Boy, how life can spiral out of control in a short time.

So, remember that gig I was supposed to guest in for a couple numbers? That's coming up this week. But since the last rehearsal I was at two weeks ago the band got rid of the bass player. They had a gig this past weekend at a potluck lunch with friends in the park. When my wife and I got there, they asked if I would sit in on bass. My father-in-law knew that I played bass in the orchestra in high school, so figured that was good enough to play the old country songs that they do. While it's been over twenty years since I bowed out the bottom end of the Halleluh Chorus standing behind an upright, I figured I ought be able to pull out a simple 1-5 on an electric bass. So I sat where I could see the rhythm guy's hand and did my best to keep up. After we stopped and ate lunch, before starting to play again, the guys in the band told me they'd already had a bunch of comments to the effect that I was better than the old bassist, and they asked me to be a permanent part of the band. So Friday I'll be playing bass all night, and still doing the guest spot on guitar.

Oh, and FWIW, I think I did horrible, and had a blast doing it. On a couple songs the rhythm guitarist was reading the chords from a book and then transposing on the fly. Which means he frequently grabbed the wrong chord, then switched to the right one, but by then I'd already hit the root note for the first chord. Thank goodness it was a very forgiving audience.