Lousy Singing and Beauty Parlor Gossip

At 8 a.m. on Sunday, the choir went over the songs we'd practiced on Thursday a.m. for the 8:30 Mass. For the first two hymns a few people started weakly before the rest chimed in. During two different songs, Frank, one of the old Italian tenors, accidentally hit the cymbals twice. The first time, it sounded like he might have done it for emphasis at the end of the hymn. The second time the cymbals clashed it was just a joke. After uncounted additional disasters, we closed with Amazing Grace, during which half of us sang verse 2 while the other half sang verse 5.

Friends of the choir members were waiting downstairs. [This is one of the few remaining Catholic choirs you are going to see up in a choir loft with an organ.] "You stank today." "We did." "Most of us didn't show up for practice," said Sally by way of explanation, "including me." I saw the priest take the choir director aside on the way out. Just when I was starting to think singing in the choir is a gratifying part of my week . . ..

Saturday I got a haircut, eyebrows tidied up, nails done at the Vietnamese run beauty salon K Hair Today in Milpitas. Kim, the owner, was entertaining customers with talk about the gay "weddings" in San Francisco. I record these without comment:

"You know about the gays getting married in San Francisco? Two men with beard and mustache kissing each other. Two women kissing that's okay. I don't mind that. But two guys! And Rosie O'Donnell. Her girlfriend hair so short. But Rosie say she the wife. "

I said, "Yah, Rosie has the long hair, and her girlfriend has it short. Shouldn't the one with the long hair be the wife?"

Kim said, "Roseanne, you think that's funny, eh?" "What is this world coming to," I said. "I don't mind," Kim said. "If that's what they want. Some of them together 20 30 years. They cry." Kim's customer spoke up from the shampoo bowl, "Whatever floats their boat."