Cat Jahnke Mews

This is the perfect depiction of how busy I’ve been feeling lately.

(I’ve always hated my feet.  If I had a therapist, she’d be very proud of me right now.)

I absolutely adore being part of the Signature Craft Sales. While the days can be long and grueling, there are many rewards.  It’s an amazing way to not only meet great folks who are coming to the show to pick up handmade products, but it’s an amazing way to meet (and be inspired by) all the artisans who are making these works of art!

Sometimes I even get to meet a real life blast from the past:

Recently, at the craft show in Regina I was approached by a crew from CBC Television.  The host looked ridiculously familiar and I was sure that I had at some point gone to school with her or seen her around my hometown of Saskatoon.  After comparing backgrounds she finally said, “Oh and I used to be on the TV show Street Cents…”

!!!

That was one of my absolute favorite shows when I was a teenager.  If you guys haven’t seen any episodes, I’m sure you can find some on You Tube.  “Fit for the pit!”  “What’s your beef?”  Loved it…

In any case, I was lucky enough to be invited to take part in one of their segments.  It aired this Thursday and they’ve posted the segments online.  It’s a brief appearance, and my hair looks wonky(!) but I thought I’d share it nonetheless.

Skip ahead to 17:50 and 21:30.  And seriously, if you know a hair stylist that wants to hit the road, that pines for long days in a car, that can handle the challenge of wicked bedhead, please send me their resume…

XOXO

Here I go again with another one of those vague diplomatic emails.  Sometimes I crave the freedom of an anonymous blog; it would be a very therapeutic way of dealing with the many stressful situations one encounters on tour.  But instead I choose to mask the details of what made me upset, and speak in grand hypothetical questions which I’m sure are soothing to no one but myself…

Let’s begin:

First of all I just want to ask: what grade are we in?  How old does someone have to be before they can just suck it up and deal with pesky nuisances without whining about “starting a petition”?  There are so many injustices in this world that need representation.  Why waste your stamina tearing someone apart instead of acting like an adult and accepting the state of affairs as they are?

Would you get your neighbors to band together to oust the renegade on the block who only plants yellow flowers?  Is that worth your time?  Because if it is, you’re a rabble-rouser and you do no good.  Don’t fool yourself in to thinking you’re a hero.  (Now I’ve got THIS song stuck in my head…  Rabble Rabble…)

Hmm… maybe all this junk just happens to inspire me and you’ll get to sing this blog post when it comes out on my next album…  ☺

Enough of that.  But if you have a spare moment, send me some good vibes because I’m feeling a little shredded over here…

On a happy note, someone thought I was 15 today!  Sweet!

Love and kisses to all my good peeps…

I’ve got a benefit show coming up in Saskatoon and the folks at Canadian Tire have been generous enough to donate a prize of our choice to the silent auction.  While driving through Alberta today, we spied one of their locations and decided to do some scouting.  I spent some serious time strolling their aisles, trying to pick out a desirable gift within the budget.  As if it’s not hard enough to choose something for someone you know; imagine how hard it is to guess the interest of a couple hundred strangers!

I think we’re going to go with a coffeemaker and pair it with the gift basket being donated by McQuarries Coffee.  Holy cow!  If you’re in the Saskatoon area and you have an afternoon to kill, go visit McQuarries.  When I was a little girl I never hesitated to stop and smell those ground coffee beans.  While I’ve never been a drinker of the stuff, I’ve been an avid smeller for years!

After making our decision, we continued on our path to Calgary, dropped our gear off at the hotel and found a sushi restaurant on 11th ave (despite Google giving us incorrect instructions).  What a great place!  Check out Uptown Sushi for cheap but delicious food and great atmosphere: a huge bowl of Edamame, the best tasting yam tempura I’ve ever had, and a beautiful décor.  To cap it off, the woman at the till gave me an interesting wire photo holder…  just because!  I’ll have to take a picture of it to post here.  Thank you Uptown Sushi!!

Meanwhile, back at the inn…  Ah, (certain chain of) hotels!  You have yet to impress me.  In fact, you have yet to host me without complaint.  I’m open-minded however and would ADORE having this track record smashed.  I’m currently lying in a pretty comfy bed, so you’ve got some points right off the hop.  The temperature’s under control, the bathroom was clean, the front desk staff was courteous, and there’s no horrific aroma emanating from some indiscernible corner of the room.  Hmm…  I hope you prove me wrong!

Tomorrow I start another weekend with the Signature’s Craft Sales.  If you’re in the Calgary area, come on down to the Calgary Stampede Roundup Centre.  With the abundance of talent that I see at these events, if you do brave the parking fee and come on by, I promise that you will see at least one amazing thing during your visit.

A demain!

I’d like to take this opportunity to thank goodness for my smallness.  My entire sleep allotment for this day was doled out in two hour increments in a car on the number one highway.  Perhaps I’ve already discussed this in a previous blog.  I don’t care; I’m freaking grateful that I can sleep comfortably in a bucket seat!

We’re billotted with one of the town doctors here in Medicine Hat.  Good thing too because I wanted a second opinion about a burn I recently acquired using faulty oven mitts.  (Check your oven mitts people!)  I realized after the show that during my last visit I also consulted with him about an injury I’d sustained in the very same place!

I think my right index finger is jinxed!

Thanks to the Prickly Pear for the great evening and for the YUMMY EGG SALAD SANDWICH!!!

I remember reading a Farley Mowat book in which he discusses his switch from a regular sleep schedule to one more in tune with the wolves he was studying.  Instead of the usual 8 hours straight, his sleep allotment came in much smaller increments spaced throughout the day.  This is much how Darren and I survive in the days leading up to a long tour, although the biggest difference between Mowat and me is that I can usually only fit in one nap in a 24-hour cycle.

I can’t believe how much there is to do!!  Besides just packing clothes and gear, we had to coordinate merch, keep the promotion in motion, clean the house for our house-sitter…  Darren even took time to remove the sticky gunk left behind on my guitar case after a run-in with some duct tape.  Peanut butter works like a charm!  A messy, unappetizing, “may contain traces of nuts” charm!

We didn’t have time to consume food ourselves, but we had to make sure the guitar case was fed.

So while the case ate like a king all out of Wonder Bread, I prepared an all-day buffet equally as nourishing:

Part of this complete breakfast!

By the end of the day I was so tired that I just barely remember giggling while describing a t-shirt caption idea.  I will share it here knowing that it makes absolutely no sense, but I just want to prove my exhaustion:

It supposed to say “Oops!” but there’s an “O” missing.  This was side-splititngly funny to me at 4 am.  I don’t think you’d truly grasp the hilarity unless you stayed up for 30 hours straight, subsisting only on “baked not fried” crackers, OR if you banged your head really hard.  I recommend neither; I’m always up for a laugh, but this one’s just not worth it…

I was so pleased to stop in Wabigoon for my first show of the tour.  Thank you for hosting us John!  I hope you didn’t mind me grilling you about your job as a “flight medic”.  I’m just so fascinated with people who have that kind of information in their head, and those kind of adventures in their past.  I wanna learn how to trach someone at 20,000 feet!  (Although with my level of aerophobia I think I would find it difficult to wield a scalpel while simultaneously clutching my armrests…)

4/13/08 – MHS Auditorium, Wawa, ON

I finally got to see Rossport in the daylight, having only visited previously in December, arriving after dinner and leaving before dawn. This would usually be a great opportunity to spy some amazing scenery, but when the morning light blasted through our window at 6:30 am this morning, I was a bit less excited about the landscape.

I need one of these thingers, like Blanche from the Golden Girls! On the road it’s very hard to control your environment and while I’ve been tempted to bring along a hammer, some nails, and a large light-proof blanket, the aforementioned gizmo would probably save me some apologizing to my hosts.

Honestly though, everything is more agreeable in the daylight. This past November we were shrouded in darkness for the larger part of our trip through this region and, looking back, I realize the long drives sit on a different place in my soul when accompanied by the stars.

I just finished a book about the race for the North Pole and while reading I was challenged to wonder about the effects of several months of night. I claim to be a night owl, most comfortable and inspired in fake light, but it would be difficult to be so contemplative for so long without imploding and shutting down completely. It’s a great mind exercise to think about how ready one is to wind down at 5 pm in midwinter, and how jazzed one is to head to the park at 7 pm on a bright warm summer day.

Heading into Wawa today, I was reminded about our last trip through and how if we hadn’t stopped at their self-serve gas pump, we would have most definitely been stranded on a frozen highway until morning. I was glad then, to be afforded a pilgrimage back to the land of my deliverance. It was not exactly what I had expected…

There are evenings during which I am quite sure that the audience is watching those seconds tick by. I think many artists will agree that a completely silent crowd is unnerving. You start to wonder if there really is anyone out there…

Tonight I finished up my second set, turned around to put my guitar on its stand, and when I faced forward again I saw something that nearly brought tears to my eyes. The folks in the MHS Auditorium were still clapping. And they were standing!

Things are not always as they seem, and conclusions often depend on your own perspective (or the light!).

4/12/08 – Serendipity Café, Rossport, ON

I had a double scoop of cookies n’ beef!

My eyes were glued to the window of the car today in an effort to spot Terry’s Taxidermy and Mounted Animal Nature Trail. I’ve just learned from Wikipedia, however, that it’s on Manitoulin Island and I’m not going anywhere remotely close. But even though I can’t visit the hotspot, I can still view my share of not-yet-deceased crows which seem to be abundant round these parts. I have never seen such huge, intimidating birds in my life! Today I saw one flying with a freaking snake in its mouth!!!

I went online and looked up any association between a crow and a snake, thinking it couldn’t be anything but an omen. I found this fable online:

THE CROW AND THE SNAKE
A hungry Crow spied a Snake lying asleep in a sunny spot, and, picking it up in his claws, he was carrying it off to a place where he could make a meal of it without being disturbed, when the Snake reared its head and bit him. It was a poisonous Snake, and the bite was fatal, and the dying Crow said, “What a cruel fate is mine! I thought I had made a lucky find, and it has cost me my life!”

Someone explain to me how this means that I will live a long, happy, properous life.

The gorgeous arched ceilings in our fantastic room at the
Serendipity Café guest houses. And a big head…

4/11/08 – A-Frame Gallery, Sioux Lookout, ON

Being a person with little to no fashion sense, with a complete indifference towards home electronics, and living in a cheap old house on the wrong side of the tracks, there’s not much on which I’d need to spend my hard-earned cash. Luckily for me, I’m a musician, and those tricky decisions regarding what to do with my next thou rarely come up.

Still, I’m learning that being in this business requires a certain cannibalistic acceptance of where the moola is going. Right back in, baby!

So Darren and I have hit the road again and all I’m thinking about is that we’ve got to buy my beloved vehicle, Enjie, a new set of tires. The ol’ gal needs to be pampered every once in a while too! And when my father learned that I had driven through BC in December on 70,000 km old all-season tires, he was rightfully shocked. (He was less shocked when he heard about our adventure in Rossland)

But despite the fact that she has no diamonds on the soles of her shoes, she still cleans up nice and is very presentable. We went for a good long drive today and ended up in Sioux Lookout at the fantastic A-Frame Gallery. If you’re looking for some sweet folks to spend time with, it’s well worth it to veer 70 kms off the Trans-Canada to visit this community. Some of the best huggers around, and eagerly generous with them too!

Some new friends offered their home to us while they were gallivanting down south (Brian/Andrea – were you gallivanting? Business-ing?) so doors were left unlocked and beds were made up for us. Happily no chairs were broken in the absence of the home’s usual dwellers, but that might be because I’ve never been a huge fan of porridge. Hmm…

On that potentially puzzling note, I will sign off on the first blog posting of my April 2008 tour. Let’s see how far I get this time…

12/11/07 – The Old Fire Hall, Rossland, BC

We were stopped by some police officers today as we drove through a small town. Lucky for them there was a four-way stop controlling the hectic streets, and this is where they set up shop. Now Darren and I are both remarkably “lame”; we have no vices to sparkle up our arresting allure. And the only time Darren’s had a run-in with the law, even the cop handing over the speeding ticket told him to contest it!

I have NEVER been pulled over. Technically we weren’t even pulled over; our departure from the stop sign was merely delayed by a few seconds. In any case, it was quite an adventure for me, especially since I (the non-driver) was the one addressed. “What are you doing?” he asked me. Apparently it’s very curious for a passenger to be typing on a laptop. If it was a ploy, asking a trivial question to elicit any kind of mouth-opening response in order to assess sobriety, why wouldn’t he direct it to the one in charge of operating the machinery?

I’m just surprised they weren’t pissed that our gear nearly blocked out our panoramic view of the road.

And as if I needed more excitement, we discovered the merits of winter tires on a very slippery hill this afternoon. Who would have thought it wasn’t a great idea to traipse halfway around Canada for the fifth time in a year on the same set of tires… During the winter… Enjie put up a good fight but I’m sure it was only a slight nudge from our Lord God above that prevented us from snowballing back down that hill. I think we were going .5km/hr when we crested the rise; that was slow enough to allow time to contemplate what the best course of action would be, but not enough time to implement it.

The struggle against the elements was well worth the evening I found waiting for me at The Old Fire Hall, though. It was great food, great people and a great atmosphere. It was a good safe environment to be in when I said goodbye to my pioneer handbag. The experience was bittersweet. I know she went on to a good home but you never forget your first…