Happy Eve of New Year’s Eve, music nerds!

Didn’t get quite what you wanted for Christmas? You’re not alone!

Garfunkel and Oates: nerdy comic geniuses, n’est-ce pas? Look for more on them in an upcoming post!

I don’t know about you, but I’ve been in a bit of a funk the past couple days; I suppose it’s part post-Christmas slump and part end-of-the-year anxiety. Where did 2009 go? How can it be 2010 already? OMGWTFBBQ!!

It doesn’t help that the internets have been rife with both end-of-the-year and end-of-the-decade pronouncements. The general consensus seems to be that the aughties were a write-off, and that 2009 in particular was pretty dreadful. The Rude Pundit sums it up colorfully (in three parts), and I can’t find much to argue with there.

Side note/commercial break: Next week, I’ll be summing up the year in classical music as part of my Community Blogger duties for the GRAMMYS®. You can bet that will be much more uplifting than a lot of the end-of-year stuff I’ve been reading! 😀 )

MMN & McDoc singing at our wedding reception

But reality is, of course, always more complex than whatever the current conventional wisdom happens to be. And for me, personally, this decade had an upward trajectory, though it certainly wasn’t a straight line. It began with the loss of VirgoMom, in August 2000. You can’t fall out of the basement, right? It continued with a variety of grad-school misadventures, halting experiments in making a living as a musician, and the quest — now a madcap comedy of errors thanks to hindsight — to find Mr. Miss Music Nerd. Of course, in the end, McDoc found me. I know it’s really, really annoying when people say that what you’re looking for will come along when you least expect it, but I have to admit, it’s true.

At any rate, when I compare I am now with where I was in 2000, all I can do is sigh with relief. Well, okay, I can do a lot more than that. I have plenty to rue and moan about; I’d lose my Temperamental Artist card if I didn’t. But I have to say, to my shock and surprise, I am… content. Happy, even. Whoa, who’da thunk it? 😉

It’s good that I’m getting this little episode of ennui out of the way now, because January will be very, very busy! I’ve been active behind the scenes, lining up interviews with interesting local music folk. I also have a pile of GRAMMY-nominated recordings that I’ll be featuring. But the really big thing, of course, is the countdown to the GRAMMY Week itself!! I bought my plane ticket for Cali and everything, so it’s game on, woot!! 😀