Houston H. Haynes

So I was walking to the Museum of Contemporary Art (MOCA) exhibit on Capital when I stumbled across a very interesting sign in Little Tokyo…

Yes kids, it actually says “Japanese Taco”. So I stopped to take a look at the restaurant frontage, and this is what it looks like:

No kidding – that first poster wasn’t a fluke – they really meant to put “Japanese Taco” up there. Better yet, the banner in the window says “the chicken taste like Lexus !!!”

I wouldn’t have considered the assertion to be credible without the three exclamation marks, but that really sold it for me.

If you think this is an elaborate hoax, just check out their site at lachicken.com. So I’m sold – now I know where I’m going to spend Thanksgiving in Los Angeles. $1 for a “Japanese Taco” is too good to pass up.

There’s a tremendous amount of history around the concept of a composer’s union in film and television industries, and most of it is bad news for composers.You can read the highlights here. Last night I attended a meeting hosted by the Teamsters Local 399 toward formation of a composer’s union here in Los Angeles. It was good to see so many (hundreds, in fact) composers interested enough to attend, gather some info, and be seen at such a meeting. It was also interesting to see who *wasn’t* there, which was also discussed at the meeting in a surprisingly open fashion. Here is a link to my take on the evening’s proceedings, so I won’t repeat them here. Regardless of the obvious (and not-so-obvious) factors against unionization of composers, I think it’s a worthy public discussion to have. I’m hopeful that something positive will come from it, but not optimistic that it will lead to the formation of a union that will be worth its salt. As I said in my post on Northernsounds forum – there’s something darkly attractive about embracing a lost cause – and I have a feeling that I’ll be seeing this one through to the bitter end.

Well – the day gig I picked up back in September didn’t pan out. I had some hope that it would settle into a steady groove – since it was both a familiar workplace and the pay was decent. However, things went awry fairly quickly as the contracting agency I was working with seemed to be operating just outside the bounds of “good faith”. Couple that with a workplace that was as dysfunctional as when I left it back in early 2007 and it made for an untenable mix. Aside from the workplace turmoil I was hit on my Burgman while commuting to work one day. Fortunately I suffered no permanent injury, but the bike was a total loss.

So now I’m back to free-lancing on audio and music gigs while also keeping my eye on the IT contract circuit. A few software QA opportunities have popped up, and I’m going through a cycle of refreshing my resume on the most-trafficked job search sites.

I’m also working on a music project that I’ve had in mind for several months, and am now committed to some sonic exploration in order to find the right “sound” or “voice” for the project. As I get little semi-finished snippets that I like, I’ll post them on my music blog under the heading “Delayed Gratification“, which is a play on words referring to digital delays and other sonic processing used prominently in dance tracks and whatnot. So now it’s back to serious multi-tasking – continuing on the creative path while keeping an eye on the day job circuit.

This is a picture that I received via email earlier today. It’s a shot of Lake Junaluska – near where my father’s side of the family hails from. It reminds me of fall in the mountains of western North Carolina, and makes me just a bit nostalgic.But it’s really nice to see the fall color, even vicariously through a digital photo.

Well, this is my first week at a new-but-old job. OK – so the job is new, but it’s at a very familiar workplace – somewhere I’ve worked before but hadn’t been around for several years. It’s great to see so many familiar faces, most of whom seem to be genuinely glad that I’m back. And more than one person needled me about “never say never” and I have to agree – the surest way to hear God laugh is to announce your plans or make some other declaration. I thought I’d never go back to this industry sector – let alone this specific company. Such as it is, I really had a good time and at least part of my brain likes what it’ doing there.

Even though there’s a bunch of things that are very familiar about this job, there’s plenty that’s different, too. The most obvious thing is my commute. I ride a motorcycle (actually, it’s a large format scooter, but let’s not split hairs at 3AM) and there are definite advantages to splitting lanes to continue moving forward while the rest of the four+ wheeled vehicles are gridlocked. But it’s not like a Sunday drive on the parkway.

It’s a real work-out keeping my eyes/head on a swivel and maintaining my lane position in that kind of traffic. I haven’t done an intense commute like that for a few years and it takes a lot out of you – physically and mentally. Both my arms and legs are sore from the isometric workout of accelerating and braking constantly. This is a much longer and tougher commute than the one I had from Studio City to Pasadena on the 134. It’s pretty obvious that I need to be in better physical condition to make this work, so I’m rethinking my workout strategy to include more lower body strength training as well as some form of stretching routine. I might go back to doing the same routine I was taught as part of my martial arts training, or I might take a Pilates class – and likely I should do both.

The other factor is mental fatigue. Twice this week I’ve fallen asleep on the couch right after eating dinner. I’ve been pretty good about getting my sleep of late so it’s not like I’m catching up or anything. I’m just brain-dead tired when I get home. I occasionally get this way after a long compositional session, but this is the first time I’ve had this happen this many times in one week. Even though there’s a lot of familiar territory at work, there’s still a lot more that needs to be understood, assimilated and mentally digested. Throw a mentally and physically draining commute on top of that and it makes for a very demanding scenario.

So this weekend is going to be about both catching up on the household errands I haven’t done during the week (hello, huge laundry pile – prepare for battle at sunrise) while also ramping up my prep for next week. So tomorrow I’m  kicking off a new/enhanced workout routine that includes more stretching and lower body resistance training. No pain, no gain – and all that.