4.30.20

Up 7. Watched Colbert/Meyers. This is one of the lamest things I do routinely, and I wish I could cut it out — but, according to the book on depression, watching “talking heads” has even been used a prescribed therapy.
Read 10 pages or so, on depressed Inuits.
Usual morning after that. Didn’t get further w/ reading. Also cooked some sausage for lunch and dealt w/ a couple online items w/ Bree.
Walk.
Worked 10:30-1. Hung up on first graf of new revision! Having trouble letting it go and tried to return to it a couple times in the afternoon. Other than that, had lunch and read quota of Solomon by about 4:30.
Visited w/ Bree 5-6, filed CDs and killed some more email.
Read Coolidge around 9:30 - to p. 100, b/c about 30 pages are taken up by “Suite V,” w/ 2 words to a page.
Some computer cleanup tasks, before a restart. Sort of a new broom principle for May.
In the same vein — I’ll continue to post my monthly reading, and think about other ways to use this space, but I’m going to stop these daily entries for now. They’re more for my sake than anyone else’s, but my days, including my writing schedule, are so routinized this far into lockdown that it seems redundant. This is pretty much what I’ve arrived at:

6:30. up
7-8 read
8-9 breakfast
9-10 song notes/exercise
10-11 walk
11-1 prose
1-2 read 
2-3 lunch
3-4 songwriting
4-5 email 
5-6 time w/ bree
6-7 walk
7-8 dinner
8-10 poetry/music
10-11 online/movie
11:30 lights out/podcast

This looks unworkably rigid, but it’s an ideal I’m shooting for most days, and not skipping the writing block is crucial to my well-being. I have intentionally taken a day off twice in the last 5 weeks. I’m following this schedule fairly strictly until about 4, but even that represents what I’m trying to complete w/in that hour - often there’s time for other tasks between 8-11 range, unless I get up late and am behind on a reading quota. The “walks” are not an hour long either. And of course, Bree and I spend more than an hour together, even in the unglamorous form of meals or home projects — though she goes to bed earlier than I do, so after 9 is a good time to concentrate on things that don’t interest her.

4.29.20

Up 6:30. Posted the last few days of this journal. Finished watching Hamlet.
Usual morning. Read quota of Solomon by 10.
Walk.
Worked about 11-1. Penciled notes in a printout of the section, started revising from the top, but didn’t get very far. Might try another hr. later, depending on how things go otherwise.
Read 10 p. Coolidge, + Bill Berkson’s intro + Michael Cohen, “Laurence Dunbar and the Genres of Dialect.”
Helped unpack deliveries. The one we worried would be spoiled was ok (still frozen).
Lunch. Played Mel Powell 10”. Bree liked it.
Worked on chorus to “Flashlight.”
Therapy.
Decompressed 5:30-7:30 or so.
Rec’d email about a cancelled grocery order. Spent some time before dinner getting a cart together for another market (though I have a feeling there will be missing items and/or substitutions. Eggs are an issue.)
Light dinner.
Again, not getting up to much after that. Dealt w/ some email, at least. Have been getting large files (uncompressed music downloads) onto flash drives and trashing what I can, but need to order a new external drive for back-up of ProTools sessions, .wav masters, &c.
Lights out 11.

4.28.30

Up 7:15. Read 15 p. Solomon.
Breakfast, coffee. Watched Colbert + Seth Meyers, exercised.
Therapy.
Felt like I needed to change schedule today - not sure yet if it’s a mistake.
Read quotas of Solomon, Coolidge (quick b/c he’s in a visual phase). Helped Bree unpack delivery.
Form notes 10 R&B songs.
Spent a while sweeping my room and taking out our trash/recycling/a small shelving unit Bree thinks has worms or something (piles of sawdust showing up). Lunch. A little irritable.
Walk.
Worked 1-3. A couple touch-ups on conclusion, sent it to my readers. Put the last 5 weeks of paragraphs in one document — 8500 works, 10+ w/ notes. Too long (but it’s good to know I generated almost 2000 words a week). Will spend the next week cutting/editing. 
Tried to watch Hamlet, but there were several interruptions. Had to call Dad, and one of our delivery orders (of perishables) didn’t come per our confirmation email; not sure whether to request a refund from the service or UPS. Helped Bree write an email to the company later. (Then we got a conflicting confirmation…)
2nd walk. (I would have skipped it if possible, but I needed a break from the afternoon. Overall, it did turn out to be a mistake alter my routine (even though I did write). Wrote to my therapist about changing to afternoons.
Rested w/ Bree a little while, but decided I needed to call Dad back to check on masks/social distancing for some business that I know he’s doing tomorrow. Also spoke to the caregiver.
Finally watched 30 min. of Hamlet.
Neither of us was very hungry tonight.
Did nothing worth recording after dinner.
Lights out 10:30.

4.27.20

Up 5. Dharma talk. Watched 1/2 hr of Hamlet.
Back to bed before 7. Got up again 8:20, though still tired.
Bree on Zoom call w/ Ron in L.A.
Coffee, breakfast, form notes 10 songs, exercise; 25 p. Solomon.
Walk.
Worked 11:40-1. Mostly revision, but started well. Wasted last 30 min or so.
Listened to a couple of versions (Julie Andrews, Elaine Stritch) of R+H’s “Something Good” for direction on chorus of “Flashlight.”
25 p. Solomon, 10 p. Coolidge.
Lunch.
Worked on “Flashlight.” new chorus idea. Bree likes it better, anyway.
Finally printed shipping label for Human Hearts drive; should go out to Mitch tomorrow.
Spent most of 4-6 reading/watching things in tabs I’d opened, inc. Frederic Jameson’s erudite/brilliant but (to me) diffuse LRB piece on Joseph Conrad, and Luc Sante’s NYRB piece on collaging. Showed Bree a segment from Mary Martin’s 1959 TV special, w/ songs from One Touch of Venus, Annie Get Your Gun (“Can’t Get a Man with a Gun,” w/ some lyrics I hadn’t heard; possibly a variant in the collected Berlin lyrics), and Lute Song, a 1946 play w/ a few songs by Raymond Scott and Bernie Hanhigen (the lyricist for “‘Round Midnight”). So then we listened to other songs from the score. Yellowface exotica - pretty bad. Listened to a podcast about COVID’s impact on Jackson Heights — apparently, the biggest hotspots have been JH/Elmhust/Corona - w/ our councilwoman Catarina Cruz, and read two recent New Yorker articles; the one on Seattle’s response v. New York’s puts paid to much of the enthusiasm for Coumo (to say nothing of DeBlasio).
Walk.
Watched a Tiny Desk Concert by the harpsichordist Mahan Estfahni (https://www.npr.org/2020/04/27/843270508/mahan-esfahani-tiny-desk-concert) b/c it includes a Mel Powell piece linked from Ethan Iverson’s blog (a Powell essay I want to work through; https://ethaniverson.com/mel-powell-unfurnished/).
Dinner. Played an Alberta Hunter record.
Filed CDs.
Listened to more Powell - realized I have a copy of a 10” w/ one of his through-composed pieces.
Computer tasks, not worth discussing. Lights out 11:30. Hope I don’t wake up too early. 

4.26.20

Up 6:30. SNL.
Read 25 p. Andrew Solomon, The Noonday Demon. Overwritten, but will give it a chance.
Breakfast, coffee. Shopped for grocery delivery w/ Bree.
Form notes, exercise.
Walk. Was able to buy 2 packs of Camels. The bodega across the street reopened (took a t-shirt mask). Smoked only 1, rather than my habitual 2; will have one more after 6.
Back before 11, watched a couple video/song links in emails (Fred Hersch, the Beths), wrote to Ted Leo to try to get my Secret Stars cover to Jodi.
Worked 11-1. Wasted 30 min again., tightened up the 1st graf moved into the 2nd. Got bogged down toward the end in a complicated thought that I think will be helpful if I get it right.
Read remaining section of Theory, A Sunday; and to 50 p. mark of Solomon.
Lunch. Called dad.
Worked on “flashlight” 30 min or so. Bree thinks the chorus is too pop.
Broke down/took out some recycling.
Spent time w/ Bree.
2nd walk.
10 p. Coolidge.
Listened to a long Bohannon (RIP) track: “Foot Stompin’ Music” (1974). Monochordal, in the James Brown manner; no full breakdown, but at least two bass drop-out passages at about 2:00 and 3:35.
Listened to Units Digital Stimulation on headphones while organizing books and CDs. Tried to make this year’s “to read,” but it isn’t realistic.
Watched the rest of Tip Top (Bozon 2013). Odd, perverse tone, don’t think it actually works - Huppert is watchable. I suppose it comes out of her films w/ Chabrol.
It does have a great Turkish rock song from 1970: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HzkpvWt1o4c
And that lead me to a tune w/ a similar title (and Turkish lyrics) by the German new wave band Ideal, whose first record I have: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Grr7w2z9vMQ
Lights out 11:00.