I hate to put yet another music post here, but what the heck…I played last night at a reception at an online journalism convention in the District, which was pleasant enough, but it also was a riot because it involved playing in front of a whole parade of bosses past and present. There had to have been a dozen current and ex-bosses there, and only two of them had ever heard me play, and they all were pretty much shocked. I’m a pretty serious guy at work and it’s really hard for people to connect the person they see at the office to the person they see at a gig, and when they hear I play harmonica, well, that’s not like playing a real instrument, is it?

When your co-workers see you, they always muse about how much fun it must be to play music…and it is, of course, but the fans are never around when you have to lug a few hundred pounds of equipment after the gig is over. That’s what I always tell people: “I play music for free, but I want to get paid for hauling the gear.”

Just got some e-mail with really bad news: My standing gig at Southside 815 with the JohnDC All-Stars has been canceled. I’ve had that gig for oh, at least a year and a half now. Worse, that was my sole standing gig — and as a result, after next week, I will have no gigs on my schedule. That will be the first time this has occurred since at least 1993. I’ve gotten close a couple of times, but never have I looked at a blank slate. Looks like it’s time for me to hit the open mic circuit again and find some musicians.

People really aren’t paying much attention, but my St. Louis Cardinals are in the midst of one of the greatest choke jobs in the history of baseball. They lost again tonight, blowing a three-run lead in the 7th inning, and now they’ve lost seven in a row at the worst possible time. Meanwhile, the Astros won again and sit an unimaginable game and a half back of the Cards.

St. Louis has won more World Series than any National League team, but the cold reality is that the Cardinals have been to only one Series in the last 20 years and lost that one horribly. At this point, I’m almost rooting for them to fade away, because I can’t imagine how badly they will be beaten in the playoffs. All those losses this year to the Cubs in Chicago are really hanging over the Cards’ heads now, and it wouldn’t shock me at all to see them lose the division and finish as a .500 team.