Year: 2014

TGIF. Stepped into a mess of my own making. Holiday party on a boat last night. Very windy. Lost power at work, insane time getting home. Worked on stuff, long time getting home. M broke his arm again.

It’s now Monday. Didn’t do much this weekend, except for the gamelan gig at Yale Union Saturday. No wash, no dishes, barely cooked. I had such high hopes…but Monday evening ended up getting it all done-woke up Tuesday to a tidier house, but insanity at work. M didn’t clean the cat box. arrrrgh.

And now Wednesday. Keeping the house clean. No gamelan, now Thursday. Getting through stuff, house is staying clean, after a fashion-need to vacuum and clean off the dinner table.
So Friday is here-slacked last night, get to it tonight. Kids are on vacation, no gift card yet. E picked me up downtown, M had a redo on his cast. Goodwill, got a pizza, S to bed, up late watching South Park and Person of Interest. Got up earlyish to take S to church for rehearsal. Did sound, libe, gas, home, got the Christmas saver, checks, can’t get my amp fixed until the New Year. Shopping at Fry’s, Target, Goodwill, Freddy’s.
Sunday: early to church, play, home via Goodwill, lunch with E, shopping, home, lazy, S to bed, up today, easy to work, stepped into a mess, part mine, part someone else’s. Quiet evening. Easy in.

So, in between Christmas and New Years. Christmas was nice, shopping, church, lazy, more stuff, church. Helped a parent with WordPress. Hard to get back to work, and now another 5 days off. We’re way short of cash.

So, it’s the end of one calendar year and the start of another. In the past, this has been quite an occasion, especially one memorable one-1983, maybe? In any case, I’m hoping my finances improve some, I want to make more music, and the inner dev stuff.

Happy New Years, everyone!

Links:

Another cop who killed a black guy not indicted. Protests, but no rioting that I heard about. C is either conservative or contrarian. M is def. a liberal. I remember in ’92, my boss called me at work saying that the cops who beat King were not guilty. I asked him if the rioting had started yet…the next day I was at the ARCO refinery in Carson, and I could see the columns of smoke rising from South Central. I left work early.

I’ve had a bit of a financial setback. If you’re a human and reading this, please tip me. We’re going to have to watch our pennies for the next month or 2. I woke up very early because of it, and after mulling things over, I daydreamed and wrote some lyrics. Unfortunately, I didn’t put them to paper. I think I’m going to start putting them to paper, then to music-probably just guitar and automated bass and drums. Maybe piano. Low tech folkie singer-songwriter stuff-I have all the right gear. Who knows? by this time next year, I might be famous! That would be a hoot-going out on the road at 53…

Now it’s Tuesday-now it’s Wednesday. Busy weekend and week. Friday was quiet, Saturday went to a memorial service for the baby. E picked me up, and we went to a Christmas fair at the expo center-lots of junk, but I got to sample wine & booze, including a delicious eggnog liqueur. Church Sunday, shopping, slacked on cleaning. Monday, back into a client drama, S to dentist, met them in Gladstone, looking for assembly clothes. Same Tues, good performance review, cleaned & laundry, woke up early, dreaming about being in a car with girls, listening to a station that cuts off songs.

And now Thursday. Gamelan was ok, but I’m messed up on the imbal on Djagung-Djagung. Dreamed about watching a performance, annoying narrator, E yelling “Shut up,” security coming, E leaves, I go downstairs, come back after I find out the play lasts 4 hours, they’re throwing squishy balls around, and water. Christmas party tonight, on a boat, and it’s going to be windy.

Links: State Terrorism and Racist Violence in the Age of Disposability, Republicans ‘dedicated with utter servility’ to the needs of the 1 percent, The Intellectual Condescension of White Liberals, 5 Reasons America Should Be Ashamed of Itself, The Wages of Global Capitalism, The Danger of American Fascism, The Right-Wing Myth That America Was Originally a Theocracy Is So Wrong, Democracy Crisis: We Are Enslaving Ourselves to Illegitimate Power, The Irony and the Ecstasy, The Obama Recovery Has Been Miles Better Than the Bush Recovery, Conservative Lies About Why the Economy Is Finally Recovering, A Multi-Billion Dollar Secret, China Passes US To Take Number One Spot As World’s Largest Economy, Propaganda Has Triumphed over Journalism, Are We Becoming a Theocracy?, How Would Today’s Republicans Treat Jesus?, A Society of Captives, Why Millions of Christian Evangelicals Oppose Obamacare and Civil Rights, Can the Left Launch Its Own Tea Party?, America’s Obscenely Rich Know Full Well That They Are Destroying America, How We Can Release Ourselves From the Tyrannical Grip of Corporate Power

Listening to: Harold Budd, Filter, Benedictine Monks of Santo Domingo de Silos, Coyote Oldman, Hole, French Frith Kaiser Thompson, Hawkwind, Dead Can Dance, Anne Dudley, Beck, art bears, Peter Gabriel, Andy Summers & Robert Fripp, Burning Spear, Neu!, fIREHOSE, Harold Budd & Brian Eno, Dr. Fiorella Terenzi, Franz Schubert, Rage Against The Machine, Rob Zombie, Rage Against The Machine, Meat Beat Manifesto, Tabla Beat Science, Anugama, Wendy Carlos, Jean Michel Jarre, Ravel, Flaming Lips, Johannes Brahms, art bears, Herb Ernst, Grateful Dead, Amethystium, Steven Halpern, Adam Trainer, Anne Dudley, Thomas Dolby, U2, Nirvana, Echoes of Nature, AC/DC, DOCKTA VALKUS, Grateful Dead, Golden Earring, Andy Summers & Robert Fripp, Rush, Philip Glass, Rage Against The Machine, Morphine, Tool, Jefferson Starship, Pat Metheny, Grateful Dead, Anne Clark, Augustus Pablo meets The Upsetter, Century of Aeroplanes, Brian Eno – David Byrne, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, The Clash, A Beautiful Machine, adrian juarez, Grateful Dead, Babe The Blue Ox, Djinnestan, Michael Stearns, Tao Te Ching, Steve Winwood, The Smashing Pumpkins, Tuxedomoon, Kansas, Brian Parnham (with Steve Roach), Peter Gabriel, Bach, Todd Rundgren’s Utopia, The Art Of Noise

It’s Monday, I’m so, so tired. The weekend was quiet-we gathered up pine boughs for the Advent Spiral at school, shopped a little, went to church Sunday. I got to bed early, but woke up a few times. Not much else-the house is pretty clean, though I don’t know how much energy I’ll have tonight (enough to run the dishwasher, a load of laundry and clean the cat box). S got to sleep in good order. I went to bed a bit late.
I feel better today-no idea why yesterday was so bad.
Wednesday: woke up to the news that our gamelan’s music director’s 3 week old baby has died of meningitis. Sad. So, so sad. Just so tragic.
Long commute home, plated dinner, gamelan was somber, house has Christmas boxes unpacked everywhere. Cleaned the cat box. Watched South Park. That is all.
Got a cash thing from work that will save Christmas. E got rid of some of her parents’ jewelry too. We’re still underwater, but this helps. I need to fix up my stick and sell it, and the tabla.

Links: Thanksgiving and the Socialist Imaginary, The Conservative March Toward a Society of Sociopaths, Dear Evangelicals: You’re Being Had, How Every Part of American Life Became a Police Matter, Are Humans Going Extinct?, The American Dream Is Dead, Slap-in-the-Face Wealth Gap Images, A Genuine Movement for Social Change, How the Young Are Indoctrinated to Obey, How White Fundamentalists Are Roiling America, Secrets of the right-wing brain, The Long, Dark Shadows of Plutocracy, An Economic Agenda for America: 12 Steps Forward, A therapist goes to middle school and tries to sit still and focus, How The GOP Is Coming Apart At The Seams, Elites Have Forced America into a National Psychosis, Conservative Christian Calls For ‘A Biblical View On Computer Programming’, I’ve Crunched the Numbers, and the American Dream Is Dead, Is the Democratic Party Relevant Anymore?

Listening to: Material, Allan Holdsworth, Cult, Jeff Beck, d’incise, Bill Bruford, Billy Thorpe, Mickey Hart, Alvari Lume, Tao Te Ching, A Beautiful Machine, Pink Floyd, Rush, Can, Clockcleaner, Thomas Dolby, Geshe Kelsang Gyatso, Peter Gabriel, Rush, Oingo Boingo, David Sylvian, Carrie Yury, Bhagavad Gita, Coyote Oldman, Beck, Jethro Tull, Boccherini, Bhagavad Gita, Rush, Gyuto Tantric University, Bitplasma Division, Renaldo & The Loaf, Philip Glass, Peter Gabriel, Philip Glass, Jalikebba Kuyateh & the Toubabs, Genesis, Sergei Rachmaninoff, George Clinton, Ludwig van Beethoven, Art Of Noise, Hole, Golden Earring, Brian Eno, Benedictine Monks of Santo Domingo de Silos, Mickey Hart, Minister, Babe The Blue Ox, Einstuerzende Neubauten, Biosphere, mystified, Bill Bruford, Radiohead, Piotr Ilyitch Tchaikovsky, Brian Eno – David Byrne, Gamelan, Babe The Blue Ox, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Allan Holdsworth, Anugama, Gamelan, Snakefinger, Anugama, Brian Eno – David Byrne, Rush, Antranik Askarian and Khatchadour Khatchaturian, U2, Master Musicians of Jajouka, Kaminari Synthesis, Beatmapper, Philip Glass, Steve Roach, Peter Gabriel, Brand X, Rolling Calf Sinfonette, Babe The Blue Ox, Moby, Collection, Daniel Lanois, Police, Frank Zappa, David Canright, Neil Young, insanic4, Tibetan Book of the Dead, Mozart, Tibetan Book of the Dead, Duran Duran, Art Of Noise, Brian Eno, Gamelan, Andy Summers & Robert Fripp, Giles Reaves, 311, Chick Corea, Ben Bracken & Eric Cook, KMFDM, Scott Smallwood

It’s now Friday…It’s now Saturday…it’s now Sunday. House is tidy, clothes and dishes clean. Went to a school meeting with S’s teacher. She’s the perfect Waldorf first grader. Meeting today with C’s teacher-he’s doing great too. Watched kids, took a nap.
And it’s Monday. Thankfully it’s a short week-I need the sleep.
Now Tuesday-I suppose I should post this one and start the next. Ferguson, MO is in flames, as a repeat of L.A. ’92. This time they didn’t even bother going to trial.
Wednesday-a half day, but gamelan tonight. M got his cast off, but his forearm is bowed. Doc says it’ll take care of itself. Yeah, right. Say the march from the bus last night-the driver was eager to get past it. Nice work gift coming-it’ll save Christmas for us. The house needs cleaning before tomorrow.

Page 23, Sentence 5: “But more than that, it was when I read Kurt Vonnegut’s Cat’s Cradle that I really understood my feelings about Israel.”, Me of Little Faith.

Links: Dave Grohl is Killing Rock ‘n’ Roll, Footnotes to the Prologue of a Manifesto, How Western Civilization Ended, Circa 2014, Which Side Are You On?, The 1 percent is gutting America’s middle class, Is God The Problem With American Politics?, The VERY Bad News FOR THE GOP in the GOP’s Midterm Victory, Why We Need Professional Revolutionists, A Simple Yet Powerful Lesson About Privilege, Being Black, the Real Indictment in Ferguson and the USA, Most White People in America Are Completely Oblivious, Ferguson and the “Us vs. Them” Illusion, Ferguson, Goddamn, Intelligence Questions

Listening to: Brian Eno – David Byrne, Yoshikazu Iwamoto, Godhead, Bob Seger, Todd Rundgren, mystified, Brian Eno, Anugama, K.M.Krebs, Brian Eno, Peter Gabriel, Addis Ababa Children  & The Upsetters, Harry Partch, Brahms, Brian Eno – David Byrne, Gyudmed Tantric Monastery, Thomas Dolby, Lili De La Mora, Dissidenten, Aphex Twin, Beethoven, Dead Can Dance, J. Dippold, Matmos, Blue Man Group, Anton Batagov, Beatmapper, Lezrod, Veruca Salt, Constance Demby, Beck, Andy Summers & Robert Fripp, mystified, Frank Zappa, Grateful Dead, The Aphex Twin, Peter Gabriel, Mozart, Jefferson Starship, Rush, French Frith Kaiser Thompson, Rage Against The Machine, Melvins, Cream, Daniel Lanois, Harold Budd & Brian Eno, o.m.s. – n.m.a., Beck, Skinny Puppy, John Lennon, Daniel Lanois, John Coltrane, Kittie, Black Sabbath, Gamelan Semar Pegulingan, Beck, Tao Te Ching, The Tibetan Book of the Dead, Mark Hamn, The Cynic Project, Yes, Tao Te Ching, Peter Gabriel, KMFDM, Brahms, Clockcleaner, Zakir Hussain, chen zimbalista/oron schwartz, Flores, mystified, Material, Heart, Tool, david byrne, Al Gromer Khan, Ghana, eneftze, The Beat, Jean-Luc Ponty, Soundwalk

It’s Friday. Got in on time, woo-hoo. Got stuff done, almost time to go. Home, got some cool iPhone music software, daydreaming, tidy, pizza.
Saturday-got sick. whoopee. Delivered E to the train, hung out at home, went back to get her, walked around the mall, got an upset stomach, that got way worse. Spent the rest of the day in pain and in bed. Odd dreams-hiding from a shooter, fighting with a guy, driving on an indoor freeway.
Sunday, much the same, stayed home Monday. Went to work Tuesday, probably shouldn’t have. Lantern walk-very cold. Work Weds, not 100%. Bailed on gamelan. Big snow Thurs fizzled out, worked from home anyways.
Friday, tried to get things done, but not everything. Home, suck meal at Hometown, pick up M from school thing. Lazy Sat-laundry, dishes. C overnight at a friends’. Sunday-skipped church, laundry, dishes, sweeping, not much else.
It’s Wednesday, C sprained his wrist really bad-we thought it was broken. Not much else, construction on the Sellwood bridge. I’m trying to go to bed earlier and do segmented sleep: working towards OOBE. Money is really tight right now: please tip the writer.

Links: 

Listening to: (I love having iTunes back to reporting play times!)

Monday-missed the bus-saw it go, sprinted after it to no avail. Got to hang out at home for a little bit. Busy, stuff, left early to go to M school parent meetings. Home, dinner, S to bed, Blacklist, bed. Woken up at 1 by the smoke alarm-a candle melted the plastic off the side of the glass-very smelly.
Tues-Very tired now, tons to do. Rep. Bonamici asked me if I voted on the train this morning. Daydreaming.
And now it’s Thursday. No gamelan last night. Not much else. The GOP has the Senate-it’s going to be an ugly 2 years. At least we can smoke dope in Oregon…Dreamed about sneaking away from a house when visitors came.

Links: Why conservative Christians would have hated Jesus, Your Reaction To An Image Of Maggots Might Determine If You Are Liberal Or Conservative, Building an Escalation Machine, Capitalism Is a Tumor on the Body Politic, The Disease of Being Busy, The Corporate Coup d’Etat is Nearly Complete, National Review Warns Republicans Not To Govern Because It’s A ‘Trap’, 11 Ways to Cope With Republican America, U.S. No Longer An Actual Democracy, How Ronald Reagan and the Supreme Court Turned American Politics Into a Cesspool, No, Democrats Aren’t a Bunch of Hopeless Wimps, Are We Raising a Generation of Helpless Kids?, Dear Democratic Party: Make No Mistake About It, Republicans Didn’t Win – You Lost, 5 Facts About How America Is Rigged for a Massive Wealth Transfer to the Rich

Listening to:

Friday, Halloween. whoopee. Pizza lunch, busy, to L’s house for more pizza and trick or treating. No boys. Home, pharma, TV.
Sat.-sleep in, lazy, libe, shop, just like every Sat. Had lunch at Pizzicato’s, went to a small party at a church friends’-our 16th anniversary.
Sun.-church, lazy, nap, dinner, S to bed, laundry, dishes. Another normal Sunday.

Links: The Shadow Surveillance State Is Really a Secret Religion, Twelve Ways Jim Crow Is Winning in 2014, Millennials Aren’t Cheap, They’re Broke, Why the GOP Is Going to Be in Deep Trouble If Their Crazy Tea Party Candidates Get into the Senate, At the Mad Hatter’s Tea Party, Fear Is the Entrée, The Act of Voting vs. the Controlling Interests of the US Empire, 5 Ways Most Americans Are Blind to How Their Country Is Stacked for the Wealthy, Gamergate and the politicization of absolutely everything

Listening to: Rush, Can, Peter Gabriel, Clockcleaner, Thomas Dolby, Geshe Kelsang Gyatso, Peter Gabriel, Rush, Oingo Boingo, David Sylvian, Carrie Yury, Bhagavad Gita, Coyote Oldman, The Art Of Noise, Beck, Jethro Tull, Mstislav Rostropovich, Bhagavad Gita, Rush, Gyuto Tantric University, Bitplasma Division, Renaldo & The Loaf, Philip Glass, Peter Gabriel, Philip Glass, Jalikebba Kuyateh &the Toubabs, Genesis, Sergei Rachmaninoff, George Clinton, Ludwig van Beethoven, Art Of Noise, Hole, Golden Earring, Brian Eno, Benedictine Monks of Santo Domingo de Silos, Mickey Hart, Minister, Todd Rundgren’s Utopia, Babe The Blue Ox, Einstuerzende Neubauten, Biosphere, mystified, Bill Bruford, Radiohead, Piotr Ilyitch Tchaikovsky , Brian Eno – David Byrne, Gamelan, Babe The Blue Ox

2:25, Monday-no headache yet. Didn’t last…Home, dinner, S to bed. One of the Portland Waldorf stalwarts is sick. Another headache just before bed. Dreamed about aliens again-this time they landed, but their cloaking failed, so we talked to them-didn’t say much-told us to leave. Another about racing cars, a ferry and people jumping off the side and swimming.

Tuesday’s gone-a bit wet, trying to be productive, small headache, home, dinner, bed, didn’t really get to sleep until very late, then S came in and wanted water, plus E snoring. <sigh> Without coffee I’m going to be really really slow.
And there’s Wednesday. Not much different-wet, work, meetings, stuff. Home, this close to missing the bus, dinner, help C with math, gamelan, home, more math, bed. Dreamed about pooping in a meeting room with stalls, and scary masks in them that a schoolmate was boasting about. Parents came in, and I shooed them out bwecause a meeting was starting. Tried to find a shirt. Meeting was about buying a company.

Links: 9 Events Which Created the Environment for America’s Emerging Police State, The Stark Facts of Global Greed, a Disease as Challenging as Climate Change, Godless Millennials Could End the Power of the Religious Right, How the GOP’s Ideology Is Destroying America’s Future, Higher Education and the New Brutalism, The Coming Revolution: Evolutionary Leap or Descent Into Chaos and Violence?, The Myth of the Free Press, Ideology and Investment, So Long, Liberty: 10 Ways Americans Have Lost Their Rights

Listening to:

Here we are, at Friday again. It’s chilly, and hard to get up. I’m looking forward to sleeping in tomorrow. And tomorrow is the last day of coffee. Yikes. The last time I kicked coffee was when S was born, or maybe when we moved up here. It’s been a while, in any case.

OK, so left a bit early, slept! on the train and almost missed my stop, E to school, all to school for a thing, drive C to a middle school dance at PWS, back to school, home, pizza, pick C up, sleep.
Slept in a bit, tidy, coffee, breakfast, UI work. Gonna be windy today.
Lazy Sat, M to church, picked him up, pj’s all day.
Church Sun, shop, headache, libe, nap, dinner, more headache. Dreamed about aliens attacking and mowing down our house.
Woke up early, working on stuff. Meetings, fuzzy with no caffeine.

These are some pretty cool online comics: Stand Still Stay Silent and A Redtail’s Dream.

Links: Why conservatives prefer propaganda to reality, 7 Facts That Show the American Dream Is Dead, Krugman Dismantles the Right’s Hysterical Fear of Actual Democracy, Inside the conservative brain, Can Capitalism and Democracy Coexist?, Apocalypse Now

Listening to: Blue Oyster Cult, Harold Budd & Brian Eno, The B-52’s, Tibetan Book of the Dead, David Sylvian, Collection, Dutilleux, John Lee Hooker, Gultskra Artikler, Babe The Blue Ox, Tori Amos, Nina Gordon, Karawitan, Geshe Kelsang Gyatso, Philip Glass, The Smashing Pumpkins, Sly & Robbie, The Orb, Philip Glass, Harold Budd, Japan, Arcticology, Richard Bone, Kittie, Brian Eno, Byron Metcalf featuring Steve Roach, Genesis, Oingo Boingo, Legendary Pink Dots, Devo, Siouxsie and the Banshees, The Umma Project, U2, Centrozoon, Deftones, Djinnestan, Brian Eno – David Byrne, Rush, Gamelan Semar Pegulingan, Jeffrey Fayman & Robert Fripp, eneftze, Philip Glass

Wednesday, and it’s rainy. Not so bad, still in a malaise. Dreamed about trying to find the right jacket for a fancy dinner, but none were right.

Easy in. Just out of ideas-UI design. First day of 1/2 coffee dosage. Got a headache around 3, feeling fuzzy, fell asleep on the train, ate, put S to bed, fell asleep and went right to bed too.

Woke up at 4, dozed. Dreamed about water skating down a river, looking at skating down a waterfall. Went to prep for a work Italian dinner instead. Propositioned the office manager. She said, “come in early tomorrow.” Only one thing would’ve made that dream better…

Easy in, found a thing, working on a bunch of stuff. Home, tidy, folding laundry, juicing, dinner. Digestive system is a bit sketchy-prolly the caffeine some. More tidy, to bed late, the thing.

Page 23, Sentence 5: “Right now, the triumph of market logic, with its ethos of domination and fierce competition, is paralyzing almost all serious efforts to respond to climate change”, This Changes Everything.

Links: Economists Say We Should Tax The Rich At 90 Percent, Superrich Have Grabbed Half the World’s Assets, Why Conservatives Opt for Propaganda Over Reality, 200+ Consciousness Raising Documentaries, The Impulse Society, Why I’m Worried About America, The Dimming Prospects for Human Survival

Listening to: Rush, Bleupulp, ZZ Top, Rage Against The Machine, Geshe Kelsang Gyatso, Al Gromer Khan, Skinny Puppy, Portishead, The Crystal Method, Jethro Tull, Amorphous Androgynous, Art Of Noise, Rage Against The Machine, Mike Oldfield, Aashid Himons, Babe The Blue Ox, Japan, Earth, Brainscapes, Carbon Based Lifeforms, Rolling Calf Sinfonette, Shambala, Exoxen, Dream Syndicate, Latin Playboys, forma, George Clinton, Todd Rundgren, art bears, Bhagavad Gita, Brian Eno, Babe The Blue Ox, Hafíz Kani Karaca, Akashic Crow’s Nest, Wendy Carlos, Kansas, Gender Wayang, Harry Partch, Helmet, Gamelan Mitra Kusuma, Legendary Pink Dots, The Flaming Lips, A Beautiful Machine, Deborah Martin, Dissidenten, Robert Fripp and Brian Eno, Peter Gabriel, Charles Lucy, Byron Metcalf featuring Steve Roach, J. S. Bach, Tuxedomoon, Pink Floyd, Alva Noto, Brian Eno, Todd Rundgren, Peter Gabriel, Steve Roach & Vir Unis, Dissidenten, aodl, Roger Powell, R. Carlos Nakai, Philip Glass, Pretenders, Steve Roach, Vidna Obmana, Daniel Lanois, Benedictine Monks of Santo Domingo de Silos, Craig Padilla, Steve Roach, Henry Cow, Todd Rundgren, mystified, Bill Bruford, Beck