Bassic-ly me

okay well...I know I'm going to look back at that statement once our baby is born and think...HAHAHAH YOU FOOL ....YOU HAD IT MADE!  but... Life is relative to the experiences you've had in the past and untouchable by those you'll have in the future!! So not only are Elizabeth and I having a baby..but we also bought a house.... a nice 42 year old 4 bedroom bungalow here in Charlottetown, nice corner lot..big backyard..big frontyard...two big trees in the backyard perfect for future Swing Installation, a finished basement for the family room, nice hardwood floors in the upstairs living room and hallways...a garage...2 car driveway...it's awesome...we love it...we love it ...we love it... but....the basement was tres 70's complete with Orange Shaggy carpet, newspaper wallpaper and darker than you can imagine...even with the fake window..I'm talking shutters that when you opened you saw concrete and a flouresent light....the subfloor in the basement was also like a...

....A Father! Elizabeth and I are having a baby...well Elizabeth is...but you know what I mean WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO HOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!! Deryl, Elizabeth & Baby

Ya know what I take for granted...and I'm sure you do too... the sky It's incredible. I'm sitting in the outdoor courtyard of Mavor's using my computer..and my neck was sore so I leaned back in my chair and stretched my neck so I was staring straight up at the sky..and it's bluer than you can imagine and there are this whisps of clouds slowly moving..they look like the rippled waves of sand left behind after the tide moves out...but slowly moving across that amazing blue sky... I looked at this...for a good minute straight....I probably looked weird but I didn't care...I had this moment...this...I went back to being a 4 year old and looking at the sky thinking..."what's the sky made of?!" - I know what the sky is "made" of, or rather what causes the appearance of this blue seemingly tangible blanket that covers us during the day and strangely disappears at night, but ...wow...it's amazing...it's beautiful...it's haunting...it...

Today during the matinee of Anne of Green Gables ( which btw...Heather MacGuigan filled in for Jenny Toulmin today and kicked ass! ) ...anyway...yeah...so ...that's gotta be the world's quickest digression... there I go again... anyway....so...today during Anne of Green Gables ( which btw...it was sold out...so people were sitting in the front row ) ...it's important to the story...it really is...because ya see...where my head is  in "The Pit" is about foot level with those people in the front row....and well..there was this girl...( well I assume she was a girl...she was wearing girlie sandals...no offense to the guy who may have been wearing the very feminine sandals ) ...yeah..so ..there was this girl sticking the front part of her sandals in the crack between the floor and the barrier between the front row and the pit...enough so that about 2-3 inches of her sandals were about 18 inches from me....and well...it was distracting...I'm sitting there trying to...

I forgot about one of the worse nightmares I had....that unfortunately came true.  In 1998 I was on top of life.  I had just gotten out of a terrible relationship, was feeling quite good and free and I'd been hired by Feast Dinner Theatres and was doing a show in Summerside at the Brother's two all summer.  Near the end of the summer, a few weeks before September, I had this dream... In slow motion....I was walking down Euston Street in Charlottetown towards Victoria Park.  As Euston turned into Brighton I started to pass Prince Edward Home.  Something made me walk up to the front of the building, though I did not know why.  ( At this time in my life I had never actually set foot inside this place ).  In slow motion...I walked up the steps, through the front door...Nurses were staring at me in pity...I walked to the end of the front foyer.  In slow motion...I turned right to go down the hallway...passed room, upon room, of people on their deathbed...

I had never owned an album by The Doors  until this month.  Of course I knew of their "hits" but I never got past that.  I liked the songs but never dug deeper.  Never felt the need to.  I find it amazing, yet uncoincidental, that Jim Morrison died on July 3rd 1971 when he was 27 and on this past July 3rd 2005, at the age of 27, I walked into a used book store with no predetermined purpose and bought " No One Here Gets Out Alive ", the biography of Jim Morrison, subsequently turning into a first time Doors fan, buying their first 5 CDs in the span of a couple weeks, watching all Doors concert DVDs I could find, buying two of Jim Morrison's books of poetry..or as he would have preferred, James Douglas Morrison's books of poetry, and I just finished watching Oliver Stone's movie The Doors...yes...for the first time.  There are no such thing as coincidences...there are only events that have meaning. The Lords. Events take place beyo...

Well we had the Jive Kings reunion on Sunday July 10th as part of the PEI Jazz and Blues Festival and what a time it was! For us and seemingly for the audience.  I have to say I really missed the excitement of being onstage with our little ol' swing band from this little ol' sandbar.  And there's something to be said for receiving crowd appreciation like that...for those of you that were there...Thanks!  For those that weren't...it was a giant tent Smack Dab in the middle of Queen Street filled with 1500 people there to support our reunion...rockin!  There's just nothing like it!  It was exhilirating, emotional, and exhausting all at the same time.  Felt like that first big weekend we had at the 2000 ECMAs in Sydney ....we went not knowing if anyone had ever heard of us and turned out to be the Buzz band of the weekend.  All weekend we kept hearing 'You're in the Jive Kings!?! Man you guys are awesome!!! I got your CD and can't wait to se...

I'm a musician I have been since I was 14.  I learned Guns and Roses tunes by ear, went through the Colonel Grey band program.  I received my bachelor of music from UPEI while touring with the Jive Kings.  I've done a good amount of recordings I'm proud of.  I've been able to use my experience and knowledge to teach my skills to probably well over 100 private students in the past number of years.   I'm a bass player.  I get paid to play bass.  But... Except for phases ( like the one I'm going through now ) I have had a terrible CD collection and I hardly listen to music How weird is that? Sometimes I chaulk it up to 'Do you see a Doctor performing Surgery at Home just for fun?!!'  ( I can attest to this....I've yet to see my father-in-law come home and cut one of us open for kicks ) but.....it's not the same.  Doctors are constantly learning through reading and conferences etc... i.e. their 'music', their 'CDs'.  But ...

First off, get your mind out of the gutter!  Today was an off day.  Tonight I was playing in 'the pit' for Anne of Green Gables and I had one of those off nights!  That's an understatement! I screwed up just about every song tonight! It felt like it was the first time I played the bass and as my first test I was given the bass book to Anne of Green Gables and forced to learn on the spot.  It started when I woke up and couldn't figure out what time it was. I had forgotten to set the alarm and had to teach a lesson at 11am.  Luckily I hadn't overslept but I woke up in a panic and that feeling basically stayed all day. I spent way too long downtown doing really nothing today and it wore on me.  I hate being away from Elizabeth and hate not having a car.  I really don't mind walking at all, in fact I love it.  I've walked all of my life.  It's just that sometimes the convenience of a car is so great.  Like today, I had to teach the lesson a...

Yes my wife Elizabeth is a music therapist and some might call me biased ( or following strict orders ) by saying that but....Music Therapy really is amazing! I have heard Elizabeth talk and write about music therapy for a number of years now, trying to explain what it is to people, and writing papers for university, accreditation files and ethical dilemnas for internships, and now proposals for starting her own Music Therpy PEI business ( www.musictherapypei.ca ).  It's one thing to hear about it and read about it...it's another thing to see it!  I had the pleasure of seeing her practice twice. I once had the pleasure of observing her practicing Music Therapy during two of her sessions for her 6th month internship at Baycrest Centre for Geriatric Care in Toronto.  It was wonderful to see my then fiancee practicing her craft and to see that she really was good at it!  The first group were general incare patients at Baycrest, and many of the...

I am SO glad I'm not in highschool anymore!  This morning I went with Elizabeth to drop her off to her session ( yes, this time I knew which quadrant I was in...but...no I wasn't driving...ha ).  I went to 'the walmart' to pick up a small CD flip case to put DVDs in for my train ride home to PEI on May 25th.  Okay I dygress...that has nothing to do with Highschool...I don't there was even a walmart...sorry.... the walmart when I was in Highschool...okay...dygressing again... So I finished early and I went back to the Highschool where Elizabeth was doing her session.  I sat in the parking lot with the windows down, damn nice day today, listening very loudly to Nellie MacKay ( check her out if you haven't   www.nelliemckay.net  ).  So, as the highschool 'kids' were getting out of class and heading to their cars they would hear this loudish music coming from my car and they would stare and me with that glaring 'I'm in highschool and you're weird...

Welcome to my Blog!  Funny thing is...I don't even really know what Blog means!  I know the concept, I know what it does, I know it's purpose, but...well...I don't know where the word Blog came from?  Is it some random word, or does it mean something? Sort of like  "G...that's one Blob of words, G!  It's so wordy it's like a Blog!"  Cheesy!  Anyway...so I used to write a lot.  Especially from Grade 10 to the end of my university degree.  I'd write in journals, poems, lyrics, letters, essays, papers, tests, etc, etc. and well, besides the academic categories, writing was a major release for me. Since becomming a web programmer I've stopped.  I spend so much time in front of the computer writing code that writing my thoughts seems like more work rather than a release, which is too bad.  The Blog Idea was in the back of my head since building my website.  But I was never sure if anyone would want to read m...