Dreaming and other cool stuff...

So of course that's Eric Slick on drums and Julie Slick on bass and here's the official Adrian Belew press release on the School of Rock website written by Paul Green:

SCHOOL OF ROCK STUDENTS MAKE GOOD
PGSORM alumni and Uber Rhythm section Eric and Julie Slick have gotten a dream gig-they are now the back up band for guitar legend ADRIAN BELEW! For those who aren't familiar with Adrian, he's a former guitarist for Frank Zappa, David Bowie, and The Talking Heads, as well as the frontman for King Crimson since 1981, not to mention his own fantastic (GRAMMY NOMINATED) solo career. He is also, IMHO, one of the greatest guitarists walking the earth, and a beautiful human being to boot.

Eric and Julie will be joining him for his upcoming tour dates, including Zappanale 2006 (which also features the School of Rock All-Stars.) While on tour, they will also be recording a live album: SIDE FOUR!

To see all of the tour dates for the Adrian Belew Trio, as well as read Adrian's own announcement about Eric and Julie, please check out Adrian Belew's website.

************

Pretty wild, huh?

Actually, I'm so excited let me cut and paste the dates here and yes! I see the Rome, Italy date confirmed and now I can get my act together and see if I can swing the Italy/Amersterdam portion of the tour:

2006 TOUR DATES
●07/06 Music Mill - Indianapolis, IN
●07/07 VPASAC - Springfield, OH
●07/08 Double Door - Chicago, IL
●07/16 Zappanale - Bad Doberan, GER (more)
●07/17 Laghetto Di Villa Ada - Rome, IT
●07/19 De Boederij - Zoetermeer, Netherlands
●07/21 Berg Herzbert - Herzberg, GER
●08/08 B. B. King's House O Blues - NY, NY
●08/09 Stephen Talkhouse - Amagansett, NY
●08/10 Turning Point - Piermont, NY
●08/11 Buffalo Icon - Buffalo, NY
●08/16 Chastain Park - Atlanta, GA

Also, I'm pretty sure August 13 and August 14 are the World Cafe Live in Philadelphia but it's not on their website yet because their webmaster has been on vacation. And I believe they expect to add more shows after the Georgia date...Florida is one possibility.

Okay, on to some writing news. In spite of the tooth from hell and construction next door, I've been on a real tear to finally finish Baby Boomer (and I may change the title yet again but that's the least of my worries) so that I can send out the whole thing before I start bouncing around Europe. Congratulations to Jordan Rosenfeld who also just signed with a new and wonderful agent as did two of my other close friends who are always in the comments section here but since I didn't read it on their respective blogs, I don't want to let the cat out of the bag for either until they are ready.

And please take notice that another one of my great pals Ellen Meister has a brand new website and finally, Amazon put the cover of her new book on their site so now it appears in all its glory on the right hand side here where I have "recommended reading" instead of that sad empty white box that's been there for the past several weeks. I say take this opportunity to pre-order it! Trust me on this, it's an incredible read.

Okay, you know this post so far has been too normal for me, and I can't even believe I'm sharing this because I swore I was going to give the whole Neil Gaiman thing a rest but yeah, it's true -- after writing about him for months and giggling about how adorable he is with my pals, last night I had my first official dream about him. While I was asleep, I mean har har. It's what just woke me up and initially I couldn't make heads or tails of what it means -- which is fine, I worry about people who take dreams too seriously -- but sitting here now and sipping my first cup of coffee of the day I do have a few theories which I'll share at the end of this thing.

But first, remember that I am still on antibiotics and painkillers so my imagination is on overdrive...the tooth from hell gets removed tomorrow which is a whole 'nother story. I'm scared!

Anyway, the dream. I'm sitting in a cafe in Germany with my family -- and that would be my entire family -- Julie, Eric, and yes, even Gary, who, exactly like Neil's Mary, likes to stay in the shadows and hardly ever travels with me except maybe once or twice a year where again, he keeps himself distant from my writing life -- affords me both solitude and freedom to come and go as I please -- hence why the relationship still continues after all of these years. And mutual adoration for Julie and Eric along with all things music of course. (As a side note, because I'm a yenta I freely admit to googling Mary/Gary but I got nothing. Well, in Gary's case that's not entirely true. There is a very staid, academic Dr. Gary Slick who is a doctor/college professor and lives in Oklahoma -- not my Gary for sure, who spent last night hollering at the television and clamoring for a revolution to overthrow the Bush administration and take control of the oil fields. Anyway, even stranger there is yet a third Gary Slick who does the dog show circuit with beagle gundogs. I couldn't resist clicking on Google Images and there he was, Beagle Gary, with a dog that looked exactly like my Monty! They won third place. What's hilarious is that our Monty isn't even a purebred but a mix of beagle and God knows what else but I swear, he's a ringer for the award winner. But as far as Beagle Gary goes, he looks Republican and wears a baseball cap. He raises gundogs for Christ sake. Wait. What is a gundog exactly? I don't think I want to know. For those of you wondering, my Gary has shoulder length hair, a full beard, and plays guitar.)

Okay, I'm digressing for a change. So the four of us are at this little cafe in Germany, and I'm pretty sure it's the restaurant which really exists with the yellow umbrellas outside in Bad Doberan where all the musicians hang during the Zappanale Festival. The waitress hands us menus and none of us could understand anything on them, even Gary, who believe it or not took German in high school because like me, who took Latin, wanted to be "different" and god forbid either of us took anything normal like Spanish. Even in my dream, I knew to warn everyone that we had to be careful of what we ordered because Julie and Eric are both vegetarians now, so that eliminated anything schnitzel-wise but as Gary pointed out, there was nothing schnitzel on the menu, anyway, and were we really sure we were even in Germany? (Another side note: Gary is the one going to Zappanale this year in spite of his hatred of airplanes and I'm incredibly jealous but I've got to stay here and baby-sit the dog. Don't ask. But as I said, I'm obviously going to immediately see about Amsterdam and Italy and a bunch of U.S. dates, too, now that they are official. Gary and I will probably be on planes flying in opposite directions on July 17. And did you ever see anyone digress so much and take so long to just spit out a story? Okay...I promise to just tell the rest of the dream now.)

So...we're sitting there all confused and starving and trying to comprehend the menu when I look up and see with a jolt that Neil Gaiman has joined us. He takes an empty seat next to me and says "Hi" and Julie, Eric, and Gary all said "Hi"...he takes a menu, looks it over, sees our anxious faces, and says "Don't worry...I'll handle this," he said.

"Julie and Eric are vegetarians," I warned him.

"I know. I read your blog," he replied. (Oh please. He probably read it twice and both times caught me gushing about him which wasn't too mortifying and there I go sidetracking the dream again)

So I blushed and could hardly talk at all and Neil says "Relax, Robin, you're part of the family now."

Ha ha - I'm still trying to figure out what that meant. I'm part of my own family now or I'm part of Neil's?

No, it means you are insane, Robin. Continue on with the dream before you lose the rest of your three remaining readers.

So Neil motions the waitress to come over and he speaks to her in some strange, foreign language that sounded more Martian than anything else. She writes down what he says and walks away. Neil looks at us and says "I've ordered us all the same thing. You will absolutely love it."

And then a few minutes later our food is delivered and we look down and we all have four huge black bowls (ha...a little Neil/Robin dining attire thrown in) filled to the top with peanut butter and milk. I'm totally serious. It was like two scoops of Skippy Extra Crunchy swimming in milk, as if it were cold cereal or something. And we all just kind of stared at each other and then at Neil, who was happily spooning the stuff into his mouth so naturally I took the first spoonful on behalf of the Slick family, my family followed suit and from that moment on, none of us could talk because the peanut butter was totally stuck to the roofs of our mouths and had rendered us all mute.

And that's when I woke up, gasping for air, and when I realized I wasn't dying of peanut butter suffocation I started laughing out loud and went downstairs to write this up before I forgot the details.

I am sure dream analysts could have a field day with me but as I sit here now, I've just come up with five explanations on my own:

(1) The dream means that in reality, I have a terrible longing to return to my childhood and peanut butter sandwiches and big glasses of cold milk were a part of that. Also, I know that Neil writes childrens' books;
(2) I am very worried that Julie and Eric aren't getting proper nutrition since they've decided to be vegetarians but that doesn't explain Neil Gaiman at our table unless I just wanted him there to look at;
(3) I really want to go to Zappanale and I'm pissed that I can't because Gary is and someone has to stay home and take care of the dog. That doesn't explain Neil Gaiman at our table, either, unless I just wanted him there to look at;
(4) I am a complete lunatic who is even being badgered by my sleeping sub-conscious to shut up by attempting to glue my tongue to the roof of my mouth;
(5) All of the above.

And now with this post I realize that I've probably finally given my Gary his first real Google listing. He would be extremely annoyed if he knew but he won't find out unless someone tells him. He never goes anywhere near a computer unless he absolutely must and considers the internet and most modern technology the Mother/Father of All Evil and the death of true creativity.

Ho ho. Not me. Give me anything electronic with either a battery and/or a plug and I can guarantee you I'll find happiness.

Later,
xo