There's a girl in The Horrible Art Class. We'll call her Rebecca. In the first of four "allow me to memorize your names" segments The Horrible Teacher said "Rabak? Rebech? Arbitch?" at which point Rebecca, blushing, said "Rebecca. My first name doesn't fit on the attendance records for some reason." She was embarrassed by this. Rebecca's hair is too long and her clothes are frumpy. But her eyes are alive under too much makeup. She's one of the Annoyed Ones in That Horrible Art Class; or, at least she's one of the ones who jets as quickly as she can. Monday she was wearing a too-large sweatshirt. It said "In Case of (mid-life) Emergency Dial (Porsche) 9-1-1" and had a crude representation of a red RUF turbo on it. I asked her "So who saddled you with the shirt? Who has the disease?" and she said "My dad had a 911" and I plowed straight through "I just got one they're great everyone should have one" without touching on "what happened to it" "what happened to your dad" "why are you wearing your dad's sweatshirt." But you can see it. Whatever the circumstances there's a good possibility she's going through life minus a parent. I just want to tell her she looks nice. I want to tell her to be brave enough to cut her hair, to stop hiding. I want to make everything be all right. I think when you're a teenager you're too busy being consumed by your own fragility to notice that you're all standing around like scared deer waiting for the tigers to come. I've surrounded myself with children in the virtual world for fifteen years now. When surrounded by real ones my instincts are the same. Protect, inform, advise. I think I've realized that my overwhelmingly paternal instincts are an overreaction to my fundamentally feral upbringing. My wife got back from a conference a couple weeks ago. They were talking about ACE scores and how many in the midwifery community tend to score higher than baseline. My wife and her new employee remarked that they were "zero" and "one" respectively but the argument was that if you have a non-zero score and your patient has a non-zero score your relationship has a cumulative score and in a traumatic birth your interactions are going to be a product of the cumulative, not the individuals. Curious, I took the test and scored a six. It bugs the shit out of me that my altruism is motivated by the shadow effects of 30-year-old bullshit. It's disempowering. It makes it feel fake. It means I became Reddit's Father Confessor not because I wanted to do good but because I was flailing to fill the hole dug there decades earlier. Now all I can notice is how stinky teenagers are. I wonder if they always were and now I sound like David Fucking Brooks.
My mom has also had a quite difficult upbringing. Maybe not a six but definitely a three or four. Her shadow is that she has always and will always worry whether she does enough for me and my sister. (She does, of course.) I think that she feels insecure where you feel fake. But she has been an important person in many people’s lives. For about half her clients, she’s the nearest they have to a shrink. She was an important mother figure to more than a few of my friends when I grew up. When you put those feelings aside and look at the result you have on the world around you, do the intentions still matter?
I realized that college this time exists in the realm of fragrance-free spaces. College last time existed in the realm of Axe Body Spray. We could have smelled like a gym sock convention and you'd never know because we put on odor the way detailers put on spray wax.
I really appreciate your perceptive ability, and the resulting stories — Not that (it ever seems that) you’re looking for appreciation. But as a recipient of your instincts to inform, advise, and protect, I don’t really care much if it’s out of a selflessness or a subconscious desire to heal long past psychic damage. Sometimes intentions are all important. Sometimes they aren’t. Edit to add because it’s relevant: I’m constantly noticing how cloistered, how terrified on the inside, college students around me seem. It’s really tempting to say that it’s different This Time, because of smartphones and Snapchat. But no one seems to have a lot of courage to do anything, speak up, be different. Who am I kidding, I’m projecting.
I wasn't really prepared for the emotional toll that leaving all these preschoolers was going to have on me. I still have a few more days teaching, but I've told the kids I'm leaving and they are... not pleased, to say the least. The hardest one has been a 3 year old kid named Ian, who's been at the school since it opened. I babysit him sometimes, because his family's a mess. His parents just finalized a divorce, his brother bullies him all the time, etc. When I was babysitting him yesterday, I told him that I'm leaving soon, but we still have time to play at the school a few more times. His exact response was: big tears "BUT YOU'RE MY BEST GROWN UP" Starts running away from me in the Fred Meyers food court Once I caught him, which thankfully didn't take long, he told me that it's okay I'm moving, because soon he's just going to get a jet, and use that jet to bring me and my family to live at his house. So, there's that.
"There is an enormous amount of luck and randomness in the world. Hope is believing that in spite of that, the game is still playable." Objectively, my attempts at online dating are going well. Subjectively it's a whole 'nuther story. I'm acutely aware just how difficult it is to take a step back when something feels so personal. I mean, on the one hand I've had more dates and lovely conversations in the last three weeks than the years before. On the other hand I've also had more rejections and ignores than ever before. It's just something I have to deal with, but it does make me wonder just how much luck and randomness is involved. I mean, I can get along with pretty much anyone, but finding just that kind of person to share my life with means being in the same place at the same time and doing the right things. What's important is that I stay true to myself. It's easy to build a protective wall around oneself, and I know that will only hurt in the long run. The last few dates I think I succeeded pretty well at that.
I feel I hit the universal lottery when it comes to online dating, but as mentioned, just be yourself and don't expect anything and you might be surprised. Best case, you find your partner and love of your life. Maybe you'll find some people that you enjoy their company for a while and find yourselves incompatible in the long run, but remain friends. My experience was that I was looking for friendship and people that I could connect with, and I made that well-known. I wasn't looking for anything serious at all, let alone a husband. But life is full of surprises. Seek friendship, and who knows what will happen.
Been a while, ne? German Uni is the best thing that's ever happened to me. My classes (Theater of the Neo-Avantgarde; The Poet Heinrich Heine) are fantastic. The only bullshit part is that I have to take two classes (Advanced Language & Comp; Travel Theory) with only other Americans, but gradually we're getting to the point where I just spend the class discussing texts with my prof while the others watch. I like my prof, so it works. The new plan is to buckle down and finish my degree next year, which is only 6 months(!) anyway. After that, grad school (or possibly theatre school) in Germany and never coming back to the US. I tried to join an English-speaking theatre group here but after about 10 minutes I realized that I have absolutely no desire to speak English anymore and left. Yesterday I asked out my German tutor, who replied that it would literally be illegal for us to go out-- even though we're both juniors, she's technically employed by the University as my "teacher." Also she said she has no feelings, but based on the 7 times in the past month that I thought "damn we almost just kissed," I'm guessing she's just trying to make it easier to move on. Not that it makes a difference, since, y'know, law-breaking. BUT! My depression has always been founded on a deep-seated feeling of isolation, and therefore has always been heavily triggered by break-ups, ending romantic interests, ending friendships, and the like. Having finally recognized this, I took extra antidepressants yesterday (don't worry, still in the range that my doc recommended), and today I'm actually doing fine. I mean, I'm disappointed, but I was out of bed after 10 hours of sleep, played CS:GO, edited an essay, and am off to my first German baseball practice(!) in half an hour. I feel like now I can focus on just building a life that I enjoy for myself, and if someone else shows up in it later, that's chill. Hope you all are doing well; sorry I've been absent and I miss you guys (hi kleinbl00 lil nowaypablo _refugee_ Cumol thenewgreen Quatrarius elizabeth and anyone else I'm forgetting), but realistically speaking don't expect it to get much better-- my love for Germany is all-consuming :) xo g
I was recently talking with a girl friend about how sexy French accents are on women and she replied that American English accents are considered sexy by European women. So... go get 'em tiger, but mach es den deutschen Frauen leicht Nice to hear from you. Playing any drums while over there?I'm guessing she's just trying to make it easier to move on. Not that it makes a difference, since, y'know, law-breaking.
I dunno... breaking the law might add some interesting tension to the dynamic. Maybe she really isn't interested? Or maybe by discussing it you've ruined the mystique? Hard to say. Good luck pal. Plenty of fish though.
Weird fucking week here. I had to get a HepA vaccination. I go to the place, verify paperwork, verify medical history, wait my turn. They take me back to the room and in walks a kid. This gal looked 18, maybe 19. I figured that she was an assistant or other low-level employee to check me in and ask all the medical and allergy stuff before the nurse came in. Then I saw her badge. BSN, RN, APRN. Holy shit. This "kid" has 10+ years of schooling and residency in letters after her name! Assuming starting school at 17, this puts her no younger than 26-28 range. Now, I hate this chick because I have scars older than her and now I feel bad about myself for being old. After the shot, I mentally added two years to her age; she was great with the injection, nearly perfect. So yea, I'm "that age" now. Fuck. In other heath news, I'm all but fucked. I'm giving up sugar, grains and starches for as long as I want to remain upright. I am definitely insulin restive but lacking the main markers of full on fuck-you-motherfucker diabetes. Giving up all the junk food, sugar, Chocolate (and that one hurts) has made the numbers move into the "You ain't dead yet" direction. And for the first time in for-fucking-ever? I'm losing about a pound or two a month. I should be losing more. I fast for 80 hours and shit my intestines clean and gain weight. Something they don't tell you about a Keto style diet is the other secondary changes that happen. Think about all the people you know that have trouble waking up in the morning. My working idea on this meme is that the standard western diet is mostly starch and carbs, and 8-9 hours after your last meal you have a major crash in insulin, blood sugar, etc. Those of you that have gone through the "keto flu?" I'm wondering if people are going through that every morning. I'm sleeping marginally better now. I'm waking up better, not as good as I should, but better. My brain is de-fogging. And those fucking numbers are moving. So physically getting better; mentally pissed off and angry.
- Finally managed to go check out the local radical library. Hell, yes. The hours a bit inconvenient for me, but I'll making use of it. They had a copy of Understanding Power, which I checked out since I'd much rather read a physical book than an ebook. - I try to pick up the random trash I find while I'm out with the pupper. I realized yesterday that I've actually made a decent impact within his poop walk radius. Most of the trash now is confined to the drainage pond for nearby parking lots. If I ventured in there, I'm pretty sure I'd lose my shoes. - Someone posted some IWW stuff to my unions' private facebook group for mayday. It wasn't even me! That was nice.
Bad wreck on the bike trail this morning. A jogger waved a warning as I approached the scene of a half-dozen EMTs loading someone onto a stretcher. I chose to exercise the bystander effect and talked with the jogger some distance from the site. He hadn't seen the incident, but said the guy "screamed pretty loud" when they moved him. It's a tricky and tight blind corner at the bottom of downslopes in two directions, where the trail turns under I-66. Yesterday afternoon I saw a close call at another bad spot, a sharp corner at the bottom of a hill where I have previously seen the aftermath of a collision. This time, a guy passed me on the downslope with an electric assist bike. You would think e-bikers would be happy to brake since they have the motor to help them get back up to speed, but in my experience they seem very protective of their momentum. He cut the corner pretty sharp, probably crossing the center line, and his shoulder came within an inch or two of the shoulder of a pedestrian walking the other way. The walker, engrossed in a smartphone world, never knew what didn't hit him. Would have been good for the highlight reel but I had earlier stopped the camera when trying to make sure it was on. Be safe out there.
e-bikers are dilettantes. They're car commuters that get sick of traffic and they don't give a fuck about anybody else. They also generally buy less battery than they need assuming they can muscle their way the rest of the way but then realize they're pussies and spend the rest of their riding lives cranky. I much prefer the homeless on their weed-whacker-powered Frankenstein mopeds to the goddamn e-bikers. At least the homeless guys smile and wave as they leave you in a cloud of 2-stroke oil.
Spent last week in Utah, and am currently reading Desert Solitaire. Putting together a five year plan which involves a year on the road/in parks but maybe I'm just a bit too influenced by recent events. Edit: left my rental car lights on all night and now the car battery is dead. Awesome start to a work trip.
It's kind of an out of body experience, seeing line items dated "2022" is a good way of disconnecting yourself from yourself. I don't know how much I believe in this kind of planning, maybe it's more academic than anything else. At the least, it's a snapshot of where my mind wanders when thinking about the future.
I won’t gush into details but I’ve made 5 year plans on and off with mostly limited attention to them afterwards since I was 19. A year or so ago I realized that all my big goals id laid out in such? The big ones; the pinnacle ones? Somehow, I’d achieved. Or was on track to do so. (Still am, in fact.) This year I’m working the most ultra version of a 5 year plan I’ve ever made, and I’m actually working it. The internet helped me break the big wide category of “life” down into about 8 sub vectors to help direct my goals. I’ve got fleshed out 1 year goals for all of them. (The further out you go in time the harder I find it to make real hard dependable goals, so my plan gets sparse after 2 year or so, but I do have goals up to the 5 year mark. Just fewer and fewer.) I took those big goals and every month I’ve been breaking down the process of how to get there with littler goals. I track most of ‘em with my handy tracker app; some don’t need it, some do. I check in on how I’m doing - supposedly every week but really more like every other. I assess how I’m doing and if I’m on track at mid month. I note the date I achieve a monthly goal if it’s discretely achievable. Goals I try at but don’t achieve I push to next month. I try to break everything down into measurable, concrete actions which I can clearly see how they tie back to my big goals. If this sounds really awful, “fun” is one of the 8 sub categories. And I’m the one who sets the goals based on the person I thought about and decided I wanted to be, and the things I thought about and decided I wanted to achieve for myself. So sure it sounds like school or project management...but everything is for myself. So why would it be awful? To do the work to achieve the great and wonderful things? Dude I fucking love it. It feels great. I know what I’m doing and more importantly I see why and how it’s gojng to help get me where I really want to go. I’ve started meal planning both as part of one of my goals and also because...order and planning and this sort of structure, turns out, are really good for me. At least better than the lifestyle I was living. I try really hard to observe what naturally works well for me and use that to make my goals easier. I want to figure out some kind of incentive structure to help reward when I hit my goals but haven’t yet because I didn’t want it to be food or alcohol related and giving myself spending money just doesn’t make a really decent incentive. ESP as a primary goal is saving right now. Just achieving the goals, turns out, feels good enough to keep me going. In my down time sometimes I try to research how to do this stuff better (I didn’t come up with those life sub categories on my own) too. Doooooo eettttttt. Babies aren’t the only ones who benefit from structure and routine. i keep the whole bundle in a folder which just keeps getting huger and huger
This is awesome ref. What are the 8 subcategories that help you think about what needs goal-defining? Are they the items under the MY PLAN heading in the photo? I've also found that when I look over old journals or wishlists, a lot of what's written under the "goals" heading are either 1) still goals or 2) accomplished since. It seems that goal-setting (or dissatisfaction with the present, depending on how you look at it) is a persistent state. And the joy of completing goals is fleeting. When I take stock, there's a lot to be happy about. But there's always something more. Is there anything more to goal-setting than the exercise of spinning the wheel? (That's a bit tongue in cheek)
Does that mean you're going to live in a van? I follow lint_hikes on Instagram. He sometimes lives in a van. I believe he's a triple triple crowner.
Hah, yes I do! Multiple van dwellers, I think. A van certainly isn't out of the possibility.
There's dream-like slowness on my time, and I have to plan accordingly. A fraction of my near future includes a chicken fence, a negotiation with Interplay, shipping human fat, a foundation inspection, and a clinical trial. People I have relationships with are appearing in the news and one of them just died. There's always something wrong about what is said. I was talking with a friend who is creating history last night. You are crazy in other people's minds, not your own. You can only choose your actions. There's always something wrong about what is said. Hey lil, you were right. 23&Me says 4-7 generations ago I have some Ashkenazi family. Oddly 6-8 generations ago, someone from India or Sri Lanka got in the mix. Everyone else is European.
The Nexus of Weirdness That's the phrase we used. In 2000 we roadtripped back to New Mexico and went up one of our old dirt roads in a near-new Isuzu, rather than a beat-to-shit '70s Chevy. The radio, rather than blasting Z-rock, was playing Future Sound of London. In New Mexico. We got to the top and ran into the younger brothers of girls we had failed to date in high school. One of the girls had moved to Denver to join the ever-present of neonazis up there. The other had gotten knocked up and now worked for the state. They caught us up; half the people we asked about were in prison or dead. That's when I found out my ex-girlfriend Amanda had overdosed on heroin a month previously, just shy of Thanksgiving. Her younger brother reciprocated by blowing his head off with a shotgun just shy of Christmas. It was December 28. We had touched the nexus of weirdness and had been drawn into its Schwartzchild radius. The world existed outside of us. We could see it, we could interact with it, but it was happening at a different rate. And it took forever to break away. Time dilated at that point and didn't spring back to normal for several years. The past was the distant past, the future was the distant future and the present was about 30 seconds on either side. It was purely perceptual; it was a thing of alienation and only alienation but it was noteworthy how permanent the effects were. I've noticed since that I get there easily when stressed and have a really hard time coming back. Occupationally I'm in a bad place because every summer weekends cease to exist while every spring winter and fall weekends are just those days when we don't have daycare. With school? Maaan. I can barely keep track of meals. Write it down, fellow time traveller. Learn your calendar. Abide by your appointment book. For you are unhinged in time and it will be only gradually that you rejoin the slipstream.
It's best not to read your own press, or watch your own interviews. Get a publicist and have them do it. It is why they exist, and they are VERY skilled at helping you contextualize and accept the mistakes and inaccuracies. Hell, my family shot fireworks for years. My dad is a gregarious and outgoing guy that everyone loves. (He has actually been the guy in a Santa suit at children's events!) So journalists naturally find him and interview him at these 4th of July fireworks shows. We learned to stop reading them because they are so comically wrong, when representing what we do. Never read the comments. Never read the reviews. Pay someone else to do it.
My dad was in local politics when I was a kid. He was continually in a bad mood about the local paper misquoting him. It seems like every time I'm connected to a news story in a way the general public isn't, I see how wrong the news gets it, yet I generally believe them when they write about things I'm unconnected to. Go figure.
I think my quarter life crisis is really gaining speed lately. I recently decided lately that I'm going to make more of an effort to socialize and connect with people which is something I thought was hard for me. I realized more recently that their are definitely people in this world who do not think that is hard for me and tend to actually feel threatened by it. Now I don't even know. The concept that life doesn't just happen and we do in fact influence the world around us is really fucking with me lately. Like, I have a lot of personality traits that others must think I'm aware of but I have no idea. I'm a good leader but I figured that out after people were already following me so I have no idea what I did to make them do that and it's honestly terrifying. Same thing goes for basically everything, why am I good at this...am I secretly bad at it ? Why are you people talking to me ? Where am I ? I'm starting to think that basically everybody else knows me better than I know myself. The 20's have been a roller coaster and I'm starting to think it keeps going.
I was in a 6 hour long meeting today. It was supposed to be 8. I can't tell if my proudest moment is the two big laughs I got out of the crowd, or when I got to whip out my super accurate and precise Reg E knowledge straight from the back of my wee lil brainy-kins: "If the transaction does not post, then there is nothing that can be disputed. Disputes cover errors in transactions; no posted trsx, no dispute. Or that's the guidance the lawyer gave us" (what I didn't say: yeah the guidance the lawyer gave us sometime like 2 years ago in one hour long meeting where we discussed like three different reg e scenarios, aka, BUT I REMEMBER). Or the one piece of Reg E disputing timeframes trivia. Or the other piece about implied authority vs. theft or fraudulent possession of an associate's card. Don't fear for me; there were definitely times I multi-tasked and fell to the back of the call and let others speak a lot. I'm pretty confident I didn't overdo it and acted in the capacity of my role -- but someone who's very good at her role and knows every in and out of what the fuck she is doing in the regulatory space she's testing. A true SME, if I will. I shined, I let others shine too. That call? I was excited for that call. I knew I'd enjoy that call. I just really found the discussion we were having all of really important ,really interesting, and offering both learning opportunities as well as plenty of spaces that would benefit with my (and everyone else's input). I told a coworker about it and apologized for not inviting her. Haha. She did not mind at all. And I wasn't the only one who got a couple big laughs out of the room; one of the people on the call with whom I work closest also has a great work attitude and the ability to make people laugh and have a better time at what they're doing. He got several as well. It was honestly an amazingly pleasant meeting for a group of people who have often been, definitely much more so in the past but still occasionally now, combative when they have to put their heads in a room and agree on certain findings. It was great. At the end of the call they were thanking everyone and saying bye and they know meetings like this are tough so they appreciate the engagement and here's how I got my second laugh, as the goodbyes began to chorus at a lull point I said "OK so, same time next week then?" Last year on my end of year review I made a question asking everyone I was seeking feedback from if I'd made them laugh in the past year as we worked together. One coworker (who I generally admire) completed the feedback. In his response he openly asked how this was relevant to my work performance. I think success at work is 50% doing the job and 50% getting along with the people. If you're strong in one you can get away with being weak at the other. But good people who care about their work are impassioned, and that means if you want to get them to work with you you are going to have to massage the conversation a lot of the time. The best work is done with people who want to work with you. It's also the most pleasant, even though yes it can be frustrating to tone down and put into polite words the issues you see clearly before you. A person who laughs with you is a person who wants to work with you. Tying back to whatever i said to klein about coworkers weeks ago thematically i guess I passionately passionately believe this.
We try to avoid them, but I've worked on more than a few projects where sharing a sense of humor was the only thing that kept everyone from quitting. Most of them ended with all of us getting a ridiculous bonus and one or more managers getting fired. Being able to make people laugh is definitely a relevant skill for a job with any kind of responsibility.
I'm sorry that I rarely have an intriguing story or pertinent observation to share with all you great people in the pub. I love visiting this thread every week and reading about your experiences. And I feel like I'm taking and giving nothing back. But interesting, personal life reflections are somewhat hard to come by when you spend 90% of your time sitting in a room working on music. I know more about your weekly lives that anyone outside my direct family, even though I've never met any of you. And, in a way, I think that's rad. Maybe some people think that's sad. At times, so do I. But it takes a concerted effort for me to remain on the straight and narrow, grinding away at my music. Any activity I do outside of that grind is like a hole that I have to climb out of to get back on the path. Sometimes it's worth it, but most times I just don't bother. It's an existence of few highs, but also one of few lows. I guess that's the path I've chosen for now, but I don't know how long it's sustainable without losing some sort of essence of what life is. Even for someone who is mostly content with that lifestyle. There's a Kayak club around the corner from where I live. I'm thinking of attending a session on Sunday.
Oh hey, I know that feel. I'm spending about 4 - 6 hours on my days off just practicing my guitar chops now. I spend most of the rest of the day listening to music, watching video lessons, etc. I still put in about 2 hours even on days when I'm working. I finally got myself a nice guitar with my tax refund, but it weighs a ton, and I'm starting to get some minor back problems. Womp womp. Have you ever read The Practice of Practice? I got it on a whim a few weeks ago and it sort of rocked my world - the actual practical advice is helpful and all and it's made my practice sessions more fruitful, but the big thunderbolt moment for me was the chapter (6) on talent. He talks a lot about the research of Carol Dweck, whose main interest is the negative effect that praise and the perception of talent (or ability) as innate/fixed has on our growth and sense of self worth. This blog's summary is kind of new-age-y, but it was really well explained in the book, and took me down a whole bunch of pegs. The author basically had a laundry list of all my bad habits, self-worth issues, and excuses for not putting more of myself into my music, while also making me feel a lot more comfortable about where I already am as a musician. It lit a pretty big fire under my ass, but also helped me feel more interested in live performance again. I've played music in public twice since I moved to Portland about 1.5 years ago - once was at an open mic a year ago, which I completely bombed, and the other time was at cgod's house a few weeks ago before D&D, just because I saw his guitar laying around and had some time to kill. The latter was quite nice, mostly because nobody was really listening that much, or expecting anything. It's been a while since playing music for people was fun for me, mostly because my chops fell by the wayside when I started recording music and had infinite takes to get things right. I get really nervous when I play, especially if it's my own music, largely because I feel like my skills are never where they should be, or the music doesn't sound the same live as it does recorded. I finally realized that it does not matter one fucking bit what the recorded music sounds like, because NOBODY will have heard it in whatever coffee shop I'm playing in. The only one expecting the song to sound a certain way is me, because I'm the only one with an idea of what it "should" be, and what all the other instruments would be doing if they were there. It's helpful for me to remember that music is not at all high stakes, and most people aren't paying attention to me anyway. Not sure if you play live music, so not sure what use this will be to you, but this combines both music and other people rambling about their emotions, so I figure it may be of interest ;). I would definitely recommend the above book, if just for that chapter alone. It's on Audible as well, if that helps at all.
Glad to hear you're still putting in the hours. I was impressed with playing on You Drank Some Darkness, so I can only imagine how much you're building upon that now. Sweet guitar too! I haven't seen that book. I have played and enjoy playing live, but not much recently. I do dedicate a reasonably amount of time playing instruments though, so it can certainly still be relevant in that way. I read some of the preview about practising slowly and it seems really interesting. I'll add it to the list. I can relate to the endless pursuit to get the perfect take when recording. It can make you go kind of crazy. But you're on the right track in letting go of that perfectionism when playing live. Partly because, as you say, some people won't even be paying close enough attention to notice. But more the fact that any minor mistakes and fluffs- that in a recording would be immortalised and forever noticeable- exist for a second or less when you're playing live. If you nail the show overall, people won't remember that you didn't fret a note correctly or messed up a fingerpicking pattern. I look forward to hearing your future output!
Also, to finally answer the question you asked like a month ago: learning the standards has been going well, though I out aside piano for now to focus on guitar. These are the songs I have memorized, and have written solo guitar arrangements for: Like Someone in Love Misty When I Fall in Love Freddie Freeloader Autumn Leaves A House is Not a Home A Child is Born Naima Lady Bird Waltz for Debby Equinox When you Wish Upon a Star WOW that looks like a lot of songs now that I actually wrote them out. Cool.
A thought, completely idle. First few sessions, record everything, if people are cool with it. Just see what comes out. I dabble. Posted a few things in the past with a less than optimal mic. One day I will find all the necessary bits to record properly.You just might get your wish! I'm living with a few jazz musicians this summer, so I may be doing some recording with them. We shall see...
Didn't know you played guitar
About once a month a financial company calls me, leaving a message for someone else asking about someone I don't know. As far as I can tell, the person I don't know gave them my phone number as a reference for a loan. Presumably they aren't making payments. I've never called them back. I can't think of a way getting involved helps me, but I want them to stop calling and want to tell them they're stupid for calling references after the person stops making payments. I blocked the number, but voicemails from blocked numbers still come through.
If you answer and tell them that person isn't at this number/this person has never been associated with the number, they should stop calling you. If they don't and you are in the US you may have consumer protections against harassing telephone solicitations if they do not stop calling you. Fair Debt Collection Practices states that, if a debt collection calls you and you inform them that the person they seek is not located at this number, they cannot contact you again (unless they have good reason to suspect you are being untruthful). i believe you can seek financial penalties if they continue to contact you
I took your advice and called them back. The response was, "sigh That figures. I'll remove your number from our records." Thanks for spurring me on to actually take action. It was really simple in the end.
Welp. Cedar prices have gone through the roof due to our unusually long winter, and low supply at the lumber yards, so instead of doing a cedar tongue-in-groove ceiling in my room (for over $1000!), I'm going to do... something else. I dunno. Maybe birch fine-finished plywood. At $35/sheet, I can cover my 16x14 ceiling in that for about $250. It doesn't have the bug-repellent properties or wonderful scent of cedar, but it'll look nice. --- Oh. And I'm on Mastodon now. Really like the platform design, and that anyone can spin up an instance with their own rules, and that it is worldwide. Check it out if you are interested in effective non-commercial alternates to social media.