yet more photos from Oklahoma

jo's everywhere...thanks to Oogers and Randull.They spent lots of time making me get in strange poses...
Again, stranger than usual...

Uhhhhh....no.

What's the plural of y'all.?

All you all.(of course...)

Think I will avoid this look.

Leather and a Big Truck

More promo shots...thanks Oogers...I actually kinda like these shots...weird...

So Sad About Eddie..

Ooogy and Randull allowed me to set up a room at their home in Oklahoma City to go to when not in Broken Bow. This was still in the "setting up" stage...and it looks like Eddie Bauer visited and then exploded.

.Working on the promos in Oklahoma

Oogy and Randull were kind enough to take me out to an oil field and snap some pics in an effort to provide something presentable for a press kit or packet for the cruise line. Seeing these reminds me that I had actually recoverd part of me during this time...more than I had seen in quite a while.

I had lost my wide blush brush and used an applicator that clowns often use to apply their makeup. I hope people will still accept me overall as a human being.

Oogers...

My high school best friend came to visit. Her name is Olga. Yes, I'm not kidding...She was another high spot in the whole experience in Oklahoma. She also wasn't deep fried. Well, at least I don't think so.

Jo backing up...

It's okay. There's nothing to see here.

Move along. Move along.

Attempting to look cool. I think I pulled something...

Well, here is the very start of some photo assembly for the promo kit...

Like many people, I don't do well with the pics of me. Can't tell what looks okay and what doesn't...

So feedback is welcome, unless you are one of the mean people in my life who will suggest I just drive off a cliff or something.

High Seas Lesbians?

Thanks to a wonderful friend who totally believes in me and enjoys my music, the Olivia Cruise Line (lesbian cruises to Alaska, Mexico, the Carribbean, etc.) are currently waiting for me to send in a promo packet to consider me for on board entrtainment. I would be hired to play...and get to cruise for free.

Needless to say I am a little bit enthusiastic about the idea, and assembling the promo packet now. That can be a challenge with no income, but I have friend and family support out there. I will get it done. The photography is already taken care of I think, and I will post the new pics when they are ready...

The biggest challenge will be to get "The Dyke Radar Blues" transferred from cassette to CD format without losing quality. I will need a professional to do that...if anyone has any resources in terms of connections to a studio or anything, let me know.

It has been so long since I have done this. I have to get a large set list together and ready, and will be practicing daily again. I just love this, and had forgotten how much. The guitar was a good investment, although it cost more than I anticipated with my exe's wrath. But I can't control that...

Even if Olivia doesn't hire me, I am going to play gigs again. Music is too much part of my fabric, and I have been idle for too long. My brother has extended an invitation for a potential tour with him this autumn. He is a talented songwriter and musician...all the way to Florida, but I would LOVE to spend time with him and HIS music for a while. He mentioned something about having the chance to play with Don Henley/Tom Petty's drummer (REAL MUSICIANS), so it could be a real growth experience for me. Another doorway to consider...

This serves to remind me that things can happen for reasons that may not be apparent at the time-especially when change is forced and painful. My healing has been slow and agonizing. I STILL miss my ex spouse and the good parts of the life we lived together...even though our interactions now are painful and frequently hostile. We both have taken things from each other, and the wounds are not ever going to completely heal...like attempting to put the dirt back into a hole once dug...never quite fills up again. Our interactions fluctuated between understanding and caring to savage and brutal...both of us...and it stalls recovery at times. I have managed to love again...trust being hard to maintain for certain. I don't trust many anymore... 

But life goes on...and it is... and I am grabbing it...

No Rest For The Weary

My ex partner and biological parent to my daughter saw that I purchased a guitar...and yes, I did indeed find it at a Pawn Shop and spent what little I had on it...to try a last ditch effort at salvation...peace...mental health...

I guess I was supposed to send that money to her although she makes several times what I did (tax free)WHEN I WAS WORKING and I am currently in such agony that I can hardly function. This guitar might literally save me, as I really wish for death at times right now...and have nothing to turn to but what calms and centers me. I HAD to have a guitar to even have a chance here...at wellness... 

and she was sure to tell me how worthless I am, and that others have made it through much worse than this. Yes, that last part is true...and if I hear from one more person the other sentiment, well...I may have to surrender to that....

I fucking surrender.

But she DID generously gave me the option of relinquishing my parental rights to my daughter, or going after me with state child support-which means when I finally get ready to resume my career, I will be so in arrears that I may as well never even work. They will attach my wages to Kingdom Hall Come. She has to pay the payment on her new RV somehow.

I have not had any real parental rights, and they have been gradually eroded ever since she started school anyway. Piece by agonizing piece. I gave them away without a real fight, as lawyering up seemed beyond my capability...

I cannot parent this little girl like this. I guess Pam can now exclude me from her life entirely, as I told her to send me the fucking papers.

I am not going to make it through this. I am just not.

"You Smashed My Heart Through A Garlic Press, You Bitch..."

(Country Two-Step Feel)

(...Because she would hate that...)

You Smashed My Heart Through A Garlic Press, You Bitch
words and music by Joanna Nicholson

Oh....you smashed my heart through a garlic press, you bitch.
You smashed my heart through a garlic press, you bitch.
You knocked it down, ran over it
then backed up to see what you hit
You smashed my heart through a garlic press, you bitch.

SECOND VERSE, SAME AS THE FIRST

My New Best Friend w/benefits

Although I should have been using any little bit of cash I have for more "sensible" purposes, life without a guitar is not going to work for me.

So, I fixed the problem. In a grand way.

And I have a new best friend. I have not yet named her. But it will come to me, probably around the same time the "Garlic Press" song finally comes to fruition.

On board tuner, abalone inlay along fretboard, beautiful finish and design, heavy wood, action like butter, MIC jack built in, great equalizer and pick-up-keeps that warm acoustic sound even through an amp...

I am in love with her. I touch her a lot...as she has GREAT curves.

Pretty sure she won't cheat on me, toss me, and then tell me it was never real.

If she does, I know a busy woodchipper.

Pardon me. Is that a pussy under your seat?

Why yes. It is a pussy under my seat.

Chicken kitty and I just drove across the country. Well, I drove mostly. He has no opposable thumbs.

He started in a pet carrier, but I was pulled over by the New Mexico Highway Patrol for the high pitched yowling so many times, I finally set him free in the pickup cab.

He did get loose once in Yuma (or someplace). Fortunately I cornered him and managed to stuff him in my leather jacket before a big lizard ate him (or something).

Once loose in my truck cab he spent some time under both my gas and brake pedals (oh joy), as well as on top of my head, or hanging from the cab ceiling like a bat.

Then he found a great spot under my driver's seat-where he wedged himself in so tightly it took a crowbar and Crisco to remove him.

People could occasionally hear him yowl from under there, and I would calmly explain that there was a pussy under my seat. Then I would say "I'm real bendy."

Most would leave me alone at that point (except that one truck driver named Cletus).

As my friend Chris pointed out after I arrived, I am staying in a place near "Beaver's Bend" Oklahoma. Somehow fitting.

So....my little chicken cat is happy now (or at least quieter and less puffed up), and I intend to get him some counseling.

Kung Fu Crabs...Dinner AND a Show!

So, after a hard day of work, my closest friend here (J.D) was driving with me back to the house. We went around the port direction, and he suddenly detoured to where the fishing boats were docked. He smiled and told me he would be right back, and disappeared down onto the docks.

He returned carrying a bucket, which he placed in the back of the truck. He informed me that he had gotten two crabs from his friends who had just returned from the crabbing season. They came right out of the boat holding tank...

I love crab (it is illegal in Alaska to dislike seafood, unless you have an allergy and will puff up like a blowfish)...but I was a little bit concerned about having to face the inconvenient truth of critters I had witnessed being alive moments beofre ending up on my plate.

J.D. said he would handle everything, and took the bucket upstairs. I continued working, and I heard a lot of banging around coming from above. Finally J.D. called out that dinner was ready. I went upstairs, and J.D. had prepared a fantastic meal,.complete with drawn lemon butter to dip the poor things in.

Did I mention that I love crab?

It was incredible...tender, sweet, steaming hot right from the shell. I made short work of mine, and when we were done (when I finally managed to look up from my plate) I noticed that the bucket was tipped over in the middle of the room, a hairbrush lay on the floor, and other things were oddly strewn around.

I asked J.D. what happened, and he told me that he let the crabs loose while he got everything ready for cooking. Apparently they had quite a  time skittering around the livingroom, terrorizing my poor cat (who is part chicken anyway and generally afraid of air molecules), bumping into things, knocking things over, making a racket with their shells, and attmpting to fight their own reflections in the slider door window glass.  

I guess one of them even watched CNN for a little while, and attempted to adjust my equalizer.

So then we ate them.

I was downstairs, and missed the whole show..

Who needs video games when you have your dinner to entertain you?

Broken Funny Bone

I was recently trying to tell a friend that I felt like something was broken inside of me from one too many nights curled up on the floor in tears. I told her how it seemed I might never feel joy again (of course, I know better)...and how my favorite foods didn't seem to have much flavor, my favorite music inspired me to nothing, and the incredible ocean shore I awaken to each morning didn't stir me at all. I told her how I WANTED these things to bring some relief and happiness.

There was one moment a while back when I accompanied this same friend to Medford where I started laughing so hard I nearly blew milk out of my nose. (It involved her seeing "shiny people"...and my sudden urge to connect her to mental health services and a tinfoil hat...).

I came back from that trip energized, and feeling alive again-hopeful for healing.

Then I was in this house again, and the memories would not leave me alone.

As time passed I have become more desperate for relief-wanting so badly to be comforted and held, wanting to connect with someone in trust and intimacy....feeling as if that might complete a broken circuit and free me from the frozen, distant, disconnected, and distrusting place I have been in.

:Unfortunately there are very few people I trust anymore-and I recently misplaced it again...thinking I was more important to and understood by someone than I guess I was.

But...now...I found myself in a phone conversation recently with another good friend, and we ended up laughing so hard I couldn't breathe.

And I felt this laughter through and through-nothing between me and this feeling I have missed so much.

So, I am sure I will feel tugs at my heart, or moments of anger. I am sure I will continue missing the things about her that no one else will ever be. But I have the most wonderful friends, and I am sure to have lovers in my future who will light up my life with the things that make them unique and special. Maybe I don't have to run so hard now...

I am back with lightness in my heart...which means that I can continue to take NOTHING seriously-and poke fun of things that are socially inappropriate to "poke fun" of. And I can find new and interesting things to lodge in my nose...or whatever it takes to make people around me as amused as I am.

And I am writing a song for HER per her REPEATED request. It is titled, "You smashed my heart through a garlic press, you bitch." It has a lot of minor chord progressions (and a kazoo instrumental).

Catchy, huh? I think it has potential.