Scab of a nation, driven insane

step five…?

Sunday, 20250615 przxqgl

step one: clear out the back end of the shed, and demolish the pressboard shelves.

step three: add a, preferably, left-hand, outswing door.

step four: add a ceiling. (materials already purchased)

step five: add insulation on the walls and ceiling, preparing for step six in the process. then add reflective mylar sheeting over the insulation.

i need two more rolls of insulation, because i bought what they had, which was R15 insulation, which comes in shorter rolls than the R13 insulation that i originally wanted… R15 insulation is better than R13, but because of the fact that it comes in shorter rolls, there wasn’t enough of it, so tomorrow i will buy more insulation… and a pair of shears to subdivide it, because the studs are not standard widths apart, and that’s about 85% of what is left, at this point… 😒

putting up insulation is REALLY hot work… 🥵

step six: add existing grow lights.

steps 2 and 3 complete!

Sunday, 20250615 przxqgl

step one: clear out the back end of the shed, and demolish the pressboard shelves.

step three: add a, preferably, left-hand, outswing door.

step four: add a ceiling. (materials already purchased)

the wall is complete! the door is complete, and it WORKS (thanks to my next-door neighbour, tracy, who does this sort of thing because he finds it relaxing)!! the only things left, at this point, are installing the insulation and the mylar (materials have been bought and delivered), and hanging the lights (all of which i can do myself). eventually, at some point, we’re going to have to re-do the electrical service to the shed, because it is currently an extension cord, buried under the turf of the back yard, and plugged into a GFI on the back deck — goddamn ron zeising! 🤬 — and i had to move the outlet in the shed, because a big FUCKING extension cord is NOT the correct way to wire an outbuilding! 😒

step five: add insulation on the walls and ceiling, preparing for step six in the process. then add reflective mylar sheeting over the insulation.

step six: add existing grow lights.

cannabis, homegrown, house stuff

back to steps 2 and 3…

Friday, 20250613 przxqgl

step one: clear out the back end of the shed, and demolish the pressboard shelves.

step two: build a wall, approximately four and a half feet from the back end wall of the shed (materials already purchased). include building a leg for the remainder of the shelves using recycled wood from the demolition project, in preparation to re-cover them (later, different project) with something more durable than pressboard.

step three: add a, preferably, left-hand, outswing door.

half of the wall is complete, and we have dry-fitted the door, which i had to cut down, because an 80-inch door is too tall… and we’re going to have to shim THE HELL out of the door, because the whole shed is so un-square that the door will not function without significant shimming. and it turns out that moe has a whole bunch of leftover doorknobs from the remodeling project at the clinic, so my un-square light room is going to get an official veterinary hospital doorknob. which is a lot better than the total lack of doorknob that i was going to go with. 😉

the rest of the wall is going to wait until the door is in place, so we will only have to cut and place once. i bought the insulation, and the mylar is ALLEGEDLY being delivered tomorrow, but i’ll believe it when i see it.

major thanks to my next door neighbour, tracy, who loaned me a circular saw that actually cuts straight and isn’t falling apart. 😉

step four: add a ceiling. (materials already purchased)

step five: add insulation on the walls and ceiling, preparing for step six in the process. then add reflective mylar sheeting over the insulation.

step six: add existing grow lights.

step 4 complete, completely bypassing steps 2 and 3???

Thursday, 20250612 przxqgl

step one: clear out the back end of the shed, and demolish the pressboard shelves.

step three: add a, preferably, left-hand, outswing door.

step four: add a ceiling. (materials already purchased)

the framing for the wall is complete, and i have added a ceiling (which was easier than waiting until the wall and the door are there), so this is already out of order, but it’s a lot easier that way. i just ordered 200 feet of agricultural mylar, and i’m going out to buy a door, and the insulation tomorrow.

and i discovered that the shed is not only not square, it is not parallelepiped-shaped, either. it was OBVIOUSLY originally built by someone who DOES! NOT! CARE!, which i find particularly annoying because it was, literally, HIS JOB to care about such things. 😒

step five: add insulation on the walls and ceiling, preparing for step six in the process. then add reflective mylar sheeting over the insulation.

step six: add existing grow lights.

Silence is a Statement Now, and Here’s What It’s Saying

step two partially complete…

Wednesday, 20250611 przxqgl

step one: clear out the back end of the shed, and demolish the pressboard shelves.

the framing for the wall is mostly done: i still have to put in the studs, but everything else is firmed up, secure, and a good deal stronger than it was before… and i found out that, on one side of the shed, the studs are 23 inches apart, and on the opposite side of the shed, the studs are 20 inches apart, so the room i’m building is NOT square. 😒🙄😖

probably finish the wall and ceiling this weekend. possibly the door, as well.

step three: add a, preferably, left-hand, outswing door.

step four: add a ceiling. (materials already purchased)

step five: add insulation on the walls and ceiling, preparing for step six in the process. then add reflective mylar sheeting over the insulation.

step six: add existing grow lights.

dead people, peanut envy, pictures, snake suspenderz / alive

hobbit… 😿

Sunday, 20250608 przxqgl

howlin’ hobbit died yesterday. 😿

according to lucifer (who i talked to on the phone, yesterday), she left in the morning, and when she came back in the afternoon, he was dead. she said he had an electrical plug in his hand, and it’s probable that he bent over to plug something in, and had a heart attack.

at least he didn’t shoot himself, like he was fantasizing about doing in a text to thaddeus, earlier in the week (and who could blame him)…

190828 salamandir & hobbit at the Oregon State Fair

cannabis, homegrown, house stuff, pictures, ron zeising

step one complete

Wednesday, 20250604 przxqgl

step one: clear out the back end of the shed, and demolish the pressboard shelves.

step three: add a, preferably, left-hand, outswing door.

step four: add a ceiling. (materials already purchased)

step five: add insulation on the walls and ceiling, preparing for step six in the process. then add reflective mylar sheeting over the insulation.

step six: add existing grow lights.

THE END RESULT: an insulated grow room that i can use year round… which is going to start with clones from the space queen seeds that i had left over from last year, because they are REALLY vigorous, and this is an excellent opportunity, which is going to end once the solstice happens, because the light changes, and the decreasing daylight will trigger flowering, and once that happens i won’t be able to clone them any longer. 😉

the former owner of this house put in brand new pressboard shelves in the shed, just prior to selling the house. the shelves SORT OF worked for the first few years, but they quickly developed major sagging, because they are pressboard. the plan, eventually, is to build more shelves out of stronger, less likely to sag, materials — seriously, i would have thought that a general contractor, as ron zeising was reputed to be, would have known that pressboard is definitely NOT the material to use for shelves, but oh well, whatever… i already know that ron zeising put absolutely no critical effort into the projects that he did, so what did i expect? 😒🙄

corruption, drumpf, i am a terrorist, political, politicians

LET’S GO TACO!! 👍👍

Sunday, 20250601 przxqgl

There was a reason for President Donald Trump’s particularly scathing response when a reporter asked him Wednesday about a new term coined about the president’s tariffs: TACO, or Trump Always Chickens Out. He had not yet heard the term, according to a senior White House official who acknowledged to CNN that the president was caught off guard. Trump had said as much at the time, saying “I’ve never heard that”…
— May 30, 2025, CNN

250601 four past presidents, bush, clinton, obama, and biden, all wearing T-shirts that say "LET'S GO TACO", eating tacos — 250601 four past presidents, bush, clinton, obama, and biden, all wearing T-shirts that say “LET’S GO TACO”, eating tacos

can i just say a big, strong, 🙄 over a “president” who says “i’ve never heard that” in response to a meme about him?

seriously… 🙄

mushrooms

what is this?

Monday, 20250519 przxqgl

yesterday, i took our old barbecue to be recycled, and when i returned home, there was a fedex package waiting for me on the front porch… addressed to “BRIAN SALAMAN”…?

it was a roughly cube-shaped box, and, for its size, it really didn’t weigh that much.

that is NOT my name, and it is not even what i put into web forms for stuff when i don’t want them to know what my name is… but it is close enough to my name that i didn’t feel too uncomfortable opening the box to see what was inside, but, initially, that didn’t help much.

what was inside was a craft-paper wad, covered in tape. it weighed less than what i was expecting, and, at first, i thought it might be a hat, or something like that, since i have received hats in boxes like that before… but i didn’t remember ordering a hat, so it was still a puzzle.

cutting through the tape, and tearing away the craft paper didn’t help much, at first. it was a dry, vaguely whitish-blue mass of… something… wrapped in plastic, but i still wasn’t sure, until i looked more closely, and realised…

it is mushrooms! 🍄🍄🍄🍄🍄

i ordered a pound (well, 448 grams, or 15.8 ounces, which is .2 ounces LESS than a pound) of mushrooms on 250514, and it took them FOUR DAYS to package them up and get them to me.

addressed to the wrong person, but… it’s mushrooms, so i figure it is close enough. 😉

i have a friend in hawaii who wants microdose capsules, so he and i went in on a pound, so that there would be plenty of capsules for a few years, because who knows what the “legal” situation is going to be in the future (or even next week 😒)…

i really DO NOT understand the legality (or lack thereof) of shipping mushrooms by fedex, but i have gotten them two other times, from the same folks, in the past (first time was less than an ounce, second time was a couple ounces), and they definitely ARE the “right kind” of mushrooms… and i am definitely NOT going to complain about it! 😉

so, now it’s time to make some more capsules. 😉

articles, i am a terrorist, i am antifa, links

Silence is a Statement Now, and Here’s What It’s Saying

Monday, 20250512 przxqgl

NO ONE IS COMING TO SAVE US.
WE ARE THE ONES WE WAITED FOR.
THEY DON'T CARE ABOUT YOU.
WITHOUT YOU WE GOT NOTHING.
THEY WON'T EVEN TRY.
WE ARE ALL WE'VE GOT. — NO ONE IS COMING TO SAVE US.
WE ARE THE ONES WE WAITED FOR.
THEY DON’T CARE ABOUT YOU.
WITHOUT YOU WE GOT NOTHING.
THEY WON’T EVEN TRY.
WE ARE ALL WE’VE GOT.

Continue reading Silence is a Statement Now, and Here’s What It’s Saying →

mushrooms, pictures

🍄 mush 🍄 room 🍄

Saturday, 20250510 przxqgl

i took >1g around 09:00 this morning, and had one of the more unusual trips i can recall, principally because, when they first started coming on, i went and laid down, and quickly realised that my feet were cold (i wasn’t wearing shoes or socks), so i covered them, which quickly resulted in covering my whole body, and i remained there until 13:00 or so, when i got motivated to write stuff down.

most of what i experienced was pulsating lights in various intricate geometric patterns (the expected stuff for hallucinogens in general), but, along with it was a very distinct and directed train of thought, that, ultimately, boils down to this… “thought experiment”?

imagine you have been born with some physical deformity: missing a part of an arm or leg, or something like that. now, imagine, that, as an adult, you are given the opportunity to visit an “imaginary place” (a “holo-deck” or something like it), and, while in that “imaginary place”, you are given surgery to correct whatever physical deformity you had. at the end of the surgery, you are a complete, whole, human being, with no deformity… but you are in an “imaginary place”. when you come back to “reality”, you still have the deformity. if you re-enter the “imaginary place”, you are a whole human being, but only when you are in that “imaginary place”. once you return to “reality”, you have the deformity.

in such a case, would the psychologist’s job be to convince you that you did, or did not have the surgery?

now, imagine that you have been born with a mental “deformity”: you are depressed, or manic, or narcissistic or something like that, which develops over many years. the same situation: as an adult, you are given the opportunity to visit this “imaginary place” and get surgery (or whatever) to completely cure whatever condition you may have had. in the “imaginary place” you are a whole human being, but in “reality” you still have whatever mental problems you had previously.

in such a case, would the psychologist’s job be to convince you that you did, or did not have the surgery?

my answer is a neon green combat boot:

drumpf, fun with the post office, i am a terrorist, pictures

groan… this again… 🙄

Tuesday, 20250506 przxqgl

today is the 6th of may, 2025.

i ordered something that was shipped from gainesville, florida, on the 30th of april…

i’m going to bet that it WILL NOT be delivered on time, and that the postal service has their head up their collective asses again. 😒

i am getting SO TIRED of #drumpf and his minions… 😠

ETA: and, now, the web site informs me that i can’t get assistance with my package until the 9th… i guess that’s one way of dealing with the problem of not being accurate on their estimates of arrival times… 😒

anhedonia, anxiety, corruption, depression, drumpf, frustration, i am a terrorist, political, politicians, quotes, rants, stupid people, the very big stupid

15748

Thursday, 20250501 przxqgl

it keeps getting worse… i stopped reading the news, because all the news does, these days, is make me dispair for humanity, and feel like ALL the changes i have fought for, and ALL the actions that i have taken part in throughout my life have been for nothing. at this point, in my opinion, the direction this country is going, at this point, is backwards, and that at an ALARMING rate. i get the very distinct feeling that we are facing another situation like martin niemöller wrote his confession about, in 1946:

Als die Nazis die Kommunisten holten,
     habe ich geschwiegen; ich war ja kein Kommunist.

Als sie die Gewerkschafter holten, habe ich geschwiegen;
     ich war ja kein Gewerkschafter.

Als sie die Sozialdemokraten einsperrten, habe ich geschwiegen;
     ich war ja kein Sozialdemokrat.

Als sie die Juden einsperrten, habe ich geschwiegen;
     ich war ja kein Jude.

Als sie mich holten, gab es keinen mehr, der protestieren konnte.

except that instead of people who call themselves “nazis”, we have people who act JUST LIKE nazis, who call themselves republicans, and instead of communists, trade unionists, social democrats, and jews, we have LGBTQ+ people, autistic people, students, scientists and social workers, and immigrants.

and they’re going after so much stuff at once, with such vigor and determination, that, after #drumpf and his crew are out of office, it will take LITERALLY DECADES before we’re back to where we were in the late ’60s and early ’70s…

and I DON’T HAVE DECADES! i’ve got two, maybe three decades AT MOST, and who knows if we’re even going to be STARTED fixing things by then.

i REALLY DO NOT want to live in a world that is worse off than it was when i entered it. 😠

When they took the fourth amendment,
     I was quiet because I didn’t deal drugs.

When they took the sixth amendment,
     I was quiet because I was innocent.

When they took the second amendment,
     I was quiet because I didn’t own a gun.

Now they’ve taken the first amendment,
     and I can say nothing about it.

pictures, purple, weird people

new, custom-tailored band jacket

Saturday, 20250426 przxqgl

250426 custom-tailored band jacket – dark purple velvet, knee-length jacket with a maroon vest, cuffs, and lapels with gold accents

i think i may have taken the purple suit to a new and unheard-of height of preposterousness. 😉

so, the father of a guy i know made him a bright pink band jacket, and i asked him if he could ask his father to make me one. last month, the guy face-timed me from pittsburgh, where his father had a whole bunch of fabric that he COULD make a jacket out of, and asked me if i wanted something other than bright pink, to match his jacket… and one of the fabrics he had was this dark purple velvet, which, to me, looks EXACTLY like a ’60s-era psychedelic rock band jacket… add to that the maroon-with-gold-accents for the cuffs, lapels and vest, and… well… $450.00 later, i’ve got a custom-tailored, ’60s-era psychedelic rock band jacket that is exactly like nobody else’s IN THE WORLD!! 😎

now, i’ve either got to find a whole bunch of new gigs in which to wear it…

or i’m going to become one of those people who dress strangely when going to fred meyers.

as thaddeus said, por que no los dos? 😉

forward into the past, house stuff, my music, unicycle

gorph

Sunday, 20250420 przxqgl

i got six 90-minute cassettes from the mid-1980s (well, technically, it was 5½, because one side was ruined beyond repair) that came from ken whitley, digitised this week, and got them back on friday. two of them are ones that are the closest to the original masters as i am likely to find, at this point, of music that i produced in the eμ studio at western, between 1980 and 1990, which i had (and lost) on my cracked cloud drive. another one is the only surviving relic of the stairway jam, which, at the time, consisted of myself, eric barcus (who was to become my brother in law), kenyth freeman (my good friend and mentor), jeff taylor, and prudy elam, on friday, april 13th, 1984, at 19:30, also in the eμ studio. and yet another one is “The This of That”, recorded at solgarth, kenyth freeman’s home, by ken whitley, featuring kenyth on flute, and brent jackson on guitars.

a picture of solgarth, even though it is no longer kenyth’s home, because you can do that kind of thing these days…

thursday, i drove to lakewood, south of tacoma, and picked up 1 enormous (15’x17′) and 1 not-so-enormous (15’x9′) roll(s) of artificial turf, which were, then, lugged and schlepped into the back yard by moe and me, and laid out on the mud-pit which is what is left of the “lawn” between the deck and the garage, thanks, in large part, to the black dogs, quill and kestrel, who, literally, run in circles and tear up the grass when it rains. the artificial turf looks A LOT better than the mud, but the artificial turf is HEAVY and, as a result, i spent all of friday and saturday, basically, either asleep, or wishing i was asleep, and i’m STILL kind of “low energy” today, although i feel a lot more “sprightly” than previously.

my unicycle class was cancelled this week, because john is out of town and they couldn’t find a replacement for him… but it’s probably just as well, as i am still feeling rather beat from the aforementioned artificial turf project.

anhedonia, cannabis, family of origin, homegrown, pictures

bluh… 😒

Tuesday, 20250415 przxqgl

i woke up in an AWFUL mood, partially, at least, because i had a REALLY disturbing dream about two friends, who are moving AGAIN in real life… and, apart from the general feeling of dread i get whenever I have had to move, rubbing off, i don’t remember why it was so disturbing. i got up, and went through the motions, taking care of practical stuff (like laundry, dishes, doctor’s appointment, etc.), while wishing i could die, or at least sleep for longer, without having disturbing dreams.

over the weekend, i went to bellingham, to get some starts from darol… who is SEVENTY FOUR now… 😲 he said that, when it became legal, he lost his customer base, and hasn’t actually SOLD any cannabis for about six years. 😲 he still grows his own, though, and he has a healthy crop that is still under vegetative lights, from which he gave me a few.

three “medium sized” “starts” (which are big enough that i might put them outside right away, if the weather stays nice), one “small” start, which is STILL bigger than the “starts” i have gotten elsewhere, plus two from seed, which are the ones with the paper markers, because they’re still small enough that i can’t see them without a clue…

darol also gave me some “surprising, but not surprising” news about my older-younger sister and her, apparently now “used-to-be” husband, which strikes me as REALLY typical and even expected, but still, not something that i would have entirely thought possible for someone who USED TO BE a friend of mine (admittedly, a long time ago). and everybody’s dying — 😒 — while i seem to be chugging along like nobody’s business, despite the fact that i think i’ve got long COVID (thus the doctor’s appointment). 😒

then, this afternoon, i went out, ostensibly to wash my car in preparation for SACBO, for which i just registered, and went for a drive, ostensibly to dry my car because i’m too lazy to pay for a drier, and sat through FOURTY-FIVE MINUTES of traffic to go the QUARTER MILE between snoqualmie ridge and the freeway, because of a new traffic light on a street that doesn’t even exist yet, but which had an empty cop car with its lights going sitting next to it… (😒), and, despite everything, the mood of the morning appears to have passed.

and, when i got home, i had a UPS package containing a wireless charger and two cube-taps which i needed to further refine my office space. 😉

cannabis, homegrown, pictures

15731

Wednesday, 20250409 przxqgl

i started them today. these are seeds from last year, but if they’re anything like last year’s crop, they should be pretty good. i’m also going up to bellingham, on sunday, where i hope to see darol and get some of his starts, which are, by definition, excellent. 😎👍

it’s a good thing it’s legal, considering the political/social dumpster-fire-in-a-flood-in-a-tornado that is currently happening. i wonder when it’s going to change?

moisture festival

as i suspected…

Tuesday, 20250408 przxqgl

it was, indeed, a very long and busy week, which reached it’s ultimate on friday-night-slash-saturday-morning, where we had a late (burlesque) show that ended at 01:30, and a call for a matineé at 11:00, which, for me, meant less than 6 hours of sleep between two very busy, 2-show days. and, because of the fact that we FINALLY got the issues we were having ALL F@#*ING WEEK with the monitors worked out ON THE LAST DAY, it ended up that we were satisfied enough with the show that we could have done another two or three weeks… which is, actually, a fairly typical sentiment for these shows, in general.

and the prominence of moisture festival madness completely occludes the FUBAR internet weirdness (which has settled back down to its normal SNAFU at this point) and social/political dumpster-fire-in-a-flood-in-a-tornado that has developed since THE LAST TIME I PAID ATTENTION… seriously? the CDC will no longer recommend fluoridated water? i guess this has become the set for “Dr. Strangelove”, now… 😱

acts i really liked, this year, include Al Simmons (a perennial favourite, for many years), Godfrey Daniels (the poster boy for the moisture festival, of course), Amy Englehart (of The Bobs, and a good friend), Lyla Goldman and her FLYING UNICYCLE!!! (FOR REAL!!) 😮, Paul Draper and his act which we FINALLY got right on the last day (😒), Bill Robison and his tape-face, and Tyler West and his “poo”-dle, just before intermission! seriously, there’s a good chance that the “poo”-dle is one of the 5 best acts i have EVER seen at the moisture festival, and it’s not JUST because of the guy who doesn’t know how to pronounce “shah,-tawk’-wah,“! 👍👍

i have isolated the “poo”-dle from the rest of the video, because it absolutely IS a moisture festival classic, in spite of the fact that it was an “aside” sales pitch for the raffle! 😉

It’s a “Poo”-dle… 🤪🤣

anhedonia, anxiety, depression, malfunctioning computers, moisture festival

things

Sunday, 20250330 przxqgl

things are beginning to settle down, a bit… there’s still some undefined (and undefinable) weirdness with moe’s and my email, which has been compounded by some apparent SUPER weirdness with either moe’s or my ability to send text messages, which SHOULDN’T be connected in any way… and the whole thing is made even weirder because we recently received a new router, which is supposed to replace our old router… and the new router, for some reason (i strongly suspect demons, or their ilk) decided that it was going to try to connect to my old mac, which has been quite happy NOT connecting to internet for quite some time… like before we moved into our current dwelling… and i keep thinking that there should be some immanent fiasco brewing with my VPN, which, if i recall correctly, acted in a way that it shouldn’t the last time i changed my IP address… but i changed my IP address two weeks ago, and, so far, there has been no indication that the VPN has even taken notice. 🤨

but, strangely enough, the “starting to settle down a bit” scenario has done absolutely nothing to my anxiety and depression… but getting kicked off mastodon, apparently, has had a MINOR effect on my depression: instead of worrying about concrete things that i read about, i worry about more amorphous things that i imagine COULD BE happening. 🫤

which is the perfect mood to start moisture festival next week. 😟 wednesday at 17:00 we load in and sound check, and then there’s one show thursday, two shows friday, the last of which gets out after midnight, three shows saturday, and two shows sunday… it’s gonna be a LONG and BUSY week. 🥵

anhedonia, host services, hybrid elephant, the battle of the computer

oy… 😒

Thursday, 20250327 przxqgl

now that it’s over, i can talk about it…

so, there was this thing where some of my web sites were bringing down the server resources for other sites, and they wanted me to use WHM to separate them into different accounts, so that it would stop happening… but the OLD host provider either couldn’t, or wouldn’t tell me how that was supposed to be done…

so, two weekends ago, i changed host providers, to one who said he would help me sort out the FUMTU that was my web site(s)… and he did!

but, as a part of that, the web site that i’m paying someone else to monitor, went down, briefly, a few times in a 24 hour period. the guy notified me that it had gone down, and suggested i contact my hosting company. i suggested that it had gone down because we had been migrating to a new host, and included the new host provider on the email thread, so he would know what was happening.

which resulted in the new host provider and the old web designer getting into a pissing match, which ended with the new host provider telling me to never again include him in emails to the old web designer, and the old web designer telling me that the new host provider is not his client, and doesn’t know what he’s talking about (which is not true).

so i fired the old web designer, and put in a new web designer, who SPECIFICALLY SAID that she would be working with my new host provider, because she doesn’t have a dog in this fight… which is to say, she is NOT ALSO a host provider, she’s just a web designer, and if she has to contact the host provider about something, she wants a way to do it, which is NOT just asking me to ask the host provider… which is one of the things that i have found REALLY IRRITATING about ALL of my previous designers. 👍👍

i need to pay for a couple of new licenses, but i would have had to pay for them, anyway, so that’s not a big deal, but the new web designer is charging me about the same price for THREE months, as the old web designer was charging me for ONE month, so it’s all going to work out in the end.

also, i got kicked off mastodon for being “too political”, so i uninstalled the ActivityPub plugin, because if i can’t read other peoples’ rantings about how awful the political stuff is, then i don’t want to contribute to it. feh! 😒

anxiety, depression, frustration, host services, the battle of the computer, web design

and others…

Friday, 20250321 przxqgl

last weekend was REALLY difficult… on top of the “normal” massive political and social dumpster-fire-in-a-flood situation that is going on, moe was in chicago, i had two dogs, a cat, a bird, and a snake to look after, AND my web sites were switching host providers, which, by itself, is one of the most difficult transitions under the BEST of circumstances…

and it’s not over yet, although it’s about 95% finished, at this point: our email still hasn’t settled down, yet. with mine, there seems to be some difference between IMAP and SMTP, which SHOULD display the same, but it doesn’t, and i no longer know enough about it to even come close to telling why, or even accurately describe what is happening… and pretty much all of moe’s mail that is more than a couple months old has mysteriously vanished, and she doesn’t even use a SMTP client, preferring IMAP, which, in itself, is somewhat disturbing. 🤨

ETA 250322 the NEW host provider is re-downloading her email, because, apparently, the first (really difficult) download was MISSING EIGHT GIGABYTES of data. 😒

and, on top of that, there’s continuing unresolved chaos and discord between the (new) host provider and the (old) web designer, which, once again, put me into a profoundly deep “chuck it all in the dumpster and go live alone in a remote cabin in the woods with no connection to the outside world for the rest of my life” mood, which is still in the slow process of dissipating. 😒

host services, the battle of the computer

whoowee… 🤦

Saturday, 20250315 przxqgl

this has probably been the worst migration i have ever experienced, and it’s PRIMARILY because of the old host provider making things AS DIFFICULT AS POSSIBLE, while, at the same time, being TOTALLY UNAWARE of the fact that they were making things AS DIFFICULT AS POSSIBLE!

they were great when i signed up with them, but since they sold out to a large, multi-national corporation, a couple of years ago, their service has taken a distinct nose-dive, and i’m REALLY glad to be quit of webhost python.

and, the staff at the new host provider has been taking up the slack in a way that really impresses me — although that might be because i am just not used to having things go my way without a lot of my hard work going into it — but, in less than 12 hours, they have taken two “not a web site” sites and made both of them work as well as they can, given that the DNS settings for both sites have changed, and it usually takes 24 to 48 hours for the new DNS settings to propagate… i’m STILL not getting, or being able to send email at one of the two regular accounts i have, but, at this point, i’m willing to wait for the DNS to catch up.

host services, the battle of the computer

battle is joined!

Wednesday, 20250312 przxqgl

i’m moving to a new host provider, so things may or may not appear correctly for a few days… hopefully less. more info as it comes in.

host services, the battle of the computer

the battle commences

Friday, 20250307 przxqgl

i have been poking around one of my old haunts, WebHostingTalk dot com, which has, in the past, been a source of succinct and correct answers, and, once again, it has not failed.

among other things, i learned that i “shouldn’t have to come here for this kind of help – your provider should support you”, and, if it were the same host provider i signed up with originally, i’m fairly sure that they would have helped me figure this out. but, for whatever it’s worth, WebHost Python sold out a couple of years ago, and their “support” has suffered the most, as a result. it used to be that i knew all the tech support engineers by name, but now there is a different “support” “engineer” for every time they respond to my tickets, some of whom don’t write english particularly clearly, and, even when they write perfectly clearly, about half of the time they only read the first two or three sentences, and then they start responding as though they have read the entire message, which means that, frequently, they’re repeating themselves, or what they’re saying has no relation to the actual subject… 😒

another thing i learned is that there is, actually a “tool” that is part of WHM, which splits “add-on domains” out into their own accounts… which is EXACTLY what i need… EXCEPT that it is only accessible by a person who has “root” privileges, which i DO NOT have… in other words, someone FROM THE HOST PROVIDER has to operate it… but, apparently, the “support” “engineers” either don’t know about it, or, if they do, then they are deliberately withholding that information and, potentially, laughing at me behind my back as i flounder about trying to figure out what to do.

both of those options are very definitely NOT what i should expect to receive from the people I PAY to help me figure these things out, especially when they’re talking about increasing their charges by 25%. 😒

SO moving everything to a new host provider BEFORE i figure them out is probably the wise and prudent thing to do.

FORTUNATELY that is ANOTHER thing that WHT is good for, and i have ALREADY made contact with a guy who said that he would host all my domains for about the same price that WHP was charging me BEFORE the 25% increase, AND he will help me split my add-on domains out into separate accounts. 😎👍👍

so, if you’re reading this, and it affects a web site of yours, be prepared to change the nameserver information at your domain registrar when i switch hosts. 😉

naturally, all this takes place at the end of the week, when the next business day is 3 days away… fortunately (this time), there isn’t something imminently going on that is going to break if i let it go over the weekend, and it will give me more of a chance to alert those people who it will affect. i’ve alerted two of the three people i still host, but the other one is proving a bit more elusive… and i totally understand, given his share of horrendous fiascoes that he has to live through… 😉

depression, frustration, host services, the battle of the computer

piling it on thick and fast… 😒

Wednesday, 20250305 przxqgl

the other day i noticed that my web site wasn’t responding. i have had some recent warnings, from my commercial web designer, that my hosting situation wasn’t as robust as it should be, and so i wasn’t particularly surprised by this, but it definitely needed further investigation.

it turns out that there has, apparently, been a change in how server resources are allocated, something which has never been an issue before (or, if it has, it hasn’t been anything I have either heard about, or have any control over), and having all my domains on one “account” strains server resources. 🤨

the solution to, at least, this PART of the problem, is to use WHM to separate the domains into different accounts… but, until i switched to the current host provider (i want to say five to seven years ago), i didn’t even have ACCESS to WHM, have only the vaguest clue how to use it, and i DO NOT know how to use it to “separate the domains into different accounts”… and, it’s my impression that it is REALLY easy to FUCK THINGS UP, if you don’t know what you’re doing with WHM… which, it is my guess, is one of the reasons i never had access to it before the current host provider… 😒

and ON TOP OF ALL THAT…

i got an email from the host provider, this morning, that basically said “oh, by the way, we’re raising your rate by 25%”. 🤬

i have LOST TOUCH with A LOT of the stuff i used to know about internet and computers, and i’m kind of okay with that… which means that learning new things about internet domains and accounts, and learning a how to use a new computer tool, was NOT on my list of things i really want to do, and changing host providers AGAIN is ALREADY something i would RATHER NOT do…

but, guess what? it looks like i’m going to be doing both of them ANYWAY! 🤬🤬

so, i responded, saying that i could use WHM, if someone who knows how to do it wants to talk me through it… this was their response:

If you want to avoid all domains sharing the same resources, the best practice is to create a separate cPanel account for each domain through WHM. This way, each site gets its own resource allocation, helping to prevent performance issues if one site experiences high traffic or other problems.

To clarify:

– You can create a new cPanel account in WHM under the Create a New Account section.
– Each account will have its own login, email setup, and resource limits (based on your hosting package).
– Please note that moving files, databases, and emails from one cPanel account to another must be done manually. Unfortunately, we are unable to assist with the migration process — you will need to handle this yourself.

You can access the WHM panel through your client area by selecting Login to Control Panel.

from their email this morning:

To enable us to continue providing you with the quality and reliability you expect — and to further enhance the performance and security of your services — we will

be charging me 25% more…

the quality and reliability i have come to expect is for them to help me figure this out, like they did prior to selling out. 😒

i am so NOT going to pay 25% more for this crap! 🤬

frustration, imaginary pooperty, technology, the cloud drive crack of 2021, the very big stupid, typography

dongkuthoomubor

Monday, 20250303 przxqgl

i have a book and a 3-CD set called “Creative Alliance 9.0” which, allegedly, contains 7000+ truetype and type 1 fonts. according to ebay, it was made in 1999, when things were still labeled as “compatible with MacOS 6.0 or greater, and Windows 3.1, 95, 98, and NT”…

gawd, i remember those days… 🙄

and, as far as i can tell, the font information on these disks still work on modern computers — “font” (or, more technically accurately “typeface”) information doesn’t change that much.

i recently followed this guy on mastodon, who is the lead for a project called “DISKMASTER” at the internet archive, which is a collection of around 26,200 disks from the period of time when CD-ROMs were the medium of choice. when he heard about this disk set, he encouraged me to upload it to the archive…

but… 😒

first, i made an account, with my default browser, firefox — recently firefox changed their user agreement to allow them to be able to sell, or use to train their AI, any information that i upload (including this text 😒), so that is likely to change very soon — and when i tried to upload the first disk, i got this error message that said “Remove all zero byte files”, said that directories are “zero byte files” and upload of directories was only possible through chrome… but there is no “chrome” for linux, and the mac i have which has a CD-ROM drive runs an “antique” operating system and no longer connects to internet, so that my really important applications like photoshop and sibelius can’t “automatically” update themselves into oblivion.

however, there IS a “chromium” for linux, which i don’t use because i’m trying to keep google from sticking THEIR nose into my private life (as much as possible), so i tried that…

when i tried to hit the internet archive, it gave me a blank page, with no clue that i had even loaded a web page. when i looked at the source for the page, it appears that i was SUPPOSED to be re-directed to a “no script” version of the page, but the URI to which i was supposed to be re-directed, doesn’t exist. 😒🙄

now, don’t get me wrong, i would DEARLY LOVE to get these disks on the internet archive, and, potentially, gain access to these fonts… i USED TO HAVE most of them, because i USED TO BE in the business of using them on a regular basis, but since the cloud drive crack of 2021, they all went away, and these disks NO LONGER WORK on modern mac or windows computers, even if they do have CD-ROM drives.

but, unless someone can tell me how to upload them without any “zero byte files”, i’m lost.

moe, unicycle

burph

Sunday, 20250302 przxqgl

moe and i went to eugene, oregon, yesterday, so that she could get a new tattoo. we left the house at 06:00 and didn’t get back until 01:15 this morning. she was under the needle for SEVEN HOURS yesterday… and it is allegedly going to take a month to fully heal. i took care of the dogs, who were very frustrated that they got shoved in their crates and went for a long ride, and then didn’t get to do anything except sleep in their crates the whole day. the eugene saturday market (apparently a cousin to the fremont sunday market) was happening about two blocks away from where the car was parked, but, because of the fact that i was feeling rather uncertain about the exact location of the car, i didn’t go, and basically slept in the car the whole day, with a couple of potty breaks for the dogs.

so, today, while i went to my unicycle class, moe took the dogs for a hike at campbell, and now they’re all asleep NOT in their crates.

i am progressing INFINITESIMALLY slowly on the unicycle, but i AM progressing… i’m not free-mounting all the time, but i am free-mounting a significant quantity MORE of the time than i was a few months ago… and i’m able to idle a few times without holding on to something… and i can ride backwards for a few feet, as long as i’m holding on to something with one hand…

there is still NO WAY i would even ATTEMPT to ride while playing the tuba (my ultimate goal), but i’m a lot closer than i was a year ago… which is something, i guess…

i re-installed the ActivityPub plugin for wordpress, so this is going to be a test to determine whether or not it actually works…

and, apparently, it doesn’t work, and i don’t know why. 🙄

my music, to do

idea 😈

Friday, 20250221 przxqgl

so, i’ve had this… idea…

for a long time, i’ve had this fantasy of creating the world’s largest flute. unfortunately, i would need a tunnel-boring machine, or to be able to make use of (for example) the cascade tunnel, which is an approximately 8-mile tunnel from the west to the east side of the cascade mountain range, starting from east of concrete… and it would also mean engaging some pretty enormous air-blowers…

not to mention the fact that, loud enough sound at certain sub-audio levels has a tendency to liquefy human tissue, and it’s my impression that sort of sound is exactly what will be produced by “the world’s largest flute”…

HOWEVER i didn’t come by the reputation for being able to make an “obnoxious” noise on pretty much anything by letting other people’s (crap) opinions stop me from making so-called “obnoxious” noises… on pretty much anything!

other good examples are the harmonic flute, which, if you turn it around and put a bass clarinet mouthpiece with a thin piece of plastic made from a credit card for the reed, turns into an instrument i call the “blathorn”, an orchestral-quality popgun, a siren from an old fire truck, and i was given a portable fog-horn a few years ago… than queue, maque! 😉

a pneumatic "super blaster" horn — a pneumatic “super blaster” horn

i’ve got this pneumatic horn that is already REALLY loud… it’s primarily intended to be used as a signal on sailboats… but, if it just were longer…

the PVC tubing is the right size for the horn to fit into, but it is the wrong size to fit into the part that does the “buzzing”, in this case, which is the metal plate at the closed end of the horn.

the way it works is that the plunger forces compressed air through a tube behind a metal plate, which vibrates against the metal housing around the plate, causing the pitch to occur… but because of the fact that it’s highly compressed air and a rather stiff metal plate, the resulting sound is REALLY loud, and, because of the short length of the horn, fairly high…

but if i figure out a way to make the buzzing go into a longer tube…

all i know, at this point, is that it SHOULD BE lower pitch, but just as loud… however, it may be that the metal plate won’t vibrate correctly, or at all, if it is trying to vibrate a larger sound column…

😈

depression, miscellaneous

yeah, i’m still here… 😒

Monday, 20250217 przxqgl

the last unicycle class of the session was two sundays ago, and the last neuro-support circus class of the session was last thursday. they’re taking a break before starting a new session (this coming sunday). between those two times, i’ve got literally NOTHING to do except take the trash out on wednesday. 😒

this week is one of the few weeks where i’ve got a “holiday” every day of the week: today (monday, 250217) is the commemoration of the death of Giordano Bruno, in 1600, who was the guy that said “Truth does not change because it is, or is not, believed by a majority of the people.” tomorrow, tuesday 250218 is Fart Out Loud Day, wednesday 250219 is World Pangolin Day, thursday, 250220 is International Pipe Smoking Day, friday, 250221 is the anniversary of the day el-Hajj Malik el-Shabazz (Malcolm X) was assassinated, in 1965, saturday, 250222 is World Sword Swallower’s Day, and sunday, 250223 is Robert Anton Wilson Day…

and i am doing only what i want to do until Robert Anton Wilson Day, which, potentially, includes working on the actual painting of timmy, which i have started, but not gotten very far with (and, while it will — hopefully — be a watercolour painting of timmy, it is, very likely, going to look NOTHING like the paint-by-number painting that i did, in spite of the fact that it’s using the same reference photo), and finishing the arrangement of Galizianer Tants, which i have started, but not gotten as far as i would like to have, by now. both of these things are, and continue to be unfinished, because i have been experiencing INTENSE political and social malaise and panic.

and moe is going to chicago in a month, in spite of the fact that #drumpf and Elmo Muskrat have been firing people who control air traffic at the FAA this week (among other atrocities), and a delta airlines flight to toronto crashed this morning — a month after the crash at ronald reagan airport in washington DC — which has only been adding to my already panicked brain. 😒

drumpf, fun with the post office, i am a terrorist, pictures

this is not a joke…

Saturday, 20250208 przxqgl 2 Comments

a USPS shipping tracker for a shipment that goes to seattle: it starts in portland, gets to seattle, and then is scanned in san francisco, and oakland, california...? — 250208 USPS not a joke

my guess is that this is as good as it’s going to get for the next few decades… 😒

i am a terrorist

public service announcement!

Wednesday, 20250205 przxqgl

on 250203, Le Journal de Montreal had #drumpf on their cover, with the word STUPID(E) below it.

250203 Le Journal de Montreal cover page

this inspired me to create a subversive button that i’ve been thinking about creating since the first time he was in office… 😒

so i did.

there is a page of artwork for 1.5″ buttons at https://przxqgl.info/images/250205-trump-sucks-1.5-button.pdf

INSTRUCTIONS

1) download, and print the above linked page (it’s 113MB, so it may take a few minutes)

2) cut them out — i use a special device that is intended to cut precise circles, but you can use scissors or a knife if you’re only making one

3) put the resulting artwork into your handy, dandy, 1.5-inch button press. don’t have one? email me at rev dot deluxe at gmail dot com with your mailing address, and i’ll make one button and mail it to you, totally free of charge.

(if you want more than one button, they’re $1.50 a piece, but if you’re only ordering one, you don’t have to worry about payment.)

VOILÁ! your very own TRUMP SUCKS button! 😈

ENJOY!

domes

the dome! 👍

Monday, 20250203 przxqgl

at some point i think i might have posted a picture of the dome,

i did. it was here, 15 years ago, and it no longer has the pictures, because i quit flickr. 😒

but my guess is that it got wiped out when i quit flickr, and/or then my flickr archive got wiped out in the cloud-drive crack… so this is the re-posting:

a large 1V geodesic dome. two windows and door are visible. one window has two hindu murtis in it. there is a large wind chime, and a child's bike leaned up against the side. — 1991 – the dome

this is the origin of my obsession with domes. i lived in this dome in 1991, according to the title of the graphic, which i just found in some obscure place that i haven’t seen since before my old cloud drive was vandalised, a few years ago, and according to the re-constructed list of when things happened, which i didn’t even have to update when i found the graphic… which, i think, is a good sign that i have at least partially recovered from that vandalism.

the dome was larger on the inside than it was on the outside. on the outside, it looked like a single-floor structure, but on the inside it had three floors. the bottom floor was where ezra lived, and the upper floor was where my bed was, right next to the upper window. the middle level was my living space, and ezra’s ceiling.

when i first moved in, there was one floor, and a bed/shelf along one wall, but the owner said i could build whatever i wanted inside, so i went crazy, and divided up the space in a way that the owner hadn’t even thought of.

you can see the 5-sided building on google maps, but it’s not a geodesic dome any longer… the owner liked the new layout enough that, when i moved out, he expanded the second floor, and added a new roof.

that got me primed… then, when i finally made it to burning man, in 2008, i encountered very many domes of different sizes and constructions, and that got me hooked.

geek stuff, technology

printed books are best!

Thursday, 20250130 przxqgl

a long time ago (1999-2000 era, so 25 years ago or so), i bought a printed book called “The Compleat Book of Scales”, which is an “exhaustive list of every possible scale and mode based on the Western European equal-tempered chromatic scale”.

it has been an invaluable resource, which i have used many, many times, since i bought it. the web site i bought it from, glassarmonica.com, has, apparently, been offline since may of 2021, and the book is, now, nowhere to be found.

i feel the same way about my notes from the tech school, which i originally collected between 1982 and 1984. i have not only used them multiple times, to this day, i know EXACTLY where to find information about screw-thread sizes, mouthpiece specifics, and ideas for how to treat ailing instruments of all kinds, which are easily transferrable skills in case i’m fixing our plumbing, or that sort of thing.

the internet is great, and everything, but there’s nothing that can beat a printed book that has been useful for its entire life. 😉

forward into the past, moe, pe(s)ts, the cloud drive crack of 2021

furgle

Saturday, 20250125 przxqgl

moe went to orlando yesterday. she’ll be back wednesday. quill is staying with one of our dog-trainer neighbours, kestrel has decided that, without moe here to make her, she doesn’t have to come inside, so i’m having to potty her on a leash, and timmy hasn’t really figured out what’s going on, but it’s different, his primary wrestling target is not here, and the result is that he has reverted to clawing my legs and deliberately doing stuff he KNOWS he’s not supposed to do, to get attention.

i used moe’s computer projector to start the outlines for a new painting of timmy, which will use the correct colour palette, and i (finally) got started on the transcription of Galizianer Tants for the fremont phil. i hope to work on both of them, extensively, while moe is gone, primarily to give my mind something to concentrate on other than how miserable and lonely i am with nobody here except pets.

the other day, i found a photo that totally screwed up my presumed timeline in the new “list of when things happened” that i have been reconstructing ever since the cloud drive crack of 2021, which was a photo of me and some kids from SPARC in the spring of 1994, when i thought i remembered working at SPARC in 1992. i have some intermittent calendars from 1984 to 2005 that i went through, which SORT OF helped me get things straightened out — for example, i thought i had lived in randy’s apartment for a month, and in fred’s basement for 2 months, in 1995, but it turns out that i lived in randy’s apartment for a whopping TEN DAYS, and in fred’s basement for a little less than ONE month, before i moved to the rooming house in west seattle. i THINK i’ve got a slightly better handle on when things ACTUALLY happened, now, but there are still some things about which i’m not completely sure.

articles, i am a terrorist, i am antifa, important things to remember, the very big stupid

I do not obey in advance

Monday, 20250120 przxqgl

I do not obey in advance.

Continue reading I do not obey in advance →

spam, the mallet, the very big stupid

this is getting REALLY frustrating! 😒

Saturday, 20250118 przxqgl

on 250110 at 09:44 i received a message with the subject line “Your Microsoft order on January 10, 2025”.

i KNOW FOR A FACT that i did NOT make an order from micro$leaze on that date, or at any other time for the past 25 years, which lead me to one, inescapable conclusion:

THIS IS SPAM!

not only that, but, because of the fact that i DO NOT ALLOW my email client to render HTML, i could perceive, right away, that this was a not-very-well-disguised attempt to trick, or con an ignorant user out of money, at the very least (the URIs were all redirects from azure.com and microsoft.com to somewhere that is very defintely NOT associated with microsoft), and, very likely for the extremely gullible, credit card and/or other personally identifiable information, as well.

so, i jumped through my standard spam-reporting hoops, and determined that the message had, indeed, come from micro$hit.

it’s not a tremendous surprise, but, still, i KNOW FOR AN UNDISPUTED FACT that i did NOT make an order from micro$leaze, so i proceded to send a report to [email protected]

this afternoon, at 14:16, i got a return receipt from [email protected] — yes, you can still get return receipts, although you have to use an email client that supports them, which is getting more and more rare in these days of web-based, cloud-based email — which said:

Your message

To: MS Online Customer Service (abuse)
Subject: [EXTERNAL] ABUSE VIOLATION: Your Microsoft order on January 10, 2025
Sent: Friday, 10 January 2025 10:02:54 (UTC-08:00) Pacific Time (US & Canada)

was deleted without being read on Saturday, 18 January 2025 14:16:53 (UTC-08:00) Pacific Time (US & Canada).

as you may or may not recall, i have been going back and forth LITERALLY FOR YEARS with micro$lop regarding my ability (or, to put it more accurately, my INABILITY) to send email to micro$lump customers. they LITERALLY refuse to tell me why, but they have been blocking the DEDICATED IP ADDRESS i have had, from which ONLY me and moe send email, for ≈25 years, with infuriating gaps (when i complain about it) that last anywhere from 2 weeks to 2 months. the only even close to “reason” i have been able to get out of them is “because we can”. 😒

SO what i learn from this, is:

it is NOT okay for me to send email to micro$hit, because it MIGHT BE spam, and they will take active and aggressive steps to block it.

however, when i RECEIVE spam FROM micro$hit, they don’t even look at my report.

🤬🤬🤬🤬

And More, my music

And More And More And More And

Tuesday, 20250114 przxqgl

finally, the And More bandcamp web site is getting a major overhaul, soon. the overhaul will contain ALL TWENTY SIX ALBUMS that we have produced since 1985, plus a new banner that says “And More – Discombobulating the Discombobulable since 1985”. 😉

Novus Odor Seclorox is a cut from the album “This Music Is Drugs”. it’s a .flac file, so it’s possible that your browser will balk at it. you can try using a different browser, or a different platform… or, you can wait until the overhaul is finished, and buy the physical album… 😉

i’m listening to music that i made, and haven’t actually heard for, sometimes, as much as 25 to 30 years… it’s scary, but it’s also AWESOME!

painting

p-n-t-ng

Saturday, 20250111 przxqgl

i have pretty much decided that, instead of figuring out a wash to make the painting more orange, and less pink (without spoiling the painting entirely, which is a DISTINCT possibility), i’m just going to leave the finished painting the way it is, and create a new painting, with a CORRECT palette. it will take more time, but it will end up with me having a painting i actually like, will leave the first painting untouched and unharmed, and it will give me something to do for a few weeks that ISN’T frowsting on the intar-toobs, which will probably be greatly beneficial to my mental health.

depression, medication, microdosing, mushrooms

🍄 🠁 20250107

Tuesday, 20250107 przxqgl

i decided that 200mg wasn’t cutting it, so i went back to what i was fairly sure was a 250mg dose, but it turns out that it measures out at an average of 304mg… which is a .1g difference compared to what i have been taking, and definitely puts me into the “something is happening” state of mind, even after 3 hours… i wasn’t sure after the first one, but i skipped a dose, and was paying attention this time, and it’s plainly clear that i am “elevated”, compared to “normal”.

next step: is this amount of alteration “acceptable”? (tentative answer, probably not on a regular basis) can i function? (tentative answer, yes) will my alteration be perceptible to, and affect my interaction with others? (tentative answer, don’t know, not enough data)

also, what if i change the schedule, and go to one every three days, rather than every other day? (tentative answer, i like the “every other day” schedule, and i’m not really interested in MORE experimentation to figure out something new)

meanwhiles, i’ve got a couple of days to prepare another batch of capsules which are SLIGHTLY less potent than the ones i’ve currently got… 😉

HOWEVER
i’ve been itching for a “real” mushroom trip (i.e. >1g) for a while, and now that the panto is over, i believe it’s time to examine that more closely. 🍄🍄🍄🍄🍄

campbell global tree farm, new year, painting, pictures

the painting and the hike

Wednesday, 20250101 przxqgl

since our trip to double bluff went so poorly, last year, we went to campbell this year, and successfully hiked about 5 miles without seeing another person… until we got outside the gate on the way back, at which point we saw what we could only guess was a keg party or something like that — five cars, one of which was definitely NOT going to make it all the way to the campbell gate (because the road is so pot-holed) inhabited by several girls in party clothes, and two guys on motorcycles (which are banned inside campbell), one of whom had what looked like a couple cases of beer strapped to his luggage rack… 🤷

as a xmas gift, moe and i were given paint-by-numbers sets based on a photograph of a pet that we sent in, in november. moe’s was a black-and-white photo of magick, which moe finished yesterday, and it looks like it was a professionally done painting. mine was a photo of timmy, sitting on one of his little shelves in the bedroom. we started the paintings on the 13th, and i finished mine last night, at ten minutes before midnight.

241231 23.49 Tim Minchin, The Cat -- paint-by-numbers — 241231 23.49 Tim Minchin, The Cat — paint-by-numbers

it looks better from a distance, or as a photo… my guess is that part of the reason is that it started out as a photo, to begin with, but also, speaking as an artist, the colour palette is way off… timmy is a yellowish-orange cat, and the painting made him out to be pinkish-flesh-tones. now that i’m actually finished painting the numbers, my next task is to figure out a “wash” to make it more orangish and less pinkish. 😒

it’s really interesting to paint stuff again… i used to paint a lot, when i was in my 30s, and i still have a lot of sort-of “professional” painting equipment: an adjustable easel, a huge collection of paint brushes and palette knives, a couple mahlsticks, and even a bunch of blank, stretched canvasses, in the garage. i found out, today, as i was searching for a colour to make a wash, that all of my watercolour paints have dried up (which is no great surprise), so i’m probably going to have to scout out a new art supplies store, since the ones i used when i was in my 30s no longer exist.

anhedonia, panto, x-mas

whuf! 😕

Thursday, 20241226 przxqgl 2 Comments

i survived “whamaggedon 2024” by never having heard the song “Last Christmas” by Wham… just to be sure, i went to youtube, searched it out, and listened to about half of it, just to make sure… i’m still not sure i’ve ever heard the song. it’s forgettable, and i have a brain injury… 🤷

the panto has been going unimaginably well, in spite of the fact that we had to have a substitute musician (greg powers, a guy i have known since high school) play the “baphoonium” part (part euphonium, part bassoon) on the trombone, because the bassoon player got sick and the euphonium player had another gig.

my “xmas” was about what i expected: other people getting way too excited about giving meaningless gifts to people they don’t really care about, in a desperate attempt to feel like their lives mean something to someone other than themselves, while completely, i might even say DELIBERATELY oblivious to the fact that their actual lives — and the actual world — is being deliberately DESTROYED around them, while they try to find reasons to celebrate. whee… yippy… 😒

friday the 13th, friday the thirteenth

for a change…

Friday, 20241213 przxqgl

“friday the 13th” has never been a particularly “unlucky” day for me…

until today. 😒

today, before i even woke up, moe was asking me to take kestrel outside to pee, because she (moe) wasn’t feeling well. apparently, when i was outside with the dog, moe’s “not feeling well” included a bout of diarrhea, and she was in the shower when i came back inside. i ended up taking rye outside, as well, while moe was “preoccupied” in the bathroom. eventually, moe felt a little better, and put the two younger dogs in her car, so that they could go chase sheep around for a few hours, but, then, it turned out that moe had left the dome light in her car on overnight, and drained the battery… which, usually, wouldn’t be a problem, because we have a battery-charger/tire-inflator gadget (which we used extensively, during the recent wind storm), that will jump-start the car… except that we loaned the gadget to a neighbour. so, moe called the neighbour, and got the gadget back, but it’s totally drained (because the neighbour used it to inflate all four tires and jump-start his mother-in-law’s car), so moe plugged in the gadget, but, being completely drained means that it’s going to take a few hours for it to recharge, so she decided to jump start her car with the pickup… which means hooking up the pickup (because it, too, has a battery that runs down for no very obvious reasons), and jockeying it around so that we can hook up the jumper cables… and, while she was hooking up the jumper cables, the positive wire on the pickup battery came loose, which meant hooking it back up while being careful not to touch the wire, to avoid getting shocked… and then, when moe’s car was running, i was backing the pickup into its normal parking spot, but, because of the fact that i was wearing my reading glasses (and not my “seeing” glasses), i was a little too entergetic with the backing part, and backed into the trailer… and then, when i was DISCONNECTING the pickup, the wire came loose AGAIN and then the tool, which i was using to tighten the wire to the post to which it is affixed, fell apart and i only just barely caught the loose part before it fell down inside the engine compartment…

i mentioned to moe that it might be in our best interests to engage an “au pair” for the dogs, since her not feeling well put me in a state of panic. i’m not sure how she feels about it, but it’s out there.

and that’s not to mention the fact that, in the past 4 days, i have received FIVE “monthly” orders of soylent (normally, 24 bottles), which i have been disputing ever since the second one arrived, but, because of the fact that i’m apparently discussing it over email, with a “large language model artificial stupidity” program (😒), i haven’t been able to solve the issue, or get them to acknowledge that there IS an issue, or issue me a refund for the orders i DID NOT MAKE, or cease the soylent deliveries… and that’s not to mention the fact that i have LITERALLY NO WHERE TO STORE that much soylent. 😒

bandits, bizarre

bandits! in issaquah!! 😨

Tuesday, 20241210 przxqgl

around noon, today, i was accosted by bandits while i was pumping gas in issaquah. the ONLY reason i did NOT lose anything is because they started out by being INCREDIBLY creepy, and doing things that i KNEW were NOT the kinds of things people who were in the situation they claimed to be in, would do…

i had just finished pumping gas, when two guys drove up in a black SUV, and started trying to get my attention. the guy driving did most of the talking. according to him, they were from dubai, and didn’t speak much english… then he started GIVING me his jewelry, and kissing my hand, and saying “gift, gift”… a large ring with a square of “diamonds” was first, then a “gold” chain from around his neck. what he said wasn’t immediately clear, but i got the impression that they wanted to trade the jewelry for cash, so that they could buy gas, but i don’t carry cash, so then they tried to get me to go to an ATM.

i don’t know much about jewelry, but i can tell you that the ring he handed me was NOT the “gold” that he claimed, nor was the “gold” chain he took from around his neck. they were just not heavy enough. 😒

the whole thing was INTENSELY creepy, and the guys seemed to be in a huge hurry, which, naturally, made me very suspicious. i said, no, i can’t take this, and turned around to put the gas fill hose away, and when i turned around again, they were gone.

there were two or three other people pumping gas, so there were a lot of witnesses, which is probably why they didn’t hang around… which added to my suspicions… but it was only after i had driven away, and was on the other side of issaquah before i realised that they were trying to rip me off.

panto

what do you know?

Monday, 20241209 przxqgl

i was completely wrong concerning the quality of the panto performances this weekend… i anticipated that the “dress rehearsal in front of an audience”, would be “somewhat less than a controlled shit-show”, and it was essentially perfect: the band got all of the correct music cues, and responded to them perfectly, the cast gave the music cues perfectly, and had all their lines memorised, and, by the second show on sunday, we (the band) were already discussing ADDING music cues for events that happened, but DON’T have cues listed in the script. i, literally, do not know how we went from as much of a disaster as the rehearsals seemed to indicate, to a show as complete and polished as it turned out to be, but i’m definitely NOT complaining. at this point, the show can only get better, and i look forward to seeing how that manifests in reality.

house stuff, panto, rye

title

Tuesday, 20241203 przxqgl

i finally moved the last of my stuff out of moe’s office, and into their new places in my re-organised office. the remaining stuff is either stuff that moe adopted (i.e. she’s going to use it in her office), or stuff that goes into freecycle. i still have a bunch of cable-management stuff, some of which i’m going to use, and a mixer in a box, at one end of my new “closet desk”. ultimately, i want to hook the piano and the synthesizer to the computer, and to the stereo, through the mixer, but it hasn’t happened yet… although it is now a lot more LIKELY to happen than it pretty much EVER been previously.

it is now, officially, panto panic season: we open on saturday, and we haven’t had a single rehearsal where we have gone through the entire play without stopping, we are still waiting for 3 pieces of music TO BE WRITTEN, we haven’t had a single rehearsal with anything close to the “entire” band that will be playing, one musician is currently sick, and isn’t sure he’s going to be able to make the first few shows (although he IS COVID negative, so far), and there are two musicians who are scheduled to play, who have never seen the music…

and yet, somehow, we will most likely pull a more-or-less finished show out of our asses, possibly as soon as the second show, saturday, and maybe even as soon as the first show on saturday.

we have a “dress rehearsal”, in front of an audience, on thursday, and, i’m guessing it’s going to be somewhat less than a controlled shit-show.

rye has continued to improve. he saw a specialist, yesterday, who confirmed that his liver values were off, but on their way back to normal. it’s a lot more likely that he will live until his 14th birthday, at least, than it was a few days ago. 👍👍

rye

rye +1

Sunday, 20241201 przxqgl

rye is feeling a lot better today… he ate breakfast, and is barking when he feels as though he’s not being included… which is frequently, since he is still tethered to an IV infusion pump.

blog birthday, rye

rye

Saturday, 20241130 przxqgl

rye is sick. 😒

a couple weeks ago, he woke up with old dog vestibular syndrome, which we were treating successfully, although he was being picky about the food that he would eat: he would only eat dog food if there was cat food mixed in… 😉

then, this morning, he went back to being picky about his food, he was running a fever, and he vomited everything that he had eaten, so moe took him to the clinic, where they determined that he has an “acute liver, possibly due to drug reaction from his meds for vestibular”, so now we have ANOTHER disabled pet (quill has two injured feet, and timmy hasn’t been losing his baby teeth the way he’s supposed to, which has resulted in “shark mouth”).

and, of course, everybody is closed “for the holiday”, which means that a specialist (which is what rye needs) won’t be available until monday, and moe isn’t sure he’s going to be able to make it to monday.

rye is going to be 14 on december 14th.

oh, also this blog is now 21 years old: it’s old enough to drink. the way things have been going, it’s probably the last thing it needs, but… 🙄

depression, frustration, i am a terrorist, pictures, the very big stupid, weather, wind-pocalypse

wind-pocalypse?

Tuesday, 20241126 przxqgl

between tuesday night, 241119, and wednesday morning, 241120, we experienced a “bomb cyclone” (whatever that means: basically a huge wind storm, with lots of rain) that took out electricity in ALL of western washington, from the sea-tac area up to vancouver, bc, and left many roads impassable. we got electricity back on sunday, 241124, which is also when 276th/issaquah-hobart road (two of the three ways to get here) opened up again, following MANY trees fallen over the road and utility lines.

ALLEDGEDLY we’re going to have internet restored thursday, 241128 (i’m writing this on my tablet, which is using my cell-phone WIFI hot spot to connect to internet), but i’m not holding my breath, because it’s a “holiday” (for what, i never have gotten it entirely straight), and, besides, i went out today, and saw MANY downed lines, trees over lines, and general mayhem and confusion… although i didn’t see ANY traffic lights out, today, which is quite a bit different than it was a couple days ago.

#drumpf and his cronies don’t believe climate change exists, and they want to fire all of the people in government who maintain otherwise. if our infrastructure is so fragile that all it takes is one bigger-than-normal wind storm to knock everything out for more than a week, what we’re experiencing now is, very likely, as good as it’s POSSIBLY going to get for the forseeable future.

getting old, ketchup, pictures

this happened…

Thursday, 20241114 przxqgl

in order to prevent myself from flipping out (too much) about the election (🤮), i have been going through and categorising my remaining vinyl albums. at this point there are two loose categories, those that i want to keep, and those that i want to sell. the ones that i want to sell are also in two, loose categories, those that are already on discogs, and those that are not yet on discogs. the pile i want to keep already almost fills the “record safe” box i got on freecycle, a few years ago, and, when i’m done categorising everything, the “record safe” should be close to full. the pile that are not yet on discogs is growing, as well, which is where everything else is going. i got some blank cardboard record sleeves, some rice-paper inner sleeves, and some vinyl outer sleeves, so that ALL of the records i send out will have adequate protection, and look “more professional”. this is the last dregs of the vinyl dump from KUGS that started (<mumble mumble>) years ago (ten? fifteen? who knows… 🙄) which is the primary reason i am now in possession of records like The Passion and Transfiguration of a Post-Apocalyptic Eunuch, and The Nova Convention, and From The Music of Harry Partch, and Feet Hacked Rails. also, since i actually HAVE my turntable set up and operational, now, i have been re-ripping the albums i USED TO HAVE ripped, but which were lost in the great cloud drive crack of 2021… another small step in recovering a tiny fraction of what was lost — sigh…

last sunday i fell off my unicycle and fucked up my tuba playing hand — just in time for the players to announce a new gig with a new brewer in the area, for which we have an emergency rehearsal this sunday, and are performing an “abbreviated” panto at some location of which i have yet to learn… on tuesday… my hand has been going through the stages of being severely bruised (blue, then purple, then yellow/green), but nothing is broken, or even fractured, so, presumably, it will go back to normal, or something like that, eventually. it’s well enough that i’m only having a little trouble typing, although immediately after it happened, i couldn’t even close my fist without significant pain.

241112 - right hand fucked up after falling off unicycle — 241112 – right hand fucked up after falling off unicycle

it’s not the same as when i was 35, and i could just expect everything to get better… 😒

i am a terrorist

Tired

Sunday, 20241110 przxqgl

Tired
by Langston Hughes

I am so tired of waiting
Aren’t you?
For the world to become good
And beautiful and kind?
Let us take a knife
And cut the world in two —
And see what worms are eating
At the rind.

clients, stupid people

i just fired a customer… 😒

Friday, 20241108 przxqgl

on 241016, i received an incense order. the customer wanted ONE BOX of 999 Lord Krishna Puja Agarbatti — which costs $5 — and he wanted me to ship it to malasia…

to avoid having to set up complicated “zones” for shipping, i have shipping set up on a “flat rate” basis, which is, for domestic orders, you can order up to $60 worth of product, and the shipping is a flat rate of $18. anything more than $60, and the shipping is 30% of the total amount of your order. for international packages, you can order up to $150 worth of product, and the shipping is a flat rate of $30. anything more than $150, and the shipping is 20% of the total amount of your order.

this is CLEARLY stated on my Shipping & Returns page.

i STOPPED asking if the customer REALLY wants to spend more for shipping than they are spending for incense, a LONG time ago: it slows down delivery, because i have to email the customer, and then wait for an answer (which, frequently, never comes), BEFORE i can ship out their order, and i find it incredibly difficult to figure out how to say that they are paying more for shipping than for incense without sounding INCREDIBLY condescending. at a certain point, i have decided that they should KNOW what they’re doing, and, besides, i make more money that way.

so i sent this guy ONE BOX of incense… for $35…

on 241017, not even 24 hours after i sent his package, he sent me this email:

It will be nice if you get my tracking number from whichever courier company you are using to ship out what I paid for it, I can’t be waiting blindly without knowing status or current location of my parcel. I have been buying products from the USA for over 15yrs now and I always receive a tracking number of whichever courier service it been sent from. Kindly endeavor that tracking number is sent to me and my parcel should be swift delivery of 4days maximum like it has always been.

i ship internationally with USPS. this is because other carriers (DHL, UPS, FedEx, etc.) have EXTREMELY poor reputations when shipping internationally… combined with the fact that they frequently, either, ship using USPS and charge more, or they lose packages, and charge more. this has been true for AT LEAST 10 years.

when shipping internationally with USPS, however, unfortunately, they do not offer tracking, like they do with domestic service, however they do offer a “US Customs ID” number, which can be used for tracking, as long as the package is in the united states, and, FREQUENTLY whatever local postal service is involved will pick up the “US Customs ID” and track it, once it reaches it’s destination country.

however, i have never(!) shipped anything to malasia, so i, literally, DON’T KNOW how long it will take, and, significantly, regardless of where it’s going, i HAVE NO CONTROL over how long a package will take to reach its destination, once it leaves my hands.

so i responded, explaining that i had never shipped anything to malasia, so i didn’t know how long it would take to get there, and repeated my message concerning the “US Customs ID number”, in case he had missed it.

on 241023, he wrote me again:

What is the status of the package I paid for since last week? Where’s is the parcel current location? Been waiting for days with no idea.

i checked the US Customs ID, and determined that the package had left the united states, and was currently in japan. he responded, the same day, with this message:

This is ridiculous. I bought a product of $5 and you changed me $30 for shipment yet it didn’t occur to you to ship out my order as priority delivery for it to be delivered within 4-5 days. I just check status of the delivery and find out that is still within the USA like WTF is this nonsense? Why charge so high for shipping fees and not make it a priority delivery? DHL service would have delivered this parcel within 4days but you chose to use USPS who are known for poor service when it comes to delivery abroad 😠😠😠

🙄

once again, i reiterated my “clearly stated” shipping charges, and the fact that DHL would have taken longer and cost more, and said “if you are dissatisfied with our service, when your package arrives, you can return it, unopened, for a full refund.”

on 241029, he regaled me with this choice morsel:

Hello.For heaven sake, where is my order? Where on earth is the order I paid for since 17th of October? Today is 30th October and I haven’t receive what I paid for or know the way about of what I paid for. DHL won’t take up to 13days to deliver my order. Where for God sake is my order? 😠😠

🙄🙄

so, to make sure that i had done everything WITHIN MY POWER to please him, i refunded his entire order, and told him so.

on 241030, this was his response:

WHAT? I BEG YOUR PARDON! AFTER WASTING 13 DAYS OF MY LIFE AND TIME WAITING? WHAT KIND OF NONSENSE IS THIS? I’M YET TO RECEIVE MY REFUND IN MY ACCOUNT. THIS IS ABSOLUTELY NONSENSE 😠😠😠😠😠😠

🙄🙄🙄🙄

so, i copied and pasted the response that square sent me regarding his refund: “Your customer with Visa card ending in 3753 should see this reflected on their statement within the next 2-7 business days.” i also informed him that i would no longer be responding to his abusive emails.

and that SHOULD HAVE BEEN the end of it…

but, NO!

on 241106, he sent me this message:

Hello, I intentionally didn’t reply to your last email all this days because I was waiting for the timeframe you gave me. One thing you should bear in mind is customers are always right. I paid for product since 17th of October and till date I haven’t receive what i paid for or my money, and you expect me to be quiet. Not as if this is my first time buying things from USA and getting it delivered to me within 5days of purchase. I’m writing to inform you that my money hasn’t reflect in my account yet, neither have I receive what I paid for. You said 2-7 working days from the last email you sent me.

to which i responded:

sometimes, regardless of how much you want to please everyone, it is impossible to do so. this is one of those cases.

and, sometimes, in spite of everything, the customer is wrong, and must be informed of that fact.

i have refunded your order, as can be seen by the attached screen shot.

if you haven’t received your refund, it’s not my fault. check with your bank.

there is nothing more i can do. ranting at me will do no one any good.

this morning, 241108, he wrote me AGAIN:

I’m writing in respect of the parcel. It came in today and was delivered to me, likewise the refund you send back to me, The money reflected in my account today. I think is unfair to be in possession of the incense I purchase from you and also my money back into my account. Please advise me on how to send the money back to you.

what follows is the response i WANTED to send, but cooler heads prevailed upon me not to:

it’s all good, there is no need to send me the money. i figure if $35 is all it takes to get rid of a rude, unpleasant customer, then it’s money well spent.

just keep this in mind the next time you feel compelled to send out nasty, ranting emails to people on the other side of the world.

also, if you never again bring your business to my web site, that would be a good thing.

instead, i sent this, somewhat more “tactfully” worded message:

it’s all good. consider the refund an exchange for the shipping delay.

in the future, you might try purchasing from Divine Mystic Lodge — https://www.divinemysticlodge.com/product/999-lord-krishna-puja/

it’s a smaller package, that costs less, but LET THEM DEAL WITH HIM… seriously!

now THIS is where it gets REALLY BIZARRE!! 😖

he responded again:

Thank so much, I really appreciate and sorry for the misunderstanding, is due to how urgent I needed the incense for spiritual prayer 🙏

🙄🙄🙄🙄🙄🙄🙄‼‼‼

i’m sorry, jack… you NEED some serious self examination and reflection, so that you can figure out how your spiritual life has gotten THAT FAR off the rails, if you think this kind of thing is an appropriately “spiritual” response to “suffering”. 😒

cannabis, homegrown, pictures

harvested today

Thursday, 20241107 przxqgl

241107 - SPACE QUEEN! baby! 👍👍 — 241107 – SPACE QUEEN! baby! 👍👍

articles, corruption, i am a terrorist, i am antifa, political, politicians, politics, stupid people, the very big stupid

What The Hell Just Happened, America?

Wednesday, 20241106 przxqgl

What The Hell Just Happened, America?

Continue reading What The Hell Just Happened, America? →

anhedonia, depression, mushrooms

still

Friday, 20241101 przxqgl

i THINK things are still going well, even though i’m still feeling like they aren’t, or shouldn’t be, or something… 😒

i’m about halfway through ripping the “questionable” albums, and i’ve discovered that, if i slow down and apply a little more patience to the process, instead of just deleting minor record skips and clicks and pops and stuff, if i enlarge the view to the point where i can see the individual samples — which is somewhere around 100 samples per .001 seconds — then i can use the “draw” tool in audacity, and actually REPAIR the sample wave! it doesn’t work very well when the record skips a groove, but every OTHER click and pop that i was able to find was really easily repaired… it makes the process of ripping albums take about three times as long, but for albums like The Nova Convention, the end result is a much more understandable and listenable recording. and i’ve FINALLY gotten around to buying blank record sleeves, cardboard covers, and plastic outer sleeves for the records that don’t already have them.

but i’m depressed and out of sorts and i don’t know why…

i guess it may be time for a macrodose. 🍄

anxiety, circus, depression, health, stress, TIMMAH!

sigh…

Thursday, 20241024 przxqgl

i think things are going fairly well… but i’m feeling REALLY tired and cranky, and i’m having a really difficult time not letting it spill over into my interactions with other people.

i THINK things are going fairly well: i’ve reached a satisfactory plateau in my office reorg, which is to say, basically, it is the same as it was last week, but i’ve fixed the wireless charging pad in my new sit/stand desk, so i can get rid of one more cable. i located a box of “questionable” albums (the albums, themselves, are questionable. the content on them is the only reason i have been hoarding them all these years), including quite a few albums that i have had on my “wish list” at discogs for a number of years, because i thought the copies that i had disappeared… they didn’t disappear, they’ve been in that box in the garage for four years because i haven’t had the appropriate space to set up my turntable… i am on the verge of writing out an arrangement of Galizianer Tans for the philharmonic… the only reason i haven’t started yet is because of laziness, and a vague fear of being successful at it… and, despite the fact that i did a 100% FACE PLANT at my cicrus class last week (the first one i have ever done), i THINK that i have finally figured out how to free-mount my unicycle — it has only taken me FOUR YEARS…

but for the past few days i have been really cranky, and kestrel bit my hand last night (which she has never done before), and my arms and legs are COVERED in bites and scratches from TIMMAH! who has developed this habit of purring and rubbing up against my legs, and acting all “soft-cuddly-kitty” in order to get me to pick him up, at which point he instantly transforms into a velociraptor. and, because of the fact that he’s still got all his primary teeth and hasn’t developed his “adult” brain, yet, he’s a SHARP velociraptor. 😒

also, i have to get my flu shot, and at least one COVID booster, and i really SHOULD get a shongles shit, which, in fact, is two shots, which cost around $400 a piece, and are NOT covered by medicare… and, if you really want to get technical about it, i really should sign up for a “yearly” healthcare check, which i haven’t done since before covid… 😒

house stuff, pictures

s-l-o-w-l-y… 😒

Wednesday, 20241016 przxqgl

it’s slowly coming together: i actually put together the turntable and ripped the stack of albums i had been collecting for the past few years, and i have shipped out two incense orders, WITHOUT having to re-arrange stuff, or unplug stuff… and i discovered that my linux box, indeed, DOES HAVE a WIFI adaptor, which means that i can plug the printer into the mac more-or-less permanently and not have to switch the cable when i want to print from the linux box…

i’ve still got a mixer in a box, and a huge pile of cables, which will, ultimately, hook the synth and the piano to the mixer, and the mixer to the amplifier, and i’ve still got a box for the turntable which i have to decide where to store, but those are both lower priority, now that i’ve got the main part of the office straightened out.

in other news, i replaced two strands of rainbow lights on the outside of our house, because the old ones were burned out, or burning out, and while i was messing around with ladders, i decided that it would be a good idea to clean out the gutters, since the weather was nice. i didn’t clean ALL the gutters, because there are a few of them that are too high for me to reach, comfortably, with the ladders i have. the new strand of lights is a good deal less dense than the old ones were (fewer lights per foot 😒) but they were the only ones i could find that are JUST rainbow coloured lights, without colour-changing, remotes for choosing the colours or flashing patterns, or a “controller app” for a phone, so i suppose they’ll have to do… despite the fact that the instructions clearly state “this seasonal use product is not intended for permanent installation or use.” and “do not use seasonal products outdoors”… despite the fact that these are clearly labeled for outdoor use… 🙄

brain injury, frustration, house stuff, pictures

slowly…

Tuesday, 20241008 przxqgl

it is finally coming together… slowly…

i finally got a couple of shelf brackets for my speakers, and then discovered, because i had ordered them online and not had the chance to inspect them in person before purchasing them, that the brackets don’t fit with any of the THREE DIFFERENT sets of speakers which i currently own(!), and, despite the fact that i ordered them online, they can only be returned “in store”, although the store won’t reimburse me, because i paid through paypal… 😖🤨

so i had to order ANOTHER “floating shelf” — online, OF COURSE 🙄 — but, because of the fact that these were “shelves” and not “brackets”, i got them to work, which meant that i — FINALLY — hooked up my speakers, and connected the computer, so that, now, i have music that is a subdued volume and doesn’t blast in my ears from wireless “party” speakers which have no volume control… 😒

and — OF COURSE 🙄 — after having realised it was missing, and spending three weeks or so looking for it, i found the patch diagram which shows all of the devices and their preferred inputs and outputs, a few days later, and — NATURALLY 🙄 — i have ALREADY plugged things in incorrectly… 😩

slowly… 😒

and i am STILL getting used to having a mouse that i can hold naturally and click without twisting my wrist. 🤬 right-handers are a lot more insidious than they appear.

brain injury, geek stuff

wow!

Friday, 20241004 przxqgl

i have just, for the very first time, obtained a left-handed mouse, and my whole world has changed.

almost immediately after my injury, like with most things, i switched from being a right-handed mouser to being a left-handed mouser… unfortunately, because of the fact that the mouse was intended to be used by a right-handed mouser, i had to learn to use the mouse at an angle that allowed me to “normal-click” the “left” mouse button, which defaults to having to change positions any time i want to use the “right” mouse button for its normal stuff.

and, as a part of re-organising my office, i discovered that i now have THREE right-handed mice which are only partially functional: two of them don’t move the cursor reliably, and the third one doesn’t “middle-click” any longer… so, i figured, as long as i was getting a new mouse anyway, i might as well get a left-handed one.

now i have to UN-learn 20+ years of bad mousing habits. 😉

moe, pictures

moe

Tuesday, 20241001 przxqgl

this was drawn from a reference photo of moe that was taken before we were married. it is one of my all time favourite photos of her.

and i THINK i have done an okay job of capturing exactly what i like about the photo in the drawing! 👍

bssb

and, exactly as i suspected…

Sunday, 20240929 przxqgl

and, exactly as i suspected, there was absolutely NO free street parking anywhere close to fisher pavilion. I was able to secure parking next to the bagley-wright theatre, approximately 3 blocks away, because of my state-issued handicapped placard, but most of the other band members i talked to had to walk a half-mile or more from their free, street parking, or had to pay $30 to $40 for two hours of parking in a garage somewhere… i noticed the parking garage i used to park in (30 years ago, or so), two blocks from the fisher pavilion, which used to be $25 for all day, now has a sign that says “EVENT PARKING — $50” which is outrageous! 🤬 NOBODY should have to pay that much for parking! 😒

but the performance went really well, and we didn’t have the usual problems with the tempo slowing down (like we usually do), because, even though we played an almost entirely DIFFERENT set-list, we actually PLAYED YESTERDAY, which makes a whole bunch of difference. 😉👍👍

bssb

BSSB

Saturday, 20240928 przxqgl

the sousa band had a performance, today, at the 100th anniversary celebration of the first aerial circumnavigation of the globe, which started and ended at sand point naval air station, now magnuson park. being held at what is now an official NOAA facility, they have a list of “officially prohibited items” which includes “All noisemakers” — which makes me wonder whether ANY of the band are going to be allowed on the property — but, because i am somewhat familiar with the location, i went up there on thursday, to scout out the best place to park, so that i could leave my vest full of “officially prohibited items” (😈) outside the purview of the people who would prohibit such things… and, in spite of the fact that the gates WEREN’T open on thursday it turns out that BOTH of the gates were open, this morning, so i was able to park where i thought i was going to be able to anyway… BUT…

😒

liz sent out an email after i left — ALMOST EXACTLY the same time that we were supposed to be ON THE STAGE — with “NOAA parking instructions!” which said that we actually COULD park in the “federal no parking zone” without having to worry about “officially prohibited items. 😒

so, in spite of the fact that i was able to park where i wanted to, i COULD HAVE parked A LOT closer, and i wouldn’t have had to worry about getting past the armed guard at the gate.

in the same way, the sousa band has a performance tomorrow at Festa Italiana, at the fisher pavilion at the seattle centergrounds… but, because of the fact that it’s happening on sunday, we have been encouraged to “park on the street, because street parking is free on sundays”…

i have been parking at the seattle center for a VERY LONG TIME, and i have NEVER found reliable street parking ANYWHERE CLOSE to the fisher pavilion, on a sunday. it JUST. DOESN’T. HAPPEN.

period.

MY PLAN is to get there around 10:00 and park at the parking lot at 3rd and harrison… but even then, 10:00 is well after the huge crowds of people usually arrive at the center, and, because of the fact that they’re not giving out parking passes this year, i’ll probably have to pay through the nose for 4 hours of parking.

health

WTF valley medical?

Tuesday, 20240924 przxqgl

today i got an email from valley medical center that said they had refunded a payment of $146.21…

they don’t tell me WHAT the payment was for, or WHY it was made in the first place, and the only way to ask questions about it is to login to my valley medical “MyChart”, type out the question(s) i have, and wait for up to 48 hours for a reply that is USUALLY an automated reply, prompting more questions than it does provide answers.

if they REFUNDED almost $150, they must have charged it for something, but going through my medical expenses for the past year doesn’t give me the first clue, which makes me wonder why it was paid in the first place? and, of course, the answer would be that if i did NOT pay it, they would have sent my account to collections because of non-payment. 😒

but, because i can “afford” it, i guess i should be happy that i am getting a refund, because if i wasn’t, it would already be paid and i would never know the difference.

😒

frustration

oingg??

Saturday, 20240921 przxqgl

moe ordered a flatpack headboard online. it was delivered in a big, heavy box, with “all*” the parts, tools, hardware, and instructions for putting it together.

the instructions included a list of parts and quantities. the LIST said that it contained two parts labeled “G”. in reality, there was only one part labeled “G” in the box, a fact that i discovered after having already assembled approximately half of the headboard… because… who EVER checks the quantity list to make sure ALL the parts are there, when assembling a flatpack ANYTHING??? 😒

moe wrote to the manufacturer, and arranged for a second part “G” to be shipped, which they said would take about a week.

two and a half weeks later, after we got used to having our bedroom taken over by a partially assembled headboard, we got ANOTHER big, heavy box, with an entirely new, complete, flatpack headboard…

the new box also contained only one part labeled “G”… 🤬

now, we are left with a new, assembled headboard, PLUS an entire flatpack headboard, MINUS two parts labeled “G”, which are integral to the assembly of the headboard. 🤦

this is another instance where the frank zappa song “Flakes” is VERY appropriate. 😒

*for extremely limited definitions of the word “all”. 😒

depression, frustration, pictures

oqeirg

Wednesday, 20240918 przxqgl

yeah, it hasn’t changed much, but motivation is a major obstacle with this project… i really didn’t want to start it, in spite of the fact that it needed to be done, and has for a very long time, now (upwards of two years)… the big problem is that what i REALLY need is a bigger mixer — which is the thing to the right of the computer monitor, on top of the stack of stereo components, in the white box, in the picture above. if i don’t get a new mixer, the next alternative is a specialised, custom-built patch bay, so that i can unplug and re-configure the studio without having to pull out the individual components, and root around behind them to re-configure everything. basically, the mixer is big enough to give me playing capability for my piano and synthesizer OR to give me recording capability for my record player and tape recorder… but not both. and to switch from recording to playing involves completely reconfiguring the mixer and the pre-amp (the bottom on the stack of stereo components, in the black box) before any actual “tinkering” can be done…

and, for that matter, i don’t even have that set up, because i have to decide where the speakers (currently on the right margin of the photo above, about in the middle) are going to go, and mount them, before i can even think about getting started with anything else, and, what with the aforementioned reconfiguring rigamarole, plus the fact that i haven’t actually produced any original music since about 2015, my motivation for setting up the stereo is minimal… at this point i’ve got the music player on my tablet talking to two battery-powered, bluetooth “speakers” (which double as “party lights”), and that’s about all i can get motivated to do.

and there are some things that i would swear i would have been able to put my hands on almost immediately, before i started this whole miasma, which are now nowhere to be found. they’re not REALLY important (my folder of music i wrote in high school, a couple of books (both found shortly after posting this), the box of CDs that i am selling, etc., etc.), but it’s really almost enough to make me wish i hadn’t started this reorganisation project to begin with. 😒

the thing about depression
well you just can’t let it get you down
you have to see the world for what it is
a circus full of freaks and clowns
and you’ll never please everybody
it’s a well established fact, he said
i recommend a fifth of jack and a bottle of prozac

anxiety, depression, frustration, moving, pictures

aowefu

Sunday, 20240915 przxqgl

this is the new office configuration. the “closet” is now a sitting desk, which (eventually) will have mostly things like the stereo amp, tape recorder, turntable, and mixer on it, with the first shelf for things like the printer. the sit/stand desk is in the standing configuration, now, but it won’t accept the old monitor riser that i used to use (it’s too thick, plus the glass surface wouldn’t hold up to the heavy duty clamp that secures it to the desk), and i’m not sure how to raise the monitor, because PHONE BOOKS DON’T EXIST ANY LONGER 😒 i’m thinking of re-purposing the two smaller shelves that are currently on the main part of the desk, putting them on the, wider, first shelf, and adding stuff that used to be on top of the bookcase (which is out of the shot, behind me)…

because, well, i read “Earth to Moon” recently, which is Moon Unit Zappa’s reminiscences of growing up with Frank Zappa as a father, and what i read gave me a whole new outlook on Frank: i still like his music, and i still think he was a musical genius, and he said a lot of things that i will still quote at the end of my emails, but (and i’m definitely going to sound like my parents, here) — DAMN!! — he was an AWFUL parent!! 🤬 and a questionable role model, at best… which means that the bookcase covers up a lot of space where my frank zappa posters were, and i’m not sure how (or if) i want to replace them.

but everything is not moved back in, yet, and i still don’t have a functioning stereo, and, in spite of the newly created shelf space, and newly created shelves in a couple of different places in the office, i’m STILL wondering where i’m going to put stuff.

i feel a lot better than i did a week ago, but it’s still not over, yet, and i’m getting really tired of it.

depression, house stuff, stress

blar!

Monday, 20240909 przxqgl 1 Comment

the time has definitely come to re-arrange my office to make the music gear more accessible, and to make the existing computer gear less of a tangle of wires in an almost inaccessible (except for the cat) part of my office.

what this entails, so far, is purchasing an actual desk — a sit/stand desk, no less, with a wireless/bluetooth charging area, and a built-in two port USB hub 😉

240907 - sit/stand desk at discount liquidation depot in north bend — 240907 – sit/stand desk at discount liquidation depot in north bend

plus clearing out the “closet” where my piano and synthesizer used to live, in preparation for transforming the “closet” into a “desk”, and re-designing the shelves, above, to make use of the entire 8-foot width, rather than the staggered 4-foot shelves that i cobbled together when we were moving in… which will also mean that i can get rid of the pile of 8′-to-10′ shelves that have been taking up floor space in the garage! 👍

ultimately, the plan is to have the sit/stand desk with my computer(s) on the wall opposite where i am sitting now, and my piano and synthesizer opposite that, with an 8-foot “desk-made-out-of-a-closet” bridging the gap. the bookcase where the desk is going to go, allegedly, will fit between the wall and the door when it is fully opened… and i’m not sure what’s going to happen with the snake or the storage under the snake… it’s possible that the storage under the snake could go under the desk, but that’s still up in the air, at this point…

HOWEVER…

we’re at that “middle” stage, where everything (well, ALMOST everything) is taken apart and chaotic, and we’re still on the uphill track of “taken-apart-and-chaotic-ness”, and i HATE that part…i guess, mostly, because i lack the ability to imagine what it will be like when it’s finished in a more-than-just-imagination type of way — i’m stuck in the middle of chaos, and it sucks! 😠

and it doesn’t help that, when i went to home depot to scout out countertop for the 8-foot desk, the only piece of countertop they had that was 8 feet long was about twice as wide as i need it to be, DESPITE THE FACT that THEIR WEB SITE, FOR THAT, SPECIFIC STORE said that there were a variety of width and colour options available, and in stock. 😒

TIMMAH!

ginger cat appreciation day

Sunday, 20240901 przxqgl

and i JUST HAPPEN to have a brand new ginger cat…

and a skeleton… 😉

the skeleton is still open for names. i suggested Ron Zeising, but we don’t want him in the house, so anybody ELSE?? 😉

spam, the mallet

smup

Wednesday, 20240828 przxqgl

this is a message for the “user” named “Philipcef Philipcef”, whose email address appears to be “liamgvideo at gmail dot com”…

your message, “Test, just a test”, has earned you a coveted spot in my “Blocked IP Addresses” list. in fact, your message has earned the /22 block of IP addresses at tis-dialog.ru (which is in russia) a spot on my “Blocked IP Addresses” list.

congratulations. 😒

if you want to test my response form, just ask… it works quite well. it also includes a wonderful little X- line, called “X-PHP-Script”, which you probably didn’t know about, which includes your IP address — 194.50.15.67 — i expanded it to the next block, just to make sure.

now you, and 1,024 other russian citizens are COMPLETELY BLOCKED from viewing ANY of my web sites, including Hybrid Elephant, which you “tested” at 06:31 PDT this morning.

and, considering that the contact information for tis-dialog.ru is “grunge at tis-dialog.ru”, i’m guessing that it won’t really matter that much. 😒

spam is bad. stop it.

cannabis, homegrown

newmoorhg

Tuesday, 20240827 przxqgl

today i switched the lights from vegetative to flowering.

last
next-to-last
germinate

i shut down the grow-tent and moved them under the flowering lights, and gave them supports so that they’ll grow up instead of out.

i still have to decide whether or not i’m going to clone them, or just shut down the grow-tent until next year… but i’ve also got to decide if i’m going to construct a dedicated grow room, or divide up the existing shed, or what, so the likelihood that i will just shut down the grow-tent is fairly high.

health, poop

oh, btw…

Saturday, 20240824 przxqgl

i had my colonoscopy on 240809. i had a polyp removed, which tested normal. the doctor recommends another colonoscopy in ten years.

if medical science has increased as much in 10 years as it has in the past 10 years, i anticipate a far easier procedure than the one i just had… which was DRAMATICALLY easier than my previous colonoscopy (15 years ago) was…

it seems really odd that, not quite 3 months ago, i spent three days in the hospital with diverticulitis. the doctors have said that, while they can’t agree on what causes it, there’s a good chance that there’s a genetic component. but none of my relatives have had diverticulitis… that i know of… the doctors also said that it could just be “bad luck”, which i can definitely believe.

cannabis, homegrown, pictures

ghroomwen

Friday, 20240816 przxqgl

germinated 240618, things are proceeding nicely and, according to the packaging, they should be ready to flower… personally, i think i’m going to give them a couple more weeks before switching the lights. at this point there’s little to lose, and a lot more to gain to let them grow a couple more weeks, and, as they’re already under lights, it’s a trivial matter to switch them when I decide is best, and not natural processes. 😉

political

a word from an actual “weird” person…

Monday, 20240812 przxqgl

speaking as an actual “weird” person, personally, i think that all the talk i’ve seen, recently, about how republicans are “weird” is offensive, and i think it should stop. 😒

republicans — particularly the MAGA/#drumpf crowd — are repugnant, awful, uncaring, and inhuman, and their thinking (what they do of it) is definitely “strange” and “bizarre”, but they are decidedly NOT “weird”!

i wish people would choose a different word to describe them. 😒

The trick is to not let people know how really weird you are until it is too late for them to back out.

pictures, timmah

Timothy David Minchin

Sunday, 20240811 przxqgl 1 Comment

introducing the new cat. his name is TIMMAH!

… because of the well-known fact that all ginger cats share one brain cell…

yes, Timothy Burch, otherwise known as “TIMMAH!” from South Park, is a ginger. 😉

as all of our cats have been named after musicians or composers (“Charlie” was named after Ray Charles, “George and Ira Gershwin” was obvious, “Ziggy Stardust and The Spiders From Mars, The Tookah” was named after David Bowie, and “Frank Zappa” was obvious), “technically”, he is named after Tim Minchin… who is also a ginger. 😉

240811 Timothy "TIMMAH!" David Minchin — 240811 Timothy “TIMMAH!” David Minchin

geek links, geek stuff

tempus fugit

Friday, 20240802 przxqgl 1 Comment

in 1998, when i worked for STLabs, i was the test lead on a brand new product for the Crayola^® corporation called “3D Castle Creator”, which was, allegedly, a gadget that lets one create virtual castles, while ostensibly being an “educational tool” that taught all about various aspects and features of castles, in general.

it had A LOT of bugs. i built a model trebuchet that i kept in my cube, and launched tennis balls over the cube walls at my co-workers, to keep them motivated. 😉 i had some really amusing screen shots of various bugs in the video portion of the program, but they all got wiped out in the great cloud drive crack of 2021. 🫤

however, i found a windows-only version of it available on “My Abandon Ware dot com”… 🙄

it probably works, if one has period hardware and operating system…

frank, pictures

Requiescat in pacem, Frank Zappa (the cat)

Thursday, 20240801 przxqgl 1 Comment

Frank Zappa (the cat) is no more.

he lived a normal cat life up until last saturday, when he stopped eating, which we figured was because of his IBS, from which he has suffered for a few years now. we medicated his IBS, and things seemed to be getting better on monday, but then he quit eating again, and today he developed a fever, so i took him in to the vet, and they discovered a “mass” in his abdomen, which, thanks to exploratory surgery (which i got to watch!!), was determined to be two fairly large cancerous tumours in his small intestine… at which point moe and i decided that it would be better to euthanise him than it would be to wake him up so that WE could “have more time with him”…

240801 the last photo of frank zappa (the cat)

150523 frank zappa (the cat)'s right front paw — 150523 frank zappa (the cat)’s right front paw

cannabis, homegrown, pictures

home grown

Sunday, 20240728 przxqgl

240708 - immediately prior to OCF — 240708 – immediately prior to OCF

germinated 240618, so we’re around 30 days in. a good start, in my opinion. 👍

dead people, pictures, tina chopp

ො ✖

Saturday, 20240727 przxqgl

240727 cucumbers planted on Osiris' grave — 240727 cucumbers planted on Osiris’ grave

somebody, recently (i would say probably within the last 2 or 3 days, at most), left flowers on his grave… the only possibilities that ian and i could think of is 1) his father, which, considering his father, isn’t particularly likely, 2) some cousin or relative that ian and i don’t know about, which is somewhat more likely, but, considering the location (finn hill cemetery is in a REMOTE corner of central, western washington, not close to ANYBODY’S house, with the exception of — possibly — his grandparents’ house, but as his grandparents are also buried in the cemetery, not particularly likely), or 3) some random church-goer who regularly goes around to the cemeteries in the area and leaves flowers at random graves, to make it look like someone remembers these people… which, considering the remote, out-of-the-way location, we figure, is the most likely possibility.

and, now, there are cucumbers planted there, as well. see ya’, randy. 😉

tina chopp

� 纂

Friday, 20240726 przxqgl 2 Comments

ian and i are going to visit randy’s grave tomorrow. i plan on planting cucumbers, in the Tinite tradition, because randy, in his Osiris RaNebo persona, was one of the original high priests of the church of tina… although i am also aware that, in the Tinite tradition, planting cucumbers is to bring the dead back to life, and, of all the people i know who are dead, i’m pretty sure randy is happier being dead, so it’s more “in the Tinite tradition” than it is in the hope that it will, actually, bring randy back to life… in fact, in reality, i’m hoping that it DOESN’T bring him back to life, because, given the political and social climate these days, i’m going to bet that randy would NOT be pleased that he has been brought back to life.

nevertheless, i’m going to plant cucumbers on Osiris’ grave, because that’s what a Tinite would do. it doesn’t have to make sense.

ocf, pictures

an embarrassment that wasn’t

Wednesday, 20240717 przxqgl

so, ON MY BIRTHDAY, in 2015, i took this picture of a furry in xavanadu…

again, ON MY BIRTHDAY, almost 10 years LATER, in 2024, i posed with Timber, a furry dog, in the photo ID booth…

without realising that they were the same person, and under the impression that they WEREN’T the same person, i, enthusiastically, told Timber about this picture i took of another furry, a few years ago…

today, after exchanging emails with Timber, i found out that both of these furries have THE SAME PERSON underneath the fur-suit! 🤣

it’s NO WONDER that, when i saw Timber, in 2024, i IMMEDIATELY thought of the furry that i took a picture of in 2015. he says “I intentionally tried to make them look quite close to one another in the facial markings and general body pattern”. he doesn’t wear the older fur-suit at fair any longer, but he says that it’s “a real treat to see some more pictures of my “younger” self from a few years ago.” 😉

ocf, pictures

immediately post OCF

Tuesday, 20240716 przxqgl

things went A LOT more smoothly than… just about ANY other OCF since i have been attending…

i left at 09:00 and pulled in to the public lot (i think it’s called “Trotter’s Field”) at around 14:30, and i WALKED UP to the registration booth — there was NO waiting in line in the broiling sun for hours at a time — and the guy found my name in his registration book right away… it took MAYBE twenty minutes, total! then, while i was on the way back to my car, i realised that my car was parked in THE MIDDLE of a huge, colossal, developing, traffic FUCK-UP that it was going to take me an hour to slog through… so i decided to wait in line, and not stress about it…

the guy in the car DIRECTLY behind me, on the other hand, was definitely impatient and stressed. he kept honking his horn and yelling, as though i could have gone anywhere. the traffic-control hippie eventually went back and talked to him, but he still kept yelling until i pulled away from him, at which point he started yelling even louder, because the traffic-control hippies weren’t letting him bully his way into the line ahead of everyone else. 🤣

then i proceeded to the “full-load teddy” booth, but the second-to-last hippie before the booth said that if i wasn’t actually driving into the eight, that i didn’t need a teddy, and to just drive right on through, which i did… i very quickly found out that this was a LIE, but, by the time i found out, i was already most of the way to the stage, and the hippie that informed me of the lie wasn’t going to waste my time by sending me back for a teddy. 😉

i drove up to the stage, unloaded my gear, got the second choice of camping spots — the first one had too much undergrowth and wasn’t big enough for my tent 😢 — got my tent set up and my gear loaded in, and took my car to where the SCOFlot used to be, only to discover that they have turned the SCOFlot into camping, and the new “handicapped” lot is north miss piggy, which is across the street and back towards registration, but still not that far from where i was camped. i found the lot, and parked, with the assurance that, as long as i had a handicapped placard, that all would be well, AT LEAST until thursday, and MAYBE all weekend, but the hippie in charge of the lot wasn’t sure.

so i left my car with the assurance that, if i came back tomorrow, they would let me know whether or not i had to move it somewhere else at that time… and it turned out that i didn’t have to move it at all… and i was a little stressed about having an expired handicapped placard, but they didn’t ask, and i didn’t tell, so i was able to use the handicapped placard with no problems… and, as sasha said, it’s not as though my handicap expires when the placard expires… even though it’s not REALLY my placard to begin with… 😉

i walked back to camp and was drinking a (cold) beer, backstage at the morningwood odditorium, by 18:30, a full TWO HOURS before i was planning! 👍👍

the shows were, typically, disorganised and chaotic at first, but not bad. the band member who missed the last rehearsal at the sweat shop who said he “absolutely was going to make the dress rehearsal at the stage”, arrived after the dress rehearsal was over, but it didn’t make any difference. we put together music for a last-minute show called “Pappenspiel”, which was two older german people (from berlin) doing bizarre, clown/puppet/mask-type stuff, which went A LOT better than i expected the first time, and got progressively better every show. i forgot to pack ear plugs (they’re already on the list for next year), which was a bit of a problem friday night, but nothing i couldn’t sleep through, and there was a booth two or three down “Phun Way” from morningwood, that was giving away free narcan, free COVID tests, and free earplugs, which was a LIFE SAVER saturday night! 😎 the bassoon player and her partner tested positive for COVID saturday evening, and left, hurriedly, sunday morning, before the first show, but, somehow, we managed to adjust the show tunes to cover the fact that we were missing an instrument… and — SO FAR (fingers crossed) — there hasn’t been anybody ELSE in our crew that has tested positive since then. we took down the stage, and had all of the crew stuff mostly packed up and staged for the arrival of the truck by 21:00 sunday evening, and, once again, i sat around back “stage” at morningwood drank beer, smoked pot, and talked about The Church of Tina Chopp with a pretty young girl who is a philosophy major in college, but never heard of it before… 😈

it was UNREASONABLY hot — between 95° and 110° every day from about 10:00 until sunset, but it cooled off nicely once the sun went away… but, of course, the lack of sun at night only encouraged the mosquitos, which were RAVENOUS. the backstage area had some new bug-repeller devices that worked better than the ones we have used previously, so it wasn’t so bad backstage, but everywhere else the bugs were endemic. i went by white bird on wednesday evening, to warn them about my recent bout of diverticulitis, but the only time we actually NEEDED someone from white bird was when one of the UkeLadies had not been hydrating enough and passed out just as she was going on stage… she had to be hauled out in a moving cart, but i saw her the next day and she said she was fine. once again, i avoided the ritz — i didn’t even walk by it, because of the heat — and i only took one shower, which was 5 minutes (or “three pushes” of the knob that lets out the water) of INTENSELY cold water, which was enough… but it was not enough, and i took a LONG shower pretty much as soon as i got home… five days of unreasonably hot weather and only one shower was a little much, but it wasn’t enough to make me even THINK about not going again next year…

monday morning, i woke up around 07:30 and decided that it would be a GOOD THING to break camp and pack up BEFORE it got to be hot as hell, with the result being that i pulled out at 09:15 and arrived home at 14:35.

and now, the pictures:

i don’t know how he was handling the heat… it was 100° in the shade, and he was wearing a full-body fur-suit… i would have DIED! 😱

240711 google lens says that this is a varigated meadowhawk, but i'm not certain — 240711 google lens says that this is a varigated meadowhawk, but i’m not certain

Varigated Meadowhawk is Sympetrum corruptum, which is an interesting binomial name, but it gets even more interesting when you realise that there is also a Sympetrum ambiguum, or “blue-faced” meadowhawk… 😉

240714 Gadzooks! It's a stump! right next to the stage, all that is left of the shittimwood tree after which the morningwood odditorium is named. — 240714 Gadzooks! It’s a stump! right next to the stage, all that is left of the shittimwood tree after which the morningwood odditorium is named.

Some Random Hippie from 2004 to 2019… then EVERYONE missed two years, because of COVID, and then i missed a FURTHER year because of COVID (😒)… then Some Random Hippie from 2023.

next year i qualify for elder status! 😉👍

anxiety, ocf

immediately pre-ocf

Tuesday, 20240709 przxqgl 1 Comment

i’ve checked 99% of the things off the list, and loaded the car, but i’m still remembering stuff i should take, but aren’t on the list — like my bathrobe, and my aqua-sox, which means partially unloading to add stuff to already packed boxes, and then reloading the car. 😒

the remaining 1% are things that need refrigeration, which means *REMEMBERING TO GET SOME FREEZER PACKS AND PACK THE STUFF IN THE REFRIGERATOR*, tomorrow morning (unlike what i did last year. 😒); and things like soap and weed stuff and glasses, which i’m actually going to USE before i leave, tomorrow morning…

i did all the available laundry, washed all the dishes i could wash (there are a few that get hand washed, which i’m saving for later), mowed the lawn… this morning, before it got so FUCKING hot — seriously! it’s literally 100°F in the shade! 😠 which NEVER used to happen around here!

but i’m still anxious… which is why i’m taking microdoses with me… i’m anxious because oregon is EVEN HOTTER than here, and predicted to get into the 120°F range by sunday. i’m anxious because i was recently hospitalised for a condition that EXPERTS have told me “may or may not recur”, pretty much regardless of what i eat, or don’t eat, i’m pretty sure that the folks at “White Bird” (what passes for medical staff at OCF) are NOT prepared to deal with diverticulitis, and i REALLY don’t want to end up having to go to urgent care, or the hospital, in a place where i don’t know where anything is, and is far away from home… i’m anxious because i keep thinking that there are things that i should have put on the list last year, but didn’t, and i will get to portland, tomorrow, before i remember what they were… 😖

tomorrow, i expect to leave no later than 10:00, which means that i’ll get there around 13:00 or so… whereupon i will stand in line for a couple of hours to get my wristband, argue with the hippies about driving my car in to morningwood odditorium, unload my car (which i am allowed to drive in to morningwood, because i have a “full load teddy”… which happens EVERY YEAR… 😒) amid sweltering heat and massive mosquitos who don’t know the meaning of picardin or DDT (much less eucalyptus, which is ENDEMIC at the fair), unpack and set up my tent in one of two places (one i want, and the other one is probably what i’ll get), schlep all the rest of my gear into the tent, amid the aforementioned oppressive heat and mosquitos, and then drive my car to where it will be parked for the weekend, which, again, will be one of two places, depending on whether or not the hippies decide my expired handicapped placard is still worth something: either they’ll let the fact that it’s expired slide, and i’ll park in the SCOFlot, which is about a mile from where i’m going to be camped, or, if they WON’T let it slide, it means that i’ll likely have to park in “Outta Site”. which is about TWO miles from where i’m going to be camped. my guess is that things will start to “chill out” (figuratively, if not literally) by 20:00 or so, at which point i’ll probably eat something and wander until it cools off enough to go to bed.

it’s going to be okay…

but i’m anxious. 😒

franklin, pictures

Franklin, Washington

Tuesday, 20240702 przxqgl

i went for a 3 mile walk up the green river gorge to franklin, a ghost town east of black diamond. there’s not much of a “town” there, any longer, having been abandoned by 1920, and i didn’t see any ghosts, but that doesn’t necessarily mean that they weren’t there, if you believe in such things.

there is, actually, a “Green River Gorge Resort” which has the DISTINCT trappings of a former hippie commune, or something like that, although, these days, who knows who lives there. i parked across the street, at a public-access artesian well.

240702 Green River Gorge Resort -- a former hippie commune, from the 1960s? — 240702 Green River Gorge Resort — a former hippie commune, from the 1960s?

here is what is left of the town of franklin. click to embiggen.

240702 - Franklin, WA — 240702 – Franklin, WA

uphill about half a mile from the site of the town, is an open mine shaft from the turn of the 20th century. it’s allegedly 1,300 feet deep, but there’s no way to verify that, at this point, because safety nerds took after it, in 1984, and made it “safe for human consumption”.

240702 -- the Franklin Mine Shaft — 240702 — the Franklin Mine Shaft

micro$hit sucks!

micro$ump

Monday, 20240701 przxqgl

the latest episode of my battle to be able to send email to live.com, msn.com, hotmail.com, and outlook.com, all of which are overseen by their overlord, micro$weat.com.

i tried to send email to a colleague at live.com.

i got the following, in response:

—–

Action: failed
Final-Recipient: rfc822;(edited to protect my colleague’s privacy)
Status: 5.0.0
Remote-MTA: dns; live-com.olc.protection.outlook.com
Diagnostic-Code: smtp; 550 5.7.1 Unfortunately, messages from [the dedicated IP address of my mailserver] weren’t sent. Please contact your Internet service provider since part of their network is on our block list (S3150). You can also refer your provider to http://mail.live.com/mail/troubleshooting.aspx#errors. [CY4PEPF0000EE3E.namprd03.prod.outlook.com 2024-06-30T22:00:08.936Z 08DC9901E2784A1E]

—–

so, i went to the place where you get your IP address delisted — https://olcsupport.office.com/ — and this was their response:

—–

Thanks for your patience while we investigated your request.
Below your IP address(es) and their status(es) are listed.

(the dedicated IP address of my mailserver);

Nothing was detected to prevent your mail from reaching Outlook.com customers.

—–

so, i wrote back, detailing the problems i was having, and this was their response:

—–

I do not see anything offhand with the IP’s (the dedicated IP address of my mailserver) that would be preventing your mail from reaching our customers.

—–

so, i wrote back AGAIN, with the bounce message above, and this was their response:

—–

We have implemented mitigation for your IP (the dedicated IP address of my mailserver) and this process may take 24 – 48 hours to replicate completely throughout our system.

—–

SO! you HAVE BEEN blocking my IP address, in spite of the fact that you told me TWICE that you aren’t…

INTERESTING, and not in the fun, finding-out-new-things way! 😒

so, i wrote back again, asking what i was to do when the INEVITABLE bounce error comes back the next time, usually in about two weeks.

this was their response, and it REALLY annoys me! 😠

—–

I do apologize, but I am unable to provide any details about this situation since we do not have the liberty to discuss the nature of the block. We regret that we are unable to provide any additional information or assistance at this time.

—–

basically, they are saying “shut up and go home. we don’t want to fix our problem which we have conveniently placed upon your shoulders. nyeah!”

also, they are saying “yes, we blocked your dedicated IP address, and will do it again, for no very obvious reasons, which we don’t have to tell you.” 🤬

i am SO glad i don’t use micro$hit software, hardware, or online services! micro$leaze is THE WORST!!

incense

grf… 😒

Sunday, 20240630 przxqgl

once again, my ability to read devanagari script puts me in a situation which is rather annoying:

i got some new agarwood incense from vithaldas narayanadas and sons, which is labeled “Agarwood Agarbatti” (in roman orthography) on one side, and “अगरवुड अगरबत्ती” (in devanagari orthography, presumably hindi) on the other side…

which, when transliterated, says “Agarvoodd Agarbatti” (hindi doesn’t use what we recognise as the letter “W”, so they use “V” or “B”, most of the time, instead)…

i would have hoped that they would have printed the hindi word for “Agarwood” (the closest google translate can get me is “एलोवुड” (/elovud/) which allegedly means “Aloeswood”, but i’m not convinced of that, either, as “लकड़ी” (/lakadee/), or “काष्ठ” (/kaashth/) means “wood”…

i suppose i could solve this by asking a native hindi speaker, or taking a class, or something, but i’m not sure it’s worth the trouble. 😒

cannabis, homegrown, pictures

2024 cannabis — second try

Sunday, 20240630 przxqgl

my previous attempt at starting from seed was a horrible disaster, which resulted in my coddling four, then three, then two pitiful plants from relatively healthy, to severely stressed, to slowly and painfully dying over the course of about a month. i’m not sure what i did, or did not do, that brought about this sad course of action — there are a number of things that i did which could have caused some stress, and a couple of things that i didn’t do which might have contributed to the problem, but i don’t know. 😢

however, i actually bought more space queen seeds, and this time they’re doing A LOT better…

according to the label, indoor plants are expected to flower in 65 days. i hope so. 😉

little good luck charms, pictures, swastika, swastika rehabilitation day, swastikas

卍 SWA 卐 STI ࿕ KA ࿖ REAHBILI ࿗ TATION ࿘ DAY ࿌

Saturday, 20240629 przxqgl 2 Comments

today is Swastika Rehabilitation Day.

the word “swastika” comes from the sanskrit word “स्वस्तिक” (/svastika/) which means “little good luck charm”. the word “swastika” replaced the more common greek word “γαμμάδιον” (/gammadion/) — which means “four letter “G”s” — in the 19th century (≈ 1800s CE).

the swastika is one of human-kind’s oldest symbols. it has appeared on rock carvings dated to 10,000 years ago, approximately 8,000 BCE, in what is now ukraine, as a symbol of fertility and good auspices. the swastika has been used by every people-group on the planet (including the hebrew people) as a symbol of good luck, love, life, light, and auspiciousness of every kind, until approximately 90 years ago, when it was cöopted by nazis in the 1930s.

one of my favourite artists, ManWoman, said this:

Think of the most sacred thing in your life, think of the most precious thing in your life, and put the Swastika into that place. Put the Swastika into your heart. Put the Swastika on your altar. Put the Swastika on the image you use to represent god, love, peace, or the cosmos. Put the Swastika on the thing that makes you happy. You will BEGIN to see what the Swastika has meant to humans over this entire planet for all of our human history. For these places are exactly the places it occupied for thousands of years, until the second world war, when it fell victim to a chronic infection.

in the past 20 years, i have seen a great deal of improvement, overall, in the general attitude of the public, concerning use of the swastika, particularly if it is NOT depicted as the nastys do, (a black, right-facing symbol, rotated 45 degrees, on a white circle, with a red background), but, even so, i had a good, artist, friend of mine tell me, last weekend, that, in her opinion, any swastika was “evil”… apparently including the swastika that she, unknowingly, put on her own art-car, which, when i pointed it out to her, her immediate response was “that’s not a swastika”, even though it clearly WAS.

The Swastika takes many forms, but it's still a Swastika. The issue is not whether Hitler's Swastika is different from ours. The issue is that it is our Swastika, not Hitler's. — 211105 The Swastika takes many forms, but it’s still a Swastika.
The issue is not whether Hitler’s Swastika is different from ours.
The issue is that it is our Swastika, not Hitler’s.

here’s hoping that, in another 20 years, humanity will have gone back to the PROPER use of the swastika. ࿗

ocf, panto, philharmonic

same as it ever was…

Monday, 20240624 przxqgl 1 Comment

SW&3D OCF 2024 — Snow White and The Three ~~Dorfs~~ Dwarves

their names are “Hungry”, “Thurston”, and “Jes’ Fine”… 🙄

this evening we had the first of two “run-throughs” with “the entire cast” before people start leaving for OCF. we “ran through” 4 songs, two of which we have played before… well, not the entire band, because we have a new substitute guitar player, who played with us several years ago for a couple of shows, and he has never played the music for this show before… and not everybody from the band was there tonight… and the cast has performed with the music, but they have entirely new lyrics to learn, along with dance steps and trying NOT to run into one another, or trip over their feet while executing said dance steps while trying to remember the new words and not sing the old ones…

we currently have 6 songs on the list, but one of them isn’t quite ready, yet.

we have our second “run through” on wednesday, then people leave for the fair, so the first complete run through, with the entire cast, costumes, and sets, will be the DRESS REHEARSAL at the fair, on thursday, the 11th of july. 🙄

this is approximately the same as how it has worked for at least 5 previous shows, so i’m FAIRLY confident that everything will work itself out, and the shows will go well…

but it’s a little nerve wracking when i consider how little preparation has actually been done for the show, compared to the preparation of the venue, making sure everyone gets down there safely, coordinating with the “officials” from the fair (primarily hillary, who is in charge of entertainment at chelamela), and everything else that has to be done… 🙄

busking, ocf, SACBO, wedding anniversary

there ain’t no cure…

Tuesday, 20240618 przxqgl 1 Comment

SACBO starts friday, and i haven’t posted about it once, this year… OCF starts in 3 weeks (for some in the crew it starts at least a week earlier), and i haven’t posted about IT once, this year…

😒

okay, this SACBO will be the last one as “local residents” for whoretense and holly, who are moving to vancouver BC in a few months. whoretense has been one of my more regular print-broker clients. the last business card i made for him didn’t have a physical address on it. now i know why. the plan is for thaddeus to show up for at least one of the two days. and my unicycle riding has become somewhat more stable this year, which means that i MIGHT be able to compete in the doughnut jousting tournament this year.

and we’re JUST getting started with rehearsals for OCF. we have two scheduled for next week (monday and wednesday) which will be the only ones with the entire cast until the dress rehearsal at the fair, which is 23 days from today. as usual, we seem to be pulling the entire thing out of our asses at the last possible minute, but because of the fact that it’s OCF, the probability that everything will go smoothly is never more than 50%, however things work out. i haven’t been to the ritz since before COVID, and i don’t know whether or not i’m EVER going back, which sort-of makes the collection of 30-some ritz tokens i have collected in the past, possibly superfluous. 😒 and the probability is very high that, once again, they will NOT have put up the story pole, and nobody will want to talk about it, which is REALLY frustrating.

also, it’s our 26th wedding anniversary on friday…

art projects, i am a terrorist, pictures

then there was this…

Monday, 20240603 przxqgl

for the past couple of weeks, i’ve seen this…

THING

peering out at me from an otherwise innocent-looking box of generic™ breakfast cereal on the shelf at the grocery store, as i was going about my business…

so i decided to put my ~~photoshop™~~ The GIMP skills (such as they are) to the task of bringing him out in the open…

240528 - Kellogg's™ EVIL Frosted Mini Wheats — 240528 – Kellogg’s™ EVIL Frosted Mini Wheats

it’s actually somewhat surprising how little i had to do to this in order to completely change the character of the entire graphic… a “free select” tool to select just the eyebrows (highly convenient that they are ALREADY on a white background!), “float” to separate them from the main graphic, then clone-stamp to fill in the resulting blank space, a little rotation of each eyebrow, separately, then anchor the floating layer back down, and a little black brush touch-up to the teeth…

i thought about making a stencil-font word “EVIL” in red, rotated slightly, in between the word “Kellogg’s” and the word “Frosted”, but then i realised that doing so would be laying it out for everyone to see, which i don’t necessarily want to do.

if anyone is interested, i have provided a link to the original, unaltered version. view at your peril. 😉

i’m thinking of ways i could just get the “eyebrows” and the teeth printed on clear acetate, so that i could just cover up the face with the more accurate one, and then watch to see how many people freak out, versus how many people don’t even notice… 😈

depression, health, poop, stress

ooof!!

Monday, 20240603 przxqgl

i spent all last week in various amounts of almost non-existent to moderate lower abdominal pain, which i initially thought was constipation, and i was treating it as though that was what was causing it.

i spent thursday night in increasing amounts of severe gut pain, alternately in bed, not sleeping, or in the bathroom, trying (and failing) to poop, so friday morning as soon as they opened (08:00) i went to urgent care, which, after poking and prodding my increasingly painful gut for what seemed like extended periods of time, recommended that i go to the emergency room for tests and procedures to which they didn’t have access, at urgent care…

my preference would have been to eliminate this step, entirely, but, whatever…

🙄😒

so i went across the street to the emergency room, where they poked and prodded my gut, took a CT scan of my lower abdomen, and came back to inform me that i have diverticulitis, and recommended that i be admitted to the hospital immediately. 💀

this all happened on friday morning, between 08:00 and 10:30. 🤬

i spent friday night, and saturday night in the hospital. they discharged me on sunday morning, and i spent last night at home.

i am REALLY glad that medical knowledge has increased in the 40 years since i first heard of diverticulitis, because they DON’T have me eating white rice, noodles, and hard candy for a month (like they did for jane vosk, when i was 20), but i still need to be “careful” what i eat for the next couple of weeks, i am taking oral (and awful-tasting) antibiotics twice a day for the next two weeks, and they recommend a diet that is (possibly) higher in fiber than i have been eating after that to prevent future flare-ups.

i would like to state, categorically, for the record, that hospitals SUCK!!!… as thaddeus says, “i love doctors, i love nurses, i love aides, i love lab techs, i even love janitors, but i HATE hospitals!!”

oh, and i have to see my PCP soon (which means that i actually have to CHOOSE a PCP — again — because neither dr. wacka-loon, nor the one after him, came EVEN CLOSE to making the cut), and i have to see a GI doc within the next couple of months to have a colonoscopy…

whee… 😒

once again, i am forced to wonder why they didn’t just let me die when i had the chance. woulda’ saved everyone an awful lot of grief and money. 😒

politicians, stupid people

#DRUMPF FOUND GUILTY GUILTY GUILTY x 34 FELONY CONVICTIONS!! 🎊

Thursday, 20240530 przxqgl

© 1973 -- i knew this would come in handy eventually. 😉 — © 1973 — i knew this would come in handy eventually. 😉

there’s still no clear decision about what’s going to happen next. my guess would be nothing will happen to him, and he will go about his normal life without a change, and that would be wrong, but, unfortunately, it’s what i forsee happening… 😒

ETA: the sentencing is on my birthday. 😒

the presumptive GOP candidate for president has 34 felony convictions…

WHAT KIND OF CRAZY UPSIDE-DOWN WORLD IS THIS, ANYWAY??? 😖😖

technology, the very big stupid

🙄 😒

Thursday, 20240523 przxqgl

that didn’t last long… 😒

here i started my reddit profile, and here i deleted my reddit profile.

there are just WAY TOO MANY people who don’t know what they’re talking about, who give expert advice like they DO know what they’re talking about, and who DOWN-VOTE anybody who DOES know what they’re talking about, who tries to clear up the rampant and uncontrolled misinformation.

i’m not JUST talking about me, in this case. 😒

rants, spam

smarp 😒

Tuesday, 20240521 przxqgl

in the past 24 hours i have received 3,500 more-or-less identical spam messages from “Magalu”, or “Magalu Ofertas”, or Magalu Recomenda”, or “Ofertas Magalu”, with “Queima de Estoque Magalu: Televisores 4k a partir de: R$ 698,99 – APROVEITE – [ SOME-RANDOM-NUMBER ]” as the subject line. however they all have slightly different “From:” email addresses that end with @SOME-RANDOM-SHIT.magazineluiza.com or @SOME-RANDOM-SHIT.magazine-luiza.com or @SOME-RANDOM-SHIT.magazineluiza.com.br

my host provider (which recently sold out to a large, foreign corporation, but, in the past, has built a considerable reputation for responding to tickets within an hour) has not responded to my REPEATED ticket updates concerning this spam. 😒

i have taken the unprecedented (for me) step of setting up global filters that actually DELETE these messages, instead of forwarding them. 😠

it’s unprecedented for me, because i am painfully aware of the fact that filters that are set up to DELETE messages frequently delete “false positives” as well as spam, but this sender has been CONSISTENTLY sending me DOS mail-bombs of anywhere from 5,000 to 500,000 spam messages, for a number of years, and i’m as sure as i can be that i have narrowed down the filters to the point where i’m PRETTY sure they’re only going to delete spam, and NOT false positives.

😒

SPAM IS BAD! END SPAM ON INTERENT! (for all the good it will do… 🙄)

pictures, snake suspenderz / alive

240511 picture

Monday, 20240520 przxqgl

240511 Snakez Alive @ the Pike Place Market

i got my check in the mail on saturday.

moisture festival, rants

annmoistfest ualureival rant

Friday, 20240517 przxqgl

2024, 7 shares, $385.00 – $55 per share
2023, 7 shares, $385.00 – $55 per share
2022, 15 shares, $750 – $50 per share
2021, 4 “virtual” shows, i played for 2 of them, no payment.
2020, 17 shares – cancelled at the last minute, because of the imminent pandemic.
2019, 13 shares, $520 – $40 per share
2018, 11 shares, $330 – $30 per share
2017, ?? shares, $480…
2016, 15 shares, $600 – $45 per share
2015…
2014…
2013, 14 shares, $490 – $35 per share
2012, 16 shares, $720 – $45 per share
2011, 14 shares…

i didn’t even get a printed letter this year — or a check, they’re “direct depositing” them, this year, which is another layer of paperwork — just an email from victoria, the new executive director, with the standard “don’t consider this a paying gig” and “you are likely to get a token amount of money, but it will be more of an honorarium than a fee” horseshit.

some rant, huh? 😒

busking

240516

Thursday, 20240516 przxqgl 2 Comments

it has now been five days since i posted that we busked at the market and made $115 a piece, but we STILL haven’t received the $100 a piece that we were promised. it sounds all too familiar. 😒

i remember another snake suspenderz gig we played, at some retirement home north of the university district, a few years ago, where we signed all the paperwork months in advance, and we were assured that we WOULD BE paid on the day of the performance, multiple times, by multiple people, and i STILL had to follow this lady around, harassing her, for 45 minutes, before she relented, and took money out of her personal checking account to pay us, because “the checks had been held up” by some incompetence somewhere.

this time, we were supposed to be paid on the day of the performance, but on that day, (five days ago), the person who was supposed to give us checks, checked to make sure she had our addresses correct, “in case she had to mail them”, and said that she would have the checks no later than wednesday… wednesday came and went, we saw no checks, and the lady DIDN’T show up when she said she was going to, wasn’t answering her phone, and didn’t even try to contact us… ALLEGEDLY the checks have been mailed, but i do not understand how, if i behaved that way towards a professional client, i would not have that client for very much longer, but she thinks that it’s okay to behave this way towards us because we’re “ONLY” buskers. 😒

i am a terrorist, politics, rants, stupid people

semitic semantic puzzle

Sunday, 20240512 przxqgl

recently i’ve been hearing a lot of what boils down to “if you support the palestinians right to exist, you are anti-semitic”…

which REALLY puzzles me…

because…

originally, the term “semitic people” INCLUDED “arabs, jews, akkadians, and phoenicians”… the term “semitic” comes from the biblical sons of noah; ham, shem, and japheth. it has only been comparatively recently (i.e. around 1930-ish) that the term “anti-semitic” has come to mean “hatred of jews” in particular…

as an aside, originally “semitic” people were from what we now call “asia”, “hamite” people were from what we now call “africa”, and “japhethite” people were from what we now call “europe”… which brings up a whole different miasma of biblical nonsense concerning “japhethite supremacy” which i am not addressing, primarily because it is biblical nonsense. 😒

does use of the term “anti-semitic” in this way mean it is expected that people will intuitively understand that what you are REALLY saying is that it is OKAY to hate arabs?

or do the people who use the term “anti-semitic” to mean “hatred of jews” really not know that the term originally included arabs as well? considering the state of education these days, it wouldn’t surprise me that much. the only reason I know this is because i looked it up when i was in my teens… i certainly wasn’t taught that the term “anti-semitic” meant anything other than “hatred of jews”…

for that matter, apart from language (which is similar enough already, apart from the orthography), and culture/religion, what really IS the difference between a middle-eastern jew and a middle-eastern arab? if you removed all visible cultural markers (i.e. primarily “clothing”), and had them stand side by side, could you REALLY tell the difference?

it is questions like this that inevitably make me wonder about the possibility that i am some species other than human… 😒

bongwater day, busking, circus, house stuff, pictures, snake suspenderz / alive, unicycle

230511

Saturday, 20240511 przxqgl

okay, since the last entry, in reverse order…

today, thaddeus and i busked at the pike place market, under the clock, for an hour, and made $115 a piece… that takes into account the fact that we were amplified (which isn’t normally allowed at the market) and playing on the back of a truck for the “flower festival”, and we were being paid $100 a piece by the PDA to be there… the extra $30 was from tips, because of course we set up our tip bucket, because we were busking at the market. for some reason (probably the fact that he was being paid by the PDA) the busker who was on the stage/truck before us did not have a tip bucket out. 🤷

yesterday, i finished the pea gravel to the west end of the house project that i started earlier in the week. yesterday was also a “category 5” geomagnetic storm, caused by sunspots, which made a “visible” aurora borealis across most of north america, so of course moe and i went out to a “light desert” near salmon la sac, and took pictures. it was the first time i have ever actually seen an aurora… i have PROBABLY “seen” other ones, but they weren’t anywhere near as spectacular, and, significantly, i didn’t have the technology to actually “see” what i was “seeing”: what i saw with my naked eye was lighter grey stripes that were, basically, indistinguishable from clouds, which, very occasionally, had slight hints of colour… but apparently cameras these days take in A LOT more light than our eyes do, and the photos that came out of monique’s phone were phenomenal:

240510 <em>aurora borealis</em> — 240510 *aurora borealis*

thursday was my circus class, wednesday was busking without amplification or the extra $100 a piece — we made a grand total of $6 ($3 a piece), which qualifies as one of the 5 WORST days i have ever had busking at the market. also i cleaned the furnace filters that i forgot to clean on monday. tuesday and monday i started adding pea gravel to the area behind the fence at the west end of our house. monday i forgot to clean the furnace filters.

last sunday was my unicycle class, where i may actually be making some progress, in that i am free-mounting pretty regularly, and i just discovered that if i do it right, i can actually idle, rather than riding away after a free-mount… but everything is still sort of tentative, and i’m not sure whether it’s an actual improvement, or whether i’m just doing fine this week and i’ll go back to not being able to do it next week… which is sort of what i’m expecting. 😒

last saturday was may 4th, which is bongwater day, and world naked gardening day, as well as the more conventional star-wars day. last friday was international tuba day, national paranormal day, and world press-freedom day. last thursday i had my circus class, may 1st (wednesday) we busked at the pike place market, under the clock, with interference from the “pike place drummer” who sets up on the corner opposite the market, so that he is NOT “on market property”, sets up a trap kit and an amplified, pre-recorded MMO tape, and drowns out all other buskers in a three block radius… and we STILL made $20 a piece, which was more than the drummer made. 😉

cannabis, homegrown, legalise it!

TODAY!

Tuesday, 20240430 przxqgl

TODAY the federal government moved cannabis from schedule I (illegal for all purposes) to schedule III (legal by prescription) in the Controlled Substance Act, for the first time since the CSA was passed in 1970.

The Biden Administration announced today that the DEA will move ~~marijuana~~ cannabis to Schedule III. Here’s a breakdown of what that means.

it’s not going to be legal, except under prescription (for the moment), but now that it has some recognised medical uses, there will be a lot more research done with cannabis, and it will be easier for researchers to obtain quality samples… and it will make it A LOT easier for cannabis-related businesses to get their business done without having to worry about breaking some federal law.

but, now that it’s headed towards legalisation, it’s time for the media to start calling it by its “official, scientific” name, and not by its “street” name, which is why i edited the article. i encourage everybody to do so, and inform the authors that it has been done. if we’re going to be dealing with a legal substance, it should NOT be referred to by the name (to quote peter tosh) of “a girl from cuba”. 😒

it’s not a total win, but, at this point, but considering everything, i’m going to count this as a win. 👍👍

time to celebrate with a fatty of homegrown goodness! 😉 Continue reading TODAY! →

cannabis, homegrown, pictures

2024 cannabis update #2

Wednesday, 20240424 przxqgl

i’ve been wondering about #2 for about a week… it appears like it’s growing, but it also appears like it’s dying, so i’m not really sure. i keep watering it, and it keeps growing, so there’s still hope. the other three are all doing really well. i’m hoping that this year’s crop will make up for last year’s. 😉

depression, health, microdosing, mushrooms, quantity

i’ve heard it said before…

Monday, 20240422 przxqgl

i’ve heard it said before that depression is like a weight, but i never really felt like that was true for me. it felt like a gloomy presence which infected everything, but not, specifically, as a “weight”… until today, the 6th day since i microdosed. i took 750mg this morning at 09:45 and proceeded to have one of the most bizarre trips i have ever had.

despite the outdoor temperature climbing, i got very cold, to the point where i put on a hoodie and closed it around my face to ward off chills. then i got very sleepy, so i took a nap for a couple of hours. when i got up i felt straight enough to drive to the place where i bought some storage media, and then i decided, on the spur of the moment, to go “out for a drive”…

and that’s when i realised: depression IS like a weight: it gets a little bit heavier, imperceptably, every minute of every hour of every day, until i go around wondering (like i was, only yesterday) how i don’t know i have the energy to do things until i’m actually doing them, only to be made more tired and exhausted by the things that i was doing that i didn’t know i had the energy to do, and doing things (like i did yesterday) like going to bed at 19:30 because i was so exhausted… and the only respite i seem to have is when i take enough mushrooms to be able to perceive that it is all an illusion. it was around this time last year that i had a profound, mushroom-induced brush with reality, and i really haven’t done anything BUT microdoses since then.

microdosing keeps the weight from getting too unbearable, but it still accumulates. i need regular macrodoses, as well, to keep things from getting too overwhelming.

because too much whelm is never a good thing for anyone. 😉

forward, into the past…

Friday, 20240419 przxqgl

i was digging through a box of, mostly, ephemera, that i haven’t actually looked in since before we moved into the house out of which we moved 4 years ago, to move into this house. the reason i haven’t looked in it for 20+ years is because i thought i knew what was in it. while that was largely true, there were a few unknown things in that box which i’ve been wondering about for some time. one of those things was the “secret” taxi-driver’s guide to seattle streets.

this was before cell phones, and before most people had even heard of networked computers, much less internet: this was in the mid-1980s, very few people had cell phones, pay-phones were the common way of communicating outside of your house or office, and taxi drivers HAD TO HAVE a way to remember where everything was…

this was it.

the "secret" guide to seattle streets — the “secret” guide to seattle streets

this “secret” guide, combined with “The Thomas Guide” map book for king county (colloquially known as the “tommy guide”), pretty much assured that, regardless of how obscure or little-known a street might be, you could get to it without having to ask anyone how to get there.

it had each street name listed alphabetically (or numerically, for numbered streets), and directions for how to get to that street from one other street. if you didn’t know where the one street in the directions was, you looked up that street, and so forth, until you got to a street you know. the “secret” guide also had the number of the map in the tommy guide that included it, so that, if you had a tommy guide (99.8% of cab drivers had one at the time) you could look it up there, as well, but as the tommy guide was a book with A LOT of streets, listed in a not-always-logical order (because it was a map book), i usually didn’t use it. the “secret” guide was more accurate and took up less space. 😉

another thing that the “secret” guide has, which is, maybe, not so useful any longer, is that it has the major bus routes for every street. as far as i know, what we now know as “seattle metro” was a completely different organisation in the mid-’80s, and i sincerely doubt that any of the bus information is reliable these days…

however, streets don’t change that much. fourty years later, much of this “secret” guide is still perfectly usable… a lot of the building names have changed, and things like the kingdome and the alaska way viaduct are no longer there… but it won’t spy on you and steal your data, like google will. 😒

cannabis, homegrown, pictures

2024 cannabis update #1

Tuesday, 20240416 przxqgl

all four plants have sprouted and are growing!

240415 plant 1 - cotyledons — 240415 plant 1 – cotyledons

240416 plant 2 -the beginnings of cotyledons

240415 plant 3 - cotyledons — 240415 plant 3 – cotyledons

240416 plant 3 - cotyledons — 240416 plant 3 – cotyledons

240416 plant 4 - the beginnings of cotyledons — 240416 plant 4 – the beginnings of cotyledons

cannabis, homegrown

also…

Wednesday, 20240403 przxqgl

i started four “femenised” Space Queen seeds germinating on 240401. all four of them germinated (no surprise, they were bought from a company that specialises in femenised cannabis seed), so i planted them today.

we’ll see if it works out better than it did last year. 😉

crazy people, links, stupid people

solar eclipse?

Wednesday, 20240403 przxqgl

so, why is it that when the “Heaven’s Gate” people were saying wacky, and provably untrue things about space and astronomical stuff, everyone EXCEPT the cult members knew that what they were talking about was utter hooey…

but, when marjorie taylor green’s boyfriend, brian glenn starts ranting about what comes after the upcoming solar eclipse, everyone treats it like he obviously knows what he’s talking about, and we had better pay attention to him… because he’s a second-rate right-wing broadcaster? 😕🤷

given the choice, i would prefer the cult. at least they had something to look forward to. 😒

busking, house stuff, moisture festival

ump datte

Monday, 20240401 przxqgl

i was supposed to have a counseling session today, but kate is sick, so i mowed the yard instead.

the moisture festival has been going on for two weeks. we’re playing the last week, which is next week (april 10th through 13th), which means that we’re also playing the shortest week this year. there’s no telling who is “in charge” of fluffing this year, and i’m not even sure they’re going to have fluffers, since the moisture festival actually LOST money, last year (for the first year ever), and it is already projected to lose money again this year, because there aren’t the grants due to COVID that there have been the past few years… which is also why the ticket price has been jacked up to unreasonable levels. 😒

we had a house guest over last weekend, and moe had a “behaviour nerds” party saturday night, and invited a dozen or so animal behaviour folks. it was okay, in that i was able to access a ton of free food, including a whole box of timbits from a couple who came down from canada, which i haven’t had since they were first introduced, in 1976, but then i went and hid in my office for the rest of the evening.

we have not been out busking for 6 weeks, and the weather is beautiful, so if we don’t go out this week, i’m going to re-evaluate my busking opportunities (or lack thereof). my PPM busker’s permit expires on april 15th, and if i don’t renew, it will mean that it will be harder to get one next year, if things change… but the fact is, the PPM management association has experienced a major shake up recently, which means that i’ve got to convince a whole new cadre of ~~idiots~~ people that i really CAN play tuba quieter than most people CAN THINK, because the last cadre of ~~idiots~~ people SAID they were going to update “the official rules” (in 2018), but never did. 😒

COVID19, stupid people, the very big stupid, videos

sigh… 🙄

Saturday, 20240323 przxqgl

busking, circus, depression, frustration, medication, microdosing, mushrooms

meh… 😒

Friday, 20240322 przxqgl

since 240214 i have had 5 circus classes, 4 unicycle classes, 3 moisture festival rehearsals, 2 counseling sessions, 2 dentist appointments (my first in over 20 years, and they STILL couldn’t find anything wrong with my teeth), and 1 eye appointment.

17 days, nominally (the only evens that were MORE THAN an hour were the dentist appointments), worth of “stuff” and 20 days of “no stuff”… almost A MONTH of sitting around reading what passes for social media these days (i still haven’t quit reddit, although i’m closer to it than ever), or taking off and playing a lonely, solo game of “this way, that way” (which is best played by three or more people), getting lost, and ending up in orting — and when i mentioned it in one of my circus classes, the coach said “orting? what’s that?”

😒

okay, i’ve done “routine” things, like splitting firewood, taking care of laundry, washing dishes, shopping, and that kind of thing, and i’ve done “important” things, like upgrading the NAS, and building a rack for the kayaks, on top of everything else, so i wasn’t REALLY frowsting on the internet tubes ALL the time, but there has been a SERIOUS LACK of things to do, recently.

plus, the glasses i got from the aforementioned eye appointment are WORSE than my current distance glasses, and they’re supposed to be reading glasses (which means that they REALLY don’t work), and moe went to bellingham today, and i didn’t, after spending the past two weeks saying that i wanted to go (and then, deciding at the last minute, last night, that i would stay here with the pets), so now i’m here, alone, with the two ADULT dogs (moe took the ~~annoying~~ puppy with her), a cat, a snake, and a parrot, in this REALLY QUIET house, and all i want to do is make noise and pretend like there’s somebody here… so i can hide from them in my office, because i don’t know how to interact with them like normal people.

but, for some reason, i haven’t even played other peoples’ music, and have just been sitting here with the silence, the sound of my keyboard tapping, and the occasional bong hit…

AND i haven’t been out busking AT ALL since february 14th, which makes my new micro-tuba REALLY sad… i’ve got to renew my pike place market busker permit before the 15th of april, which means going through the whole rigamarôle again, only this time it’s with new folks in charge, who i have never met before, and, what do you know? the “official rules” STILL say “no brass instruments or drums allowed” in one place, and “muted tubas will be accepted on a conditional basis, and added to the 2018 rules” in another place… except they weren’t, and nobody has bothered to define EXACTLY what they mean by a “muted tuba”, and nobody has bothered to update the rules since then. 😒 and that’s not to mention the fact that i’ve been hankering to go out with my harmonic flute, my hindu drum machine, and my electronic rig, to some place OTHER than the pike place market, but i haven’t done so for reasons which come down, basically, to paranoia and self-doubt. 😒

this is one of those “i’m feeling grouchy and out-of-sorts” experiences that, in the past, i would have solved by taking mushrooms, but… well… i’ve been taking ≈250mg of mushrooms, every other day, for the past 8 months, i have absolutely NO clue what “the protocol” is for microdosing, and, at this point, if i have a trip that isn’t at least partially decent, i’m going to get even more frustrated than i already am. part of what i’m doing about it is, the next batch of capsules are going to be 200 mg, rather than ≈250mg, but i still have ≈100 250 mg capsules left, so it’s going to be a while until i get to them. the weather has been playing around with being nice enough that hiking in the forest sounds feasable, but the weather is also hit-or-miss whether it’s going to be nice or rainy, and it’s probably going to be that way for the next few weeks.

the NAS

meet the new nas… same as the old nas

Friday, 20240308 przxqgl

except that instead of less than 1 TB of space left, i now have about 6.9 TB of space.

i wonder how long that will last me? i wonder how long it’s going to be until i have to upgrade again… 🤷

malfunctioning people, pictures, rants, stupid people

extremism

Tuesday, 20240305 przxqgl

a while back, i mentioned this, and i tried to summarize, but i didn’t do anywhere near as good a job as xydexx did, with fewer words… 😕 oh well, here’s the real deal:

the NAS

THE NAZZ

Monday, 20240304 przxqgl

the NAS

all signs point to THE NAS!!!

Sunday, 20240303 przxqgl

the second disk has been installed, and the RAID1 instance is rebuilding again. allegedly, in around 27 hours, it will be complete, and then one of the twisted pair will remote in to change the partition sizes from thick to thin.

everything is proceeding EXACTLY as planned! 😈

the NAS

Friday, 20240301 przxqgl

i keep thinking of Lord Buckley and his ravings about “The Naz”… once this is all over, i’m going to have to dig out my lord buckley CDs. 😉

i have the disks in hand… well, one of them is in hand, the other one is already in the RAID1 array, and is currently rebuilding — which means that i can’t use the NAS for things that i normally use it for… once the first disk has rebuilt, i can pop out the second smaller disk and replace it, and then wait for it to rebuild… also, apparently, along with the difference in space, i can now use a “thin” disk (as compared to a “thick” disk), which means… something… having to do with the array’s ability to expand into a larger disk space… or something like that… 🤷

i am astounded by the amount of technology i no longer understand, despite the fact that i am as much of a geek as i am, for as long as i have been… i mean, there’s some of it that has been superceded: people no longer use HTML4, but i had been a certified geek for 25 years before i worked with a disk that was more than a gigabyte, and i now have a 12 TERAbyte disk array, and from what i understand, it’s not even REALLY that big… despite the fact that the guy who showed up to put it in, today, mentioned that it is, and i quote, “a shit-ton of space”… 😉

allegedly, if everything goes according to schedule (and there’s no reason to believe that it won’t), the 12TB disk will rebuild for a long time — >24 hours — and then i have to shut the disk down, remove the 4TB disk and replace it with the other 12TB disk that is sitting on the desk, next to me, and then power it up again, at which point it will rebuild the other disk for >24 hours, and, after that, i can use the device normally. allegedly, there is some sort of arcane voodoo that someone has to do to the operating system to convert it from “thick” to “thin”, but, allegedly, that can be done remotely.

hopefully this will last me a little longer than the 4TB array did. 😉

stupid people, the very big stupid

warum?

Tuesday, 20240220 przxqgl

why are they called “scholars” and given titles like “doctor”, when what they study is entirely based on easily disprovable lies? why is the study of easily disprovable lies even a thing, much less a thing in which one can get advanced degrees??

why do they CONTINUE TO BE honoured, and (apparently) well paid, to disseminate these easily disprovable lies to gullible and vulnerable people, who (apparently) don’t know any better?

why do we, as a society, encourage this, rather than actively working to eliminate it? 😒

medication, microdosing, mushrooms, pictures, quantity

🍄 capsule update

Wednesday, 20240214 przxqgl

so i’m going to try a smaller dose for the next 100. i’ve learned a little more about how to make capsules more uniform, and i decided to make 200 milligram doses, rather than the (nominally) 250 milligram doses i’ve been taking. a “microdose”, by definition, is “subperceptual”, and, for the most part these are, but every now and then i get a little twinge of psychedelic-ness, and i KNOW that as little as 50 mg will affect my mood, so i figured why not go lower, just to see what happens.

turns out using a sieve to sift the powdered mushroom filters out the pieces that are big enough to cause problems with consistency, and makes it easier to re-powderise the remainder. i was able to get 100 capsules that range from 190 mg to 210 mg, compared to my last 100, unsifted “250 mg” doses, which were anywhere from 190 mg to 270 mg. i’ll take a 20% margin, but 80% is pretty close to unsatisfactory. 😉

i’m still about halfway through the 250 mg doses, but i’ve got the next 100 doses all ready, plus around another ounce or so of powdered mushrooms, and “30 gram” “ounce” of unpowdered mushrooms…

forward into the past, geek stuff

other large storage devices i have known…

Sunday, 20240211 przxqgl

to continue the nostalgic rambling started here, another large storage device i have known in the past is the “unimaginably large” 4TB hard disk array that i worked on at openwave for three years, from 1998 to 2001… my unwillingness to reformat and reinstall the operating system on said machine was the direct reason i lost my job at openwave, three days before the computer industry crashed… which meant that i got out of there just in time and i got to laugh at my colleagues who still had to go to work, but DID NOT have their shares of stock, while i did not have to go to work, and i DID have my shares of stock! 😉

when i first started working at openwave was before it was called “openwave”… on my end it was called “software.com”, and we made the interfaces for managing email and email accounts on your cell phone, in the early days of internet connectivity on a cell phone. there was another company, called “phone.com” which did… erm… something else with cell phones… i never actually knew what they did… but the big-wigs at software.com and phone.com got together and decided to create a new company called openwave. i had been working for software.com for two and a half years, and got along famously with the people i worked with, but they came in with this new company and decided to shake everybody up, and i was placed with a vietnamese woman manager from san diego (who i never actually met in person), and one of her first tasks for me was to reformat and reinstall the operating system on this machine… but, having worked on the machine for most of the time i had been at software.com, i knew that it was also the machine that was used, internally, to manage the email accounts for everybody at software.com, all over the world, and reformatting the drive would delete all of these peoples’ email. i talked with a few other people from software.com, to confirm that this was, actually, the case, and they were all astounded that this woman would ask me to do that, considering how important that machine was, so when it came time for me to give her an answer, the answer i gave was no, i will not reformat and reinstall the operating system on this machine. i explained precisely why i would not reinstall on this machine, told her there was no more discussion available, and went on with the testing i had been doing for the past three months. three days later, she told me to reinstall or be fired. i said you can’t fire me if i quit, and walked out… three days later, the computer industry crashed and the rest is history.

before i started working there, i took a “field trip” to santa barbara, where the software.com headquarters was, at the time, and i actually saw the “unimaginably large” 4TB hard disk array… it was a big cube-shaped box, on wheels, that sat in the corner… it, too, was an “electronic black hole, into which one could throw data files forever, and not fill up”… it was, literally, THE email server for the entire company, all around the world. there were hundreds of thousands of individual email accounts, and tens of millions of individual email messages, all managed by this one box…

and, soon, i will have a box THREE TIMES AS BIG sitting on the shelf above my desk… 🤯

forward into the past, technology, the cloud drive crack of 2021, the NAS

the NAS

Wednesday, 20240207 przxqgl 1 Comment

i remember when i got my first real computer job, after having volunteered as a typesetter for a newsletter for high school students who were planning on visiting the soviet union, back in the late ’70s. my first real computer job, which was in 1987, was for kwik-kopy printing, in the fountain district of bellingham. at the time, there were three local print shops in bellingham, kwik-kopy, minuteman, and kinkos… but kinkos was more of a”copy-only” place, and, in reality, when they got a print job, they would send it out to either kwik-kopy or minuteman. 😉 at the time, my only familiarity with computers apart from working on my father’s dumb terminal, and later his tandy/radio shack computer, was the experience i had on the Lisa that ran PageMaker, at the ~~russian spy~~ newsletter. only Tina knows what my father used it for (he regularly ran jobs that took more than 24 hours to complete, and my recollection is that he deliberately overclocked at least one processor out of existence), but i used it for writing programs that did weird stuff instead of acting like a computer, and, later, i started programming a GOD assistant for a friend’s rôle playing game called “Swords and Machinery” (get it? “S&M”… get it? 🤪)…

but my first actual computer job was using a MacPlus 512k computer with two external floppy drives (one for the system and one for programs and data storage), and an “almost unimaginably large” 80mb hard drive. at the time, i remember thinking that it was like an “electronic black hole, into which i could throw data, literally, forever, and not fill up”… 😒 little did i know… of course, this was also during the time in which you could take four 512k floppy disks to any apple dealer and walk away with a free copy of the operating system. apple computers have changed A LOT in the past 40 years… 😒

the point of all this nostalgic rambling is that my “almost unimaginably large” 4TB NAS, which i couldn’t imagine how i was going to fill up when i got it, a couple years ago, is more than ¾ full, and i need to upgrade, if i’m going to keep ahead of the kinds of problems i had with my previous NAS 😒… so i emailed the twisted pair who whips my computers (and networks) into shape, and asked them about an upgrade to the next logical step above 4TB. the numbers they came back with were for 6TB and 8TB, which were respectable, and would basically double what i’ve got now, but i was talking on the phone with one of them, yesterday, and he said that they had 12TB drives for CHEAPER than 10TB drives, and when i asked him how much a 12TB drive was going for, he said $210… and i was FLABBERGASTED… i was under the impression that drives were A LOT MORE expensive than that… recall that i spent $600 for the 4TB drives i got just two years ago…

and, naturally, since two 12TB drives would come out to $420, i said i had to go for it. 😉

so, in a couple weeks, one of them is going to come by, remove the 4TB disks and replace them with 12TB disks. hopefully, that’ll do us for a little while more, this time.

farcebook, the very big stupid, twit-turd

i’m so tired of so-called “social media”… 😒

Friday, 20240202 przxqgl

so, having given up on farcebook and twit™-turd™ (otherwise known as 𝕏itter — pronounced “shitter”), i decided to try reddit.

after creating an account, i went searching for “sub-reddits” in which i might be interested, and almost immediately i came across r/Incense. however, after only a couple weeks on the sub-reddit, i was permanently banned for “spam”, because i mentioned that i had some particular kind of incense for sale, in response to ONE person. i didn’t include any links or even an indication of what my business name was, i didn’t address large numbers of people, or post indiscriminately, but the moderator wasn’t interested in discussing it because “we both know what spam is”. 😒

another frustrating sub-reddit that i discovered was r/trees, which, oddly enough, is the sub-reddit for marijuana enthusiasts (if you want the sub-reddit for actual “Trees”, try r/MarijuanaEnthusiasts). the majority of the posts in the r/trees sub-reddit can be largely summarized as: 1) “i have taken too much cannabis and think i’m going to die, what do i do?” or “how much is ‘too much’?”; 2) “how do i cheat/pass a drug test” or “i’ve failed a drug test”; or 3) “i’ve decided to quit/cut down smoking weed because of reasons”. i’ve developed a tendency to ignore the posts in the first category, because they’re just too frustrating. in response to comments in the third category, my default response has come to be r/leaves, which is the sub-reddit for people who want to quit smoking weed. however, my default response to posts in the second cateogry — do not work for companies that require a drug test as a condition of employment. 😒👎 — generates A LOT more ‘👎 dislike’ responses than anything else. people seem to believe that it’s okay to ‘cheat’ on a drug test in order to get an ‘ideal’ job, but when i suggest that not submitting to something that is not only wrong, but is, in some cases, illegal, just to get a job that appears to be ideal in the moment, is simply allowing the companies to continue to abuse their “workers” with impunity, and is, very likely, just giving them the opening to inflict further abuse on their “workers” at some indeterminate time in the future, I AM the one who is “crazy”, and people go to great lengths to enumerate the reasons WHY my approach is the wrong one.

fundamentally, we don’t NEED “jobs” — i can authoritatively state this because i have lived significant portions of my life without having had what most ‘normal’ people would think of as a “job” — however, companies NEED people to work for them. if WE decide not to work for companies that require drug testing as a condition of employment, those companies would either IMMEDIATELY STOP requiring a drug test, or THEY WOULD GO OUT OF BUSINESS!!

plain and simple.

similarly, r/PsilocybinMushrooms is full of posts from people who have taken too much and don’t know what to do, or have never done psilocybin, want to start with a heroic dose and want to know EXACTLY what to expect (while refusing to take the advice of people who have a lot of experience and recommend against it), and A LOT of actual misinformation about microdosing and mushrooms that don’t contain psilocybin, like Amanita muscaria, and it is JUST SO FRUSTRATING to attempt to communicate with people who refuse to listen. 😠

i haven’t totally given up on reddit, yet, but my impression is that i will, eventually. and, given my recent interactions with discord, i’m beginning to wonder if what is recognised as “social media” is designed not to be particularly “social” for those of us whose brains don’t fit into the “social” mold. 😒

technology

another social medium that i am avoiding…

Wednesday, 20240131 przxqgl 1 Comment

i decided that i would try discord, since a lot of my friends have recommended it.

i went to discord’s web site, and clicked on “load discord in your browser”, only to be confronted with a page that said “we’ve noticed something strange going on” and wouldn’t go any further without verification, which involves entering my email address and password…

but, i don’t have a password…

this is the first time i have tried to login to the site. this is the first time i’ve ever even SEEN the site.

really!

😒🙄

i’m guessing that it has something to do with some combination of the facts that i’ve disallowed all cookies, have my browser cache set to zero, and am trying to login using a VPN, but whatever… 🙄

i guess i’m not going to be on discord… oh well… 🤷

bizarre, brain injury, dreams

i had a really weird dream last night

Tuesday, 20240130 przxqgl

i had a really weird dream last night. before my injury, i had bizarre, vivid dreams pretty regularly. since my injury, i have had less than a dozen dreams i could remember, and none of them have been as bizarre or vivid as they were before my injury.

i miss those dreams… 😢

nevertheless, the dream i had last night is another dream i have had in a long series of dreams, starting before my injury, that have involved a “house” that i have “lived in”, usually in the past, but sometimes, temporarily, in the present. it is an old, not very well maintained house, with victorian architecture, that has been “updated” at least once, in the past, before i lived there the first time. the “house” has at least 5 floors (sometimes many more than that), which include the sub-basement, the basement, the first, or ground floor, the second floor, and the third floor, and each floor above ground is more rickety and more falling-apart than the previous one. even under the best of circumstances, the house is an “abandoned” house, which, when it was first built, was a large, fancy house, but lost most of its “fanciness” a very, very long time ago.

last night, i was staying in the “house” with a bunch of my friends from cirque de flambé/fremont players, including one person — simon neale — who died a few years ago. in the dream, i know he had died, so i figured it must have been a “flashback” or something like that. at first, i was on the third floor with a bunch of random people (and at least 2 more floors above, which is why the “house” is so weird), and one of them wanted to move some large boxes down to the ground floor, and asked me if they could take the elevator. i told them that the “old” elevator still sort of worked, but that it was scary, because i remembered that, in another dream involving the “house”, i took the old elevator up, and it just kept on going up, and didn’t stop, once it reached the top floor of the house. i recommended the “new” elevator, which was in the front of the house, and had been installed comparatively recently, but which didn’t go up beyond the third floor, or down below the ground floor, but, because of the “house” being in general disrepair, i was skeptical that there was a path to the “new” elevator that would support the person AND the large, heavy boxes that they wanted to move.

then, i was on the ground floor, moving my stuff into a vacant room which i was going to occupy temporarily. i looked out the window, towards the back of the “house”, which was on an alley that i recognised as being in downtown seattle, in the early ’70s… in fact, it was one of the large, victorian houses on the opposite side of the same street that “The Monestary” (a gay disco club that was torn down in the ’90s) was on. there was someone backing a pickup truck into what looked like a parking space, directly behind the “house”, but which i knew was actually the buried roof of the basement, which was very definitely NOT designed to hold up a pickup truck… the truck went backwards, hesitantly, until it fell through the roof, and the whole back side of the “house” collapsed. i managed to find my way out of the “house”, which is where i ran into simon, who was dressed in his “captain hook” costume, from the panto “peter pan”. i mentioned to him that the house had collapsed because someone drove a truck into the back yard, but simon was having trouble with his “hook” prop, and said that i should find another way in.

it was at that point that someone sent me a text-message which caused my tablet to emit its characteristic “clown horn” noise, which woke me up. it turned out that the text message was from one of my friends from the cirque de flambé/fremont players, which confused THE HELL out of me for several hours afterwards.

pictures, tuba

micro-tuba!! 😎

Thursday, 20240125 przxqgl

I BOUGHT A NEW TUBA! 😎

240125 salamandir, frank, and two tuba cases.

the bigger of the two is still smaller than the original case i have for it. i bought the new case (on the left side of the photo, to my right) a couple of years ago, because the original case, while still good, was 50 years old, and not as solid as i would like… and it was HUGE!! the new case (shown here) is only about 25% smaller, but it is also brand new, and designed to fit the instrument better… but it’s still big enough that, when i put it in the back of my car, there is NO room to spare on either side… the micro-tuba, on the other hand, is small enough that i’ll be able to fit A WHOLE BUNCH of extra gear when i go to the oregon country fair this year… 😉

this shows exactly why the new tuba is needed: it has rotary valves, whereas the big tuba has piston valves, and, despite the fact that it is less than half the physical size of the big tuba, the little one plays in EXACTLY the same pitch. that’s right, other than the physical size of the instrument, there is no other difference!

yes, it is, in fact, possible for me to hold two tubas at the same time. if i had my other mouthpiece, i could probably PLAY two tubas, but not at the same time, because that would require me to have a ridiculously, and unrealistically, wide mouth. if the micro-tuba was the same size as the other one, i could probably still hold them, but i could definitely not play either one without putting the other one down.

i took it out busking at the pike place market, yesterday, and it sounds EXCELLENT! 👍👍

it may be time for me to revisit this idea… 😉

COVID19, moe, stupid people

sigh… 🙄

Thursday, 20240125 przxqgl

moe has COVID… again… 😒 i probably do, too, but i haven’t tested, because i’m not doing anything until my sunday unicycle class, so if i’m still symptom-less then, i’ll test before going to class, and only go if i’m negative. moe tested before she left for work, this morning, and was negative, but she started noticing symptoms once she got to work, and tested again, with a positive result.

naturally, she found out that she’s sick on the last day before she has her weekend… and she has to cancel a mammogram and a massage tomorrow. 😒

i remember, in early 2020, before they found a vaccine, leading scientists and experts warned us that we had a pandemic on our hands, and that if EVERYONE wore a mask for a couple of months, without exceptions, we could get ahead of it… but #drumpf said that it would miraculously disappear, disbanded the federal pandemic response team, and started raving about hydroxychloroquine, and drinking bleach, and using infrared light inside the body, and enough people believed him that, here we are now, 4 years later, with hundreds of variants, and no end in sight… and i’ve got an extended family of neighbours, down the street, who STILL believe #drumpf’s lies! 😒

dead people, pictures

Professor Peter Schickele, head of the Department of Musical Pathology at the University of Southern North Dakota at Hoople

Wednesday, 20240117 przxqgl

Professor Peter Schickele, head of the Department of Musical Pathology at the University of Southern North Dakota at Hoople, died yesterday, at the age of 88.

230117 The Art of The Ground Round, score by P.D.Q. Bach, autographed by Prof. Peter Schickele

in 1977, or thereabouts (it was prior to my 18th birthday) the northwest chamber ensemble, or some group like it, gave a concert of music by P.D.Q. Bach, who was the composer whose music was the particular area of study of Professor Peter Schickele. they gave a party at some fancy bar/restaurant on the waterfront in downtown seattle, along with a scheduled “P.D.Q. Bach Compose-A-Like” contest, and Professor Peter Schickele was the guest of honour, and the judge of the aforementioned contest. i had been a fan of professor peter schickele for many years, i owned all of his albums (i think there were 4, at the time), and his book, along with the scores for many of P.D.Q.’s musical works, such as The Art of The Ground Round, and The Seasonings, and i was an AVID composer of… some might say “bizarre” music… however, at age 17, i was simply too young to get into a 21-and-older bar. however, i had a plan: a friend of my father’s was a member of the northwest chamber ensemble, and he got me into the bar with no questions about my age, where i entered a composition of my own, for left-handed sewer-flute and electronic tape. i actually made a left-handed sewer-flute, which had a faucet at the bottom, and part of the performance was opening the faucet, whereupon water would drain out of the extraneous tubing behind the head-joint cork. the performance went about as AWFULLY as any performance i have ever done, everything that could go wrong, did go wrong, with the exception of the water draining out of the faucet, which couldn’t have gone wrong because there was, literally, no place else for it to go, i actually only played about 4 notes on the “flute” part, the tape playback machine refused to work, and then it only worked intermittently… and yet, somehow, i won first prize in the contest. and the first prize was two tickets to the concert. the guy that won second prize had actually composed a legitimate, classical-style string quartet, in three movements. the second prize was a “genuine” P.D.Q. Bach “water-powered turntable”, which was a lawn sprinkler with a record platten attached to it with zip-ties. i got professor peter schickele’s autograph on several of the scores that are still in my possession.

he will definitely be missed. 😢

ganesha the car

𝄡鲽頇♭

Tuesday, 20240116 przxqgl

the front, passenger-side door-handle cover on my car broke the other day. i had noticed that it was coming loose for a few days, but then it got REALLY cold, and it just snapped off when moe was getting in the car to go to the airport, a couple days ago. in the process of figuring out exactly what broke, i nudged the broken piece a bit too vigourously, and dropped the broken-off piece into the interior of my car door… if it had not done so, there’s about a 90% chance that i would have just glued the part, reinstalled it, and been done, so, i went on youtube, and looked up instructions for how to remove the door panel, and instructions for how to replace the door-handle cover — which, according to youtube, are “made of chocolate”, a sentiment i wholeheartedly DISAGREE WITH, primarily because, if they were, actually, made of chocolate, they would be good to eat, and these things, while EXTREMELY fragile and apt to break if you look at them funny, are, very definitely, NOT good to eat… the guy gives the “official” hyundai part number, but it is the part number for the LEFT door-handle-cover, and i need the number for the RIGHT door handle cover (which, according to the dealer, is 82662 G2030)… and the only colour in which it is available is grey 😒 so i’m going to have to get it painted to match 😒 which means that the part ($25) and the painting ($75) by itself are going to cost me $100… i can ~~probably~~ put the cover on myself without a question, but i’m worried about the loose, broken part rattling around in the door, so i’m probably going to have to pay someone to take the door panel off and retrieve it… i started to follow the directions in the video, but got as far as “start removing the panel from the bottom — note the socket” and, while i found the socket, i pried fairly hard with a screwdriver and was unable to get more than about half an inch of the panel to barely loosen before it became almost impossible… and, well, i don’t want to actually BREAK anything, so i figure it’s a good idea to let people who actually know what they’re doing to dig around in the guts of my car door. and i’ve already talked to a place that will paint the grey part for me, and another place that will retrieve the part from the guts of the door (although i don’t know how much they’re going to charge me for that part).

miscellaneous

harpy noo yer

Saturday, 20240113 przxqgl

tomorrow, moe is going to florida for her yearly dose ~~of COVID~~ of accolades from the national veterinary board, or something like that… she’s been invited back (i think) six years in a row, when the “NORMAL” practice is to only be invited back two years before having to “take a break”… which means, either, that my wife is, literally, outstanding in her field, or that the “system” is broken… but it also means that i have to take care of two of our three dogs. the youngest one, quill, is going to stay with our neighbour who is also a dog trainer, because she actually has the experience needed to keep an approximately one-year-old puppy in line, where i definitely DO NOT. the other two dogs get to come with me (or stay home), while i go to my unicycle class tomorrow, and maybe my circus class, wednesday. i’ve officially cancelled both classes, in case the dogs are recalcitrant, or in case i don’t feel like going, but i think i’ll do at least one of them, and at this point, it seems likely that i’m going to do the unicycle class, tomorrow, because i haven’t been in a while, and i really need to get back into it more regularly…

i’m buying a new tuba! 😎 i’m buying a new tuba! 😍 i’m buying a new tuba! 😜 i’m buying a new tuba! 😛 i’m buying a new tuba! 👍👍👍👍👍 as soon as moe gets home from florida, we’re going to take a road trip to yakima to pick it up! 😁

crazy people, i am a terrorist, pictures, politicians, stupid people, the very big stupid

sigh… 🙄

Thursday, 20240111 przxqgl

230111 - our neighbour's house — 230111 – our neighbour’s house

bizarre, pictures, political

sigh… 🙄

Tuesday, 20240109 przxqgl

240109 #drumpf misspells "ludicrous" — 240109 #drumpf misspells “ludicrous”

donald #drumpf doesn’t know how to spell “ludicrous”… or he forgot to tag @Ludacris… 🙄

tuba

mumph…

Monday, 20240108 przxqgl 2 Comments

officially, the panto is over for another season, and we haven’t quite gotten started gearing up for the moisture festival yet… and i’ve found myself in another dilemma of my own making… 😒

during the last day of the panto, it all came together for me to realise that i would REALLY LIKE a tuba that has rotary valves, rather than piston valves. the tuba i’ve been playing on for a number of years now is a C tuba with piston valves that used to belong to Hokum W. Jeebs, and there’s ABSOLUTELY NOTHING wrong with it, except that it has piston valves… and, these days, especially with the fact that my right hand doesn’t work as well as it did before my injury, the piston valves have too much “throw” — there’s too much of a difference between the valves’ “open” position and its “activated” position — and it is getting more and more difficult for me to GUARANTEE that the valve is activated when it is supposed to be. rotary valves, in general, have less “throw” because they use the “up-and-down” motion to activate a rotor which rotates, rather than a piston which moves up-and-down, and the valve parts can be closer together, because the entire valve is oriented differently. i looked at the “woodwind and brasswind” web site, and discovered that a new C tuba with four rotary valves is between $10,000 and $14,000, which is WAY outside my range…

i mentioned this to one of my band-mates, who is also a tuba player, and he found (on farcebook) an advertisement for someone who is selling a used CC travel tuba for $1,800…

it’s REALLY a shame that there isn’t a “drooling face with eyes half closed” glyph in the emoticons block of unicode, because it would be REALLY appropriate here…

this is a CC tuba, the same as my current tuba, that is, physically, half the size of my current tuba, because it is wound up differently, and it has rotary valves, AND i can ALMOST afford it, at this very moment!!

however, it comes (if it comes at all) with a few very specific caveats, which i have been mulling over in my head almost constantly since i first found out about it. one of those caveats is that monique and i have this “agreement” these days, that if i want to buy a new instrument, i have to sell one of my old instruments… and i just happen to have an “extra” trombone, a trumpet, and a couple of clarinets, which have been sitting in their cases on a shelf in the garage ever since we moved, and i’m pretty sure i wouldn’t miss them if they went away. the other caveat is that it costs $1,800, and my bank account (well, okay, Hybrid Elephant’s bank account) only has about $1,300, which means that i would have to “borrow” $500 from the “household” account, and, what with xmas, and the foundation, and the washing machine, and, and, and… i’m not sure how well we can handle this… and, to a lesser extent, if i do end up “pretending” like i am interested in buying it, the guy and his tuba live in yakima, which means a road trip just to try it out and a long trip home with nothing if it turns out to be a bust…

ETA 240109 16:00.00 so it appears that i’m going to buy a tuba, as soon as snoqualmie (sdukʷalbixʷ) pass opens up again… at this point, everything has fallen into place short of my actually playing the thing… soon! 👍👍

anhedonia, doggles, new year

sigh… 😒

Tuesday, 20240102 przxqgl

the “holidays” are over, and things are getting back to “normal”, which means they’re getting back to boring, irritating, depressing, or some combination of the three, and it doesn’t look like it’s going to change much, if at all, for the forseeable future.

our sort-of “annual” trip to double-bluff beach happened, but it was complicated by high tides and the (also annual) polar-bear swim that happens at double-bluff beach at the same time, so instead of getting there really early (i.e. some time between 8:00 and 9:00), we got there after noon, and (naturally) there were A LOT more people who have the same tradition we do… plus there was an added new dog that has never gone to the beach before (quill), and an old dog (rye) who is now deaf and blind enough that he can’t distinguish between his own people, and other random folks with a dog, who also happen to be throwing a ball. the result was a walk on a crowded beach for about half an hour before we had all three dogs on leashes in a place where they’re supposed to be off-leash, because they were all acting up/out and we couldn’t control them. it ended up that we packed it in before we even got to the point where you go around the rock outcropping that blocks the view of the actual park, and about a mile and a half BEFORE the place where the rock ended up — which, now that i come to think about it, could be the last time i was there… 😒

doggles, moe's mom, new year, panto

almost there…

Thursday, 20231228 przxqgl

just a few more days until “the holidays” are over for another year. so far, i’ve been doing fairly well staying out of it: we had a party and karaoke last saturday, which i missed most of because of the panto. then on sunday — xmas eve — we had dinner with a couple of friends, and on monday — xmas day — we had my () mother-in-law over for dinner, which meant spending the afternoon and evening having to listen to cheesey xmas music and make “small () talk”, and that was it for xmas. this weekend, i’ve got two panto performances on saturday, and one on sunday. sunday night/monday morning, frequently, we drive up into the mountains — rather like we do on the fourth of july — to get the dogs away from our neighbours and their incessant fireworks. monday — new years day — we traditionally take the dogs to double-bluff beach, which we haven’t done for a few years because the pandemic has limited our ability to travel…

appliances, mushrooms, panto, x-mas

the last two weeks of the year…

Monday, 20231218 przxqgl

it’s time to hunker down and ignore as much “xmas” music as humanly possible, while, at the same time, having a bunch of panto performances, and various other “xmas” party-like things happening…

so far, the panto performances have been going really well, in spite of the fact that one of our star performers, in an essential, featured rôle, got covid last week and had to be replaced by the understudy. she’s no slouch, and has stepped into the rôle more or less seamlessly, but… she’s a woman playing the rôle of “the dame” (which is characteristically played by a man, dressed as a woman), and it’s just… not… right… not to mention the fact that she really does a mediocre job of acting the part: she reads her lines acceptably well, but is either too “over the top” or not “over the top” enough, and her “act” feels forced, and not real.

and, then, a week after the new year, there’s more panto performances, my son’s 41st birthday (i still don’t really understand how that happened), and then we start gearing up for the moisture festival… again.

this year’s difficulties also includes three of our six pets having pretty much identical dental problems which may or may not require surger(y/ies), and the failure of the washing machine (AGAIN! 😠) which has required draining the machine, disconnecting the power, drain, and water supply connections, and tipping it over on its side — because “modern” washing machines don’t have any “user serviceable” parts, despite the fact that it’s pretty much exactly the same washing machine that it has been for the past 50 years — to access the drain pump, which can be replaced for $50 by ordering the part number on amazon, rather than paying some “appliance repair technician” $130 to come out and tell us that modern washing machines are only designed to last for 5 years or so, and we bought this about 5 years ago… 😒 once again, the frank zappa song “Flakes” comes to mind…

in spite of all that, my mood has been surprisingly adequate, although i am nearing the end of my most recent batch of 50 microdoses, and if i recall correctly, the next 100 microdoses include quite a few (if not all) that i made “manually” (rather than “in bulk”), which means that they’re likely going to be a lot more variable in their actual dosage. the plan is to obtain another ounce… somewhere… i thought i had two reliable resources, but it turns out that one of them is only sort of reliable, and the other, while seemingly a lot more reliable, is the one i find more “sketchy” (in that they’ve been selling psychedelic mushrooms, and accepting credit card payments, more or less openly, on the web, for at least ten years, and apparently, haven’t caught the attention of anyone who has the legal authority to shut them down), and, also, costs more than twice as much.

COVID19, depression, panto

grumph! 😒

Thursday, 20231214 przxqgl

still adequate, although somewhat more meh than usual, partially because we’re in the middle of panto season and “the dame” (macque, in the part of auntie gertie) got covid last week 😒 the understudy is leah, who was responsible for the poster/banner disagreement a few years ago, and is currently responsible for the web site’s current host, wix, which is owned by the israeli government. 😒 i tested negative for covid today — it is my impression that i just got my fourth or fifth booster a little more than two months ago, so i may still be covered by that, but i tested anyway, out of an abundance of caution. i will test again before i leave for the theatre on saturday. 😒

can i just say, i am SO DONE with covid? and i am PARTICULARLY done with the predominantly-republicunt-stupidity-about-disease-enablers who are now going after RSV, which is booming in infants and people over 60. naturally, there’s a vaccine that the enablers are saying is a fake, and injects nanoparticles into your DNA, or some horse-shit like that… and — naturally — NOBODY is wearing masks any longer. 😒

i wish i had died when i had the chance. 😒

stress

suspiciously adequate

Sunday, 20231203 przxqgl

nothing has been going wrong… apart from stuff over which i have no control whatsoever, which is mildly alarming, but not overly so… nothing has been going outstandingly well, but things so rarely hit that mark that it doesn’t really surprise me that much. my unicycle “click” seems to be permanent, which i totally CAN NOT figure out, but, hey, i’m not complaining… we’re into the final week of rehearsals before the panto opens on saturday. one show is already sold out, but another show has only sold one ticket, and they’re talking about cancelling it, but no decision has been made yet.

i keep anticipating something going wrong, especially at this time of year, and when nothing goes wrong, i start getting anxious. 😒

depression, incense of the month club, microdosing, unicycle

surprisingly adequate

Thursday, 20231130 przxqgl

today’s mood, overall, is surprisingly adequate: i took 250 mg 🍄 @ 09:00 this morning, but that wasn’t what triggered it. i went to my circus class at noon, and i think i experienced the “click” that people talk about when learning unicycle… i can’t put my finger on one thing that is different from a week ago, or even a month ago, but, for some reason, today i was able to free mount more than half of the attempts i made, and, if you want to talk about free mounts that didn’t go two rotations or more, that ratio goes up to almost three quarters of the attempts. another thing that i found A LOT easier to do today is turning left. i’ve been able to turn right for quite some time, but turning left has eluded me, up until today. it’s still sort of sloppy, and not particularly precise, but it’s a left turn that wasn’t there last week. if this is the “click” everyone talks about, it took about 3½ years longer to hit me than it did for the people who told me about it… but, apparently, it’s there… 🤷

and then i came home and put together the last IOTM offering for the year.

medication, mushrooms

🍄

Sunday, 20231126 przxqgl

250 mg 🍄 @ 10:30 — further medication logs are on my tablet.

depression, medication, mushrooms

🍄

Friday, 20231124 przxqgl

YESTERDAY: 1 g 🍄 @ 10:00 — which was DEFINITELY a mistake: not a “bad trip”, just a trip in a time and place where i would definitely have preferred NOT to be tripping, i.e. with a bunch of people (six, seven if you include moe), some of whom i don’t know really well, and one of whom i actively dislike (you know who you are). i took mushrooms as the result of a bunch of hasty and not-too-well-thought-out decisions which were contradicted almost immediately after it was too late, and the end result was that i slept for four hours and was high for another three or four hours after that, while everybody else had thanksgiving dinner. as i said, not a “bad trip”, just a rather unpleasant one which i would prefer not to repeat. thank you.

a very strong reminder that “set and setting” are two thirds of the trip… something you would think i would know by now… 😉😒🙄

TODAY: 250 mg 🍄 @ 08:30

fun with the post office, microdosing, miscellaneous, panto, people, pictures, players, wolfenoot

misc. update-ish

Tuesday, 20231121 przxqgl

i ordered some jewelry from an artist in poland. i’ve been tracking it for a month, now. from poland, it spent almost two weeks undergoing microscopic scrutiny in customs, in florida, and then it took another week to get from florida to kent, washington (which is right down the road from where i live)… but, after spending a full 48 hours, plus, in kent, it suddenly, this morning, makes a leap to juneau, alaska, where it is currently “preparing for delivery”… 😒 if it’s anything like the recent shipments i’ve gotten from germany, the united kingdom, or portugal, it will be delivered today, in my residential mailbox, with no further explanation for why it was reported to be in alaska, but, as this delivery is “registered mail” (because of the fact that it’s jewelry), i’m probably going to have to sign for it, rather than having them just leave it in the box.

the postal delivery person just came and went, with no registered package from poland, so i guess it HAS gone to juneau, and who knows when i’ll be seeing it. 🙄

i’ve settled down to microdosing every other day, which seems to be working A LOT better than the commercially available (legal) alternatives that i have tried (buproprion), but i’m getting frustrated again, because either, i feel “okay” (in that i do not feel as frustrated or depressed), or i feel frustrated and/or depressed about stuff that has been there, is there now, and will be there tomorrow and into the future, regardless of whether or not i am taking medication of any kind. it’s frustrating to have to be taking a microdose to feel better, rather than being able to do something constructive to rid myself of the factors which cause the frustration and depression to begin with, but which are not possible, because they require things like killing tens of thousands of #drumpf-cultists and/or making major changes in society as a whole… which is exacerbated by the knowledge that if i were taking 2.5 grams, instead of .25 grams, things would be a lot more different. i call mushrooms my “don’t give a fuck pill”, but i guess i should call the microdoses my “give a little bit less of a fuck pill”, which, i’m not totally sure, is the point.

in the upcoming 49 days, i have 25 panto-related obligations, including 18 performances and 7 rehearsals, starting next monday. wolfenoot is thursday (as is thanksgiving), when our friends from hawaii are coming for dinner (but, significantly, NOT my mother-in-law), and, on friday, moe and i, and our friends from hawaii, are all going to go get tattooed: a few years ago, pre-COVID, we rented a house on the beach, and invited a whole bunch of friends to come and visit. the only people that ended up being able to come were micah and shaya, our friends from hawaii. we spent a week in a VERY large house, under the influence of a fantastic amount of trendy chemical amusement aid, flying kites and playing board (bored?) games, which included a “boys-against-girls” round of pictionary, in which the girls won with monique’s drawing which has come to be known as “snake-camel”… so, on friday, we’re all going to get a tattoo of “snake-camel”… which looks like this:

the panto this year is a re-visitation of one of our previous pantos, “Red Riding Hood and The Three Little Pigs”. we’ve got 7 rehearsals scheduled during the next two weeks, including one band-only rehearsal. marni, the flute/alto-sax player that moved to england just before the pandemic, is back, and she was the “purple” member of the group, so i don’t know how the fact that i have sort of taken over that position is going to play out. rehearsal season, this year, has been decidedly abbreviated and condensed, and i’m not sure whether or not that is a good thing.

medication, mushrooms

🍄

Monday, 20231120 przxqgl

.25 g 🍄 @ 09:30

medication, mushrooms

🍄

Saturday, 20231118 przxqgl

.25 g 🍄 @ 09:00

medication, mushrooms

🍄

Thursday, 20231116 przxqgl

.25 g 🍄 @ 09:30

house stuff

this is something new…

Wednesday, 20231115 przxqgl

the last time our neighbour’s tree fell on our fence, the neighbour’s contribution to the solution was to cut up the half of the tree that had fallen on our fence, and $500 towards the repair of the fence… which was on the order of four thousand dollars… 😒

then the old neighbour sold the house and moved away… after 35 years… 😕

this time, the new neighbour — the same house, same property as the last time — offered to cut down four dead trees, ASAP.

WOO! FUCKING! HOO!!! 🎉🎊🎉

Continue reading Ukraine says Israel-Hamas war shows West must ramp up arms production →

aw, yeah!!!

Tuesday, 20231114 przxqgl

so, i tried measuring .01 grams of mushrooms, and it wouldn’t go, because the scale isn’t that accurate…

but now i have a MILLIGRAM scale, which measures down to .001 gram!

i wonder how this is going to work? i presume that i wait a couple of days, and then, instead of taking my .25 gram dose, i’ll measure out and take a .01 gram dose, and then wait a couple of days and take a .005 gram dose…

at this point, i’m going to wager that i’ll perceive something…

i’ve also been hearing that “microdosing is a placebo” and “there is minimal evidence to support microdosing”… but i can’t confirm who has been saying these things, so at this point they’re just propaganda, as far as i’m concerned.

because i now have a milligram scale, i can assess whether or not i’m actually taking .25 gram doses… average of 5 random capsules tested, range between 190 mg, and 270 mg, is 230 mg… which is REASONABLY close, given the procedure and methods used… not TERRIFICALLY close… and the procedure and methods used were haphazard, at best… 😉

medication, mushrooms

🍄

Tuesday, 20231114 przxqgl

.25 g 🍄 @ 11:45

medication, mushrooms, spoons

horse-whipple

Sunday, 20231112 przxqgl

today’s sequence of events: i woke up in a foul mood because of the dream which i wrote about earlier. then i took mushrooms. then, shortly before i was supposed to leave for my unicycle class, we discovered that, once again, our back fence has been destroyed by a dead tree from the neighbour’s yard, which had fallen on it.

on the way to my unicycle class, around 11:00, a dangerously aggressive driver in a red nissan pathfinder, washington license number CKF6505, cut me off on the right, as i was turning right from the right turn lane off SE 216th to renton-maple valley road — i.e. they passed me on the right shoulder, and cut me off as i was turning right from the right-turn lane — and then proceeded towards renton at 80+ miles per hour, where the normal speed limit is 45-50 miles per hour.

then i went to my unicycle class, in which my free-mount attempts were more than 50% successful, and my left-turn attempts were, also, more than 50% successful, which is highly unusual. then i went to glazer’s, downtown, to pick up moe’s xmas gift. then i went to issaquah, picked up orders from petco and home depot, and got groceries at fred meyer, and made it back by 15:00.

once home, i unloaded the car, switched the laundry, took the dry laundry upstairs and separated it prior to folding.

i think, probably, the biggest single event that contributes to my NOT STILL being in an irritable mood is my unicycle class. as is my usual habit, i showed up 15 minutes early, so i could practice, and my FIRST TWO attempts at free-mounting, AND turning left were successful, one right after the next… i don’t know what i am doing differently, but whatever it is, works.

the 250 mg mushroom capsule i took this morning MUST HAVE HAD ALL the good stuff in it, because, particularly at my unicycle class, i could DEFINITELY feel the psychedelic effects. it was not enough to alert other folks, but it was somewhat alarming that it was as powerful as it was, considering the dose.

i’ve definitely used up all my spoons for the day.

dreams, medication, mushrooms

🍄

Sunday, 20231112 przxqgl

.25 g 🍄 @ 08:00

i had a dream that i could remember, which is VERY unusual. AND it was really frustrating. there was a party at our house, which wasn’t our house, but it was, in the dream. i was in my office, hiding from the majority of the party, as i frequently do. there were a bunch of kids, with their parents, that were part of the party, and one little girl decided that it would be funny to film me with her tablet, when i was working on my computer, but the app that she was using to film me was one that steals your passwords and suchlike, and ships them off to russia without your knowledge, which, of course, she didn’t know, because she was a kid. i found out about this after she had filmed me entering MY password to somewhere, and i confronted her father, who said that i could have her tablet to try to delete any information that it had stolen, but, because of the fact that it wasn’t MY tablet, everything was set up differently, and i couldn’t figure out how to do it… and then they decided that they had to go home, and wanted her tablet back… 🤬

medication, mushrooms

🍄

Friday, 20231110 przxqgl

.25 g 🍄 @ 11:15

medication, mushrooms

🍄

Wednesday, 20231108 przxqgl

.25 g 🍄 @ 11:30

blood pressure, house stuff, medication, mushrooms, stress

maybe only 10 steps back…

Monday, 20231106 przxqgl

blood pressure 120/90, which is pretty good considering how much stress i have been under. 😒

the workers showed up and dug some underneath the house… i didn’t really pay attention, because i was irritated with the company that sent them…

the sequence of events was as such: they originally came up with a plan to shore up our sinking foundation which involved drilling through the floor of the living room and dining room… which DID NOT work for us. so they figured out how to do it from under the house, but it turned out that they actually had to ADD another support beam… and, about this time, they switched the job to a new foreman who didn’t know anything except for the part where we said they can’t go through the floor. so when he showed up on friday, he DIDN’T HAVE THE PARTS to finish the job… and, today, it turns out that the company that was supposed to do this job in “one day”, NEGLECTED TO ORDER THE PARTS, which will take a week or so to arrive… so they dug around underneath the house for a while, and then i had to go out, and when i got back, they were gone, leaving behind three enormous holes outside the foundation, and, likely, some smaller holes inside the foundation, under the house, an oxy-acetylene welding rig, and a big pile of metal parts. meanwhile, they’ve taken $5,000 off the original quote, and it’s pouring buckets of rain into the really deep holes that they dug around the foundation of our house. 😖 HU knows when they are going to come back. 😒

HOWEVER… the mushrooms helped a lot more than i thought they would (comma gawd damn it!! 😉), PLUS i got TWO incense orders for a total of $125, i made 100 .25g capsules for my neighbour, and i found a copy of Vol. 2, by the Nihilist Spasm Band, which is something that i had in my pre-crack music collection that i was unable to recover… which, at this point, leaves me “adequate” instead of “meh”. a step up, i guess.

frustration, medication, mushrooms, stress, the very big stupid

one step forwards, fourteen steps back… 🙄

Monday, 20231106 przxqgl

the workers haven’t showed up yet, but HoneyBucket^® showed up, took away their porta-potty, and didn’t leave a new one — i suspect because they originally contracted a porta-potty for the “one day” that they said it would take, and never bothered to change the porta-potty contract when it turned out that it was going to take more than one day…

however, moe’s at work, won’t be home until 21:00, they SAID that the “scheduler” would call her on friday, but she didn’t, so even when the workers DO show up, they won’t know what to do, i don’t know what they should do, and moe is in surgery all day, which means that she may not be able to answer her phone.

they originally said that they “do this kind of job all the time”… i wonder if they screw up this badly on the jobs that they do “all the time”, and, if so, how they have managed to stay in business. 😠

.25 g 🍄 @ 08:00, but i don’t think it’s going to help. 😒

house stuff, medication, mushrooms, stress

here we go… 🙄

Friday, 20231103 przxqgl

.25g 🍄 @ 08:15…

at 09:00, three guys showed up to jack up our house… allegedly in one day…

at 09:15, they’re in the “what have they done to us?” stage of the job, with one of them under the house, confirming that there ISN’T the three feet of headroom that they requested, in spite of the fact that they told us it would be okay, and that he has to put in an extra support beam, which they didn’t tell him about…

there are only three of them. 🙄

he’s currently on the phone with the structural engineer, who HAS YET to appear on site to see the house.

so far, the entire project has been planned by people who have NEVER seen the house. 😒

it’s DEFINITELY going to take them more than one day. 🙄

at 09:45 they have decided that they’re going to do SOME prep-work to get the site ready, but that the real job of jacking up the house is going to have to be postponed to a yet-to-be determined future date… and which will DEFINITELY take more than one day to complete. 🙄

it reminds me A LOT of the frank zappa song, Flakes

pictures, samhain

samhain

Tuesday, 20231031 przxqgl

(music by ken whitley, the other half of And More)

medication, mushrooms

🍄

Tuesday, 20231031 przxqgl

.25 g 🍄 @ 09:00

cannabis, homegrown, pictures

the change

Friday, 20231027 przxqgl

i harvested the third of my three plants on wednesday. today i cleared out the grow tent, moved the clones to the shed (as compared to the grow tent), took the grow tent apart and got the critical parts ready for cleaning, which i’m sure they’re going to need, considering that the previous crop got pretty moldy, and the more current crop was developing a case of spider mites, which APPEAR to have been thwarted by liberal application of diatomateous earth. i am considering insulating the shed, which really wouldn’t be that difficult, and it would give my current clones a better chance at survival… although, at this point, they seem to be doing pretty well, in spite of the diatomateous earth.

it’s amazing to me how much space the grow tent tool up… which gets my mind to thinking of a way to put it on its side, on top of one of the shelves… possibly use it for starts, or something…

medication, mushrooms

🍄

Friday, 20231027 przxqgl

.25 g 🍄 @ 09:00

what i want for xmas!!!!

Wednesday, 20231025 przxqgl

ITS.FUN — caution: they want $1,562.50 a year for registration, and apart from the fact that it would add a great deal of “fake” legitimacy to the “fake” email address i have been using FOR YEARS — [email protected] — it’s probably not worth the money. 😉

you’d be surprised where you can go with a fake email address that looks like a real one… 😉

articles, i am a terrorist, the very big stupid

Ukraine says Israel-Hamas war shows West must ramp up arms production

Monday, 20231023 przxqgl

Ukraine says Israel-Hamas war shows West must ramp up arms production — but, here’s the million dollar question… WHY? WHY SHOULD THE WEST SUPPLY WEAPONS TO PEOPLE WHO DON’T WANT TO PURSUE A PEACEFUL RESOLUTION TO THEIR PROBLEMS, BUT WANT NOTHING MORE THAN TO MAKE WAR? if these people want to make war so much, let them make their own weapons! so, this doesn’t do much to help ukraine (why they’re raising the issue is another question entirely), but i’d be willing to bet that a significant portion of the weapons currently being used by israel against ~~hamas~~ ~~gaza~~ PALESTINE are being supplied to them by the united states… what if we just said ‘no, we will not provide weapons for war to anyone’?

medication, mushrooms

🍄

Monday, 20231023 przxqgl

.25 g 🍄 @ 09:45

medication, mushrooms

🍄

Friday, 20231020 przxqgl

.25 g 🍄 @ 10:45

medication, mushrooms

🍄

Thursday, 20231019 przxqgl

.25 g 🍄 @ 09:00

dead people

oh, yeah, there’s this…

Monday, 20231016 przxqgl

phrenology bust in "dr." william mcdonald's office — phrenology bust in “dr.” william mcdonald’s office – it might be a coin bank…

it turns out the reason i didn’t hear from “dr.” karl peterson, the guy who has been responsible for renewing my cannabis permit for the past few years, is because he died in march.

the ONLY reason i saw him is because he had the necessary degree to help me jump through the medical permit hoop, and i put “dr.” in quotes because he was a naturopath, which meant that he made most of his money “diagnosing” ignorant and gullible people, and then flogging useless vitamins, minerals, and dietary supplements as the preferable cure. i had enough of that kind of horseshit when i was hanging out with the PHBFH, and i don’t have the time for it any longer.

the new guy, “dr.” william mcdonald, is the same sort of huckster… but, he also does the medical permit racket, so i’ll put up with it for a while… at least “dr.” peterson didn’t have a phrenology bust in his office… 😒

medication, mushrooms

🍄

Monday, 20231016 przxqgl

.25 g 🍄 @ 13:30

The Fourth Way

by Georges I. Gurdjieff

The fourth way is sometimes called the way of the sly man. The “SLY MAN” knows some secret which the Fakir, the monk, and the Yogi do not know. How the “SLY MAN” learned this secret, it is not known: perhaps he found it in some old books, perhaps he inherited it, perhaps he bought it, perhaps he stole it from someone: it makes no difference. The “SLY MAN” knows the secret and, with its help, outstrips the Fakir, the monk, and the Yogi.

Of the four, the Fakir acts in the crudest manner: he knows very little and understands very little. Let us suppose that by a whole month of physical exercise and intense torture he develops in himself a certain energy, a certain substance which produces certain changes in him. He does it absolutely blindly, with eyes shut, knowing neither aim, methods, nor results, simply in imitation of others.

The monk knows what he wants a little better: he is guided by religious feeling, by religious tradition, by a desire for achievement, for salvation. He trusts his teacher who tells him what to do , and he believes that his efforts and sacrifices are “pleasing to God”: Let us suppose that a week of fasting, continual prayer, privations, and so on, enables him to attain what the Fakir develops in himself by a month of self torture.

The Yogi knows considerably more: he knows what he wants, he knows why he wants it, he knows how it can be acquired. He knows, for instance, that it is necessary for his purpose to produce a certain substance in himself. He knows that this substance can be produced in one day by a certain kind of mental exercise or concentration of consciousness; so he keeps his attention on these exercises for a whole day without allowing himself a single outside thought, and he obtains what he needs. In this way a Yogi spends on the same thing only one day compared with the month spent by the Fakir and a week spent by the monk.

But on the fourth way, knowledge is still more exact and perfect. A man who follows the fourth way knows quite definitely what substances he needs for his aims and he knows that these substances can be produced within the body by a month of physical suffering, by a week of emotional strain or by a day of mental exercises –and also that they can be introduced into the organism from without, if it is known how to do it; and so, instead of spending a whole day in exercises like the Yogi, a week in prayer like the monk, or a month of self torture like the Fakir, he simply prepares and swallows a little pill which contains all the substances he wants. And in this way, without loss of time, he obtains the required result.

miscellaneous, the very big stupid

add turtle

Sunday, 20231015 przxqgl

thoughts about the current crop of chaos that is currently engulfing the world:

it all comes down to belief, generally, and belief in absurd and demonstrably false things in particular. jews hate arabs because they are muslim, and believe “the wrong things” about “god” and his “chosen prophet” who, supposedly, lived around fifteen hundred years ago. arabs hate jews because jews stole the arabs’ traditional homeland, due to jews’ belief in demonstrably false things about “god”, which happened two to three thousand years ago.

“christians” in the US, and elsewhere, are inclined to back jews, because judaism is the foundation of “christian” belief… except that what a certain portion of the jews in israel currently are doing things that are completely the opposite of what jewish — and “christian” — leaders have said, for centuries. there are also a significant portion of people in the US, and elsewhere, who support arabs, because of the evil stuff jews have been doing to them for the past 50 to 100 year, or longer. it doesn’t matter that both jewish and muslim leaders, once again, FOR CENTURIES have warned people AGAINST the exact behaviour that we are currently seeing from both sides, the hatred for things that are totally made up, on both sides, continues unabated.

if humanity could, somehow, magically eliminate all of this false belief, we MIGHT be able to recognise that we are ALL human beings; that nobody is “superior” to anybody else, and that we would ALL get along a lot more easily if we were to actually HELP one another, instead of killing one another.

but, of course, we won’t, and people will continue killing each other until there isn’t anybody left to kill, and humanity will have snuffed itself out and have no further recourse.

friday the 13th

fri. the one and three

Friday, 20231013 przxqgl

medication, mushrooms

🍄

Friday, 20231013 przxqgl

.25 g 🍄 @ 10:00

medication, mushrooms

🍄

Tuesday, 20231010 przxqgl

.25 g 🍄 @ 09:45

campbell global tree farm, pictures

snoqualmie tree farm

Saturday, 20231007 przxqgl

“sdukʷalbixʷ” is the lushootseed (dxʷləšucid) word from which english-speakers get the word “snoqualmie”. it means “people of the moon”.

medication, mushrooms

🍄

Saturday, 20231007 przxqgl

1 g 🍄 @ 08:00

medication, mushrooms

🍄

Friday, 20231006 przxqgl

.25 g 🍄 @ 11:45

pictures, political, the very big stupid

SNARGGHL!!

Monday, 20231002 przxqgl

there are a bunch of campaign signs that have sprouted up through the area, recently, including this one:

231002 "FEWER" NOT "LESS"!!! 🤬 — 231002 “FEWER” NOT “LESS”!!! 🤬

knowing NOTHING ELSE about these candidates, i would not be inclined to vote for them PRIMARILY because of their ungrammatical use of the word “LESS”… 😒

but BECAUSE OF THE FACT that they (or, more likely, some over-zealous zombie sign maniac) chose to post their sign RIGHT ACROSS THE STREET from a MIDDLE SCHOOL:

i really start to wonder… obviously they DON’T care about children, despite what their other signs might proclaim, because instead of leading them in education, they are lambasting them with ungrammatical twaddle… and they really MUST NOT have thought about it very much, because the people who are the most likely to see this humongous sign are middle school students who aren’t old enough to vote… 🤣

i want to “correct” it… 😈

medication, mushrooms

🍄

Monday, 20231002 przxqgl

.25 g 🍄 @ 08:45

cannabis, homegrown, pictures

harvest season?

Saturday, 20230930 przxqgl

because of the weirdness surrounding the three cannabis plants i’ve been growing this year, i harvested two of them — the two that “re-vegetated” and spent time in the grow tent — because 1) they were as ready as i expect they’re going to be, and 2) the two that lived in the tent turned out to be mutant plants the likes of which i have never seen before…

these “leaves” were coming directly out of the stem of the plant. there was no bud structure, and no leaf stem… really bizarre, and really common on this plant.

are these male buds, or female buds? i think they’re female, because, in spite of the seed-pods, there don’t appear to be any seeds… but…? who knows? 🤷

in spite of all the weirdness, i have some AMAZING buds, plus i’ve got one more plant that is still about a month away from harvest, which is looking REALLY good, AND there are two clones, one of which took off about three weeks ago and is now almost two feet tall, and the other which just took off a couple days ago, which is actually the older of the two, but it has been sitting, not dying and not taking off, for about two months.

forward into the past, getting old

getting old really sucks…

Tuesday, 20230926 przxqgl

yesterday i successfully unclogged the drain in the upstairs sink.

when it worked, i celebrated in almost exactly the way i did when i was awarded a superior rating for the piece for solo trombone i had written, and performed, when i was 18. 😒

medication, mushrooms

🍄

Tuesday, 20230926 przxqgl

.25 g 🍄 @ 10:05

medication, mushrooms

🍄

Friday, 20230922 przxqgl

.25 g 🍄 @ 16:20

made ½ ounce of ¼ gram doses (57 total capsules) for kate, my counsellor. 🤣

Frank Zappa Day, ganesha chaturthi, medication, moe's mom, mushrooms, talk like a pirate day

🍄

Tuesday, 20230919 przxqgl

.25 g 🍄 @ 11:00

the last dose was last thursday, but all this chaos with moe’s mom has caused me to forget that i have this resource. 😒

also, it’s ganesh chaturthi, frank zappa day, AND international talk like a pirate day, all at once! 👍

moe's mom

moe’s mom

Saturday, 20230916 przxqgl

she has been in the hospital since wednesday. her condition is, i gather, still more or less idiopathic, but they think it may be medication related, since she takes SO MANY medications, and has for SO MANY years… 😒 or it may be a cardiac issue, or, possibly, a UTI related issue, nobody appears to know for sure… she has also been in the emergency department since wednesday, because they can’t decide what to do with her, and when they CAN decide what to do with her, she has to wait for a bed to become available, and while she’s waiting, another bizarre thing happens, and they go back to being unable to decide what to do with her. 😒 whatever it is, she hasn’t slept in four days, she’s hallucinating — she called me, this morning, ranting about snakes and hedgehogs… what the “good” news is still has yet to be determined. 😒

ETA: sort of “good” news is that they have, finally, found a bed for her somewhere other than in the emergency room. monique says that it’s “excellent news”, but i’m not so sure, considering all the rest of the chaos that has been happening over the past few days…

medication, moe's mom, mushrooms

🍄+

Thursday, 20230914 przxqgl

.25 g 🍄 @ 09:45

plus, moe’s mom went into the ER yesterday, for some idiopathic condition. she’s apparently “a lot brighter” today, but not back to “normal”… she might come home tomorrow. what the “good” news is has yet to be determined. 😒

medication, mushrooms

🍄

Tuesday, 20230912 przxqgl

.25 g 🍄 @ 14:30

cannabis, homegrown, pictures

i wish there was a “miscellaneous symbols and pictographs” entry that was a cannabis leaf, but i guess i’m out of luck…

Friday, 20230908 przxqgl

so, before i moved them out of the tent, my two inside plants looked like this, so i wasn’t too worried about what sex they were…

but, as you may recall, when i moved them out of the tent, i encountered SIGNIFICANT mold on the underside of the plant that is on the left, in the picture above. i propped it up, and trimmed off almost all of the mold — i am still fighting mold on this one plant, as of yesterday… i think i’ve gotten it all, and then another patch of it crops up… 😒 and i’ve also propped up the outdoor plant, as well, but that is only because it is spreading out wider than the space that i’ve got all three of them growing in, now, and not because it really NEEDS propping up. 😉

now that i’ve got my lights a little more under control, i think i can see why some people who grow LOTS of weed like “re-vegetating”, because it appears to create MASSIVE buds

2023-09-08 and they've got another month to go! — 2023-09-08 and they’ve got another month to go!

but re-vegetating also produces THE WEIRDEST mutations i have ever seen:

it still astounds me that it is legal! 🤯

another weird thing that has happened to me is that my medical cannabis authorisation needs renewing , as it does every year — as if, one day, i’m suddenly NOT going to have a brain injury… 🙄 — and so i texted dr. peterson, like i have for 6 years in a row at this time… but this time he didn’t respond. he retired a couple of years ago, but he kept issuing cannabis authorisations because he liked the money or something, probably… and he’s gotten more flaky as the years have gone by, but usually he responds… but not this time. so i called Marley 420, which is the medical dispensary i frequent, and asked them for a recommendation, and they pointed me towards a place in covington, but it turns out that they don’t do authorisations for people who have bipolar in their medical charts, and they recommended this guy in vancouver, washington. but i figured there had to be someone closer than that, plus i’ve had some rather unpleasant experiences with long-distance telehealth

a doctor in georgia, dr. olajumoke akinyele, who was responsible for my buproprion prescription, initially: she prescribed too much and i went through a week of, essentially, “overdosing” on a drug that made me nervous, twitchy, anxious, restless, short-tempered, unpleasant-to-be-around, caused massive tinnitus, etc., etc., before she got around to changing the dose, and when i asked her about psilocybin, she didn’t know what i was talking about and said that it would be too much like taking cocaine or heroin. 😒

so i asked my counselor, kate, if she had any recommendations. she said to contact dr. j, who didn’t do cannabis authorisations, but recommended i go to Green Leaf Health Care (😉) and, it turns out, that the doctor at green leaf, dr. mcdonald, is the guy who gave me my first medical authorisation, back in 2013. 🤣

medication, mushrooms

🍄

Thursday, 20230907 przxqgl

.25 g 🍄 @ 07:45

medication, mushrooms

🍄

Tuesday, 20230905 przxqgl

.25 g 🍄 @ 09:30

medication, mushrooms

🍄

Sunday, 20230903 przxqgl

.5 g 🍄 @ 08:45

medication, mushrooms

🍄

Thursday, 20230831 przxqgl

.25 g 🍄 @ 08:45

forward into the past, karass, pictures

weird coincidence? or part of my karass?

Tuesday, 20230829 przxqgl

this is a picture of my kindergarten class. i am second from the right, in the second row.

1966 Mrs. Peace and my kindergarten class

interestingly enough, this was at marvista elementary school, in normandy park, in 1966. another of my friends, smerdyakov karamazov was also at marvista in 1966, but he was in the second grade, and i didn’t know him at the time… 😵 (that’s a “dizzy face”, in case it isn’t obvious)

but the real point of this whole study is the teacher, Mrs. Peace — her name was Shirley, but i didn’t find that out until much later. the reason i found out her first name is because, about 20 years or so ago, moe started hanging around with another local dog trainer, named ali. she was always coming home talking about something ali had done, or had not done, that was really interesting, ali having surgery, ali living her life, that sort of thing. i paid attention, but it was all from a distance, because i had never met ali, and didn’t know her… until one day, moe happened to mention ali’s last name…

peace…

peace is not a particularly common name, so immediately, i asked if she was related to mrs. peace, my kindergarten teacher.

the answer is yes.

ali peace is the granddaughter of shirley peace. shirley died earlier this year, at the age of 98. unfortunately, i wasn’t able to find out if she remembered me, but…

this woman, who i have now met, who is a frequent guest at our house, who has been a friend and colleague of moe’s for 20-plus years, is the granddaughter of my kindergarten teacher… 🤯

cannabis, homegrown

ooh! 😟

Tuesday, 20230829 przxqgl 1 Comment

i’ve been thinking about moving the outdoor plant indoors, because the weather is turning. so, i took the plants from the tent out of the tent so that i could switch the light to a vegetative light, and put the clones in the tent… but when i moved the plants out of the tent, one of them almost immediately fell over, revealing a WHOLE BUNCH of moldy undergrowth! 😧 so, it’s actually a GOOD THING i decided to switch the plants around, because, otherwise, i wouldn’t have noticed until it was too late!

so i switched the lights, put the clones in the tent, hooked up the second flowering light, located some poles, propped up the plant that had fallen over, cleaned up and trimmed off a WHOLE BUNCH of moldy undergrowth, and put the three plants under flowering lights…

they went outside on 230529, two of the plants went inside on 230807, and the third one today… somewhat less actual sunlight than last year, but my recollection is that i started them later, this year, as well.

oh well, what matters is the end product, and i believe that, now that i have eliminated the mold, it should work out fine.

medication, mushrooms

🍄

Tuesday, 20230829 przxqgl

.25 g 🍄 @ 10:35

medication, mushrooms

🍄

Friday, 20230825 przxqgl

.25 g 🍄 @ 0930

articles, geek stuff, HTML in email is evil!!, html-formatted email, i am a terrorist, technology

Distinguish tech pros from tech poseurs with this one weird trick

Wednesday, 20230823 przxqgl

Want tech cred? Learn how to email like a pro

i LOVE to see this!!! 🤍🤍

it is a prime example of how I AM NOT WRONG when i rant about the evils of HTML in email! and it even includes a more complete version of the RANT regarding top-posting, that i sent out with EVERY! SINGLE! FUCKING! EMAIL! I! SEND! (🤬) along with the INTERNET STANDARD RFC 1855 to support it!

if there was one thing on internet that i feel EVERYONE should read, and pay attention to, it is this. if even half of the people on internet read this and did what it said, spam would disappear overnight! 👍👍

-- 
namaste
salamandir (he/him)
[email protected]

A: Because it breaks the logical sequence of discussion
Q: Why is top posting bad?
     -- https://www.ietf.org/rfc/rfc1855.txt

()  ascii ribbon campaign
/\                   -      increased security
   My Email Client   -      against html e-mail
Is Not A Web Browser!
-- 
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medication, mushrooms

🍄

Tuesday, 20230822 przxqgl

.25g 🍄 @ 11:20

cannabis, ganesha the car, homegrown, mushrooms, parades, snake suspenderz / alive

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Thursday, 20230817 przxqgl

cannabis update: all three plants, once again, are exhibiting strong female tendencies. i’m going to keep the two that are in the tent, in the tent, just to make sure. then, when the weather turns, and i move the outdoor plant inside, i’ll switch the light in the tent, move the clones in there, and move the flowering lights out into the shed, where the big plants can finish up. macque sez he’s going to come and get the rest of the cirque stuff out of the shed, so that will mean that i have even more space. there are now two clones: one came from the top of the outdoor plant, and it’s apparently doing fairly well, although it hasn’t grown very much. the other came from my neighbour, about a week ago. it is “train wreck”, but, at this point, i still don’t know whether or not it’s going to live. we’ve also talked about setting up an indoor grow, this fall, to replenish any shortfalls i may experience prior to then, which is fine with me. i’ve actually grown indoors a lot more than i’ve grown outdoors, so there’s that…

um… lemme see… .25g 🍄 230727, 230731, 230804, 230807, 230812, and 230814, snakez alive performances 230805 (gemma daggatt houseboat gig), and tomorrow, 230818 (PPM/sunset supper), plus regular busking at the market, on wednesdays, ganesha the car shown at the “Jet Blast Bash” 230805-06, briar sea scare parade 230809, 230811 at the Fircrest Residental Habilitation Facility in shoreline, and this weekend, 230819-20 at Fresh Paint in everett. at the briar sea scare parade, and at fircrest, i had the privilege of showing my car with Goddess Kring, aka Shannon Kringen, who is a local folk hero who performed strange art pieces on public access TV when i worked at micro$lop.

circus class cancelled today because of heat. i think i have successfully weaned myself off of twitter (which is now called “𝕏”, but it’s still at “twitter dot com”)…

forward into the past, spiritual

forwards into the past???

Thursday, 20230810 przxqgl

so, i’ve been thinking about my spiritual experiences from the “early days” of my spiritual quest (i.e. 1978-1990), and i remembered visiting a man i knew as “father satchakrananda” in… oh, i guess it must have been 1981 or 1982… at the “raj-yoga math and retreat center” in deming. he was an older man, with a long grey beard, who wore a cassock, and had the brusque shortness of a person who had been in the business of teaching others who don’t want to (or can’t) learn, as i would come to recognise later, and his orthodox christian mass was topped off by handmade, crusty bread, real wine, and a dab of tiger balm on my ajña chakra, which was refreshingly unusual. his “monastery” consisted of, apparently, one female disciple, who looked totally overworked and underfed, who was silent, and jumped when father satchakrananda said so, but i didn’t get the chance to look around very much, since i was going with the PHBFH and her friend, bhakti, who was driving. at the time, i wasn’t really looking for reasons not to believe that these folks really had supernatural powers, and the “set and setting” was okay, for a short visit, so i wasn’t really impressed by this guy, because he insisted that he was “father”, NOT “swami”, and used christian jargon for everything, when i knew that what he was talking about was really hindu ideas — this was shortly before i started my own in-depth study of christianity — but nothing really struck me as unusual, apart from the sincerity of the mass.

but ~~then~~ — NOW, 40 years later — i looked him up on internet… and what i found was surprisingly unsettling, for as little as it was. the first link i found was the Raj-Yoga Math And Retreat page from encyclopedia.com, which looks as though it was either copied from some advertising or promotional material, or written by father satchakrananda, himself. it was on this page that i learned that he is referred to as “Yogi Father Satchakrananda Bodhisattvaguru”. 🙄

i was IMMEDIATELY reminded of my brother-in-law (the one who is married to my older-younger sister), who decided that he wanted me to refer to him as “paramahansa brahmavatar”… 🙄🙄🙄

another reason i think the information was copied was because of the misspelling of the “Nooksuck” River, near Deming, Washington… it’s spelled that way in every link i found relating to father satchakrananda, and it SHOULD BE spelled “Nooksack”… and the fact that he was “mystically initiated” in 1973 by swami sivananda who DIED 10 years earlier, is “IN NO WAY” suspiciously convenient, or an indication that he may be a phony… 😒 not to mention the fact that all of the “encyclopedia.com” “references” are books by “yogi father satchakrananda”… 🙄

for the record, i believe that anybody who has to put the fact that they are a “guru” or “avatar” or whatever, INTO THEIR NAME, and then INSIST that one call them by that name, is about as far away from being a REAL “guru” or “avatar” (or whatever) as you can possibly be, without outright denying that “gurus” or “avatars” (or whatever) even EXIST… and i REFUSE to satisfy their desires by referring to them with that appellation. it is egotistical, and wrong! 😠

and THEN i found a link to the Suspicious Berean, and his 2018 screed entitled “30 years ago: Yogi Satchakrananda underwhelms Edmonton… 🙄 it starts out promisingly enough, with a mention of a performance by peter popoff, the disgraced so-called “christian” televangelist whose “mystical powers” turned out to involve his wife on a CB channel and an un-announced ear-piece with which she directed the supposedly “divine” “words of knowledge” and “healings”… and he, too, repeats the “nooksuck” mis-spelling, which makes me wonder where HE got it from… but then he mentions self-proclaimed “christian” evangelist “cult experts”, dave hunt, and rabi maharaj, as having “excellent” resource material to counter father satchakrananda’s phony-ness, which strikes me as a ludicrous joke. if this guy thinks rabi maharaj and dave hunt are any LESS phony than father satchakrananda, then he’s not worth paying attention to in the slightest… 🙄

what astounds me is that EVERY SINGLE link that i rounded up for the “raj-yoga math and retreat” had, essentially, the same wording, down to the “nooksuck” mis-spelling, but, apart from that, i could find NO further information about father satchakrananda. i know he was the coordinator for the “northwest free university”, and taught yoga there in the late ’70s, but i couldn’t find any information on line about the northwest free university — even though i KNOW it existed, because i looked into attending classes there, at one point… ⁇⁇

cannabis, homegrown

sigh… 🙄

Monday, 20230807 przxqgl

two of my three outdoor plants are “re-vegetating”… what this means, apparently, is that the plants were triggered to start flowering much earlier than they should have been, and when i moved them outdoors last month, they decided that, instead of continuing with the production of buds, they had to go back to vegetative growth, which causes the little bud-lets to develop into sort-of fan leaves… but they’re smooth, instead of serrated, and they only have one finger, instead of the characteristic five or seven fingers…

this is frustrating, because outdoor plants shouldn’t re-vegetate, and, if i allow them to continue, then they won’t be flowering by the middle of next month, like they should, which means that there won’t be any buds this fall. 😢

so, i bought a light-proof grow tent, to force them back into flowering…

i don’t really understand why all three of my plants aren’t re-vegetating. they were all started at the same time, and they all moved outdoors at the same time, which should mean that they all got the same “trigger”, but only two of them were affected… and, when it comes time to move them inside, it will be that much easier, because two of them are already inside, with a 12-hour light cycle.

i wouldn’t worry about the grow tent, but i cloned one of the plants, and it’s currently inside, under a 24-hour vegetative light, and if i didn’t have the grow tent then i would have to kill the clone, or the mature plants would continue to be confused — and confused plants are more likely to become hermaphroditic, and we DON’T want that.

although, if it DOES happen, getting a bunch of feminised seeds instead of buds, would not be ENTIRELY awful…

there’s still a chance that i’m going to have to kill the clone, but it’s a lot less likely now that i have a grow-tent, because, when the other plant has to move inside, i can just switch the lights, and move the clone into the tent to keep it from getting confused.

bizarre, DJ

once again… 😒

Monday, 20230731 przxqgl

DJ is a non-verbal, autistic child, approximately 10 years old, who lives two houses down from our house, at the end of the dead end street. when we first moved in, his parents were in the process of getting divorced, which happened shortly after we moved in. since then, he has been here less frequently, and without as much “fanfare”… without the dogs, WITH pants, more frequently with an adult present, NOT randomly showing up on our back deck, or in our kitchen, that sort of thing…

until about a week ago. suddenly he was around, fairly late at night (after 20:00), by himself, doing things he hasn’t been doing for more than a year: turning on the sprinklers in our front yard, playing, sans pants, in our neighbour’s back yard… this afternoon, i discovered that he has been pulling on the man-gate to the back yard on the east end our house… fortunately, the ground is sloped, so if he pulled, the ground prevents the gate from opening… but if he pushed with the same vigor that he pulled, he would have gotten into our back yard. 😒 he actually snuck into our neighbour’s house — much like his ventures into our kitchen, prior to us getting the fence and the locks 😒 — where he proceeded to let their new cat out, before being caught by our neighbour, who just happened to be home… 😒 the cat came home about 3 hours later, so that’s good, but…

it turns out that one of the reasons he hasn’t been showing up as much is because his father got an alarm that goes off when DJ leaves the property… but DJ learned how to turn it off a couple weeks ago, and his father is only JUST finding out about it… 😒🤨🙄

it’s not the kid’s fault, and i don’t want to call the cops, because interacting with the cops will only further traumatize the kid, and, very likely, the cops will, ultimately, not be able to do anything anyway, but his father is a real piece of work, and, if nothing else, could REALLY use some professional help… for both him AND the kid! 😒 his comment, as he was walking away from a confrontation with the neighbour and i, this afternoon, was that he “didn’t know what to do”, and suggested “putting him on a leash or tying him to the ground”, which i immediately characterised as “cruel and unusual punishment, which he ABSOLUTELY DOES NOT deserve”… 😒

circus, malfunctioning computers, mushrooms, music, videos

a series of okay things that have happened…

Friday, 20230728 przxqgl

my NAS got overloaded:

the problem was that moe USED TO back up her laptop to the NAS, but then she got a new laptop, and, for some reason (i blame demons), it stopped being able to backup to the NAS. it said that there was already another backup there, so it couldn’t start a new one… and she let it slide for… um… a couple of system upgrades, so AT LEAST a year. when we finally got around to seeing what was really going on, we fired up TimeMachine™ and it said “there’s already a backup here… do you want to append it, or start new?”

WHICH IT HAS NEVER DONE BEFORE!!! 🤬

so, because it’s a new computer, we said “start new”… not realising that the backup that was already there was close to 2TB, and the NAS already has all of my data on it, so the probability that the new backup was actually going to fit was slim to none… 😒 so, when the new backup failed, due to lack of space, i suggested that we move the old backup to an external hard disk, and try it again… except that, for some unknown reason (i blame demons), i was UNABLE to copy the old backup, because of an “unknown error”… meanwhile, unbeknownst to either of us, TimeMachine™ had decided that the best alternative was to try again, which filled up the disk. literally… there was something like 40GB of available space on the 4TB NAS, and NO WAY to remove ANY of it, because, despite the fact that i AM “admin” on the disk, it wouldn’t let me delete or copy files, because, apparently, TimeMachine™ had screwed around with the permissions, and would no longer let me! 🤬 what ended up happening is that moe had an external hard disk which to which we were able to backup her laptop, and then we BOUGHT a new 2TB external hard disk to which i was able (finally… i blame demons 😒) to copy the old backup… but then, when i tried to actually DELETE the old backups from the NAS, it wouldn’t let me… because of an “unknown error”! 🤬🤬 at this point, i was getting really tired of this crap, so i called the place from which i bought the NAS, which also manages my offsite backups, and sicced them on the problem… and, after a couple of false starts, they were actually able to delete the two old backups and return the NAS to a more “normal” capacity.

230728 NAS at "normal" capacity — 230728 NAS at “normal” capacity

now that everything is cleaned up, there’s even the possiblity that moe can, once again, point TimeMachine™ back at the NAS for its backup, without causing too much anxiety on my part. 😉

i got to “fly” on a flying trapeze, yesterday! 230727 salamandir on the flying trapeze (because, for some reason (i blame demons), i can’t put my own videos “in line”, like i can with youtube videos. 😒). it’s a circus skill by which i have always been intrigued. what i learned is that, if i wanted to do it more than once, i would probably have to make some sacrifices of other stuff i am doing — like “riding a unicycle” — and learn a WHOLE BUNCH of new shit… and, at this point, as fun as it is, i simply DO NOT have the space in my already-damaged brain, to store a whole bunch of new shit…

i got a capsule-making machine — as compared to the “capsule-making TOOLS” that i got on amazon, a couple of weeks ago, which are tools for making “one capsule at a time” 😒 which work exactly as advertised, but it is only one capsule at a time, which is REALLY time-consuming… — which is able to make ONE HUNDRED “double zero” capsules in about 15 minutes or less… and i used the machine to make a HUGE QUANTITY of quarter-gram doses of mushrooms. and, because of the fact that i made a HUGE QUANTITY of them, i have been spreading them around a little, to people i know who could use some microdosing antidepressants. 😈

on 230703 (almost a month ago), i ordered 2 CDs from Yello in germany. but, because of a wonky web form that was probably originally programmed to cater to audiences in germany, i ended up entering an address which, while TECHNICALLY points to my current location, probably WOULD NOT be understood by the “american” postal service. i realised this almost immediately, and went through a week of trying (and failing) to get in contact with the distributor of the recordings to correct the address. i succeeded in getting automated responses, in german, from a few different addresses, and i got a WHOLE BUNCH of bounce notifications, because, apparently, their email is handled through micro$lut, which has decided that the dedicated IP address which handles MY email — and ONLY my email! 🤬 — isn’t legitimate enough to be able to send email to their users. 😒 but i paid using paypal, which DOES have my correct address, so i decided to let paypal and the postal services figure it out. and, after being delayed TWO WEEKS being processed through incoming customs (for some reason… i blame demons?), i finally got the disks, today… and i discovered that one of the CDs is actually a 2 CD set of really early, unreleased stuff by boris blank… i just bought it because it has the same name as the music-generating app that i have for my tablet… 🤣

cannabis, homegrown

cannabis update

Saturday, 20230722 przxqgl

the three plants are doing well. i trimmed the bottoms of all of them A LOT more than i did last year. so far i haven’t seen any effects, but it’s still relatively early. also, i cut off the top of one of them (the GMO), and, since i have some rooting powder, i decided, what the hell, and so i cloned it… and (for a change), the clone is thriving! 👍 i topped the plant on 230719, and the clone actually grew since then! i figure, the closer to harvest i get, i’ll move the clone inside, under vegetative lights, and start on a new crop. 😉

i STILL can’t believe it is legal… 🤣

🍄 capsule update

Friday, 20230721 przxqgl 2 Comments

i got an actual capsule-making machine, capable of making 100 0-sized capsules at a shot. i tried it out, and the resulting capsules are between .31 and .36 grams, which is close enough to call them .25 gram doses — although, out of 25 grams of material, i had around 2 grams left, which i couldn’t insert into the capsules because they were already as full as i could make them… uh, lessee… instead of being .25 gram doses, they are .23 grams… as i said, close enough…

i haven’t taken mushrooms since tuesday (three days), and i’ve been “weaning off” buprprion since wednesday. according to my mood-tracking app, my mood has been somewhere between “irritable” and “adequate” with occasional diversions into “meh”… which is okay, considering.

.5 g 🍄 @ 1530

ocf, pictures

OCF pichurs

Friday, 20230714 przxqgl

230707 salamandir as a russian orthodox priest

230707 salamandir, chris huson, sasha malinsky, chris gross, and kiki hood

salamandir and harmonic flute, and sam and fujara

mushroom 🍄 quantity

Thursday, 20230713 przxqgl

i went two days without microdosing, and at the end of the second day (yesterday), i noticed a distinct and sudden change in my mood, from more-or-less content, easy-going, and accepting, to sour, disagreeable, snappy and depressed. 😒

so, this morning (still sour and depressed), i made up five .25g capsules, one of which i took immediately (at 0800), and the rest i plan on taking every OTHER day, to see if that evens out my mood a little more.

at the recommendation of my counselor, i also installed a mood-tracking app on my phone. i’m still getting the hang of it, but — maybe — it will help figure out exactly how much i can take without overdoing it.

ETA: heh… listen to me talking about “overdoing” mushrooms… as though there is ANY SUCH THING as too many mushrooms… 🤣

mushrooms, ocf, pictures, players, videos

immediatly post-OCF

Monday, 20230710 przxqgl

microdosing the fair was successful beyond my wildest imaginations!! i took a .25 gram capsule, every morning at 0700 or so, so if i were to have some kind of major psychedelic effects manifest, i would probably be over them by 1100, which was when our “call” was, every day.

i was actually able to relax(!), and have a good time(!!), despite the fact that i avoided the ritz, because of COVID concerns (mine, not theirs)… however, i will say that being, literally, right across the path from a place that makes mac and cheese with smoked salmon in ENORMOUS bowls didn’t hurt anything. 😉

AND i experienced at least two occasions where, absent the .25 gram dose, i would have been SIGNIFICANTLY more cranky and disagreeable afterwards. the first was yesterday, when the guitar player (chris gross) and i conspired to take a cart full of gear to our respective cars, because having two people drag a cart is infinitely easier than having to either drag it yourself, or having to wait, sometimes as much as an hour, for the cart to return… so we loaded up a bunch of gear that we were no longer using, and schlepped it out to the “SCOFlot”, where the “handicapped” people (and marginally-handicapped people, such as myself, who have a valid placard 😈) are allowed to park… only to discover that i had left my key-fob back in camp, three quarters of a mile away… so, i trudged back to camp and retrieved my key-fob, and we unloaded my gear into my car, but in our original schlepp-age, one of the cart’s tires had bit the dust, and we got about halfway to chris’s car when the inner-tube got wrapped around the axle, and ceased moving forward… so we spent 15 minutes untangling the inner-tube and schlepped another quarter mile out to chris’s car. chris unloaded his stuff, only to discover that he had left his guitar back in camp! 🤣 so we went back to camp AGAIN… the second was this morning. naturally, after a glorious, sun-shiney weekend, it rained monday morning, which meant that i had to put the tent away wet. i got everything packed up and moved out to the staging area (on the stage), and slogged out to retrieve my car, but when i got there, i couldn’t get the key-fob to work… like, AT ALL!… and it’s a new enough car that i haven’t poked around and actually FOUND the manual key slot… my comment (to no one in particular) was that it sucks AND blows: all things a good vacuum cleaner should do. 🤣 i phoned moe (thank cthulhu i had cell service) and she gave me some suggestions, and said she would look up a youtube video for me… and then i got the key-fob to work, ONCE, which was all it took… i was able to start the car by holding the key-fob up to the start button, and i was on my way… but when i got to camp, “somebody” (not a part of our group) had parked an ENORMOUS camper, with an ENORMOUS trailer, directly across the opening to our stage/staging area, blocking three cars IN and making it impossible for me to park remotely close to the stage. i started carrying a load of stuff around the camper-trailer-conflagration and i ran into (literally) someone who was helping a kid into the truck, and i asked them how long they were planning on staying there, to which they responded five minutes… fifteen minutes later, they were STILL there, so i got someone from our group to help me move the big, heavy, bulky power cart to a place where it blocked the camper, and went back to loading. 😈

the guy eventually left (after struggling to move the power cart by himself 😈), and i was able to pull in next to the stage, but when i shut my car off, the key-fob stopped working AGAIN, only, this time, because i was already in the car, i was able to get it started again, but it was only after i was in the car, ready to go, and the car said “key-fob not present” that i realised that it was the battery in the key-fob, and not something more serious… and, when i got home, i took the fob apart and replaced the battery. 😎

the panto is a re-run of one we did a few years ago, “Red Riding Hood and The Three Little Pigs”, and it was together, with no missed cues from either the band OR the actors in record time: by the second day, we pretty much had it down, and the actors were starting to modify the script in ways that will be reflected in the productions this winter.

also,

and,

230708 i invited her to morningwood odditorium, where we had been pasting googly eyes on everything, but she never showed up

230709 i asked him if he was the Muffin Man, and he said no, he's a cupcake — 230709 i asked him if he was the Muffin Man, and he said no, he’s a cupcake, so i had to mention the line from the frank zappa song about the muffin man: “some people like cupcakes better. i, for one, care less for them.” 🤣 he said he had heard that a few times.

finally,

boats, ocf, pictures

immenently pre-OCF

Tuesday, 20230704 przxqgl

interesting, informative and educational blurb about the difference between “imminent” and “eminent” goes here.

july 4th (🤢) today. we’re planning on taking a drive in the back country, rather as we did last year at this time, when we came down with COVID. this year, we’ve already got the COVID out of the way, so i have every intention to leave for OCF around 08:00 tomorrow. as i did last year, with some creative ingenuity, i fit everything EXCEPT my foghorn* into the car, so the only things i have to do tomorrow is take a shower, put the stuff from the fridge into the cooler, put freezer-blocks into the cooler, and put the cooler, and the 5 gallon water bottle, into the car, and gather a few, small items — my soap and foot ointment, my tablet, my reading glasses, my phone, my weed, pipes, and vape supplies — into their assigned boxes, and then i can leave. moe doesn’t have to be in to the clinic tommorrow until 10:00, so there’s a chance that i’ll be gone before she gets out of bed… at least i hope so, because she works WAY too hard, and doesn’t take time off as frequently as she should.

in the past week, we have gone from having NO boats, to having TWO boats (kayaks), three paddles, PFDs for one human and one dog, and the roof support rack (with “all the trimmings”) to carry one kayak… the other (smaller) kayak needs some foam pads to carry on the roof, because it is short enough that it doesn’t fit… but that’s okay, because it means that i can carry it on the top of MY car, as well as moe’s… this morning, moe took the larger boat out on rattlesnake lake, with the “puppy”, quill (who is now the largest of our three dogs 😒), and he only fell in once (🤣) before he decided that he was going to sit in the center of the boat and be a good doggie…

230703 moe and quill in a kayak in the pond across the street

230704 quill being a good doggie on rattlesnake lake

how we made the journey so quickly has to do with moe’s boss giving us the smaller kayak and paddle, and moe developing an insistent obsession. 😉 i know that goat island has a web site, now, but it seems like everywhere has a web site, so it’s not as surprising as it once was. it makes me wonder what’s happening in what used to be fishtown, these days.

after OCF…

* i have wanted to take the foghorn to OCF for a few years, but i have never been able to fit it into my car, with all the other stuff i have to take to OCF… but, it’s probably a good thing, because i think that it would annoy a lot more people than it would amuse… oh well…

tea

Saturday, 20230701 przxqgl

i forgot how much i like mushroom tea…

i took “some” mushrooms, today… “some” meaning “measured by eye, approximately, somewhere between a half gram and a gram, maybe a little more”. i took them around four… or, rather, 16:00… and it’s currently almost 21:00 and i still definitely feel it, but, because of the fact that i made tea this time, it has struck me completely differently. i spent at least three hours in the back yard, in the hammock, alternately sleeping, meditating, and laughing at the squirrel, who had been used to climbing up the blueberry bush and launching himself over to the suet feeder, where he had been gorging himself… so i moved the suet feeder about 6 inches further away from the blueberry bush, and, now, the squirrel launches off the bush and hits the squirrel baffle, making a lovely “clang”… 🤣 EVERY! SINGLE! FUCKING! TIME! 🤣🤣🤣

then i sat on the front porch while the sprinkler was going in the front yard… then i came in and listened to an album of mash ups with moe, while she edited her book… and i think i’m going to bed soonishly…

ah, my “don’t give a fuck pill” comes in convenient tea form, as well. 😉

miscellaneous, mushrooms, ocf, players, stress

less than a week until OCF… why am i paralyzed with anxiety? 😒

Thursday, 20230629 przxqgl

officially, less than a week until OCF, and i’ve been accomplishing a lot, but i feel like i’m headed for doom… my list of things to take to OCF is about 80% complete and prepared, and i’m already getting things staged to load up the car on monday, because the probability is very high that we (moe, me, and three dogs) are going to leave EARLY tuesday morning, and go some place remote, where there are few people and fireworks… because we have a dog who is afraid of fireworks

she, literally, hides, when people shoot guns, in the distance, which is a fairly common occurrence around these parts, and we’ve learned that, if we go somewhere remote, we can have a good time and the dogs don’t get so stressed out.

i’ve got most of the camping gear assembled, and about 90% of the music stuff assembled (including the harmonic flute/electronics, and the foghorn). pretty much the only thing i haven’t packed yet are my “working clothes” (costumes) and my “mundane clothes” (for hiding in large crowds), a few essential items, and the hats, which i haven’t even decided what i’m going to bring yet…

i ordered a “capsule filling machine” the other day (it’s supposed to be delivered tomorrow), which SHOULD make it easier to fill capsules… which is a good thing, because 1) i have a (new) connection to more psychedelic mushrooms, and 2) i already have one person who wants to buy some, and another person who is interested, but hasn’t committed yet, and filling the capsules by hand is time-consuming, messy, and wasteful. i still marvel at the fact that what was one of my favourite illegal drugs, when i was in my 20s, is, in my 60s, on the verge of legitimacy, and widely praised for it’s qualities.

monday was the “panic rehearsal” for the pre-OCF panto — usually the “panic rehearsal” gets finished at 23:00 or thereabouts, because it’s SUPPOSED TO BE the last complete runthrough before the fair… it’s usually, also, the FIRST complete runthrough before the fair, which it WAS NOT this time… and it actually got out at 21:00 instead, which is when it is supposed to be finished. tuesday, i had an alto sax to work on, which went far easier and faster than i anticipated. the alto belongs to one of the members of the fremont phil, who is going to OCF, so it was important that i got it done post haste, and i delivered it to him on tuesday evening, at the sousa band rehearsal… because he’s thinking about joining the sousa band, because he’s got a serrusophone, and various other things that would fit right in to sousa’s music. 😉 wednesday i went busking with thaddeus. we didn’t make that much ($17 a piece), but it was enough to cover parking with some left over, and it’s kind of difficult to compare with the last time we busked, which was at the fremont solstice festival, where we busked for 3 hours and made almost $100 a piece. but, while we were busking, thaddeus got email from the PDA, asking us if we want to play for another “sunset supper” in august. thursday (today) i went to my circus class, rode my unicycle for the longest time i have EVER ridden it, TWICE, and rode in a complete, 360° circle, TWICE, but i totally forgot that i was going to take some medication from home (for moe’s mom’s dog, her name is lacey, but we call her “the unicorn”), stop by the clinic to pick up more medication for moe’s mom’s dog, and deliver both of them to moe’s mom before my class. 😖 so, AFTER my class, i went to the clinic to pick up the most necessary medication, and delivered that to moe’s mom… she can wait a few days for the other one.

tomorrow, i’ve got to get the last few, essential items for the fair, and i might take mushrooms, if everything works out… because i really need to “not give a fuck” for a while.

wedding anniversary

moe and i have been married for 25 years…

Wednesday, 20230621 przxqgl 2 Comments

which is 15 years longer than the longest amount of time moe’s mom predicted when we got married. 😉

I WONDER IF THIS IS WHAT EVERYONE HAS BEEN LOOKING FOR…

impending OCF 🍄 post

Tuesday, 20230620 przxqgl

i am on the verge of deciding that i am going to “microdose” mushrooms at OCF: .25 grams EVERY DAY for the period of time i am there, to get more control of my mood… i have been feeling TREMENDOUSLY depressed, and anxious about going, despite the fact that i also know that OCF has been one of my all-time favourite things, in the past, and i’m afraid the depression and anxiety are going to control my actions… so, if i take .25 grams of mushrooms every day, it will give me the “twinkle” that i desire, and reduce my depression and anxiety, without making it so that i can’t function as a part of a group which has been assigned to do two performances a day for three days.

i may take a few extra 1 gram capsules to spread around, or to eat myself, if i’m feeling adventuresome… 😈

busking, COVID19, didjeriflute, ganesha the car, miscellaneous, mushrooms, ocf, SACBO, tuba

impending SACBO update

Thursday, 20230615 przxqgl

SACBO officially starts tomorrow, but it generally involves a caravan to various weird places around seattle, and, because of the fact that the caravan is done by a different person, and the people participating don’t always have radios, or ways to contact the “leader” in case they get lost, there is a lot of chaos, usually involving lost people being followed by other art cars because “they should know where we’re going”, or “they should know where they’re going”, or something like that, which isn’t actually the case about half the time… and, not having a radio myself, i opted out of the art car caravans a LONG time ago. i’m going for the actual festival, though, which is saturday and sunday. i’m taking my canopy, busking gear, and my harmonic flute and affiliated electronics, and MAYBE some incense, if there is enough room and i’m not too lazy. thaddeus is supposed to show up saturday for busking activities, but i’ll probably be on my own sunday.

i got a new tuba hard case. it is smaller than the previous case, which is both an advantage and a problem: the advantage is that it is smaller, and somewhat easier to lug around, but it doesn’t have a handle on the end, as the old case did, which makes lifting it a bit more difficult. and, the fact that it is smaller also means that there isn’t the separate case, inside, to keep mouthpieces, my tuba strap, and polishing cloths, which is a problem. it also doesn’t have wheels, and is a more rounded shape at the bell end, which means that it only fits on my folding hand cart one way, and it is the wrong way… but it cost $950, which means that i’ve got to get creative to solve these problems, because i’m not just going to send it back and look for a tuba case somewhere else. a lot of the cases don’t fit the instrument (particularly those sold by amazon(⁇⁇), sweeTWATer, and others), or cost WAY too much to order, wait for delivery, discover that it’s for a “right-hand bell” tuba, and send it back… it turns out that the ONLY place to buy a case for a conn 2J is allied supply — the same company that i have been ordering musical instrument parts and materials from for… <mumble, mumble> 30-some years — and i actually have an account with allied… so i ordered it from allied, and instead of paying $1800 for it from a local retailer, i paid $550… and another $400 for shipping… 😧

it came in a BIG box!! with a lot of plastic packing materials that couldn’t be recycled, so i put it out with the trash last night, and some time during the night, bears came and raided our trash can, spreading plastic packing materials all over… 😒

i actually, successfully, “microdosed” mushrooms last weekend. it all started on saturday, 230527, when the BSSB played at folklife. apparently, at some time during my stay at the TREMENDOUSLY CROWDED seattle center grounds (which included several people who wanted to take pictures with me, because i was wearing my fancy band outfit), i was exposed to COVID AGAIN, and i tested positive on 230528. 😒 unfortunately, we had scheduled a birthday party for moe’s mom on the 28th, which got cancelled… and then moe got COVID, as well… 🤬 ultimately, we put off the birthday party until 230611, two weeks later (when both moe and i were testing clear), but i woke up on the 11th in an absolutely FOUL mood, and moe was also feeling under the weather and disagreeable… so i took 0.05 grams, just as moe’s mom was getting here… not enough to really get me off, but definitely enough to change my mood… and, sure enough, it changed my mood. it was moe’s mom, so i wasn’t exactly exuberant or anything, but i wasn’t snapping at everybody and hiding in my office. my case of COVID was mild: i probably wouldn’t have even noticed i had it, if i hadn’t tested. and the good part is that now i’ve got “natural immunity” for the next 2 or 3 months, which means that i WON’T get COVID and not be able to go to the oregon country fair, AND, even if i get exposed at the fair, the probably is fairly high that i won’t get it at the fair, either… i hope… 😉

enlightenment, spiritual

reference…

Thursday, 20230608 przxqgl

SPIRITUAL RANT

i have to keep reminding myself that, in spite of depression and politics, there is still a higher purpose for life.

dead people

lars kirmser

Tuesday, 20230606 przxqgl

Lars (Larry) Kirmser was the instructor for my classes at the tech school, between 1984 and 1986. at the time, he was pushing 50 with at least 20 years experience in the musical instrument repair industry. among his vast experience was several years working for one of the top flute manufacturers (emerson deford, maker of the emerson flute, and the deford flute), and he even designed a common flute that is still in use today.

it’s a little difficult, for me, because when i was in his class, everyone called him “Larry”. he didn’t change his name to Lars until after i left the class. one of my favourite examples of this was when a guy named greg (who was a “goof-off, screw-up”, if there ever was one) had just started in the class, and was working, alone, in the “woodwind and guitar” section of the classroom — which was where we kept a lot of equipment that could, literally, tear your hands off if you weren’t careful. i had been working there, with him, until moments before, when i went back to my desk for something. greg was working on the stationary belt sander with a very thin piece of wood… and, as i was turning around, i heard this loud BANG from the wood shop, and greg came out holding his hand, which was bleeding profusely, and shouted “LARRY, I GOT A BOO BOO!!”… greg was carted off to the emergency room and showed up to class the next day with his hand in a bandage… he was carted off to the emergency room more than once, the most serious of which was when we had to move the 50-gallon drum of potassium cyanide, which we used to strip silver plating, from its old, rusty, metal drum to a nice, new, clean, blue plastic drum… and greg tried to start the siphon by mouth… 😒

i was a 30-something with high hopes and a burning desire to learn a trade of which i could make use (as compared with the study i was already doing at the monastery, which was guaranteed to benefit nobody, except — possibly — me…) and i did, for several years. i did musical instrument repair for 5 years, in two different periods, for “The Music Shoppe” in bellingham, and i worked for about a year for “Mellowoods And Music” in friday harbor, which included being “on call” for the friday harbor traditional jazz festival, in 1991. during the time i was in lars’ class, we, as a team, restored an ophecleide that had had an unfortunate encounter with a truck: it had fallen out of the back of the truck, and then the truck had backed over it, flattening it completely… and we also worked on a very strange instrument that larry brought in one day, which he had bought from a pawn shop in downtown seattle. it had been painted neon green, and had a flared bell (which we later determined was from an unfortunate trombone), and had been sitting in the pawn shop display window for 50 years. after stripping off all the paint, and disengaging the unfortunate trombone bell, we discovered that it was, in fact, a heckel-biebrich, stritter system contrabassoon, one of the first 20 or so ever built.

at the time, i was REALLY in to drawing things (as can be seen by the cartoon on the left), and, between 841004 and the end of 1985 or so, i produced technical drawings for at least 7 different instruments i worked on, including a 3-push-rod AND a 4-push-rod bassoon, an oboe, at least 3 different flutes (bundy, gemeinhardt, and emerson), and a holton, rudy wiedoft model alto sax… now that i know lars isn’t going to publish a book with my drawings as illustrations, i MAY break the seal on the original drawings, which have been sealed (as a hedge against piracy) since they were drawn.

i lost contact with him after i graduated and went back to bellingham, and, when i moved back to seattle, finally, he was no longer at the tech school, none of his students were around any longer, and nobody wanted to talk about “it”… i never determined what “it” was, with any detail, although “it” might have had something to do with the FUMTU surrounding another student, dan oberloh, who was supposed to graduate around the time that i did, and was already gearing up to open his own shop, soon after graduating, only at the tech school’s (and larry’s) expense. my recollection was that larry found a whole bunch of “stolen” tools and materials in oberloh’s tool box, although it was undoubtedly a lot more than just that. at this point, he may be a good technician, but as far as i’m concerned, he is unprincipled and unscrupulous, and i would NEVER take my horn to oberloh. i got back in contact with lars a few years ago, when i had my trombone slide rebuilt, of course, i took it to the Music Trader, which is the shop he opened up after the tech school. since then, he has also gotten to know my Conn 2J C tuba, which i inherited from Hokum W. Jeebs.

lars died 230126 in his sleep. i just found out about it yesterday. 😢

damn it! all of my friends are dying! 🤬

aparajita, HPOI

WOOO!! ✊✊

Tuesday, 20230606 przxqgl

the a,-pa,-rā’-ji,-tā, has arrived! 🥳🎉

there are now 576 MORE boxes of aparajita special herbal durbar agarbatti available at Hybrid Elephant!

go nuts, incense fanatics! 😉

aparajita, HPOI

naturally… 😒

Sunday, 20230604 przxqgl

they SAID they were going to deliver HPO Aparajita on friday, but, friday came and went with the shipment leaving east midlands airport (UK) at 21:45…

saturday, i was awoken at 07:41 in the morning with a text message saying that additional shipping fees were due, and they would ship the items back to india in 5 days if it wasn’t paid. 😒

they never said anything about “additional shipping fees” when they sent me the shipping information, last week… 🙄

but they were only $42, so i paid them, which updated their web site to say that “payment is received and recorded for shipment related fees”, at 07:47, but nothing since then…

apparently DHL shuts down, completely, on the weekends… nobody is available at customer service, their “chat bot” is limited in what it can do, packages don’t get delivered, packages don’t get transferred… if it’s in the air at 23:59 on saturday, there’s a crew to land the airplane, but it’s my impression that there isn’t a crew to unload the airplane until monday morning. 🙄

since then, i have gotten three different answers from their “chat bot”, which include “your shipment label has been created, but the shipment has not been turned over to DHL yet”, and “your shipment is on hold in cincinnati, awaiting payment of shipment related fees”… which are contradictory, and, most likely, completely untrue… 😒

and i can’t talk to an actual human about this until monday, which won’t do me any good because, at that point, i’ll be able to get updates from the web site. 😒

according to the web site, it cleared customs at 03:13 in cincinnati, and it was placed on hold in seattle, which, hopefully means that i will get my aparajita early on monday… 😒

and the guy said he was going to send it this way, this time, so that there wouldn’t be such a hassle, like there was the last time i ordered incense from him… 😒

campbell global tree farm, hiking, pictures

campbell global

Thursday, 20230601 przxqgl

we went to the Campbell Global Snoqualmie Tree Farm today, pretty much square in the middle of the humungously vast, unpopulated area surrounded by skykomish, grotto, baring, halford, index, big bend, gold bar, startup, sultan, woods creek, monroe, high rock, duvall, novelty, lake marcell, stillwater, carnation, pleasant hill, fall city, snoqualmie, north bend, riverbend, tanner, ragnar, and garcia. we walked 4.5 miles, 2.25 up and 2.25 down from approximately here (which is where we parked the car), we left home at 0830 and arrived back around 1500. we saw things like this:

230601 campbell global snoqualmie tree farm

as i frequently do when i am hiking in the deep forest, i picked up and packed out litter. one piece of litter i picked up was a rainier beer can that was before they introduced the integrated opening tab (i.e. it had a separate opening tab that would cut your feet if it was encountered barefoot), but after they started marketing “all aluminum recyclable cans!” which, i would guess, places it somewhere between 1970 and 1974… far away from pretty much anything that one might consider “civilized” by any stretch of the imagination, and i find litter from when i was a teenager. 😒

230601 40-year-old "PLEASE DO NOT LITTER" litter — 230601 40-year-old “PLEASE DO NOT LITTER” litter

230601 40-year-old "All Aluminum Recyclable Can" litter — 230601 40-year-old “All Aluminum Recyclable Can” litter

aparajita, HPOI

whee!

Tuesday, 20230530 przxqgl

i just got a text message from DHL, saying that two cartons of aparajita are set to arrive at my house on friday! 😉👍👍

forward into the past, getting old, music, pictures

pig-tures

Monday, 20230529 przxqgl

apparently ezra has been talking to my father recently.

ezra texted me to say that my father had given him two photo albums that contain mostly pictures of me…

the fact that my father gave them to ezra, and not to me, is one of the reasons i haven’t talked to my father in a very long time, now. 😒

i believe this picture was taken between 1972 and 1974, and i believe it was taken in new york, before we moved back to seattle… i may be wrong, but the seamless backdrop was something that my father didn’t have room to set up more than a few times, and i don’t remember seeing it after we moved, but that could just be my swiss-cheese brain at work. the closer it was taken to 1972, the more “brand new” the trombone was…

of course, the original photo may have a date on the back, but because of the fact that i have COVID, currently, i can’t rush over to ezra’s place to look. 😒

this was taken on 221024 by someone at the fisher pavilion who wanted a picture of me, and i liked it so much that i asked for a copy of it. this is my current Ballard Sedentary Sousa Band uniform, and i was at the fisher pavilion to play for Festa Italiana, like we do every year… the coat is a new acquisition that i bought at a “purge-o-rama” sale at a costume shop in redmond. i have been looking at that, exact coat, in the display window of the costume shop, ever since i worked in redmond (in 1995 or thereabouts), and i finally went in because i had heard that the shop was closing (it’s not, they’re just moving to a new location… one without display windows), only to discover that they wanted $300 for it, but because of the fact that they were having a “purge-o-rama” sale to prepare for the move, they had reduced the price to $100… so i bought it immediately.

prior to that, i wore a uniform that i got from working for the Floating World Circus, after i graduated from high school. it was also red, but a lot it was also a lot more “normal” for a band uniform…

this picture, i believe, was taken in 1991, in anacortes, where the band that i was playing in at the time was playing for a parade.

the astute observer will immediately realise that the trombone depicted in all of these photos, is exactly the same. 😉

cannabis, homegrown

cannabis

Monday, 20230529 przxqgl

i got 3 starts, yesterday: 1 GMO, 1 White Urkel, and 1 Runtz.

repotted them today. i got 5 new grow bags, but i only needed one, because i have 2 left over from last year. i bought 25 gallon bags, but they’re WAY too big, so i folded one in half (horizontally) and it’s still bigger than i need, but it’s what i’ve got. it will be interesting to see how the wider root structure affects the quality.

COVID19, pictures

oy! 🤬

Sunday, 20230528 przxqgl 2 Comments

230528 positive COVID test... 🤬 — 230528 positive COVID test… 🤬

this is the fourth (or possibly the fifth) time i’ve had it. i’m fully vaxed, fully boosted, i wear a mask everywhere (inside), and i STILL got COVID! 🤬

stop the world… i want to get off! 😠

pictures, tablet art

new art!

Saturday, 20230520 przxqgl

actual art… actually created… by me! 👍 incredible!

okay, they’re modeled after photographs, which i used as reference, but the artwork is not the photographs.

it’s amazing! 😎

what makes it even more amazing is that i created it on my tablet, with a stylus, the same as i would on paper, except that i can actually FIX wobbly lines, accidental brush strokes, and that sort of thing, WITHOUT having to start over from scratch…

and i can make animated gifs, as an added bonus… 😉

this may just be enough to start my sketchbook again… wouldn’t that be something?

moisture festival, rants

ann moist ual fest ure ra ival nt

Thursday, 20230518 przxqgl

mump…

2023, 7 shares, $385.00 – $55 per share
2022, 15 shares, $750 – $50 per share
2021, 4 “virtual” shows, i played for 2 of them, no payment.
2020, 17 shares – cancelled at the last minute, because of the imminant pandemic.
2019, 13 shares, $520 – $40 per share
2018, 11 shares, $330 – $30 per share
2017, ?? shares, $480…
2016, 15 shares, $600 – $45 per share
2015…
2014…
2013, 14 shares, $490 – $35 per share
2012, 16 shares, $720 – $45 per share
2011, 14 shares…

as always, they included a note that says “Please don’t approach this as a paid gig or a money-making booking, because there is no financial guarantee…” blah, blah, blah, only this time they emphasised how much they appreciate our contributions, “each year we are amazed by the dedication and strength of the entire team…” and, once again, blah, blah, blah…

this is the second smallest check i have received since i started keeping track, and the smallest number of shares, from 4 to 10. i’m not the one making the decisions, but from where i sit (on the stage, in the band pit), i don’t see how it might be possible for us to get more than 7 shares, unless we increase the number of shows, or go for more than one week. given that this was the first time away from the palladium, and still being severely affected by the pandemic, both of those things are possible, i suppose.

artificial stupidity, geek stuff, malfunctioning computers

urgh… creepy… 😒

Wednesday, 20230517 przxqgl

okay, officially, ChatGPT works better than google.

when i upgraded to jammy, the application that i use to transcribe CDs — K3B — also got upgraded. because of the fact that i installed fresh, rather than upgrading, K3B was installed without the encoder needed to transcribe CDs into .flac files (why is still beyond me). i KNEW i needed to enable the FLAC encoder, but i couldn’t figure out how…

so i went to google, typed in “how to enable flac encoder in k3b”, and got a HUGE PILE of links, most of which were for how to transcribe FLAC files into audio CD format — exactly the OPPOSITE of what i want to do. then i typed in “enable flac encoder k3b” and got another HUGE PILE of links, most of which were EXACTLY THE SAME as the last time… although, this time, the top link was to the K3B manual, so i tried that, and got a couple of links which were mostly incomprehensible, primarily because they were talking about things that AREN’T K3B, or flac files. i tried several other combinations of queries at google, over the course of an hour or so, with similar results, getting more and more frustrated every time…

then i tried ChatGPT…

i typed in “how to enable the flac encoder in K3B”…

and it gave me PRECISE, STEP BY STEP INSTRUCTIONS for how to enable the flac encoder in K3B…

ChatGPT instructions for enabling the FLAC encoder in K3B

and it WORKED!! 😒🤨🤔

officially, ChatGPT works better than google.

enlightenment, videos

bounded chaotic mixing

Saturday, 20230513 przxqgl

bounded chaotic mixing produces strange stability.

230502 bounded chaotic mixing produces strange stability

frustration, hybrid elephant, incense of the month club, miscellaneous, pictures

<sigh>… okay, i’ll update… 😒

Saturday, 20230513 przxqgl

we went to the campbell global snoqualmie tree farm, this morning, ostensibly to exercise dogs, but an ulterior motive was to scope out the “firewood” area, which is adjacent to the active logging, but they have logs pulled to the road and stacked, so that (if you’ve got a permit) you can go up there with a chainsaw and lop off firewood-length pieces, put them in your truck, and drive home without having to pay for it… thing is, the permit costs $300, which is about the same as a cord of firewood, but (if you’ve got a permit), you’re allowed to take up to 5 cords of firewood… plus, there’s literally 90,000 acres of trails that NOBODY else hikes on, because you’ve got to have a permit and a key… and, guess what? moe bought a permit when they went on sale, which is a little surprising because the permits sold out within a half-hour of going on sale… oh, and we have a pickup truck now… did i mention that before? we’ve had a ford f150 pickup truck for a little more than a year. it doesn’t get used for much — picking up loads of gravel, wood chips, or, soon, firewood (still got to wrassle up a chainsaw) — but it gets loaned to a whole bunch of different friends who need a truck for this or that…

230513 campbell-global snoqualmie tree farm

i wrote to the newest member of the IOTM club last week, both from my hybridelephant.com account, and from my new hybrid elephant gmail account (because i’ve been having trouble with email, which is another story), and i have gotten no response, which makes me REALLY suspicious about this subscription… but, at this point, there’s absolutely nothing i can do about it, except to cancel the subscription and refund their money… which, at this point, is a little extreme, since, basically, the ONLY thing they’ve done is make me suspicious… but they’ve made me suspicious, which is very suspicious, and i really feel like there should be more than i can do to alleviate my suspicion.

the email thing is starting to grate on my nerves… fundamentally, there is NOTHING “wrong” with my email, but because of the fact that it doesn’t (by design) go through one of the “big guys” (i.e. micro$lut, yahoo, google, apple, etc.) i am finding that more and more services are either silently blocking my email, or producing more and more convoluted hoops that i have to jump through to get my email to… the people i do business with, my customers, suppliers, etc… 😒 at this point, i’ve gone back and forth with micro$lop so many times that my host provider is no longer willing to fight with them on my behalf, and has recommended that i route my mail through google or micro$hit to solve the problem… but i don’t see why i should have to pay — especially, i don’t see why i should have to pay micro$not — to solve a problem that micro$hite is causing to begin with. at this point, when i suspect that there may be a problem (like when a customer has an address @hotmail.com or @live.com, or something like that), i send them a response from my hybridelephant.com account, and if i think it may have been “interfered with” in some way, then i send them another response from my gmail account, which usually does the trick. but it’s grating on my nerves because it SHOULDN’T be this way, and i SHOULDN’T have to worry about whether or not my emails have gone through… it’s not like i’m running an open relay, or something like that, i’m just not willing to send my email through one of “the big guys” because, to be quite frank, i don’t trust “the big guys”… and it’s behaviour like i have seen from micro$leaze that causes me not to trust them. 😠

hybrid elephant, incense of the month club

HMMMMM… 🤨

Thursday, 20230504 przxqgl

so i got another subscriber to the IOTM club, and at first everything looked okay… but the closer i looked, the more weird it became… everything came out the way it’s supposed to, so, technically, i am in the clear if somebody’s credit card was stolen and re-used, but i still wonder:

specifically, i wonder how a person with one name, in one location, can order something with a card that is for someone else’s name, in a completely different location, on the other end of the country. 🧐

this is very definitely not “normal”, if there ever were such a thing.

miscellaneous

i’m not sure what to think of this…

Friday, 20230428 przxqgl

i was reading back through my old blog entries, and i came across this one, about my perceived connection between the movie “La donna più bella del mondo” and the opera “L’Arlesienne”… i specifically remember thinking “internet would be a much better place if you could ask questions in human language and not be inundated with meaningless information that is only intended to sidetrack you from what you really want to know.” it’s now a couple years later, and ChatGPT is a thing that didn’t exist a couple of years ago, so i wondered if, maybe, it could cut through the horseshit and get me somewhere closer to the answer…

Rev. DeLuxe: is the movie “La donna più bella del mondo” a remake of the opera “L’Arlesienne”?

ChatGPT: No, the movie “La donna più bella del mondo” is not a remake of the opera “L’Arlesienne”. “La donna più bella del mondo” is a 1955 Italian musical film directed by Robert Z. Leonard and starring Gina Lollobrigida, Vittorio Gassman, and Robert Alda. The film tells the story of a woman who becomes a famous movie star and the men who fall in love with her.

On the other hand, “L’Arlesienne” is a one-act play by French writer Alphonse Daudet. It was adapted into an opera of the same name by Georges Bizet, which premiered in 1872. The story revolves around a young man who falls in love with a woman from Arles, but she is already married and eventually drives him to madness.

Therefore, these two works are not related in terms of story or content.

Rev. DeLuxe: is it possible that the movie “La donna più bella del mondo” and the opera “L’Arlesienne” are related in some way?

ChatGPT: There is no known direct connection between the movie “La donna più bella del mondo” and the opera “L’Arlesienne”. However, it is possible that there could be some indirect influences or inspirations between the two works.

For example, it is not uncommon for filmmakers to draw inspiration from other works of art such as literature, music, or theater. It is possible that the filmmakers of “La donna più bella del mondo” were influenced by the themes or characters of “L’Arlesienne” and incorporated them into their own story. Similarly, the opera may have influenced other aspects of Italian culture, such as fashion or language, that were then reflected in the movie.

However, without any concrete evidence or statements from the creators, it is difficult to determine if there is any direct or intentional connection between the two works.

Rev. DeLuxe: why might i be under the impression that the movie “La donna più bella del mondo” and the opera “L’Arlesienne” are related in some way?

ChatGPT: There could be several reasons why you might be under the impression that the movie “La donna più bella del mondo” and the opera “L’Arlesienne” are related in some way.

One possible reason is that both works are part of Italian and French cultural heritage, respectively, and share certain characteristics or themes that are common to their respective artistic traditions. For example, both works could explore themes of love, beauty, and the human condition, which could give them a similar emotional tone or feeling.

Another reason could be that you may have come across information or reviews that compare the two works, even if they are not directly related. This could create an impression in your mind that the two works are somehow linked, even if there is no direct evidence to support this claim.

Finally, it is also possible that your impression could be a result of a simple misunderstanding or confusion between the two works, especially if you have not seen or heard either work firsthand.

ouch! 🤣

ॐ अरुणाछलिष्वरय नमः — AUM ARUNACHALESWARAYA NAMAH

🍄 hmmm…

Saturday, 20230422 przxqgl

i tried to measure out .01 gram of mushrooms. it wouldn’t go. i tried measuring .05 gram, and that worked… in the process of reducing the measure, i observed the scale registering .04 gram, momentarily, but i get the very strong impression that my electronic scale (which i bought through amazon) won’t do the trick. i’ve got an old triple-beam scientific scale, out in the garage, that, it’s my recollection, will measure down to .001 gram, but the last time i used it (which was shortly after we first moved in to our OLD house, i.e. close to 20 years ago), i recall having to put a small coil of wire that weighed a tenth of a gram, on the platten to get it to balance correctly… but it’s an analogue scale, so there’s pretty much nothing that can go wrong, apart from corrosion and dust…

on the other hand, i could start titrating up, starting at 1 gram, just to keep things “scientific”… 😉 and to satisfy my desire for a REAL trip… 😉😉 i’ve actually got enough that i could take 5 or 10 grams without too much difficulty… unfortunately, my experience leads me to believe that such an event would be a multi-day process, and, at this point, there’s not an awful lot that would prevent me from doing things for which i might get in trouble during a multi-day trip, which is NOT my goal. 😉😉😉😉

hindu, pictures

i guess that settles that…

Tuesday, 20230418 przxqgl

i guess i’m a hindu, now…

i guess there was some doubt, considering that i don’t believe in “god”, in the sense of the word recognised by most people… even other hindus… not to mention the fact that i was born in peoria, which is nowhere near the indus river, and “technically” to be a “hindu” means being born on the indian subcontinent, south of the indus river…

Hindus subscribe to a diversity of ideas on spirituality and traditions, but have no ecclesiastical order, no unquestionable religious authorities, no governing body, nor a single founding prophet; Hindus can choose to be polytheistic, pantheistic, monotheistic, monistic, agnostic, atheistic or humanist. Because of the wide range of traditions and ideas covered by the term Hinduism, arriving at a comprehensive definition is difficult. The religion “defies our desire to define and categorize it”. A Hindu may, by his or her choice, draw upon ideas of other Indian or non-Indian religious thought as a resource, follow or evolve his or her personal beliefs, and still identify as a Hindu.

but i got something in the mail, today, that proves, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that there is SOMETHING in me that recognises hinduism as the right spiritual path for me, and i didn’t realise it until i looked it up, when i got the object, this afternoon.

the object i got was a stone. specifically, it is a red “sonbhadara shila”, which, like the shivalingam is the stone that represents shiva, and the shaligram shila is the stone that represents visnu, the sonbhadara represents ganesha, and when it is combined with four other stones, which represent other deities, they become the object of worship for “panchayatana puja“, which was introduced by adi shankara as a way to stop people from fighting over which deity is supreme, but it is apparently a lot older than shankara…

but it’s just one stone, right? how could a hunk of rock make the determination for me that i am a hindu, beyond a shadow of a doubt?… i hear you ask…

the reason is because, without realising it, over the past 40+ years, i have been collecting interesting rocks and crystals, and, again, without realising it, i have now amassed ALL FIVE STONES… the red sonbhadara was the last of them! 😉

the stones, and their corresponding deities, are: shivalingam represents shiva, pyrite, or “swarnamukhi” (स्वर्णामुखी – “golden face”) represents shakti (parvati, devi, or ambika), sphatik or quartz crystal represents surya, shaligram represents visnu, and sonbhadara represents ganesha.

i’m only about 90% certain that the black stone is, in fact, a shaligram. it came, carved that way, as part of a lingam and yoni set that i purchased from india, a number of years ago, and the stone was immediately replaced with a different lingam… however, i learned (again, today) that sometimes shaligrama are carved into lingam-shapes, and the stone doesn’t really resemble a shivalingam, otherwise, however it DOES resemble a shaligram… and, technically, the sphatik is supposed to come from the vallam river in tamil nadu, and the pyrite is supposed to come from the swarnamukhi river in andhra pradesh, and i’m fairly sure that mine don’t, but, from my standpoint, quartz is quartz, and pyrite is pyrite, regardless of where it’s from.

so, i guess that means i’m a for-real hindu now. 😉

also, i got some new, obscure incense: silver oud and mysore sandal, made by <insert fanfare here> shroff channabasappa and company! the company i thought was out of business, but apparently is going… well, not as strong as they once were, but going, none the less… WOO! 👍

moisture festival, pictures

get moist

Saturday, 20230415 przxqgl

230323 moisture selfies – photo by sasha malinsky

blog birthday, livejournal

20 years of blogging! 🎊

Friday, 20230414 przxqgl

another milestone this week (this month, this year…) is that, as of today, i have been blogging for 20 years. i first started out at LiveJournal — my first “real” post at LJ, duplicated here for those of you who don’t want to use a LJ link (and i don’t blame you. 😉). i had a couple of posts on the same day, but they’re just tests, to see if the thing actually worked the way it was supposed to… and, oddly enough, i didn’t actually go to burning man that year, because i had a brain injury instead, which caused the people i told about it, later, to say that “now you don’t have to go to burning man, because you’ve already had a brain injury!”, which only made me want to go even more, to find out whether they were right or not… and, as it turned out, they were right. i can state, with authority, that burning man is a lot like having a brain injury: they’re both bizarre, unexpected, surrealistic, larger than life, and something i would wish to have happen only once in my lifetime. ultimately, the only major difference i can see is that fewer people die at burning man.

after my brain injury, i decided that blogging would be a good way to supplement my already failing memory, and so i started doing it more regularly… and, indeed, for better or for worse, it has been a good way to remember things that i definitely would have forgotten otherwise.

i gave up livejournal on 071130, after the “strikethrough”, other various shenanigans, and the final decision to sell to СУП in russia (and transferred all of the entries, so that there would be no reason to use LJ as a source), and moved to my own domain, which has changed homes several times, since then, but has always remained at przxqgl.hybridelephant.com.

enlightenment, medication, mushrooms, quantity

i wonder if this is what everyone has been looking for…

Friday, 20230414 przxqgl

today i took 1g (= two 00 capsules) and went for a walk with rye (our oldest dog). while i was out, i experienced a couple of things i have never experienced before. the first was, about halfway through the walk, i decided that i really wanted to be at home, taking a nap, instead of floating around deep in the forest.

ordinarily, when i have taken mushrooms, the LAST thing on my mind is taking a nap…

so, instead of going forwards deeper into the forest, i went back, and on the way i felt, distinctly, a couple of times, like i have in the past, just prior to passing out… only i didn’t pass out (if i had passed out, it turned out that there was an older couple, with a couple of yappy dogs, that would have found me within a few minutes), but, instead, i experienced a distinct “raising up” and “seperation” of my consciousness, to a point a little behind, and about 5 feet above where my body was — i remember looking at the path ahead of me, which i had always thought was relatively level, and thinking that it looked a lot more down-hill than i remembered — and, because of the fact that i was walking with a dog, i experienced a distinctly odd sensation as my body walked along behind the dog, but i was not part of my body. i got the distinct impression that, as it were, my body was an “automaton” that i was, nominally, in control of, but “i” was not a part of that body.

i have read a fair amount about ego death, both positive and negative, but it has always been a lot more of a “view from the outside”, as i was never really certain what, ultimately, they were talking about. 😉

but this puts everything in an entirely new perspective: if “i” — who i think i am — is NOT my body, then what is it? who am “i”, if not my body? and if my body is not “myself”, then, apparently, regardless of what happens to my body, “i” will continue to exist… अहं ब्रह्मण्सि तत्त्वमसि — AHAM BRAHMANSI. TAT TVAM ASI — “I am God. That Thou Art.” 😉

it’s possible that i experienced nirvikalpa samadhi. ॐ🙏

the amusing part is that i have read stories of people taking higher and higher doses of psychedelics in their attempts to achieve this mythical “ego death”, but i seem to have done it with a controlled, 1 gram dose. 🤣

the whole experience lasted, maybe, 45 minutes… from the time i was crossing the creek, including meeting with the older couple. basically, until i got to my car, which brought me back into my body again. i want to go back there.

and, i want to tell you, it was a REALLY interesting experience when the aforementioned older couple and their aforementioned yappy dogs came down the path… i — or rather, my body stood to the side and put a hand on my dog as they approached, with their yappy dogs getting yappier and more aggressive, to the point where they had to pick them up, and walked past me with snarling, snapping little curs (to which i, or rather “my body” said “don’t worry, i understand”), all the while “i” was high up in the air, behind my body, making it go through the motions and try not to appear as altered as i really was… 🤣

house stuff

hey!

Wednesday, 20230412 przxqgl

i just realised… today is the 3rd anniversary of our moving into our (new) house… and now, the house even cooler than it was when we first moved in, because it has started to be “de-zeising-ified”: we’ve hooked up the complete HVAC system, replaced all the heating duct work, built a retaining wall, added a fence (and replaced that fence), pressure washed the deck, cleaned out the gutters (twice), built a new stair from the garage into the back yard, and gone through almost all of the huge stack of firewood they left us. and we’ve had a bunch of neighbours move away, and had new neighbours move in, so we’re not the newest family in the neighbourhood any longer! 🤣

moose

Sunday, 20230409 przxqgl 2 Comments

🫎

medication, mushrooms, quantity, snoose junction, trude

🍄

Wednesday, 20230405 przxqgl

0.05g = ⅓ of a 0-size capsule
1200 ingested
1300 nothing. going for a walk.
1600 – after going up to the “yellow gate”* and getting my car stuck in ¾ of an inch of snow (🙄), i ended up going down to landsburg and walking down to the bridge. i DEFINITELY got the parts of the mushroom that were the most potent, this time (damn it! 😠), because, while i wasn’t inebriated, i was definitely feeling good… nothing visual, though. after walking to the bridge and back, i chanced upon a friendly bearded guy coming out of the security gate at landsburg crossing, so i asked him if there were public tours of the areas behind the “no trespassing” signs, with specific emphasis on trude and snoose junction. he gave me a physical address in north bend, and told me to inquire there… which is more information than i have gotten from internet in two years of hunting!

*the “yellow gate” is the “secret back entrance” to taylor mountain, but it’s still more snowy than my jikatabi like, and it’s up hill, which, along with getting my car stuck, just didn’t seem worth the effort… and i got my car unstuck, for which PRAISE GANESHA! 🐘

people suck

what happened?

Tuesday, 20230404 przxqgl

in 1978, i was a just-out-of-high-school musician and composer of “unusual” music. i won the state award for music performance playing a composition that i wrote, which was a companion piece for the bach ‘cello suite number 1 in g, first movement; after playing the first movement of the suite number one, instead of the second movement, i played my composition. it was for solo trombone, which meant that it was in bass clef (like the ‘cello suite), but, unlike the ‘cello suite, it did not have a time signature, key signature, nor tonal center… or, it might be said that it had “multiple, unrelated” tonal centers 😉. it also had a section where the only way to play it correctly meant being able to circular breathe.

as an aside, in another competition when i performed this pair of pieces, i was interrupted halfway through my performance, by someone who came in and started talking with one of the judges, because they thought i was “warming up”… 😒 once they had realised their mistake, and apologised to me and the judge, i was given the unprecedented option of starting over, which, under ordinary circumstances, was NEVER allowed.

not many (who am i kidding, it was really absolutely no) other people were interested in even looking at the music i composed, much less performing it, or even trying it out in rehearsal… even in classes where developing composition skills was the whole point of the class. 😒 eventually i “transitioned” into composing more “popular style” music, and that was that…

in 1978, the composer Wieland Hoban WAS BORN, and he is now famous for “unusual” music, like this performance, by Pavlos Antoniadis of “when the panting STARTS”, a composition written “separately for the pianist’s ten fingers, as an ensemble rather than a unity”…

😖 waaa! it’s no fair! he gets to do it and be famous, and i didn’t! what happened to people’s idea of what music is between then and now? grumble, mutter… 😒

articles, the cloud drive crack of 2021, the very big stupid, WD sucks

boycott western digital! 😠

Monday, 20230403 przxqgl

Western Digital confirms digital burglary, calls in law enforcement

western digital is, ultimately, responsible for the great cloud drive crack of 2021, and they still haven’t made good. the only thing they’ve done is offer me a 40% off coupon for a new cloud drive. 😠 as if 40% off is going to console me after 40 years of my personal data, artwork, music, and everything else, was summarily deleted by some low-life miscreant who doesn’t even know me. as if 40% off would even REMOTELY convince me to change my mind, and purchase another storage drive from them, EVER… 😠

i say, the more WD experiences shit like this, the better i like it, and if the person or persons who did this, ever need a place to hide out, my house is always open.

Continue reading boycott western digital! 😠 →

🍄

Thursday, 20230330 przxqgl

0.10 g = ⅔ of a 0-size capsule
1530 ingested

i’m not expecting much in the way of sensations, but, judging by the previous encounters, we shall see.

1630 nothing. however, i am going for a walk.

around 1730 i noticed a definite change in my mood, but nothing else.

1830 nothing psychedelic visually or otherwise, but a definite change in my mood…

gawd DAMN it. 😠

bssb, moisture festival, mushrooms, unicycle

w(h)oo…

Tuesday, 20230328 przxqgl

seven performances of the moisture festival later…

the first performance of the moisture festival, i wore my purple suit, with the purple bow tie and the purple tando hat… and the guy who was in the attendent’s booth at the parking garage had a blue beard, and was dressed all in blue. when he saw me, he said “you’re as purple as i am blue!”… he said his name is blue. 😉 i’m taking monique to a moisture festival show on sunday, specifically because i want to see this guy called “the broken juggler” — michael rayner — who, i think, lives in tacoma, and is around 60 years old. he has a regular thing where he posts videos of himself: he has a pillow that has nicholas cage’s face made out of sequins, and, while he’s rocking on a rola-bola, or standing on a spring-loaded wiggle-board, or something like that, he does some sort of complicated juggling thing, or he spins a flaming cheeseburger on a parasol, or he does some fancy flower-stick maneuvers with a tennis racket, or something like that, with one hand, and, with the other hand, he strokes the sequins on the pillow so that nicholas cage’s face appears, and then he throws the nicholas cage pillow over his back, and sinks it in a basketball hoop behind him. 🤣

i’ve got a sousa band rehearsal this evening. first one of the 2023 season. we’re down a tuba player and at least one trombone player – the tuba player and his wife, who plays E♭ saxhorn (it’s a small horn that looks like a baritone, only with a trombone-like bore, and tuned in E♭, so it is between a french horn and a baritone. reads in treble clef. she plays french horn parts, most of the time.) are moving to portugal and the trombone player is moving to italy. i MAY have located one or two other trombone players, which would free me up to play tuba, although i don’t really want to, because i know ALL the trombone parts, but i know NONE of the tuba parts… and tuba is a really important instrument in a large ensemble, which means i am not even the best choice for a replacement tuba player…

i haven’t taken mushrooms for 10 days, and the weather is changing to the kind of weather in which i like to take mushrooms. this year, moe got permits to go and cut firewood in the “campbell-global snoqualmie tree farm”, a huge tract of land northeast of fall city, which, technically, is all private property (unless you have a permit). there are a whole bunch of rules about what you can, and cannot do while accessing their property, and there are even more restrictive rules about who gets a permit, which mean that, if i decide to go there to hike while taking mushrooms, i can’t bring a friend (other than moe, who also has rights to a permit) unless they buy a “day pass” at the perimeter gate, they can’t ride in my car, and they can’t take their own car in to the main parking lot, which is about five miles uphill from the perimeter gate. 😒 but, apart from that, it goes from I5 in the south, all the way up to highway 2, in the north, and it’s probably 25 miles from east to west, and it’s all forest, logging roads, and no civilisation for miles.

before the moisture festival started, i had my first serious fall off my unicycle… but, because of the fact that i had bought safety gear (knee and elbow pads), literally THE DAY BEFORE, and was actually WEARING that safety gear, i didn’t get as injured as i could have. however, i did get a scrape on the side of my left hand, and i bent my glasses to the point where i had to take the lenses out to get them straight-ish… and they’re still not as straight as they were. i’ve got an appointment with a new eye doctor, with my new vision insurance (thanks to moe), on friday.

moisture festival, pictures

moist

Monday, 20230320 przxqgl

gearing up for the moisture festival (starts march 23, i play one show on the 23rd, and then two shows per day on the 24th, 25th, and 26th), AND one of my favourite costume shops is having a “purge-o-rama sale”, in preparation for moving to a new location… so…

230320 - rainbow sequins — 230320 – rainbow sequins

😉

🍄

Saturday, 20230318 przxqgl 1 Comment

0.25g = 1 0 capsule
12:00 pm ingested
at 1:00 i noticed some yawning and a desire to pee
at 2:00 i noticed some twinkly edges around things, and had a strong desire to be somewhere other than in front of the computer, but i can resist for a while, because i also got 4 new CDs in the mail, and i’m working on transcribing them onto my cloud drive… yes, music takes priority over everything.
at 4:00 i’m still yawning, and i definitely feel elevated, but not necessarily high… unless i hold still for 30 seconds or more, then i can REALLY feel it. 😒

what i am learning from titrating like this is, basically, no matter how fine you grind it, any one 00 capsule, or one 0 capsule, is going to be VASTLY different from any other 00 or 0 capsule. 😒 NOT what i wanted to learn — primarily because i could have told you that before i started this experiment… 🤬

fun with the post office, pictures

SCHENECTADY???

Friday, 20230317 przxqgl

i ordered a CD from france. it’s Sergei Prokofiev’s “Peter and The Wolf”, performed by the Scottish National Orchestra, conducted by Neeme Järvi, with Lina Prokofiev as the narrator.

in my opinion, the only better performance is the one in which Victor Borge is the narrator, but i’ve already got that one.

i’ve been tracking the package (as i often do, particularly when they are from places other than the united stoats), and, according to the web site, it should be out for delivery, today…

in schenectady?????

230317 - SCHENECTADY??? — 230317 – SCHENECTADY???

🤯

🍄

Saturday, 20230311 przxqgl

0.50 g = 1 00 capsule
12:00 pm ingested
1:00 came on
5:30… wasn’t paying attention, but haven’t felt anything for more than an hour.

😒

depression

alarming

Friday, 20230310 przxqgl

yesterday was a good day. the weather was beautiful, and i did NOT take mushrooms, but it felt like i had. i had the feeling that everything was going right. i went to my circus class, and despite the fact that i didn’t free mount more than twice, i felt like i was riding really well, and i practiced riding backwards and idling without any problems… i even idled once without holding on to the bar that i was using to steady myself. i walked the tight wire forwards AND backwards, without falling, and i identified “bad habits” that i had been doing, unconsciously, that affect my ability to balance. i did “rim walks” on a german wheel, which gave me an idea that i want to try out, which is riding my unicycle with my hands above my head, to change my center of balance… i cleaned the furnace filter the day before, which was the reason our house was so cold, and cleaning the filter fixed the coldness, which made me feel like i had accomplished something. at one point, i actually remember thinking that — MAYBE — this was a sign that things are going to change, my life is going to get better, and that i won’t be so depressed any longer.

and, this morning, i woke up in a really foul mood. depressed as hell, and the weather is still not warm enough to take more than a minimal dose of mushrooms…

maybe tomorrow.

DEPRESSION SUCKS! 🤬🤬🤬

Continue reading You thought you bought software – all you bought was a lie →

🍄

Wednesday, 20230301 przxqgl

1.00 g = 2 00 capsules
12:30 pm ingested
1:00 came on (while driving to tacoma)
4:20 still going

230301 dusk selfie — 230301 18:30 dusk selfie

house stuff, stupid people

phoooooaaarrgggh!

Friday, 20230224 przxqgl

so, the other day, i mentioned that our washing machine was broken, and that they scheduled the repair for today.

this morning, the repair guy showed up, plugged in the washing machine, and could not get it to malfunction. 😒

then he asked me if i had the part that he was supposed to replace. i told him that i had paid for it, but i assumed they were going to ship it to him, since i don’t know how to install it.

the guy said that they would have told me if they were going to ship it to me, that he didn’t have the part on hand, it would take two weeks to get it, and that we would have to reschedule another appointment. then he said that it was going to cost almost $500 for the part, and almost $200 for the “trip charge”.

i calmly told him that i had already paid for the part, i wasn’t going to pay more for another part, he could go fuck himself for the “trip charge”, and, politely asked him to leave our property. 😠

it’s a really good thing i decided to do laundry at the laundromat YESTERDAY (24 hours ahead of the appointment, and i wasn’t 100% sure they were going to fix the machine), because then i would have been REALLY angry. as it was, i had another load of laundry ready to go, and, because of the fact that the machine was functioning again, i took advantage of that fact and did it at home, rather than going BACK to the laundromat for a second time this week.

however, i was very definitely NOT the person to call GE and get things straightened out… because if i called them, even now, several hours later, when i have had some time to calm down, it would NOT go well for anybody, and the probability of GE EVER coming to our house again would be significantly diminished.

so moe called.

she managed to get through to them WITHOUT having to wait on hold for a couple hours, because they had actually texted her to arrange for today’s appointment, so she just called them back. the lady she talked to was tremendously apologetic, intensely infuriated with the GE drone that i had talked to originally, AND the repair dude who showed up today. she said that the part had actually been purchased (HAH!), and was supposed to arrive by fedex this morning, but fedex had changed their schedule without notifying us (GE knew about it, but they didn’t notify us 😠). they rescheduled the part delivery for tuesday, and rescheduled another appointment on wednesday.

🤬

i am a terrorist, pictures, snoose junction, trude

this is the kind of thing i would have gotten in trouble for, when i was younger…

Sunday, 20230219 przxqgl

i really want to go exploring in the cedar river watershed.

the place that is surrounded by a fence, with big, dire warning signs that say “NO TRESPASSING – $10,000 FINE!”…

200828 the watershed, photo by The Prophet Ian

but, the thing is, there are a couple of “communities” near my house which i really want to go and visit: Trude, and Snoose Junction. if you plug those names into google maps, they exist, and if you plug in your home location, it gives you directions for how to get there.

and in the case of Snoose Junction, it gives me two alternate ways to get there!

i know there aren’t people living there… legally, anyway… i do know that there are some hold-outs who live on the outskirts of society, who probably live in the watershed illegally, but the state frowns on such things, and i would think that the location of an actual community, even a defunct one, is probably one of the last places such people would choose to live, because of that…

if they don’t want people going there, then why are those places even listed on the map? why does it give precise, turn-by-turn directions for how to get there, if nobody is supposed to go there? it doesn’t make sense to me! 🤨

both of these places are an easy bike ride from my house, they’re both places where people used to live, and i want to go poke around, take pictures, and see what is there now.

i know that they say $10,000 fine for trespassing, but i also know that there are SEMI-TRUCKS that regularly go in and out of the security gate at landsburg crossing (marked “Cedar River Trailhead” on the maps above), and i’ve seen folks with state-owned trucks, traveling on roads that have no trespassing signs on them, so i KNOW that the state makes exceptions to that rule… now it’s just a matter of finding out which strings to pull to have them make an exception for me… 😈

house stuff

phoooooa

Thursday, 20230216 przxqgl

saturday, our three-year-old GE washing machine, basically, failed: i finished a load of laundry, moved it into the dryer, and refilled the washing machine, when the control panel went crazy, started beeping and changing settings without me having to touch anything. i thought it was weird, and reached for the power button, but the power button didn’t work. so i unplugged it, waited a few minutes, plugged it back in, and it was the same deal, beeping and changing settings without me touching the controls… i let it sit, unplugged, overnight, and managed to get one more load out of it, but then it settled on the electronic controls not working at all, or working independently of user input, the physical selector worked, but it also worked as a power switch, which it SHOULD NOT do, and the actual power switch didn’t work at all. 😒 so i unplugged it and arranged for a GE technician to come by and look at it on monday. the GE guy came around and plugged in some sort of computer device(!) into an ethernet port in the back (why i’ve never noticed it before is still a mystery), and, eventually, reported that the control panel was shorting out. he also said that he thought he had seen everything, but this was a malfunction that he had never seen before, which i said is par for the course where i am concerned. 😒

the replacement part costs $500 and won’t be here for two weeks.

a replacement washing machine costs $700… and we’ve had this one for three years… 😒

GE has a standard 1 year replacement warranty, and SELLS an “extended warranty” that lasts for 5 years, but… a brand-name washing machine SHOULD last more than three years before needing to be completely replaced… in my opinion… 😒

moe called the GE customer support line, waited over an hour on “hold”, and then gave up. the next day she called back and waited “on hold” for another 45 minutes before she gave up again. today, i called the GE customer support line and waited “on hold” for 40 minutes before i talked to someone, who said that they couldn’t help me, but transfered me (after another 30 minutes “on hold”) to someone who could. i explained the situation, and they said that they could offer me a 50% discount on parts and labour “as a courtesy”… and they made an appointment for next week to come and fix it.

so i only have to take our laundry somewhere else once more before it gets fixed.

busking, didjeriflute

hermanic phlooote

Wednesday, 20230208 przxqgl

moe got me a “hindu drum machine” for xmas, and i’ve been playing around with it, but it assumes that you know what you’re doing, and a lot of the labels are in devanagari script… and, while i can read devanagari script, i still don’t know how to make sense of the words that it is trying to convey. don’t get me wrong, it’s an AWESOME gift, and i am going to play the hell out of it, but i’ve got to learn a little bit more about what i’m doing first… not to mention the fact that it doesn’t have a way to hook it up to batteries (yet)…

so, along those same lines, i got an “app” for my “tablet” (it STILL seems really bizarre to me that people say it that way, but… it doesn’t matter) called “iTabla Pandit”, which is, basically, the same “hindu drum machine”, but it’s also got a couple of tambouras and a shruti box, all of the labels are in roman script, there’s an obvious indicator when the taal repeats, and the entire thing is tunable, both individually (you can tune both tambouras separately from the tablas and the shruti box, OR you can tune all of them as a group [which is what i did]).

and it sounds AWESOME with the harmonic flute, by itself, with no electronic help at all… i’m getting ready to test it with electronic “oomph” in the park down the road (because it’s not raining and the sun is out for a change). hopefully something fun will come of it.

ETA – 230208 1500 PDT — yup, it’s a good one… i’ve got to figure out how to run sound from my tablet into my amplifier, but the harmonic flute is quiet enough that i can do without it for outdoor performances. 😉👍👍

busking, depression, moisture festival

Noisserped

Tuesday, 20230207 przxqgl

with the panto over, there hasn’t been much for me to do, and, because i have been depressed, i have spent a lot of time sitting and doing nothing, because if i get up and do something, something could go wrong, and then the world would have one more reason to hate me, but if i sit and do nothing (these days, twit™ turd™ counts as doing nothing), nothing can go wrong. it’s a lot of… fun? i’d take mushrooms, but the weather has been rainy and cold, and it still gets dark around 5:00.

we tried to go busking last wednesday, but we got there around 10:30 and there was nobody there… probably 5 or 6 vendors where there are usually 50 or 60, and even fewer tourists, at the bridge spot. under the clock there were booths with their chain barricades down, and, while there were people at the fish market, there weren’t any fish on display, and it looked like they were cleaning up to go home. as far as i can tell, it wasn’t any sort of holiday, and nobody that we talked to had any clue why the market was a ghost town.

allegedly, we’re gearing up for the moisture festival. we’re doing the second week, march 23rd through the 26th, 6 shows… but it’s at the broadway performance hall, this year, which doesn’t have parking, which means that there is a very strong probability that i will have to park half a mile away, and hike in with my tuba… plus, my understanding is that the broadway performance hall is a union shop, and i am fairly sure that the moisture festival is NOT a “union shop”, and never has been, so i don’t know how that is going to work. meanwhile, the old palladium is boarded up and has a “for lease” sign on the front. 😞

growing, mushrooms, pictures

shroomies! ?

Tuesday, 20230131 przxqgl

i got some psilocybin Q-Tests to test my homegrown shroomies, to make absolutely certain that they are, in fact, Psilocybe cyanecens…

they are! 🍄😀😉😈‼‼‼

OM, pictures, printing stuff

the next phase of operation mindfuck

Tuesday, 20230131 przxqgl

they’re here.

now i have to (once again) pester the web designer into showing me how to make a product that has multiple purchase choices: one postcard, two postcards, three postcards, four postcards, five postcards, multiple 5-postcard packs… that sort of thing… he’s showed me how to do it once, with the jagannath pins that i had a few years ago, but they all sold out, and the item got deleted in one of my “clean up my web site” binges.

artificial stupidity

what is every all which what where when why how whos?

Monday, 20230130 przxqgl

i succumbed to peer pressure, and checked out ChatGPT, the “Artificial Intelligence” language model about which everyone has been ranting. my initial impression is that it is the next step beyond Racter, and it actually wouldn’t surprise me too much if i have a disk with Racter on it around here somewhere.

i asked it what it can do. it responded:

As a language model, I can perform various tasks such as:

Answering questions
Generating text
Conversing in a natural language
Summarizing text
Translating text
Providing information and facts on various topics.

i am inquisitive by nature, which is probably why i made such a good software tester. and, as a software tester, i have discovered that the following question is one that either stumps or confuses so-called “artificial intelligence” programs (like Racter) in some stunningly spectacular ways, and so i asked it

what is every all which what where when why how whos?

and i got, probably, the most coherent response i could have gotten, considering that, ultimately, i asked the question of a computer: it said:

“What” and “which” are interrogative pronouns used to ask questions.
“Where” is an interrogative adverb used to ask about a place or location.
“When” is an interrogative adverb used to ask about a time.
“Why” is an interrogative adverb used to ask for the reason or cause.
“How” is an interrogative adverb used to ask about the manner, means, or method.
“Who’s” is a contraction of “who is”.
“Whose” is an interrogative pronoun used to ask about ownership or possession.
“All” is a pronoun that refers to the whole quantity or extent of something.

there are some pretty astounding things that it DIDN’T do, by which i am very impressed: it didn’t ask me ‘what i meant’… it assumed that what i was typing made sense, and so it made as much sense of it as it could; it didn’t try to change the subject; it didn’t ask me to ‘rephrase the question’; it gave generic, accurate answers to every part of the question it could perceive, regardless of whether it ‘made sense’ or not; and it EVEN tried to make sense of the ‘nonsense’ word i put in there — whos — which it could neither identify as ‘who’s’ or ‘whose’, so it gave me both definitions.

then, the conversation took an entirely unexpected turn…

PRZXQGL: are you related to racter?

ChatGPT: No, I am not related to Racter. Racter is an early computer program designed to generate text using simple algorithms, while I am an advanced language model developed by OpenAI, using deep learning techniques.

PRZXQGL: you are related to racter, whether you know it or not.

ChatGPT: You are correct that there are some similarities between Racter and my language model. Both Racter and I generate text, but the approaches and technologies we use are different. Racter used simple algorithms, while I use advanced deep learning techniques that allow me to generate human-like responses.

“human-like”?

heh heh…

“HUMAN-like”??

ROTFLMAO! 🤣

that’s RICH, coming from a computer… 🤣 especially one which knows about racter without me having to prompt it… 🤣

it is exactly why responses like these serve to make me even more skeptical of these “artificial intelligence” programs than i already am. 😒😏

ETA 230131: i had the following interaction with ChatGPT, which goes to strengthen my determination that it is the next step beyond racter:

PRZXQGL: describe the poem “Jabberwocky”, by lewis carroll, in minute detail.

ChatGPT:“Jabberwocky” is a nonsense poem written by Lewis Carroll, first published in his book “Through the Looking-Glass” in 1872. The poem is about a protagonist who sets out to slay a fearsome creature called the Jabberwock. The poem is famous for its imaginative and absurd use of language, as many of the words used in the poem are made up or have alternate definitions.

The poem consists of 14 stanzas, each containing four lines of rhyming couplets. The language used is highly imaginative and playful, featuring words like “frabjous,” “vorpal,” and “bandersnatch.” The overall mood of the poem is fantastical and dream-like, as the protagonist journeys through a strange and surreal world in search of the Jabberwock.

The poem is often interpreted as a commentary on the absurdity and confusion of language, as the words used in the poem are intentionally made to be confusing and difficult to understand. Despite this, the poem remains highly entertaining and imaginative, as the protagonist’s journey to slay the Jabberwock is full of twists and turns, and the language used to describe it is highly imaginative and playful.

Overall, “Jabberwocky” is a classic example of Lewis Carroll’s innovative and playful approach to language, and is considered one of his most enduring works. It continues to be popular and widely read to this day, and is a testament to the power of imagination and playfulness in language.

🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣

art projects, pictures, printing stuff

new scheme… will it work?

Tuesday, 20230124 przxqgl

for a few years now, i have been playing around with this app for my tablet called FRAX, to which i was pointed by my friend gunnar, who is a fractal maniac. i find it really easy, and somewhat meditative, to generate an infinite variety (they’re fractals, after all 😉) of magnificently detailed, wildly psychedelic patterns, and i can crank out 4 to 6 images per hour, for several hours, before getting “bored” with it.

i have maintained for some time that “boredom is a state of mind i never visit”, and, while it’s true, from the outside one might presume that it’s boredom, when it’s really something else… but i digress…

the other day, i went through the photostream on my tablet (which i am finally getting organised enough that i can find what i’m looking for, some of the time), and discovered that i have 91 frax drawings in a directory, which started me thinking…

what if i made postcards out of these drawings, and sold them on my web site?

i’ve got more than enough raw material, and they wouldn’t take that much tweezing to get them to fit on a postcard…

and i can buy 100 18 point postcards (the really thick ones) for less than $20, which means that i can sell them for $1.00 a piece and make a profit (assuming that people buy them, about which i am not as certain).

not only that, but i can send them out to the IOTM club, which is coming up a lot sooner than i realised.

so, yesterday, i ordered 100 of five different fractal drawings (not necessarily the ones depicted here)… we’ll see what happens next.

moe, pictures, temple grandin

my famous wife! 😉👍👍

Monday, 20230116 przxqgl

230116 monique feyrecilde and temple grandin

my famous wife and her famous friend… over whom i have been a massive fanboy for longer than monique has been alive… 😉

busking, COVID19, doggles, growing, moe, mushrooms, orlando, players

it’s already almost halfway through january… 😒

Wednesday, 20230111 przxqgl

moe is going to orlando on saturday. we finished with the panto last weekend, and, yesterday, macque tested positive for COVID, which means that he likely was exposed at the panto. moe sez she’s going to wear her mask religiously, except for when she’s drinking water, but… i was potentially exposed to macque, and moe was potentially exposed to me, and nobody will know anything until she’s already in orlando. we’ve arranged for a puppy-sitter to take quill (the new puppy), so that i won’t have to deal with an un-trained seven-month-old puppy, which is a good thing, because i actually have a paying gig on saturday (the day moe leaves for orlando), in georgetown, and, with moe in orlando, a puppy would put a severe strain on my ability to perform successfully.

i harvested around 15 dried grams of wavy caps from my experimental mushroom patch, and, as far as i can tell, the mycelium has grown into the ground, which means a much higher possibility of more wavy caps, if not soon, at least next year. dare i say, this is a long-term project that appears to have gone right, for a change.

growing, mushrooms, pictures

🍄🍄🍄🍄🍄🍄🍄‼‼‼

Tuesday, 20230103 przxqgl

so, this happened… 😉

at first, i wasn’t completely sure (it’s always a good idea to be skeptical with mushrooms), so i plugged it into PictureMushroom which confirmed that they are, in fact, Psilocybe cyanescens, a “Toxic” mushroom.

specifically:

Wavy caps and should be treated as a moderately poisonous mushroom, best avoided. Ingestion of wavy caps can induce symptoms that include vomiting, nausea, fever, psychosis and seizures.”

it goes on to describe almost exactly the same environment, region, climate, and time of year. combine that with the fact that i INTENTIONALLY propagated P. cyanescens spores, and i’ve got about as much confirmation as i need… 🍄😉🍄😎🍄👍🍄‼

hybrid elephant, pictures, spam

🤣🤪

Tuesday, 20230103 przxqgl

in my attempts to break free of #twit™ #turd™, i have created a reddit profile. i joined the r/incense subreddit, and almost immediately got banned for “spam”. the “spam” i am guilty of disseminating was the phrase “i’ve got resins for sale: pure frankincense, copal, and loban (seperately)… i’ve also got a big chunk of palo santo.” which i posted in response to ONE person.

it’s not “spam”. i didn’t advertise anything, i didn’t include links to my business, and i didn’t “mass mail” anybody: this was in response to ONE person.

nevertheless, the moderator that banned me was disinterested in discussing it, because “we both know what spam is”, and, as i am a “newbie” at reddit, i didn’t feel like arguing about it…

but… 😉

i was searching for other subreddits which may or may not be similar to r/incense, when i came across this post… in r/incense 🤣

someone else's reddit ad in a subreddit from which i was banned... 😉 — someone else’s reddit ad in a subreddit from which i was banned… 😉

and it got 14 upvotes! 👍👍😉 this is, also, NOT spam (as it is on my own web site): a link to 999 Lord Krishna Puja Agarbatti, if anybody reading this is interested in purchasing some. 😉

busking, ganesha the car, growing, moe, moisture festival, mushrooms, new year, philharmonic

Add New Post

Sunday, 20230101 przxqgl

blah blah, new year, new me, blah blah blah… 😒 i’ll tell you what: i’m going to do the best that i can NOT to kill myself this year, through direct or indirect action (indirect, in case you’re dense, refers to COVID or something like that). my “new years intention” (because “resolutions” are too restrictive) is less depression.

along those lines, i didn’t get a harvest from my “experimental” mushroom patch last year, but it has developed LOADS of mycelia… now, there’s no GUARANTEE that they’re “the right kind” of mycelia, and, until they start sprouting mushrooms, there will be no way to know for sure, but… it was three unplanted containers of sterile potting soil, covered with a thin layer of wood chips and straw, which i inoculated with mycelia LAST YEAR. i didn’t plant anything else in the containers, and, basically, i have left them alone for a year… apart from watering them occasionally, during the dry months last summer. i don’t KNOW that the mycelia i propagated is the one i’m looking at, but… well… there’s enough mycelia that all i had to do was disturb the top layer of wood chips SLIGHTLY to expose A LOT of mycelium… so there’s always hope…

however, even with auxiliary mushrooms from matrix genetix, the weather has been snowy/rainy/awful enough that it has been difficult to take as much mushrooms as i like, so i’ve been taking “microdoses” that i can’t perceive, but which smooth out the bumps to the point where i’m not snapping at people, complaining about everything, and being a complete recluse… but i’m still not particularly pleasant to be around. 😒

i’ve got to have my car serviced. i’ve been noticing a significant decrease in mileage for the past few months, i may need new tires, and, apparently there are “firmware upgrades” that are only available from the dealer. but the closest hyundai dealer is in renton, and i’ve pretty much burnt my bridges with the renton hyundai dealer years ago. there’s a dealer in auburn, with whom i haven’t burnt as many bridges, and there’s the dealer in puyallup where i bought the car, but this is sunday AND new year’s day, so i’m not even going to be able to call anyone about it until tomorrow. meanwhile, i’ve got to go to costco (tomorrow), and moe is leaving for a week in orlando on the 14th, which, coincidentally, is the same day thaddeus and i have our first paying gig of the year.

i got a “small” package, yesterday, of incense from one of the more reliable US distributors i deal with (“small” meaning only two kilos 😉), delivered by USPS, which was totally saturated, as though it had sat outside in the rain overnight, or something like that — which it certainly did not do outside of my house. 😠 only half a kilo of the two kilos of incense were damaged, and i have notified the shipper, but (once again) it is the new year, which means at least there won’t be anybody there until tomorrow, and i’m not sure there is anything that can be done about it, anyway. 😒

the moisture festival is happening. hooray(?). it’s going to be at the broadway performance hall, a “union shop” — meaning that there are going to be people not associated with the moisture festival doing things like managing the stage, moving sets, setting lights, operating spotlights and other suchlike stuff, and there’s nothing that can be done to change it. i’m kind of wondering how they’re going to deal with the fact that the bands are definitely not union organisations, but, at the same time, it’s for someone else to deal with. 😒 fortunately. 😒

snowpocalypse, VEWPRF

VEWPRF

Saturday, 20221224 przxqgl

moe’s mom was supposed to be here for christmas eve dinner, but the ice-pocalypse has still got us in its icy grip… mind you, issaquah-hobart road has been chemically de-iced and plowed, and for every other place in the greater seattle metropolitan area, the roads are passable, at worst… but i had to walk out to the park at the corner of hobart-ravensdale road, this afternoon, to pick up a package, because the fedex driver, the USPS driver, a door-dash driver, and a tow truck had a “confligration” (complete with flashing lights and everything) at the top of our neighbourhood. there were two cars that passed me on the way to the park, which i’m not sure whether they got through or not, and there were two more cars that passed me on the way back… and i’m not sure whether or not they got through either…

so, conditionally, moe’s mom is coming for dinner tomorrow (after it has been >50° for more than 24 hours), along with scott and nancy (our friends from up the road towards issaquah about 10 miles), and that means that moe has decided that she has to make TWO dinners… she had originally planned to make indian food for dinner with scott and nancy, but her mom won’t eat indian food, so she’s getting enough steak for dinner, and to take back so she can have left-overs tomorrow… and, because of the fact that steak night was supposed to be tonight, moe made pasta tonight…

snowpocalypse

official 2022 snowpocalypse. 🤬

Friday, 20221223 przxqgl

so, around here, anyway, it’s not so much a “snow”pocalypse as it is an “ice”pocalypse… there was only about two inches of snow last night at 9:00, but it was really windy overnight, and my guess is that it sleeted and/or freezing-rained enough that, this morning, there’s two inches of what LOOKS LIKE snow, but is, in reality, one to one-and-a-half inches of old crusty snow that has been TOTALLY ENCASED in a clear layer of ice… there’s ice on all the tree branches, and our slight incline out the garage door into the back yard has become totally impassable — unless you want to slide on your ass… it’s supposed to warm up and mostly dissipate by tomorrow, and the high tomorrow is supposed to be 50°… but, despite the fact that it is “warming up”, currently, it’s “warming” from yesterday’s low of 14° to a somewhat-more-normal 31°, and it’s supposed to start snowing at noon, and continue until 7:00 or so… in other parts of the metropolitan area, king county metro is COMPLETELY shut down, and seatac airport has gone from COMPLETELY shut down, to having one runway open, and alaska airlines cancelling 100% of their flights out of seatac today. moe says the last time she remembers this happening was in 1996, but then it wasn’t anticipated, which made things that much worse.

ETA: it is now 1:30 pm, and it’s 33° and raining… which, of course, means later on, when the temperature once again dips below freezing, that we will have SEVERAL LAYERS of increasing thicknesses of ice. woo. i’m SO glad i don’t have to go anywhere for the next few days. 😒

snowpocalypse

yup… i figured it was just a matter of time…

Tuesday, 20221220 przxqgl

it started snowing in fits and starts sunday evening, after the panto. it mostly melted yesterday, and it was raining hard this morning… but then, around 11:00, it changed from rain to grauple, and then to sleet, and then to snow… and it transitioned back and forth between rain and snow at least three times before it got dark, which means that our beautifully plowed street (for a change!) is now two inches or so deep in slush, ice, and snow. i went out this afternoon around 1:00, and on my way home i saw two cars off the road on hobart-ravensdale road, one of which was a fairly substantial jeep or something like that, which had been going uphill and slid off the road facing oncoming traffic… which was complicated by a row of oncoming cars which were stopped because of the aforementioned jeep, which was just after a curve in the road. once i got past the conflagration, i encountered a large semi-truck with a huge piece of equipment on the trailer, which was tooling along at an elevated rate of speed, as though there weren’t about 8 cars that were stopped a thousand or so feet further up the road… 😒

it’s not really deep, but it’s REALLY slick, and people around here don’t know how to drive when it’s slick… which, of course, doesn’t stop them from trying, and failing in the most spectacular ways. 😒

fortunately, i don’t HAVE TO drive ANYWHERE until after the first of january, and, hopefully, it will all be gone by then. 😒

ganesha the car, hybrid elephant, pictures

W000T!! 😎

Tuesday, 20221220 przxqgl

i’ve had this sayagata-pattern iphone case for an iphone that i have never owned, and, probably WILL never own, simply because its got a cool pattern on it. i was showing it off to moe, a week or so ago, and complaining that i didn’t know of anywhere i could get an iphone case with pictures that i want on them, and moe recommended about a dozen places that make custom iphone cases… because, these days, her “google-fu” is orders of magnitude better than mine… 😖

so, i had one made. now my phone exactly matches my car. 😎

geek stuff, linux-upgrades, meta

W00T!

Friday, 20221216 przxqgl

i took the plunge and installed kubuntu 22.04 (Jammy Jellyfish) as a dual-boot — since i have a TON of extra disk space because of the NAS, and because of the fact that i have a 2TB SECONDARY hard disk, which i conveniently forgot about…

i figured it was about time to upgrade when i saw the “upgrade now, you fool!” warning messages, that appear at the top of my screen when i boot the computer, for the past week or so, but i’ve read some… “THINGS”… about upgrading jammy, rather than installing fresh… and, well, i have a TON of extra disk space because of the NAS, i have a 2TB SECONDARY hard disk, which i conveniently forgot about…

it only took me two days to go from blank disk to almost completely identical systems, with surprisingly little data loss… i’ve been having some trouble with widgets, applications, and the “task bar” (which is behaving strangely enough that, my guess is, they’re going to have an update which fixes it within a few days), some of my more fantastic “desktop effects” (specifically, the ones seen here) don’t seem to exist, and i’m having some trouble getting the browser configured correctly, but, all-in-all, this has been an amazingly painless procedure.

climate change, depression, incense, moe, people suck, players, stupid people, weather

default title entry

Tuesday, 20221213 przxqgl

last saturday and sunday were the first four performances of the panto during the winter holiday season, in three years. the last time we actually had a panto performance during the holdiay season was in 2019. the panto has been performed at the oregon country fair, last summer, but i missed it because i got COVID19 less than 12 hours before i was scheduled to leave. 😒 it was really fun to perform in a group for an audience again, but i was also acutely reminded of all the “politicial” horseshit that surrounds working for a group of actors and musicians. i was asked to provide a “5 minute warning” which, after two tries, no less than the stage manager told me not to make that noise any longer (this was one of the people on the board of directors, a few years ago, who screwed up the process of printing the posters because she refused to understand how the pricing breaks work, and almost screwed with the process of having the banners created in 2019, because she thought that grommets were not going to be necessary, or some crap like that 😒). also, i was asked to provide two different “ratchet” sounds, but, after two performances, they decided that the quieter of the two (the one that i had actually bought specifically for this performance) was loud enough that the actor couldn’t be heard above it, which means, not only that they don’t have two different ratchet sounds, but, because of the fact that i’m having to “mute” the remaining ratchet, i can’t match the ratchet sounds to the actors actions as well, which is, i’m absolutely positive, going to be irritating and a cause for a “note” later on.

monday (yesterday) i had to get up and take moe’s CPAP machine to the company that made it, because it has been making a strange noise for 6 months or so, and they’ve JUST gotten around to calling her back and making an appointment… but when i got there, they told me that the machine was beyond its EOL, and they would replace it, except that they didn’t have any machines, and didn’t know where to get one. i said, “so, what are we talking about, here? days? weeks? months?” and their response was “i’m not sure”. 😒 i thought it was somewhat unusual for them to have such a blasé attitude about moe’s prescribed medical device, but i brought it home… and, some time between then (around noon) and 7:30, they called moe and said that they had found a machine, which i picked up this morning.

the past couple of months i have been averaging about two incense orders a week. mind you, a lot of them have been for ONE BOX, but, at this point, i’ve stopped trying to get people to order more than one… if they want to pay twice as much (or more) for shipping, as they pay for one box of incense, it’s none of my business… or, i should say, it IS my business… which i would be driving away by telling them that it’s stupid to just order one box of incense. however, at this point, the price for a medium flat rate box is $17.05, my base rate for shipping is $16.50 (which is smaller than a medium flat rate box), and one box of incense is anywhere between $1.50 and $7.50 or so… it’s stupid… but it makes me money, so i’m not going to complain… after all, as far as i’ve been able to tell, i am the ONLY place they can get aparajita, or krishna puja 999 online… 🤷

the snow is mostly gone, but we’ve still got at least two more months of actual winter before things usually start getting back to normal, and despite what that “evangelical” preacher i saw a video of THIS MORNING says about “global warming doesn’t exist because it says so in the bible” (🤬), climate change has already had more than one negative effect on the environment around here, so i’m not going to hold my breath. it really astounds me that we are twenty years into the 21st century, and there are STILL people who believe in angels, demons, jeezis, and “de debbil”, but DO NOT accept the evidence of their own eyes concerning climate change, the economy, abortion, homelessness, health care, gay marriage… people in positions of authority whose word most other people treat with considerably more credibility than mine. 🗡🤬

HAH! 😤

Tuesday, 20221206 przxqgl

yesterday something happened to my “widgets” — the things that contain the various content in the left hand side bar on this page — that caused them to disappear, and be replaced with the “default” widgets, which were boring and didn’t actually convey any useful information. at the time, i was on my way to a rehearsal, and couldn’t take the time to fuck around with it, and figure out where my content went to… but today is something different.

at first, i figured i would just rebuild the content that i could remember, but then i realised that i had A LOT of content that i didn’t remember — the list of haikus, for example, or the excerpt from “Kissing Hank’s Ass” — which i WOULD NOT be able to recreate from memory… because my memory sucks. 🤕

but then i remembered… i have a plugin called “updraft”, which makes a weekly backup of the entire site, and downloads it to my (new) cloud drive. i could just restore the most recent database backup, and it would only delete one post: the post that i made, yesterday, called “BUGGER! 😠” which complained about my not having the time to fuck around with it.

so i restored the most recent backup, which restored my OLD widgets, then i took their advice and changed them from “text” widgets that contained HTML code (which, apparently, is “bad”), to “image” and “custom HTML” widgets, which, essentially, work EXACTLY THE SAME, but don’t have a tendency to arbitrarily disappear with no warning.

i don’t have yesterday’s post, but i’ve got all my widgets restored, and now, instead of having a grumpy post about how things don’t work, i’ve got a triumphant post about how i’ve been able to overcome adversity. 👍

pictures, weather

snow(pocalypse?) 2022

Thursday, 20221201 przxqgl

it’s early enough in the season that i hesitate to call it an actual “snowpocalypse” (particularly since mercer island apparently has no snow at all), but, around here, it’s bad enough that i had to cancel my attendence at the (essential) panto rehearsal, last night, and i’m going (once they open) to have to cancel my attendence at my circus class this afternoon. 😒

moe waited until 8:00 am to go in to work, and, apparently, the “main road” is clear (having been plowed this morning), but i still worry about her ability to get home. yesterday, she left work at 5:00 pm, and didn’t actually get home until 7:30, because of the snow/traffic that had built up in issaquah… and she said the state patrol had just closed down eastbound highway 18 as she was going by.

AND i have four incense orders that have been scheduled to ship out today, and it doesn’t look as though i’ll be able to do it, because… well… moe took the truck, and my car is snowed in! 😠

i hate snow. 👎

BUT… there’s this weird thing happening in the pond across the street, this morning. i THINK i know what is happening, but that doesn’t make it any less weird:

i think that this circular hole in the pond is where there’s something (a branch, i think) sticking through the surface of the pond, and making a place where the snow/ice doesn’t stick… i’m not sure, because i have never seen this kind of thing before, but that’s the only thing i can think of.

blog birthday, pictures, players, twit-turd, weather

both blirgday &c.

Wednesday, 20221130 przxqgl

on this day, in 2007, i started this blog, as a response to livejournal selling out to the russians, which means that this blog has been in existence for 15 years, in more-or-less the same place. i wonder if it will last another 15 years. 😏 as a result of getting closer and closer to leaving “twit-turd”, i have established a presence at linktr.ee, where i put ALL the links to EVERYWHERE that i might be contacted… which is a little strange, because, as far as i know, it is the first time i have EVER posted, in the same place, links to personalities that i have endeavoured to keep separate, prior to this. it is also a bit strange, because i actually switched my harmonic flute video to “public” from “you can’t see it unless i gave you the link”, because i didn’t want “salamandir” and “rev. deluxe” obviously associated with each other. now, i’m not as concerned, i don’t think anyone of consequence will notice, and, even if someone of consequence DOES notice, it simply doesn’t bother me as much as it did 15 or 20 years ago.

“twit-turd” has become a seething morass of white supremacists, nazis, fascists, MAGAts, drumpf-lovers, vaccine denial, and hatred, ALL OF WHICH is more-or-less unmoderated, because (among other stupid things he’s done), when “ELONgated MUSKrat” bought it (under duress), the first thing he did was to re-instate a whole bunch of people who had been kicked off the service, for violating rules that “ELONgated MUSKrat” disagreed with… which, at this point, includes “Fartgorie Taylor-Greene” (who was booted for spreading vaccine misinformation), and Donald J. Drumpf, himself (who was booted for spreading lies about the 2020 election). how long i stay there is still up in the air, but it’s a matter of days, weeks, or months, and certainly not more than a year, unless some massive change happens. 😒

the first show of 2022 fell yesterday. it wasn’t very much, but it’s enough that i am re-thinking my plans to go to the panto rehearsal this evening, despite the fact that we only have three more rehearsals until the show starts.

this was yesterday, at approximately 9:30 in the morning. i PROBABLY could have driven my car in this amount of snow, but unfortunately…

this was today, at approximately 7:45 in the morning… i definitely COULD NOT drive my car with this amount of snow… moe says that, outside of our neighbourhood, the roads are plowed, clear, and passable, but… from where i sit, it looks like a skating rink, and i have to get up a hill (which moe said is a skating rink) in order to get out of the neighbourhood… and the only reason moe knows this is because she took the truck, loaded with concrete blocks to work today, because her car needs new tires (which she just discovered yesterday, after having slid around on various streets on her way home from work, yesterday).

genealogy, genetics, moe, pictures

weird genealogy

Saturday, 20221126 przxqgl

we got a whole bunch of new information about moe’s ancestors, and one family group caught my eye almost immediately: moe’s 4xgreat grandparents were related to each other…

the brother married into one family, the sister married into another family, they both produced children, who, then, married each other to produce one of moe’s 2xgreat grandfathers…

her 3x great grandparents were first cousins…

we don’t know, for sure, who the brother’s parents were, but they were born 15 years apart, in the same town, in the same county, in the same region of the netherlands, so the probability is fairly high… 🤣

COVID19, house stuff, miscellaneous, unicycle

and, as expected…

Monday, 20221121 przxqgl

i felt like a truck had run over me, on saturday… slept for a large portion of it, while the TV was on, which might give you an impression of how “out of it” i felt. i recovered enough to go to my unicycle class, on sunday, but i was winded about 20 minutes into it, and i had to take a couple of “breathers” after that. our alternate unicycle coach, nick, is the unicyclist i saw at the moisture festival this year (from the band pit, so the wheel of the unicycle was, literally, within 10 feet of me) do a perfect free mount and ride away, with a woman standing on his shoulders… during MULTIPLE shows, so it wasn’t just a fluke. 😂 i am tantalizingly close to being able to free mount… at this point i would say i’m doing it about a third of the time. i keep making microscopic adjustments in what i’m doing, and it’s really frustrating when i find something that works, and i can’t replicate it reliably enough to do it again… i guess it’s a good thing i’m dedicated, because i am painfully aware of the fact that i STILL can’t do essential things like idling, or riding backwards… 🙄 oh well, some day, maybe… i suppose…

then i came home and burned the pile of summer detritus in the fire pit across the street… except that a bunch of it was so green that it wouldn’t even burn… like a bunch of unripe tomatoes from the garden, and a bunch of leaves from the brussels sprout plants… but, because i was using a propane flame thrower as the fire-starter, and an electric leaf blower to accelerate things, i ended up making “fried green tomatoes”… 😉

today i was supposed to meet up with gunnar (i have a bag of weed for him 😉) but, before i left home, i got a text message from him that said “Cannot feline. Oils yoy mail”… um… ¿؟፧‽ so i called him. he explained that he hasn’t been getting enough sleep lately, and was not going to be there, so i drove down to puyallup, via our old neighbourhood, went by rick’s old place (there’s someone else living there, unsurprisingly) and came back by way of enumclaw, black diamond, and ravensdale.

COVID19

booster #5

Friday, 20221118 przxqgl

i got my fifth COVID booster today, along with my annual flu shot. i’m feeling okay, so far, but my arms are sore. if tradition holds, i will be feeling under the weather tomorrow. whee. 😒

malfunctioning people, rants, stupid people

extremism

Saturday, 20221112 przxqgl

i’ve been reading, the past couple of days, about “extremism” on the right, and on the left, as being somehow equal in their “extremism”. i was reading about how alexandria ocasio-cortez had to “stand up” to an interviewer who tried to imply that the two forms of “extremism” are the same, and it reminds me of something my old friend xydexx said about nazis. imagine this:

you and your extended family are having a potluck picnic, and everyone is supposed to provide some food. but when you arrive at the picnic, there, sitting in the middle of the table, is a huge steaming platter of dog shit, surrounded by dishes of actual food, provided by other relatives. do you want to interact with the person who put the dog shit in the middle of the table? and what about the rest of the food… would you be inclined to eat ANYTHING from a table that featured a huge steaming platter of dogshit? would you be inclined to talk kindly and gently with the person who provided that platter, to find out what their story is, to find out what possessed them to bring a huge steaming platter of dog shit to your family picnic? would you be anxious to hear their reasons for messing up your picnic? would you ignore it, hoping that the perpetrator would change, if given a good example?

the probability is very high that you would not do those things, but that you would find out who the perpetrator is, and eject them (forcefully, if necessary) from the picnic area.

that is the difference between “extremism” on the left versus “extremism” on the right: “extremism” on the left is more inclined to help other people, regardless of who they are, whereas “extremism” on the right wants everything their way, and if it’s not exactly the way they lay it out, they’re going to mess up the picnic for everyone.

xydexx has a multi-paragraph statement about this, but that’s basically what it boils down to. in xydexx’s version, the furry fandom is the extended family, and nazis and other fur-haters bring the dog shit, but the argument expands nicely. when people say “there are two sides to every argument” when the discussion is about having a country with universal health care, instead of causing harm to people you don’t like (furries, gays, trans, etc., etc…), you know that whoever is saying it is probably NOT someone you would want to invite to your picnic.

HPOI, zelle

↑ 221110 – HPOI (sort of)

Thursday, 20221110 przxqgl

i can’t use zelle for accepting payments, because it makes the customer have to go through an extra step, with which they are not familiar (and, i suspect, somewhat skeptical), but it turns out that i can use zelle for making payments to people in other countries — in this case, tibet — a lot easier and faster than i could using a wire transfer or western union.

it turns out i was somewhat skeptical, myself… i made a payment of almost $300 to someone i only sort of vaguely know, from tibet, and didn’t hear anything back from them for a few days, which made me wonder… and then, yesterday, i got an alert from my bank that the payment hadn’t been collected because the person i sent it to was not signed up with zelle, which made me very concerned, especially since i read the other day that zelle, and the bank that’s behind zelle (key bank? i don’t remember… one of the lesser-well-known ones) are being sued by… germany, i think, or something like that… because of all the zelle scams that have been cropping up.

it turns out that they were just getting their shit together, as well, and hadn’t completed the process of signing up, because i got a notice today that the payment had gone through, and then i got a response from the person in tibet, saying that they had received my payment, and would be shipping me a medium-ish pile of incense soon.

it seems to me to be a payment method that is RIPE for scams, but, when it’s not used for scams, it is a GENIUS way of transfering money. 😉

miscellaneous

update

Wednesday, 20221109 przxqgl

the word that i’ve heard is that the democretins won most of the most essential races, but not others. and georgia is going to a runoff between republicretin herschel walker (a “christian” anti-abortionist brainless ex-football jock who has allegedly paid for at least two abortions with two different women, and has multiple unacknowleged children with multiple other women), and democrud rev. raphael warnock (an actual Christian minister) who, at last count, was winning by THOUSANDS of votes… 😒 now we have to worry about the global economy, which is still more or less up in the air. 😒

the most recent incense order i recieved didn’t have the shipping charges included, which is a major problem. a little bit of investigation, combined with a brief back-and-forth with the developers confirmed a bug in the version of woocommerce square plugin that i was using, which is, if the customer doesn’t enter the state that they live in, the shipping charges are not included on their reciept, and they can proceed through checkout without having to enter the state in which they live… which is DEFINITELY a bad for business, as it requires me having to write the customer and ask for more money. presumably i have been updated to the most recent (fixed) version of the plugin, after having to explain that my questions about cost were not a criticism of how much it costs, to the web designer, who was all set to cancel the web maintenance agreement that we’ve had for the past three years. 😒

i lied… i have actually logged into twit-turd twice since i said i was not going to login for a couple of days… but the fact that the democrasts have done somewhat better than expected has made it somewhat more tolerable.

corruption, crazy people, depression, frustration, i am a terrorist, i am antifa, people suck, political, the very big stupid

scary…

Tuesday, 20221108 przxqgl

today is the midterm election.

republicunts are projected to win majorities in both the house and senate, which means that

they plan on impeaching president biden, more out of spite than anything else (because there’s nothing to charge him with, but that won’t make a difference, because democretins impeached #drumpf TWICE 😒), and…
they are actively planning on (and bragging about it)
1. eliminating social security and medicare
2. any and all investigations into the crimes of #drumpf, the stolen government documents at mar-a-lago, and the january 6th insurrection will cease immediately
3. a national ban on abortion
4. a national ban on birth control
5. a repeal of gay marriage
6. further oppression of trans people
7. making cannabis and other marginally legal drugs illegal again
8. further wanton environmental destruction, promoting oil, coal, and elimination of endangered species protections
9. gerrymandering and further voter suppression to make future election wins by democretins a lot more difficult
10. other horrendously awful, inhumane, and massively unpopular stuff, primarily because they can.

and, if they win, there’s a much greater chance that #drumpf will run for president, again, and if he does, he will likely win, because of the republicunts’ love affair with voter suppression, and that will basically be the end of a democratic united states. 🤬

and if they don’t win at all (preferably), or if they don’t win enough to make a difference, the republican’ts have openly vowed to wreck the global economy, by refusing to raise the debt limit.

i am staying OFF twit-turd… maybe forever, but at least for a couple of days, or until the election FUBAR has died down a little.

hybrid elephant, incense, square, stripe, stripe sucks, zelle

payment gateway and business update

Friday, 20221104 przxqgl

officially, square works. i got an order for >$90 from hong kong transferred to my bank account today. i already confirmed that it works for domestic packages, but the fact that it also works on international packages is the final step. now, officially, the only thing i am using stripe for is IOTM subscriptions, and i’ve only got 15 of those left before i shut the whole thing down.

officially, zelle works, but not in the way i was expecting, nor the way that THREE representatives of BECU explained to me. there IS NO “zelle for businesses” (or, if there is, it’s not available from BECU, because it’s “not free”, or something like that… 🤷). what happens is that i, now, have two new accounts at BECU, a consumer savings account, and a consumer checking account (to go along with my “business” checking and savings accounts). when i want to use zelle, i have to transfer money from my business checking to my personal checking, and THEN i can use zelle to send money. i found this out because i ordered a smallish pile of incense from tibet, and they wanted me to use zelle for payment (which i think is a GENIUS idea, because it’s essentially instantaneous, and avoids all the fees that wire transfers or western union entail). so now i have a smallish pile of incense from tibet that i’m expecting some time within the next month or so.

uline has apparently been donating hundreds of thousands of dollars to republican/right wing/homophobic/anti-abortion/nazi/fascist horseshit with more and greater frequency, recently, and i finally got fed up with using their triangular boxes. i found another source of essentially identical triangular boxes, which are BOTH better AND cheaper, so the last 20 or so boxes from uline are going to be the last i use before i switch my brand loyalty to the boxery. i have a half a jillion uline packing slip envelopes, but i bought them before we moved, and i’ll be using them up for years before i’ll have to worry about getting more. 😏

busking, geek links, music, technology

🙄

Thursday, 20221103 przxqgl

so, i decided to reposition major furniture in my office, to achieve the following results:

i have to figure out how my studio is set up. i originally set it up to use with the piano/synthesizer setup, and i seem to recall doing at least one piece of music in that configuration… and then i set it up some other way, which i don’t remember, and now everything is mixed up and i can’t figure it out, because all of the connections are on the back of the devices, and in order to access the back of the amplifier, i have to move the printer, and stand on a stool, while leaning over the printer, and accessing the back upside down… which isn’t ideal. what i need is the back of everything to be as easily accessible as the front, which means moving stuff around.
in the process of trying to figure out how the studio stuff was hooked up, i thought i had completely disconnected every audio connection from my computer to the amplifier… and yet, i seem to be able to play music from my computer, and hear the sound through the speakers… which would seem to indicate that there is a new/different/as-yet-undiscovered audio connection that i have overlooked somehow… (possibly the HDMI connection from the monitor, but how does it get to the amplifier??? 😕) but, unfortunately, the cables from the computer to the amplifier are accessed from the back, AND under my desk… which is REALLY not ideal… i’ve got to figure that out.

this may involve a trip to ikea and possibly a new desk, as the one that i have is a repurposed ikea table.

the reason i want to figure out how my studio works (again), is because i have recently discovered jamulus, which appears to be an audio interface that is designed to be used over internet. i realise that there’s some pretty hard physical constants that make audio connections… let’s say difficult… over long distances, but, apparently, distances less than 50 miles or so the latency is tolerable, and they get around the rest of it, sketchily, by having everyone listen to the server, and not the actual sound coming out of your instrument, and… well, i haven’t been able to busk the past couple of weeks (HVAC stuff), and i’ve been going nuts, because there are new songs that we’ve been talking about, but we can’t get together and rehearse because i have to be at home to let the workers in… and now i’ve got jamulus installed, and (apparently) working… all i have to do is hook up a microphone, which i do, but… no sound… and thus began the task of figuring out how the studio is set up.

there’s another thing i tried to get set up, but couldn’t, because of a lack of installation instructions. JamStud.io actually advertises “jam online without latency”, despite the fact that, as far as i know, scientists are still stymied by the speed of light 😉 which makes it impossible to have an audio connection without more and more latency as the distance increases… but, hey… if i could get it installed, i might be using that, instead.

samhain

💀💣

Monday, 20221031 przxqgl

i made a bunch of operation mindfuck envelopes, which i intend to give to “trick-or-treaters” tonight, but not in the way they expect. moe put an announcement in the neighbourhood farcebook group that we would put candy outside our house, for whoever wanted to come by and take it, to do so… but moe is going to be at one of her dog classes, this evening, and probably won’t get back until 8:30 or so, so i’m going to put a big bowl of candy on a chair, next to our mailbox, and then i’m going to put on my black djellaba, and my black burnous, and my wizard hat, and skulk about in the shadows (of which there are plenty) and pop out at people with bizarre secret messages. 🧙😈

this is a test: 🫨 the test is over. hmmmm… 🧐

house stuff, ron zeising

more ron zeising shenanigans

Wednesday, 20221026 przxqgl

ron zeising is the former owner of our house. he is a general contractor, and, as the former owner of our house, seemed to think that he could do things to the house without doing them properly — or at all — and get away with it a lot easier, because he was a general contractor who “knew how to do things”… like build decks (wrong), or run electrical service to an outbuilding (wrong), or install HVAC systems (wrong), or do duct-work (wrong)…

the most recent shenanigan that we have uncovered is the fact that, i’m about 99% sure at this point that the ONLY reason he installed the “latest, top-of-the-line” heating and cooling system in this house, was to increase the resale value of the house. i know, from a couple of the next door neighbours, that he never actually USED the system, because he heated the house with the wood stove in the winter, and left all the doors and windows open in the summer… and, yet, when we bought the house, one of the big selling points was that it had the “latest, top-of-the-line” HVAC system… we very quickly discovered that the cooling part of the system had been installed, but it was never hooked up. and now, we’ve discovered that exactly the same thing was true of the heating system, as well. the last time we had trouble with the heating system, we blamed it on the duct-work — which was installed by ron zeising — and had that replaced… but that was spring time, and we weren’t using the heating system. now, when the weather is getting colder, we discovered that it wasn’t entirely the duct-work. what we discovered is that the heating elements weren’t hooked up, and the blower wasn’t hooked up. they were installed, but… ron never used them, so he didn’t bother to finish the installation, because he didn’t have to.

i’m really glad we got this house, and the next door neighbours are SUPER AWESOME (especially compared to our former neighbours, who were crack addicts), but i’m also really glad ron zeising left the area, because if he hadn’t, i could imagine all kinds of nasty things i could do to his “business”… 😒

circus, depression, ketchup, mushrooms, OM, unicycle

in the humdrum

Sunday, 20221023 przxqgl

monday moe was in vegas. i got a whole bunch of spam, DIDN’T have my regular counselling appointment because of a misread calendar, two weeks ago, DIDN’T get my tires rotated in spite of waiting around for an hour while they DIDN’T rotate my tires… 😒 i’m still not totally sure what happened: i made an appointment, showed up before i was supposed to be there, told the guy that i had an appointment, which he confirmed, and then… i waited for an hour, went up to the counter to inquire when they were going to get to my car, and was told “within the hour”, but i had other places to be, so i had to bail and come back later in the week…

and i was already ripe for mushrooms… 😒

wednesday, the smoke from wildfires (i never bothered to find out where they were) was bad enough that both seattle and portland had the WORST air quality in the world — worse than singapore or hong kong. also, apparently, someone dumped, and burned, a human body just up the street from the trailhead to the back side of taylor mountain, where i walk a lot… where i saw the bear… 😒 moe came home. i picked up quill at the puppy-sitter’s place near lake desire at 8:30, and picked up moe at the airport at 9:30.

thursday i had my circus class, and on the way back home, driving down I5, the smoke was bad enough that i couldn’t see more than a mile or so in front of me. 😒 then got my tires rotated — for real, this time. i was in and out inside of 15 minutes. a guy i had never seen before, but who i assumed was one of the managers, said that he “knew all about” the fiasco on monday, and that they’d get to my car right away… and they did, which kind of surprised me…

friday i decided that i was not going to take as many mushrooms as i had planned, because, by that time, the smoke from the wildfires was really awful. we bought some inflatable halloween decorations — a unicorn skeleton, and two enormous, flashing eyeballs. when it got dark, it started raining, so, naturally, monique decided that was the time to put them out… and the eyeballs (which were my part of the deal) only had one set of tethers, which meant that i had to cut and singe nylon string, in the dark-and-rain…

saturday i actually took mushrooms. instead of four capsules, i only took two, but — as is seemingly fairly typical — all the “good stuff” had filtered to the bottom of the bag, which meant that two capsules was SIGNIFICANTLY more than the past couple of times i had taken four capsules… and it was raining REALLY HARD, so even if i wanted to go up to taylor mountain and risk being high on mushrooms in the vicinity of an actual murder investigation(!!), it was raining hard enough that there was standing water in our back yard, which usually indicates that the trails on taylor are flooded, as well.

it was weird not being able to walk around while tripping balls, as is my usual habit, but i got through it okay… although i REALLY need a beanbag chair, because the only “comfortable” chair in the house is directly in front of the TV set (because that’s where moe usually sits), and, while it is actually big enough for two of us, i REALLY DO NOT want to watch TV while high on mushrooms… so i sat for a couple of hours in the 2nd-most comfortable chair in the house, which is on the opposite end of the house, until i got done peaking, and then it was — more or less — life as usual, only “usual” included being high on mushrooms this time.

we had a karaoke party last night — about 10 people… including one of our next door neighbours, kelly, who i talked to fairly extensively regarding our respective weed crops this year… it still ASTOUNDS me that it is legal, and, while still not technically legal, i have a mental health professional RECOMMENDING that i take mushrooms… 😲

today was the last unicycle class of the session — a new session starts next sunday — and i think i may have gotten back to the point i was at the end of spring session, before “the summer from hell” (which is how i have been referring to the summer of 2022), during which i had very little time, and even less motivation, to practice unicycle.

i have a sousa band rehearsal on tuesday, a circus class on thursday, tracy and kelly (next door neighbours) are having a “costumes optional” halloween party on saturday, and halloween, proper, is on sunday. i have been making more Operation Mindfuck envelopes to be distributed to random people, while in costume, over the coming week.

spam

why?????? 😕

Monday, 20221017 przxqgl 2 Comments

when i woke up this morning, at approximately 8:30, i checked my email, and i had over identical 1,000 spam messages, in my spam folder, and more coming in as i watched… now, at 9:45, i have deleted approximately 1,000 MORE identical spam messages… and there are more coming in at this very moment…

ETA: as of 11:00, i have deleted at least 1,000 MORE identical spam messages… 🙄 if i don’t read it the first time, what could POSSIBLY make a person think that i’ll read it the 5,000th time?

WHY do people do this?

<sigh> 🙄

i suppose it’s similar to asking why people write scripts to delete all the data in unknown peoples’ cloud drives.

as winston churchill said, it doesn’t take all kinds, but there are all kinds. 🙄

doggles, incense of the month club, moe, mushrooms, purple, stripe sucks

grumble…

Sunday, 20221016 przxqgl

moe went to las vegas today. she’ll be back wednesday. the puppy went to stay with someone who is more able to handle a rambunctious puppy who doesn’t realise how big he is. i’m supposed to pick him up on wednesday, before i pick up moe at the airport. the other two dogs are “adults” (and know how to behave), but they are already concerned that moe is gone and won’t be back for a while. under ordinary circumstances, this would be a minor inconvenience, but because of the fact that the north american continent is experiencing YET ANOTHER COVID surge (thanks, republicunt anti-vax morons 🤬), airports are going to be especially dangerous, and vegas (as always) is going to be full of tourists from who-knows-where, who all think that COVID is no longer a concern, because our extremely NOT #drumpf president, joe biden, said that COVID is over. 🤬 and the ones who think joe biden lost the election are the ones who got us this far into the pandemic without any hope in sight, to begin with! 🤬

yeah, i know, it has been a couple months and i really need a mushroom break, but i can’t really take a break from the dogs, and i can’t really take two dogs on a 4-hour hike in the forest while i’m on mushrooms… moe could probably do it… she doesn’t take psychedelics that often, but it’s my impression that the part of her brain that speaks dog isn’t that affected by them. 😉

my stripe problems have vanished. i swiched from stripe to square, disabled the stripe plugin, and that’s the end of it. i’m actually NOT going to cancel my account right away, because i’ve still got 15 IOTM accounts to sell, and i’m really not motivated enough to figure out how to do that on square, in the middle of the run (so to speak). but it feels REALLY good to be quit of them.

bellingham, pictures

the license plate in question

Monday, 20221010 przxqgl

i went to bellingham on saturday. i left maple valley around 10:45, made it to bellingham by 11:30, picked up the license plate and dropped off a bag of weed for darol (i figured he deserves it, considering how many bags of weed he has given me), and made it out to ken and kamala’s new place on hannegan by 12:10, left there around 1:30 and drove down chuckanut on my way home.

and i’m pretty sure that the “old curse of bellingham” (the one where an old indian chief is reputed to have cursed the people that come to bellingham, that they will never be able to leave) is a superstition, because i have no more desire to live in bellingham. i have friends who live there, and it will always be a place i USED TO live, but i have zero desire to move back there. in spite of everything i’ve been complaining about recently, and my state of depression, i would still rather be where i am, than in bellingham.

bellingham, kenyth freeman, malfunctioning people

the story of the license plate…

Friday, 20221007 przxqgl

in 2019, shortly after faddlefum died, i was in line to inherit one of his license plates, which said “BREATH”. my recollection is that francie and i discussed it several times, and i was supposed to pick it up (or have it mailed to me) by the end of july, but i got caught up in stuff, and didn’t contact her until october, at which point she said she had given it to someone else.

i was friends with kenyth for decades, but i don’t know francie more than in passing: she worked with kenyth before i met him, but she moved out of town (new york, or something, is my recollection), and came back and got married to him until after i had moved out of bellingham, when kenyth already knew that he had alzheimer’s.

i figured that it was because she didn’t know how much kenyth meant to me, and went on with my life, DRAMATICALLY disappointed in the choices kenyth made about a life-partner, and without much motivation to be in contact with her in the future…

and that was where it stood until a couple of days ago, when i got email from francie, saying that she is getting ready to move and came across kenyth’s license plate, and would i be interested in having it.

and, it turns out, it is a VERY GOOD THING i didn’t say something about the fact that she told me she gave it to someone else, because the process of getting back to her involved discovering that gmail is blocking messages from hybridelephant AGAIN, which had me calling kamala to see if she had a phone number for her, and, in the process of explaining the whole thing to kamala, she mentioned that francie had the license plate on display in her house for the past couple of years. maybe i’ll mention it after i have it in my hands.

i can understand if she’s a grieving widow who doesn’t want to give away something that reminds her of her husband (even if he was her husband for a relatively short period of time, kenyth had that kind of effect on some people, particularly women)… but i DO NOT understand telling me that she had given it to someone else, and then putting it on display in her house.

nevertheless, i’m going to bellingham tomorrow, to retrieve the license plate from her. she says she’s having an “open studio” tomorrow evening, in bay street village (which is where the PHBFH lived when i first moved to seattle to go to the tech school), and it will give me a chance to see ken and kamala’s new place… and i might stop by and say hi to darol, as well.

articles, geek stuff, technology

You thought you bought software – all you bought was a lie

Tuesday, 20221004 przxqgl

THIS!

exactly, all of THIS!

this is PRECISELY the reason i prefer to use FOSS whenever possible!

i AM one of those “1990s Linux proponents” although i didn’t start using linux on my own computers until 2000 — the last version of windows i installed was W2K server. before that time, i was predominantly a mac-head. i tested windoesn’t software (testing windows is easy, because there are plenty of bugs to be found), and used linux (and unix) at work for years, but i used macs for everything else… while i was building up the courage to switch to linux on my own machine. 😉

cannabis, homegrown, miscellaneous, pictures, square

up. date.

Monday, 20221003 przxqgl

the most recent payment gateway to be tried is square. i checked authorize.net, but they want a $25 a month fee above and beyond the credit card processing fee, and sometimes i don’t make $25 in a month. square seems to be a viable alternative which comes highly recommended by at least one business-owner that i know personally (despite the fact that my web developer says “this one is one of the worse gateways” – he also accuses me of “refusing” to use paypal, however, which just goes to show how much he really knows) and i actually signed up for a square account a few years ago, when i bought a credit card reader for my phone… which i never used because i never needed to. apart from the fact that i have to go through all 323 products that i sell, one at a time, and mark them “sync with Square” (i’m still not certain what it even means, yet, but i’m sure i will find out soon enough…) i’m hoping that this will be the end of my credit-card-processor search for a while, because i’m done with it.

harvested one plant today. i was manicuring it, yesterday and today, and i found a small patch of mold on one of the buds, so i snipped it off, finished manicuring it, and gave it the chop. the other plant still has a couple weeks to a month before it’ll be ready, but, because of the mold on the other plant, i’ve got to be even more aware than i am normally, if i don’t want a moldy mess instead of nice fat buds…

however, currently, i have a fine crop of nice fat buds, so i’m hoping to keep it that way. 😉

hybrid elephant, rants, zelle

oyoyoyoyoyOYOYOY!!! 😒 (part 2, continued)

Wednesday, 20220928 przxqgl

so, i emailed woocommerce tech support. they told me that they didn’t see a zelle-compatible gateway installed. i told them that i was using “Direct Bank Transfer (BACS)”, according to THEIR instructions, which were given to me by an employee of THEIR company.

then they informed me that their plugin DOESN’T SUPPORT ZELLE…⁈

so i took them through the process of enabling zelle ON THEIR PLUGIN, and enabling zelle at my bank, and THEN they tell me… oh, if you do it that way, YOUR CUSTOMER has to go through this EXTRA STEP to send you the payment, and until THEY do this extra step, their order will be placed “on hold”.

which is NOT going to work on my web site: incense customers are impatient and flighty. if they have to go through this extra step to make a payment, they’re going to abandon their shopping cart, not make a payment, and not get any incense.

which is “BAD FOR BUSINESS™” 😒

i wish this little piece of information could have been conveyed to me A MONTH AGO, when i had three separate email conversations and a zoom call with a woocommerce representative, named bradley gilkerson, who ASSURED ME that it was fully compatible with zelle (false), and that all my customers would have to do was enter their credit card information (false) and it would instaneously (false) be transferred to my zelle account (false) without extra fees for credit card processing (false). 🤬

220909 how many things can you find wrong with this email?

so, basically, i have wasted a month, and $200, getting a plugin that won’t work, installed and set up, only to discover that it won’t work, and now i have to UNINSTALL the plugin that won’t work, and find a new, different plugin that WILL work… and (hopefully) do it all before stripe decides that they’re going to cancel my account… AGAIN!! 🤬

frustration, hybrid elephant, stripe sucks, zelle

oyoyoyoyoyOYOY! 😒

Tuesday, 20220927 przxqgl

will it ever end?

i got zelle enabled and installed on my web site. i tried to test it, by purchasing incense: entering my information, and checking out. i got a notification from the web site that i had received a new order. i got a notification from the web site that my order had been received, but it had been placed “on hold, while we confirm that payment was received”… and then…

nothing.

i waited 24 hours.

still nothing.

no indication from the bank that either a withddrawal or a deposit had been made, no indication from the bank that either of those things were ABOUT TO happen, and, when i logged in to the web site, there was the order, in “on hold” status.

i contacted woocommerce, maker of the plugin i am using, but it is probably going to take them a while to get back to me, because all of my interactions with them have to go over email.

i actually called the bank, talked to their tech support which is (allegedly) the place to talk about zelle, and went through the entire process of creating a new order, with them watching the back end zelle interface. i got two notifications from the web site, but the bank was unaware that any transaction had taken place at all.

so the bank put in a ticket with zelle, to see if they can figure out what is going on. 🙄

THEN i got email back from woocommerce, which informed me that the woocommerce payments plugin wasn’t completely set up on my site, and that no account had been created. i checked, and the only part of the plugin that “wasn’t installed” was the part where i create an account — WITH STRIPE — so that i can use the plugin to process credit cards… but that’s why i’m using the plugin to begin with: to GET AWAY FROM STRIPE… and besides all that, i am not interested in stripe, i’m interested in zelle, which DOESN’T require that i sign up with stripe… AND i already HAVE a stripe account, and a stripe payment gateway plugin that is completely separate from woocommerce and zelle, and (for the moment, anyway) it appears to be working fine.

i gave them (some of) the information they were asking about, and fudged the rest, but it appears that they lay off work around 4:30 or so, so i anticipate not hearing anything from woocommerce until AT LEAST tomorrow. 🙄

hybrid elephant, incense, mushrooms, stripe sucks

Ƭȟȉȿ Ⱥǹƌ Țħăţ

Friday, 20220923 przxqgl

today i talked, face-to-face, with an actual person at BECU, who told me that “zelle for businesses” is “not a thing”, and that there is ONLY zelle for personal accounts.

however, in order to open a business account at BECU, i had to open a personal account… which has never been used for anything, because i do business through my business account… but there’s no rule that says that personal accounts CAN’T be used for businesses, especially if the only transactions in that personal account are ones that ONLY apply to a business, so i activated my personal account for zelle, and made it so that any money paid to that account automatically gets transferred to my business account, where it belongs.

thus ends the stripe fiasco. all i gotta do now is switch payment gateways on my web site, and i’m quit of stripe.

and good riddance to bad rubbish! 😠

on the other paw, i got two incense orders today, one of which was for 5 boxes of incense, shipped to houston, texas, and one which was for 4 boxes of incense, shipped to ashanti, ghana. the one to houston was addressed to a person named “Nwogbo”, and the one to ashanti went to someone named “Agbogah”… and the one to ashanti was for $5.00 worth of incense! i REALLY DO NOT understand people from remote countries outside of the united states, who order relatively small quantities of incense that i’m POSITIVE are sold locally, and then pay more for shipping than they did for incense. it happens regularly enough that i’ve stopped asking why, and just sending it out, but it’s really mystifying to me.

oh, and on an entirely different subject all together, i have stumbled upon a RELIABLE, LONG-TERM source for mushrooms 🍄 on internet (of all places)… i got the first batch through a twitter acquaintance (which was REALLY weird), and the second batch i got “direct from the manufacturer” — a place called Matrix Genetix — which was an experience so far beyond “really weird” that it defies description… i got an ounce of APEs, which are a strain of cubensis. not my all-time favourite, but, at this point, any port in a storm…

spam, the mallet

YAAAAAA!!!! 😈

Thursday, 20220922 przxqgl

i got home from my circus class this afternoon, and discovered approximately 1000 IDENTICAL spam messages in my spam recepticle. over the course of the next half an hour or so, i deleted approximately 500 more IDENTICAL spam messages…

so i decided to do some research. what i came up with is that EVERY ONE of those spam messages had been sent from an IP address in the range of 37.32.0.0/16, in iran.

so i blocked it.

and NO MORE SPAM from that range of IP addresses. not a single one! 👍

THIS is why i do it! 😈

pictures

surreal 2

Sunday, 20220918 przxqgl

this is what i wanted with #3, yesterday, but i didn’t get the offset right, because i wasn’t working with an extended background, once i extended it, i was able to get the offset where i wanted it.

it looks better the bigger it is… it might be cool as a heroic-size portrait… 😉

pictures

surreal

Saturday, 20220917 przxqgl

1 and 2 are straight from apple messaging phone. 3 is from the gimp, and is a combination of 2 and the reverse of 2. moe thinks they’re creepy. i disagree.

rants, stripe sucks

i thought it was the end, but i was wrong. 🤬

Monday, 20220912 przxqgl

this morning, i learned that, despite the fact that my bank allows the use of zelle, it only allows personal accounts to use it. “zelle for businesses” is, apparently, a “pay-for” application that isn’t used by the bank, so i can’t switch to using zelle, like i thought i was going to be able to do for the past couple of days.

argh! 😒

while i was freaking out about that, i got an email from stripe (at 6:30 in the morning), which said:

Unfortunately, following an additional review of your account, we’re still unable to support your business as it falls under our restricted businesses. Specifically, we are unable to accept payments for herbal incense , as mentioned on our restricted businesses list (https://stripe.com/restricted-businesses).

HERBAL INCENSE????

first they said it was tobacco products, then they said it was items “which mimic illegal drugs”, THEN they said it was because i “accept payments for aggregation or grouping of funds” (which i STILL don’t know what they’re talking about, and now i don’t think they know, either), and now it’s because i carry “herbal incense”????

T??

F???

need i mention that there is NO restriction on businesses which carry “herbal incense” on their list of restricted businesses… 😠

so i sent them a response, saying that.

45 minutes later, i got this message from stripe:

In order to provide you assistance with this inquiry, my colleagues and I will be reviewing this case, so we can provide you with the proper information about the verification of your company and the reason for the restrictions of this type of business and once we have a response to this concern we will reach out back to you.

which was followed, half an hour later, by this:

I just wanted to let you know that we have successfully completed our review of your account, and your payouts have been re-enabled.We may be asking for more information down the line, but for now you’re all set.

W??

T????

F?????? 😵

so, if i parse this correctly, on 220823, they said they were going to cancel my account. then, on 220829, they said they weren’t going to cancel my account. then, on 220901 they said they were going to cancel my account for a different reason, and on 220908 they said they were going to cancel my account for yet another different reason, which they emphasised on 220909. then, this morning, (220912) they said they were going to cancel my account for another FURTHER different reason, and then they changed their minds, and said they WEREN’T going to cancel my account. 😵🤬

it’s a really good thing i kept detailed records of this fiasco, because i wouldn’t be able to keep it straight, otherwise. 😠

needless to say, as soon as i can locate another payment gateway that ISN’T stripe, i’ll be switching hybrid elephant to that, because, as it is, this is totally ridiculous! 🤬

miscellaneous

Saturday, 20220910 przxqgl

today i learned about the composer carl orff, who lived from 1895 to 1982. i’m somewhat embarrassed to say that i thought he was a 19th century composer, and i was shocked to discover that his lifetime and mine overlapped, despite the fact that i have actually played the piece he’s most famous for, which is the oratorio known as “Carmina Burana”… he was still alive when i played it, too. 😉 but he is also the originator of what has come to be called the Orff Schulwerk method of music education, which is, primarily, intended for children, but can be extrapolated very easily to encompass special needs students, and (significantly for me) older people who have some movement difficulty. there is the Evergreen Chapter of the American Orff Schulwerk Association which i have written to, in order to get more information, because this inspires me in a way that i haven’t been inspired in a long time.

also, i was looking at the wiktionary article for litmus, where i learned that the etymology comes from the protogermanic cognate “blee” which means “colour” or “hue”… at first i thought it might have been a typo for “bleed”, but no, it’s “blee“…

so, this has been a week from hell, but i’m still capable of finding things that aren’t hell, that interest me. 🤔

stripe sucks

stripe — the end 🤬

Friday, 20220909 przxqgl

this morning, i got the following email:

220909 - Stripe - The End — 220909 – Stripe – The End

the only mention of “Stripe Connect” (which is an API, and not an actual, finished product) on the “restricted businesses list” is a restriction on “C2C services outside of Stripe Connect” in japan.

as far as i can tell, “C2C” can mean “Customer To Customer”, or “Consumer To Consumer, or “Corporation To Corporation”, or “Cradle To Career”, or Coast To Coast”, or “Coups 2 Cross” (a band), or “Kabushiki-gaisha C2C” (a japanese animation studio), or… there’s no telling which one they mean… and i no longer have the patience to wait for their explanation.

my business is not in japan.

i don’t carry any products that fall into the category of “accepting payments for aggregation or grouping of funds”.

and, on top of all that, stripe monetizes white-supremacist and neo-nazi web sites, which i have known about ever since i switched to them, but was never motivated enough to do anything about it.

they gave me until next tuesday to be off their services.

stripe sucks

stripe, again, still! 🤬

Thursday, 20220908 przxqgl

i got a message from stripe, this morning. it said:

Unfortunately, following an additional review of your account for Hybrid Elephant, we’re still unable to support your business as it falls under one of our restricted businesses categories. Specifically, we are unable to accept payments for tobacco products, as mentioned on our restricted businesses list.

however, they ~~can’t~~ won’t tell me which products are causing the issue! 🤬

i have stooped to contacting them on twitter, to see if i can get new eyes on the problem, but, at this point, i’m not going to hold my breath that there will be a change in the outcome.

the only thing i can hope for, at this point, is that i can delay their cancelling my account until i can get a new credit card gateway installed and working… and, at this point, it doesn’t look good. 🤬

ETA:

We’re unable to reveal the exact reasons as to why your account presents a high risk, for security reasons, but we do thorough reviews of every account before coming to this difficult decision.

so they WON’T tell me what products i carry that increase their risk, they’ll just shut me down and tell me to go somewhere else. 🤬

#StripeSucks!!!

stripe sucks

stripe, again… 😒

Tuesday, 20220906 przxqgl

as expected, stripe didn’t pull their head out of their collective ass today.

I apologize for the delay and inconvenience this may have caused. I’ll have this shared with my team for further review, and should be back in touch with you as soon as we’re done.Feel free to get in touch with us in the meantime if there’s anything else we can help with.

maybe tomorrow… 😒 #StripeSucks

stripe sucks

stripe, still… 🙄

Monday, 20220905 przxqgl

so, friday was the day that stripe said it was going to cancel my account. if the existence of my account is any indication, they have NOT done that… yet…

however, the last thing any stripe employee said to me was “I was able to check that your website products are not related to tobacco products or services. However, I cannot confirm anything for you at this time until a result of this validation is obtained.” so, i’m still not sure they WON’T cancel my account for, alledgedly, selling “tobacco products”. 😒

and, of course, this is a “holiday” (“labour day” was created to distract americans from “may day”, which is actually the holiday for labourers), which means that the earliest i expect to hear about this most recent “validation” is tomorrow… but i’m not going to hold my breath that it’s going to happen at all… in fact, it wouldn’t surprise me at all if i NEVER hear about it from stripe, especially because, as soon as i can settle on which one it’s going to be, i’m going to change credit card gateways to one that actually does their job, and doesn’t make unsubstantiated judgements about things that do not concern them. 🤬

and, thanks to my recent mushroom experience, i STILL give less of a fuck about these things, than i did prior to taking mushrooms, in spite of the fact that i am still very anxious and depressed. mushrooms are good for you (or, at least, for me)! 😉👍👍

stripe, stripe sucks

🤬🤬🤬STRIPE!!🤬🤬🤬

Thursday, 20220901 przxqgl

stripe! 🙄

on 220823, i received a notice from stripe, saying that they were going to cancel my account, because i carried “tobacco products”.

i submitted a request for review on 220823. they said that they would get back to me within 48 hours, to evaluate my request.

on 220826 (72 hours later, 24 hours BEYOND their self-specified limit), i still hadn’t heard anything, so i got in contact with them. they said “the review is taking too long as expected” (🙄) and told me to be patient.

on 220828 (120 hours BEYOND their self-specified limit 😒), i got a notice that said “We have successfully completed our review, and you are welcome to continue processing payments with Stripe.”

on 220829, i got a notice that said “We’re contacting you to let you know that we’ve successfully completed a review of your account based on the information you recently provided to us.” and my account status went from “in review” to “good to go”.

on 220901, i got a notice that said “Unfortunately, following an additional review of your account for Hybrid Elephant, we’re still unable to support your business as it falls under one of our restricted businesses categories. Specifically, we are unable to accept payments for tobacco products…”

i STILL don’t carry ANY “tobacco products”, and since 220826, i have REMOVED AND DELETED any products i carry which MIGHT BE MISTAKEN FOR “tobacco products”. 😒

so, i contacted their helpdesk.

the first person i spoke to said that there was no need to worry, that my account was “good to go”, and not to be concerned. when i asked them if they could explain to me why i received that notice this morning, they shunted me off to a member of their “specialised team”, who wouldn’t answer my question about why i received the notification this morning, but ALSO wouldn’t confirm that my account is “good to go”, either. he said ” I would like to make sure that I’ll provide you with the accurate information so please bear with me while we complete our review to your account.”

so, my stripe account has now gone through THREE (or four) reviews in the past two weeks, and they STILL can’t determine whether or not i carry “restricted products” (even though i clearly DO NOT).

once this whole thing gets settled, permanently, i AM going to switch credit card processors, because STRIPE SUCKS!!! 🤬🤬🤬

and that’s NOT TO MENTION the fact that stripe monetises white-supremacists and nazis, and i have been looking for a reason to dump them anyway. 🤬

cannabis, homegrown, pictures

buddlies

Monday, 20220829 przxqgl

pretty good shots, for my phone… although, i admit that the shots got orders of magnitude more difficult as the range decreased… the last one was the best of five shots, the other four of which were blurry because i was breathing. 😉

mushrooms, pictures, stress

my “don’t give a fuck” pill 🍄

Friday, 20220826 przxqgl

mushrooms.

mushrooms are my “don’t give a fuck” pill.

when i get cranky, depressed, irritable, out-of-sorts, and tired of doing anything, my “don’t give a fuck” pill helps me survive all of the unjust, inconsiderate, and outright wrong things that are happening to and around me. 😒

yeah, it doesn’t make the problems go away, or even diminish noticably, but what it does is gives me the ability to “not give a fuck” rather than letting them fuck with my brain to the point of incapacity.

that’s what MEDICINE SHOULD DO!

my MENTAL HEALTH PRACTICIONER TOLD ME to take mushrooms. — it still BLOWS MY MIND that i was given this instruction 🤯

she was right. 😉

so, instead of griping about how unjust my life is these days, and how many things have gone irretrievably wrong, i’m going to post pictures of my cannabis plants, and my trip in the forest. 😉

and it’s only the end of august! 😋

i went up road K again, where i saw the bear last year. no bears this year, but plenty of evidence that they had been there. 😉

because of the fact that it has been so dry, i actually went all the way up road K to the place where there isn’t any road, and there’s a sign that says “trail under construction, use different routes”. i could have gone further, but i was tired, and it was uphill. uphill is great when i’m “on my way up”, but by that time, i had reached a plateau, and uphill was asking too much.

so i walked back down to the old homestead, where i meditated for about an hour.

looks can be decieving… is something my father would have said. 😒

220826 i'm in the middle of nowhere, and i'm not really sure why i'm here, but I EXIST, AND I AM IMPORTANT! — 220826 i’m in the middle of nowhere, and i’m not really sure why i’m here, but I EXIST, AND I AM IMPORTANT!

and the difference in my mood will definitely be to my advantage tomorrow, when there’s going to be game night at the burke’s, and on sunday, when the sousa band is playing at the ballard locks. 😉

hybrid elephant, rants

what the fuck, stripe? 🤬

Thursday, 20220825 przxqgl

tuesday morning, i got an email from stripe, the credit card processor for hybrid elephant. it said:

[Please Read] Closure of your Stripe Account for Hybrid Elephant

We’re writing to inform you that we have determined your business, Hybrid Elephant, is in violation of the Stripe Services Agreement. Specifically, we are unable to accept payments for tobacco products, as mentioned on our Restricted Businesses list.

um…

i don’t sell tobacco products.

repeat, i DO NOT SELL tobacco products, of ANY KIND!

never have, never will. 😒

i went to their list of restricted businesses, to see if i could figure out what was going on. they mention tobacco products, and e-cigarette juice (is it just me, or does the mere concept of “e-cigarette juice” sound just a little bit creepy?), and they also list businesses which sell “illegal drugs, items intended to mimic illegal drugs, and items intended for use manufacturing or using illegal drugs.”… which i take to mean that they’re down on “paraphernalia”, and i HAD a “Pipes” category on the site…

but, because of the fact that i actually haven’t sold a pipe in more than two years, i actually had the “pipes” category removed and deleted from the site today.

they said if i disagreed with their decision, that i could submit an appeal, which i did, on tuesday. they said they would get back to me “in 1 or 2 business days”. according to the way i figure it, “1 or 2 business days” should have been yesterday or today.

their web site DOES NOT list a phone number. moe said that they apparently have a “chat” feature, which i have used in the past, but i can’t seem to find it. if i can locate their “chat” feature, i’m DEFINITELY going to be in contact with them tomorrow. if i can’t, i don’t know what i’m going to do.

they gave me until 2nd september before they’re going to quit accepting payments from my site. 🤬🤬🤬🤬

it KEEPS! GETTING! WORSE!!! 🤬

and there doesn’t appear to be anything at all that i can do about it! 🤬

bizarre, depression, frustration

😭

Wednesday, 20220817 przxqgl

after busking, today, i was driving home, up hobart-ravensdale road, and i got to the wind-ey part, just south of the cedar river, right before the summit-landsberg cutoff, and i encountered a deer which had been hit by a car, going the other direction. the car that hit the deer didn’t even slow down, but the injured deer was wobbling and bouncing all over the roadway, as i drove up. there were two cars going the other direction, which almost hit the deer, and three cars (mine included) going the other direction, which narrowly avoided hitting the deer. it wobbled over to the guardrail on the opposite side of the road, tried to jump, failed (because its back legs were no longer working), and i was able to pass, but almost immediately after i passed, the deer wobbled into the middle of the road again.

i cursed, because the only thing i could think of to do to help the deer was to kill it, because it was so injured that it probably wouldn’t walk again, if it survived at all… but the only way i had to kill it was to run it over with my car, which isn’t guaranteed to kill it, but IS guaranteed to mess up my car, and, besides that, there were two other cars going the same direction as me, and two cars going the opposite direction, and, with the deer wobbling around in the middle of the road, there is no guarantee that hitting the deer won’t also involve hitting another vehicle… and, by the time i had worked all this out, i was already on the other side of the cedar river, and away from the excitement. 😒

i drove the rest of the way home — about a mile and a half — in a daze. i texted moe, and she recommended that i go back and check if the deer was still on the road, and if it was, to call 911, but i didn’t… there were at least 5 other vehicles present, one of which had actually pulled off to the side of the road and stopped by the time i rounded the bend at the bottom of the hill, and there’s a sure bet that at least one person had enough wits about them to call 911… and, besides, i was (and still am) REALLY distressed by the whole thing, and going back, even if it was completely gone, would have just made it worse. 😭

i suppose it’s what i get for living out in the sticks. 😒

clients, weird people

another weird incense customer…

Monday, 20220815 przxqgl

i’ve had an incense customer since 2018. he has always ordered the same variety of incense and nothing else, and, except for his first order, which was for three boxes, he regularly orders 10 boxes at a time… but that’s not the weird part.

the weird part is that, apart from the time between 2020 and 2021, when his orders all came from the same location, he has ordered from a different residential location, in two different states, EVERY SINGLE TIME…

and, as i said, he regularly orders 10 boxes of the same variety of incense at a time. 😕

makes me wonder… is he an AirBnB owner, or something like that, and is stocking up for his residences? is he a renter that burns incense so much that he has been evicted, and has to find a new place? is he ordering gifts for random people? what? 😵

politics, the very big stupid

so…

Tuesday, 20220809 przxqgl

yesterday, the FBI served a search warrant at Mar-A-Lago, home of the former #SCROTUS, #drumpf. #drumpf wasn’t home, he was in new york, testifying in another legal proceding against him…

but he’s publically losing his shit, which is amusing to watch. 😉

however, forgive me for being skeptical, but, with all of the other fiascos going on — abortion, gun control, healthcare, climate change, nazis/fascists in the government (and elsewhere), and so on — while this is excellent news on the surface, i doubt that it’s going to amount to much.

we can always hope, but i’m not going to hold my breath. 😒

rants, the battle of the tablet, the very big stupid

and to think… 😒

Sunday, 20220731 przxqgl 2 Comments

at one time i was a major apple fanboy… 😒

admittedly, it was back when the operating system was free, and all you had to do was go into your local computer store with four floppy disks, and you would walk out with a functioning operating system… in the early ’90s…

these days, apple has turned into a proprietary nightmare, which penalises people who buy and sell apple products without going through “proper” channels.

example:

my tablet has been needing service more and more frequently. it got a slight bend in the frame, and, apparently, the way they are made is flimsy enough that the strongest element is the screen… which breaks at the slightest breeze in the wrong direction.

my tablet first started exhibiting the symptom of “not charging” a few years ago. the first time it happened was when it was still under applecare warranty, but i took it to a third party repair shop (one hour device repair) once the applecare had expired. one hour device repair has a lifetime warranty on repairs, so subsequent times it started exhibiting this symptom, i took it back and got it fixed for free… and, usually, got a new screen in the process, because they had broken it in the process of fixing the charge port.

then, a couple months ago, someone (it may have been thaddeus, but i’m not sure) sat on the tablet (or something) which put enough of a bend in the frame that the screen no longer met the edge of the frame… at which point i started needing to get it repaired (for free) more frequently, but, on the up side, they could get the screen off without breaking it.

the last time this happened was last week. i took it in, and they diagnosed a new problem with one of the power management chips. they said that, under normal circumstances, their experience has been that once this power management chip starts to go, there isn’t anything that can be done to fix it.

🙄

so, knowing that apple sells “refurbished” equipment for EXORBITANT prices, the first place i looked was on craigslist, where i found an ALMOST IDENTICAL tablet (the old one is a 3rd gen., and the new one is a 4th gen.) for $690… which is A LOT less than i could get it refurbished (starts around $1,200 and goes up from there). i contacted the guy, and arranged to pick it up (which is what i was doing at dick’s drive in the other day). he said that the applecare subscription expired tomorrow (which is now yesterday), but he was going to extend it a month, so i could get a chance to switch it over to my name.

so, i called applecare, and (after getting cut off mid-call), i finally learned that i couldn’t switch the applecare to my name, because it had to be done by the original owner. so i contacted the guy, and arranged to meet him in issaquah. when he called applecare, they asked him his name, and the serial number of the device…

and then, they told him that it is NOT POSSIBLE to switch the applecare to anybody else. i can’t even wait for the applecare in his name to expire, and then subscribe with my name, because i am not the original purchaser.

if i had bought a “refurbished” tablet (from apple), it would have come with “refurbished applecare”, but, because i bought it directly from the seller, they didn’t have a chance to “refurbish” it, and they aren’t willing to issue a new applecare subscription.

AT ALL!

EVER!!!

🤬

apple has just lost ANY loyalty i may have still had for their products. this is totally stupid! 🤬

bizarre, pictures

welcome to western washington

Thursday, 20220728 przxqgl

220728 dick's drive in — 220728 dick’s drive in

where, when someone tells you to eat a bag of dicks, it isn’t necessarily a bad thing…

climate change, COVID19, politics, rants

it’s never going to be “back to normal”… this is the new normal.

Wednesday, 20220720 przxqgl

last summer, we had temperatures in the 110s farenheit. this year, europe is having temperatures in the 40s celsius (approximately the same).

the recent COVID19 variants have “stealth” capabilities: they have very few, if any symptoms, and can fool some tests into giving a negative result… but the infected person is still massively contagious, and, because of the fact that there are few symptoms, they are less inclined to do things like mask and isolate, which infects others… and they still have the possibility of developing “long covid”, or monkeypox.

and i remember, way back when the pandemic was first starting up, in early 2020, before they discovered the first vaccines, when the CDC basically said that, if we could get EVERYONE to wear a mask for a month, that we could get ahead of it… but of course, that never happened, because there were too many COVIDiots who believed #drumpf when he said it would miraculously vanish. 😒

AND EVEN NOW there are public media personalities and prominent politicians who are TELLING PEOPLE that there is no pandemic, that it’s a fraud concocted by the chinese to destabilise our economy, that masks are a sign of slavery, and encouraging people to eat horse paste to “cure” COVID symptoms. 🙄

the republicunts, through a largely #drumpf-appointed supreme court, have overthrown Roe v. Wade and are champing at the bit to overthrow gay and interracial marriage, birth control, and transgender health care, and enact a nationwide ban on abortion, with no exceptions for rape, incest, ectopic pregnancy, or, basically, anything else, and the democrats, lead by our so-called “president” joe biden, seems disinclined to do anything about it.

there has hardly been a week go by — sometimes as frequently as every day — when there HASN’T been a mass shooting. sometimes it’s the police killing innocent, unarmed (but, unfortunately, black) people, and sometimes it is people like kyle rittenhouse, who crossed state lines with his mother and an (unlawful) assault rifle to join a riot, ended up killing two people, got away with it, and is now a “celebrity” who appears on talk shows and is interviewed by pundits, or the kid who shot up a grocery store in buffalo because he wanted to start a race war, who was taken into custody by police, completely alive and unharmed, or the kid in texas who shot up an elementary school, or the kid who shot up a black church, who was taken into custody by police, completely alive and unharmed…

and, once again, the republicunts are blaming everything, and everyone EXCEPT the guns, and, once again, the democrats, lead by our so-called “president” joe biden, seems disinclined to do anything about it. 😒

meanwhile we have people like tucker carlson, alex jones, and other news media figures, who are actively fomenting unrest, with disinformation, misinformation and flat-out lies about everything from the most recent presidential election, to “the great replacement” conspiracy, to “Q-anon” madness, and blatantly right-wing, fascist, nazi propaganda. and we have people like the “proud boys”, the “3 percenters”, the “oath keepers” and other blatantly right-wing, fascist, nazi fanboys, who eat it up and spew out their own particuarly putrid brand of garbage, which is duly reported on by the news media.

and they STILL haven’t addressed things like gun control, universal health care, student debt forgiveness, or climate change, all of which are broadly popular and essential. federal minimum wage is STILL less than $7.50 an hour, which isn’t even starvation wages, these days.

AND IT’S NOT GETTING BETTER!

in fact, in many ways, it’s getting WORSE!! 🤬

at this point, as far as i can tell, the ONLY hope for a reasonably un-polluted, reasonably progressive future, with more or less equal rights for everyone, is a massive general strike… and that’s probably not going to happen, because a big chunk of people can’t be bothered or don’t care, and another big chunk of people believe they CAN’T go on strike, because of rent and food worries…

but, as far as i can see, those two big chunks of people are just delaying the inevitable, because the chaos that WILL ensue WHEN (not if) civilisation collapses will be WAY worse.

COVID19, stupid people

stupid motherfucking anti-vax republicunts, update (🤬)

Thursday, 20220714 przxqgl

according to the latest CDC guidelines, i was supposed to isolate for 5 days, and wear a mask for a week, as long as i continue NOT to have symptoms.

i isolated for five days, and on the seventh day (three days ago), my rapid antigen test had a SOLID positive line inside of five minutes (moe says it was more like 10 minutes, but i disbelieve her, this time), despite the fact that it’s supposed to take 15 minutes. my impression is that this is a fairly common occurrence, because there are "tips" that you can find on the web, that contain instructions on how to ~~gimmick~~ INCREASE THE PROBABILITY OF NEGATIVE post-COVID testing, which include rinsing nasal passages, blowing your nose, and using a neti pot immediately prior to the test.

but, the thing is, i have a gig TOMORROW where i will, potentially, be playing my tuba for multiple hundreds of probably un-masked people (it’s the west seatle summer festival), and, while it’s going to be outside, there appears to be another "surge" happening: SINCE THE FAIR i have gotten email from no less than 12 people who got COVID AT THE FAIR!! 🤬

and the STUPID MOTHERFUCKING ANTI-VAX REPUBLICUNT NAZIS would have you believe that it’s all a hoax, and that people aren’t REALLY getting sick.

🤬🤬

COVID19, health, malfunctioning people, stupid people, the very big stupid, twit-turd

stupid motherfucking anti-vax republicunts!! 🤬

Thursday, 20220707 przxqgl

i SHOULD BE at the oregon country fair, at this very moment… but i am not.

less than 12 hours BEFORE i was supposed to leave, i tested positive for COVID-19. moe tested positive, as well. 😒

i mentioned it on twit-turd™, and some random person responded “your (sic) fully vaccinated? why blame the anti-vaxxers?”

to which i responded “”your” fully vaccinated?” PLONK! 😒”

(if you don’t know, “PLONK!” is the sound that spam messages make when they are shit-canned)

however, here is my reason for blaming the antis/republicunts:

if you recall, way back, two years ago, when this whole pandemic was first starting up, the CDC came out with a statement along the lines of “if we can get EVERYONE to wear a mask for a month, we can defeat this.” this was BEFORE they even had a vaccine…

but there were a whole bunch of anti-mask republicunts who believed #drumpf when he said that it would miraculously disappear, and totally ignored the CDCs recommendations.

and tens of thousands DIED because of it.

then they announced a vaccine, and there were a whole bunch of anti-mask republicunts who said that the vaccine contained aborted fetuses, or some such garbage, and refused to get vaccinated.

literally MILLIONS died, but the antis stood their ground, as millions of THEIR OWN KIND were dying around them…

and, more recently, there has been the “federal” (#drumpf-appointed) judge who decided that the mask mandates for airlines and public transportation were “unconstitutional”, and the rush to re-open businesses, and the rush to “get back to normal” that has totally ignored the CDC recommendations (AND, i might add, COMMON SENSE) which means that millions MORE died…

if we had listened to THE EXPERTS about this, we would have been done with it, or, at the very minimum, be well on our way to recovery by now, but…

now, don’t get me wrong: if a person CLAIMS TO BE an “expert” on something, i ALWAYS take what they say with “a grain of salt”, particularly when they claim to be an “expert” in MY health. but i also know enough history to know that, in 1918, when we had a pandemic of the “spanish flu” (which turned out to be an american phenomenon that was first isolated by spanish doctors), BEFORE the advent of reliable vaccines, the “anti-mask” crowd was the PRIMARY reason (along with world war one) that it lasted for 3 years.

yesterday, i felt “under the weather”, and slept most of the day. towards the end of the day, i transitioned from feeling “under the weather” to feeling truly awful, but (fortunately) moe was there with over-the-counter medicines and common sense, and i actually slept through the night (which is something that i rarely do, under the best of circumstances, these days), and i feel weak, but more-or-less normal today… but i was SUPPOSED TO BE at OCF LAST NIGHT — my panto comrades are going to miss me, there are at least two pieces of music they CAN’T PLAY because there are prevelant tuba parts, and, because of the fact that i tested positive on tuesday night, i can’t even go out in public (even with a mask) until sunday or monday.

and i have ZERO compunction about naming the stupid motherfucking anti-vax republicunts as THE primary cause of this. 🤬

and, despite the fact that boris johnson (the UKs answer to #drumpf) stepped down as the prime minister of the UK, yesterday, i am still not holding my breath that anything is going to change for the better, any time soon.

fortunately, i haven’t seemed to have lost my sense of taste and smell: i’m currently burning incense, which i can smell, and moe made chicken soup, which tastes AWESOME, but both moe and i have commented on the “brain fog”, which will, hopefully, go away over time.

depression, mushrooms, ocf, pictures, rye, spoons

what the…?

Tuesday, 20220628 przxqgl

i don’t know for sure, because i don’t know what it would be like if i HADN’T taken mushrooms a week ago, but i will say that it’s PROBABLY a good thing i took mushrooms a week ago, because the intervening week was depressing beyond belief.

last tuesday, which was also our 24th wedding anniversary, when i was IN THE MIDST of a significantly more powerful psychedelic experience than i EXPECTED (considering how weak and impotent the immediately previous psychedelic experience had been), i got a text from moe, which said that some unknown thing had happened to rye (currently, our most senior dog, at 11½ years), and he was having trouble walking, moving, and standing — quelle horreur!!

when moe came home (still in the midst of a significantly more powerful psychedelic experience than i was expecting), rye was barely recognisable: he was curled up and bent over like a dog that was in SEVERE pain, he could barely walk, and he couldn’t even manage the two stairs leading from the garage to the back yard. they had done everything they could at moe’s veterinary practice to alleviate his pain, but they didn’t have a clue, and when they sent his x-rays out to a specialist, there was still no clue why he was in pain, so thursday, he had an MRI, and had surgery on his neck THAT DAY, because it was that emergent. 😱

the neurologist said that they were suprised the dog was walking at all. 😟

he came home from the hospital friday, and has been recovering ever since… which, basically, means that his movement is severely restricted: he lives in an ExPen, in the living room, full time, except for 4 or 5 bathroom breaks every 24 hours, and he sleeps in a kennel in monique’s office. it’s going to be two weeks before he will be allowed to go up and down stairs again, so moe has moved all of her stuff downstairs for a couple weeks.

SINCE THEN, i have had to deal with, suddenly, being in the middle of rehearsal season (rehearsals wendesday, sunday, monday, tuesday, wednesday, and so on) which i haven’t experienced AT ALL for two years, AND i’m going to the oregon country fair, for the first time in two years, which TERRIFIES me, even though i really want to go, AND (oh, joy), we’re getting a NEW PUPPY WHILE i will be at the oregon country fair… which means that, when i get home from OCF, we’re going to have a disabled dog, and a new puppy, AT THE SAME TIME…

😩😰

i am running low enough on spoons that i actually cancelled busking this week, because i have a rehearsal later that day, and i’m pretty sure that if i went busking, i would be totally useless by the time the rehearsal came around.

quite apart from it being EXTREMELY WEIRD to be high on mushrooms while dealing with emotional people (who don’t know i am on mushrooms), and a severely injured dog, and quite apart from the fact that i am committed to doing something (OCF) that simultaneously terrifies me and is something i REALLY want to do, this entire sequence of events has not been particularly easy or enjoyable for me… 😒

and i’m REALLY not sure how i would have been able to handle it if it were NOT for mushrooms.

depression, frustration, medication, mushrooms

🍄mush🍄room🍄satis🍄faction🍄

Tuesday, 20220621 przxqgl

the other day i took one 00-sized capsule of dried mushroom, and experienced an OVERWHELMINGLY ASTOUNDING reduction of my depression, but a heightening of my FRUSTRATION that it “wasn’t enough”.

and it wasn’t enough, dammit! when i take psychedelic mushrooms, i expect to FEEL something… not just be less depressed! 😉

(i’ll take being less depressed, if that’s all it’ll give me, but, seriously… it ain’t enough.)

so, today, i took FOUR 00-sized capsules of dried mushroom.

no more frustration. 😉🍄

cannabis, ocf

just realised…

Monday, 20220613 przxqgl

this year will be the first year that i have been going to the oregon country fair in which i have had ENOUGH cannabis! it’s legal in oregon, and i have a medical permit AND i still have more than a pound of buds from last year’s harvest… 😎

of course, it’s still prohibited by the fair, but everyone knows how much that is enforced. 😉

frustration, mushrooms

🍄mush🍄room 🍄frustration🍄

Tuesday, 20220607 przxqgl

once again, i have stooped to buying mushrooms through twitter.

this time, apparently, i was more successful.

i got two 3.5g packages (¼oz total) — professionally produced, expensive packages (which, in themselves, make me wonder A LOT about their provenance) — of APEs, which are a variety of p. cubensis.

they definitely appear to be “the right thing”, however, once again, i run HARD into this frustration that i may or may not have expressed previously, which is, specifically, that i take MINISCULE amounts of this “drug”: one 00-sized capsule of pulverised mushroom — so small an amount that i notice absolutely NO “psychedelic” effects WHATSOEVER — and, yet, there is an OVERWHELMINGLY ASTOUNDING reduction in the level and quality of my depression.

i HATE IT that this drug is so good. i HATE IT that, in spite of everything, this drug remains illegal. i HATE the bizarre hoops that i’ve had to jump through to obtain it…

and i HATE that i am unable to take enough more that i can actually get some psychedelic experiences out of it, because i don’t know when (or if) i’m going to be able to get more. 🤬

pictures

new IOS toys

Tuesday, 20220531 przxqgl

220531 salamandir comic book mono selfie — 220531 salamandir comic-book mono selfie

articles, crazy people, i am a terrorist

Uvalde Police Didn’t Save Lives Because That’s Not What Police Do

Friday, 20220527 przxqgl

i, hereby, quit the human race. 🤬

this is the reason why: #ACAB!! 😒

Uvalde Police Didn’t Save Lives Because That’s Not What Police Do

Continue reading Uvalde Police Didn’t Save Lives Because That’s Not What Police Do →

spam, the mallet

why i do it, part ∞

Wednesday, 20220525 przxqgl

Re:[## 78615541 ##] ABUSE VIOLATION: Give your feedback, get a $75 8J+NqPCfjag

Zoho Campaigns has a zero tolerance policy towards spam, and we do everything we can to curtail it. Thank you for sharing the email header. We have taken punitive action against the user as per our terms of use.

i don’t get these notices often, because of various “spam policies” held by the offending parties, but, occasionally, i get solid validation that the spammer i reported has been flattened by the mallet.

it feels good.

ganesha the car, pictures, SACBO

art for car!

Sunday, 20220522 przxqgl

i am, once again, the owner of an art-car! SACBO here i come! 😉

(however, on the way home this morning, i picked up a rock chip on the windshield, which is already bigger than it was originally… looks like monday is going to be “repair my windshield” day. 😒)

circus, unicycle, videos

happy “ride a unicycle” day!

Sunday, 20220515 przxqgl

220515 salamandir on a very small bicycle

okay, so it’s not a unicycle… but i’m free-mounting at least once for every 15 minutes of practise… and it’s not often that one gets to ride such a tiny bike. 😉

behind me, you can see hannah, riding a unicycle, between two bars. she is probably no older than 7 or so, and i WATCHED HER learn more on the unicycle, TODAY, than i learned in two years!

it’s so inspiring having young kids in the same class as old geezers.

friday the 13th, friday the thirteenth, pictures

also, friday the 13th… booga! 😱

Friday, 20220513 przxqgl

gooply and northful…

moisture festival, rants

annual moisture festival…

Friday, 20220513 przxqgl 2 Comments

i got my MF check today… 😒

2022, 15 shares, $750 – $50 per share
2021, 4 “virtual” shows, i played for 2 of them, no payment.
2020, 17 shares – cancelled at the last minute, because of the imminant pandemic.
2019, 13 shares, $520 – $40 per share
2018, 11 shares, $330 – $30 per share
2017, ?? shares, $480
2016, 15 shares, $600 – $45 per share
2015,
2014,
2013, 14 shares, $490 – $35 per share
2012, 16 shares, $720 – $45 per share
2011, 14 shares…

as always, they included a note that says “Please don’t approach this as a paid gig or a money-making booking, because there is no financial guarantee…” blah, blah, blah…

the fact is, the moisture festival is STILL one of my “top paying gigs” every year, and the fact that i’m on SSDI doesn’t matter.

at the same time, $50 a share is as high as it’s been since i started keeping track… i wonder if this means that i’m one of those people who has been making money because of the pandemic? 😒

busking, pictures

snakez alive busking

Wednesday, 20220511 przxqgl 2 Comments

photography by david carlos

hats, pictures, purple

it’s…

Tuesday, 20220510 przxqgl

it’s almost a sacrilege to wear this hat with ANYTHING other than an all-purple suit (and even better if it was a matching zoot suit, but they cost too much), and i have such a suit… but i’ll post this because it’s SO cool…

220510 salamandir's purple Tando hat — 220510 salamandir’s purple ~~zoot~~ *Tando* hat

this is the final element of an all-purple suit: coat and pants, vest, shirt, cufflinks, a choice of 3 DIFFERENT shades of long ties, or a bow tie, pocket-square… i’ve even got a purple and black lapel-pin…

i MIGHT be wearing this to busk in, tomorrow… we’ll see. 😉

growing, mushrooms

🍄 also 🍄 mush 🍄 room 🍄 news

Monday, 20220509 przxqgl

i 🍄 moved 🍄 the 🍄 mycelium 🍄 outdoors 🍄 today! 🍄 two 🍄 to 🍄 four 🍄 months 🍄 to 🍄 obtain 🍄 fruiting 🍄 bodies 🍄 before 🍄 final 🍄 determination 🍄 fingers 🍄 crossed 🤞😉

ganesha the car, pictures

fitment

Monday, 20220509 przxqgl

unless something very unusual happens after this point, this is what my car’s hood will look like, very soon… (except that it won’t be blurry or fuzzy, that’s just the screen-resolution graphic. the finished product will be full colour and crisp lines. 👍😉)

and, to midnight window tinting (the guys who didn’t care about the fact that i couldn’t email updates to them), i say “bleh”. 😛 wicked wraps was able to handle my file without an issue, didn’t require me to save it in a different format, was able to figure out EXACTLY what i wanted with minimal input from me, they’re doing it for less money than midnight window tinting 👍👍, and they even took the finished graphic as a RGB file (which amazed even me), because, apparently, their equipment works better with RGB than it does with CMYK… 👍 they haven’t even seen my car, yet, and, already, they’re doing a far better job than you guys ever did! “bleh” 😛

anhedonia, depression, getting old, malfunctioning people, political, politicians, politics, stress, stupid people

urgh!

Friday, 20220506 przxqgl

from the inside, looking out, life is pretty decent: we’re busking again, there are gigs on the horizon, nothing serious is wrong with the house, i’m getting my art car made… i’ve still got a big, scary thing that hasn’t happened for 2 years, but was pretty much essential to my life for some time before that (which is the oregon country fair)…

but from the outside looking in, 50 years of my life, and most of my identity, has been summarily dismissed by the supreme court, which has indicated its willingness to overturn roe v. wade, despite the fact that there isn’t a single state for which the overturning of roe v. wade commands more than 30% support…

which, of course, is PRIMARILY due to #drumpf, who, despite being impeached TWICE, managed to jam through three supreme court “justices”, two of whom are credibly accused sexual predators, and the other is amy coney barrett, who thinks that a woman’s place is barefoot and pregnant.

and all of that is coming from EXACTLY the same people that gave us matt gaetz, who is under investigation for human trafficking and sex with teenagers, and jim jordan, who is accused of enabling a sexual predator, and roy moore, who is accused of sexually predating teenagers at a mall, and madison cawthorn, who idolises hitler, and films himself fucking his cousin in the ear, and another guy who is a long time republican politician who was convicted of possessing pornographic images of children, and the “jewish space laser lady”, and on, and on, and on, and on, and FUCKING ON!!… 🤬🤬🤬

and the chance that ANY OF THEM are going to face real justice of any kind is vanishingly small. 🤬

and that’s not even to mention the fact that #drumpf, himself, along with ALL his cronies, and partners in crime, are STILL running around free, and having rallies, and spewing misinformation, disinformation, and OUTRIGHT LIES to anybody who will listen, which, apparently, is about 49% of the population of the country…

seriously, politics has gotten so over-the-top, blatantly FASCIST, pretty much ever since #drumpf was elected (but, honestly, i see the first inklings of fascism in the 1970s, when nixon and mcgovern butted heads)… the country, and the world, has gotten so right-wing, “christian”, and “conservative” that it’s beyond merely frightening, and everything i’ve seen seems to indicate that it is going to get orders of magnitude worse before there’s any hope of it getting better…

and, if that wasn’t bad enough on its own, don’t even get me started on climate change… 🤬🤬🤬

brain injury, cannabis, hybrid elephant, pictures

a long time ago…

Saturday, 20220430 przxqgl

a long time ago…

(and i know it was a long time ago, because it was when i put a lot more faith (or whatever) in such things, which i have not done since well before my injury…)

i learned that there was some sort of mystical presence unlocked when, instead of using yarrow stalks, you used hemp stalks to cast i ching hexagrams.

i have always thought it was an interesting idea, and, to that end, now that it’s legal to grow hemp, i have now accumulated 50 appropriately sized hemp stalks which are intended to be used to cast i ching hexagrams.

however, because of the fact that i no longer place much faith (or whatever) in “techniques for divination”, i wonder what i should do with them? 🤷

i understand that i ching, particularly, is used as a valid form of self exploration, as well as a meditative practice, especially when the ancient, and far more meditative form of casting (which uses yarrow/hemp stalks), is used… but i don’t feel tremendously inspired to take up, or incorporate, another ancient practice, along with the ancient hindu, taoist, and muslim practices in which i currently engage.

i could put them up for sale on my web site, but that would seem to imply that i have multiple sets of stalks… and, while i do, there aren’t that many, currently, and only one of them is prepared enough to sell…

🤷

ganesha the car, pictures

new car, new art

Friday, 20220429 przxqgl 1 Comment

this may not be the final artwork, but it’s pretty close.

i dispensed with midnight window tinting, despite the fact that they sent me an original graphic, last year, when my cloud drive was vandalised, because the guy refused to talk to me, gave me vague reasons for doing things that i know nothing about, and refused to tell me more, then gave me a screen shot of my artwork that was totally screwed up (despite the aforementioned fact that he actually had a good copy, previously), and, to top things off, his email provider uses a spam detection service that “detected” my email, and refused to deliver my emails to him, and when i texted him to tell him, his response was “don’t care”…

i’m now going with “wicked wraps” — sounds like an east coast thing, but they’re on the west coast… who knows? 🤷 — i haven’t met them in person, yet, but i’ve corresponded with them, and i’ve seen their work, driving on the freeway…

growing, mushrooms

further mush 🍄 room fun

Friday, 20220422 przxqgl

the mycelia that i inoculated back in february have been making themselves evident for about a month now, and everything i’ve read seems to indicate that distributing the mycelia, once it’s growing, doesn’t necessarily require sterile components… I THINK that means i can put NON-sterile potting soil, and NON-sterile wood chips into my planter bags, and move them outside pretty much any time… at this point, i’m going to experiment, by putting half of the mushroom spawn in sterile media, and half in not-sterile media, to see if there’s any difference.

the sooner i transfer the spawn, the sooner i will have a crop. at this point i’m thinking, maybe, august or september… 😉

anhedonia, brain injury, dead people, health, stress

continued…

Sunday, 20220417 przxqgl

as i was saying…

i’m so used to being depressed and anxious that, when things are going well, instead of enjoying the fact that things are going well, it makes me more depressed and anxious, because i KNOW that things are getting ready to go “wrong-er” than they have ever gone before, and they’re just waiting for me to relax and ease my guard a little, so that they will have even more effect… 🤬

once again, i have found myself in one of those places: everything is going smoothly, the moisture festival is over, and, apart from being sick for a couple of days after it was over (NOT COVID!), everything went about as well as i could normally expect… i had a unicycle class today, and i worked on my free-mounting and my turns, and i didn’t fall off… and one time i managed to ride THROUGH a group of people and i didn’t hit one of them! 😉👍 there’s a better-than-normal chance that thaddeus and i are going busking on wednesday… i got two incense orders this week… the next big thing on the schedule is OCF, which IS happening, and i AM going (despite the fact that it terrifies me), but only because the band needs a tuba… i don’t know that i’m going to do an awful lot other than play music, and hide in my tent, but i AM going to go…

and, yet, i have this feeling of impending dread… gilbert gottfried died the other day, and he was 67… only five years older than me. i’ve already tried to die once, and failed miserably… what’s the guarantee that i won’t be more successful the next time?

combine that with the fact that i haven’t seen a doctor, apart from an ophthalmologist, for more than 10 years, and that is PRIMARILY because, in spite of everything (i.e. my brain injury), i am overly suspicious of “doctors” in general: i have had personal experience, on a number of occasions, where, if it weren’t for ME saying something, i would have been treated for diseases or conditions that I DON’T HAVE, because somebody, somewhere, made a notation error, and nobody actually knew me well enough to know that there had been an error made…

my erstwhile GP, doctor wackaloon, had notated in my chart that i had a heart stent, but had no notation about my brain injury… and he had been my GP for 10 years! 🤬 and when i was in the hospital, recovering from my brain injury(!!!!😠), i had to inform the nurse that i am not, in fact, diabetic, which was in direct conflict with my chart, which said i was… 🤬🖕🤬

and even the ophthalmologist thought i had glaucoma, because she made me take the glaucoma test with my right hand, and my right hand doesn’t work about half of the time! i told her this before i took the test, but she said no, that it was “standard” to test people with their right hand. when i took the glaucoma test with my left hand, like magic, glaucoma was no longer an issue. 😒

and i’m really not sure how to resolve my suspicion of doctors, and go see a (different) GP, because of the fact that i don’t have any health insurance other than medicare, AND the fact that i would probably have to personally interview several doctors before deciding, and i don’t really think that doctors make time for that, these days… 😒

but, at this point, apart from entirely expected “getting old” things, like sore muscles and arthritis, my health appears to be pretty good… which — i guess — is as good a reason as any to figure these things out now, rather than waiting until i actually have something go wrong with my health, and having to make the decision out of hurried necessity… 😒

moisture festival, the end of an era

the end of (another) era…

Monday, 20220411 przxqgl

the last performance of the 2022 moisture festival happened last night. it was the last performance (that we currently know of) in hale’s palladium, EVER… the palladium has been sold, and there is no word on whether or not the “new owners” (whoever they may be) are interested in continuing to rent their former beer warehouse to a bunch of crazy hippies for a month, every year.

the largest, longest-running comedy/variety showcase IN THE WORLD is now looking for a new venue… rather like Teatro Zinzanni (a long-time moisture festival ally), which has been looking for a new venue, on and off, for 20 years. 😒

in 2004, the moisture festival was held, for the first time, in rev. chumleigh’s circus tent in downtown fremont. it was two days: the fremont philharmonic was to play the first day, and the zebra kings were supposed to play the second day, but because of the fact that the zebra kings were nowhere to be found, and most of the fremont philharmonic was backstage when the show was getting ready to start, the fremont phil played both days. at the time, i was under the impression that the moisture festival was going to be a “one off”, because i couldn’t imagine the city actually allowing us to set up a tent in a parking lot all the time, but little did i know that, already, there were plans being made.

the fremont phil, at the time, consisted of fred hawkinson, on trombone, the leader of the band, and the composer of most of the tunes we played; jeremy reinhardt on baritone and flute, and the composer of the rest of the tunes we played; ted lockery on trumpet, pam mcrae on clarinet, sasha malinsky and alan… um… i don’t remember alan’s family name, on drums (they alternated); john cornicello on keyboard, and myself on E♭ tuba. we were just off playing for billion bunny bash, and the cirque de flambé shows at magnusen park, but before fred quit the band. i remember, specifically, people not being able to find ANY of the zebra kings, and it being about five minutes before curtain when they asked us if we wanted to play, i also remember A LOT of chaos, disorganisation, and people running around like headless chickens… something which never completely went away, even after we moved to the palladium.

the first show in the palladium was when it was still being a beer warehouse: pallets of kegs, empty beer bottles and cans, A LOT of beer, porta-potties for public toilets, and a significant rat problem were among the first recipients of the moisture festival shows. the second year (the first year in the palladium, which would have been 2005) was four days, i believe, and the start of the tradition of the “marathon”, which was, the last show went on until there were no acts left who “wanted” to perform. the first marathon lasted until midnight, and from that time on, until we decided that it was getting to be a bit too much, the marathons got longer, and longer… and longer… and LONGER… the last marathon (year 6 or 7, possibly) started at 9:30 pm and lasted until 6:30 am the next morning… and we STILL had acts that wanted to perform, but some of us had to go to work in the morning, and ALL of us were so tired that we couldn’t see straight. after then, we decided that the tradition of the marathon had outlived its purpose. 😉

after year 2 (the first year in the palladium), i was more convinced that we were going to establish a yearly event.

the moisture festival started expanding after year three or four, i think… primarily because of the fact that, during one of the burlesque performances, an arialist had a “strategic costume malfunction”, ripped off her costume, and continued the performance entirely naked. the audience LOVED IT, but mike hale (the owner of the palladium) was a “christian” and was completely scandalised, although he made it sound a lot more like he was concerned about the city ordinance regarding “titties and alcohol”. 😉 he threatened to have the entire event shut down unless we found another venue for the more “suggestive” shows. 🤣

i made the programs for year 7. year 9 the programs went online, because that way it would be easier to modify them, when (as happened in previous years) an artist cancelled at the last minute, or changed their schedule without notifying anyone. and it made excellent use of the new domain and web site that the event had just purchased. 😉

the 2020 moisture festival was all set to go when the pandemic hit, and it was unceremoniously cancelled at the last possible moment. the 2021 moisture festival was four days of online presentations. i took part in two of them, but it was so totally “not the same” that it was entirely forgettable.

the moisture festival WILL continue… we now have the infrastructure and the network to insure that. what is still in question is how that continuance will take shape.

whatever happens, despite my near-constant griping and moaning about individuals associated with the moisture festival, there will be nothing, EVER that even remotely compares to the moisture festival, as it has been.

depression, frustration, house stuff, moisture festival, stress

🤬

Saturday, 20220402 przxqgl

i’m so used to being depressed and anxious that, when things are going well, instead of enjoying the fact that things are going well, it makes me more depressed and anxious, because i KNOW that things are getting ready to go “wrong-er” than they have ever gone before, and they’re just waiting for me to relax and ease my guard a little, so that they will have even more effect… 🤬

one week of moisture festival down, one fluffing session complete (also, a term used in vaudeville, to describe preparing the awaiting audience outside the theatre for the show they are about to attend: getting them “in the mood”… 😉), and one more week to go… it’s kinda sad that this is probably going to be the last show in the palladium (and, possibly, the last moisture festival, ever), but it’s good that we were the band that had two weeks this year. i realise that i have been complaining, almost every previous year, that other bands were getting more of the limelight, but it’s good that it worked out this way, and i can say that i’ve been a part of the moisture festival ever since the beginning, when we did the show in rev. chumleigh’s tent in downtown fremont…

i’m getting totally fed up with the former owner of our house: ron zeising, general contractor and owner of a “home improvement” business, who thought that, because he was a general contractor, he could make “improvements” on his (now our) house “on the cheap” and skirting (or outright ignoring) building codes. recently (last month?) we paid $6,000 to a HVAC specialist to rip out and replace ALL of the heating ductwork in the house, because poor design (by ron zeising) meant that most of the heat from the very expensive, top of the line furnace (which was one of the selling points of the house), was going into the crawlspace, and the heating bills were through the roof.

of course, ron never had a problem with the heating bills, because, despite the fact that he had an expensive, top of the line furnace AND a heat pump, which provides central air conditioning as well, ron heated the house with the wood stove, and left all the doors and windows open in the summer… 🤷

we just had the last workman leave from rebuilding the “retaining wall” under our deck… and it’s a good thing, too, because, if we hadn’t, the deck would have eventually fallen off. now it is a good deal less likely to fall off, but in order to make it secure, it still needs some work: when it was in the process of being built, ron zeising just piled large rocks, bricks (including half of someone’s chimney, and a large cylindrical concrete footer for a post), and random construction rubble, next to the house, covered it with a thin layer of topsoil, and then built a deck over it… concrete pillars, on top of a thin layer of topsoil, and construction rubble… 🙄 it’s as though he thought that, because of the fact that he was a general contractor, nobody would ever question the work that he did, so he just. didn’t. care. 🤬

however, end result: we got a nice, new, secure, sturdy retaining wall, a couple of new raised beds to grow vegetables, and A LOT of new concrete under the deck pillars(!)… 👍 and yet another $6,000 chunk taken out of our checking account. 🙄

2021 coup

history, repeating itself…

Tuesday, 20220329 przxqgl

if we do not learn from history, we will be condemned to repeat it… 😒

within our own FUCKING lifetimes! 🤬

moisture festival, twit-turd

MF: one week down, one to go

Monday, 20220328 przxqgl

220327 moisture festival intermission, from the orchestra pit

as the moisture festival enters its third week of 2022, they have been testing EVERY PERFORMER, EVERY DAY, and so far, NOBODY has tested positive… and there has been only one person associated with the festival who has tested positive, independant of the MF testing, and he tested positive BEFORE coming in contact with anyone from the festival…

and, as everybody has been saying, it’s really great to have a LIVE audience for whom to perform…

but i’m still terrified… not enough to stop me from plating, but enough that it is definitely making a difference in my performances: i totally screwed up the melody for Godfrey Daniels’ tune yesterday… i played the first few notes correctly, and then got totally lost and confused. i picked it up again, a few measures from the end, but, as ALL of my other performances of this tune have been exemplary, that one was a major embarrasment. 😒

one of the unintended results of playing the moisture festival is that i haven’t been able to spend as much time on “twit-turd“, with the immediate effect being that, when i logged in, this morning, there were TWO events which were “trending”, about which i knew absolutely nothing… and the more i read, the less i understood about both of them. 🤨 i’m not giving up on it (because, honestly, it’s the most contact i’ve had with people on the fringes of, and completely outside “my community” since i gave up fecesbook), but, once again, i am forced into a position where i have to examine whether or not these “social media platforms” are, really, good for me… and i get the very strong impression that the answer will be “no”. 😒

not that it’s any great surprise…

moisture festival, pictures

moisture festival formal

Wednesday, 20220323 przxqgl

looking at the photo above, at 100% (what you see here is approximately 45%), i’m not sure whether or not i like this effect… which is odd, because, as far as i know, i didn’t use any effects when processing this photo… 😒

moisture festival, unicycle

sunday (yesterday)

Monday, 20220321 przxqgl

i THINK i MAY have learned to free mount my unicycle! 👍

i went into the last class for this session about 15 minutes early, because i wanted to “practice” before class actually started. i free mounted almost immediately, and then did a couple more “almost free mounts” — i actually mount the unicycle, but i have to abort before i ride away: i figure it’s a “real” free mount if i can pedal at least twice, all the way around, before having to abort, and these were less than two complete rotations — then class started, and i got down to actually doing it… and i was able to break the limit of ten free mounts (after which i said i wasn’t going to count any longer) before the end of class. 👍👍

THEN, i went home to find moe out in the front yard, pulling weeds, and i asked her if she wanted to see me free mount the unicycle, and she said yes… AND I DID IT! 😎 THE FIRST TIME!! 😎👍👍👍👍

now i really have to get started on my flaming tuba… it won’t be long now. 😉

then, later on, i went to Fyodor Karamazov (tim furst)’s wedding party, to play my tuba with a group of musicians who were SPECIFICALLY chosen to play at this party, two days ago. it was a wedding, so there were A LOT of speeches, which meant that we didn’t play music as much as i would have liked (because we had to vacate the building before 1:00 am, otherwise the police would show up), but, strangely enough, it didn’t affect my payment in the least… and, because of the fact that there was ZERO traffic at 1:00 am, it only took me a half-hour to drive home…

but, apparently, i misplaced my regular reading glasses, after the show, so, in order to read the computer screen at a reasonable distance (as compared to a foot away from my face, while squinting), i’ve had to commandeer the glasses that i usually keep in the workshop… they’re the same prescription, but they’re a lot more chewed up, because i use them in the workshop. hopefully the regular ones will show up soon, because glasses are expensive, and i’ve “lost” too many pairs of glasses recently (which means “in the last 5 years”). 😒

HPOI, moisture festival

rejoice!

Saturday, 20220319 przxqgl

they DIDN’T break the screen of my tablet, which means that i picked it up TODAY, and it charges, just like it should! 👍 now i KNOW i’ll be able to use it for the moisture festival!

and, speaking of moisture festival, i got a call YESTERDAY to determine if i was up for playing in a band for tim furst (fyodor karamazov)’s wedding TOMORROW, and, naturally, i said yes… because i haven’t played music for long enough that if i were a normal person, i probably would have forgotten how to do it by now… and the fact that they’re paying me $100 doesn’t hurt… 😉

also, i ordered 12 dozen boxes of Sugandha Shringar Gold incense, from india, at the beginning of march, and i just took delivery of what moe calls “a big box of incense” (but i know better, because i have gotten “BIG” boxes of incense, in the past, and they were more than HALF AGAIN as big as the one i got today)… but it’s for an “old time” incense, which has been around for AT LEAST 50 years, and it’s somewhat rare.

but it is a PRIME example of how “those indian people” use sanskrit… well, okay, devanagari, because hindi is written with the same alphabet, and i don’t really know which one they’re thinking of when they do this… but the insence is called “Sugandha Shringar Gold”, which it says on the english language side of the box. on the other side of the box is what one might assume is the name of the incense in hindi (or sanskrit), written in devanagari letters. if you don’t actually read devanagari letters, you might assume that it is the hindi, or sanskrit equivalent of “Sugandha Shringar Gold”… it says “सुगंध शृंगार गोल्ड” except “sugandha” is already a sanskrit (and hindi) word that means “incense”. “Shringar” is a place name, of a place in india… and the rest of the name? “गोल्ड” is the word “gold”, spelled out in devanagari letters — “GOLDD” — and they do this ALL THE TIME! i’ve seen NUMEROUS boxes of incense, and other things, which have devanagari writing on the box, but are, basically, the english words, spelled out in devanagari letters. they don’t use the hindi words, or the sanskrit words, they use ENGLISH words, spelled out phonetically, using devanagari letters. 😒

irritating!

technology, videos

new desktop behaviour!

Friday, 20220318 przxqgl

220318 new (optional) desktop behaviour thanks to kubuntu! 😎

frustration, gripes, the battle of the tablet

this is friday, right?

Friday, 20220318 przxqgl

today is the day one hour device repair said they would repair my device… because they couldn’t do it tuesday, because the right person wasn’t in. so i took my device in to redmond, watched the guy open up the shop, he took my device, said the board tech would be in in about an hour, and he would text me when it was ready, and i went home.

when i got home, i got a text from the guy. he said that his board tech had called in sick, and they’d have it done tomorrow.

except that i have to, you know, USE it tomorrow… 😒

fortunately, i have printouts of all the required pieces of music for tomorrow’s rehearsal, because there’s almost a 100% guarantee that IF they actually have it done tomorrow, it WILL NOT be in time to take it to the rehearsal, and i’m still not 100% convinced that they’re not going to break the screen in the process of taking it apart… which, naturally, will mean that it will be EVEN LONGER until i get it back. 😒

this time, instead of being one step forwards and two steps back, it’s actually been two steps forward and one step back. i wonder how long i’ll be able to keep up this pace? 😒

linux-upgrades, the battle of the computer

now that’s what i’m talkin’ ’bout!

Wednesday, 20220316 przxqgl

i made the jump from kubuntu 18.04 to kubuntu 20.04 today, and it went smoother than i had ever hoped, in my wildest imagination… 😎

i’ve been slowly configuring the computer for about a month now, and i finally found an old debian CD that had the .deb file for sigrot, which i installed this morning… and that’s pretty much the last thing that i had to install from external sources.

my old .deb file for sigrot went away with the old cloud drive data, and they discontinued it around 2000, so it’s “no longer available”… but it turns out that i can purchase install CDs for old versions of debian from LinuxCollections dot com — apparently the modern version of CheapBytes dot com, which went out of business a while ago 😢 oh well… — and it turns out that the versions of debian called “slink” and “potato” have the most up to date version, and it works perfectly well on kubuntu 20.04…

and why wouldn’t it? ‼⁉ it’s a tiny little application that only interacts with plaintext files that I provide, and it only makes a .signature file, so it’s not relying on system calls or hardware requirements… why they would have discontinued it is beyond me… apart from the fact that, i’m fairly sure, nobody but me even uses a .signature file, these days… 😈

i already had to install gucharmap, because no KDE-based character map works as well for what i do, and i’ve also installed the “Deep Connections” gramplet in the new version of GRAMPS, which is A LOT easier than it has been in previous versions. i’m fairly sure that there will be other things that i will install as i use the machine more, but i’ve got the old machine set up next to me, and i can use its configuration as an example when i need to.

at this point, the system looks good, and the minor tweaks that it needs will get done when they come up, because this is good. 😉

but this is, far and away, the easiest complete system upgrade i have ever experienced. THIS is the way it SHOULD happen, ALL THE TIME!! 😁👍👍

also, i finally got a mouse whose third button works the way it’s supposed to, which means that, now, i have to UNLEARN the “copy-and-paste” gesture that i have been forced to use, because the old mouse had a third button that didn’t work consistently. new computers that work the way they’re supposed to, ROCK!!

family of origin, frustration, genealogy, house stuff, the battle of the tablet

urgh

Tuesday, 20220315 przxqgl

so, the tablet-fixer shop got the part in, and they said i could come in any time, and they would fix it “while you wait”… so i took it in this morning, only to discover that the person who can fix it (without destroying it) won’t be in until friday, unless i want to take it to bothell…

the thing is, i’m still more convinced than not, that they’re going to break the screen in the process of taking it apart… like they have, twice, in the past… and if they’re going to have to replace the screen, i would rather that the people who have dealt with me, and my device, in the past, be the ones that deal with me this time, rather than having to “break in” (so to speak) a new person, when my device gets broken… 😒

but i’ve got a zoom class on thursday, and, while i CAN do it on my phone, it’s A LOT smaller than my tablet, which makes things like responding to chats A LOT more difficult… and i’ve got the final rehearsal for the moisture festival on saturday, so if they DO break the screen, it probably won’t be fixed until after the second week of moisture festival, which is the first week i am supposed to be playing the moisture festival… which is decidedly LESS than ideal. 😒

the guy was supposed to come by yesterday and finish the insulation on the ductwork, but because of the plumbing disaster that happened over the weekend, and the EXTREME squeamishness of the guy, it turned out that he REFUSED to work, because of a little puddle of clean water that was left over from them running the hose into the cleanout under the house… 😒 our next door neighbour (who is a professional plumber) came over during the actual disaster, and again, after the HVAC guy left. what the HVAC guy said made me think that there were new leaks and ground saturated with grey water, but when i and the plumber went into the crawl space, the only moisture we could find was a small puddle of clean water… the plumber said that the HVAC guy was being a prima donna and a “pussy”, and called him up to tell him so… which i thought was EXTREMELY funny. but HE won’t be back until NEXT TUESDAY!! 🤬 and they want the crawl space to be COMPLETELY dry, and clean, before they will complete the work… the thing is, the weather has been rainy for a week, now, and, even with a fan down there, the ground moisture is NOT going away. i got a 25-foot sheet of visqueen which i’m going to lay down after a couple more days of the fan being down there, but, if the guy doesn’t finish the work, then i guess i’m not going to pay them the $6,000 that we agreed on when they started. 😒

on the plus side, i met someone who, i think, is my third cousin, once removed: ryan dorward, currently from bali, but normally from vancouver, BC, otherwise known as SHARPS. he is the great-great-grandson of John Muir Dorward, the elder brother of Peter Dorward, my great-great-great-grandfather… which makes our common ancestor Robert Dorward, who lived from 1803 to 1846 in Arbroath, Scotland.

anhedonia, depression, frustration, ptsd

not only… 😒

Saturday, 20220312 przxqgl

ah, the “joys” of hoMEOWnership… 😒

we’ve been, essentially, without heat for at least two weeks. the guy came and replaced our heating ducts, but he wasn’t able to finish the insulation, so, now, the heat registers are blowing a lot warmer air than they were before he came, but they’re still only blowing lukewarm air, and most of the heat is STILL bleeding off into the crawl space. he’s coming back to finish the job on monday. 😒

they’re supposed to text me, today (at the earliest), to let me know if the part for my tablet is in, but i doubt that they will, and, despite the fact that most of their repairs are made “while you wait”, there’s a good chance that, when they do text me (which will likely be monday or tuesday… or whenever they get around to it… 😒) the screen will break in the process of taking it apart to replace the charging port, at which point there’s going to be another two weeks (or so) wait before i get my tablet up and running again. 😒

AND last night, after i went to bed, the plumbing problem that has been gurgling in the distance for a few days, erupted (literally) in our downstairs bathroom…

a few days ago, the laundry drain backed up and spilled (fortunately clean) water into the garage. monique snaked it out, but she only went about five feet before she decided that it was “good enough”… so, of course, the drain backed up again while she was out, the next day. i snaked it out again, this time extending the snake as far as it would go, which is 25 feet. i found a couple more clogs, but nothing major… then i noticed that the kitchen sink was gurgling when the laundry drained… and the kitchen sink was gurgling when i flushed the toilet… and the kitchen sink was gurgling when someone took a shower… 😒

i discussed this with tracy, our next door neighbour (who is a professional plumber), and determined that the laundry drain was not installed “up to code”, and is not vented, which means that, from time to time, it’s GOING to back up, and there’s not a lot we can do to prevent it.

then, i noticed that the drain attached to the sink in the kitchen is also… wonky… it, also, does not have a vent, and is installed with a P-trap that is installed normally (i.e. the way it should be), and ANOTHER P-trap that is installed upside down, making an “S” or “N” shaped thing, and then another 90° turn before heading down into the crawl space…

another FINE job done by former owner ron zeising (or, presumably, one of his lackeys) because he was a general contractor, and “could”… 😒

monique and i discussed this, and we both agreed that it would be a good idea to get a plumber out to assess the problem BEFORE it turned into a geyser or a fountain, but, apparently, after i went to bed last night, that event happened: someone flushed the toilet, downstairs, which backed up into the bathtub, and in the process of plunging the toilet, the wax seal failed, which spewed sewage into the bathroom.

monique checked with a couple of professional plumbers that she knows (including tracy), and developed a plan of attack, but…

just for once, i’d like to be able to wake up in the morning without having some sort of immediate disaster that has to be dealt with. 🤬

frustration, music, rants, technology, the battle of the tablet

here we go again… 🙄

Thursday, 20220310 przxqgl

i’ve got a zoom class this evening, a telehealth appointment tomorrow, and a moisture festival rehearsal on saturday…

… and my tablet decided to stop charging this morning. 🤬

i got in touch with the technician that replaced the charging port (odd that this seems to happen on an almost yearly basis… odd indeed… 😒), and informed him that it had quit charging again, and he said i should bring it in. so i left an hour earlier than normal, and headed up the east side of the lake to redmond, where the technician confirmed that it was, indeed, a faulty charging port, said that they would fix it on warranty, and ordered the new part. 👍

problem is, i’m fairly sure he DIDN’T also order a new screen at the same time… and this particular model of ipad is NOTORIOUS for screen breakage when you have to open it up FOR ANYTHING… kinda like they had to do last year (and the year before) when they replaced the charging port. it turned into a two week job, during which time the screen of my tablet was BROKEN, which precluded me from using it for ANYTHING… 😒

and that can’t happen this time, because i have zoom classes, telehealth appointments, and moisture festival rehearsals AND PERFORMANCES in the next three weeks. i can get through the rehearsals and performances with my old-school hard-copy music, and the zoom classes and telehealth appointments THEORETICALLY can take place on my phone, but it will be at least three levels of hassle that i would rather avoid, if i had the choice. 😒

technology, weird

mind blown… 🤯

Tuesday, 20220308 przxqgl

The Evolution Control Committee – Fool On The Hill, major/minor swap

so, i’ve heard a couple of other “modifications” like this: John Denver, Country Roads in a minor key“is a significant example, but, still, i gotta ask…

HOW DO THEY DO THAT???⁇⁇

seriously! 🤔

i can imagine how the key of the entire piece could be changed from major to minor, but changing the individual chords from major to minor, or vice versa, would be A LOT more work, and even if one were willing to put in the amount of work necessary to do it the way i imagine it’s done, it wouldn’t result in anywhere as “nice” sounding music… 🤷

along the same lines, Jolene at 33 is also pretty awesome. 😉 but i’ve done that…

busking, moisture festival

moist moisture

Wednesday, 20220302 przxqgl

the moisture festival is, tentatively, back on the schedule this year. the phremont fill is taking weeks two and four, the sancapators are taking week one, and i don’t know who is taking week three, but it’s probably the naked truth.

moist fest rehearsals are happening, with a surprisingly large number of “replacement” musicians: euphonium, guitar and flute are all new to the phil this year. guitar has played as a substitute for us in previous moisture festivals, and flute plays for the sancapators, so she’s already familiar with the chaos that usually happens. euphonium is a guy from bellevue who i probably know from high school — he went to samammish at the same time i was at interlake — who just moved back to bellevue a couple years ago, and i recruited him from the sousa band. euphonium’s name is tony, and flute’s name is cate. i don’t remember what guitar’s name is, despite the fact that i’ve met him, and played on the same stage with him, fairly many times in the past. (ETA: it’s chris, which is why i don’t remember it… he just falls into the category of “another chris” and gets promptly forgotten, because there’s another chris in the same band… 😒)

despite our regular guitar, stuart, not being available this year, he’s still the fluffing liason, and he’s already said that i and whoever else i can get to play, are welcome to come in and fluff on april 1st. the pike place market has lifted its mask mandate, which means, when the weather gets nicer, i’m probably going to start busking again. for sure with thaddeus, and i’ve got a fantasy of busking with thaddeus on his “banj-itar” and kiki on her “banjo-lele”… it would be a plethora of not-quite-banjos that would add a lot of extra “oomph” to the group.

unicycle

FREE MOUNT!!!

Sunday, 20220227 przxqgl

i free mounted my unicycle, for the first time, today at 12:43 pm! 😎

one step closer to having The Tuba-Cyclist ready for presentation! 😉

(it’s only taken me THREE YEARS… 😒)

gripes

cancelled

Friday, 20220225 przxqgl

my circus class, yesterday, was cancelled.

my DBT class, yesterday, was cancelled.

my counselling session, today, was cancelled.

when i woke up this morning, it was 52°F in the house, despite the fact that we’ve got what everybody else says is “the best HVAC product on the market” supposedly heating our home… except that “the best” is hooked up to the ductwork that was done by “the worst” general contractor, who was ron zeising, former owner of our house — seriously, i get the impression that he put things in like the heat pump/furnace/central air conditioning unit with the SOLE INTENT of driving up the price of his house, because, while it is “the best” HVAC system available, it’s air-handler is only about half what the square footage of the house requires, and the ductwork is a COMPLETE MESS of new, old, and whatever the hell he had left over in the scrap bin, which, at it’s BEST, only delivers about half of the heat to the rest of the house… but our crawl space is 15°F WARMER than the rest of the house… which, of course, has encouraged critters to make nests under the house, further deteriorating the already sketchy ductwork. 🤬

so, instead of spending that money to remodel the upstairs bathroom (take out the jacuzzi we don’t use, and put in a sauna that we will use), we’re now having to throw $6,000 at critter-proofing the crawl space, and totally replacing all the ducts under the house. 😒

and, to top things off, the guy who is currently my “medication manager”, dr. uzowulu, asked me if i worry a lot, and when i said yes, his response was to tell me not to worry so much, and pray instead. 🤮

growing, mushrooms

mushroom 🍄 landmark

Saturday, 20220219 przxqgl

innoculated P. cyanescens using the “90-second-perfect-every-time” brown rice method for spawn, today at 4:20 pm.

alledgedly, the planters are getting here next thursday. they will be filled with sterile potting soil and STERILE wood chips(‼🍄) and deposited in a secure location outdoors, and the spawn will be introduced… erm… when it’s ready.

how will i know it’s ready? when the mycelium makes itself evident!

that’s it…

if everything goes the way i’m hoping it will, i should have a healthy, self-regenerating crop in 3 to 6 months.

wtelf

W.T.FedEx??

Friday, 20220218 przxqgl

two weeks ago, i discovered that the planters i want for my mushroom project can’t be acquired locally, so i had to order them online, from california. they were originally supposed to arrive wednesday the 16th, this week.

thursday (yesterday) morning, when they hadn’t arrived, i went online to “check my order”, and discovered that they had been waylayed twice in their journey from city of industry, california, and were currently in the middle of their second “waylay-ance”, in lakehead, california.

oh, well… i figured… they’ll be here tomorrow…

right?

actually, no… 😒

today, i check the status of my order, only to discover that the package has been rerouted through st. peters, missouri… only a 2,700 mile detour on a trip that should only have been 1,200 miles to begin with… 🤯

W.T.FedEx?? 😒

incense

kapoor kacheri

Monday, 20220214 przxqgl

i got some more channabasappa & company incense today. this is probably the last of it, because the rest is all duplicates of stuff i already carry. i got a kilo of kapoor kacheri bathi. this is what i have distilled from the available “knowledge” about kapoor kacheri:

Kapoor Kacheri – Hedychium spicatum

Kapoor Kacheri may also be referred to as Spiked Ginger Lily, Kapur Kachli, Kapur Kachri, Perfume Ginger.

3rd Chakra – personal power, 4th Chakra – unconditional love, 5th Chakra – speaking truth, Grounding, Introspective, Purifying

Anti-allergenic, Anti-arthritic, Anti-asthmatic, Anti-bacterial, Anti-inflammatory, Anti-rheumatic, Anti-spasmodic, Decongestant, Expectorant, Mucolytic, Tonifying

Hydacheium Oil which is also known by the popular name Kapur Kuchari is extracted from Hydacheium that grows to up to 3 feet tall. It has loose terminal flower spikes that have individual flowers that are yellow with reddish stamens. Its antibiotic properties have also increased interest in the medicinal properties of the species.

The root stalk is useful in local inflammations, nausea, asthma, bronchitis, hiccups and in pain. The rhizome of the plant is said to be carminative, stimulant and a tonic. It has been described as useful, specially as an anti asthmatic agent. Clinical trials have been conducted in tropical eosinophilia, with promising results. It counteracts bad mouth taste and smell.

incense smells like the best qualities of camphor, sandalwood and agarwood. it is as though camphor and sandalwood had a baby, and that baby grew up, got together with agarwood, and they had a baby… that baby would be kapoor kacheri. it is quite subtle, and doesn’t hang around for very long. 😉

cannabis

add end um…

Wednesday, 20220209 przxqgl

so, i went into home depot recently, and, at the entrance, there was a sign that said, essentially, “we test for illegal drugs as a condition of employment, so if you use illegal drugs, don’t even bother to think about applying for a job here”.

but, here’s the thing…

cannabis is legal.

and their excuse of it being “company policy” shouldn’t make a difference in a place where cannabis is legal.

shouldn’t it?

depression, mushrooms, pictures

mush room 🍄

Wednesday, 20220209 przxqgl

i took “the rest” of my mushrooms today, at 12:00 pm. i don’t know how many there were, in terms of “mushrooms”, but it was between 1 and 2 grams (two 00-sized gel-caps, plus a tiny amount) of powder, mushroom bits and detritus at the very bottom of the bag. this trip followed the predictable pattern of ramp up, peak, maintain, and ramp down, but it was a great deal more than i expected, considering how mediocre my recent mushroom escapades have been. i must have been taking the parts that didn’t have the right stuff, before, because this trip made up for it “in spades”. 😉

the fact that i actually logged in here, and am making what i suppose is something like sense, at this point, at 5:00 pm, is somewhat amazing, and is made even more amazing by the fact that i went out and got a prescription refill for moe, a 12-pack of diet ginger ale, and canned salt-free green beans for dog food, an hour ago. i have discovered that driving while high on mushrooms has, apparently, been affected by both the fact that i have been driving NOT on mushrooms for quite a bit longer than the last time i did so (which was in my 20s), and the fact that cars, these days, are a lot more “hands off” than they were fourty years ago… following distance, speed limits, road-center detection… even an amount of steering… are all “automatic” at this point.

“high self”, meet “normal self”. 😉

while i was out walking in the woods today, i saw a fallen branch with moss growing off of it… and it looked just like a lazy duck with green hair.

220209 is this just a fallen log, or...? — 220209 is this just a fallen log, or…?

i knew those emergency eyeballs would come in handy… 😉

i confirmed that the big tree that has been speaking to me, is a “Tree of Being”… the only other one that i know of is on sehome hill. this one appears to be around 600+ years old. i sat beneath it, today.

this better have some lasting anti-depressant effects, otherwise i’m going to have to do it again. 😉

incense

dashanga

Tuesday, 20220208 przxqgl

DASHANGA (“Ten Ingredients”) CONSTITUENT INGREDIENTS

6 parts kustha, 2 parts gur, 3 parts laksha, 5 parts nakhla, haritiki, and raal in equal parts, 1 part dapai, shilajay equal to 3 lav, 4 parts nagarmotha, and guggul one part

——

KUSTHA

Kustha (Saussurea lappa C.B.Clarke) is an important medicinal plant which was mentioned in ancient Hindu literature and Ayurveda. It was considered as next to Soma plant which is best among the plants. It grows in the reigions of Himalayas and Kashmir and is used in Ayurveda for fevers, skin diseases, headache etc. Kustha is well known for its cures since the ancient times. Etymologically the word “Kustha” is derived from “Krushnaati rogam”. It means, one that ploughs out or drags out the disease from the body.

Dolomiaea costus, formerly known as Saussurea costus, commonly known as costus, Indian costus, kuth, or putchuk, is a species of thistle in the genus Dolomiaea native to South Asia and China. Rishi (Hindu) mystics of Kashmir especially ate this plant. Essential oils extracted from the root have been used in traditional medicine and in perfumes since ancient times.

Costus is the root of this plant. The root of the plant is the key part used for medicinal or homeopathic purposes. The root is also called by its Latin name radix aucklandiae (root of aucklandia).

It has a large number of names in other languages, including kuṣṭha in Sanskrit; kust or qust in Arabic and Persian; kut, kur, and pachak in Hindi and Bengali, kostum, gostham, and potchuk in Tamil; upaleta and kur in Gujarati; kot or kust in Punjabi; changala in Telugu; sepuddy in Malayalam; kostha in Kannada; kuth or postkhai in Kashmiri; and kosht (קשט) in Hebrew; koto in Swahili; mu xiang in Chinese.

——

GUR = jaggery

——

LAKSHA

Botanical Name
Laccifer lacca Kerr.

Family
Lacciferidae.

Synonyms
Coccus lacca, Kerria lacca.

Regional Name
English : Shellac, Laksha (Lac). Hindi : Lakh, Sanskrit : Laksha, Bengali : Gala, Gujarati : Lak, Telugu : Kommolakka, Lakka, Tamil: Komburrki, Malayalam: Arakku, Ambalu.

Part Used
Resin.

Description
India and Thailand are the main areas in the world where lac is cultivated. Over 90% of Indian lac comes from the States of Bihar, Jharkhand, Assam, Madhya Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh, West Bengal, Maharashtra and Orissa. Lac insects thrive on certain trees and the principal lac host trees in India are Banyan, Peepal, Khadira, Palash, Kusum and Ber.

Lac are scale insects (Laccifer Lacca) which live on trees called lac host trees where they secrete the lac resin which is scraped off and manufactured into shellac. To produce just 1 kilogram of lac resin around 300,000 insects lose their tiny lives. A scale insect is a common name for any of about 2000 insect species found all over the world that attach themselves in great numbers to plants and trees. Scale insects range from an almost microscopic size to more than 2.5 cm. They can be very destructive to trees – stunting or killing twigs and branches by draining the sap.

The life cycle of a lac insect takes about six months and consists of four stages: egg, larva, pupa and adult. With this life cycle, the lac industry obtains two lac crops each year from each tree. Females lay up to 100 eggs, which hatch out into larvae. These small red larvae, roughly 0.5mm, long crawl out of the brood lac (or mother cell) and settle on the twigs. At this stage both the male and female larvae live off the sap of the trees. The lac scraped from the branches is known as crude lac or sticklac. Crude lac or stick-lac, consists of the resin, the encrusted insects, lac dye, and twigs. This is crushed, washed, dried to form Seedlac. Seedlac is then converted into Shellac by hand or machine.

Phytoconstituents
The major constituent of laksha is the resin (70-80%); other constituents present are: sugar, proteins, and soluble salts, coloring matter, wax, sand, woody matter, insect bodies and other extraneous matter; a volatile oil is present in traces. Lac resin is composed of mainly hydroxy fatty acids of C14- C18 carbon chains, such as aleuritic, butolic, C14- C16 mono- and di-hydroxy acids along with hydroxy terpenic acids having the rare cedrene skeleton as jalaric, laccijalaric, shellolic, and laksholic acids.

Ayurvedic Properties
Rasa : Kasaya, Guna : Laghu, Snigdha, Sneha, Virya : Shita, Vipaka : Katu, Karma : Kappa, Pitta.

Ayurvedic Applications
Pachana, Depana, Apasmara, Kushta, Raktadosha, Kasa, Antrasula, Prameha, Atisara, Arocaka, Hidhma.

Medicinal Uses
It is used for liver diseases, Diarrhoea, Dysentery, Intestinal parasites (worms), Injuries, Fungal infections, Eczema, Scabies, Herpes, haemostasis, Internal bleeding disorders, Hiccup, Cough, It is also used for Low bone mineral density, jaundice, dropsy, kidney disease, reduces fat the Adipose persons, joint disorders, osteoporosis, osteomalacia, osteoarthritis etc. It is also helpful in obesity, renal and spleen disorders, jaundice, backache problems, leprosy, ulceration, epilepsy and chicken pox.

——

NAKHLA = charcoal(?)

——

HARITIKI

Terminalia chebula fruits – https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terminalia_chebula

——

RAAL

Ral is the gum extracted from Sal tree (Shaala). It is the astringent Ayurvedic medicine widely used in diarrhoea, dysentery, skin diseases, stops bleeding, heal wounds, herpes, burn wounds, fractures etc.

Sal Tree
Botanical name : Shorea robusta
Family : Dipterocarpaceae

Qualities, Uses

Medicinal Qualities of Rala
Rasa (taste) – Tiktha (bitter), Kashaya (astringent)
Virya (potency) – shitha (Cold)
Guna (qualities) – Guru – heavy to digest, Snigdha (unctuous)
Karma (action) – Grahi – absorbent, Sthambana – styptic in nature

Indications of Rala
Blood disorders
Excess sweating
Visarpa – herpes
Vrana – It cleanses the wound and hastens its healing process.
Vipadika – cracks in palms or soles with pain
Graha – psychiatric disorders
Bhagna – fractures
Agnidagda – Burn wounds
Jwara – fever
Cough, Asthma
Shoola – abdominal colic
Atisara – diarrhoea
Kandu – itching
Sphota – blisters
Bleeding haemorrhoids

Effect of rala on Tridoshas
Vatapittahara – Balances vata and pitta dosha
Chemistry, controversy

Rala chemical constituents
It is composed of chemicals like hydroxyanone, dammarenediol II, Ursolic acid etc

Controversy
Sarja rasa or sarjaniryasa refers to gum extracted from Copal tree – Vateria indica
Rala is gum extracted from Sal tree

How to get gum extract
How To obtain gum extract from Sal Tree?
A white viscous substance oozes out from sal tree when few strips of bark is removed. On exposure it hardens and change to brown colour. It is collected after 10 to 12 days. Again the substance oozes out and the procedure is repeated. This gum extract can be collected several times in a year.

Features of Sal dammar
Color – Yellow to brown color
Odour – aromatic
Nature – Brittle
Opaque

——

DAIPAI ?

——

SHILAJAY ?

——

NAGARMOTHA = cypriol

——

GUGGUL = bdellium

——

thistles and bugs… hmmmmmm… 🤔

——

okay, this is what i get for geeking out about incense:
👉OPOPANAX!!👈
(i ordered some opopanax oil! 😀)

hybrid elephant, incense

oh… my! 😮

Friday, 20220204 przxqgl

so, i got the channabasappa & company incense today, and it is OUTSTANDING! 👍👍

i got a kilo each of dashanga, and guggal bathi… the dashanga is powdered, with no stick. i’m not exactly sure how to burn it, but i suspect that charcoal tablets will work… and it is an OLD TIME HIPPY scent that i haven’t smelled in a LOOOONG time. because of the fact that i’m not sure how it’s burned, and the fact that it comes in 100 gram packets, i’m not sure if i’ll end up selling it on my web site, but it will DEFINITELY be an addition to the IOTM collection. the guggal bathi is… not what i expected: i knew the scent, but i expected it to be a dark, wet incense, and it is, actually, light coloured and fairly dry… but it, also, is an OLD TIME HIPPY scent that i haven’t smelled for many years, and, because of the fact that it is a bathi (comes on sticks), it will be a lot easier to put on my web site. 👍

THIS is why i made the effort to do business with this person, despite the fact that i KNOW her to be flaky… when she DOES come through, it’s always with SUPERLATIVE product. 😉👍

hybrid elephant, incense

incense

Wednesday, 20220202 przxqgl

i FINALLY got shipping confirmation from the flaky incense lady from minnesota — the one who, two years ago, took my money and, 6 months later, STILL hadn’t shipped me the incense for which it paid, so i ended up having to go to the credit card company for help cancelling the order… this time, it only took her TWO months, and the USPS tracking number says that the “USPS in possession of item”, which means that it actually exists in someone’s mind OTHER THAN mine, and the flaky incense lady. i’ve known about her for 25 45 years or so (i’ve GOT to start remembering that my brain injury was almost 20 years ago! 🤕), as “another person who sells incense” like i do, and it seems to me that i used to do business with her a lot more frequently than i have in the past 10 years or so, but that’s only because, more and more in my dealings with her, she became the “flaky” incense lady.

i have actively avoided doing business with her for a few years now, because, back when i made my first bulk order from MSDF, she said she wanted to “go halves with me”, but, then, she “didn’t have the money, but would pay me later”, which she never did… and then, a few months later, said that she had a customer who wanted some bulk MSDF incense (which i had just imported), and she told them to contact me… and they never contacted me… 😒

but she’s “going out of business” — from my point of view, she’s SAID she’s been going out of business for at least 10 years, but whatever. she’s liquidating her supply of incense made by shroff channabassappa & sons — the same company that made “Leadbeater” incense, which is one of my two all-time favourites… and, while she doesn’t have leadbeater incense, she’s got a couple of other scents which i really like, i know would sell well, and, could possibly be additions to my “Incense Of The Month” selection, because, as far as i have been able to tell, shroff channabassappa & sons is out of business, as well. 😉

and, like i said, USPS is in possession of the item, and estimates that i will be receiving it on saturday. whee! 🎉

on the other side of the coin, i also just got email from Aravinda Parimala Works — makers of “Sugandha Shringar Gold”, which has been available from me since before i started the business (thanks to my association with Sugandha Prabhu) — informing me that, despite my inquiring about it 6 months ago and having them assure me that it would be available after the first of the year, at this point “Sugandha Shringar Gold” is completely sold out, and they will have to make more before they can even think about sending me some. 😠

at least they answer my emails in a timely fashion, unlike the flaky incense lady, who replies to my emails when she feels like it, which is, frequently, never. 😒

circus, pictures

cirque du soleil

Saturday, 20220129 przxqgl

a couple of friends bought moe and i tickets to see the cirque du soleil show “Allegria”, which we used today. i have seen “Saltimbanco”, and “Volta”, and i think i like this one best of all. it is, apparently, “Allegria 2.0”, which is a reboot of the show they did from 1994 to 2013, which, according to moe, was “why there weren’t as many set pieces and why there was a lot more acrobatics…” and, indeed, there was A LOT more acrobatics than i have seen at previous cirque shows. there were stacks of 3 people in several of the acts, and EVERY. SINGLE. ACT. had some variety of “death defying stunt”, from the stack of 3 people that “fell” into a bunch of long poles, which were being held on the shoulders of other guys, and ended up with two of the stack of three people standing ON the poles… and a 4-way “tumble track” that had 8 people bouncing and tumbling over the top of each other… and the guy with the german wheel that started with the wheel flat on the ground, and he got it up and rotating SIMPLY BY exherting momentum with his feet…

220129 cirque du soleil fire baton juggler - photo by moe — 220129 cirque du soleil fire baton juggler – photo by moe

and the guy that juggled two fire batons, which he lit by passing the fire from one end to the other with his mouth… and the people that did the 3-dimentional acrobalancing dance, hanging from wires in the ceiling… and the contortionist/hand-balancer that, i think, may have been in the moisture festival a few years ago… and the flying trapeze artists… oh my! i don’t know what the original “Allegria” show was like, but this one BLEW. ME. AWAY!

literally… there was one of the “entr’acte” scenes, with clowns, where they created a literal blizzard of confetti that completely engulfed the people who were sitting close to the stage (which included us)… and then, after they had done a little dance with leaf blowers, to get the confetti off the stage, they had people who ran sheets up, over the heads of the front rows of seats, and they blew the confetti on to the sheets, which were, presumably, gathered up and recycled for the next show… there was A LOT of confetti…

and i got a souvenier collapsible velvet top hat, which is something i have wanted for a very long time. 😉

Continue reading micro$not, mshtml, and activex →

look, it’s the end of the world!

Monday, 20220124 przxqgl

a VERY long time ago — i would guess somewhere between 1964 and 1967, or thereabouts — i participated in a “market research study” (for which my parents, hopefully, got paid), where, over the course of a week or so, i would try various different dry cereals, and “potential” dry cereals — which they had produced, but hadn’t “hit the market” yet — without knowing anything about them, and rate them according to what i thought dry cereal should look and taste like.

i’m fairly sure i screwed up ALL of their data points, because i was a combination of three things, which severely skewed my personal experience of dry cereal. the first was that, when i was very small, there was a concern that i might be allergic to cows’ milk (which had been proven false, by the time this took place), and so, when i was learning which cereals i liked, i was only given cereals that could be eaten “without milk”… which, for some reason, meant various different kinds of oatmeal and grits… i wasn’t even given “cream of wheat” because it had the word “cream” in it, and, particularly, my mother was CONVINCED that it wouldn’t be good for me. the second was that my parents were “progressive”: not full-blown “hippies” (however, my dad did have long hair and a beard, but it wasn’t until the ’70s) but definitely not the standard fare for the time and place they were from, which was central illinois “corn country” in the mid-to-late ’60s. thus, they were CONVINCED that sugar was “bad”, so, as a result, when it was determined that dry cereal was “a thing”, i was only given ‘bland’ cereals, such as cheerios, kix, chex, puffed wheat, and grape nuts. by the time i was part of the survey, i was eating cows’ milk all the time, but i never liked “sugar frosted flakes”, “sugar smacks”, “chocolate frosted sugar bombs” or anything like that… and the third thing is that, when i was very small, i was forced to eat fruit at a time when i really DID NOT want to eat fruit, and, as a result, i developed a lifelong distaste for fruit, in general, and about 75% of the cereal that i tested was fruit flavoured, in some way or another.

i spent a few days trying, and rejecting about 95% of the “chocolate frosted sugar bombs” they offered me, primarily because they were so sweet that it overpowered any “cereal-like” taste there may have been.

however, there is one thing that i remember clearly, and that was that “they” (the people conducting the survey, who were, according to my interpretation, in a position to know these things) told me that there would NEVER be “chocolate cheerios”. they told me that the makers of cheerios were totally against making their cereal “pre-sweetened”, and if i saw chocolate cheerios on sale, it would mean the end of the world. cheerios was, by definition, NOT a “pre-sweetened” cereal.

over the years, they have come close… the closest they’ve gotten that i know about was “honey-nut cheerios”, which was “pre-sweetened”, but, because of the fact that it was, alledgedly, sweetened with honey, and not sugar, it was, alledgedly, “okay”…

however, when i came across this, yesterday… 😱

miscellaneous

but still…

Saturday, 20220122 przxqgl

so, it turns out, there’s a MINISCULE chance of my getting pulmonary fibrosis.

as a fully vaccinated person:

there’s approximately 2% chance that i will get COVID (the “98% survival rate” that anti-vaxxers seem to think applies to them, as well). if i do, there’s approximately 2% chance that it will be bad enough to put me in the hospital. if THAT happens, there’s approximately 30% chance that it will end up with pulmonary fibrosis.

but still, i don’t relish the idea of getting COVID, even if it is “mild”. 😒

moe’s birthday was yesterday. she’s still not as old as i am.

we’re starting to gear up for the moisture festival, which IS going to happen, in person, this year — but, beyond that, who knows, because it’s alleged that the palladium has been sold — although precisely HOW they’re going to hold the moisture festival in the middle of a pandemic remains to be seen.

we’re starting to think about starting to gear up for the oregon country fair, this year, in spite of the fact that it hasn’t happened for the past two years, and nobody’s really sure whether it is GOING to happen… but, naturally, if it IS going to happen, we need to be ready for it, because, one way or the other, we’re GOING to have a panto ready in december, despite the fact that we probably won’t have a place to perform, because of the aforementioned alleged selling of the palladium.

thaddeus and i have a gig scheduled in october, as “snakez alive”, and kiki came over last week, with her banjolele, and we played old timey tunes á la Peanut Envy. at this point, we’ve played enough in common to get us through a couple hours of busking at the market, but the market still requires masks for buskers, and i can’t wear a mask and play tuba at the same time… STILL… 😒

anhedonia, COVID19

OY! 😠

Wednesday, 20220119 przxqgl

moe went on her first post-COVID business trip to florida. she left last friday, and returned yesterday.

she’s got to wait 72 hours before she tests from the trip.

REGARDLESS OF THE OUTCOME OF THE TEST, she’s got to go in to the clinic on monday, because ALL of the rest of the employees of the clinic ALREADY HAVE COVID!!! 😠

which means that it’s INCREDIBLY LIKELY that i’m going to end up with COVID, despite being fully vaccinated and boosted.

there are reports of lung fibroids in breakthrough cases, which would SEVERELY limit my ability to play wind instruments. 😠😠

and she STILL wonders why i would have preferred to DIE when i had the chance! 😠😠😠

i am a terrorist

apropos of nothing in particular, but…

Friday, 20220114 przxqgl

what is MAGA going to do when #drumpf dies?

clients, frustration, hybrid elephant, incense of the month club, pictures

so, there’s this…

Wednesday, 20220112 przxqgl

so there’s this, which is a prototype (flong!) of a 1½" button for next month’s IOTM VIP goodie…

however i’m not sure about it. it’s an absolutely delicious double (or triple!) entendre, for those few who “know about such things”, but how many people spent the first 30 years of their lives studying obscure religious facts? and, i’m afraid it could be taken to be VERY offensive to… um… just about anybody else…

under normal circumstances, i wouldn’t care in the slightest, but this is, allegedly, representing my business, and i would be sending them out to people who don’t know me…

[ETA 220114] — it’s an 18th century drawing of what the ancient roman god Priapus might have looked like. ΣΩΤΗΡ ΚΟΣΜΟΥ (soter kosmou) means “Saviour of the World”, and it was usually inscribed below the penis face. however, in a bizarre twist, the figure of “a man with the head of a rooster and an erect penis for a beak” may have also been a representation of st. peter, in which case, ΣΩΤΗΡ ΚΟΣΜΟΥ refers to jesus. it’s one of the reasons a penis is sometimes referred to as a “peter”. 🤣

family of origin, getting old, karass, malfunctioning people

🙄

Monday, 20220110 przxqgl

i swear, these people must be a part of my karass (also, karass), because i keep running into them in THE MOST unexpected places, despite my overall desire to separate myself from them as much as possible… 😒

recently i’ve developed an interest in mycology (who am i kidding, i’ve ALWAYS had a very strong interest in a certain kind of mushroom… 😉) particularly because it seems fairly likely that, with a little coercion (from spores which i already have), i can start producing psilocybe cyanescens outside, in my fenced yard, pretty much whenever i choose to do so.

to this end, i recently purchased a book by mushroom expert paul stamets, called “Mycelium Running”, and, on the colophon page for the book, i noticed that the cover design was by two people, one of whom is andrew lenzer…

who is married to my younger younger sister.* 🙄

the one i haven’t spoken to since… i don’t know, 1988? maybe…? probably earlier than that… maybe as early as 1980… when she was 12 years old… 🙄

and, i have to keep reminding myself that members of one’s karass aren’t necessarily one’s “friends”… 😒

* as compared to my older younger sister, who is two years older than my younger younger sister… but they are six, and eight years younger than me, respectively, so i wasn’t around for a lot of their growing up and getting married stuff, and i have never actually met andrew lenzer, my brother-in-law… but, knowing my siblings, i would wager that there have been many unpleasant stories told about me for years. 🙄

swastikas

RT

Friday, 20220107 przxqgl

i’ve been playing around with illustrator (mac), photoshop (mac), frax (tablet), procreate (tablet), inkscape (mac/linux), and the GIMP (linux), for a few days, and this is the result. i’m thinking of making stickers out of it. i wanted to play around with making the QR code an integral part of the artwork, so that you don’t have to go to the QR link to appreciate the art, but if you do hit the link, you’ll get even more information.

enlightenment, hindu, pictures

blasphemy?

Tuesday, 20220104 przxqgl

okay, this is discounting the fact that gods only exist in the minds of those who worship them… this is a purely practical examination of the aspects of hindu gods, in particular… and to be precise, an examination of their clothing.

most depictions of deities are clothed. there are deities which are naked, and part of the devotion to these deities is dressing, undressing, and bathing them, but i’m talking about the deities that are depicted as clothed.

i wonder…

a depiction of the multiple arms of Kali Maa, in Goa

how is Kali Maa supposed to put on that shirt?

ganesha the car, pictures, snowpocalypse

BLEHHHH!!!

Monday, 20220103 przxqgl

day NINE of more than one foot of snow, and it’s currently snowing at this very moment!

i tried getting out to ship out the IOTM orders this morning, and didn’t even make it out of the driveway before getting stuck!

this is not fun any more. 😒

although, it’s a good thing i got stuck when i did, because i could have made it halfway down the street, or halfway to the middle-of-nowhere post office before getting stuck, which would be even worse…

[ETA] moe came home early, and informed me that there is a tree down across the road, about 150 yards up the street from our house, where it can’t be seen from our house… which means that, even if i had gotten out, i wouldn’t have got far. a lady heavy equipment operator came around and plowed the street in front of our house, all the way to the dead end, in exchange for $100. she said she’s been plowing the roads in our neighbourhood for 4 years.

COVID19, depression, new year, pictures, snowpocalypse

bleh

Saturday, 20220101 przxqgl

blah blah new year, blah blah pandemic, blah blah isolation, blah blah depression…

same as it ever was:

day 5 SEVEN of 1+ foot of snow. keeping fingers crossed, but no power outage yet. at this point, the main roads are slushy, and some of them are bare and wet, but the street in front of our house has few enough tire prints that i can still count them. last year someone eventually plowed our street, but i don’t know who, and they haven’t done it this year. i brushed all the snow off my car, and ventured out today, because i’ve actually got a unicycle class tomorrow, and i needed to know whether or not to admit defeat, and take monique’s all-wheel-drive car (or the truck). as it is, it’s supposed to get up to 42°F, so i will probably take my car to class.

house stuff, miscellaneous, moe, music, VEWPRF

VEWPRF/year-end stuff

Tuesday, 20211228 przxqgl

i’m slowly rebuilding my music collection. today i added two tom zé albums, from the early 2000s, which are “no longer available” — meaning “the only place to find them is on discogs. one is an album i had pre-cloud-drive-disaster, called “Estudando o Pagode (Na Opereta Segregamulher e Amor)“. the other is one that “just happened” to be available from the same vendor, from two years earlier, in 2003, and it’s called “Imprensa Cantada“. both of them appear in several tom zé anthologies, but the original CDs have artwork that is NOT included in the anthologies, and, especially in the case of tom zé, the graphic artwork is almost as important as the musical artwork in the overall scheme of things. i should be getting another Gogol Bordello CD pretty soon, also

we’re giving away the last piece of ikea furniture that we own, that is NOT shelves, tomorrow… which should be interesting, as we currently have three days worth of snow on the ground, and only a few tire tracks of people driving past our house. it’s the king-size storage bed frame, which means that now we’ve got the adjustable bed frame on the 4-inch legs that it came with (rather than on the 2-inch legs, on top of the storage bed), no storage under the bed (currently), and no headboard (currently). the plan is to get some other form of storage, and a headboard… and, possibly a dresser and nightstand to replace the ones i inherited from my grandparents in 1980-something.

moe is getting “stem cell treatment” on her knees on thursday [UPDATE: WEDNESDAY!!] (hopefully the roads will have cleared enough by then that i can drive out of the neighbourhood). this is to (hopefully) “cure” her bum knees, which currently have no meniscus. if everything goes according to plan, this is going to create “new” padding between the bones in her knee. naturally, “insurance” won’t pay for it, and the only other option — total knee replacement — isn’t happening at the moment because the orthopedist that moe has been seeing is fat-phobic, and won’t operate until she’s lighter than she’s ever been in her adult life. 😒… so the (veterinary) clinic is paying for the whole procedure(!!). alledgedly, it’s going to be a couple of days of being “pretty out of it”, followed by a couple weeks of “light duty”, and then it will develop into an “up to 80% improvement”, which is A LOT better than where she’s been for the past few years.

i’ve managed to stay a lot more insulated from the standard xmas “celebration”, this year, but it’s primarily because of the pandemic, which doesn’t look like it’s going to be ending any time in the forseeable future, barring a miracle of some sort… and, as we all know, miracles that involve anti-vax mask-holes, and the right-wing, republican’t, fascist, white-supremacist IDIOTS that currently make up slightly less than HALF of the population of this gawd-forsaken wasteland, are, for all practical purposes, totally unheard-of… but, on the plus side, almost complete isolation for the second year in a row, has made it so that i have only had to listen to one, partial rendition of “feliz navidad” this year, so i can’t say that’s all bad.

and i got a theremin for xmas! 😎

incense of the month club

IOTM CLUB

Sunday, 20211226 przxqgl

i inducted another person into the Incense Of The Month Club yesterday, which means that i now have 20 slots left… and it’s further evidence that, while there may not be MANY incense fanatics out there, there are a few of them.

ganesha the car, pictures

😥 ؟…yhaow

Monday, 20211220 przxqgl

here is the beginning, and here is the end:

cannabis, homegrown, my music

blirk

Tuesday, 20211214 przxqgl

i wasn’t doing anything else, so i spent the day decarboxylating the trimmings from my harvest, in october (more technical information), so now the whole house smells like weed, and i am REALLY high…

so, naturally, while i was waiting for my timer to go off, i made a pretty good rhythm track for the music i talked about a while back, and now it sounds like this:

i still can’t quite get my mind around the fact that it’s 100% legal… astounding!

forward into the past, getting old, tracts

kick in the brain

Tuesday, 20211207 przxqgl

from before the wayback machine… these tracts that i just found, were prototypes for smaller versions, which were originally designed to counter the “occult” graffiti i found in an abandoned house in the woods near bellingham… the same house i found the tail coat, which i still have (although it’s been substantially modified, at this point)… the house was obviously a place where teenage doodlehums gathered to do illegal and/or immoral things, and i wanted to “enlighten” them by leaving bizarre literature in their abandoned hideaway. it was in a section of fairly dense, second growth forest, on the outskirts to the northeast of bellingham… there were some neighbourhoods east of there, along alabama street, but the place where the railroad had been was, basically, second growth forest. not even a driveway to the house. the house was two stories, but when i was there, the second story was not safe (although i did go up there, a couple of times), and there was a well-house with a working well… and about 50 feet beyond that were what used to be a railway. it was a perfect place for teenage doodlehums to gather, mark up the walls with “satanic” graffiti, smoke pot, write graffiti about smoking pot, and dream about having illicit sex with their imaginary girlfriends.

i figured they had probably heard all the standard propaganda from the “christians” (the “satanic” graffiti was all the evidence i needed), and this was back when i was full of fire to enlighten the masses, so i came up with a number of tracts which were left in the abandoned house, in phone booths (remember them?), and traded for chick tracts at the local storefront ministries that bellingham had at the time. the first version of these tracts was originally published in 1987. one of the later versions was published in 1992.

now, the place where the abandoned house was, is a neighbourhood of slightly-more-upper-class tract houses with a trail that, 75 years ago, was a railroad that served the logging community in that area.

hybrid elephant, incense of the month club, unicycle

derp

Thursday, 20211202 przxqgl

since 22 november (a week ago monday), i have gotten 8 incense orders, and i’m back to almost $500 in my bank account, after having been, basically, wiped out in june. i sent out the final incense of the month to my first two incense of the month clients, which means that i have, officially, been doing the incense of the month club for a year, now. my business is as strong and as vital as it has ever been, and i am beginning to rebuild from the cloud disaster in june, but, every day i realise there’s another picture, or document, or bit of information, that i HAD on my old cloud drive. i’m still reeling from the loss of approximately 50% of my music collection. 😒

i’m learning to free mount on the unicycle, which is an important step in learning to ride the unicycle while playing the tuba. i have to be able to mount with no hands, not holding on to anything except the tuba, and i have to be able to ride away, while holding the tuba, without falling down. at this point, i’m ALMOST to the point where i can mount the unicycle with no hands. at this point, i can mount the unicycle with a pole in my left hand, to help me balance. if everything goes EXACTLY RIGHT, i can ride away after a couple seconds of wobbling and balancing on the pole. also, i am pretty sure i have learned how to turn left… which is important. turning right is a lot easier. i’ve been able to turn right for a while now. it turns out, turning left involves looking left, preferably at where i’m intending to go, and adding a little bit of extra “oomph” with my hips at just the right time. who would have ever thought that riding a unicycle would involve looking as much as it involves balance?

blog birthday

borg blithday

Tuesday, 20211130 przxqgl

hi, today is the blog birthday. it’s not actually the blog birthday now, because i am writing this in advance, and scheduling it for the blirg bothday, but you don’t know that.

this is the 14th anniversary of this blog in this location, in spite of the fact that “this location” has actually changed at least three times since then. the location has changed, but the URL has remained the same. for the record, the bog is now physically located in florida, under the auspices of WebHost Python, which has been my host provider for around 5 years now. rather strange, as i am physically located in the seattle, washington area, completely on the other side of the continent from the location of the blig.

internet is awesome, sometimes…

the blithday of the borg in it’s original form is actually 030415, but that was back when it was on LiveJournal, and brad was still in charge. these days i’ve tended a lot more towards the Bacchus’ First Rule of Internet philosophy: “Anything worth doing on the internet is worth doing at your own domain that you control.”

it’s true.

forward into the past, frustration, the cloud drive crack of 2021

ARGH! (A₁R₁G₁H₁)

Monday, 20211129 przxqgl

another casualty of the cloud drive crack:

my “HANDY-DANDY LIST OF WHEN THINGS HAPPENED”

which i have been updating since my injury (2003) to help me keep track of what happened in my life, and when it happened in relation to other things that happened in my life.

my recollection is that it was a fairly complete, if compact, version of an “autobiography”, which i had been updating with new material, or changing around the position of old material when new evidence came to light, for a LOOOOOONG time… it was DEFINITELY a “working document”, and it’s gone. poof. 😩😖

a couple weeks ago, i started to rebuild it, but i’m confounded by the fact that things that appear very vividly in my memory don’t seem to match up in a predictable way with the timeline of my life. i don’t remember when important things happened:

for example, i am reasonably certain that i lived in St. Gordy’s house in 1988, but the job i remember having — working at mellowoods and music in friday harbour, doing musical instrument repair for the friday harbor traditional jazz festival — didn’t happen until 1991… and i actually HAVE a button from the friday harbor traditional jazz festival, and it actually SAYS “1991” on it, so it’s kind of hard for me to argue…

but, the problem is that i lived in St. Gordy’s house for a while, then i moved up the street a couple blocks and lived there for a year or so, then i moved into the dome in 1990, and i lived there until i moved to thillberg road, in mount vernon, with ruth…

or, when i freight hopped to wenatchee… i know i lived in the dorms during 1979 and 1980, and i moved to lummi island for 6 to 8 months, and then i moved to mackenzie street, and lived there until i moved to seattle to start the tech school, in 1984. i also know that i didn’t freight hop to wenatchee until i lived at mackenzie street, but i can’t remember, for sure, whether it happened in 1982 or 1983. at this point, i’m LEANING TOWARDS 1982, because i have calendars and sketchbooks from the early 1980s that may seem to indicate that, but nothing is written in clear enough language that i can be totally certain. 😖

fortunately, Ezra, St. Igon (with whom i freight hopped to wenatchee), and St. Gordy are still in my “contacts” list, but this whole thing started when St. Igon ASKED ME when we went to wenatchee, and that was AFTER i had already started to rebuild my list.

and ezra is in michigan with his sweetie, and won’t be back until mid-december…

FRUSTRATING!! 😖😖

my music

hair

Sunday, 20211128 przxqgl

the latest from j. vernon mcgee, with the hell processed out of it. it’s a vern serm about hair, which he, somehow, works out to being equivalent to demon worship.

don’t worry, i processed the hell out of it, so it’s perfectly safe for ordinary people.

it needs a rhythmn track.

titles

tittles

Friday, 20211126 przxqgl

Symbolic Coach Lines
Christian Trees
Economy Whining (or “Economy Whinging” for a more “european” look)
Quipping for Christ
Teachers With Tentacles
Lowest Quality Price Tools
Best Jumbo TV Happiness
Gummy Whores
Overgrown With Underbrush
Hair Salon and Ankle Clinic
Lowest Price on Pubic Hair
Ceremonial Bread Fights
Fart Stand
Rain City Racists
Jutled Boxes
Your Safety is for The Lates
Worship Your Dick
An Imaginary Housing Community
We Make Hydraulic Noises
Bruch, Beeler & Giday, Attorneys at Law
Sage’s Gulag
Jalapeñes
Stortch
Smarmy Pants
Self Hostage
Flimflam Phloem
Acceptable Bones
War To Salvation Church
Can I Ask A State Trailer Park?

gripes, meta, pictures, rants

goo dot gl 😒

Thursday, 20211118 przxqgl

a few years ago, i got a QR code from google, attached to their URL-forwarder at goo dot gl, that resolved to वृत्तिः from “Unknown Album”, which i promptly had made into a sticker, which i have been sticking to various different things, and handing to strangers i meet on the street, for a few years now.

i INTENDED to use goo dot gl’s analytics to determine how many people had hit the link, and where they were located. apparently that was only a SMALL FRACTION of the information i could receive from the QR code.

what i didn’t know is that they shut down their URL-forwarder at goo dot gl in 2018 and i only JUST found out about it.

fortunately the QR code, and the URL-forwarder continue to work, but…

goddam it, gewgel… when you stop using something important, you should make it somewhat more obvious. 😒

now, admittedly, i INTENDED to use the goo dot gl analytics, but i only logged in to see what was happening for the first time, today, so i really was NOT paying attention, but still… you would think that a company as big as the big G could be a little more public about things like this.

the battle of the tablet

so, my tablet is broken, again…

Thursday, 20211118 przxqgl

this time it started out as a charging port. it was intermittent for a while, i had to plug it in a certain way, with the plug held just so, or it wouldn’t work. then i upgraded the OS to 15.x and it ceased charging all together. of course i noticed right away, since i almost always keep it plugged in to power, unless i’m actually using it for something.

i had to wait a week (with my tablet unable to charge) while they waited for a part to come in. i was supposed to pick it up today.

i heard the technician who actually fixed it, say, about 3rd gen 12.9″ ipad pros, he’d seen one with a broken charging port “last week”. he also said the job was sensitive, because switching the charge port means disassembling the screen, which is “sensitive”… which meant that they might have to replace the screen as well…

i don’t think i was intended to hear that part, because the technician was talking to his boss, but… well…

he was right.

they broke the screen. 😒

i was supposed to pick it up at 2:00, and when i walked in, the guy said that there had been an “issue” with the screen, and that i was getting a new screen, which — he said — would be delivered “tomorrow”…

the last time they replaced the screen (last year? two years ago?) their replacement “tomorrow” took around a week. and, because of the fact that they broke it, while in the process of fixing something else, they get the privelege of keeping my tablet until the screen comes in (whenever that ends up being). 😒

and, of course, i have a telemedicine appointment tomorrow… 😒 i think i can do it on my phone, but i have never done it before, so it’ll be challenging, at the very least. 😒

cannabis, homegrown

homegrown! 😎

Sunday, 20211114 przxqgl

starts under lights on 210502, official first bowl smoked on 211114.

ManWoman Memorial Day

࿗ ManWoman Memorial Day! ࿘

Saturday, 20211113 przxqgl

in memory of ManWoman, born 2 feb., 1938, died 13 nov., 2012. father/mother/brother/sister to everyone, but particularly those who have swastika tattoos.

࿗࿘࿕࿖卍卐࿌😉࿗࿘࿕࿖卍卐࿌😉࿗࿘࿕࿖卍卐࿌😉࿗࿘࿕࿖卍卐࿌😉࿗࿘࿕࿖卍卐࿌😉࿗࿘࿕࿖卍卐࿌😉࿗࿘࿕࿖卍卐࿌😉࿗࿘࿕࿖卍卐࿌😉

2021 cloud drive fiasco, pictures

aaarrggghh! it happened again!!

Thursday, 20211111 przxqgl

that’s A³R²G³H² for those of you keeping track…

i have discovered YET ANOTHER thing that fell victim to the crack of 2021, and that was the user manual for our fireplace!

particularly, this exact diagram (found, and re-downloaded by MOE, who is the undisputed google-master of this house) which is found on page 28 of said manual:

this shows the position of the flue/damper (labeled “burn rate air control”) and the automatic startup air control for the woodstove. the flue/damper is a thing i am familiar with, but the postion and manufacture of this particular woodstove, plus it’s relative “new-ness” from my standpoint, makes it very difficult for me to remember the correct position, which is VITALLY important when starting this stove, in order to prevent huge clouds of smoke from coming out of every non-welded join in the entire stove and chimney…

and the “automatic startup air control” is something i have never experienced in a woodstove before… it’s got a mechanical timer, and it gradually closes vents at the bottom of the fire, so that it has plenty of air to start with, but not so much air after 30 minutes or so…

and WITHOUT the information in this diagram, i have a very difficult time remembering the correct position for these things, which makes it REALLY frustrating, when i have to start a fire, as i did this evening. 🤬🤬🤬

fortunately, i have MOE to rescue me when technology fails. i now have this manual re-downloaded and stored away in an obvious place on my new cloud server. 😉

my guess is that this sort of thing is going to become, more-or-less, a standard occurance chéz salamandir, so it’s a good thing i’m starting to keep track of it now… i think… 😕

forward into the past

latin

Wednesday, 20211110 przxqgl

when i was in high school, i took latin, but that’s not the story.

the story is that, when i found out they were going to offer a latin class, i IMMEDIATELY wanted to sign up for it… but my parents said no, that latin was a “dead” language, that nobody spoke any longer, or used for anything (😏), that i would never use it, and it would just waste my time.

i was a junior in high school, and i REALLY wanted to learn latin. i pestered my parents for a few weeks about it, but they stood fast…

so i went to my high school guidance counsellor, and told her. she immediately agreed with me, and gave me a bunch of “hints” that i could use to try to convince my parents, but none of them worked. my parents were the stubborn, pig-headed people that i have come to know them to be since then, and they were adamant that it would be a collosal waste of my time to learn latin.

i went back to my high school guidance counsellor and told her that the hints didn’t work, and that i still REALLY wanted to learn latin… so she CALLED them.

she talked with my mother (who was the louder of the two) for about half an hour, and, somehow, convinced her that my studying latin would NOT be a waste of my time. i was overjoyed.

today, 40 years later, latin is something that i use on a DAILY basis, to help me understand, and better utilise the language i speak… to help other people understand confusing things (of which there are many)… to learn about places, and things, in a way that english, by itself, doesn’t even have a clue about… to have a better grip on romance languages that ARE used in the modern world — i also studied french in high school, and it gave me a better understanding of the french language, as well as giving me a sneak peek at spanish, italian, and portuguese… at this point, it would take me about 3 days of immersion to get functional in any romance language, and probably not more than a week before i was understanding most of what was said to me…

WRITING, on the other hand, would very likely take quite a bit longer, particularly in italian or portuguese, because they spell things strangely, have silly, inconsistent silent letters, “non-standard” pronunciation for other letters, and are, generally, more laid back, which makes learning to write more difficult 😉

and that’s ALL because i studied latin. 😉

and i use approximately ZILCH of the other subjects i studied in high school, with the exception of music, which i also use, on a daily basis… actually, that’s not entirely correct: high school taught me skills, like how to study, how to use the scientific method, logic and reason to figure things out, the proper use of tools like a wood lathe, proportional dividers, engineering scales, and a linotype, all of whose skills can be transferred to the “modern” world in a variety of ways…

in other “forward into the past” news, i finally got around to editing the Wraith Ugly/Bob Larson tapes. i’ve been flogging them on bob larson’s twitter feed, which is somewhat amusing. 😈

pictures, swastikas

also…

Friday, 20211105 przxqgl

Friendly Swastika dot Art

climate change, pictures

the pond progress

Friday, 20211105 przxqgl

the pond, last month…

the pond, this month…

it’s still not as full as i have seen it, but it’s getting there. a month of near constant rain doesn’t hurt, but it’s still not as full as it was before this summer. 😒

woo…

Wednesday, 20211103 przxqgl

a couple weeks ago, i suddenly couldn’t login to my blog. it didn’t give me any of the standard “you can’t login” messages, instead it gave me half a page of code that was only partially legible (to me), and no clue what happend or how to fix it. 😱

after a good deal of futzing around, and a few back-and-forths with the host provider, i figured out that it was because i had a 2FA plugin, set to auto-update, and WordFence, also set to auto-update. when WordFence added a 2FA feature which was activated by default (generally, a good thing), and auto-updated itself, it “auto-updated” itself right into the middle of a conflict with the 2FA plugin that was already there, and active. 😱

at the time, i figured that it would be easier to delete the 2FA plugin and use the feature provided by WordFence… so i deleted the 2FA plugin, and set up the 2FA feature provided by WordFence.

except that, unlike the 2FA plugin that was now deleted, WordFence’s 2FA feature only gives you the ability to set up an authenticator ONCE, and, after that, it “assumes” that you have an authenticator set up, so it doesn’t give you the ability to set up another one.

which i discovered today, when i tried to login using my phone, rather than the tablet on which i have set up the new 2FA set up. the result was that i entered the 6-digit code given to me by google authenticator, only to have it rejected… twice… and then i was banned from logging in TO MY OWN GODDAMN BLOG! 🤬

THIS is why the web designer DIDN’T set plugins to auto-update on Hybrid Elephant! 👍

after i used one of my emergency login codes, i set the plugins to NOT auto-update, re-installed the 2FA plugin that allows you to set up more than one iteration of the authenticator, and deleted, and re-installed the blog on the authenticator on BOTH my tablet and my phone…

whew… i think that’s everything… 😕

cannabis, miscellaneous, music

yawn, again…

Friday, 20211029 przxqgl

back to nothing happening again…

my harvest is curing, but the trimmings aren’t drying as fast as i would like them to. i’m pretty sure that if i took the screen off of my office window (which i am not currently using anyway), i could speed up the drying process. maybe i’ll do that today.

i went to a concert with moe and her friend lora, a couple days ago. i was chosen at the last minute to substitute for lora’s husband, who said that a concert might jeopardise his recent sobriety (and he was an AWFUL drunk, so i totally agree), and, also, because, that way, i could drive and lora and moe could talk. 😉 it was the first time i have done ANYTHING that “public” in almost two years, and it felt really weird. it felt weird going to the tacoma-dome, and being in the (relatively light) crowd of people getting into the venue… i wore a N95 mask AND my cloth mask, and kept my hands in my pockets as much as possible. it felt weird sitting in the row of seats with a totally strange (masked) woman so close that she was touching my arm, for the two and a half hours of the concert. a majority of the people were wearing masks, but there was also food and drink available, and a significant number of people thought it was “okay” to wear their masks incorrectly (under their nose), which made me feel like they could have easily taken it off and not felt guilty about it. it felt weird, and creepy, and, when i got home, i felt like i had been swimming in other peoples’ cooties. i took a long, hot shower after the show.

the concert was jackson browne and james taylor, with both of whom i am, more or less, unfamiliar. with jackson browne, there were a few songs that, once he started singing, i went “yeah, i know that song” (although there was one that moe said “if you were alive in the ’70s, you know this song”, but i didn’t), and even a couple that i knew most of the lyrics to, but, honestly, if it weren’t for the fact that i was hearing them at a show that featured jackson browne and james taylor, i wouldn’t have been able to tell you that it was a jackson browne song… hell, i was under the impression, prior to the concert, that jackson was a black man, because that’s the way i always imagined him. that’s how ignorant i was. 😕 james taylor was only a little better, in that i knew that he was white, and i knew a few james taylor songs — all of which they played, of course 😒 — but with both of them, i never had time to listen to their songs because they were INTENSELY popular, so much a part of popular culture, and, particularly, because, james taylor was married to carly simon, and was addicted to heroin…

i never had a thing for carly simon, but i figured that if he were that famous on his own, and he was married to carly simon, then i’m guessing there was something more than “love” involved in the process. 😒

besides which, at the time, i was a lot more interested in the music of morton subotnik, arnold schönberg, and karlheinz stockhausen, who were — and are — A LOT more interesting… 😉

but the musicianship was outstanding — james taylor was backed up by steve gadd on drums, and bruce fowler on horns, both of whom played with frank zappa — the music was good, the lyrics were as “woke” as i remembered them to be in the ’70s, and more “woke” and more “blunt” for the newer songs, james taylor is no longer married to carly simon, or addicted to heroin…

but i would still have much preferred to see a concert of music by morton subotnik, arnold schönberg, or karlheinz stockhausen. 😉

they started up my unicycle class again. it meets for the first time on sunday, which is also halloween. i have to figure out a costume in which i can also ride a unicycle… also, now i have a much higher possibility of learning how to turn left before the end of the year.

i ordered two “performance masks” on the 5th of october, and they still haven’t been shipped out… but it’s just as well, because it has been raining a lot, particularly over the past few days. the pond has water in it, again, but it’s still drastically low.

cannabis, getting old

this is what getting old must feel like…

Thursday, 20211021 przxqgl

i harvested on tuesday: 4 hours of bending, stooping, squatting, and sitting on top of a propane canister (with a piece of plywood over the ring, so i didn’t get ring-butt)… by bedtime, tuesday night, my lower back was painful enough that i couldn’t bend over. i took a muscle relaxant before bed.

yesterday, i woke up and immediately took two tylenol, and made it through the day without too much difficulty or pain… but the most strenuous thing i did all day was blow the leaves off of the back yard — a pointless excersise… there’s already three times more leaves than there were before i started, yesterday. i spent most of the day sitting, standing, or walking on level ground, and it was okay, so i decided to go for a walk. i went for a 2.5 mile walk, and was okay, as long as i was walking on the level, but any uphill or downhill produced spasms so intense that i wondered whether or not it was a good idea going for a walk. at the same time, i went to sleep last night without any medication, so i figured that it was going to go away.

i was wrong.

today, i realised i have my circus class. i felt okay when i got up, and was able to move around, get dressed and suchlike, without pain, so i figured it was a temporary thing, but by the time i was about halfway to class, i realised that circus class today would probably NOT include trampoline, tumble track, unicycle, or tissue, which pretty much leaves juggling, tight wire, and stretching. we started with some warm-ups, and that went okay, then moved to juggling, and that went okay, and i excelled on tight wire, because i discovered that my back DOESN’T hurt if i stand up straight, and engage my core, which is EXACTLY what you need to do on the tight wire… i walked forwards AND backwards on the wire, using nothing but a balance pole in one hand! 😎 but then we moved to stretching, and… no. my body DOES NOT want to stretch. 😒

i came home, ate lunch, filled and shipped out an incense order, and went for another two mile walk… it was better, but there were still major twinges when i went up or down hill.

my next door neighbour just showed up with a batch of warm chocolate chip cookies that are “medicated”… 😉 he listened to an abbreviated version of my circus class experience today, and recommended i try two cookies.

i still can not believe that it’s legal. 🤤

cannabis, pictures, The Holy Vegetable

HARVEST!

Tuesday, 20211019 przxqgl

starts under lights on 210502, harvested 211019, almost two pounds (estimate based on raw weight of the harvested plants), 171 days, 122 of which were outdoors…

… making this my first successful, mostly-outdoor grow. 😉

cannabis, pictures, The Holy Vegetable

yum! 🤤

Monday, 20211018 przxqgl

harvest tomorrow. 😉👍👍

busking, incense, malfunctioning computers

yawn

Tuesday, 20211012 przxqgl 2 Comments

nothing has been happening.

nothing has been happening politically, nothing has been happening socially, nothing has been happening musically, nothing has been happening in regards to the COVID virus… i now have A LOT of “free” time: every other week i have a one-hour appointment with kate, and every week i have my one-hour circus class, but that’s it. 😩

i’ve been spending a lot of time hiking on taylor mountain.

i shipped out two incense orders, today. i’m averaging between two and six orders a month, and, before i got cracked a few months ago, i actually had over a thousand dollars in my bank account… but then i got cracked, and spent it all on replacement hardware and a pile of recovered, possibly useful data.

i have expanded ZIP files for about a tenth of my fonts collection, from the recovered data. mostly TTF files, and just a small fraction of the fonts i used to have. fortunately, my recollection is that my entire >10,000 font library is backed up on CD, somewhere… i’m sifting through the rest of the recovered data slowly, and more or less randomly: it’s totally discouraging to look at this huge pile of recovered data, which took me a couple decades to accumulate, but which is now many, many schrödinger’s cats with random file names, EVERY ONE OF WHICH has to be opened to determine whether or not it’s corrupt, and if it’s not, what general pile it goes in, which all have to be sorted again, later on, and then, probably, sorted at least once more before they’re back in more-or-less the place where they’re supposed to be. 😒

so, it’s something to do, but, literally, i would rather be doing ANYTHING else… 🤬

i ordered some “performance masks” from J.W.Pepper a few weeks ago. they were back-ordered (without my knowledge), and, when i talked to a customer service drone on monday last week, i was assured that they would be shipping out later that week, but i still haven’t seen or heard anything. they’re called “performance” masks, because they look like you’re wearing a mask, but, in reality, the mask has a hole in the front, that your mouthpiece goes through, which makes it practically useless as an actual mask… but the new rule at the market is that the only buskers allowed MUST BE masked, so it’s either wear a “performance” mask, or don’t busk. 😒 but i can’t busk at all, until the “performance” masks are delivered, and, as far as i can tell, at this point, they’re still on back order, and who knows when they’re going to arrive. 😞

rants

the pond, nazis

Wednesday, 20211006 przxqgl

across the street from our house is a pond. it normally has about 10 feet of water in it. you can see it in this photo of the “first morning”, which was taken last year. the pond started losing water in early spring of this year, and it has been mostly dry for almost four months.

today, after 3 days of rain, the pond FINALLY has water in it… not 10 feet of water, or even 10 inches of water, but it’s a start… and it’s going to have to rain A LOT MORE before we’ll be back to the “normal” 10 feet of water. 😒

but “climate change” and the coronavirus are chinese frauds, and we need to prevent the teaching of Critical Race Theory to junior high school kids in public schools. 😒

seriously, i’ve been removing flyers for patriotfront dot us, and flyers for somebody who is running for school board SPECIFICALLY on the platform of “mask CHOICE, not mandate” and “no CRT in schools”, from the bulletin board at the local convenience store… 😠 i’ve been replacing them with my “ultimatum to world leaders”, with a link to ABillionPeople.org, but it’s been being taken down almost as soon as i put it up, so i’ve been trying to get “creative”…

but it’s really disturbing to me that there are actual nazis living in my community. 😠 if he gets elected (which i hope doesn’t happen, but around here, who knows), i wonder how much actual school board experience he has, because the pandemic is not going to last forever, and once he discovers that public primary schools AREN’T teaching “critical race theory” he’s not going to have much of a platform left… but, by then, he’ll have discovered that the school board buys school books for the district, and i’m pretty sure he’ll have something to say about that. 😒

aparajita, clients, famous people, incense

squeeeee!! 😊

Tuesday, 20211005 przxqgl

i just sold 10 boxes of Aparajita — an incense which, as far as i’ve been able to tell, is available NOWHERE ELSE in north america, and possibly the western hemisphere — to the Govinda Gallery in washington DC… which is the place that Astrid Kirchherr and Donovan exhibit their work…

squeeeEEEEEEEEE!!‼‼ 😊👍👍👍

farcebook, farcebook sucks

interesting…

Monday, 20211004 przxqgl

fecesbook was down for around 6 hours, today… down, like, completely down, DNS not working, routes not functioning, nslookup and whois not working, domain for sale…

it’s back up, at this point, but, allegedly, fuckerberg lost 7 billion dollars as a result of the outage, and is now only the fifth richest person on the planet. still no word on exactly what caused it. 😉

COVID19, frustration, i am a terrorist

mrmph… 😒

Saturday, 20211002 przxqgl

two days ago (thursday) i got my COVID19 booster, and my flu shot.

i was also going to get my shingles shot (shongles shit?), but medicare doesn’t cover it (🤬👎⁇), it’s actually two shots, and they cost around $200 A PIECE!

so i didn’t get that, despite the fact that i had chicken pox, and moe has ALREADY HAD shingles, in spite of the fact that she’s not in the targeted age group. 😒🤬

yesterday, i felt like hammered shit, and slept most of the day. i suppose it was probably a combination of the two vaccines, along with the fact that i didn’t have any side effects from the two previous COVID19 vaccines…

today, i’m recovering, but i still feel like i’ve been run over by a steam roller.

HOWEVER…

there are STILL people who refuse the vaccine, for one horseshit reason or another. there are STILL people who say that it’s got a 98% survival rate (leaving out the fact that there are many major, long-term health problems that follow most survivals)…

THEY are the ones who are DIRECTLY RESPONSIBLE for the 700,000 COVID19 deaths that have happened since january, 2020…

AND THEY STILL REFUSE THE VACCINE!! 🤬🤬🤬

soon, there will be a 9/11-style mass-death every week from COVID, and these people — all of whom try to keep 9/11 in the forefront of our minds, whether or not we want it there — will STILL be refusing the vaccine.

…

okay, i’m going to say this because it’s not on twit-turd or feces-book, and nobody is going to ban my account for advocating someone else’s death… 😒

i think it would be best for everyone if the government simply KILLED these people, so the rest of us can get back to something vaguely resembling normalcy, some time in the next decade. 😒

crazy people, stupid people

HAW, HAW, HAW!! 😈

Monday, 20210927 przxqgl

a few moments ago, shortly after 7:00 pm this evening, i was alerted by the sounds of footsteps on our front porch, to the presence of people about to knock on our front door.

i still haven’t gotten over how intensely quiet it is out here. even with my music playing in my office, i was able to hear footsteps on our front porch, and was able to get there BEFORE they knocked on the door.

so i confronted two very young (probably no older than 21 or so) females, in masks, a taller, blonde one in the back, and a shorter, asian looking one (although she spoke with an american accent, so i would guess that she’s not first generation immigrant), JUST as they were about to knock. the shorter one introduced themselves as “missionaries from the church of jesus christ”… and she didn’t have the chance to say “of latter day saints”, because, by that point, i was ALREADY indicating that i was very definitely NOT interested in talking to missionaries. we said our mutual goodbyes and, JUST as i was closing the door, it started to rain…

HARD… 🤣

it rained for 10 minutes or so, REALLY HARD… long enough that, i’m fairly sure, they got TOTALLY soaked… they didn’t appear to have a car in the vicinity, and i have seen them riding bicycles on back country roads, before, so i’m guessing that they had a long, wet walk, in the dark, back to whatever mode of transportation they had… and i KNOW that our next door neighbours on both sides likely had a very similar response to mine… and we’re at the end of a dead-end road, with a what-is-usually-a-pond on the other side of the street… ROTFLMAO!! 🤣🤣🤣🤣

i suppose i should have been a little concerned for their safety, since they were young women, alone, lightly dressed, on foot, in the dark, in the rain, in a remote area known to be inhabited by… less than savoury characters… and bears… 😉

but i wasn’t. 😈

malfunctioning computers

however… 😒

Sunday, 20210926 przxqgl

one distinct DISadvantage to having a new, working cloud drive, is that there have been two different occasions within the past two days, where i thought of something, and went to look for the source files, thinking that i knew exactly where they were located, only to discover that they were on the OLD cloud drive… 😒

god DAMN whatever anonymous skript-kiddie that caused this! 🤬👎‼

my music, shameless self promotion

blowing my own horn

Thursday, 20210923 przxqgl

now that i’ve got a functional cloud drive, i am going through and replacing what i can of my lost music collection, including music that i produced myself.

i have four St. Fred albums on bandcamp, and the only one of those four that were lost on the old cloud drive has not been replaced locally, and that album is The Church of The Pleistocene, which, naturally, means that it has been a few months since i heard it last…

i downloaded it today, and listened to it… and it has held up pretty damn well, considering that it was released in 2018… and i REALLY liked this track, number 14, called “Lamentations”…

in the same way, there are also nine albums of music by And More on bandcamp, which i haven’t heard for even longer (why listen to music i made 30 years ago? i just have it because i made it 30 years ago) and that, too, has stood the test of time admirably. the track is called Pfisteria:

<a href="https://and-more.bandcamp.com/album/slashing-through-the-undergrowth">Slashing Through The Undergrowth by And More</a>

i still laugh when i listen to this… 🤣

(that’s how i know it’s finished music, if it makes me laugh… 😉)

my music

interesting

Sunday, 20210919 przxqgl 2 Comments

i’ve been playing around with “yellofier electrified” on my tablet, for the past few days, and i came up with this vaguely spooky “music box” tune which i really liked:

then, because i didn’t have anything better to do, i exported it from electrified, and imported it into audacity, where i doubled the track, and then set one stereo pair to play back 10% slower than the other stereo pair…

and the result was an EVEN BETTER version 👍

pictures, vaping

the 2nd plateau has been achieved!

Wednesday, 20210915 przxqgl

on 190114 i reached the first plateau, and i’ve been hanging around there ever since.

but, recently, the batteries that completed the first plateau have been acting like they’re on their last legs, not holding a charge, or charging inconsistently, so i decided to get new ones.

unfortunately, the batteries that they made in 2019 are no longer being manufactured, and i really don’t like buying stuff online, where you can’t examine it closely before deciding it won’t work…

which is exactly what happened with an outfit called “slick vapes” (they have a web site, but i won’t link to it, because they’re assholes). i looked through their selection of dab pen batteries and bought 3 “Evolve” batteries… which turned out to be exactly the same as the batteries i rejected prior to reaching the first plateau (they were “pen sized”, wouldn’t hold more than a few hours charge, when they would hold a charge at all, charged inconsistently, etc., etc., etc. 😒). then, i discovered a new type of “coilless” atomiser that looked like it would fit, but i wasn’t sure, because… online… 😒 so i ordered them, and they got back to me and accused me of using a stolen credit card… 😒 and when i got that straightened out, they said they had shipped the product, but the tracking number they sent me said that USPS was still waiting for the package two weeks after they said it was shipped. 😒 and when they FINALLY arrived, wouldn’t you know, they don’t fit any of the vape mods i have. 🤬

i’m still in the process of getting that whole FUMTU straightened out, but, in the mean time, i went to XHale Vapor ‘n’ Smoke, in issaquah, and bought an ELeaf iStick TC40W battery which has controls for temperature and wattage! so now i don’t have to press the button and about 50% of the time get no vapour at all, and the other 50%, get so much vapour that i choke. 😉 it also has a battery life indicator. the one down side that i’ve noticed, so far, is that it uses the micro-USB charging port, but it came with a cable, and the other micro-USB cables i have fit, so i’m just going to have to see how long it lasts. but it’s solid! it’s “hefty”… it’s got substance… not like the batteries from slick vapes, which, honestly, look a lot more flashy than anything else.

cannabis, pictures

cannabis babies

Friday, 20210910 przxqgl

two cannabis starts under lights on 210502. 18 weeks later, 126 days, and now they are taller than me…

every day they’re bigger, and looking more and more juicy and delicious! yum! and totally legal! 😈

articles, geek links, geek stuff, technology, the very big stupid

micro$not, mshtml, and activex

Tuesday, 20210907 przxqgl

back in the dark ages, when i was working at STLabs, before we moved to factoria (i.e. STLabs… so, what? maybe 1995? 1996? somewhere in there), i was testing Internet Explorer version 3.0, which meant, basically, that i was testing micro$not’s browser engine, which is called MSHTML.dll. at the time, a very good friend of mine from college, saint fred (now, sadly, passed on) was mucking about with the innards of micro$not’s operating system, and discovered a problem which had existed for several years prior to this, which micro$not had “made disappear” by changing the technology’s name from OLE — which was, itself, a “renamed” technology, originally called Visual Basic for Applications, or “VB-A” — to “ActiveX”, and, in the process of making it “disappear”, actually made it more prevalent and insidious, by making it work seamlessly with even more micro$not technology.

and, saint fred being who he was, took advantage of this by writing the “Exploder Control”, which could be embedded in a web page, or a microsoft document, and would, when “activated”, perform a clean shutdown of the computer on which it was being viewed… whether you wanted to shut down your computer, or not.

you hit this web page, and, within seconds, your computer shuts down, with no further input from you. 😏

or…

you open this microsoft word document, and, within seconds, your computer shuts down, with no further input from you. 🤣

i watched it happen as it first came out, before anybody realised what it was. it was hillarious! i gave the URI for the exploder control to my boss, and then went back to my workstation and listened, as she suddenly whined “it shut down my computer!” 🤣🤣🤣

and, of course, micro$not’s response to this was to threaten saint fred with lawsuits for doing stuff he shouldn’t have been doing, and when that didn’t work (because fred made sure that the exploder did everything strictly “by the book”, including getting micro$not’s signature on the control), they made the exploder control something that was detected by their anti-virus software (even though it was very clearly NOT a virus, and, actually, did everything totally “by the book”, something to which micro$not never admitted), and, once they figured out that they had caused all of this, they pulled their signature on the control, so that it raised even more red flags before actually activating it…

and, basically, did everything EXCEPT fix the problem, which, after a few months of frantic ass-covering by micro$not’s marketing department, while the tech industry had a good laugh, got swept under the rug, anyway, by more current micro$not fiascos.

but the technology remained, and every version of windows has support for activex, every version of MSHTML.dll has support for activex (which is one of the reasons micro$not got rid of MSHTML.dll a couple years ago, and current versions of ~~Internet Exploder~~… um… what’s their browser called again? EDGE, that’s it… uses google’s “chrome” browser engine, instead. the browser wars are over! micro$not LOST!) and you can, literally, do ANYTHING with activex, that you could do from the normal user interface of windows, and there is, literally, NOTHING stopping you from doing this — or other, more nefarious things — given A LITTLE knowledge of the technology.

which is why, when i saw this headline: Miscreants fling booby-trapped Office files at victims, no patch yet, says Microsoft the FIRST THING i thought was “Exploder Control strikes again!”

this is one of the VERY BIG reasons i do not use micro$not on my computers. i don’t even have my microsoft 5-button mouse any longer!

i wonder if they’ll ever learn. 🙄

miscellaneous

so, unrelated to anything else…

Sunday, 20210905 przxqgl

i remember learning, some time ago (like, possibly, as many as 20 years ago), that the movie staring Gina Lollobrigida, which features the song “‘A Frangesa” (the name of which i have been unable to determine), was a “modern remake” of “L’Arlesienne”, by Georges Bizet and Alphonse Daudet…

or, possibly, that the movie starring Gina Lollobrigida was based on the real-life story of the person about whom Alphonse Daudet wrote his romanticised play…

but i can find no solid evidence for or against this theory, on internet.

i wonder if i imagined the whole thing… 😕

i can say that, if i had known about the movie with Gina Lollobrigida when i first learned the song “‘A Frangesa” (which was when i was in 8th grade, or thereabouts), i would have had a much more positive opinion about the song than i had at the time. 😉 as it was, it was a harder-than-normal concert band piece which i could play, but very many of my fellow student musicians were unable to play (because it’s “faster” than most of them could play reliably), and, because of that, it sounded VERY MUCH like an elementary school band trying very hard to play something that is too difficult for them EVERY! SINGLE! TIME!

ETA 210907: the movie appears to be called “La donna più bella del mondo” (the most beautiful woman in the world), but was english-ified into “Beautiful but Dangerous“… but i still haven’t been able to find out whether or not it was a remake of L’Arlesienne. internet would be a much better place if you could ask questions in human language and not be inundated with meaningless information that is only intended to sidetrack you from what you really want to know… and it’s full of computers! ick! 😒

mushrooms, pictures

see, this is the problem…

Wednesday, 20210825 przxqgl

even under the best of circumstances, “microdosing” mushrooms is a hit-or-miss proposition…

a couple weeks ago, i decided i was going to take a “proper” mushroom trip, and, towards that end, i prepared two 00-sized capsules with the oldest of my mushroom stash. by last week, i had decided that i didn’t want to take the whole thing, all at once, so i took the larger one…

and didn’t feel anything… 😞

which was really dissapointing, but i figured the mushrooms were old enough that they’d lost all their potency. despite the fact that i didn’t “feel” anything, i definitely noticed the “characteristic” anti-depressant effects of the psilocybin, and so, this week, i decided to take the other, smaller capsule.

that was at 12:30 this afternoon…

this time, i DEFINITELY feel something…

despite the fact that the capsule was approximately 25% SMALLER than the one i took last week, i’ve definitely had a marvelously melty afternoon, after going for a ≈5 mile walk in the woods, i came home and spent the afternoon doodling and listening to music over headphones…

it’s now approximately 6:00…

something i haven’t done in a very long time… stupid brain injury… 😒

ganesha the car

ganesha the new car

Monday, 20210823 przxqgl

once again, gas is $4 a gallon.

on july 18th, i got a new car: a 2019 hyundai ioniq hybrid.

it gets ≈65MPG… (it actually gets between 60 and 70MPG, depending on how i drive)

i LIKE spending $25 for gas, looking at the “full tank” indicator, and seeing that i’ve got almost 800 miles before i have to fill up again. 👍😎

although, i must admit, as a person who almost religiously got gas when the indicator said the tank was half empty, i still haven’t quite gotten used to the fact that, when the indicator says the tank in the new car is half empty, i’ve still got more miles to go before i have to fill up than any of my previous cars had when they were entirely full. 😉🤣

also, i REALLY like being able to drive down the street and not make any noise… i like stopping at a stop light and not making any noise. i like going 75 on the freeway and not making any noise… and looking down at the indicator to discover that i’m going 75 on the freeway, not making any noise, and RECHARGING MY BATTERY ALL AT THE SAME TIME! 👍👍👍😎

i have dreamed of owning a hybrid for at least 40 years… check that off my bucket list. 😉

now, to get some artwork on this blank canvas. 😈

🤔

Thursday, 20210819 przxqgl

this afternoon, i was doing some yard work, and i found this in the gravel between the house and the trailer…

210819 Alaska Yukon Pacific 100th Anniversary pin, quarter for scale

it’s small enough that i’m 100% certain that, if i didn’t already know what it was, i wouldn’t have even noticed it, but…

AS IT HAPPENS… i know EXACTLY what it is, which is a 1909-2009 Alaska Yukon Pacific 100th Anniversary pin, which was given to performers at the celebration, and (i believe) were also for sale to the people who came to the celebration. i know this because, in 2009, the ballard sedentary sousa band peformed at the Alaska Yukon Pacific Exhibition 100th Anniversary… although, for some (now) unknown reason, i was unable to make that gig, so i had liz get me a pin, becuase i have always been interested in the alaska yukon pacific exhibition, and i was really dissapointed that i couldn’t be there… and i THOUGHT that pin was on my red fedora, because that’s the last place i saw it, and it was only last week that i wore that hat…

could i have lost my AYP pin? 😨

so i ran upstairs to check, and… no, my AYP pin is right where it’s supposed to be:

210819 my AYP pin, right where it's supposed to be — 210819 my AYP pin, right where it’s supposed to be

so, that raises a new question… was the former owner of my house at the AYP 100th anniversary, and did he/she/they buy a pin? or were they performers? i consider the latter to be EXTREMELY unlikely…

the battle of the computer

umph!

Wednesday, 20210818 przxqgl

i’ve come to a decision.

there are over 150,000 separate files, which takes up 4.5GB, in the .jpg directory alone, of the recovered data.

it took my computer half an hour of doing nothing but loading the directory, before it was completely loaded. every time i opened a file, it took 10 minutes to reload the directory.

i would have to open every one of them to determine if it’s corrupt or not, and if not (about ⅔ of the time), i would then have to determine what it is, and where to put it.

if it takes me (conservatively) 30 seconds per document to make those determinations, i will be doing this for the next 4,500,000 seconds, or more than 7 months of doing NOTHING but opening files to determine whether or not they’re corrupt… no eating, sleeping, shitting, busking or anything else, just slogging away in front of the computer.

factoring in those other things, i’m looking at a couple years, minimum. 😒

i may have been willing to do it at one time… who am i kidding, i’ve NEVER been willing to do that, for that long, for as little payment as i would get. 😒

it’s sad, but there it is: the last 6 years of my life, in pictures, and they’re all going down the toilet, along with a significant portion of my business, my music and artwork, and monique’s photos from the past 6 years.

now, do i keep the data on my new cloud drive, or do i delete it. i’ve also got it on the 1TB external drive that the data recovery folks sent me, so it wouldn’t be entirely deleted… but… 😭

this is one of the times the computer has won the battle. 😒

ETA: interesting, but extremely BIZARRE development is that, upon further investigation, there is a “.jpg” directory, and a “photos” directory, in the recovered data. the documents that are in the .jpg directory are about ⅔ usable files, but their names are gibberish, and there are more than 150,000 of them, all in one directory. however, for some strange reason, the files that are in the “photos” directory are in subdirectories that indicate the manufacturer of the camera, scanner or printer (of which there are about 50), and further subdirectories that indicate the make and model of the camera, scanner or printer (there are A LOT of them), and the files themselves, for the most part, contain the date they were taken in the filename… and, let me tell you, i have A LOT easier time figuring out what a photo is if it is named something like IMG_20061129_133315 (49EA1400).jpg than i do if it is named 80AB2B00.jpg… A LOT!

busking, COVID19, depression, the battle of the computer, wildfires

oh, alright… 😒

Saturday, 20210814 przxqgl

this is an update. what i’ve been doing:

busking. this has been a long time coming. it’s really good to get out and play music for people, and, so far, we’ve been averaging between $15 and $25 apiece for an hour or so of busking. now, instead of howlin’ hobbit and his ukulele, it’s thaddeus and his banjitar — an interesting hybrid, that looks like a banjo, but has six strings and is tuned like a guitar. as i’ve always said, the money is an extra, added bonus, for me, and it’s still true, even after a year and a half… but it’s always nice, and we’ve actually already got one “paying” gig as a result: the pike place market is putting on a “sunset supper”, and is hiring market buskers at $100 apiece for an hour of busking while rich people eat food… that is, most likely, NOT offered to the buskers, but they’re paying $100 apiece, so it’s sort of okay… the BSSB has started rehearsals again, too, which is another bonus. 😉

ripping CDs back into my music collection. i have only gotten the barest of starts sorting the recovery data, in spite of the fact that, in the small print, the data recovery people say that their “free” recovery media (a 1TB hard disk, in my case) only has a warranty of five DAYS — which, to me, says “if you don’t get your data off our recovery media post haste, we’re not going to guarantee that you’ll have ANYTHING, regardless of how much you may have paid us.” nevertheless, at this point, i’ve got all of the data that really made a difference (the panchamukhi ganesha from my car, the spreadsheet containing the data for the Incense of the Month Club, and the spreadsheet of blocked-for-spamming IP addresses), and, basically, if i had anything else i need, i don’t remember it, and probably won’t until i need that data again, which will mean that i’m probably going to have to keep going back to the recovery data on occasion, for the rest of my life… however, if i already have freshly ripped .flac files, then, when i finally get around to slogging through the 1TB MESS of recovered data, it will be slightly less of a concern if the archives i got are incomplete or corrupt. this is an ongoing project that is probably going to take several weeks to finish, and while it’s going on, i may not post here, as much.

hiding from the smoke and heat. it hasn’t been as bad as it was a couple years ago, but it’s definitely smoke season. i look out my office window and see orange skys and translucent air, and the AQI is 63, which is firmly in the “yellow” range. busking, yesterday, was an extra bonus, because it was around 10°F cooler at the market than it was at home… it’s 20° cooler than it was in june(!!), but it’s still in the high-90°s, which is extremely rare around here, in my experience. the government climate change investigatory committee just released the first part of their study, a few days ago, and it says what climat change activists have been saying for 30+ years, now, which is, basically, climate change is real, it’s happening, and it was definitely caused by humans… and then, two days later, 7 democrats switched positions, and voted with ALL the republicans, to pass a law making it illegal for the government to EVER ban fracking. 🤬 so, i guess that means that, ultimately, climate change will kill us all, but the rich people are going to die last. 🤬🤬 i have never wanted to, but it’s my impression that, soon, i will have to apologise to ezra for bringing him into a world where he may never reach his full potential, because of the thoughtlessness and carelessness of my immediate ancestors.

hiding from the virus. the delta variant is 1000 times more contagious than the original strain, and they’re saying that recipients of the pfizer vaccine, at least, will have to get a “booster” shot, but they’re not saying when it will be available, or how long we have to wait before getting one. in the mean time, schools have been making masks optional, and reopening, and then closing down again, when 40% of the students get COVID, while the right wing, q-anon devotee, anti-mask, anti-vax, trump morons are dying by the thousands, and STILL ranting their nonsense about it affecting pregnancies, or tracking microchips in the vaccine. there’s an image i saw on twitter that is, basically, a huge banner, strung between two cars, that says they’ll never get the vaccine, and that you’ll have to kill them… the ironic part is that, most likely, we won’t have to kill them, because the virus will do that for us, and we won’t have to do anything. hospitals are failing in missouri, texas, and florida, where the governors are particularly anti-mask and anti-vax, despite the surge in cases, and a vast majority of the fatalities have been people who refused the vaccine. at this rate, we’re going to be dealing with this pandemic for A LOT longer than the 1918 “spanish flu” pandemic, primarily because of STUPID people who won’t get the vaccine or wear masks, on account of their “freedom”. 🤬

what have i gotten myself into this time?

why do i do this? 😒

Friday, 20210806 przxqgl 2 Comments

apart from the fact that it looks… i don’t know… cool? creepy?

and it actually tastes okay, as well. it doesn’t taste like antifreeze, at any rate…

drunk interpretation of thai music

buddha bless – pak takhrai

Thursday, 20210805 przxqgl

yah ma pak, yah ma pak
soh by ting ya mi yah mah pak
yah ma pak, yah ma pak
soh by ting yang mi ya mah pak
ah yo ma mella hen mai, yah ho hane prupah tah drei
uhkonda pakatzong tzai raipa tah treibal ke
waggah boom
sah ting mabe me mamei, yah chun tehma batsal trai
bahchoi dupoinga dai mai, pah teh tege dur chatse

malfunctioning computers, music

hope? — dashed?

Thursday, 20210805 przxqgl

sorting through the mess of recovered data is heartbreaking.

i’m finding all sorts of stuff that, once i actually see (or hear) a bit of it, i know exactly what it is, and i’m starting to get things organised enough that, some of the time, i even have a place to put it, once i’ve discovered what it is…

but, then… everything doesn’t come crashing down, but…

i ~~have~~HAD a CDR album called “We Bore 2“, which was one of my favourites. it was produced in 2003 by Toast & Jam Records, which has, since, gone out of business, and their web site is now a japanese porn site… it was a “various artists” compilation of electronic, experimental, glitch music, and it was AWESOME!

i found a .RAR archive with the .mp3s for “We Bore 2”, and i was, like, “COOL!”… i expanded the archive, and put it in the place it had been taken from in my collection, and went on to the next archive.

today, for the first time, i actually LISTENED to “We Bore 2″…

yeah, all the tracks are there, but track 1 is NOT what was there the last time i listened to “We Bore 2″… and track 2 is also the same way, to a lesser extent… and track 3 is pretty messed up… and track four is mostly there, except for a patch in the middle which is totally missing… and track 5… and track 7… and track 8… and track 9… 😭

pretty much all of the tracks have something wrong with them…

and i can’t get another copy of the CD, because i originally downloaded it as a .rar file…

and, i’m pretty sure (given the huge quantity of .rar and .zip files that got recovered) that more than a few of them are going to have exactly the same problem. 😭

ETA: all is not lost… well, for “We Bore 2” anyway… it turns out i actually have the original CDR for this album… but i’m fairly sure that is NOT going to be the case with a majority of the .rar and .zip archives i have…

my music

NOBODY will listen to this music

Friday, 20210730 przxqgl

NOBODY will listen to this music — prove me wrong.

NOBODY will listen to this music - 210801 — NOBODY will listen to this music – 210801

busking, music

sumbunal

Thursday, 20210729 przxqgl

i found sumbunal of my music collection, on a huge stack of CDs and DVDs (possibly two, i haven’t checked thoroughly, yet) which i had stashed in the garage, in a cabinet in front of which i have stacked 4 huge cartons of incense… so, naturally, it was the absolute LAST place i thought to look. this appears to be my music backups from 2002, or thereabouts, until 2016 or 17 — when i “moved everything to the cloud” — which means that the part of my collection that isn’t backed up, is, very likely, music that i have on CD (which i can re-rip, if necessary) or music that was in a .zip or .rar archive… and, strangely enough, not many of the .mp3s that are on the recovery disk actually made it, but there’s probably 90% to 95% of the .zip and .rar archives that appear to have made it through… meaning that, when i opened the archive with ark, it opened and didn’t tell me that the archive was corrupt most of the time… 😕 i don’t completely understand how that happened, but i’ll take it.

and, to be honest, there are more than a few albums where i was able to download all but one track from the backup disk (for whatever reasons), so i’m really glad that i actually have as many CDs as i do, because that makes it a lot easier to go back and re-rip one track from an album.

it’s been more than a month since i played music through my stereo speakers. i spent ALL DAY today, listening to music and uploading gigabytes of music to the new NAS. 👍😉

and, TOMORROW, i’m going BUSKING!!! 👍😎👍

ganesha the car, incense of the month club, the battle of the computer

gress

Wednesday, 20210728 przxqgl

why is the opposite of “progress” not “congress” rather than “regress”?

i got in contact with the vehicle-wrap artist that did the actual artwork for the previous car, and he, also, sent me an .eps file containing the original artwork, so i’m sure i have backed it up, now… although i haven’t backed it up to the cloud drive, yet, because i can still only access it through a web browser on my linux box, and not at all on my mac laptop… and i am worried that they’re not going to be able to make it work on my mac laptop, because i did the steps to auto-mount a network drive, at startup, and it took my password and chewed on it for 30 seconds or so, and then rejected it… i THINK it’s because the cloud drive wants me to login to /cgi-bin/ but the ancient mac will only let me login to the base server URI. and on the linux box, it allows me to specify the login directory, and accepts my password, but never gets beyond that, to actually logging me in — it just repeats its request for a username and password, over, and over, and over, and over… 😕 hopefully, when the guy comes over this evening to give me the keys, he will be able to conclusively address these issues.

ETA: he addressed those issues like a boss, and had BOTH the ancient mac and my linux box wrapped around the NAS’s little finger in about 10 minutes… the old mac, apparently, doesn’t like the domain name, and REALLY doesn’t like the fact that my username has an @ symbol in it, but it eats up the intranet IP address like it’s going out of style, and, because of the fact that it’s ONLY addressing the NAS from the intranet, i just gave it the administrator username instead of my username… and the linux box was, basically, the same, once we figured out how to do it… and connecting monique’s computer was easiest of all: just gave it the intranet IP address and everything was kosher. 😎

there’s A LOT of music in .zip or .rar archives in my recovered data, so, once i get to the point of actually expanding those archives, i will have a significant part of my music collection back… for that matter, i’m pretty sure i “backed up” my music collection to CD, around 10 years ago or so, which means that, once i find where i’ve put it, there’s a good chance that my music collection will be back to 75% to 80% of what it was prior to the crack.

the western digital support personnel that i talked to on 210724, who said that someone would be calling me “monday or tuesday” lied, because it is now wednesday, and i HAVE NOT received a call from them… which only strengthens my suspicion that they are NOT going to try to contact me until after 210731, which is their deadline for making a claim through their data recovery program. 😒

the process of categorising partially corrupt files is both time-consuming, and ultimately frustrating, because, once i have rough-categorised the files, i have to go back through, re-open every file again to determine what it is, re-name the file, and then categorise it AGAIN… and A LOT of the file names started with the date that they were last looked at, which, frequently, is a complete mystery from inside the document, so even when i have them renamed, and categorised, i still can’t complete a time-line for stuff that was modified more than once… which will, very likely, cause major headaches in the future, particularly with documens created for other peoples’ printing. 😒

seriously, whatever anonymous skript-kiddie did this to me — who has never even met them before — just for “lulz” — better hope that i don’t run into them late at night in a dark alley, because, if that ever happens, the result will NOT be positive for anyone. 🤬

on a lighter note, i got my physical copies of questionable content, the electronic copies of which were lost… i’m slowly getting everything put back together.

but i still have to rewrite the IOTM blurb about patchouli for next month, because it’s coming up really soon, and it’s the only IOTM blurb that i didn’t get back… which is a real shame, because the old one was really amusing, and i don’t know if i can remember all of what i said.

malfunctioning computers, the battle of the computer

new nas

Sunday, 20210725 przxqgl

lord buckley would love this…

but, unfortunately, lord buckley was part of the data that either wasn’t recovered, is corrupted, or i haven’t found it yet because i’m dealing with sixty gazillion files that are named something like 0SVP8382U794.mp3 or 3O1458DNLWO.jpg, because all of their meta-data has been deleted. 😒

anyway, the new NAS is up and running, although not completely configured yet. i have an “app” on my phone and tablet that gives me access to the cloud drive, and i can access it through a web browser on my antique mac and my linux box.

ETA: and accessing it through a web browser is an entirely new experience for me, because, despite the fact that it’s in a web browser, the “pages” are things like the file center, which allows me to “drag-and-drop” files from my local computer, to upload them. basically it acts like a window, even though it’s technically a web page. will wonders never cease?

although i’m fairly sure linux has a more direct way of accessing the cloud drive, the guy who came by to set it up wasn’t a linux geek, and, apparently, has never met a linux geek in the general public. he was astounded when i told him that i had been running linux for 20 years… 😉

but the new NAS is WAY cooler than the old cloud drive, primarily because it is, apparently, possible to edit files while they are still in the cloud, rather than having to download them, edit them locally, and then over-write the old file on the cloud. if what i have already experienced with audio files is true, the likelyhood of my losing any MORE music is practically eliminated. also, it appears to be possible to install executable code on the NAS, and run it locally, which would make things EXTRA SUPER COOL, but i’m not 100% sure of it, yet. 😉

ETA: the NAS has, apparently, either configured itself, or something has been installed remotely that allows it to communicate with my linux system via a number of different protocols, including SMB, MTP (whatever that is — Media Transfer Protocol… who knew?), HTTPS, and bluetooth… which is really odd, because my computer doesn’t even have a bluetooth reciever, so i kinda wonder where the “Bluetooth” icon in the remote network directory came from… unfortunately, i have been unable to connect with anything other than HTTPS, even though the SMB instance takes my password and doesn’t say it’s wrong, it just won’t log me in… which is something to take up with the configurators tomorrow.

the “twisted pair” who are ~~whipping my computers into shape~~ doing my configuration are going to be finished up tomorrow, at which point i hope to have the more direct method of connecting on at least the linux box (if they aren’t able to figure out the antique mac, i understand). i’ve already got a lot of stuff sorted out of the recovered data, including a whole bunch of music, embeded in .zip archives, which appears to be uncorrupted, so, initially, it appears that i may not have lost everything. oh, i also discovered a bunch of CDs that have the date 4/20/13 on them, that appear to be raw .wav files of my first three cassettes, originally produced in the 1980s. if they are as pristine as they appear, then i MIGHT NOT have lost all my old music.

AND western digital FINALLY got back to me — i originally reported the loss on 210624, and, since then, i have sent the drive to texas, waited two weeks, and had the people in texas deliver the drive back to me, which arrived ONE WEEK BEFORE the western digital team (which “values your data”) got around to contacting me… 😒 they said they couldn’t help me unless i uploaded the system logs, but when i plugged in the drive, it wouldn’t even mount on mac, which means that they couldn’t even talk me through the process of recovering the system logs, at which point the issue was “escalated”, and they are, alledgedly, going to call me back monday or tuesday. at this point, i would estimate that it’s NOT particularly likely that western digital is going to call me back before 210731, which is when their web site says i have to have contacted them regarding a data loss from CVE-2018-18472… because after 210731, they don’t have to do anything about it. 😒

pictures

bare bear!

Wednesday, 20210721 przxqgl

i saw a bare bear (a black one) today, at 47.4336528, -121.9412438 at approximately 1700 hours.

sorry, there are no pictures, i was too busy getting the fuck out of there.

here are some wildlife pictures that aren’t twice my size with four inch claws, even if it was going the opposite direction.

dear deer (i think it's a buck) — dear deer (i think it’s a buck)

also, some paraidolia, for you religiomus folks. 😉