Days 450-456! Welp… I thought the rain was finally clearing up. But I was wrong. This week was unfortunately another week of lots of rainy days. I did sneak in a surf one day, but my eyes have been stinging since so it might’ve not been the smartest move. Either way, I’m super excited for the sun to come back out. I DID get to spend a lot of time producing music this week and started making strides to finishing songs! So hopefully I’ll be able to share them soon!

I woke up on Thursday, March 27th to a text from my boss saying, “Clear skies today! Come on over.” Andddd 15 minutes later, I got another text saying “actualllyyyy the rain just started have the day off.”

So… another day off due to the rain, left to my own devices.

I spent the day watching the TV show severance, reading, and relaxing. It had been a while since I had heard from my friend Nathan, who has been helping me produce music (for free I should add). So I decided to reach out to a local producer to see if the vibes were right!

I went down that day to Maclean to meet up with the producer, Jack, who happened to be from Leeds, England!

His studio was in the basement of his home and it was quite nice! He offers a really affordable price and the songs he’s helped produce sound very clean and professional. We chatted for 30-40 minutes about what my vision was, what he could offer, and I asked a few questions as well. But afterwards we were both stoked to work with each other!

What’s crazy, is Jack actually knows Nathan well, so it’d be an easy transition from one producer to the other! I did double check with Nathan that he was okay with me going to someone else, and of course he was. But on Friday, March 28th Nathan was finally able to help make more demos with me!

Friday was another day off from work… this rain is really dampening my 88 days of work plan! But, I chatted with my boss, Aly, and we’ve worked something out to make sure I get the days all done!

I again spent the day relaxing, doing the same things as the last couple of days. But in the afternoon, Nathan and I went to the studio and worked on a new demo!

We were able to get the majority of the song done, so it’ll now be a great base for my time with Jack, the new producer! Only 3 more songs left to make demos for (for now…)!

Saturday, March 29th… another day off from work unfortunately. Not only was it raining, it was SUPER windy too. So much so, I woke up to a loud CRASH as one of my window awnings broke into the side of the outside wall of my room. Thankfully it didn’t break the window! But it was quite the shock to be woken up from!

Somehow it survived the cyclone but not this…

I braved the rain and wind to go to the grocery store and after I got home, Nathan asked if I wanted to swing by his house to record more music!

I of course said yes and went over to jam at his little studio he has at home.

We were able to crank out the third song of the EP, which was super fun to make! He’s honestly such a blast to hang out and work with, butttt unfortunately he’s now way too busy to keep up with making tunes. So it’s the perfect time to switch over to Jack!

I’m really glad I got to meet and work with Nathan. To provide free studio time is something I’ll probably never see again while making music (unless I ever have a home studio… kinda need to stop traveling for that to happen though). I’m also glad I was able to help him on his journey of learning to be a producer! But I’m super excited to continue on with making music with a professional and can’t wait to see how the EP turns out.

The silver lining to all this rain and time off from work is having the time to make music! Who knew, when I first got to town that, Yamba was going to be a hotbed for music talent, producers, and jam sessions!

Sunday, March 30th came with the first sunny day in probably a week!

The day started with a nice FaceTime from my mom and sister! They were together for my cousins bridal shower, which I’ll be going home for the wedding in May! A great way to start the day.

I also read for an hour, which was how I’d been starting my mornings during this time off from work. Another really nice and relaxing way to start the day.

I then was able to spend time on the farm! I decided to work a half day to get myself back in the swing of things and even out my hours from the previous half day I had last Wednesday. The farm was flooded again, but it was nice to be outside, in the sun, doing something physical!

While I was working, I received another FaceTime where I got to say hello to lots of family! I truly cannot wait to see them in just about a month and a half!!

Of course, I had to take advantage of this sunny day. So after work, I hustled my way to Pippi Beach to get a surf in! The water was pretty disgusting post the storms, but the first half of the session was fun with lots of little waves that I caught! The back half as the tides and winds shifted became lumpy and choppy and not as fun. But I was glad to have gotten a session in!

The water quality was a bit concerning though…

When I got out of the water, one of my pub work friends, Chantelle, was on the beach! So I sat and chatted with her for a bit before heading home.

When I got home, I started filing my taxes, which I thought was going to be a breeze since I have very little income to claim… but it ended up being a major headache! Who knew foreign income would be a hard thing to file…

Luckily I have a friend in the industry and he came to my aide!

And then… I finished Severance! what a phenomenal tv show! I think it lived up to the hype and can’t wait for the third season. I can’t really say too much about it, it would spoil the show. But if you like sci-fi, a bit funny, kinda serious, a little bit dark, with twists and turns that make you think, it’s for you!

Monday, March 31st rolled around for a FULL DAY OF WORK! Wooooo! We’re back!

I spent my all day screwing in trees to the support wire. I finished one of the sections of trees and moved on to the next section, which means two are now done… lots more to go.

I decided to not go for a surf after work and focus on doing my taxes… which I still didn’t finish. I worked on some ideas for guitar solos in some of my new songs we recently recorded, and read more too!

It felt good to finally be back out for a full day of work!

Tuesday, April 1st was here! Happy April fools day… no pranks were played today unfortunately, but how the HECK is it already April?! Where is all the time going??

I set off for work this morning, expecting another day like Monday… but I was a bit wrong.

Sure, I spent all day screwing trees into the support wire again. But two things made the work day QUITE different. The first, was seeing and hearing the farm dog chasing, playing with, and killing a baby hare. It was quite unpleasant, but it’s what the farm dogs are for (and rats… ew)!

I thought that was going to be the end of oddities on the work day. But when I got back to the house for my lunch break, I noticed the door wide open. I thought it was odd, but just assumed Aly was either back from her farm duties or had her reasons for leaving it open. Well, turns out neither was the case and I saw bird poop throughout the house… odd…

Then I heard Evee outside staring at the window barking and put two and two together. There was a bird IN THE HOUSE.

Not just any bird, a big freaking magpie!

Thankfully the room it was in was full of screened in doors so I could open it all up. But first I brought Evee into a room where she couldn’t get at it, had to give the magpie a fighting chance! It took a bit for the magpie to stop flying into the glass and realize the doors were open, but I was able to get it out to safety before releasing Evee.

It was a pretty stressful situation!

The rest of the workday was the same old normal, which I welcomed after the mornings festivities.

I stopped at Coles again for some more groceries and then hopped over to the library to ask if I could renew my book for a 3rd time. They said no, but they were fine if I turned it in late since there were no other reservations on it! I was super happy to hear that since I’m finally under 200 pages of this super long book!

I spent the rest of the afternoon finishing up my taxes on a new program my friend Chase suggested! It was a breeze this time around and I was able to get them squared away… fingers crossed!

I woke up on Wednesday, April 2nd to two very exciting emails. My federal and state tax filings had been approved! Let’s go!!!

Unfortunately though, I had no work today. But… the silver lining was I got to spend the day creating music! Around 9:30am, I made my way down to Maclean to have my first studio session with the new producer, Jack.

We spent around 5 hours working on one of the songs on my EP. I recorded harmonies, watched him mix and master the track, gave my input on it as well, and we had Jack play the drums so we could remove the midi drums (midi drums are made through the computer not an actual drum kit).

The song still has a bit of work to do, but it sounds MUCH more full and professional than what it did previously. Nathan and I did a good job, but getting someone who knows how to put a track together through and through is another level that we didn’t have.

We were having so much fun that I forgot to eat lunch! So when we wrapped up around 3:30pm, I drove home and immediately ate lunch… a bit late! I pretty much spent the next chunk of time listening to the song we just made and taking notes about things I want to change next time I’m with Jack.

I took a quick nap and then made my way up to the pub! My friend Paddy just moved in with his dad (the manager of the pub) and he wanted to hang out and jam. It’s been wayyyy too long since our last jam session and we were able to use the basement of the pub.

Somehow no one was able to hear us upstairs, so we were able to play to our hearts desires! It was great getting to hang and finally play together again!

I hung around for a bit after jamming chatting with my former coworkers. Eventually I made my way back down the hill to call it a night!

It looks like this next week will be nice and sunny! Hopefully it stays that way because I haven’t worked a ton these past couple of weeks. Also… I want to surf!! So this rain needs to go away and the storm water in the ocean needs to clear up so I can actually enjoy the water.

But, as always, we’ll have to wait and see what the next week has in store!

– Elie