Overheard at Table 4: For Kevin Staedeli

He was a good man.
He was a musician.
He was the kind of musician who just wanted to make music.
He didn't really want the fame or the excess or the riches or the wealth or the girls.
(well, maybe the girls, I mean, what musician doesn't want the girls?)
Well, anyway,
He knew his gear and he knew his sound.
He could play with other bands and he could play with his own.
He was perfectly at home on any stage, big or small, any bar, any venue,
He spoke to the audience with his guitar and his bass.
He was, what they call, a musician's musician.
When you earn the respect of other musicians,
You have reached the level of artisan, a true craftsman.

I don't know how he spent the last twenty years of his life.
I just know he was playing music.  What he wanted to do.
He did it every day.
That's really all any of us could ask for - the chance to do what we love doing.
Every day.

He died four years ago and I didn't even know.
Man, how we let people slip away.
But what I have heard about the Austin scene, this was the musician that he was,
And I will never forget that big-toothed smile of his, or that hearty laughter,
or the sound of his Gibson Les Paul.





MR
2016-0229

Overheard at Table 2: A Man in the Ladies Room

Lucky Moran: Had to use the woman's bathroom the other day.  Co-worker was in the men's room because the men's room has a shower.  So I was thinking to myself, 'What is this cultural barrier toward using the women's room?'  I mean, the only thing different is that there is no urinal and there's a pad dispenser . . . which, by the way, I think should be free and not cost 75 cents.  I mean, what if the lady has a need and doesn't have any quarters?   That's just cruel!

Overheard at Table 4: Follow up to Skype interview

Douglas:  So how'd your interview go?

Michael: It went pretty well.  The recruiter went through my qualifications, then said, 'but there's curve ball they just threw out - you gotta be able to speak some Spanish'  So I told her I did speak some Spanish.  Wife from El Salvador.  We talked for a bit.  Told her I wasn't totally fluent, but she said that was good enough.

Douglas: Think you'll get to meet the client?

Michael:  Hope so.  But then, when I told Analisa, oh MAN! She was all like 'Why did you speak Spanish to her?' and I said, 'Because she's a recruiter!  She needs to be able to shop me to her client that I speak Spanish - the only way to do that is to SPEAK SPANISH!' and Analisa's like 'Is she hot?'

Douglas: Oh boy, what did you say then?

Michael: I said, 'No way, she's hideous!  Festering boils, warts, FEA!' and then she said, 'Show me her LinkedIn!  I wanna see her LinkedIn!'  . . . so she pulls up her LinkedIn and there's her profile of this steaming hot Latina and so now I'M in the doghouse just because the recruiter is good looking!

Douglas: Dude, you always said you liked Latinas because they get jealous.

Micheal: It's not the jealous part that gets me.  It's the retribution part!

Overheard at Table 5: Skype Interview

Michael:  ... so this recruiter wants me to do a Skype interview before she'll send me to meet with the client, and I'm wondering 'Why do I have to do a Skype interview?  Isn't a phone interview good enough?' and I try to get her to 'fess up about it, that it's really about seeing me and making sure I'm not freaking hideous, but she gives me some BS about how it's 'standard practice' and so I'm like 'OK, what the hell'. . .

... then, as I'm waiting for her to Skype in, I look at her LinkedIn profile and holy shit the recruiter is STEAMING HOT!  Then I'm like, 'Oh crap, now I'm really in for it, because on Skype you're always looking down because the camera is above the screen so it's naturally going to look like I'm staring at her cleavage!

How in the hell am I supposed to handle this?

How did they handle these things in the old days?

Overheard at Table 2: The Ingredients of Success

So many people think that just talent and drive are the ingredients of success.  They forget opportunity.  Talent, Drive, Opportunity.  The three components of success.  You can have them all in different amounts, but you have to have a mixture of all three.

Most of the people who have the talent don't have the drive.  They just think they can take a tiny bit of talent and it'll open the doors to fame and fortune.  Some people have more drive than they have talent, and that'll let you hack out some measure of success, that is, until you come up against someone with as much drive and more opportunity.

Now, opportunity is where most people get stuck.   We've kind of swallowed this BS pill that everyone has the same opportunity.  American Dream and all that jazz.   Not really true.   Kids in Compton or Tuscaloosa Alabama just do not have the same opportunities (connections, backing, etc) as kid in Beverly Hills or Rolling Hills CA.

And yeah, sure, the belief is that the drive will let you create opportunities.  Sure.  Hey.  Whatever.   Point is, you got a lot of people out there thinking only about 2  of the 3, but the triad is what gets you that gold ring.