Peruvians

So, I've been in Jersey for some time now. I'm doing the leg of my trip where I go visit my mom's arm of the country and I go back and forth between her residence in Clinton, NJ, her place of work in Allentown, PA and whatever adventure may be had in those parts.

I'll talk a little more about Allentown once I have some real adventure there. If you can't wait, check out another post on this blog, here:

This weekend, I was afforded the opportunity to go New York and make the acquaintance of the Gabriel Alegria Afro-Peruvian Jazz Sextet via seeing them play in their club on Friday and then, on Saturday morning, go with them on a trip to the Litchfield jazz festival in Connecticut.

This, seems like a pretty slick plan, and credit where its due, thanks mom, for putting that one together.

Howwwwwever, there was a little glitch. You see, I was supposed to go hear them play in NYC Friday at 8 in Tutuma, their club, and then Saturday at 7:30 AM, at that club, I would join them on their bus.

Problem being what to do between 8 pm and 7:30 am. Ideally, I would get a lodging somewhere cheap and in the area. However, the swanky jazz club is of course located in a nice part of Manhattan, meaning that there is nowhere cheap nearby at all. And even willing to travel a great distance, cheap places were often straight impossible; it is New York in the summer, the few hostel environments (ahyuck)were certainly probably checked out.

I mean, if they weren't normally, they certainly were when I decided to start wondering where I would stay around 5:00 pm on the way to the club to hear the band.

And of course, I pretty much needed to be in Manhattan so that I could actually make it to the club in the morning. And forget crashing at a friends place, who on earth would I know, So, I'm in a pretty tight spot.

But then, epiphany strikes me like me a girlish slap to the face. I remembered that one of my friends had recently moved to New York and, my some whimsy of a humor-loving god, in Manhattan.

The good lord does smile upon me and I may stay in her gentrified harlem lodging.

Which is some 80 blocks from the place I need to be at 7:30 in the morning, but hey, at least I'm in the borough.

PAUSE

Okay, some shit has has happened between this post and my present, therefore I must give you a truncated edition cause we all need to move on with our lives.

Suffice to say, despite my bonehead move, going to New York without a place to stay, and the fact that I was supposed to spend 7:30 am to 12:30 am with some reputedly hard-drinking Peruvians at the Litchfield Jazz Festival, I had a great time.

I met a dude named Huevito (literally "Eggy") who could make the most sweet music by banging on a box. That's the short story anyway. Despite seeming like a wild-man intuitive musician, he could stop carrying on like a hyper eight year old long enough to shoot off about the Andalucian roots of a particularly variety of Peruvian
tap dance.

And blah blah, my brother's going to India, I'm gonna hang out.

Peace