Francesca, Jen and Anna Menendez. August 15, 2006 8:44pm (photo by Raquel)

It's 5:15am on Wednesday as I type these words. Oh well, I'm back to one of those weeks where I go to bed and wake up at wierd hours. It's OK cuz I don't have anything scheduled until 1:00pm--a rehearsal with a dancer at DC Dance Collective which is just a 10-minute walk from my house so I could sleep in, yay!

I was at that same studio at 2:00pm yesterday afternoon (Tuesday) playing for a private lesson for another dancer friend. She was planning on taking private lessons anyway to learn a new choreography and improve her technique, but I still had a hand in pushing her to make it happen now before her schedule quickly fills-up with university classes. We made this informal pact where in return she's going to keep bugging me about working on my CD. TIP: the buddy system helps in setting and accomplishing goals.

So I'm going to Guitar Center and picking up a Mackie Spike, a USB audio interface, so I could do some rough draft recordings at home before taking it to a serious studio. I promised I'd have one track completed by the time my dancer friend would have learned the new alegrías choreography, which will be two months from now: October 15th. TIP: when setting goals it helps to be very specific. We discussed all this, amongst other things, while casually enjoying drinks on the patio of the cafe around the corner on this warm and slightly humid Tuesday.

Fast forward a few hours later, I was at Las Tapas performing with dancers Ana Menendez and Jen. My dancer friends Raquel (studying with Ana Martinez) and Francesca (currently a salsera but someday a flamenca) showed up so naturally I got one of them to take pics.

My relatively new camera is not bad for the price ($120) but it's not as good as the one Canon Powershot I had before. Raquel turned the flash off and got some interesting action shots. Afterwards, she was telling me about how she loved the stage lighting behind the stage created a shadow play on the ceiling adding a very dramatic element to the performance...