First off, in tribute to Russia's fallen statesman, Boris Yeltsin, I present the following video. Some of you have seen this before. It's My Niece's Foot, the band I was in in Japan in 1993-94. The song started off as a weird Russian inflected country hoedown jam by Nick (violin) and Sam (guitar). I started shouting, "Boris Yeltsin! Boris Yeltsin!" in hardcore style and so the song was born. Later on when Emily (vocals, tambourine, Asprin bottle) joined we added the heavy metal bit in the middle. That part began life as a separate song titled "Depressing Zoo," all about the very depressing little zoo in Takaoka, the town where we lived at the time. Parts of the video come from the gig we did on a moving street car.
Also, I'd like to remind everyone that on April 28th we'll have our monthly one-day retreat at the Hill Street Center. Details are over there in the links on your left. Come along and spend a day staring at walls together with us! I'm still amazed at how few people show up to the Saturday Zen classes. Last week there were 6 of us, including me. When I give a talk lots of people show up. But ask people to try out a little of the practice and they all scatter. I know many of you are nowhere near Santa Monica. But I'm also aware that many of you are very near Santa Monica and still don't show up. It's not that scary. OK? I don't yell and scream. I don't bite. No one will hit you with a stick. No one will try to make you join the group.
There was other stuff I was gonna say, but now I can't remember what it was. I gotta go do my real job anyway.
