The road...to recovery...

 ...is slow. It is slow. But I'm still on it. 

I bought a UA Apollo Solo A/D converter a week ago. I got it set up and running. Now to find the time to record something. 

I was motivated because an old pal, Jeff Jagielo, reached out to me about a project he's working on. Sent me some tracks to play some horn on. I've already mapped out the parts and am ready to print it. Now I just need to find some time when I have the house to myself, or I try it in the bedroom. I can do that, right? The mics aren't hot when I'm tracking trumpet so what's the risk of noise from TVs in the other room, etc interfering? 

Well, I don't want to start my first project after a long dry spell off that way. 

I'm spending the time in between practicing my horn, doing some embouchure recovery exercises. That's the slow part. The road to recovery, that is....

I'll bet you thought I was talking about the alcohol, right? I'm good there. I don't even think about taking a drink. I'm feeling just fine without it. There may come a time when I don't feel that way and will have to fight against those impulses, I keep telling myself. But I'm not anywhere near that now. COVID is bad enough, if I drink and act like an asshole again, I'm done. I'd rather be annoyed with other people drinking than be the one being the annoying asshole or worse. I'm safe from all of that now, and I don't want to ever go back to feeling the way I felt at my worst. 

I have a split screen up right now, White Stripes, Glastonbury, 2005 on Youtube on my right, this browser with blogger on the left. Previously watched the recently released footage of the Basement performance from 2005. I guess that's Nigel Godrich's basement. Pretty sure. I could probably pause, or open another tab and look it up. I mean, I'm already in google, right? Nah. I'm pretty sure. I'll just leave it at that. I don't always need to know everything right away - or ever, really. 

I sure do miss live music these days. Now that we can't go watch it, I really miss it. I wasn't watching it all that much in the years just before COVID. But I sure as hell will when we all get the green light to go back to the clubs. I want to get a band going again. This part of the recovery has been good - a boost for my confidence. For years I struggled with feelings of inadequacy. Nothing I could perform would possibly be good enough, just mediocre. So why bother? 

You know what? I might as well give it a go. If it sucks, people will tell me (by indifference) and then I can just go back to the hibernating I've been doing for, oh, the last 16 years! Well, aside from the occasional horn gig where my lip barely lasts cos I never practice these embouchure exercises. I never did exercises, I just played a lot more. But now? The road...to recovery...