Good Morning. Hello. How are you? #1206
Chores, garden bench, Jane bench, MRI, bee stings, H Mart, Costco, Chappell Roan and the most successful opening slot of all time. Folksonomies still going strong. UK and French election jealousy
Good morning. Monday. After a long weekend. ‘Twas a wonderful weekend, but the mood broke somewhere Sunday morning. Headache arrived. Realized I have to go back to work soon. Was exhausted from three straight days of hard work outdoors under a baking sun. And now, now I am at my computer, in my office. Haven’t been in here in days. I am asking my brain to undergo a full transplant, as I forget all about garden benches and carpentry and yard projects and load up adtech and management and… oof. Feels a faustian bargain. But we gotta feed our kids. Whoopee. Okay, brain. Reload, reset. Open up that Keynote and try to remember what’s in it. You can do it.
I am listening to the new reissue of Cindy Lee’s 2020 album What’s Tonight to Eternity. It is great but it is no Diamond Jubilee, which still has not been released on vinyl. How is Cindy Lee supposed to win a Pulitzer and/or Nobel Prize without issuing the album on physical media. Hrm, well, I suppose that’s fitting, really. I also have a cop here of a reissue of Cindy’s other 2020 album, Model Express, but it is not listed in Discogs, and if a record is not listed in Discogs, does it exist? I have been having this problem with the Sacred Bones Record Club edition of Khanate’s Clean Hands Go Foul for a good month now. Just refreshing the tab, no one is updating Discogs. Am I going to have to do it myself?
It really is something how rare this is, though. Folksonomies, user-generated content, Wikis: Still going strong in a lot of places, in a lot of ways. One of the good things about the internet that hasn’t, by and large, been ruined. Though you can definitely feel it fading a bit. Do the kids want to keep maintaining these vast wikis we’ve developed on the internet? Will they fade eventually, just as truth fades? Probably, probably.
All right let me regale you with holiday weekend chores, performed in 100 degree heat, my god, it was so hot. A hundred degrees is one thing, but on top of that, I was working in a greenhouse, and on top of that, the stone floor of the greenhouse is black. Crawling around on the floor, getting the garden bench table top screwed in place on its legs: just so freakin hot. I would accidentally touch the sunny part of the stone floor with my hand and it felt like I was frying.
But the garden bench is done! And it is in place. Okay, it’s not completely done. I have not plumbed up the sink yet, I have not installed the pull-out trash cans, and there are three small pieces of trim I need to put on the front still. And I think I am going to add a lower storage shelf onto it. But still! Look at it! It is a thing of beauty. I am so excited about it.
LOL it looks so easy now that it’s in there. But it wasn’t! The framing was a bitch! There is electrical conduit everywhere. Plumbing comes in through the floor and blocking where the legs could be. The whole floor is at a slight pitch and every leg needed to be individually leveled.
But look at that awesome potting section where the excess dirt will go through the grate and into the black bin below. I am so excited about that
While in the mood of making benches, I also finished up Jane’s workbench for Chore House, along with an accompanying rolling caddy for her toolboxes. It is all pink. It is very cute. Is it master carpentry? No, but it is competent and it has pocket holes man I love my new pocket hole jig.
Also had one of the pool company work crews over for Thursday and Friday. We got done the following:
The rest of the cast iron plants transplanted out of the side house work area, where it was way too sunny for them, and moved into the shady grove where we had previously transplanted the other cast iron plants and they are so much happier. I love this giant grove of aspidistras in the woods, it is so pretty. Keep the aspidistra flying (I also realized this weekend I need to read that book, loved the Richard E Grant/Helena Bonham Carter film adaptation and everything was so… modern. Modern sensibilities and concerns from people a hundred years ago. Also in my head the book takes place in like 1850 and not 1930 in my head Orwell is always a century earlier I should see a therapist about that).
Got two 4x4s mounted in concrete for my two Hoselink systems, because they are too top-heavy to use the helical piles I have been using. Painted them. have not mounted the Hoselinks yet.
Got rid of the annoying AF bushes that were covering up the septic tank and my low-voltage lighting control pole
Cleared brush, GWB style: the stuff that was just cut, and the stuff cut like two months ago, to a secret place in the woods. Spent a lot of time thinking about how people dump things in the wood. Wished I could mulch all this wood, but it is too tangly.
Cleared a pile of annoying flowering bushes on the east side of Chore House where I am thinking of either planting more garden or building a kiln for drying wood, TBD.
Spread mulch everywhere, 20 yards of mulch, made everything look pretty for the visitors to the clinic and for me. Man, it is all so pretty now. Look!
Hrm I am just now noticing they did not level that left bench when they mulched. I will have to go fix it.
And I already had all those rocks, spread around in various little piles. I had em moved there because I’m going to make a fire pit right there. But I realized I could do that myself so I did not make the crew suffer through it in 100°F heat.
Other weekend activities:
Got a MRI on my brain because of my headaches. It is fine. That is a relief but also not a good answer.
Got a migraine. It lingers still, which is actually probably as much a reason my mood is crappy today as going back to work because I love work I do, crush it, LinkedIn, bro.
Oh I busted out the weed whacker and cut all the weeds at the edge of the pond so Janet could have a nice view. This worked great, and I wore my TrueWork overalls for it and no problems. BUT, my glasses slipped out of the overall chest pocket, so after I chaned out of the (now soaking) overalls, I went back to find my glasses, found them, and stepped on a yellowjacket next, while only wearing shorts and Crocks, instead of the full protection overalls I was wearing earlier. I had very clearly weed whacked right over the nest previously, in my protective overalls, and didn’t even notice. But this time, in shorts, I got stung about nine times. Super fun. I still itch everywhere.
But here is a sweet picture in my farmer getup.
Jane and Emma went swimming at the neighbors’ twice this weekend, and I stopped by after yard work each day and did a bit of lounging around the pool that was nice.
Friday evening Gymnastics and pizza run that was nice. Emma is about done of taking care of Janet each evening, so we are getting our evenings together again. My week of evenings alone, watching Youtube videos, have come to an end. I miss it, but I do like having my wife back.
Saturday morning Jane and I did our normal Bojangles/Lowe’s/Dunkin run and I bought some hardware stuff and paint stuff and Jane got munchkins my god my wife and daughter love munchkins amurca!
Took Jane to the playground Sunday morning and a) had rags in the car to try off all the playground equipment because I am super dad and all the kids were very happy cuz I was the only parent with rags, and b) brought my litter-picker-upper stick and a trash bag to pick up litter. Really felt very prepared. Forgot Jane’s water.
On Sunday we went to Cary to go with some friends of ours to two hallowed American retail establishments: H Mart and Costco. I bought stuff at each. They were super fun. I ate too much junk food. We were gonna go to the posh new Cary park/playground with a beer garden, but it rained, alas.
Donated $100 to a friend’s gofundme to buy a Segway mobility thingy for handicap people because she is having health problems. I have had, for a good 30 years or so, lingering guilt about an episode in the 90s where this friend got a ride from me from Boston to Providence to go to a Goth night — Kathryn’s, I believe, Shelter it was called, I believe. Anyway I was really into Mercury Rev’s Yerself is Steam, having recently seen them live opening for My Bloody Valentine. And I played the album at deafening volume the whole way down to providence, to this friend’s obvious discomfort (she was sitting in the back with her ears plugged). It was so obviously douchey. At the time I probably thought some complex thing about suffering for art and whatnot. Anyway, when I donated this $100 to her gofundme, I apologized for this incident. But also, wtf. I was probably that big of a douchenozzle all the time at the age of 24. Or maybe she doesn’t remember. Or maybe I wasn’t always that big of a douchenozzle and that’s why I remember and still feel guilty about this incident. But also I bet I did equally crappy things all the time that I don’t remember. Also, apologizing felt nice but it also felt like an imposition: this person needs money for some medical devices and here I am burdening them with some obligation to forgive me for past transgressions. Though not really, I suppose. The money was given already, she could have told me “see you sucker,” which, honestly, I probably would have deserved? Why does it feel like apologies are self-absorbed sometimes?
I would like to say that I feel unburdened, apologizing and making amends for this wrong. But I do not, I just kind of feel worse. Doing mean things is so lame! It haunts you for life! There’s no coming back from it, the Catholics are lying.
I would like to posit that Chappell Roan’s appearance as the opener on Olivia Rodrigo’s Sour tour may be the single most successful opening slot of all time. Back when I “discovered” her, before the masses, back in March or whatever, before the Sour tour, she was really not that big. Now? Lady has five singles in the top forty this week. That is Elvis-level shit, that is Taylor-level shit. At the beginning of the year, Chappell Roan’s entire catalog had received just over 3 million streams. It is now closer to 65 million. Insane.
I’m telling you, man. Most successful opening slot of all time.
Congratulations to France and England for having awesome elections, where the liberals trounced the conservatives in both countries. Side by side on my piano, keyboard, oh lord, why don’t we…. I mean, England we saw coming, but France? Everyone thought that was gonna be a disaster. Maybe we can pull this off. Dems may as well start positioning their candidate as “anyone else” and be done with it. I am back to annoyed with Biden and his ego this week. God all I want to do is retire in putter in the garden I have no sympathy for people in their 80’s hanging on to power just let it go dude.
Jane bedtime last night, no daddy school, alas. We tried one on Friday it was kind of a catastrophe. Assistant Teacher Mommy was in the room and that makes it hard for Jane to learn she just ran around like a lunatic she did not care about the framers of the constitution or the bill of rights — well, actually, that’s not entirely true, she is into the idea of rights. Some more than others. She likes speech and religion, the press is kind of okay. Does not care a whit about the right to assembly, but I keep trying. Jury trial is too academic for her as is the one about soldiers not sleeping in your house, well of course soldiers can’t sleep in your house, silly. It is depressing and difficult to explain to her that these things happen to people, and that rights matter. If you succeed, she just gets sad. Lose lose. And, I confess, we’re just skipping over the 2nd amendment completely. I’ll have to get to it eventually but it’s… well, it’s too depressing to deal with. Thinking I’ll tell it like a ghost story: haha silly people believe this silly thing. If you meet someone who believes this, just smile and nod and move on.
She did ask to do Daddy Dance Party last night, though. We hadn’t done that in ages. Not the easiest thing to do with this infernal boot on my foot, but it was still super nice. She’s been more and more into music lately, and she’s a lyrics machine just absorbs them. Correct me on my singing along to “Get Him Back.” Has most of the Chappell Roan album memorized. Played the Pet Shop Boys “So Hard” cassingle in my office the other day and sang along. She will never be one of those kids who doesn’t know what a cassette deck is that is nice.
I am rambling. Let’s go deal with summit prep. I have quite a two weeks ahead of me. Whole company is coming to visit me next week. And I have a lot of slides to make before then. Wish me luck.
Here have a synthpop compilation today.
All right well I was going to put one more photo in here but Substack is yelling at me that this email is nearing the size limit so imagonnago. Hope your transition back to the grind is not too terrible. Love you. Bye.
"It really is something how rare this is, though. Folksonomies, user-generated content, Wikis: Still going strong in a lot of places, in a lot of ways. One of the good things about the internet that hasn’t, by and large, been ruined. Though you can definitely feel it fading a bit. Do the kids want to keep maintaining these vast wikis we’ve developed on the internet? Will they fade eventually, just as truth fades? Probably, probably."
I am pretty bullish on folksonomies etc. continuing because they have *never* been a mass phenomenon. Even at the height of the social web, the % of folks who were truly active on these sites and projects - who were even aware of social tagging as a thing - was pretty low. This is also probably why those sites never quite broke through or sustained relative to investor expectations (though Flickr is still humming along!), but also was never quite the fad-bust cycle outside of very online commentators. And because they're mostly not high-traffic or remunerative corners of the Internet, they'll continue to appeal to obsessives rather than be another place for the maw of spam comments (now with AI!) to ruin.