A More Clever Fake Bass

Something On The Horizon

Wednesday, September 20th...sprinkling lightly under partly cloudy skies; it is a cool 75 degrees out there...

I'm at the Uxi Duxi getting a double shot of "green bali" kratom, which wiped the balance off of my plasma card. I have no cash in my pocket.
Rose owes me 5 dollars, but called 3 times today trying to borrow more money. I didn't answer, but I knew it was Rose. Especially when the phone rang right after 1:30 PM. Rose is one of the few people that I have told about my waking up at around 1:30 PM almost every day, without the aid of an alarm clock.

It is my own theory that I wake up when the sun is exactly overhead, at "virtual noon." The sun will be directly overhead at "true noon" only in Pensacola, Florida where the timeline is drawn for "Central Standard Time," which is our zone. It take an hour and a half, approximately, for the earth to rotate enough to bring New Orleans directly under the sun; this would be the brightest time of the day; and when the magnetic pull from the sun would be its strongest, too, I guess; and when I have been waking up automatically, going back to the homeless days of sleeping outdoors.

Rose has found a soft spot in my heart, by at least remembering this about me, and calling right around 1:35 PM.

She has paid back reliably the 8 or so months that I've lent to her; and paid me back double. This past July and August broke that chain of lending, as I had been too broke to even be able to double whatever little I had.

I thought that I might get the bonus money for my plasma yesterday, but got 15 dollars, instead. If I go tomorrow, I'll get the bonus and walk out of there with 50 dollars. Then, I might be able to lend Rose 40 of it and get it back double 9 days from now.

But, I did alert Travis to the possibility of doubling money through Rose. He seemed certainly interested. He is planning upon giving Dorise his first month's rent, plus the security deposit, on the 28th, and moving in at that time. He has already told her of his intention to do this and so, doesn't want to get off on the wrong side of the bed, so to speak, by asking her for a couple extra days to pay her, right off the bat, while I'm using figures of speech. I almost want to call Dorise, on Rose's behalf effectively, and tell her that Travis has a chance to double his money (paying her and pocketing enough for next month at the same time) but doesn't want to do it because it is more important to him to make a good impression on his new landlady.

She might then call him and tell him it's OK for him to pay her on the 1st of the month, rather than the 28th. Then, Rose could get her medication, Travis could make some money; and he'll still be out of my place, so I'll be happy, too.

But that would involve my meddling in their respective businesses.

Dorise might feel that she shouldn't discuss whatever arrangement she and Travis had made, with me. And Travis isn't going to call her to ask if he can have 2 more days to pay. So, Rose's fate would seem to be in my hands.

It would be simple if Dorise can call him and say: "Hey, you can move in on the 28th and give me the money on the 1st so you can lend Rose the money for her medication..." and then hang up before he gets started (speaking non-stop for the next half hour).

Intervention Circumvention

So, yeah, I just called Dorise, who answered on like the 6th or 7th ring, and I basically asked her if she would call Travis and tell him it was OK if he paid her a couple days later than they had, I guess, initially agreed upon, assuming it was OK, of course.

The way Travis laid it out to me (in a non-stop barrage of words) was that he was intending to impress his new landlady by giving her over and above what might have been "agreed" upon. According to him, she gave him an option to pay her by the week (perhaps as a way of softening the financial impact of such a major transaction to the common man) but he was going to present her with the whole amount, plus the deposit, and probably, in his inimitable way, slide her a 50 spot as a pet deposit,

Poor Beast

on behalf of his poor cat, Beast, that he took in from the outdoors where it had been abandoned and where it surely developed a fascination for certain aspects of the outdoors, perhaps such a basic as being able to eat grass, and that he will incarcerate in a prison where they only serve the cheapest dry cat food available on the free market; you're in for life, even though you're innocent, and your litter box is inexplicably, in a way that must astound even a cat, lined with some kind of plastic liner in which your claws will become entangled, making it nearly impossible for you to cover your poop with dollar store litter, frustrating you, damaging your psyche at a primordial level by thwarting you in your attempt to do what cats just do; sniff their poop, cover it up using natural motions and graceful strokes with the paws, artistic, if slowed down and set to ballet music types of motions that are so ingrained in the species that a cat in the Serengeti will go through them just like Harold the cat in New Orleans, even though they've never met nor Skyped.

I think the idea of the plastic bag is to keep the litter box itself from becoming soiled.

I almost want to ask Travis: "Don't you have anything to keep the plastic bags from getting soiled, so you don't have to constantly change them?"

"Well, the plastic bags are really only like 4 cents each, because I get the dollar store ones that come in like 24 bags for 99 cents, plus tax of course and..." and wrap it up a half hour later.

So, I told Dorise that Travis has a chance to make some money in loan sharking, but that he would never call her to ask for an extension, out of pride, or something, and that the only way he would be able to help Rose out would be if she (Dorise) were to call him and say: "Hey, I talked to Daniel and if you want to help out your friend there in the building, then you can give me your rent on the first, I don't care, I'm swimming in money," or something.
"A first impression is very important," said Dorise, with a lot of finality in her tone.
In the initial moment of silence after she said it, I pretty much found the answer to the question floating there in the air.

So, I will go ahead and leave it to Travis what kind of impression he wants to make.
If Dorise would indeed take the security plus just one week's rent and still feel that the Travis had met his end of the agreement, then he could lend to Rose and double his money, and Rose could get her medication, or whatever.
The World Is My Oyster
I have a chance to go back to the apartment and knock out some kind of recording. I could shut the valve on the AC and, since it's only 75 degrees out, the place wouldn't start to heat up like a baked potato. Travis is at Starbucks where he is doing his job for Amazon, and said something about being at it until late into the night.

I told him that I was going out to busk, so he will be able to meet me at the Lilly Pad until at least 12:23 AM, which kind of means that I could go back and record music until midnight instead of busking, knowing that I'm going to get 50 bucks for my plasma tomorrow, and maybe even accomplish something.
"Fake Bass Tightener"

Real Bass

I have discovered a setting in the "equalization" menu in the Audacity program which is labelled "fake bass tightener." Is this what I'm hoping it is?!?

I can imagine that this is a setting for those like myself who record a regular guitar playing as much like a bass as it can, and then drop the pitch of it one octave, putting the notes in the bass register where it becomes a fake bass. At least, I've always thought of it as such.

It always sounds just a bit flabby, though, and I have spent a lot of time fussing with the equalization, trying to get the tone to sound like Jaco Pastorius (shown). It is very hard to equalize a bass, I find. There are sliders for 25 hz, 30hz and 50 hz, for example. How is one supposed to be able to hear that the notes coming through at 25 cycles per second are kind of drowning out the ones at 30, I mean, come on...

My most recent approach has been to record a bass part on the guitar but to only drop it down, say, a fifth. Then the guitars can play along in the new key to the bass, without the bass having been bastardized a full octave down so it has retained more of its semblance to the original sound.
But, a fake bass tightener...interesting...