One Byte Over A Killo (Of Words)

Thursday morning and  I was up around 6 in the morning.

Harold had been  outside for about as long as I'd slept, maybe seven and a half hours...

I wanted to  go offer to let him in, but I also was intent upon completing The Morning Pages -three longhand pages of stream of consciousness, as prescribed by the "The Artist's Way" author, Julia Cameron. Harold has become rather rigid in a habit of immediately seeking my attention as soon as he's done eating. Immediately after eating, upon coming back inside, he will, while still licking his lips come over and dig his claws into the couch like he's stretching; and then jump up and lay on top of whatever I have next to me -a mirror loaded with cocaine, whatever- and he will have started meowing steadily, and then will press his butt against me, facing away, and continuing to meow, like he's not going to stop.

I know at  least two "cat people" who will say that he's "saying" "Scratch me" and that's where I would put my money, but I have a problem with him turning away from me, unless it has to do with the direction that my nails would scratch him in, perhaps it feels better to him to be scratched with the grain of his fir...

But, the whole  appeal of him as a pet is whatever intelligence he may have, which is seated in his head, which he's facing away from me.

I have previously  had to tell him to sleep, like when I'm trying to do the Wim Hof deep breathing method, and I had to pick him up and transport him to the next room, but I felt like I owed him some kind of explanation, so I said "I'm doing my breathing, Harold!, stretching the syllables of "breeeethiiiing..." out, kind of similating deep breathing, and I had gotten him to begrudgingly accept his full stomach and soft bed, without also being scratched.

I give him  credit, though, for an ability to change the tone and inflection of his meows. The "begrudging" tone is pretty distinct, but, if I persist in trying to ignore him, he'll start making his meows sound like "Harold" and I haven't been able to ignore that one, for the same intelligence that it hints might exist in him...

Not intelligent enough  to figure out that turning fully away from someone and pressing your butt against her is rude, maybe, but definitely able to change the tone of meows to convey things like "that feels good" or "that hurts" while being scratched.

I made harold  wait an extra 35 minutes to come in and did The Morning Pages.

I think Harold  is becoming more predictable in his habits is because I've been becoming more regular in my own, lately.

I feel like  I'm becoming a different person, or at least a different personality, due to perhaps the creatine monohydrate that I've been taking about 7 grams of every day for what is probably right around 6 months, now. I just saw an ad for some concoxtion of probiotics with cranberry extract and a few other ingredients, and the AI generated voice over (probably) was pretty adamant about how important it is to get a 6 month supply of the stuff. They cautioned that, as their company expands, there may be times when their warehouse has been temporarily cleaned out, by popular demand. And, it would be a shame if, just when your body is starting to respond to the stuff and real healing is on the horizon, you have to discontinue it while waiting for the supply chain to catch up, type of thing..

I think it  is because of marketing.

The amount of  people willing to venture $40 on some probiotic cranberry stuff is most likely huge, and they don't want to miss out on that "curiousness" driven demographic, even though they know that 6 months on the stuff will have a transformational impact.

I think that  is smart, especially if there is an immediately noticeable benefit by month three, that would prompt the individual to order more...

But, that made  me wonder about there being things that take six months to really kick in, and if it isn't the creatine monohydrate, more than the sardine fast, that has me feeling like a different person, or a third thing.

That would be  the "Introduction To Astral Projecting" videos that I've been watching more frequently, lately, and actually participating in them, by falling asleep while they emanated from speakers on each side of my head.

Astral projecting is  something I actually hadn't had pause to consider since I was in jail back in '92.

There was a  guy who was facing a double murder charge there, who was a fledgling practicioner of astral projection. He had a book on the subject, with fittingly cool art on the cover, and the guy was basically trying to leave his cell and walk the beaches of Guam every night. He was also on some kind of psych medications. Most likely the most intense that 1992 had to offer; suitable for the likes of a double murderer, type of thing..

My feeling on  the matter is, and was, that if you know you're trying to leave your body and travel places because you're stuck in prison for probably the rest of your life, and wouldn't have the faintest interest in that realm if free to roam and murder people two, by two...it's probably not going to work so well.

But, anyways, I'm  finally fixing my electric guitar, turning it back to a normal guitar from being a Frankenstein that had one bass guitar string slotted in with the rest. It made for some interesting inversions of chords providing unusual bass notes, but now it can become the more standard six string, like George Harrison played...

It's late afternoon.  I' about to do some kind of guided meditation, perhaps in order to meet my higher self on the astral plane. Jeez, wouldn't it be quite the coincidence if I run into that guy from jail up there, after just talking about him...?

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Here's To Your Health; Sardine Fast Resumes

This is Saturday  morning at around 9:45, and I have already run to the stores for coffee, distilled water and sardines..

3 large tins  of that storied, iconic fish.

There was a  Latino guy, about 18 years old, but maybe 15, stocking the shelves at the Ideal Market, right by the sardines, who attempted to help me select cans -probably so I would be out of his way sooner- by locating more of the kind I had picked out from the half dozen of so varieties they sell there.

Only the "La  Serena" brand in the "in chipotle sauce" and "in jalapeño" varieties don't have xanthan gum nor "thickener" listed as ingredients, so I was focusing on those. 

I have yet to research xanthan gum as a food additive, but I can already imagine Dr. Sten Ekberg -bald head and all- in a "I ate only sardines for 30 days, and here's what happened" video, which I imagine he has, if the sardine fast is worth its salt, cautioning his sardine-adventurers: "If the ingredients list mentions 'xanthan gum' or 'thickener,' you want to avoid it," type of thing.

And then going  on to say that xanthan gum is the same thing they use to boost the octane of Formula One racing fuel, or that they distill it from orangutan feces or something."

"...and does that  sound like something you want to put in your body?"

But, I was  trying to load up on the chipotle and minimize the jalepeño variety, but the kid had retrieved more of the latter from the maze of cans, and had offered to hand them to me. 

I didn't know  how to say: "If I just live off the jalepeño kind, I'll develop a burning irritation in my rectum, and I'll wind up having to shove a Q-tip up my asshole to scratch it..."

As a 2nd  year Spanish student, that was out of my league.

"Siri, how do  you say 'Q-tip' in Spanish?" type of thing...

Is Xanthan Gum Bad For You? 

Foods contain a very small amount of xanthan gum. In these small quantities, xanthan gum is not bad for you, and it’s considered safe to consume. It also doesn’t cause side effects for most people. -WebMD

I left there  with 2 cans of each, having rushed a bit to facilitate getting out of his way, lest he think I was intentionally trying to be a pain in his ass, standing there reading the fine print on 12 different cans.

Having run out  of food money a week ago, and then having lost the spotlight (again) that I use to illuminate the stage at the Lilly Pad -concurrent with Jacob being put out of commission by car troubles- put me in a position to conduct an experiment upon the box of food that comes, as if by magic, the third Thursday of every month, to each resident of Sacred Heart, who is over 60, from some charitable organization.

It is about  a one week supply of The Standard American Diet.

Having the proclivity  to be a conspiracy theorist, I have looked at the "senior food box" (as it is referred to by the residents) with a shadow under my eyes, so to speak.

First off, the  words of my late father come to me: There's nothing free in this world; you're going to pay one way or another, I paraphrase...

Second, I think  about the tacit implication that "a nigga's" food stamps have been kind of pre-calculated to have run out by the third Thursday of every month, and, isn't that interesting?

People who are  strangers to intermittent fasting might not view these last few days of every month as being divinely ordained as a time of fasting and prayer. Rather, they might have the notion that one has to eat 3 meals every day or starve to death..

"At least I  got this to eat," they might think, before going to work on the 3 pound brick of "process" cheese product. (See Dr. Sten Ekberg's video entitled something like: "This Ain't Even Cheese, Dog!" for more on the 'government cheese...').

There was a  guy who lived here named Lionell. He was known to really love the orange cheese. If you didn't want yours give it to Lionell, type of thing.

Lionell died of  some kind of cancer about 3 years ago. He was 57, I believe.

The way the  box got me was through the low-fat powdered milk. I added it to my coffee while ostensibly a couple days into a one week water-only fast. I figured I would remain in 'ketosis,' although the lactose in milk is technically a sugar, I believe Dr, Sten said..

But, after being  driven by demons to go out and get some alcohol on or about the 3rd day, with that being straight liquor (no carbs; though alcohol is technically a sugar, according to Dr. Sten) I was beset with the urge to cook one of the "spaghetti's" from the box, rationalizing that I was going to use a lot of extra virgin olive oil and/or real butter on the finished product. That would give my body a choice of fuels to burn, carbs or fats, the good kind of Omega-3 fats...

This led to  me waking up feeling depressed for the first time since before I started the sardine fast 5 weeks ago. It was just about 10 minutes of thinking that human beings were just animals, a baby step up from cockroaches in intelligence, and only through our self aggrandizement do we envision our consciousnesses as composing a dream in the Mind of an infinitely loving God, and that anything we do is eventually going to be reduced to minerals as we dissolve into irrelevance...like, how are we going to preserve the music of Gustav Mahler once the universe has collapsed upon itself and there is the next Big Bang? type of thing...

Performing the exercise  of thinking up "3 things that I'm grateful for" before stepping out of bed, was proof against this; and I felt back to my 'normal' self within 10 or 15 minutes; But I had had to induce the actual "feeling" of gratitude the way an actor might make herself shed tears by willfully thinking of sad things.

There is usually  a sense of: It's not going to work this time; but it did; and, by the time I had had a tablespoon of kratom with creatine monohydrate powder, I felt pretty good. Although squatting down to do certain chores, I noticed the stiffness in my knee joints, which had disappeared about a week into the sardine fast, threatening to encroach upon me...

A couple nights  later, it was the peanut butter, fully hydrogenated cottonseed and/or soy oil and all that I stirred into the crunchy rice cereal that comes in the box, in powdered milk, sprinkled with pure cocoa powder and cinnamon, creating chocolate cinnamon peanut butter crunch...that I pigged out on, like it was an addictive drug..

I concluded the  next morning that the peanut butter definitely gives the government cheese a run for its money, as far as bringing on inflammation and the kind of brain fog that can make one forget about a pot of water left to boil on the stove.

"My" eczema started  to come back, in the form of itchy skin on the scalp and face, after just two losing battles against the senior food box.

I'm not sure  if the CEO's of Big Food are in cahoots with Big Pharma and/or Big Medicine. I've heard it said that there is a 'you keep them sick, we'll make money treating them, you'll make money overcharging them for drugs, the insurance companies will be the money movers...just tell us what we need their life expectancy to be, so we can adjust their medications accordingly, to make it all work...keep up the good work, we're killing it this quarter!" types of conversations behind closed doors..

Not in this  country, though, I ultimately conclude.

Putin, Zelinski or  Xi (not Netanyahu, though, let me be perfectly clear on that..) might do their citizenry that way; like sending millions to their deaths -they would probably even bomb a girl's elementary school, the sociopaths!

Ukraine's population of  white Christian men may have been decimated, and are now being replaced by a diverse group of immigrants, for example...

But this is  the west, where patriots are valued like loyal beagles. There are no such evil machinations going on here.

It's ultimately the  same individuals holding the reigns of power. but they know better than to try to exploit the U.S. citizens.

This is the  land of free cheese! Come and get it, niggas!

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The General Overall Feeling of Wellbeing Meter

So, yeah...

20 years ago,  on this day, I would have been waking up to a digital alarm clock the size of a pager, and set for 5:12 a.m.

It would still  be dark and around 70 degrees, the morning of April 29th, 2006.

It would be  pretty quiet, with the morning birds still asleep, and the pond surrounded by what sounded like 250 bullfrogs, also having simmered down, by 5:12 a.m.

I would break  that silence with the 'phfkack!!' of an energy drink being opened.

That was the  closest thing to a ritual that I practiced. Taking a few gulps then getting on my bike to ride 2.7 miles to Workfoce quality temporary staffing. I would toss the empty in the same trash can at the marina. It was a 12 minute ride.

Getting there around  5:37 a.m. put me ahead of a contingent of workers who arrived by bus, from some poverty stricken part of town.

I worked all  5 weekdays, plus Saturday. The check I cashed every afternoon was for $49.62. So, I was taking "home" just shy of $300 every week, finding more than enough food in the Winn Dixie dumpster, to go on the fire, and really just spending money on alcohol and cigarettes.

It didn't take  long for me to be walking around with almost a thousand bucks in my pocket, amongst the good people of that upper middle class area, who might pity me for my homelessness.

But, all this  is to maybe put yesterday's post in some context.

I was thinking  that I might "recycle" posts, every 20 years, as in, going back 20 years and reading the post in hopes of jogging my memory. Then perhaps turning them into a "It Was 20 Years Ago, Today" type of sidebar; where the perspective gained over the past 20 years can be applied to some sort of commentary, informed by wisdom, type of thing.

I will say  that; the energy drink every morning with the high fructose corn syrup is one thing that I would tell myself of 20 years ago to eliminate. It gave me the glucose spike which got me through the 8 hours of laboring, after which I switched to the keto diet with red wine in the evening.

But I basically  cut out HFCS around 10 years ago; and it took a good 3 or 4 months before I just felt better all around. It took me from like an "83" to an "88" on the general overall feeling of wellbeing meter...

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"Invited To A Bash," A 20 Year Old Post Reworded

Brought Back to the present moment; this is where I was and what I was doing back exactly, sort of, 20 years ago.  

Yesterday, I was  dispatched via a demolition ticket from the Workforce Labor Pool to assist in the dismantling of a Holiday Inn, situated on the distant reaches of Jacksonville Beach.

We entered the  fray armed primarily with sledgehammers—formidable, masculine implements—which we swung with a certain reckless abandon, bashing away at the structure.

Among us were  several formidable laborers. One individual, known to his peers as "Cowboy" or "Wild-man," was entrusted with the stewardship of myself and a fellow worker. 

Nothing was to be spared, we were to swing the hammers as if possessed, and, there were some guys whacking desks and microwave ovens, mirrors, whatever... 

When the hammer  was in Cowboy’s own grip, he became possessed by a convulsive fervor, his movements so animated one might have supposed he harbored a profound personal vendetta against the establishment. 
In a phrase, I believe he was on meth..
He was, in other ways though, a singular inspiration. 
Accompanied by great heaving grunts and groans, he whirled and struck with such tempestuous rapidity that he was soon drenched in honest sweat, his countenance a vivid crimson as he doubled over, hands upon his knees, gasping for the very air he had exhaled in his fury.
I mean; can I meet his dealer?

I observed that  his blows frequently landed upon the very points least likely to yield. Had he possessed the foresight to turn an object upon its flank and strike a more vulnerable seam, he might have cleaved it in two; instead, he labored through twenty or more redundant strokes. Loath to offer criticism to such a whirlwind, I maintained a respectful distance—as, indeed, did everyone else—and allowed him to proceed with his industry.

I had to  sort of ruminate on the 120 year history, or whatever it was, of the famous Holiday Inn on Jacksonville Beach, before destroying it...
The ghosts and memories being symbolically thrown from a third floor window to a dumpster below..
More than a century of days and nights the inn had stood: the wedding celebrations, the famous people and other souls...

I felt a pang of nostalgia, wondering what secrets those walls might have whispered, had they the gift of speech.

Then, I grabbed  my sledgehammer and started bashing away.

The strains of  Peter Gabriel’s "Sledgehammer" were in my head, most of the day -a pretty good indication of the speed and rhythm I myself adhered to, when bashing...

I wound up (excuse the pun) with fifty-three dollars and some odd change.

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A Chance To Play With My Toy

I've gotten the  python3 script tweaked further, so that the text is a little smaller and the random pastel colors selected for each subsequent paragraph are ones that show up better against a dark background...

So, I'm blogging  just as much to play with my new toy, as anything else.. The alternate paragraphs (this one, for example) should be the inverse of the preceding one. So, if some shade of magenta is chosen for paragraph 1, then paragraph 2 should be its inverted shade of orange.

But, the code  I had written was inverting not only the color, but its "saturation" and "value," so that a nice bright magenta would be followed by an equally dim orange...

Now, the "bright  and pastel" aspect is maintained while the colors become inversions of each other, in pairs.

Meta AI has  been helpful, and Perplexity AI even more so.

It won't be  long before I come up with some idea that is going to make me wealthy...

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My Glitches Are Sketchy

Good, are we  on the same page??

Wow, I think  what I've learned is to put a drum beat on the stereo, first thing in the morning, and then open the audio studio and be ready to put some rhythm guitar part to it, on a wim..

Then, I can  jump over to the microphone and capture anything I might suddenly want to play over that beat. 

This might even be taken to the extreme of seeing something on Facebook, or somewhere, and expressing my thoughts about it in the form of a musical passage in the JiangNa style. That is what the beat is called that I've been playing over for a couple days, now..

[inserts JiangNa beat  research here...]

Jiangnan drum beats are characterized by a combination of powerful, rhythmic, and culturally rich percussion, often utilized in traditional performances to celebrate festivals, rituals, and artistic expressions, such as those performed by Wang Jianan in "Battle Drums" or within the context of Jiangnan sizhu instrumental music

There's a box  of macaroni and cheese in the front lobby. Right now it's like a shot of heroin, as far as how I'm representing it in my brain...

I could probably  put some cayenne pepper in it, and turn it into zesty macaroni and cheese..

The price would  be slightly itchy skin and/or scalp about 12 hours after ingesting; and redness of the skin wherever it was scratched, over the next couple days...

A couple days  ago, it was a fresh loaf of bread -a Whole Foods product, misshapen in form due to them not having used gums and other agents to make it sponge-like- in the pantry box on the corner of Rendon and I forget which cross street.

This kind of  bread, which has less than a dozen ingredients, when toasted and slathered in real butter, is not the worse thing someone who has had his sardine diet interrupted, could eat, in a pinch as it were..

But alongside the  loaf of bread in its tightly twistie-ed bag; was a cellophane sealed cupcake, in which you could see the chocolate chips even before you could read the front of...

Its first listed  ingredient: sugar. Right to the point, there...

I was given  a blessing in a form pretty symbolic of the "manna from heaven" of Old Testament lore, and, right beside it was a sugary cupcake, and that's not all; it gets drastically worse. For, one shelf down was a large Poptart box in which were 4 two-pack's of them.

Satan wasn't messing  around.

He might have  reasoned that I would grab the cupcake by insinuating that the "sugar" listed as the first ingredient was a healthier, Whole Foods brand, not harvested by slaves kind of "sugar" that wouldn't be so bad. And then The Deuce upped his anti: "with a strong cup of that coffee you just got from Trader Joe's!"

So, I grabbed  the cupcake, because of the coffee.

And then, like  the drug dealer who's selling bunk* the Father of Lies tried to rush me into a rash decision, pointing out the schoolchildren who were just starting to make their way to the school down the street. They would be walking past the pantry box and seeing the Poptarts. What is the life expectancy of a Poptart in a pantry box that 10 year olds are walking past?!

I only had  time for one thought: "Grab the Poptarts while you still can! Later, you can decide to put them back, if you change your mind after thinking about how sweet they would be with strong coffee, or something..." type of thing...

All this is  to say that, despite having gained a lot from the sardine-only diet, most notably the ""loss"" of cravings for anything other than sardines (I guess, once the body has converted its metabolism over to a fat burning system, it intuitively starts to associate sardines, not Poptarts, with "food") I should have just stopped at the loaf of bread, toasted and slathered with butter. But I made a Poptart and coffee junkie of myself. I can already sense the world distancing itself from me, subtly, but....

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No Beef With The Sardine Fast

I just got  back from the Ideal Market, where I encountered a lady who had about a 4 foot long sugar cane in her cart. I asked her if one boils, or grinds down such a thing.

"No, you just  peel it and suck on the inside. You've never eaten sugar cane?"

She was a  slightly rotund Latino looking woman about a half foot shorter than me and had a very dark skinned boy of about 4 or so -small enough to fit in a shopping cart along with a sugar cane, some bottled water; and the kind of sugar-water "orange juice" that that particular culture (that one in three of wind up with "diabetes") seem to like.

"No, but I've  had savillas before."

"Savillas have aloe  in them."

"Yeah"

"I guess I  know why they call it sugar 'cane,'" I said, making a gesture like holding a cane..

I got ground  beef to go with the sardine-only fast. This is allowed, due to a technicality.

Nutrition in the  21st century is more the art of what to avoid, then it is about the 'miracle' foods. Unless that "manna from heaven" comes in a sardine can...

I left my  phone to charge during the frolic to the Ideal Market and back.

Since my Firefox  browser crashed last week and I installed a Chrome browser, I've been pretty amazed at the behavior of that particular piece of software.

Had I not  known better, I might think that the "news" that is featured in that section of the search function is really news, and not propaganda. A monopoly on propaganda can be pretty convincing; jumping around to different platforms, seeing basically the same thing, then feeling like you are 'informed' because you have read "all the news," type of thing...

I have to  roll my eyes when people exclaim: "Don't you watch the news?!" along the way to explaining that

It's all the  same suspects, with the same transparent motives: just keeping people at odds with each other, instead of them.

He who controls  what comes over the phones that everyone in the world scrolls on all day, every day, has a lot of power. But this is primarily effective on the 'boomers' who might still believe the Warren Report, or that 8 million people voted in 2020 who had never before and haven't since, type of thing..

Better than when I was 50 (above)?

I had to  manually type things like: "Glen Greenwald," "Russell Brand," "Tucker Carlson," "Finkelstein," into the search box, to retrieve my trusted sources. While, to give the illusion of "balance," there were results for the kind of "right wing" news that trades in gossip and emotions. "Watch this politician's face when confronted with the truth," type of fluff...

And, still my  computer will shut off and go into reboot in the middle of some video that "I don't need to see," according to...?

Anyways; I've been  getting more accomplished and have less anxiety, almost zero depression, extra physical energy and I'm playing the guitar better than ever in my life (finally surpassed my 36 year old self who practiced the way marathon runners run every day) and, the sardine diet has been instrumental. I have more of a peripheral awareness; like I can put on a pot of water to boil, then go off and do something while waiting for it to do so, without being distracted by it until hearing the water that hasn't boiled out of the pan yet sizzling away and reminding me that I was making coffee, type of thing...

I'm 2 hours  from getting my retirement benefits, after a hellish month when I overdrew my account and was hit with charges, and had to start "in the hole." That should have freaked me out, but I am so slow to freak out these days, with all the gratitude and joy meditations, the sleep affirmations and the sardine fast..

Each one of  those 31 days of March, a new miracle happened.

Alyne 

and Mike, Lidgley

"..the moon was blue; and every crazy day brought something new to do."

One day, I  ran out of sardines. I went out for a walk, not doubting at all that I might just find a case of sardine cans sitting right along the way. It wasn't sardines, but a box of a dozen 'pea protein' energy drinks; which lasted just long enough for food stamp money to come in.
Another day, waking up in the afternoon, out of coffee; I had just nudged myself into a state of gratitude despite that situation when, out of my wallet fell one of the Starbucks gift cards that the LIdgley's have sent on various occasions like Christmas...
*I don't know why my pictures of them are rendering like this, without me showing. Probably a Google Chrome facial recognition bug designed to remove me from everywhere online, because I don't have TDS...?

On days when  I hadn't found something 'just sitting there,' Jacob would call wanting to busk, and we would split enough money to get me to the next day, the next manifestation, or we might just busk a second consecutive evening.

And then there  was one broke-ass day when someone called wanting to buy a tire that I'd listed about 6 months prior, on Facebook Marketplace. As I stood there thinking: I'd really like to go and get a couple cans and a bottle of red wine, but I don't have any money. And then thought: gratitude and joy for having life itself; and then the notification came in: "Do you still have the tire?"

I Have No Beef With The Sardine Fast

I've got some  ground beef in a skillet on the stove right now, which I'm getting mighty hungry for; but must do the Wim Hof deep breathing exercises on an empty stomach; as per Wim's wims; and so I must delay my gratification for about 35 minutes, during which I will be supping on the food of the gods, alkalizing my bloodstream, and manufacturing natural pharmaceuticals in my brain and body...

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40 Days (basically) Into The Sardine Fast

I had read, with some skepticism, things online about how the sardine diet can cause a squid to grow out of your head; but I figured it was trolls or whatever...

At first I was pretty calm, upon realizing that I had, in fact, a squid growing out of my head...

I was amazed by how unfazed I was about the squid; as, my brain really began to feel like it was repairing itself. Then, the squid started kind of melting into me, imparted some kind of intelligence into my mind as, time began to slow down, so that the ticking of my clock seemed like every ten days here, and I began to become lighter to the point where I felt like a cloud moving through anti-matter air; and I lived many lives as time dragged to a halt and I became nothing; and the only thing there was, full stop, was energy... and I became like half god, half squid in that moment; and became a very powerful, though sometimes downright angry looking, spiritual being -a portal to infinity! So just a heads up when you see me..

Sometimes I can't decide whether I'm more angry above, or to the left!
But I also can be a benevolent half squid/ half god.. 

I would say, in closing, and blogging as half god, half squid; have a good day everyone, and if this is indeed a side effect of the sardine fast, I tend to think it's a bonus..

>

How Do I Delete This? Kill It!!

Yeah; ""Ctl+a"" selects 

all of the blog post from the previous time; and then Ctl-k clears the screen so I can start typing in the day's thoughts...

I thought about:  why the letter "k" in conjunction with the Control key to delete all selected; and, while perhaps the letter "d" had already been assigned to "duplicate," and that might figure in, I believe it's connection to the human through her "intuition" being representative of the word "kill."

If you don't  have the manual for the Geany editor I use, you might be floundered by trying control+d only to notice that you have done something other than delete, say, yesterday's blog post.

Then, the code  writers figured, the user then should try the letter k, to kill the stuff highlighted on the screen.

I was just  thinking it's something like that which will be the bug in the AI realm that will be the undoing of mankind.

Control+d should have  been repurposed to delete; make disappear; demolish, even the text.

But, instead, I  give the command to kill it each time...

I went to  get 2 cans of sardines from Ideal Market, where I felt bad about being a 63 year old who finds the cashiers who work in there deligtful in their beauty who has not the impulse control not to show it.

They probably think  I am...I'm trying to think of that Spanish idiom for "crazy sardine man.." by now. Four weeks of 2 cans every day and, usually, nothing else to go with them...

Those poor young  ladies of various Latina persuasion, trapped behind those registers...nothing to do but gossip in between customers...

I thank God  in advance for a wonderful Latina about 20 years my junior, who's going to start going in there buying lot's of sardines..2 cans a day! A vibrant and healthy one with mental clarity who probably jogged to the store, and is a musician..

A pretty lady  who'd seen the same youtube videos as I about the keto and the carnivoire and the sardine diets; and had taken control of her life and is now looking for a like minded man, type of thing..

The day is  too beautiful to just sit and blog about it...(that might should be the new title of this blog..)

I

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Cartoons On The Horizon?

Another brainstorm, after having found this book somewhere..

As daunting a tast as learning cartooning comprehensively seems; I think I will create just one or two "characters" and then just use them as my main one's as it will be enough of a challenge just to learn how to draw them from different angles and perspectives...yeah..

Lilly's Doghouse Revisited

This is the  Saturday night in between Good Friday and Even Better Sunday...

The Easter bunny  is going to have hidden little chocolate eggs all over my apartment.

I remember, as  about an 8 year old, going to my dad's tool room, which was also the big freezer for sides of beef room and the stacked cases of Miller Lite beer room.

I returned to  the living room with a screwdriver, and was about to start taking the screws off the back of the Zenith color TV, thinking that the Easter bunny would have thought that inside the TV would be a great place to hide eggs.

"No, the Easter  bunny wouldn't put any eggs in there," my dad said. "He wouldn't have time to open the back of our TV; he has a lot of houses to go to...he's in a hurry..."

I often try  to recollect what my state of mind was, back when I believed in a fictitious rabbit that hid candy in our house every Easter Sunday. I guess I actually believed in the thing; yet; I think the very same "voice" -that is technically the negative of a voice (since it speaks only when all other voices are silenced) was aware that, the supposition of the existence of the Easter bunny raised more questions than it answered...

As a seven  year old, it never dawned upon me to ask my parents how the Easter bunny got in our house, and even why he chose one particular brand of commercially sold chocolate eggs to hide in our living room. And, why only in our living room and how were our parents so sure that it would't have hidden some extra eggs, say in the basement...

I don't recall  ever having any persistent curiosity about the Easter bunny. Like, the day after Easter I don't think I ever wondered aloud to my parents: "I wonder what the Easter bunny does the rest of the year' or any such muses. That was probably because my attitude might have been: who cares, it doesn't bring chocolate those days, so, out of sight, out of mind, type of thing, perhaps...

That being said;  there were little chocolate eggs hidden all over my place this morning...

Jacob and I  went out to play at Lilly's this afternoon. This was unusually early for us, 4 pm. and I noticed as we were unloading our stuff and starting to walk to the spot that I had a missed call from Lilly.

I was pretty  sure that it had been her calling to protest our having played from 11:30 until after 2 a.m. the night before, and she might even have been calling to inform me that Jacob and I were hence banned from playing at the Lilly Pad for maybe a month or so, like the last time...

It really was  my fault for having gone and set up at 11:30 after Lilly had chastised me for doing such probably a year ago. I guess I was thinking that that was a year ago, and it would be alright.

In the meantime  some black guy had sat on the stoop where we play and had unpacked what looked like a barber shop out of a large backpack and I think he was intending to offer haircuts to tourists.

We should have  just walked up to him and maybe asked him if he would be cool with doing his hair thing one stoop down, so we could play there. Hindsight is 20/20.

Instead I made  the mistake of calling Lilly to inform her of the guy.

She went out  and ran him away, but then we made the mistake of showing up with our gear whilst he was refilling his backpack with hair care products and clippers and trimmers.

He basically told  us that we need not bother setting up to play because the lady had just come and told him he couldn't run his barber shop in front of her house.

To boil it  down, he said that, should we set up and be allowed to play, he was going to sue Lilly because, in his opinion "that would be racist."

The race card;  of course...

"Well, we're both  Italian," I said to the guy.

"What the f**  does that matter?!" he said.

"Exactly," I said.  "It doesn't matter what you are, it's not about race."

Then, Lilly came  out and used the matter of us having played until 2 the previous morning, as an issue to tell us we couldn't play.

I think she  was actually afraid of the guy invoking the "R" word against her, either on social media or in any other way...

We moved down  a block to the green door and had a good jam for the couple hours we had before Jacob had to go do other things...

"That would be  racist!!" What a stupid ignorant "The View" watcher he was, to have delivered that of himself..

It would be  easy to blame that on his phone, and what comes over it all day, every day.

But, at some  point it's incumbent upon the individual to figure out how he is being manipulated and just not ""go there."

We are playing  really well, I'm starting to feel that familiar "audience in my hands like putty" sensation while playing and, it's about time... 

I think marijuana usage had delayed that particular evolution, the past couple decades...

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The Post That Was Blocked By The Algorithm That We Have Been Assured; Doesn't Do Anything Like That...

 

I had a nice post that I had written, and I even sent it through my Python3 script to pretty it up.....it was swallowed because I used the word "nigger' is what I'm thinking..I might write it again but; yeah....maybe later....

I guess, just as well because it was very "controversial."

This Is An Interesting Post....April Fools!!!!

Good morning everyone;  it's about 8:12 in the evening, central standard time...

I spent about  8 bucks on a bottle of Barefoot cabernet sauvignon last night around the approach of midnight, thinking it might be better than the $5.49 bottle of Gallo.

The other 8  dollar choice was the Yellow Tail brand.

Both of these,  I have found to be good values, being just as good as the just under $20 bottles. The Yellow Tail, in particular, benefits from the exchange rate between US dollars and whatever kangaroo money they use down there. Plus, the vineyards are not on as expensive real estate as the one's in California.

California wine has  their Governor Newsome's fiscal hijinks baked into the price tag. This should have detered me from getting the Barefoot, but I suppose I had some lingering brain fog from having had to switch off the sardine fast, after having mismanaged the monthly fish fund..

I may have  diverted too much money to the wine account.

Winn Dixie was  going out of business and had wine 75% off. A rare opportunity to try bottles normally priced at around $50 that are worth every penny at that price. But, having them for sale at $12.50 was, in effect, an insideous way to get me to spend 50% more on the nightly bottle of Cabernet..

There are few  meals more delightful than a good can of sardines and a Federalist Cabernet...

The Barefoot wine  was disappointing, and I have noticed that almost all the 2023 vintage has been pretty poor.

That makes sense,  as these were made during the "pandemic" when the grapes probably had to be picked by gloved hands on mask wearing people, picking 6 feet from the next person; and probably nursing sore arms from intra-muscular injections, if that is indeed how that gene altering, vulnerability to the next strain they create producing, concoction was administered. I don't know.

I have the  vivid memory of having to get a Covid19 test, and bring proof of the  "negative" result to Harrah's Casino ,so I could cash in some chips that I'd gotten in my tip jar, before the economic war broke out between the tech and pharma oligarchs against the oil tycoons.

Taking every automobile  off the streets of the world was indeed a stroke of genius. Kind of funny to think of the masses cowering in terror inside their dwellings, just because some billionaire wanted to teach some OPEC billionaires a lesson.

I had my  little paper document indicating that I hadn't gotten "the virus," (did anyone, really, or was that the "seasonal" flu just repurposed, with things like ivermectin kept out of the public consciousness to insure that there would be enough "victims" to keep up the ruse?) and was able to get past the masked security lady at Harrah's.

Next, I encountered  a group of about 25 people, who were gathered just beyond the entrance, and who broke into a thunderous ovation as I walked past.

They must have  thought I'd gotten the jab, and they were applauding...that. Wow, given what we know now.

These were the  "useful idiots" I had heard so much about, I thought. "Tribal stupidity," anyone?

They believed the  mainstream media narrative. It was on "every" channel and even PBS and NPR, so...

I was tempted  to hold up my proof of negative result and announce: "I just got a negative test result so I could come in here and cash out some chips; there ain't no way I'm taking that experimental therapy. With the main reason being; well...you guys..."

But I just  let it go and let them think I had switched "teams" and was just awaiting further orders from my antenna TV..

And, so I  also let it go here... 

Back To The Present: Wednesday, April 1st 

My food money  came in at midnight but, by then I had already had a 5.5 ounce tin of Sardinas brand sardines with a $3.99 + tax bottle of shiraz from Trader Joe's. The next bottle up price-wise is the Trader Joe's brand coastal Cabernet Sauvignon at $5.99 + tax.

After a 10%  taxation, the total comes to $6.58. 

I had counted my cash and had exactly $6.58. 

It seemed like a no-brainer, when adhering to the Law of Attraction to just pay no mind to details; I should have just emptied my pockets onto the register as if it were preordained, but..

I would have  been walking out penniless, with a really nice red wine as good as any "under $20" bottle..but I had balked at the "penniless" part. Was I going to need to ride a street car or something?

So, there I  sat with the lesser wine and decided to stay in and work on recording my guitar along with a metronome then overdubbing drums played "live" by me on the keyboard along with it.

Then I had  a smörgåsbord of drum beats that I could switch between measures and try against different guitar rhythms. The measures or bars that came out "perfectly" I could make repeat and create whole new songs out of.

That fun must  have lasted till around 4 a.m. because here I was, waking up at around 12:30 p.m. on this Wednesday..

I look forward  to hearing what I created. This is another new phenomena. I had habitually been reluctant to play back the previous night's work the next day; afraid that I wouldn't respect it in the morning, type of thing...

It was immediately  out in the sun with me, after I brewed a cup of coffee, using enough grounds for a pot for just one large cup, to do the morning papers, as prescribed by Julia Cameron in her "The Artist's Way" book that I'm still in week 1 (of 12) in. But I am fervently and conscientiously working that "week 1" program.

The 3 handwritten  pages (which I'm supposed to file away without re-reading) just came rolling off my 1.6mm ball point; words appearing like on a screen at the back of my forehead; like a teleprompter channeling Bob Dylan or Leonard Cohen...or... Jimmy Buffet?

Fine, Indeed!

I just started  liking and appreciating fine point pens after having hated them all my life, and looking askance at those who did like them...

You have to  press much more lightly with them and basically write smaller. I used to hate the thin line they made, especially when writing on a single sheet of paper upon a hard surface. I thought that they accentuated any jerkiness in one's penmanship, which they indeed do, but only if you are pressing down hard on them. 

I had discovered the Bic Crystal® ball points that have the largest (1.6mm) points on them, and writing on sheets that had the padding of extra sheets them, alowed the pen to sink in a bit and produce thick, and well controlled strokes...

But now I  have become pretty good with a fine point. What a crazy life...

Now that I  am a firm believer in The Law of Attraction, I'm finding things as soon as I feel gratitude for the possibility of me finding them...

I came back  in and decided to raise the blinds on my windows so that, the Brazilian flag, used like a curtain on one window and the Mardi Gras mask face in another one would be fully lit up at night when my indoor lights shine through them. Last night I noticed that the blinds were blocking about half of each of them..

I had found  the Brazilian flag, folded up and sitting on a brick column the morning I went out to find 20 dollars. Yup, I had found in myself a wellspring of gratitude over the possibility of going out and finding 20 dollars (just about totally broke, but not feeling in any way lacking) one morning probably 2 years ago now. I walked along just kind of looking around, and decided to take the Brazilian flag home and use it as a window curtain. I then walked a little further where those very same Brazilians can often be seen standing by their parked pickup trucks listening to music and drinking Corona beer. And, there was a 20 dollar bill just laying in the dirt...

So, I raised  the Venetian blinds so that my display will be fully visible at night; then noticed one of my plants being a little brown. I watered it, then decided to move the other plant to the window sill as spring is upon us and I had just raised the blinds to let even more light in. And in lifting the plant, I discovered my white and brown pieces of charcoal that I was making drawings with a couple years ago before misplacing my charcoal...

There it was,  all along. But it was only one thing leading to another -letting in sunlight, moving plants around that led to the discovery.

"When it's time  to resume charcoal art, you will know. Trust, and obey..." type of thing...

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