Best. Summer. Ever.

So I haven't said much (if anything) about it here, but I have been teaching myself to play the trapset/drumkit/drumset/whatever the crap you want to call it this summer. The story:

My old youth group at First Baptist Church of Hinton has had a pretty decent praise band going for the past year, thanks in large part to the amazing efforts of Jessica Boling (guitar player/bank teller/youth). In fact, forget the "decent" part. With the people available to her, Jessica has managed to put together a group that is downright impressive. However, there has been one hitch.

Their drummer became a bit unreliable towards the end of the school year, and as of the beginning of the summer he had practically disappeared entirely. He had a tendency to skip practice but still expected to be allowed to perform with the group. On a couple of the occasions when he wasn't there for practice or the performance, I decided to pull out the water jug/egg shaker combo and Jessica was kind enough to let me play with the group. This sound, however, simply was not a good match for the group as it had been assembled. The musicians were used to something with a little more edge than a makeshift djembe being played by a third-rate percussionist.

So I spent some time learning the trapset. And I like it. A whole lot. (random side note: I don't know why drummers are so hard to find; it's so much fun to play, you'd think everyone would want to) Obviously, I'm not that great at it; I can only do a couple of different beats and my fills are, at best, inconsistent. But at least I'm havin' fun.

Anyway, last week we went to Falls Creek (http://www.fallscreekok.org), and I got to play every stinkin' day of the week. That was so much fun.

So yes... I like to drum.