One year ago today: January 2, 2021, defund all embassies.
Five years ago today: January 2, 2016, now easy & automatic.
Nine years ago today: January 2, 2012, credit junkies don’t read.
Random years ago today: January 2, 1980, just across the border.
An early day had me and Sam on an extended walk, gives one a chance to clear the baffles. By sunup, I made us omelets (cheese, mushroom, kale) and cooked a batch of the latest non-beef. I say, it’s come a long ways from the rubbery cardboard days. Try it, they’ve really engineered the product, it now chops, cooks, and even smells perfectly like ground sirloin. In pasta sauces and mixed dishes it is great to work with, remembering that even the amount of cooking time had to be determined and matched to real meat. And it has finally dropped to a competitive price. Here’s the Reb with Sammy at the lake last week.
Tough call. Top of the list would be that with guitarists, musical ability is inversely proportional to reliability. I learned that big bands are gone as far as making a living by performing. I learned I could solo on bass, but that has too many limitations to pursue. My song list has changed by 4/5ths, a guitar player rarity. And though it dates back long before 2009, I have now very keen insights into what a guitar player should be doing on stage. At this time, I have only one hour of music ready and it is not meshed with the Beat Buddy drum pedal which I have to give an honest try.
How’s my strumming? Better, now that I’ve learned to “listen” to the bass lines. This serves mainly to give each strum an often super-subtle spin. My fingers are roughening and my wrist is toughening. This week I was able to remove the capo and play in A, though this is not yet a decision. I was also able to tune back up to standard without cramping my hand, something I did not have to contend with on the bass.
This got me into a row with Elliott, see below. He does not believe I can hear a single bass note and sing the rest of the song a cappella in key. According to him, this requires perfect pitch, and since I don’t have perfect pitch, this is impossible. Send him a video for proof and, well, he can’t see what is in the rest of the room so he’ll not accept that. Nonetheless, I quickly notice my ability to stay on key and have adapted that to lots of stops and chops on the guitar to spice up my lousy chording.
Another change is that while I’m using the chorus pedal to fake an instrumental break, I’ve memorized a set of single mostly pinky-figure spots I can press for a chord variation without the bother of learning a whole new chord. This is done by sound, though I’m certain there is guitar chord name for what’s played. The only one I know that I play is G9. I would estimate the bulk of what I do on guitar is based on theory, not experience. My kingdom for an ounce of talent, something I don’t have to work at an hour for a split-second of gain.
An element of new country assists me on some tunes and it is the growing sophistication of chords used as transitions. A growing fraction of my list has these, and the good news is they are regular “farmer” chords, so I don’t have to bother with jazz substitutions.
What gives? I have a mild skin allergy that flares up at times until I get used to a new climate. It is abated by, well, by trial and error, because that’s how I found out about using my girlfriend’s slightly damp bath towels around a half-century ago. It was simple, the towel trick worked long enough for the allergy to abate. We are talking about long trips into a different time zone. I was floored by an attack from visting Murfreesboro which is like 40 miles from here. And the towels here have long since worn off. Pardon if I’m in a grumpy mood.
By noon, I’m my legs are in pain. So the pets and I have made plans to stay home all day, maybe do a little reading, watch some DVDs, play a little guitar. Oh, before I forget, playing guitar gives me an ache in the left elbow. It’s directly from the pressure needed to play the chords and I’ll sooner or later have to address the problem. It can’t be helped by a bandage or splint, since it is not caused by position or movement, rather the deep internal strain from holding my arm at the correct angle.
Wooden box.
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Still discovering new features on the car, the one that is hardest to master because it is not intuitive is the three zone cimate control. If you set if for comfortable, it should be like the Cadillac was. The temperature was set and forget. This minivan, besides taking nearly five minutes to heat up, has to set each time to get it right. I know there is a way, but as I said, it’s not something obvious and it should be.
The Reb called to say she’ll be a couple days over. And wrote about the strange experience of having nothing to look after every day. I know she had the pets or parents every day for at least the past 13 years. The last two visits I was here, which is not the same as her getting out and away on her own. Things that seem such a good idea at the time often rope us into daily commitments that never let up. Er, unless you know somebody like me. Anyway, let’s hope she doesn’t like it too much and run away from home, gang.
How about a vacation for me? I’ve been only to Tennessee since November 2018, Miami doesn’t count. Nothing to see or do there when you are over 35 except spend your hard-earned money. Who knows when the Smithsonian will re-open? That leaves a tentative plan to finally see the Great Lakes. It’s okay, I’m not expecting much. Lots of water, scraggy shorelines, but I’d like to say I’ve been there. I sketched out a plan to go north from Nashville, having only a large-scale map. I’ve heard of the Straits of Mackinac and suppose there is a ferry boat across to the Northern Peninsula. My knowlege of Michigan is near zero, a look at Wiki tells me they have festivals for salmon, mushrooms, trout, music, fudge, snowmobiles, film, timber, potatoes, cherries, lighthouses, warblers, and chestnuts.
Judging by the minivan gas mileage, the tentative 2,308 mile round trip via Duluth will require 116 gallons of gas. Other than that, the travel parameters are so near to motorcycle costs that I’ll use that standard. I would essentially be living in the van, staying at the very best Love’s (truck stops). I can say right now there is enough in the “blue” account to stay at seven cities for more than a day each. I tend to visit libraries rather than tourist traps. To that end, I have a handy booklet publishe way back in 1980 when there were still gas stations with diners in every little town. It was a grand time to tour by hippy van, but by then I was working for a living.
Do I have any hard numbers besides mileage? Yes, based on a two week trip, my total budget would allow for $75.85 per day, with another $483.55 if I schedule to be away past the first of the subsequent month. I recognize this, it is the olld motorcycle equation. I could afford to stay on the road permanently. Speculating I can play guitar by then, there’s a chance to return with more than I started with. What a pity it took so long to get to such a spot in life. I’m fine, but there will be no hiking or mountain-climbing.
Allow me to point out the latest on-line screw up. Rumble. This outfit could have learned by the mistakes of others, but that is not the millennial way. I know the site is new, but the functionaity is not. One thing you want in a site that professes to publish news stories is a way to filter them, and the old con of needing an account to view the comments is still making the rounds. Like BitChute, there is no clear path to filtering out old posts, something that should be possible at the top search level. It’s the same bunch of idiots cranking out the same old garbage.
ADDENDUM
I’m not sure if this is a waste of time, but over the past few days, Elliott and I have gone at it over the Canadian system, and this guy has all his relatives in Canada. This is the time to mention that the Canadian system indoctrinates from birth that Canada is the Promised Land and all their problems and evils are directly caused by American interference. The follow on to that is Elliott is convinced the Canadian system is better, particularly with education, and he is very statistically inclined. He does not question any “expert” who provides what serves to confirm his own beliefs, which is highly amusing if you don’t take it seriously.
Thus, I’m toying with the idea of publishing material redacted from out blogs over the past 48 hours. He has recently discovered memes and prefers the type that personally insult Trump, where I tend toward those that provoke thought. Did I mention, he is a neverTrumper to the core, believing that Joe Biden was elected President, and that I am an uneducated redneck, out of touch with the changes in the world. That seems illogical for a guy that has only been out of his home town once or twice in his life and who does not read technical material. Don’t say nothing, he’s touchy about that. He's also very touchy about not being able to sing, the more so because he knew me when I couldn't.
There are other cautions I’ll have to judge, such as his belief that placing unqualified people in charge results in diversification. He thought Hillary should have been elected to the US could “catch up to the rest of the world in having a woman in charge.” He does not specify which of those foreign countries we should emulate but it’s likely in Europe and not Asia, type of thing. Elliott is also a team player of sorts. Of sorts? Yes, the kind who thinks everybody who isn’t on his team is a bad sport.
