K&W - Yorba Linda 13Jan2006

Pretty good. Yorba Linda can be very good to us, or sometimes not so much. Kristy and Crystal from work were there, right at the very beginning. That was really nice, 'cuz the hardest part is just getting started, and although I know that I ought to make a big, noisy announcement that we're here to play, I'm never brave enough. With Kristy there to "talk to", I was able to make an initial announcement, which got the ball rolling, people looking and listening, and requests coming in.

We got a pretty good response, and made $20 in tips, which is probably a record for that store. (It's strange how much the physical layout of the stores affects the tip jar.) Even the new coffee-making kids were loudly appreciative.

I don't really know Crystal at work -- she's new, but apparently a friend of Kristy's. I had the impression that Crystal was basically being dragged in so Kristy wouldn't be there alone after her husband had to leave for his swing-shift job. Crystal's quite young, hip, and I certainly didn't expect that she would be impressed with our set of ancient tunes.

But I ran into her in the break room on Tuesday morning, and asked her what she thought. I expected some kind of polite "You guys are really good" comment, but she practically squealed it -- *way* beyond "polite" -- and wanted to know where and when we're playing next! I was completely stunned, as I always am when teenagers and 20-somethings seem to like us.

K&W - SCP 06Jan2006

Warren and I played at South Coast Plaza on Friday. Because of Thanksgiving, Christmas and all, it's the first time we've played together since November 12th, 8 weeks ago -- our longest break since we started playing Tully's almost 4 years ago.

We did surprisingly OK, though my voice was pretty trashed from this cold that's left my head, but won't leave my throat. We both knew we'd better practice during the week, and it seems to have worked, though I made more than my usual allotment of big guitar mistakes.

But overall, pretty good. I think I got a song or two on the recording for the website that are worth hearing. We were lucky to have a friendly audience, starting out with old-Toshiba-friend Karen Reader, who's back from a 10-year stint in Kansas. Fortunately, Warren had some oblique advance warning, or neither of us woulda recognized her, but she knew us, and seemed pretty happy to see us, too.

We had polite and occasionally enthusiastic applause most of the night, but most surprising was a little round of applause at the very end, as I "signed off" -- kind of a "let's give it up one more time" round, though sans MC prompting, of course. We've never had that before.