One year ago today: June 26, 2018, at least linking is still legal . . .
Five years ago today: June 26, 2014, so few Jackson impersonators . . .
Nine years ago today: June 26, 2010, remember erasable (re-usable) paper?
Random years ago today: June 26, 2011, I smell plagiarism.
Whoa, she’s a hot spell. Watch the climate change people try cashing that check. There is talk of Europe lowering speed limits so their cars don’t strip the melted roadways. They use cheap tar, but a lot of it, over there. Insert French joke here. I’m measuring for the option of putting a second air conditioner per room over installing 240V wiring, I have my reasons. No work is proceeding on the property, as most of the work needs to be done out in the sheds, were even the fans full blast limit occupancy to a few minutes at a time. Maybe I’ll plant the bamboo.
My camera doesn’t catch up with me until this Friday, so these pictures are what I find amusing in the archives. Like this tree without leaves, taken on the grounds of a Civil War era mansion in Tennessee. The caption just says it was a Sunday, meaning the Reb & I walked the dogs together in the morning, which would be before she left, so that places it on March 10 this year. Early morning, look at those long shadows.
In an unsettling development, when went to use my regular software to download some music off youTube, the files would not take. They apparently copy, but the resulting files are zero bytes. When they can manipulate what you can or cannot do with your property, that is how much you can trust the secrecy of your private files. I will just dig out my older but excellent XP equipment. The recording is done off the sound port, not the software, so it is immune to such assaults.
For now I’ll treat it like some error, but two identical errors? If it’s some new blocking tactic, that just proves my criticism of American special interest groups. These reprehensible people do not want to go create their own youTube with software designed for their cause. No, that’s too much like work. They’re all the same, it’s easier to drag others down to their level. They want your beach, your clubhouse, your bus seat, your paycheck, and now your computer. The goal is always to do as they please while forcing others to pretend to like it.
And that is always their downfall: people can only be forced to pretend to like for so long. When they’ve had enough bullsh, those same people go do something like elect a Trump. BWAAA-ha-ha-ha.
And on that note, the Democrat mob continues to embarrass itself by refusing to let go of the Russia election thing. Now they want the investigator to testify, not on the outcome, but on the event itself. It appears they want him to state the party line that Trump tried to interfere with the investigation and he doesn’t want to say that. The whole Democrat bunch are coming across like crybabies and the looming Trump landslide has them shitting their diapers en masse. They are apt to try anything, so everybody be on the lookout. Political history recycles faster than, what? Kennedy girlfriends?
SE Washington State.
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Here’s the teardrop that I want. Look at that beauty, a 1935 torpedo. If I’ve shown you this picture before, it’s because I like this unit. Propane tank, and is that an A/C unit on the roof? Did they have A/C in 1935? Look at those curved windows. And the doc looks like he at some point snagged a curvy little student nurse for himself. Nothing like an intern back in the day. Just think, no body fat, no tattoos, no body holes except what she was born with. And I sure do like that trailer.
Next on the agenda are a dust collection system and a hand planer. The amount of sawdust generated has gotten to the stage of demanding attention. I would likely go the Harbor Freight route, but because their business model now stinks, I’ll check Northern Tool and other alternatives first. I have an unspent total tool budget of nearly $1,212 so I’ll be looking for quality. This hand planer, around $70, is an unfamiliar item that by default peels away 1/64th of an inch. For box-building, it’s probably handy as can be, but I would have to learn to use it carefully. My history with this kind of tool says I tend to overdo things. And remind me to take it back to Tennessee next time because that porch screen door does not like humidity.
The bamboo dried out in the car during the short trip back. Will it grow? Well find out soon enough, and I’m planting it in a strip across the yard to the shed, where it if sprouts anything like where it came from, people from the street will have no view at all of the entire east end of the yard. I like that.
[Author's note: when you see Washington State pictures of abandoned houses, it's best to remember the area is prosperous and any major landowners in the state are millionaires. Chances are any dilapidated buildings are because the owners moved to town long ago.]
ADDENDUM
The Reb wants to learn that set of music, which more than resembles our situation so long ago. Let me recap. She is a vocalist that prefers jazz-like music, I am a bass player. Neither of us plays the guitar, but between us we can strum a few chords. We could, by 1989, do a set (one hour, usually 8 to 10 tunes) entirely of bass and vocals. These were hand-picked tunes given to that arrangement. Read on for what’s changed since then.
Foremost, I’ve learned to arrange duo music and burned through dozens of guitarists who didn’t make the grade. She’s gone through many bands but her forte is solo work. Over the last couple visits we plowed through some tunes and the sparkle is still there. This is how one thing leads to another, for anyone who hasn’t already guessed. While we still can’t play guitar, I’ve spend decades learning to get around that on the bass. As long as she can hit the odd chord, and she’s much better than that, we can crank out some remarkable sounds.
My vocals are weak, hers are award-winning. But that is a perfectly workable combo. She picked some country music I’ve never heard of, but give me a few hours on it. I would scramble for any chance we could play together again because the synergy is there. In spades. We’ve started on this path before, but now have the advantage of knowing what doesn’t work, which points us in the same direction. This time, we would only have to decide on a destination.
We both have a ton of pro stage time. As for compatibility, would you like to hear some of the band names we’ve been kicking around? Here, have a laugh. I think “Loved Her Hated Him” is descriptive, she thinks it’s too long. Okay, so it doesn’t roll off the tongue. She won’t even consider “EWB” when I told her it meant “enemies with benefits” since it does not apply to use. Careful how you interpret that. She’s aware of how often I joke about you-know-who, so she’d call the group “Taylor Slow”. Ouch!
I suppose any of these would make a great album title. Stay tuned on this episode. Why? Because I follow up every musical lead I can, and I’m far more likely to respond to an idea when it comes from her direction. That, and we are not the sort to make the same mistakes a second time. Today, I’m learning two of her picks, “My Give A Damn’s Busted” and a tune I’ve only heard at Karaoke, “Before He Cheats Again”.
Wait, there’s more. This is also my initial exposure to the sort-of-okay side of new country. The music tends to include every known country instrument in every song. It’s full-orchestra country, almost as if somebody has the idea they can upgrade the style. The Reb tends to choose tunes that have either weak or strong hooks, nothing mediocre. In the strong tunes, it means that at any given moment, several instruments are playing that hook. And who do we know that specializes in picking out the representative notes from all that and playing it on bass?
To my delight, these notes tend toward standard bass runs with a little syncopation. After a mere hour, I can solo the two tunes must mentioned. The downside? The bass lines bear little resemblance to the originals, which often sound “disinterested”, a kind of non-country sound punctuated by one or two opportunistic flourishes throughout the arrangement. And usually indistinct or drowned out because several others are competing for that slot. That style of bass is more trouble than it is worth besides being hard to dance to. That’s where I can restore the intended sound, all on my 7/8ths scale bass.
If we get enough of this music, it diminishes the requirement for any fancy guitar work. The Reb is already familiar with my stage cues and how I handle instrumental parts. Myself, I have a lot of work to do with the big band. However, their music tends to be old enough that any really tricky parts likely have an on-line tutorial. If you blend several of those, you can come up with a decent bass line for tunes like “Get Back” which I like but would hardly devote my own time learning.
After all those encouraging words, I must add that my bass playing is deteriorating due to a nagging and persistent pain due to the motorcycle collision. At the time, I made the decision to live with the pain rather than risk surgery, and I stand by that. But gigging means playing four hours at a stretch and the pain emerges at around twenty minutes, affects my playing by 30 minutes, and the longest I’ve played without a break is an hour, by which time I’m missing notes and sometimes passages. The pain is not intense, but it’s there and the arm will not obey commands. This will not do, this will never do.
