Thank you! By the way, I watched Ink Masters. I am so curious about whether the field attracts shitty people, or if that's due to selection bias for the sake of TV. Also, who the fuck is signing up to be a canvas on these shows? If there's some kind of pipeline, then I'm interested. So many social experiments, so little time.
Good stuff! Happy new year pubski! Tomorrow Trump's ilk are convening in DC. The rally begins at 11am. He's already suggesting that "Antifa," will cause problems. He WANTS there to be violence. The only way he can hold on to power is through upheaval and civil war. He will do anything to stay in power and claim victory. He doesn't give a shit about the country, just himself. He's a wounded animal, backed in to a corner. It's worth being concerned about what could happen in the next two weeks.
Now the dems need to get as much as possible and more done in the next two years and keep the democratic bases they gained in places like Georgia galvanized. No small task considering the monumental arrogance of the national DNC.
The Democrats have two years to jam through everything they can. Make M4A happen, work on law enforcement changes, finalize LGBTQ+ equality, increase taxes on the wealthy, raise minimum wage, Green New Deal, and get us the hell out of the Middle East. But it won't happen, they will try to "include" everyone and accomplish nothing. I really wish the radical left could take control like the radical right has.
The best part? The House has passed HUNDREDS of bills that are just waiting in the queue for a vote in the Senate. Bills don't have an expiration date. So - if they wanted to - the Senate could have a flurry of votes, pulling everything out of storage and passing a ridiculous number of progressive policies into law. McConnell's tactic of not allowing these things to come to vote could result in the largest progressive sweep in America's history. If the Dems have the balls to do such a thing. Which they don't. But it's fun to speculate, isn't it?
Just watched "Portrait of a Lady on Fire" and really enjoyed this movie. It helps that I speak French, because I could be 100% engrossed instead of reading the subtitles - but even so I think it's a film worth watching. It somehow mirrored emotions and a headspace I've been in since New Years, and it feels good to direct the feelings towards a screen instead of inwards. I've also foolishly (but perhaps also because of sleep deprivation) called classical music "cheesy" a few days ago. Felt like an immature teenager hot-take even while I was saying it. And the movie definitely made me regret my words even more. I think the biggest thing that has ruined classical music for me, is that dumb broom animation by Walt Disney. It's just so intertwined in my mind, I can't un-couple it and listen to classical things with a fresh ear and good mental imagery. I've tried to find some good classical stuff to listen to today, but it's all just so vast I don't know where to start. I'm too impatient so I end up skipping around a piece, never settling in. Music is the medium I've always had the most trouble connecting with. I get bored, annoyed, frustrated I'm not actually finding what I want to listen to. I've had my moments with music, but they come rarely. They are not easily-replicable. And I'm always surrounded my extreme music lovers, it almost feels like i'm handicapped sometimes. Even with the mega shitty start of this year with the government probably announcing our harshest lockdown yet tomorrow, I'm optimistic about the coming year.
Classical music is a minefield for the novice, that's for sure. You can get bored so quickly, if you just sit down and try to consume it like a pop song. The best way to introduce yourself to it is to have it playing in the background while you are doing something else, and focused on a task. Don't THINK about what you are listening to... just let it wash over you. A great place to start would be on a Spotify playlist. I just searched the word "Classical" and came up with several good playlists - Calming Classical, Classical Focus, Classical Essentials. Play one of these in the background while you are focused on a project and working on something. If you like something, click the heart. Otherwise just let it ride. If you don't focus on it, you will feel it more... the movements will change, and you'll feel the difference ... and over time you will get an intuitive feeling for the structure of classical music. Instead of intro, verse, chorus, verse, middle-8, chorus, verse, outro, like a pop song, you will begin to viscerally understand how each movement of a classical piece differs, and how they are related. That will help train your ear for what to listen to, and how to "consume" the sounds and movements and sections of each piece. At least... that's my advice, if you want to get in to listening to and appreciating more classical music....
I'll give it a try! Maybe it's just because I'm not used to it, but when I've tried a little in the past I find orchestras just pull too much on my attention. It gets loud, quiet, fast, slow and I can't help but stop whatever i'm doing to pay attention. But once I start paying attention I get bored and start skipping around the piece, or jump to the next one. But then that's my experience with a lot of music. I think driving is one of the few activities during which I can get absorbed into music, but then the sound quality is usually shit. Or live performances, where I can observe the artists and crowd - and that won't be a possibility for a while. I sorta blame my parents, we barely ever had music playing at home growing up and it's been an uphill battle my whole adult life. I'm secretly hoping there is an obscure genre I haven't discovered yet that will blow my mind. Or that I will find the "right way" to listen to music. I'm at a point where I like many very different things, I have genres and artists I like, but I really struggle to match it to my mood, so I will circle around the rolodex of my favorite playlists getting endlessly frustrated until I stumble upon the right thing by accident.
when i listen to music while exercising it helps me focus on it and avoid the skip-this-part, wait-i'm-zoned-out syndrome, might be worth trying if you haven't
Wow. I can't comprehend that and it makes me genuinely sad. I can sympathise though, like when I read that mantis shrimp have 12 colour receptors instead of the measly 3 humans have and we'll never be able to comprehend what that experience is like.Music is the medium I've always had the most trouble connecting with.
It took a week and a half for my ski boots to arrive, but I got them last Thursday. I've been able to get out skiing three times since then and feel more confident each time. I'm skiing classic cross country and got some narrow metal edged touring skis. The metal edge really adds a lot of stability, I think. It's nice having something new to do.
Welp. It's close, but it looks like Ossoff is going to win at this point, and with Warnock already being declared the winner last night, Mitch McConnell's nihilistic destruction of American decency and decorum can finally come to an end. What a fucking relief. Music. Starting taking a songwriting class that has frankly blown my mind in the first three days of this month-long class. It goes through the whole process, from basic music theory, to finding inspiration, to how to use your DAW and synths, through final mixing and mastering. The curriculum has you writing and completely mixing three songs in a month. You go through the class with a cohort of about 40 people, and there's a social aspect to it, where you share your audio clips and progress with each other and comment/help each other out. My cohort has people from every continent and every age group and every skill level, and frankly it is one of the sweetest and kindest groups of people I've ever interacted with. The most important thing for me is that I have taken classes on music theory, and taken classes on songwriting, and taken classes on synthesizers, and taken classes on DAWs... but connecting them all together has been a big issue. This class has already helped me hurdle several of these issues, and I am ALREADY feeling more confident/agile with my tools. Now if I could just get this B section figured out... Work Started again this week. And it's good. Already got a reasonable amount of things on my plate, and they are interesting and good projects. But, most importantly, my old collaborator from Australia (who I had a joint venture marketing business with for about 5 years) and I have started a New Thing together! We are going to be writing and creating together again, and I couldn't be happier! She's a gem and we play SO WELL off each other. Making more money on the side is honestly just gravy (and will probably go to more music production garbage that I don't need but has nice blinky lights and knobs to play with). :-/ Fortunately, the first six week long project doesn't start until February, so I can finish the songwriting class before we embark on this big ambitious writing project in mid-Feb. 2021 is a significant improvement over 2020 so far...
Welp, I'm kinda, almost, maybe, probably, actually done with term 3 now. Halfway to a bachelors degree. Dang. I had plans to do a bit more with my app project but that didn't happen so now I might get a passing grade though I am kind of unsure. I'll continue work on the app in either case, so if I have to do more work for a passing grade it isn't that bad. I miss my cat. Sometimes I hear the floor creak and turn around and expect to see her there. We're getting kittens. I knew that I wanted to keep having cats after Kathlyn, but I did hope that "after Kathlyn" was going to happen far off in the future. I'm confident that the decision to get kittens is coming from a good place and not desperation to get back something that I can't ever get back. I feel like there is two aspects to feeling shit about my cat being dead, the grief over her being gone, and missing having a cat. And nothing but time is going to soothe the first one, but the second one can be solved. Having this feeling of the one thing I want the most (my cat back) being out of reach has kind of made everything else feel less important which is kind of bad with deadlines looming. I managed the last one (though I don't know if I passed the exam) and I think I'll have something to hand in on Monday even if it isn't up to a passing standard. A petty shit start to 2021 tbh, but I think it can still be a good year.
I'm really sorry about the loss of Kathlyn. She must have been an incredible friend. I think your feelings and your introspection are healthy. My cat Max passed away in April of 2019, and it was just me and Tess for a while. She and Max never really got along, but I could tell she was lonely. So Hugo came home. Hugo isn't Max, and I still miss him. I sometimes still ask Tess if she remembers him (but being a cat she doesn't answer). Hugo is curled up in my legs currently, and he's a nice boy. But I still miss Max. Bringing him home came from a good place, and I'm sure you're right that getting kittens will be for you, too. I always like to think my cats wish they could still be here but are glad another cat in need has a home.