IAAD VII: EYE OF THE NEEDLE DIARY

Week 9

Monday March 10 2025

Noon

Switching to daylight saving always messes me up. It’s just tough for me to get out of bed in the morning until my circadian rhythm adapts, and that takes a week or so. So up not so early, the morning routine, breakfast. Not enough time before my first student to get any serious work done. Warmed up with some OST electric; a little Mystery Train and, for some reason, Rebel Rouser. Why Duane Eddy on an overcast March morning? No idea.

After my morning student, to project work. But for today and maybe several days, that’s not on the guitar.

Yesterday at SGC rehearsal Greg sneezed, and the words immediately out of my mouth were “Bless you.” A conventional response, and I wouldn’t have given it a second thought except that for the past week I’ve had a perpetually open document in which I’ve been collecting common phrases and idioms that contain religious references, particularly ones that I use at least from time to time. So when I heard my voice reflexively wishing blessings on Greg, the question I’m holding came back to me in a very concrete way. What does a crusty old atheist mean by that?

I spent my “practice time” going through my list and kind of cataloging these phrases. Most are simply colloquialisms in common use in the culture I grew up in. Many are vulgar. Almost all of them are simply ordinary thoughts or exclamations, punched up with a religious reference. “I’m tired” becomes “I’m tired as Hell.” Something surprising comes along, “Holy cow (or crap or shit or moley)!” or “Good Lord!” Something goes wrong, “Damn it!” Am I thinking of the actual constructs of “Hell”, “Holiness”, or “Damnation”, let alone using them in their original meaning? 

I can go on and on in this vein, and have a tendency to do so. But the underlying question for me is: What do I mean when I casually speak these terms? 

And what do I mean when I earnestly say, “Lord have Mercy”?

This isn’t going to be answered today. And I have work to get to.

Wednesday March 12 2025

10:00am

The switch to Daylight Saving is really kicking my ass this year.

Yesterday I again slept too late to do my AAD practice before my first appointment. And as the day wore on, the best I could do was 45 minutes of generic, slightly Asturias-oriented, calisthenics.

This morning I did a much better job of getting going early. But after doing my daily morning 10-minute yoga and stretching routine, while I was sitting on the side of my bed putting my socks on, I felt an ache creeping into my lower back. Sat still for a few moments to see if it would pass. But it remained. Hobbled into my day.

“Lord have Mercy” is a whole lot less theoretical today.

Did get my morning guitar practice in. But it was wobbly and unfocused and unsatisfying in general. Tylenol. An AT lie-down. So far nothing is helping. It’s going to be a long day. 

Thursday March 13 2025

10:05am

A little more human today. My back thing has improved but it's not gone. At least I can pay attention to other things now. In spite of Daylight Saving I was up early enough to get my morning routine as well as an hour of AAD practice in before my 9am zoom student.

Remembered to go into the Practice Room this morning. I was alone. Right hand warm-up on open strings, testing the waters. After such a miserable practice yesterday, looking to see if my lower back would permit me to actually pay attention. As I write this, I’m wondering why I don’t practice while standing more often. Most of the time when performing I am standing, so wouldn’t practicing that way make sense. Plus, whatever this spasm action in my back is all about, it’s actually happier when I’m moving than when I’m sitting (or lying in my bed – the first 5 minutes or so after I got up this morning were pretty exciting). I may give this a shot tomorrow morning.

Thankfully this morning was a vast improvement over yesterday. I was able to remain engaged and not just going through the motions. Stayed with pretty basic stuff. Moved from open strings to Guitar 1, playing through it several times. Then to more of a left hand focus. Since I’m going to be doing a Burbles Redux guided practice on Saturday morning, I went back to the 5-note version of the First Primary, moving through a couple of the possible variations. Once settled in, added counting in 4/4 to this. From there to a short refresher of the sequence I’m using in the presentation, practicing various fragments while counting in 4/4. Ended the hour with several passes of Guitar 3.

Departed the Practice Room. I had completely forgotten that I was in it in the first place. Had a half hour to get out of my chair and stretch, make a cup of coffee, get the OST guitar tuned up, and put some thought into what I’d be doing with my 9am student. Interestingly, as we were checking in on the stuff he’s been practicing he asked a couple of technical questions that took us down a very GC path, and the net result was that the lesson had something of a quality of continuation from my personal practice. 

Friday March 14 2025

9:30am

I have a project for the weekend that is more or less Level T on steroids, so I let myself arise at my leisure. Which is to say, about 6:45am. The project begins right after the IAAD team meeting this morning, so a short report.

The usual morning routine. But instead of diving into guitar practice I decided to cook and then enjoy a real breakfast. After clean up I jumped into the practice room. Work this morning was purely about the EotN sectional meeting I’m leading tomorrow. 5-note first primary, while counting in 4. After about 5 minutes I remembered my thought yesterday about practicing while standing. My back has almost fully recovered so I wasn’t getting constant reminders. Went for it, and spent the rest of the session on my feet. After working through a number of variations on the primary, while counting, and breathing, I moved to the succession of Burble exercises I’ll be presenting tomorrow. For this I turned on a loop I created of the A minor section, which I plan to use instead of the metronome tomorrow. About this time Kim joined me in the room. Went through the sequence, though not spending as much time on each iteration as I will in the session tomorrow. 1 beat, 2 beat, 3 beat, and 4 beat sequences, beginning on each of the 5 notes of the pattern. 1 bar patterns, separated by a bar of rest. 4 and 8 bar patterns. 

Waved to Kim as she departed. Wrapped up my work and left the room. Before completing I began a short personal zoom meeting, where I recorded myself along with the loop, just to check the audio balance on the playback.

Ironically, all of this felt good enough that I could have gone on for much longer. Oh well. 

Saturday March 15 2025

5:00pm

Short and sweet:

Morning: 

• An hour of Warmup
• Lead Eye of the Needle sectional
• An hour of prep for Part 2 of a massive Level T project
• House meeting

Afternoon: 

• 5 hours Completion of Part 2 of a massive Level T project

Sunday March 16 2025

IAAD – day off

SGC – morning on

 AND..... CONTINUE.