Good morning. Hello. How are you? #987
Flip-flopping Frederick Douglass, Walmart Run, Studio HVAC done, Instagaram ads, Topo Chico, AirPods Theft Trial, Clarence Thomas, Five more Neubauten albums
Good morning! Hello! How are you? All is well over here, right now, right this moment. Pretty dark place yesterday, but some good work news in the afternoon, the completion of the HVAC in the attic, and seeing some friends in the evening snapped me out of it. Very much enjoying the absurdity of this part time sideline pool contracting gig. Apparently we’re starting a storage unit facility. And longtime readers know how much I freakin’ love storage units. I made it very clear that I will get my auctioneers license so when the time comes, I can auction off the property of non-paying customers. I mean, this is like two years off but whatever.
Just back from recycling center/McDonald’s/Walmart run, hence the late arrival of this edition of GMHHAY. I am 99% sure Walmart was playing the uncensored version of Olivia Rodrigo’s recent masterpiece “Vampire,” which is so scandalous. Shame I’m not a clickbait journalist. I bet that’d be a great article in Vulture or something. If they even still have human writers.
They had no bottles of Topo Chico — they are always out. But they had massive amounts of Topo Chico Hard Seltzer. What does this say about us as a society: Do we like non-alcoholic water better? Or Worse? Is Walmart trying to keep us drunk? Or can they not keep up with the demand for normcore Topo, even though it’s at all the other stores. Who knows.
Five more Neubauten albums yesterday, my god, it’s never going to end. Right now I am on (November) 2006’s Solo Bassfeder - Kompositionen — a collection of solo pieces composed by individual members on their Bass Spring instrument. I was unable to find a full playlist of (September) 2006’s Klaviermusik, which seems to be a collection of piano pieces, so I will have to cobble that together from Youtube when I have more free time, which is probably not today. Please forgive this breach of obsessive consumption ettiquette. Anyhoo, the most shocking thing about this project is that so far, 20-some albums in, not a single one of them is bad, or derivative. They are just such a wildly original group, it really is insane.
In my Break it Up book about the history of people who’ve wanted to break up the union, yesterday they said that around the time of the south’s secession, Frederick Douglass (two S’s) tempered his relatively recent unionist leanings and thought it was probably best to let the confederacy go, so, you know, now he’s changed his mind again. This does not, however, temper to further understand his logic for how on earth the constitution could be a document for justice, so we are still going to investigate that more. Than you for your Douglass biography recommendations.
Like I said, the attic HVAC is done. Looks mostly awesome. There is one thing they did, at my instruction, that I am now second guessing and I kind of want to do it a different way. Also I hate hate hate normal HVAC ducts, all puffy and huge, why can’t them make them smaller, why to the cool looking metal ducts have to be so expensive. I have some regrets about that, but only a couple will be exposed, and I could cover them up if I want to but I think it will look better with them exposed. Someday if I have regrets maybe I will replace that one segment. Also I do know about The Unico System but that shit is expensive. Someday. If I win the lottery.
SO. Now we are stuck in a holding pattern in the attic waiting for the roof to get done because both the electrician and the spray foam people want the roof done before they do their part. And I don’t know exactly when it’s gonna get done, new high tech product and all. I was supposed to get an update yesterday but it did not happen. We shall see today.
In the meantime, pool contracting partner Rocky says that he is chopping a ton of wood on his land off of Andrews Store and his buddy has a mill and they will mill me all my ceiling panelling timber for free, which seems to good to be true, but could save me, like, $10k or some shit because rough-sawn roof panels are paradoxically way more expensive than smooth-sawn ones. And they are much better for sound diffusion.
Anyway the next thing is to pick out a floor, which is hard! Hardwood floors are so expensive! And then I will do a test process in the small office room off the front door. But seriously. So expensive. Ridonkadonk.
Gate guys came and pointed out a million things wrong with the current gate setup, that I could tell were totally actually wrong so now I gotta get a new gate system which is a bummer but the new one will be better and have access controls and wifi and shit but still. Unexpected expenses. SUCKS. Everything is priced to be affordable but always a bit annoyingly more than you want to pay. This is going to be my life for the next two, three years.
Did you guys hear about that AirPods theft trial? Some girl in high school was accused of stealing her classmate’s AirPods in 2019 and when she was “caught” she immediately handed em over and said sorry, it was a mixup. Honestly there were some mitigating factors that we don’t talk about but that’s the long and the short of it. The crazy part is that the school had the cops get involved, which I guess is not crazy anymore in America, is it? But the really crazy part is that this girl was like “nope, I did not do this I am not paying this fine or admitting guilt I will take this to trial” and for four years the government kept harassing her about it until it finally went to trial this week and she won. I love a good story of fighting the man. Jury was quick about it, too. Couple hours of deliberation? Nullification mayhaps? Fine by me.
Speaking The Man here’s a big shocker: Clarence Thomas is even more corrupt than had already been proven, the dude’s just been spending his whole justiceship (is that a word?) being pampered and shuttled around on private jets by billionaires. The whole thing is simultaneously appalling and utterly not shocking. And it makes you wonder how long supposedly high-minded, centrist John Roberts can keep pretending that the court does not have a problem. I don't even know what to say about it that hasn’t already been said, I just like reminding people about how awful the Supreme Court is these days.
Look okay yes I looked at one — one — lingerie ad on Instagram like three weeks ago but this does not mean I need every ad to be lingerie ads. I like looking at a pretty woman in their underwear as much as the next person (queue that Magnetic Fields song) but this is getting insane. I just… Meta is so bad at advertising how do they make so much money I swear to god I’ve been in this business for twenty years and read every major economic study on the industry and it still stumps me routinely. It is… somewhat humbling, I gotta admit.
Also there are SO MANY things this whole system should know I am buying loads of right now — fake booze brands! There are so many fake booze DTC brands and I want to try them all, why am I getting no ads for them? Power tools. Gardening shit. It’s all lingerie! My wife says they are trying to remind me of my impending ten year wedding anniversary next week, but also that would just reinforce how dumb they are, because joke’s on them Emma would not… ha okay now I suppose I just need to buy some. Embrace the system, accept your role as a cog in the machines of loving grace, buy what they tell you to. Red is the new blue.
You asked for it, wife.
Next Instagram ad, today’s your lucky day.
Ambient album for you. Not a Neubauten track on it. Most of the ambient stuff is on albums not on Spotify, alas. But we will get there, never you fret. New Mary Lattimore is awesome.
Have a lovely weekend! Our friends Nick and Meghan are coming. Very exciting.