2:44 am - 25 September, 2003
any escape you like
Practicing a new drum solo in this prison of an empty house. All I see is my sticks and practice pad calling to me. If I had a cat or something to keep me company, it would be different, but I don't. So I pick up the sticks, yet again, to work and work and still fail.
So I go to Starbucks. Perhaps someone I know will be there. Thankfully, Sal is there, and I sit and drink an iced black tea with milk (I'm a Brit. I like milk in my tea. There's nothing wrong with that.)
But then they are closed and Sal is gone, leaving me with two new companions I have met a few times but really don't know very well at all.
Oh well. Near-strangers are better than going home, so I stay.
The baristas leave, and one invites us to Bennigans with him. I think "Oh, but I work there..." Then I realize I didn't work today so I can drink. Then he says the one on Beach, which I don't work at anyway. No problem. I don't know anyone there, but a beer's a beer and I don't want to be alone with my thoughts or my sticks.
So I go, and only the Barista shows up. No problem. I've waited on him before, and he knows my name. He seems cool enough, so I sit and drink. We talk about work and Shreveport and Gambling and Vegas and the bar I went to for my 21st birthday, which happens to be the place I'm going tomorrow night to see a band play. I invite him. He says he'll be here (at Bennigans). No problem. I wasn't that intent on convincing him anyway.
The bar closes, and I come home. Back to my thoughts and my sticks.
I'll practice so I don't have to think.
