Keith in Laguna Beach -- Saturday, 05Sept2015

Warren was Back East visiting with family, so I went down alone. I thought Tom would quit at 9, but his curfew has been lifted, so he plays until 10:30 now.

So I set up on the other corner, but ended up talking to a pair of "regulars", Wendy and Tom, most of the time. Tom says he prefers me to the Tommies' because my music makes him cry. I thought he was kidding, but when I started playing he asked for a Beatles song so I played "Let It Be". He tried to hide under his baseball cap, but he really was crying. "Let It Be" doesn't seem all that sad, but there you go.

I moved to the ice cream corner when the Tommies left at 10:30, but of course most of the people were gone. And that, coupled with Homeless Willy pestering anybody who dared to slow down, made for a pretty poor night. Willy was trying to sell some rubber-band launched light-up whirligigs to passing tourists. But since his pitch was to demo that, every time he launched one it ended up in the middle of the street, I'm not sure how he convinced anyone.

He also resumed his annoying routine of shouting out the artist at the end of every song. I finally had to tell him that, since I had gone to the trouble of learning these songs, I was pretty familiar with them and knew, and had noted on each song sheet, the artists, thanks anyway.

I did get a little attention around midnight as the bar-hoppers appeared. And there were a pair of cops "walking the beat", and they marched by the first time, but on their way back I was in the middle of "Over the Rainbow" and one of them stopped the other one so he could listen. That's never happened before -- they're usually "all business".

But a big part of why I even stayed was to try out my new ukulele. My old one doesn't have a pickup, so I couldn't use it in the act, but this one does. I waited until it was really late, and started with "I'm Yours" by Jason Mraz. Although I thought nobody was around, suddenly there were people zooming by, and lots of them put money in the jar. Novelty, I guess -- but it seemed weird to be making a better impression with the silly uke than I had been with my guitar.

Definitely nice to have the change of pace in the act, so I'll keep at it, but I wonder what Warren will do while I'm playing it. A big part of the beauty of it is how plain and simple it is, so it won't really work to have him playing electric lead over the top of it.

But that may be a moot point if we can't get the ice cream corner until 10:30 every time. It's just not worth going down there that late.