One year ago today: September 14, 2013, for unknown reasons,
my SECOND most popular blog post ever.
Five years ago today: September 14, 2009, typical broke day.
Ten years ago today: September 14, 2004, Shipwreck Coast.
What's a fluzzle? It is part of a "floating puzzle". I have no idea if what I come up with here is already on TV, but here is a product I would have liked in my day. It is a floaty toy that can be interlocked into any number of combinations. Great, except for when the kid in the middle throws up, but you can see these $35 items at The Grommet, sort of a Sharper Image outlet but before all the vibrators and shower radios. Their website is annoying to visit because the geniuses over there altered the function of the back-arrow.
The band is also moving in the wrong direction as one member dictates everything the band plays. The hitch there is his disguised designs on the new singer fool everyone except her and I, and it is to her advantage to allow it to continue. But this means he is coming up with ever more obscure and over-romantical music that are unsuitable for this band and for live stage-work in general.
Also, it has become intolerable the degree to which one of the band members thinks he is making time with the vocalist (he doesn't stand a chance). But he keeps insisting we learn music, romantical duets, duh. Over several months it has degenerated into music that is no longer suitable for the band at all. Anyway, the problems have been simmering for a long time and I don't think these guys realize that I have no qualms about quitting a band and moving on. They act like the time already put in has committed me.
I did not quit or anything, but walked out saying I require time to think this over. And here are some of the things I need to ponder.
√ These guys did not put this band together. They were nowhere until the singer and I arrived, and that is to where they will revert if her and I ever quit. But they act like they are the kingpins. (This doesn't bother me until it affects the quality of the music.)
√ The guitarist is no good at learning anything new, he can only play the songs that were on his list thirty plus years ago. Sure, he can play the hell out of them but so what?
√ The drummer is badly mismanaging the band. His techniques are back in the last century, even the content on our website is stale. And he will not or possible cannot adapt.
√ Our track record sucks. I make seven times as much calling bingo.
√ The song list is twice too long. The guitar player eats old Doors and Berry for breakfast at home every day and assumes everyone else does. I can't stand half the music we play.
√ Sunday practice has become tedious. Instead of rehearsing and improving, the time is required mainly to run over old material that has started to drift.
√ And for anyone who thinks I won't quit, I learned their entire song list in 90 days and there isn't much stopping me doing that all over again with the next band.
New topic. I retired to home for tea and soup, to take my time. Some statistics on military gear got my attention just because. So many clips about the latest MiG fighters, but one can't help but notice how every last one of them seems to be a direct copy of the latest US fighters that came out a year earlier. And the specs that the MiGs are faster. Blah, blah. Every jet ever built could be made to go faster by the same trade-off. Burn the turbine hotter and accept a shorter engine life.
And Stalingrad. Yes, it was the largest battle in history and a turning point. But it was only one of a series of similar offensives the Soviets launched around the same time all along the thousand-mile front. Stalingrad was not special in that context. The entire German line was brittle. And it cracked at Stalingrad.
Nor was there any problem in the Middle East between Arabs and Jews until the Zionists arrived. The locals had lived together in peace for a really long time. It is when the Zionists began to take the area for a homeland that instantly alienated the Palestinians. (Nonetheless, the Palestinians were tenants and never did own the land they claim belongs to them.)
A month ago I would not have thought it possible, but I went back to deep-read my navigation books. I say it that way because the books are so deep to start with they half drove me blind. But now, I can pick out nuances of what the author meant and compare it to what he wrote. Things have been quiet for a while because of mental consolidation, not because I took a breather. I've gone back and reworked all the examples in the texts, all by hand, so this takes time.
Further, I made a less than optimum decision learning to use what are called "concise" [navigation] tables. I must now undertake the mindbreaking process of dismantling one complete mode of thinking and replacing it with something equally complicated that produces similar but more accurate results. Learning has a lot to do with the way one imagines the world around themselves. Sadly, 99% of humans will never change their minds like this because the prerequisite involves admitting they have been wrong all along.
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