Good morning. Hello. How are you? #1003
Buying a Space Echo from a hoarder, chores, dreams, Boston, Listening to Jimmy Buffet in the bleak midwinter
Good morning. Happy Tuesday. Hope you had a lovely holiday, ideally with a bunch of chores. Mine was great. Just back from taking Jane to school. How trip took 30 minutes, place is ten mins away. Ten there, ten waiting in line, ten back. It’s annoying. Looking down the barrel of a gun of fifteen full days of my life commuting to school. Emma has it worse. It’s nearly an hour to go pick her up. What a waste of time. Of course, if we didn’t do that, should could spend 2-3x as long on the bus in each direction. An even bigger waste of time.
Had a dream last night that there was a big event in a theater in Boston, somewhere in Copley, kinda near the Copley Square hotel and where BCG was back in the day. It was an amazing high tech sort of performance of animation and shadows and puppets, all kinda run off of Arduino and Raspberry Pi. It was put on by Spot, the post house that use to throw those amazing halloween parties. Everyone was there. It was a big old Boston to-do. Sean and Jussi and Ben and Emily and Abby and Dawn and this guy I worked with on the first Obama campaign (not from Boston) and a kid from my elementary school (Ditto) and a million other people. The play/performance was pretty good, but there were some lighting issues. Afterward we all caravanned out and debated whether to go to Man Ray or the Loft and my god I miss that place so much.
N.B. I will be in Boston next Thursday for Peter Gabriel. Maybe even next Wednesday for Man Ray. Are you going to Man Ray next Wednesday?
Props to the Schlage company for sending me a new battery caddy because the one in my Schlage Encode Plus was ruined by battery corrosion. Second American Industrial Company I have emailed and they’ve just sent me a replacement part at no cost. Really gives you a little faith in the world.
RIP to Jimmy Buffet. I never cared much for the dude but Harmony Korine and The Beach Bum got me to change my tune and I have become very obsessed with “A Pirate Looks at 40” these last couple of years. When I was in high school and riding to school at 5 in the morning with my mother, who worked there, Glen and Jerry, the local DJs, would play the same songs every morning in the same order. Not sure what was up with that. Maybe they were really tired. Anyway, it would be, like -20°F, we’d be driving in the pitch black, and Glenner and Jerry would play that Pina Colada song (not Jimmy Buffet, I know) and then Margaritaville, back to back. I think it was their sense of irony or something: it’s cold here but we are dreaming of the tropics, I guess. But, then, they would also play the Smithereens every morning, so who knows. Also I went to a Margaritaville once and the place fuckin ruled and Jimmy Buffet was on to something. Margaritas are pretty awesome. Also I hear he did a lot of good deeds but I have not investigated this.
Anyway. Lovely weekend. Chores chores chores. Just great. Chores are the best. After writing to you on Friday I had a work call and then lunch and then I had to go to the UNC Medical complex to have a nice doctor look at my hand. The calcification from prior trauma (aka stealing Adrian Grenier’s limo) was not the culprit. Turns out it was boring old trigger finger run wild. She injected both fingers with steroids. Boy, that was a rush. Anyway they are about 80% better now after four days. Can make a fist. Can hold down a guitar chord (aside from my utter lack calluses). Still some pain and some fear/mental trauma, but it’s almost all better. Really is something. When medicine works its magic. She also took a look at my elbow and said yeah, it’s gonna take like a year to get better, as long as its improving keep doing what you’re doing but if it gets worse, call us. Awesome. It is getting better, but seven months of tennis elbow is no fun.
Other chores this weekend: painted the new conduit in the garage so it matches the walls. Looks great. Pressure washed the part of the garage floor that had a bunch of crap on it from the previous owner, that I meant to do before I moved in but there wasn’t time for some reason. I set the miter saw up with the new shop vac and the automatic switch and it is awesome. Cut a bunch of wood to start building my caddy for the shredder but decided I needed to plane the 2x4s and the planer isn’t set up yet, so… next weekend. Refilled my pills, took out the compost, played a game of Civilization (lost to the Russians but it was close), listened to some records, did a lot of cleaning, spilled a bottle of goo gone, kept working on wiping a pile of work laptops for charity donation.
Watched a bunch of videos about patch bays. I cannot get my head around patch bays. Part of the problem is the terminology “input” and “output” when it comes to a patch bay. Are you talking about the front or back? Top or bottom? It kills me. Patch bays, man.
I bought a Roland RE-201 Space Echo off of Facebook Marketplace. Dude made me drive to his house in Burlington, NC and it was a trip. Lovely 40-minute drive through farmlands on small country roads, zero complaints there. Got to his neighborhood and it was one of those McMansion farms with no trees but that seemed reassuring: nice normal dude with a studio in his garage. But nope. Drove to the absolute back of the neighborhood to a house in the woods off of a dirt road. It was still a McMansion but it looked like a haunted McMansion. And not in a fun Halloween way. Anyway, guy was outside, smoking a cigarette. He didn’t smoke in the house. But there was a pile of like 200 cigarette butts in front of his own garage. I can only assume he did not smoke in his house in order to keep his guitar gear mint, as it was clear his guitar gear was the absolute most important thing in his life.
He was high as a kite.
His house was a total hoarder situation. He was obsessed with Eddie Van Halen. He had a really cute dog. I went inside and it was terrifying, but he had the Space Echo set up in the living room so I did a quick check of it to make sure it works. Thing was immaculate, great deal. But this dude needed friends or something so he made me come into another room and check out his main rig. He had been buying this vintage gear since the 80’s and despite the house being a classic hoarder situation, all his guitar gear was immaculate. It really was insane. This room had two 2x12 cabs, one with a Music Man head, one with a Marshall head. He had another RE-201 hooked up, along with an original Big Muff from the 60’s and an original Centaur and some cool vintage overdrive rack unit, all in mint condition. Upstairs in another room he had four Marshall stacks, another RE-201 and an Echoplex that looked brand new. It really was something. Dude would not let me go. Talked to me about Eddie Van Halen and other guitarists for an hour. Eventually I got the money in his hand and got the unit and back to my truck and he rested his hand on the hood and kept talking to me. It really was something. I feel for the guy. Said he and his girlfriend broke up recently. It did not seem he was fit to do any actual work. He had an amp guy, but would not give me his name or number.
Also the house had Christmas trees set up everywere. Like ten of them.
Finished Ben Smith’s Traffic but I have a lot to say there so I think I will wait until tomorrow to get into that.
Jane has gotten her new weekend routine down. She gets up when she wants, she goes pee and gets dressed, she plays by herself and then she comes and finds me at 7:30. It’s been great. She climbs into bed for maybe five minutes, one day she brought her Cabbage Patch Doll. Then we get up and we brush our teeth and we go play until she wants breakfast. I do a lot of Duolingo and video watching and record listening but every once in a while she insists I go over and play with her with the LEGO™ brand building bricks. I made this nice parade float. I was very proud of it. She took it apart before the next morning.
Moody and quiet playlist for you. Almost all new. I guess that Sinead song is old, and the Charlie Parr with Low. But the rest! All new. New Kristen Hersh! New Courtney Barnett! New Bonnie Prince Billy and Kevin Drew. Good times.
Thank you, friends. Thank you, friends
Wouldn't be here if it wasn't for you
I'm so grateful for all the things you helped me do.
All the ladies and gentlemen
Who made this all so probable
Thank you, friends