kavame, kaptain

weds I have less than $1.50 in total bank assets. Payday is Friday. I could stay in and meditate but I have a revelation: pawn loans.
I look up the value of the old PRS knockoff I got when I helped that guy move out and figure I’ll get enough to cover a couple nights out. Before the mens group I run by Cash America and get 75 bucks for it, due back 100 bucks in 30 days. I proceed to the church, lead the worship, we fellowship.
I get home and change into the proper getup. The karaoke klub is perched inside an old commercial brewery south of downtown. Turnout is slight and all-male but at least they’re into it. There’s a ruddy lean long faced gent on the front stool who goes along with the shtick and seems to get it when I act like I’ll steal his backpack as I enter the crowd during “pressure drop” (maytals, toots and the) and attempt to garner participation. When I return to my lonely stool he opens up his praise and asks if I’d accept a small token of appreciation. Given his circumstances with the union I can’t help but accept, pocket the g.
One cat looks like Joey Ramone’s only-begotten-son-on-IPA’s. I tell him as much while he glam-metals in a 3X tie died band shirt that barely fits his stature. He’s in a group with the other guy.
I pry: Joey Jr plays guitar. Long face goes by Omenfrog and plays the cittern. He’s playing solo at the Kava lounge; it’s the same lounge where I’d stumbled in and met the lovely young lady from Florida, of Argentine descent no less, but that’s for another time; thus with the merger of fatestrings it’s inevitable I’ll be there Friday to see firstly, foremostly, what the heck a cittern is.

I get up and do “trampled under foot” (Zeppelin, Led) to much approval. Theres some neck tatooed tootall junkies playing pool down the hall. I ask into the mic if we can get those freaks to sing, slightly ridicule them from afar. Sure enough the one guy with a posture like an elongated rooster comes down for a drink and when I put the mic in front of him he abides in spite of the meth. The music is working.
I mingle with the musicians and tip the DJ before I bail into the cool northwestern night.

Thursday after work I tell the guy from the worship team there’s a couple things going on. Three bands uptown tonight. Omenfrog tomorrow. Then the pièce de résistance: Saturday a ten-act all female lineup at the very same venue as the karaoke klub.
He’s sick but hoping to rally for Saturday.
I get all dressed up in the most toned down fashion I can manage, don the bluesky truckerhat and get in the little red electric car. I make it all the way to the show just to turn around, grab a wendy’s JBC (cash) to stifle sudden nausea before heading home. I remaster some demos and repost. Inflate the bed. Descend to sleep.
Friday is too sunny to bear from the confines of the office. When work ends I bathe, grocery shop, drink some red wine mixed with ice and coca cola. I leave at 7 and get there 7:30; Omenfrog is standing outside with large white leaf earrings and a leather jacket over a leather vest. The cittern is a beautiful instrument, as if el greco had drawn a banjo: all wood with a bulbous body and slender neck, five courses of strings, tapered headstock. I wish him luck in the parlance of the discipline and head in. The first act is on with an electric guitar and a loop pedal. It’s well composed, compellingly played. Becoming more and more compelling after I order the kava with the pineapple it, add micronized.

There’s a pac man table game with my name on it and I beat a few levels in a growing glowing hazy aura of subtle euphoria that begins to edge my cynicism into ebullience. Attendance began with the strictly overweight LOtR/D&D crowd, now blending into young couples, yuppie bachelors, addicts. I’m defying categorization moving from the pac man table to the spot behind the leather couch where I can see Omenfrog’s fingerpicking up close despite the massive forearm sized like a country ham up on the seatback around the similarly-proportioned neck of the woman next to the forearm’s owner.
When I realize this is the highlight of the night on this side of town, I start searching for a new destination. Like a lighting bolt it appears on the night out blog: Roller Disco.