Anarkalele

Our Riverside Ukulele Liberation Front has been going on for over a year now--I think a year-and-a-half.

Yesterday's meeting had a loony kind of feel to it. I t was probably the largest meeting so far. We started off small and our numbers swole to the gills.

The theme? Summertime. Only I brought a summer tune that wasn't really a summer tune except it was a Beach Boys tune: "Help Me Rhonda". I made copies of this song because I had procrastinated and, at the last minute, it was the only song I could find.

So, we get in tune and we have this new guy and I think we better play an easy tune because this guy is really new so I pull out "This Land Is Your Land." The problem is that most of the people had no copy of--summer attendance being what it is, many of those who showed up were not there at the last couple of meetings. So, we shared as best we could and it seemed like music.

After we played that song into the ground, Anna passed around extra copies of her song from last week--"one More Bottle of Wine"--and we gave that a go. Nobody had ever heard it except Anna. Again, it seemed like music after a couple of runs.

It was so hot (we meet in a the basement) that, at one point, I began to feel a little light-headed. I didn't say anything. I jut kept throwing down beverages and just played most of the time.

At this point, there about 12 people and we were running out of stuff that we had enough copies. I was about to start with "Help Me Rhonda," when Joanne--this nice lady from the Claremont scene--came scootin' in and passed out five or six songs that she had brought.

We worked on those awhile and everybody had fun, so what the hey?

A former student of mine showed up with her ukulele. I hadn't seen her for a couple of years, so it was a nice surprise.