K&W in Laguna Beach -- Saturday, 11Oct2014

Another terrific night! Lots of friendly people all night long, listening and requesting songs. It's great to be able to get The Corner even starting at 7:00, 'cuz my stuff works better after dark, and my batteries last late into the night. There was a lull around 10:00, but then we had another surge (with backup singers on "Hallelujah", and a great little dance party) and ended up going at it until 12:30 when my batteries died.

We hung around talking with Greeter Mikey for another hour, and he knew why it's been so pleasantly young homeless guy free lately. Turns out that Shirtless Josh was, in fact, the local dealer, and once he got busted and hauled away, the rest of the guys have had no reason to hang around there/him. Thanks, LBPD! But what took you so long?

It's pretty clear that the "normal people" (tourists and locals) feel more comfortable when those guys aren't there, which makes collecting a self-sustaining critical mass of audience much easier for us.

So our only distraction was a brief session with Little Mexican Lady, who managed to keep her pants on this week, but was doing her odd dancing right in the middle of the corner, scaring people away. Warren asked her to do it over at the side, which she did, but then got disinterested and left.

Anyway, it was nice that there were no other players around, so I was able to leave the amp cranked up pretty loud. I don't really need to blow the audience away, but it really helps me to have the monitor speaker up loud so I can hear myself, and I can't control them separately. It was a bit disconcerting to see people three stores away down the street, dancing to my songs, but the cops drove by several times, but never stopped to hassle me.

A guy came by and listened for just one song, but left a tip and his card in the jar, saying that he owns a (tiny) gallery "down the street" (a mile), and we should call him and come play there sometime. It's too far away from downtown to get much traffic for Artwalk, but maybe if he's doing some kind of event or something?

Also, a guy that Warren knows came by to invite us to come play at his Wednesday night gallery art-thing, which features local artists and bands. Sounds like fun -- I'll give it a try.

Around midnight, an apparently homeless guy I've never seen before came by. He was nice enough, and sat on the bench and listened politely for a while. Then he got up and put his "lucky pink dollar" in the jar, explaining that it was all he had. I feel kinda bad about that, but I didn't really get what he was saying until I was counting the jar and, sure enough, found a pink dollar. Considering his condition, I not entirely sure how "lucky" it's actually been for him, but I'll keep it in my pocket and give it back to him if he shows up again.

I had an idea earlier in the day, that when/if somebody wanted an autograph with their CD (case), I could draw my cartoon self-portrait, too. People seldom ask for an autograph, but if I offer, they always take me up on it. So I offered 4 or 5 times last night (out of nine CDs sold -- I'm a little shy about it) and people were always pleasantly surprised when I handed them back the signed and cartooned CD.