i got home from rehearsal last night and my computer was turned off, which is odd since i didn’t turn it off before i left. i tried to turn it on, and it wouldn’t go, so i pulled everything out from it’s niche and sprayed compressed air at various places inside, checked the sockets and determined that it wasn’t a hardware failure, so i plugged everything back in and it didn’t work again, but this time it gave me a keyboard error. after mucking about until well after midnight, i determined that it was the cable from the KVM switch to the computer. fortunately i had a spare, so i replaced it and now everything is operational again, but it’s hot enough today that i’m probably going to shut everything down anyway, once i get a label made for the incense order that is sitting here next to me.

the upshot of the rehearsal yesterday is that we’ve postponed the cirque shows until the last weekend of september and the first weekend of october, which increases the probability that we’re going to get rained out (shades of vancouver), but it will also give us a couple of months to finish the show, rather than opening next weekend, like was originally planned. also we got news that one of the colleges in portland has been begging for us to come down and do a show for them, which is intriguing, since they’ve not only offered to pay us room and board (to the total of around $15,000), but they have no fire regulations, unlike seattle which has been basically regulating us out of business. it’s going to be the “summer barbecue” show, with two “families”, the “Carnivores” and the “Veganis” (not “Vaginas”), which is going to be a take-off of “Romeo and Juliet” (Rodeo and Achooliet), with the requisite feud between the two families, including the “grandfathers” of each family going after each other with flaming canes, a pyrotechnic barbecue grill (which actually works as a barbecue grill) in the shape of a bull – El Diablo – and BBWP stuck in the middle. also, i’m on the verge of buying a sousaphone, so i won’t have to transpose unless i want to. the sousaphone is currently in the new bathroom at the powerhouse, and there was nobody there yesterday when i went to check it out, but it’s there, and it will soon be mine! now i’ve got to figure out how i’m going to schlepp it around from performance to home and back, and i’ve got to figure out where i’m going to keep it when i’m not actually performing – i live in a tiny little house without enough room for a proper workshop and, like a genius, i’ve bought an instrument that is so large that there’s currently no place to keep it, but i’m sure i can work out something.