Another Saturday and Sunday come and gone. Quicker than you can say TGIF, we’re already on the pre-dawn drive back to work. It’s a process as old as time. I’m sure there were cavemen wondering where the weekend went as they were leaving their cave for the rock quarries or something(I bet that Flintstone cat went through this as well.)
Anyways, it was still a decent weekend. Wasn’t much in the way of creativity, but the wife and I got an afternoon walk in on Saturday in town. We also picked up our new chair that we ordered with our new couch. Got the call Saturday that it was in and instead of waiting for them to deliver it Monday morning we picked it up in our old van(which is now our son’s vehicle.) It was great to finally get it, as now the living room looks complete.
I did watch a few movies. Friday night I watched The Babysitter on Netflix. It’s an older one I never got around to watching. Enjoyed it. Funny, gory, and a little touch of teenage love for all the feelies. I then started watching The Babysitter 2 and wasn’t impressed. Shut it off after about 45 minutes. Saturday I watched Night Swim. Pretty good ghost story/haunting flick that has to do with a natural spring swimming pool. If you have access to Peacock I recommend it. Great cast with Kerry Condon and Wyatt Russell. Sometimes even a so-so horror film is elevated with great actors. Saturday night my wife and I watched the Director’s Cut of Midsommar. Ari Aster’s Midsommar is a pretty divisive film. You either really liked it or really hated it. I’m of the former category. It’s one of my favorite movies of the last few years, honestly. I won’t go into it, so if you haven’t seen it and you can handle something a little challenging go for it.
The Director’s Cut is 3 hours long, so sit somewhere comfortable. My wife had never watched it. I took my oldest and my son to see it back in 2019 at the only theater it played in within driving distance to us. It was at the Showland Theater in Plymouth, about 45 minutes from us. We were the only three people watching it. It was quite the experience. I remember walking to the van thinking I wasn’t sure if I liked it at all, but we talked about the movie the whole ride home. By the time we got home I realized that I in fact liked it quite a bit. Those are the best movies, IMO.
Anyways, my wife saw about 35 minutes of it before she started falling asleep. Though what she saw she liked, so there’s that.
Sunday was the official first mow of the season. I went out early and started picking up the yard for the fourth time in the last month(damn winds and pine cones.) After getting the yard picked up I decided the backyard was ready to be mowed. There were spots where the grass was so thick and long I was afraid to wait any longer. The front yard was fine. It could use to wait another couple weeks, but the backyard gets fertilized on the regular by our four-legged friend in the house. Gotta admit, felt good to get the mower going. That’s the true sign that spring is here.
We also went to visit my good friend John Vance at the new location for Karma Records. After close to 15 years Karma Records moved from their current location to their new spot, which is now in town and next to Chimp’s Comix. The spot is owned by Chimp’s owner Nick, so John is renting directly from him. I think the spot will be good for both businesses, as there’s definitely crossover between the two stores’ customers(me included.) I’m sad that they won’t be 10 minutes from my house, but I’d rather they move and be able to afford the rent than stay and lose money. And really, the new spot is a hell of a lot bigger.
John said they’d be at the new place from 12-4 with the door unlocked. Not open, but open to a few folks to come by and see how things are going. They closed for one week to get everything moved, and so today they’ll open from noon to 6, then they’ll go back to normal hours by Friday. I was really impressed with the place. There’s just a lot more room in there. It’ll be great for Record Store Day which is coming up on 4/20.
There’s a bittersweet aspect to Karma Records moving, as I’ve been going to the old location for 15 years. Besides being close to my house, it’s a spot with lots of memories; from countless Record Store Days, to taking my kids in with me at varying ages over the years, to my kids going in on their own to buy stuff, to ALL the albums I’ve bought there. The new spot will be great, but after all this time it’ll just take some getting used to is all. Big chunk of my record buying history is tied to that old building.
This is a good week, though.
First is this whole solar eclipse thing happening. A totality solar eclipse. Am I traveling three hours south so I can take part in it? No. I can be happy with 98 % totality, I don’t need to be in complete darkness(besides, I live like that most of the time.) My oldest lives in Indianapolis where they will be at 100% totality. They said quite a few businesses are closing because of the massive amounts of people coming to see the show. I’ve heard different numbers, but the most recent was a quarter of a million people coming to the area for this. My son said he helped a couple yesterday at work(he works at Martin’s Supermarket) that were here from Los Angeles for this thing.
Now in my twisted head I’m imagining this thing turning people into zombies or something, ala Night of the Comet. It’d be the perfect opportunity to take out a large swath of the population, if you were an alien life form trying to take over a planet. Or if you were a pissed off Mother Nature wanting to get back at humans for soiling a perfectly good planet with chemical contamination, causing global warming, and giving the world The Kardashians.
I’m sure it’ll be fine, but that’s what overactive imaginations do.
Another great thing about this week is that I only work today and tomorrow, then I’m off Wednesday until the following Monday. What am I doing? Well the most important thing is that I’m not going to be at work. I need to get away, reboot, and forget about the 9 to 5 for a bit. I also just wanted to some down time at home. I plan on working on new music and doing some painting. I also plan on getting up on the roof and cleaning it off, along with the gutters. Not my favorite thing to do, but it needs done. Backyard looks good, so I’ll do some grilling as well. I think the weather will cooperate this week. I grilled yesterday. It was so nice out when I was working in the yard that it just seemed like the perfect day to do it. But as we drove home with all the food and charcoal in tow it began to rain. It did let up, long enough for me to get some burgers and dogs ready.
Enjoy your week. And if you’re out looking for some totality be safe. Watch everyone around you. If they begin to start twitching, growling, and foaming at the mouth get to your car and get the hell out of dodge. Nothing good will come of that.
Complex Distractions 
It seems like I remember a Karma Records being in Fort Wayne. Is it the same owner? Same store, but just moving around? My faulty memory?
For some reason I keep thinking it was in Marion, but I think that was Wooden Nickel. Maybe I’m conflating things.
Nice that John is getting a bigger space for better rent, and renting from presumably like-minded people!
I definitively understand that bittersweet feeling, though. There are memories I have of Butterfly Records when it was over by the former high school that didn’t transfer to the Buffalo Street location across from Kline’s (Klein’s?).
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There was a Karma in the Fort. Regional chain. The last two I believe are in Warsaw and Plymouth.
I had no idea Butterfly was ever near the old high school. I knew it was out in the KMart shopping plaza, and then Buffalo. I have fond memories of the Buffalo St location. Those were my formative years.
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Butterfly started out as a part head-shop right across from the courthouse, pretty much where Readmore is/was. I never knew it was in K Mart plaza. I got to know Jay and Steve when it was by the old high school. Steve was always trying to talk me out of buying stuff I was exploring John Coltrane’s Blue Train (I’d red enough to know I probably shouldn’t dive in too far, too fast, especially since I didn’t even know if I would like jazz), Lou Reed’s The Blue Mask, Elvis Costello’s Imperial Bedroom…
It was a good time discovering music. He sold me a linear tracking turntable and let me take it home and just pay it off with lunch money and such.
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For a short time Butterfly was in a storefront that was where the two plazas joined. Basically at the end of the Kmart side and where the other line of stores met up. In the corner. I don’t think it was there very long. I remember going there with my dad when he bought Alice Cooper’s ‘Welcome To My Nightmare’. I rarely ever saw Jay. Steve was the guy I always dealt with. Nice guy. And the only place in town where you could buy individual guitar strings…in case you didn’t have $5 for a whole pack.
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Yeah, Steve was always there for the guitarists.
I think I remember you saying at one point you realized how much more you were spending on strings buying them individually…? That might be something that changed a little, because when I worked there, people would be paying, like, twenty-five cents more if they bought singles.
Was K Mart Plaza where Arby’s and Carl’s Jr. and Pizza Hut were? So much has changed.
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Yeah, I think you were paying a bit of a “convenience tax” buying them individually. But hey, I liked having the option. Especially when I first started changing my own strings. It was a learning curve and you’d end up breaking a couple of the high strings when tuning.
Yes, that’s the plaza I’m talking about. It’s a ghost town now out there, but back in the day it was a happening spot.
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That record store looks awesome. We had one in town that was attached to a coffee shop which was great yet the record store guy drove his business into the ground. (dumbass) Coffee shop is still there though…
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There’s a record store in Goshen(about 30 minutes north of me) that is next door to a coffee shop. Great set up. Buy some vinyl, then go next door and have a cup of coffee and stare at the album sleeves.
The new store is so much bigger. It’ll be great for the big crowds on RSD.
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I was in Monteverde Costa Rica a few years ago and they had a laundromat/used bookstore/coffee shop. It was a great setup, except you could also just pay a dollar and they would wash and dry one load for you. But it was a nice place to chill.
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Laundromats need all the help they can get. That sounds pretty cool.
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Yeah, it was nice. Plus there was enough international tourism that they had books in quite a few languages, as I recall.
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