I am crushing it today!

Little Lies - Dave Barnes

The above is off Dave Barnes' new album "What We Want, What We Get" that was released today. He also played this Saturday night at the Music City Unsigned Tin Pan South Showcase, and I've had it in my head ever since.

So I guess I'm setting the bar for crushing it pretty low these days, but I feel like I've really accomplished stuff today (and it's only 2). I woke up this morning and filed my online registration as an LLC with the State of Tennessee. It was actually extremely easy because they have a website that fills in all the forms for you and files them electronically. I did the same thing with the IRS to get a federal Tax ID number. So by the time I got out of bed today I had already done two of the things I had dreaded about getting this thing going. Two down, a couple dozen to go :)

I also finalized my business cards today, and should have 250 coming my way within the week.

I was going to go to the bank today and set up accounts and credit cards and all that, but I decided I have to have something to do tomorrow, right? So instead I bought my favorite lunch in the world (small basket of chicken fingers tossed in Ole Smokey sauce at McDougals) and took it to Centennial Park, where I am currently sitting on the steps of the Parthenon using the park's free wireless. And the weather is GORGEOUS for this too! I'm definitely going to do this more often.

I also talked with my old job today to see when they want me to come in and help them get the quarter closed, and they said they'd keep me posted, but probably beginning of next week. Which, in theory, is great for them because they're trying to save money and all that, but it just means I'll have to cram 200 hours into 2 and a half weeks instead of 3 and a half. They really have no idea how screwed they are at this point.

Last night I went to see "Clash of the Titans" for my friend Ryan's birthday. Not an incredible movie by any stretch of the imagination, but it knew what it was and I appreciated that. An entertaining way to spend the evening, and I had good company too so I can't complain. There are a bunch of movies coming out in the next couple months that I'm excited about too:

April 9 - Date Night
April 16 - Kick Ass
April 23 - The Losers
May 7 - Iron Man 2
May 7 - Babies
May 14 - Robin Hood
May 21 - Shrek Forever After
May 21 - MacGruber (I LOVE Kristen Wiig)
May 28 - Micmacs

Looks an awesome way to spend the next couple months :)

Don't Stop Believin'

I have my first official client! Granted, it's one without activity at this point, but there definitely will be some in the near future, and you have to start somewhere, right?

In related news, apparently my negotiating skills, while still extremely uncomfortable, aren't as bad as I thought. I was able to get the software company to drop the price by a couple thousand dollars, and I signed the purchase agreement on Friday. No turning back now; this stupid software will end up costing me more than twice what I paid for my car. Dang.

I've been getting a fair amount of work from my old company this week, and it looks like I'll be spending most of April over there getting them ready to make client payments at the end of the month. If left to their own devices, they would be royally screwed in a couple weeks. But at least I get paid real money to clean up the mess :)

The weather in Nashville is b-e-a-utiful right now, and it doesn't look like that's gonna change at least in the next week! I can hardly believe it's April already, but since that's the case I guess this weather is about right. I've had a couple of landscaping surprises this spring: none of my plants died over the winter (including the bush I thought had died last summer and the three maples I planted in October) and apparently the purple bush-like things I planted in front of my windows have white flowers in the spring. Who knew? I really like them, and I may actually put a couple more in this spring. Now I just need to remember what they're called...

I get to go to two and hopefully three shows this weekend, all part of Tin Pan South, an annual songwriters festival in town. Friday night is JD Souther (wrote most of the Eagles hits), Jonathan Cain (member of Journey), and Brett James (hottest writer in Country music right now, and a member of my South Africa team). Then Saturday night are the Music City Unsigned showcases, featuring Dave Barnes, Jennifer Knapp, Charlie Peacock, Matthew Perryman Jones, and Katie Herzig, among others. I'm sure I'll have plenty of music to recommend after this weekend, so I'm going to take this chance to recommend Ben Rector from the show last weekend. Infectious piano pop at it's finest, Ben is, ironically, like Ben Folds covering Matt Wertz. Check him out:

The Beat - Ben Rector