Serenity Gardens (10.23.17)

Interacting with a fun crowd at Serenity Gardens. Photo by Asimia Heron.

We're getting slammed by a record-setting fall heat wave here in Southern California. Yesterday, in my usually cool beachside town, it briefly went over 100 degrees. To put that in perspective, our average temperature for October is 69 degrees. Today is supposed to be even hotter, and like the majority of our neighbors, we do not have air conditioning here. It kind of sucks, truth be told.

It will also be pointed out to much of the country tonight as game 1 of the World Series kicks off at Dodger Stadium, where it will likely be the hottest WS game ever played. I'm not going to spend a lot of time talking about climate change on this blog; there are many better places to learn about and understand that topic elsewhere. I will take the opportunity to say that it's unquestionable -- to me and to 95% of scientists -- that man's effect on the climate is undeniable, and that for the rest of my life, extreme weather conditions will become more and more commonplace. There's no way around it at this point, so I'm going to predict that putting an AC unit in this home will be an inevitability as these hotter and hotter periods keep coming.

Do these pixels look sweaty to you? Photo by Asimia Heron.

The only reason I bring it up now is that by the time my show at Serenity Gardens got started at 6PM last night, it had cooled down to about 85 degrees. That's still a pretty toasty environment to be putting full energy into singing and playing guitar for a crowd of people. I made sure to power through a lot of water before, during, and after the show, and keeping hydrated and cool when possible is the only way to get through one of these heat blasts without bad repercussions. In any case, the show itself went really well, which surprised me. I made sure not to play too many high-energy songs in a row, which I think helped.

Where Is Kat?
As many people know -- since I bitched about it constantly -- my ladyfriend Kat (aka Christina) was recently gone for over two weeks, from September 21 to October 6, in South America. She visited Bolivia, Peru, Chile, and even Easter Island. It was something she always wanted to do, and I was very happy that she did (despite missing her while she was gone).

However, now she's on a much less joyful trip. Her father has been dealing with terminal cancer for over a year, and on Friday of last week, she got the call that he didn't have much time left. Immediately booking a flight to Seattle that day, she's been up there helping out her family, which is absolutely the right thing to do. It has been extraordinarily difficult for all of them, and all I can really do is be supportive as possible. Having been gone on vacation and immediately turning around and leaving town is not what she'd planned, and it's my hope that the situation resolves as quickly as possible so she can get back down here and start to settle into normalcy again.

The Show
Ah yes, the show. It was a good one, as I mentioned previously. I did one song I'd never done before in SL, and reached deeper into my bag of tricks to do several others I hadn't played in years. Despite the heat, my voice and guitar were both behaving reasonably well, and the people who attended seemed to have fun. No complaints. Good times. Would do again.

Rocking with my skeleton band. Photo by Asimia Heron.

Getting the show rolling. Photo by Aurelie Chenaux.

Collapsing into a chair after my performance at Serenity Gardens.

And real life sweatiness right after finishing the show.

Serenity Gardens set list...
Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere (Neil Young)
Northern Sky (Nick Drake)
*Alison (Elvis Costello)
Losing My Religion (R.E.M.)
Jack Straw (Grateful Dead)
Nothing Compares 2 U (Prince)
Big Yellow Taxi (Joni Mitchell)
Peaceful Easy Feeling (Eagles)
Better Man (Pearl Jam)
Don’t Let It Bring You Down (Neil Young)
Shame Chamber (Kurt Vile)
Just Like Starting Over (John Lennon)
Tea for the Tillerman (Cat Stevens)

*Indicates the first time I've performed this song in SL

Giant thanks to all who came to the Zak Show, with special thanks to the following people who helped support it (and super duper thanks to Asimia and Aurelie for handling the photos in Kat's absence)!
snowflakenana Resident, ErikKottzen Resident, Debi Palmira, go2smoky Resident, easyglider Resident, Asimia Heron, Tyche Szondi, TheaDee Resident, Aurelie Chenaux, my sweet manager Maali Beck, and the great management team of Serenity Gardens, Tilly Rose and Ilsa Wilde!