January 17, 2017

Yesteryear
One year ago today: January 17, 2016, half-way through “Dark Matter”.
Five years ago today: January 17, 2012, MDBA.
Nine years ago today: January 17, 2008, Hummala bebuhla zeebuhla boobuhla.
Random years ago today: January 17, 2011, Simple: it’s always your fault.

MORNING
           Here’s something you’ve never seen before. These are the little rings on the core memory diagrams. They are not magnets, they are made of ferrite, and they are not so tiny afterall. These have long been superseded by solid state memory. I’ve seen a number of diagrams showing these rings in different alignments. Do the rings actually move? Or spin? If they move, I can build it. Expect that I’ll be looking closely at this memory.

           What fun it is to watch these Liberals make such clowns of themselves with the protesting. It’s accomplishing the opposite of what impression they think they are making. Tomorrow, I’m going to a short meeting, but one where it is known politics will be discussed. Sorry, members only. It’s also fun to watch the illegals march down the street demanding their rights and freedoms, something the slimeballs never dared to do back where they come from.
           These protesters come across as whining babies. Like this is the first time in their lives they’ve been jointly and severally told to go to Hell. And they don’t like it one bit. You know what’s most ironic? The way the Libtards are complaining that Trump just made a bunch of promises he can’t keep just to get elected. How once in, he never intended to do a thing about the country’s real problems. It is hard to imagine a stranger batch of words out of the mouth of a Liberal.

Picture of the day.
London fog.
Remember to use BACK ARROW to return to blog.

NOON
           I’m still waiting on the 30-ton jack, which has cost me a month already. I used to day to sketch out a few projects that have become possible now that I can use dowels. It turns out to be really easy planning, like the kitchen door will take 26 quarter-inch pegs. It turns out I do have the correct router bits to put a very simple pattern of finish on the door. And I have the bit that makes that inset for placing panes of glass. I can’t wait to get my work shed happening.

           I read another chapter of “Londongrad”. This would be a good time to repeat that there is no way I ever knew this was both a movie and a British television comedy. To me it is another detective-slash-spy novel, and not a very good one at that. Here's your mini-review on what I’ve read so far. It just drags along, I dunno, maybe trying to sell the reader on the concept that Russians make superior cops and businessmen?
           This “Londongrad” is getting wearisome. I’m on page 80 of 390 and it won’t get off that Russians-are-special premise. Only they know what is really going on, only they can see through everybody, blah, blah. Why am I still reading? Well, the book is like this blog, but the book is unintentional about it. You learn a few things while reading it that are hard to come by any other way. Most of us don’t listen to BBC or Moscow for our terrorism news.

           The plot is already tedious. A Russian gal, all of whom seem to work in strip clubs, was found murdered. She was taped up to a playground swing. She was a stripper, a hooker, but with a heart of gold, and of course, married to a brute, who it is pointed out is Ukrainian, not Russian, another of course. That’s one or two paragraphs, the rest of the story so far is Russians congratulating each other on being Russians, and every lost last one has a hidden agenda. As I said, tedious.
           An example of what you learn is the problem with illegal immigrants. What are they even doing in England and Germany? Simple, the rich and the politicians got greedy and let them in for the money. Like Miami, they open the doors for South American crime bosses, or Vancouver, letting in the Chinese drug lords. These foreigners buy million-dollar houses for cash and no questions asked. And now the pols act shocked to find out when you let in such money, the crime tags along.

           The Rebel is now stuck in gear. The problem did no appear until nearly a thousand miles, but it seems the clutch plates may be for the 250 model, not the 450. Worse, the only way to tell is from the serial numbers which are worn off. Corrective measures have been taken, both to the bike and the people who lied to me about it. Although I rarely drive that fast, the shimmy above 65 mph is bone-numbing after a few hours on the road.

           I’m still waiting on the 30-ton jack, which has cost me a month already. I used to day to sketch out a few projects that have become possible now that I can use dowels. It turns out to be really easy planning, like the kitchen door will take 26 quarter-inch pegs. It turns out I do have the correct router bits to put a very simple pattern of finish on the door. And I have the bit that makes that inset for placing panes of glass. I can’t wait to get my work shed happening.
           The entire cardinal family has returned. The nicest birds on the block, although they can disappear for weeks at a time. The juvenile male is now I’d guess 80% the size of the Mr. Red, and he keeps his distance. The pecking order is Mr. Red, then Mrs., then Junior, but the younger female is very elusive because she does not give the warning chirp. I can’t spot any pattern to their feeding hours other than morning and evening. And there are some tiny white-breasted birds, like small finches. I’ve got photos through the screen window that are too blurry to print.

Country Song Lyric of the Day:
“Messed Up In Mexico, Living On Refried Dreams.”
NIGHT
           I was over to Mack’s to play guitars tonight. He’s got a Tascam, one of those type that brun only to CD. They are large units which makes them easier to operate. They retain that pathetic feature that they can only record one or two tracks as a time. But he’s produced some seriously good music—if you like folk music. Irish folk music. I can take it or leave it though I’ll declare I would not like a steady diet of it. I wanted to record my playing a bass instrumental with him strumming, but he had a really hard time with split chords. Maybe next time I’ll hand him a chart.

           Let me talk about guitar recording. My opinion isn’t flattering because most guitarists presume they know how to record music. It’s more precise to say they know how to record themselves and it sounds like it. They develop incredible skills at covering up what slow learners they are and that they can only play a handful of songs.

           Mack is no different. That’s an observation, not meant as a bad thing. He’s got gitaritis but doesn’t really know it is a defined condition. Few guitarists would admit it. For example, most of the music he plays is dreadfully slow love songs that never seem to end. These tunes are so obviously chosen as an extension of the guitarist’s personality rather than for audience appeal. Hence, these guys play a lot of “listening” music when they should be playing “dancing” or “drinking” tunes. You can have one guess which type I play.
           As usual, they don’t consider what the bassist plays when they choose music. A parallel would be if I expected a highly skilled guitar player to only crank out tunes like “Gloria” or “Louie, Louie”. Then when he complains, you got it, tell him “it’s easy” as if that is placates things, like he didn’t know it is easy until you told him. Then suggest if he had any “real talent”, he could make that simple shit sound interesting. I didn’t say a word, since we know guitar players can dish it out, but they can’t take it. And they suck at “following”, strange for a gang that puts so much stock in other people’s ability to do it.

           The recording never got done tonight. The picture is Mack tuning up, but in the end, he could not learn the chord sequence. I asked him to play it because I thought it would be a piece of cake and because when I play it, no matter what it sounds wrong. But he could not get it after 15 tries. He could strum it when I single-noted the bass, but the second I began the instrumental, he could not break the habit of playing even numbers of measures.
           Did you know he pays for music? That’s right, 99¢ per tune. He says he’s got thousands of tunes. Duh, well, Mack, then there’s a lot more to it than implying that 99¢ is nothing. I’ve decided to go for a small laptop if I can find one that isn’t messed up by recent Windows releases. I’ll not soon forget those people in Nashville who wanted a blood sample before they’d quote me a price on the right to perform music live. What, you don’t remember that? Then read the addendum.

ADDENDUM
           In 2014, I think it was, the digital copyright people were clamping down on bands that performed cover tunes. I do not believe that copyright was ever intended to repress live music, yet the new law makes it clear the owner of the musical rights can charge a royalty if you whistle his tune down the sidewalk. Unlike other copyright, this new ownership is perpetual. It’s a distortion of liberty if you ask me. The money flows with the recording industry, not the music industry. The DMCA is nothing but a sordid attempt to blur that distinction for profit. It is accepted practice that musicians copy each other without necessarily making money by recording the same music for sale.

           There was nothing wrong the way it was before, a kind of professional etiquette that one did not make a recording of somebody else’s music and sell it in competition with the original. But that’s altogether a different category than performing the music live, where you are being paid for the performance, not the music. Only the greediest of people would categorize live performances as a “copy” of anything. It takes a special kind of stupid to think you can make money by forcing musicians to either pay a royalty or do only originals. It would destroy the industry and nobody would make anything—that’s how stupid they are. I personally would not mind if that happened.

           For those of you who don’t go back that far, in 2014 the Nashville lawyers were going after clubs who advertised Top 40 live music. That’s the clubs, not the musicians. So I thought to call Nashville and ask what the price would be for the rights to play 100 tunes. See my thinking? That if they succeeded in cracking down on music and I would be the only one left standing, I could name my own prices. But that’s not what happened when Nashville answered the phone. (This was during their “You can click but you can’t hide” campaign that fizzled.)

           They went ballistic when I would not reveal my identity. They wanted my complete personal information and they would “call me back” in a few weeks to tell me the price and give me a list of the tunes they decided I could have. That’s correct, I was not to be allowed to specify which music I wanted. They got quite furious when I would not tell them my name or location, and certainly was not about to give them my phone number. All I wanted was a price quote over the phone. They plainly had something significantly different in mind, giving me the third degree instead of answering my questions.
           This policy of getting the identity of people who even make inquiries on file may not directly affect most of us directly, but it is pretty obvious the direction things are going with that. They did not politely ask, they demanded. By 2015, the situation quieted down and we heard nothing more of clubs being threatened. But you can bet your ass the problem has merely gone underground. Probably when they found out no musician would knowingly participate in their scam. Did I say scam? Definitely, because they could only have pushed such laws through the system by pretending they were something else.


Last Laugh


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