One from the heart

If you’ve been following this blog for any reasonable amount of time—and really, if you have you need to get outside more—then you already know I have what we could accurately call a slightly compulsive side to my otherwise sparkling personality.

Whether it’s food, movies, jokes, the crap tables or in this case, music, I’ll latch onto something then run it mercilessly into the ground, usually driving everyone around me crazy along the way.

I think by now you know a certain gravel-voiced singer from New Jersey is one of my life long obsessions. I don’t even want to think about the money, time, travel and effort that’s gone into following him around the country for years. I’m not complaining: it goes without saying, even though I’m going to say it, that I’d do it all again in a heartbeat.

Especially the trips where I got double airline miles.

Well, the bad news for those around me on the friends and family plan is I believe I may have found another artist I can see myself getting that obsessed about. His name is Paul Thorn.

Gravel voiced, bluesy, honest, beautifully written songs that speak directly to and from the heart, he’s the real deal. In a world of singer/songwriters who should be wildly famous and popular, Paul Thorn is right up there at the top of the list.

How did I find out about him? Funny you should ask. I was surfing YouTube for a funky Donny Fritts video, as one does. The video I found was a song called Temporarily Forever Mine. I loved the idea of the title, and it was a beautiful song. I noticed it’d been written by some guy named Paul Thorn.

For the next four hours, I went down a YouTube rabbit hole watching his videos over and over (compulsive, remember?). I was hooked.

I went to his website, paulthorn.com, to see where he was touring. Come to find out the only Southern California show he was doing on his current tour was at a club called Belly Up in Solana Beach, near San Diego. On a Monday night. Not the best night or the closest venue, but it didn’t matter. I was going to see him and nothing could stop me - except for the torrential rainstorm that decided to hit the night he was playing. I couldn’t leave work early enough, and even if I could have traffic was impossible.

So, disappointed though I was, I checked his site again to see if there were any other cities I could catch up with him. Turns out, while I was sleeping, he added a Newport Beach show just two nights later.

Long story long, I scored two tickets to the sold out show. The wife couldn't join me, so I invited my friend Eric - a fine musician in his own right - and we went and saw him. It was spectacular. He performed an earlier album of his in its entirety, as well as several other songs of his. And one Jackson 5 song, which made me love him more.

You'll notice I haven't done any Jason Statham jokes. First, I'm pretty sure he's heard them all. And second, he was a professional boxer who at one time went six rounds with Roberto Duran, so I don't want to upset him.

Anyway, here are a few videos to give you a little flavor of what I'm talking about. I hope you like him as much as I do.

And should you decide you want to see him live, just say when. I’m in.

The big dipper

The photo is slightly misleading since this post is about my kitchen floor, and not a giant sinkhole. But if I don't do something about it soon, it could wind up like that.

When we first bought our house, we did the traditional walk-through before we closed. That's the part of the transaction where you notice all the little things that are wrong you didn't notice before, and the sellers - along with their mother who's acting as their real estate agent - tell you why it's not really a problem so they can close the deal and move on to their next home in Newport Beach. Then you take them to arbitration for trying to pull the wool over your eyes, and you get a judgement in your favor for $10K. How you like me now Duleep and Jamie?!

I may be getting off point here.

Anyway, during the walk through I noticed a small, shallow, hardly worth mentioning little dip in the kitchen floor just in front of the dishwasher. I wasn't even sure I'd felt it, and no, I won't be using the high school girlfriend joke here.

Fast forward sixteen years later, and that dip in the floor is now a small canyon.

We don't know whether to fix it or add a viewing platform.

We're leaning towards fixing it.

The problem is, our house was built in 1949, and the kitchen floor is tiled with linoleum. So, one thing leads to another. If we're going to fix the dip in the floor, we have to tear up the linoleum to do it. Which means not only do we repair the subfloor, but we put in a new floor over it. Also, we've been planning to remodel the kitchen since we've lived here, so it would only make sense to do all the cabinets and appliances first and then tear up the floor.

That dip is slowly turning into a money pit.

We haven't decided exactly what to do yet or how much we want to spend on it. We do know we're in a race against time, because we're only probably a couple months away from someone stepping through the floor and being hip deep in linoleum.

It'll probably be me since I'm the one who loads the dishwasher all the time. It's not because I want to. It's because, and I'm not bragging here, I'm a dishwasher savant. I know how to maximize the space. It's like that movie A Beautiful Mind, except in my version, instead of seeing equations in the air John Nash sees how all the dishes fit in the racks.

I know the entire family will be happy once the kitchen is done. It's really the last problem we have with the house. Then, we can all sit back and enjoy this house the way we've wanted to since we moved in.

Besides, I'm sure the lights blowing out when we run the washer, dryer and dishwasher at the same is fairly common.