One year ago today: July 5, 2019, the longest blog?
Five years ago today: July 5, 2015, auctioneering/racketeering.
Nine years ago today: July 5, 2011, the bus is still late.
Random years ago today: July 5, 2012, getting ready for Colorado.
Moving fence posts in the Sunday morning climate, who needs a sermon? I’ve gotten used to the bells ringing from Friday onward. I don’t recognize all the tunes, some of them kind of start off like Led Zep. As I waited for my grits, I had another go at finding that video shown in Germany in the 1930s concerning the Boer War. This conflict holds some fascination for me as it created the modern guerilla war in a big way. Most documentaries don’t portray the Boer side accurately. It’s a film made with famous German actors, but I can’t recall the title If you know, leave a comment.
Here is a photo of something unheard of in pre-millennial America. A stockout.
[Author’s note: I’ve been millenialized again. I carefully planned the roof in the back yard to be completed by the weekend. But I told you, if Superman was in Florida, this place would drag him down to their level. Sure enough, for the first time in known history, the lumber yard was sold out of fence panels. It goes further than that. Not only do I have to complete the roof on weekdays, the forecast for the next week is rain every day. The lumber, when I get it, cannot be stored outdoors, since I need a conspicuous amount.
Into the spare bedroom it goes, this triples the work load. But that is Florida. Peasants do not have to know any details about what you are doing to jack you around. They only need to know you are doing something. And it is impossible to disguise any brand of productive activity around the unwashed masses.]
It’s true, nobody seems to have designed a better device to keep the squirrels off your bird seed. I will try my idea of hanging it inside a bird cage. That will make it harder to fill and once again, Florida seems to know when I want to buy a used bird cage, offering only models upward of $200. I recall how Memphis got in and out of his cage and have an idea of how big a space is required. Forex trading starts on week 15 in a few hours and I’m considering opening a real-money account. More for the experience than profit at this stage, plus there is a sum of money just sitting doing nothing. The Auvoria people are recommending changing from VPS (virtual private server) to RDP (remote desktop protocol).
RDP has always been suspicious, if only because users keep saying it has more advantages, but fail to specify what those are. My concern is security, as the first thing I do when I get a computer is turn off any type of remote access. I’ll have to look into this before I’ll take a chance that MicroSoft or anybody who has anything to do with those people, they have been a shady bunch since Windows 98 when they started installing funny code. There are two types of computer users, those who deeply distrust MicroSoft and those without much of a clue about what is really going on. If I do a remote, it will be up north, dedicated, and I’ll be the one doing the remote log-on.
Ha, half an hour later, I viewed the instructions for setting up the RDP. They had Millennial Mort in his most helpful artificial manner demonstrating how to set the various options. Now there folks is your definition of idiot. He went through some twenty stages, having to delete and change defaults, backpedaling several times, and leaving tons of unexplained settings in the background. Why idiot? Because he had no clue what a mess his generation had made of these things. In his limited brain capacity, going through all this technical bull was absolutely normal. To me, it typified what a bloody mess they have made of things. Nowadays, every install should be a simple procedure in plain English, with every capability clearly displayed. Hell, by year 1999, if MicroSoft had any brains, such how-to videos would have been obsolete.
For the record, the first time I officially complained about how needlessly complicated MicroSoft was making things was in 1986, when I had to take a college level course to get my computer to work. That was the year I set up a fax broadcast business and needed three computers. I could not possibly afford Apples and regretted even allowing what were then known as IBM computers into my household. However, by using dedicated computers, I feel it is time I learned how to work remotely, something I’ve barely dabbled in—and you know why? Because of all my illustrious expert user friends, none of them had the inclination to let me set up a computer at their place. There’s a huge amount of skepticism over having such a computer in one’s house even by people who don’t question a thing about a Facebook account. So I’ve only accomplished remote access across the lab and I don’t much remember why I never used it.
Non-millennial product @ age 85.
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Stock outs are another way for passing the cost on to the consumer. It is marginally more profitable to run out of something than to pay for deliveries to keep the shelves stocked. What’s so sad about this is the whole system is no longer the American way. That’s the way that made this country the greatest on Earth, and business-wise, it has been quashed. A true American business would not think of stiffing their customers with empty shelves, they’d pay for a rush order. Not nowadays, let the customer drive all the way over, park, and walk to the aisle before he finds out. Maybe he’ll do some revenge shopping. Total scumbag attitude.
This photo is the same condition in the Alka-Selter aisle. Every weird flavor, cold, and sinus version, but no good old Alka-Seltzer, the one most people use. All I can say is the people who let these things happen deserve what they are going to get. That’s why I had to chuckle as I did some last minute shopping at Wal*Mart and the robot was cleaning the floor. That’s probably the only job in the store that is worth $15 an hour. So you know, it was five minutes to closing time and I was way over in automotive trying to find a windshield repair kit.
I had intended to take a video of the robot in this far northeastern corner of the building. Sure enough, just as I got the camera out, two people showed up and the robot is programmed to shut down when that happens. They weren’t buying anything, they just rounded the corner and kept walking. How did they know? And the one time it was too late to wait around for the robot to re-start. By the way, they were sold out of the repair kits.
How did they know the exact random items I was shopping for? It’s befuddling they can be out of what I want and nothing else. I don’t think I’m jinxed, so what is it? I not due for anything like this much bad karma and it’s unlikely I’m the target of any voodoo rituals. Oh, I also bought a wrist watch, it’s cheaper than replacing the batteries which are now sold in 2-packs so you lose the other long before you need it. The thing had never been set ahead for savings time, so when I stopped for last call at the Broken Rudder, it was past closing time. I warn you, if these screw-ups cause you anything more than distress, stay out of Florida.
Forex trading has commenced, the app is still stuck on the pound-kiwi. The exchange rate is falling steeply so I’ve issued a series of buy orders. The chart does not show a floor, but I know there is one. I’ve learned since I’m using 1:100 leverage, never risk more than 1% on any given trade. I’m looking more closely at a strategy of even smaller trades, but more often. It’s not like I’m working the computer to death. I’ve further noticed a currency I could not peg on the major (US dollar) lists by the symbol CHP, then I remembered Switzerland isn’t part of the Eurozone. That has to be it by default. But since I though the Swiss dealt in franks, I put up CHF. Turns out this is a semi-failed crypto-currency called Coin Poker. But is has a full trading spread and press releases. I’m not ready for that kind of trading yet, it’s still a thought.
The nuances of the trading system remain a blur in my mind. I’ve come a long way but can’t figure it out. Maybe it is one of those things with no curve, rather it suddenly makes sense in one day down the line. In fact, it is complicated enough that I wonder who else is flying by the seat of their pants. I’m putting a lot of faith in that software and the back of my mind says there must be other software constantly being developed that can best other brands. Conceptually, that is not difficult.
ADDENDUM
A fairly complete analysis of the Saturday gig shows that I cannot possibly control the relative volume on stage without a sound man. I’ve run into this problem before, but this time I had normalized all the tracks to the same volume and levels, removing any DC offset. But at full stage volume the tiniest remaining differences makes me sound like a disk jockey. It would be impossible to memorize each setting even if there was time to adjust it before each song. For the umpteenth time in my life, I join the ranks of those who create an act they cannot use. Sigh.
The new guitar player's ad is still running, but the guy is another dreamer. Mid-30s and still no real stage experience, a laughable combination these days. Since around ten years ago, his age group appears to be the typical age of musical last-chancers. They still have delusions of grandeur though that is part of this game. They call my music old, but their song lists are centered on the 1970s. The average age of working bands in Polk seems to be late 40s, with 35 or so being the youngest. Things change but I regularly drop in on places with a younger crowd to see what form things have taken. And most of the time, I find canned music.
Since music is alive and well, and you can’t go wrong assuming the motives of most band musicians are not that different than when I was a teen. Ergo, the change is structural. Bands with younger members don’t play the same venues but weirdly, they don’t seem to play anywhere at all. My instinct always tells me this happens when the focus shifts from performing to recording. My view of recording demo tracks is a phase most musicians go through—but outwardly it appears more and more of them are never getting through it to the other side. I call it the “baloney makes you horny” phase, after Sissy Spacek.
(When you see it.)
