my back. I just wanted to feel better.
It turned out to be a woman that treated me, but I can assure you there was absolutely nothing erotic about it. Oddly, having another woman rub her hands all over your rear end is not anywhere near as exciting as one might hope. It was painful. Also, it was not quite embarrassing, but it was close. It felt like paying someone to treat you like a baby.
At one point, this nice lady had what I assumed (hoped?) to be a knuckle driven deep into the sorest point on my left butt cheek. She must have known that I was in pain, because I stopped talking. I never stop talking. But I did then. So she said, “Take a deep breath.” I thought, “I will if you take your knuckle off my butt.” But she did not, at least not for a few seconds.
So I took a deep breath. A few of them, actually.
Soon thereafter, she told me that the muscles all up and down my spine were, “Among the tightest she’d ever seen.” So there: my back muscles are tighter than yours.
Even so, I never got so much as a participation ribbon for all my troubles.
When it was done, I got dressed and then she asked me how I felt. I didn’t know what to say, because I honestly felt the same. So I came up with the only insightful, helpful thing I could think of and answered her by saying, “Umm, I don’t know.”
Nice.
She said, “Some people feel great right away. For others it takes a while longer.”
Hmm. Okay. Well, I agreed to go back next week and then limped back to the Kevin-mobile to take me home.
So here I sit today, happily visiting with you, shifting in my chair every few moments to ease the pain emanating from my left gluteus. My back and butt woes are officially “to be continued.”
When we finally finish our CD, please don’t congratulate me by slapping me on the rear.
I’d rather have my finger caught in a mouse trap.
– Kevin
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