i've caught two in the last twelve hours (one around midnight, the
other around 8:00 am) near the front door, which is a little different.
essentially every roach i've ever seen in here has been near the
plumbing on the far side - in the kitchen usually, or maybe in the
bathroom or sometimes in the closet in the bedroom. but always clearly
near the plumbing as a water source. so, to see two of them come in from
the other side like this is a little different.
so, i
did some liberal spraying along each of the four doorways around the two
entrances. i suppose we'll find out how many get trapped in it over the
next few days. but, it seems to suggest there's been a population
increase in the back area. it's generally stated that seeing roaches in
the day is a bad sign.
i haven't seen any on the
plumbing side yet this year, but i will be doing spring cleaning over
the weekend - which means spraying behind the appliances and replacing
the steel wool.
the headaches have subsided. and i want
to be clear that i wasn't trying to be accusatory. i was just trying to
figure out if the unit was sprayed when i wasn't here, as that struck
me as a likely explanation for what was happening. pure intuition. and,
obviously, i would like to be informed when the unit is going to be
sprayed, if the unit is going to be sprayed. but i wouldn't have raised
the issue if i wasn't getting dramatic symptoms coming from the air -
not just headaches, actually, but visual hallucinations (tracers) and at
one point an inability to speak. i mean, i spent a day in the hospital.
they told me i had a migraine, and maybe that was it, but it kind of
seems like i was poisoned. again: i'm not making accusations, exactly,
i'm more just contemplating possibilities. however, because i've sprayed
down here this morning, i've now contaminated myself regarding any
testing. i wouldn't have sprayed if i didn't think it was gone, anyways.
at the very least, realize this: if there was spraying down here this
month, i got some pretty nasty side effects from it. so, that shouldn't
happen again without telling me what's happening so i can adjust...
i am now moving this laptop back into the bedroom, and getting ready to turn the pc back on. the last thing i have to do on the laptop is clean this page up, but it won't make sense to do that right away - i'll have to do it as i'm rebuilding the alter-reality (and the period disc) from 1996 on. and, in order to get there, i still have to sort through some things, to make sure i've found everything i can.
i don't know if there are still usenet or mailing list archives for me to access online, but it's secondary to finding what i can in squirelled away pst files first, anyways. iirc, it was about mid-1997 that i started rambling on the internet. the alter-reality starts in the summer of 1996, and will consequently kick back in around july. but, then i've got a year before i need to worry about it. and, i consequently may put it off for a little while, depending on how fast i find things.
i'm hitting a strange show tonight (melt banana / melvins...and i'll probably stay for napalm death, too, depending on set times), because it's 4/20. but, i think i should get through most of this scavenging by the end of the day, too. and, then i can get back to finishing what i started doing back in december.
almost there. seriously.
and what do i have to show for it? well, i've pulled down over a gb of text from the internet. 1.2 gb. of text. stored in word documents. i jest you not, this is the truth. message boards. youtube. email. facebook. it's 1.2 gb of text. since 2011. and understand this: i have many times more than this from before 2011. so, when i claim that i'm building an alter-reality with a lot of writing....
it'll be really obvious what i'm doing as soon as i start doing it. and i'm just about there.
and, did i mention that i quit smoking, too? that was really important. and, frankly, this was a pretty productive way to do that. time is a strange intangible and everything. i'd prefer it if we weren't stuck running out of it. and, i may be lucky enough to catch the cut-off point after all. i'm beginning to think i was too pessimistic. but, i don't regret this. and, if i can catch immortality after all, then i'm just setting myself up for it. hey, that cut-off point is coming soon, whether i catch it or not.
this is basically a fake email address. i'm still using the death.to.koalas address.
i'm clearing out some old email. communications with my dad. school stuff. losing my mind on hormones...
this is a direct forward, catch me after the jump.
======
i'm going to fade away now for a bit...
Jason Parent <death.to.koalas@gmail.com> 11 August 2010 at 04:57
To: Sarah
Reply | Reply to all | Forward | Print | Delete | Show original
....i still want that add and you know not getting it is weirding me out..
...but i'm getting the point, silent and clear.
it's a shame, really. ten years. multiple shared apartments. jams. discussions. arguments. trips. concerts. love. hate. just about everything in between.
i think there's a fundamental disconnect going on right now between the way that we see each other. i would introduce you to a room as follows: "this is my friend, sarah.". you would introduce me to a room as follows: "this is my crazy ex-boyfriend, j.".
friend.
ex-lover.
i've had a persistent fear over the last five years that i was going to eventually lose you forever, and when i say that i mean lose *you*, a friend, a person that's very important to me. in a fit of insanity, i think i may have actually managed to accomplish this...
.....and that my only hope of not losing you forever is to back off and wait until you decide to call, if you ever decide to call ever again.
i'll get over it, i just wish i didn't have to.
you're probably actually relieved to hear me say this, and that actually makes me a little bit sad.
======
that was right before i started to lose it - a little after i told you i was going back on hormones. and i think it's clear that i realized what was about to happen, right? that i knew you were going to react poorly. and that i knew i was going to break apart into little pieces.
but, even at this point i think the fundamental disconnect is clear:
i would introduce you to a room as follows: "this is my friend, sarah.". you would introduce me to a room as follows: "this is my crazy ex-boyfriend, j.".
is that not spot on accurate? but, see this is the crux of the situation that i was never able to give up hope on: if you would have been able to merely see me as a friend, as i was able to see you, then there wouldn't have been a crisis. i did not think this should be so difficult. and, frankly, i did not initially realize that you retained latent feelings. you have two children, after all. i thought you were completely over me.
i'm not going to pretend that i can make sense of everything that i typed or did over the next few years. it's not that there wasn't logic to it; to the contrary, the logic was often very complex. it's that i was having difficulty determining what was real and what wasn't. so, trying to decipher what i had typed or did (in hindsight) relies on understanding some paranoid projection of something, which is not always obvious at this distant a date. i was convinced that there was some kind of a conspiracy to keep you away from me. but, see, all i wanted to get across was that my intentions were benign. i was convinced everything would right itself, if you would just know in your heart that all i truly wanted was to hang out twice a year. that is in itself as neurotic as anything else. but, perhaps, if you were completely over me...
i need you to understand that i was dealing with some advanced psychosis. maybe i still am. there were many complex factors. and, while it wasn't your responsibility to deal with it, and i do not fault you for my crazy behaviour, your perception was self-fulfilling. that is, in time, i *became* your crazy ex-boyfriend. it is true that what i wanted was to be your friend. but, the harder i tried, the more of a crazy ex i became. and there was no solution to this.
i can't deal with unsolvability...
today, i live on odsp in windsor, ontario. i moved here because the cost of living is a lot lower. i will likely remain on odsp for the rest of my life. but, i need to be clear: this is not rhetoric. i'm not just saying that i lost my mind, or that i had a mental breakdown, or that i was dealing with psychosis. i have been diagnosed with a mental illness. i live on disability as a consequence of it. i am not dangerous, but i am unpredictable. and, my behaviour over those years was a consequence of it - even if it's not entirely obvious to you when or how i was schizing out.
it is very unlikely that i will ever go back to ottawa.
i am a very patient person, as you know, but i do have limits. and, the empathy that i had for your distress over my transition has faded. i've actually developed a level of bitterness. i am probably holding you in higher regard than is fair to you, and reacting poorly to unrealized expectations that i have no actual business holding you to. but, it is what it is.
but, i never got the closure i wanted, either. we were friends for ten years; you just decided to ignore me one day. i thought i deserved some kind of explanation. i actually think i still do. i don't think that anything that happened after this day negates this.
i'm giving you the courtesy of providing an explanation for my own behaviour. this is of course very general, but i don't think either of us really want particularly granular details. but, i'm good at 'splaining. and i think i'm getting my points across clearly. if you'd like to reciprocate, i'd still appreciate that. otherwise, i wouldn't expect to hear from me again - these emails are in the process of being destroyed.
i've been dealing with some
pretty severe headaches for the last few weeks, and i'm kind of putting
together a hypothesis. now, i think it goes without saying that the
most important thing is everybody's health....
i went
to a concert on the evening of monday the 4th. the first headache hit me
on the afternoon of wednesday the 6th. i became aware of the bed bug
concern on thursday the 7th. i was nursing one when you came down on the
evening of the 8th. what i've noticed since then is that the headaches
have something to do with the air quality in the basement, and that i'm
going to need to air the basement out (probably tomorrow and monday). in
the mean time, i have the fan running nonstop. i've tried to turn it
off a few times, and the headache always comes on very strong. so, i'm
pretty sure about cause and effect with something in the air in the
basement.
now, who knows, right. it could be anything
at all, really. but, i'm just having a hard time shaking the possibility
that there may have been some spraying done in the basement when i was
gone. i mean, it all adds up. while it's true that the basement is
overdue for an airing out, and i could just be reacting to stale air.
why did it just start to affect me a few weeks ago?
if
there is something to the hypothesis, and i'm *still* reacting to the
pesticide, there must have been an awful lot of pesticide sprayed down
here. and, i think i ought to be concerned about long term effects, at
this point, due to continued exposure.
either way, the
reality is that i've had almost two weeks worth of migraines, now. i'm
going to need to seek medical attention one way or the other. that's
going to involve taking blood tests and other things - if i'm dealing
with chemical exposure, i'm going to figure that out. so, if you can
help me figure out of there was spraying down here, it's just saving me
some time, really.
i've been thinking about it a long
while and trying to get my head around it. how could anybody spray a
unit and not tell the person?
that seems insane. so,
i've been putting this email off, maybe to the detriment of my own
health. but, i've clued in that there's a kind of child-like concept of
punitive effects at play. i could imagine that he might have been afraid
that he'd be "caught" with bed bugs, and so wanted to spray to make
sure nobody found out.
and, then he couldn't tell me, of course.
it sounds inconceivable. but, to a child, the possibility of not getting
caught with bed bugs would outweigh everything else. or, at least
that's the best i can make sense of it.
it's all
horribly negligent and everything, but i'm really more concerned about
my health, right now. if there was something sprayed down here, figuring
out what it was will help me in determining what kind of exposure i've
had, how much i've got in me, how to clear it out, etc. and, i'm going
to get to the point through testing, eventually, anyways.
i
trust you'd tell me, if you knew, because you're a responsible adult
and everything. i'm more presenting arguments for you to throw at paul
to get an honest response out of him. i really don't think i'd get one
out of him, myself.
even if i can air the place out
tomorrow and it works in eliminating the headaches, i think i need to
know if i'm possibly reacting to something or not.
i
need to be clear that i'm not exactly making any accusations. as
mentioned, it could be anything. but, i can't shake the suspicion - and
i'm consequently going to end up testing for it. if i can get some
confirmation, it's just going to allow me to reduce exposure faster and
reduce risk factors quicker.
the landlord
Jessica,
I have asked repeatedly that My brother and niece catch one bug or bugs
so that I could verify there are bed bugs. my niece started this scare
originally with what she thought were bites on the back of her hand.
That turned out to be Xema. She had recently visited her Doctor and was
told she had XEMA on her hand and not bites. Up to this point they have
not caught one bug to show me that Bed bugs are identified as a problem.
At this point I am convinced there are no bed bugs at all. If there
were bed bugs they would have multiplied and there would be evidence of
many bugs and actual bites. I have not seen one bed bug to this day. I
know you research things quite well and I have done my share of reading
and researching! bed bugs spread and multiple quickly. I have not
seen any evidence that there are bed bugs in my niece's place or any
other place. ..... I was told that my niece's boyfriend, killed a bug
crawling up the wall and which they determined it to be a bed bug. Still
they did not keep it to identify it as a bed bug.. The other point I
want to make is that the thought of bed bugs does make people panic and
do not want to be associated with this problem. SO, people to panic and
react without verifying. So please be empathetic to this reality.
SPRAYING.
I do know that they did spray in my niece's place about a week ago
which was about 1/4 to less of a spray can; my brother did the spraying,
one time along the bed boards and baseboard in one room. This was
isolated to their apartment only. I do not believe this product could
have migrated to your apartment, since they followed the instructions to
keep all their doors closed while this product settled. Please keep in
mind each units ventilation system does not mix their air to the rest
of the air in the building. All exhaust fans purge air outside the
building. Please, also keep in mind anything is possible when door s
open and close, but I would say that any migration of the product would
have been minimal to the existing hallway and they did keep doors shut
for the appropriate time. The other point that I must make is that I
cannot stop any tenant from spraying in their apartment. I cannot even
stop you from buying a can of spray and you spraying your apartment.
All I can do is educate everyone to be mindful of any bug situations,
think clearly of what they should or should not do and that they must
contact me before they act. Additionally, I have been specific with
my niece and my brother, there will be no further spraying in the
building for bed bugs, since we have no proof of bed bugs. They must
have my permission to spray anywhere in the common hallways and
basement!!!!!. ....
jessica
yeah. and,
i've done a little more research and it does turn out that the symptoms i
was experiencing - aphasia (difficulty speaking) and auras - are
actually common symptoms of severe migraines. the thing is they're
*also* symptoms of pesticide poisoning. i mean, i initially thought i
was having a stroke. there was a point where i couldn't speak.
so....it's more like i wanted to rule it out.
consider
this: i suppose you could imagine how a fumigation in here might have
also created those symptoms. that's what i wanted to be sure hadn't
happened.
i really don't have a history of migraines
either, so it's not like i could say i was expecting something from a
trigger. but lots of things cause migraines. it turns out the number one
trigger is in fact environmental conditions. so maybe i just had a bad
reaction to the stale air, after all.
i know it's a
crazy thing, but thank you for determining whether there was spraying
down here or not, just so i know what had happened.
it's
maybe easier to see why poisoning is something that's in the distinct
realm of possibility. and, so, given the circumstances...
Friday, April 15, 2016
i should be back on track by monday at the latest.
but i need to answer a question: am i going to be doing anything new?
i've been clear for years that the answer is no. & absolutely not.
i'm
35 years old, now. when i started this phase of archival and
completion, i was 33. i'm past my creative period. ask yourself this
question: can you think of a single interesting record made by a 30
year-old?
but i've also grown up. and i'm past the age
where i want to be making music, too. my contemporary interests are in
politics and political philosophy. i will be spending the rest of my
life writing.
but, i do not want to leave these ideas
unfinished, either. so, i am focusing on completing unfinished works.
and, then i am going to be doing something else with the rest of my
life.
generally, the shorter the review, the better the show was. son lux are probably the most important band in existence right now, so to say they are a known entity is an understatement. and, they are absolutely essential to experience at every opportunity.
the venue was a block from the tunnel, so it wasn't much of an adventure. but i ended up swallowing something at the show that caused me some grief, and i need to blame myself for being haphazard with my safety. that shouldn't have happened at all. it's best to follow my vlogs for the next couple of days to get the follow up on that.
the opening band (dawn of midi) was very tight minimalism that would have been far more effective if it was about 30% shorter. it was very much built on top of the work of steve reich, but was very reminiscent of a record released in the 90s called "reich remixed". but, because it was centered so squarely on the drums/bass combo, there were also strong references to minimalist strains of prog (like king crimson). as mentioned, it was just a little too long, but i think that had a lot to do with the standing-room-and-watching setting, too. it would have been better suited for something like a lounge atmosphere, or perhaps as background music for math homework.
jessica
it seems as though i've been able to avoid the
dogs in the apartment for the night. to be clear: my opposition is that i
don't want strange animals parading through here. i would not oppose a
human inspector.
that said, i understand that i cannot
stall forever. so, i will have to allow the inspection, should cooler
heads not prevail. just allow me to quickly make the following points,
both to attempt to persuade you to halt and to make clear where i stand
should the dog track anything in.
1. there are no bed bugs in the unit.
2. bed bugs are not like roaches or air-borne pathogens. they must be carried from place to place.
3.
a detector dog is a perfect transmission vehicle. it actively seeks
them out, thereby volunteering itself as a ship from them to sail on.
4.
it is consequently dangerous and irrational to allow a detector dog to
move through the unit. there are no bugs in the unit now. there may be
by the time it's done.
so, if you insist, i cannot stop
you - i can only stall the process, in hopes that whatever media-fueled
hysteria behind this comes to pass. but, should the dog "find"
anything, i will legally argue to the maximum extent of my ability that
it was the dog, itself, that brought them in.
there are no bed bugs in this unit.
the landlord
Jessica,
I have become aware of the situation and I know my brother does not
have good judgment or thinks things through. I will be around as soon as
I can. Please wait till I get there. I have told my brother to find a
bug for proof and not be so stupid to believe a bug smelling dog! I
believe there are no bed bugs at this point.
i've set the 10th for my shut down deadline. that's three months since i quit smoking - and i've held to this. so, again: every other annoyance aside, that's something that i'm happy that i got done. just about anything is worth that. i can talk about wishing i had prioritized it earlier, but i just got tired of putting it off.
it will take a few days after the tenth to get rolling again. but, there will be some more completions before the end of april.
again: i quit smoking. for real. i had to turn my brain off for a few months to do that. it's led to low productivity while i normalized myself, but you should really congratulate me for it.
the drip seems to be around the seal, rather than in the plastic - it was just accumulating on the plastic.
i
have taped over the area. i know that this defeats the purpose of the
drainage, but my prerogative is in keeping the water off of the floor.
and, i suspect that the issue is upstairs, anyways.
i'm going to guess that the seal probably needs to be recaulked. but that the issue is probably really in the furnace.
and, i
want to be clear about something: i am not a nihilist. i am an atheist
and a secular humanist. i believe i've actually argued very strenuously against
moral relativism and very strenuously against subjectivity in art. i
believe in the objective reality of a world determined via scientific inquiry.
there is no god in this world, but there are plenty of things that are true. in
fact, i would argue that the truth value of the statement there is no god
is true. that is, itself, a truth. i am a positivist. i believe truth is
obtainable - and that one of those truths is that there is no guiding force in
the universe.
but, i haven't been through this here. not exactly. bits and pieces.
the problem is the way the discussion is framed, to assume various things for
granted. i am an anarchist; i reject hobbes. i do not believe that people need
the threat of god, or the threat of some sovereign, to fall in line and behave.
rather, i think that religion and authoritarianism are corrupting forces. we
are not evil in despite of the state but because of it. the collapse of the
state would bring us back to a "natural condition" of mutual aid and
reciprocal altruism. this is not because we have a selfless nature, it is
because altruism and rational self-interest are equivalent, when fully
understood.
what that actually means is that i think that nietzsche is just a tempest in a
teapot, because i reject the assumptions he was working under in the first
place. understanding the obvious truth that there is no god will not collapse
society, but allow it to reach it's next stage of development. nihilists should
consequently be seen as reactionaries that seek to uphold the status quo - at
best. at worst, they end up as straussian neocons like hillary clinton and want to take
us back into the dark ages.
there is a certain line of thinking that ends with nietzsche, but it was a
stupid line of reasoning that was in opposition to the real movements of
enlightened thinking, anyways. his supposed crisis was resolved by aquinas, who
was himself just quoting aristotle. what you see in his writings is a fool
coming to terms with the idiocy of his systems of thought. but, only fools
would have ever walked down that path in the first place. this is centuries
after galileo!
so, i don't think that nihilism presents us with any sort of a real problem.
but, if we want to be stuck in this foolish historical narrative? a very
obvious and completely satisfactory solution immediately presents itself in secular
humanism. and, there is consequently really no reason to take note of the man
or his writings at all. he should be forgotten. instead, we should remember the
line of thinking that takes us from aristotle, through aquinas and ends with
comte.
a cold and warm front were colliding over detroit on this evening, and it was that time of the year where the ten degree drop can mark the difference between spring and winter. while it was the proper background for this type of music, trying to figure out the timing of the collision and how to navigate it caused me havoc all day. the shifting weather forecasts did not help much; i was trying to plan within the margin of error.
--
the warm front seemed to linger a little longer than was forecast, which led me to overheat on the way to the show. i had planned to walk in single digit temperatures through a north wind and low humidity; i got double digit temperatures through a south wind and high humidity. had i worn any makeup, it would have melted off by the time i got there - so i at least made that choice correctly.
--
dark red are a two piece drums/bass combo, but i want to stress that they weren't really what you'd expect with a drums/bass combo in 2016. the bass functioned as a guitar, but it was actually a very slow-moving kind of almost doom rock sound. and, he was able to get enough harmonic complexity out of the combination of things to give it a gazey feel. the culmination was a kind of grassroots grunge sound, in the way the term was initially constructed. this is going to be quite the acquired taste - at the end of the day, it really reduces largely to a very fuzzy bass throwing layered walls of distortion at you. so, i have to caveat it by saying that the idea is a little bit stale. but, if this is something you have a taste for, it was done fairly well. it's all in the tone, really, right - it doesn't really matter what else is happening, so long as you get a thick enough tone.
the stargazer lilies seem to be touring their new record, but they haven't released it yet. i'm only familiar with the first record, so i may have been tricked - they may have played older material i don't know. but, i think that around half the set was new material. the newer material seemed to be a little grittier, and a little less focused on melody - which is a shame, because that's what drew my attention to this disc. see, it's not much of a feat nowadays to string a rack of effects together and staccato out to nowhere; rather, the abundance of acts doing this since the early 90s has kind of blurred it all together into a stale cliche. time has just made the situation worse. it's become very formulaic and really rather boring. what's been lost in the rush to total atmosphere over musical content is that the genre was initially built on overlapping harmonies. whether you want to cite the cocteau twins or mbv or the cure or whatever else, this genre shines when it is music with counterpoint and harmonization and 13th chords and other fun things of the sort - and falls apart when it's just some more boring I-IV-V folk tones, run through a flanger or not. what pulled me into the record was the greater level of musical literacy. it's not just a wall of sound, it's a very musical wall of sound. the newer material seemed to take a step back from that in favour of generic shoegazer contrivances, but i'll withhold judgement until the record comes out.
that may come off harsher than intended. see, i wouldn't go out of my way to see sounds-like-every-other-sheogaze-band on a blicky march night. but, if i happened to find myself in front of one, i wouldn't complain about it either. i recognized about half the set, and enjoyed what i recognized more than what i didn't, but the truth is that the last record set a high bar. it was an enjoyable head cave, either way.
here is a full set:
the trip home was horrific. it initially seemed like i was making excellent time (the show was done before 11:00), but i ended up getting stuck at the bus stop with a horde of drunken frat boys on their way home from a hockey game. worse, the bus missed it's route (the driver claimed it got stuck in the tunnel, and i'm suspecting it had to do with increased security from the attacks in belgium). so, it turned into having to listen to these idiots throw homophobic slurs at each other for almost two hours.
they kept calling cabs down, and the cabs kept refusing to take them because they just wouldn't shut up. it's probably a lot of repressed homosexual desires, and i get that, but it's just really annoying to listen to. one minute, they're yelling at somebody to suck their cock; the next, they're calling each other faggots.
it's not as though i'm offended by the language - i don't care, really. it's more that i'm offended by the stupidity. when i find myself in these situations, i just want to snap my finger and have them cease to exist - or perhaps click my heels and transport home.
even worse is when they want to talk to you. everything is a competition, right, so they're constantly trying to start a debate and win it. it's never about the discussion. it's always about winning and losing. this one buffoon was unable to differentiate nihilism from atheism. if i didn't believe in god, i therefore couldn't believe in anything else. and, he just wouldn't drop the strawman. he had to win. so, you have to let him, to avoid losing brain cells in the resulting discussion - and then hope he goes away. thankfully, there was a beer waiting for him down the road.
then, they expected me to get into a cab with them. right. like i'm going to risk going through customs with these idiots. you can't just explain to the border guards that you took the cab with them but don't know them; that's not how that works. when they did finally leave, though, the serenity that followed was almost overwhelming.
the drip was forming at the corner. i've just
taped it over. hopefully that's good enough. i don't know if the drip
was coming out of the corner or just rolling down towards it. my concern
is just keeping the water off the floor, so if that doesn't work then
i'll tape the connector over. but i think i have the responsibility to
inform you.
i still don't have a phone. i've lived long
enough without one that i've learned how to exist without one, and
decided it's more of a luxury than a necessity. and given that it is
essentially a government spying device, i've actually decided that i
even actively don't want one.
so, i know you're transferring ownership. let me know if there's a better email address to use.
but, yeah. it's dripping. slowly. it seems like the plastic cracked. but it may be the seal, too.
getting from windsor to ann arbor and back to see tortoise was somewhat of an adventure, and the vlog really only tells a part of the story. so, i'm going to go ahead and start from the beginning.
===
i had decided before i went to bed that the racist bus system was going to stop me from seeing the show, but i dreamt of the suspension bridge at iguazu falls and woke up invigorated by the prospect. i decided that i would go if i could find a truck stop close to the drop off point - which i did find. so, i dirtied myself up a little, grabbed my knapsack and hit the road....
they had the dogs out at customs to sniff some greyhound passengers. the ridiculousness of the drug war was really apparent, at that point. just the absurdity of it, you know. it's one thing to get kids to watch some infomercials in grade school, it's another to send the canine unit out under threat of a term in a cage. that's a game i don't play. it's a fool's game; your opponent is not rational, not swayed by discourse. it's another layer of the hyperreal, but to poke at the surreal and hope it vanishes is better left to thought experiment than real life....
i caught the bus outside a federal building (overheard statement by a passing bureaucrat: "we control the department of health"); it was an hour and a half before it dropped me a mile from the I-275, which is the highway that i've identified to be the segregation line between detroit and the surrounding suburbs. it did not take long for a three-piece family to pick me up, and drop me at the bus station.
the car was full of bernie supporters, who were intrigued and a little unsettled by the canadian health care system. you can imagine it's a big thing, right. see, but that's exactly what i picked up: that it *is* a big thing. and, that's exactly what i tried to get across. see, in canada we just take our coverage for granted. we don't ever have to worry about losing our insurance. it's never up for debate: it's universal. and, universal means universal. it took a few tries, but i think that eventually got across - and when it did, a very comfortable pause set in.
but, what about the taxes? don't i get tired of taxes for everything? i was in the middle of explaining that i've never made enough money to pay health care taxes when the car pulled in, i thanked them kindly and i headed for the bus stop.
the bus from ypsilanti to ann arbor was another hour up washtenaw road, pulling into a detour through the university of michigan campus and eventually stopping at the city's central bus station. the good news was that i beat the sunset; the bad news was that i had three hours to blow before the show started.
===
after poking around the area, and determining that almost everywhere i could go within the range of my mental compass would require a reservation, i stopped at a restaurant that's fancier than anywhere i'd normally go to to get a beer and something to eat. i wanted a burger, but had to settle for some kind of salsa poutine and a greek salad.
"would you like bread while you're waiting?"
"listen. i hitchhiked here. i don't want to spend a lot of.."
"...it's free."
"ok. great."
i'm not ashamed of my lower class upbringing, or afraid to put it on display. but, i was afraid that i'd get one of those famous tiny plates that you get at fancy restaurants. twenty dollars for a leaf of lettuce, right? and that'll be ten dollars for a side of dressing, please. but, in fact, the two plates, together, were a relatively large meal. and, it came to no more than the price of an expensive sub - or perhaps the price of a burger.
two beers later, and i was out to see the show. but, i'll make sure to do a little more research on places to wait, pre-show, if i ever go back to ann arbor.
===
i was there right at doors, so the line-up was fairly short. but, the door guy was very reluctant to accept my id.
"you're 35?"
"yeah."
a skeptical glance.
"you look good for 35."
"it runs in the family..."
i'm actually used to this. in fact, i've been told more than once that my id is fake and i'm not getting in - past the age of 30. but, this would have been a distance to travel to get bounced. he motions to his buddy...
"is this real id? nexus card?"
"is it from canada?"
"yeah."
"it's good."
i saw the guy repeatedly over the night, as i came in and out. the skepticism on his face was palpable: no way this kid is 35. i'm only 32! if this kid is 35....
but, this kid *is* 35. sorry, dude. it's true.
===
i take a look at the beer menu. $1.75? score.
"what is this rolling rock?"
"it's just a watery beer."
"well, i'm from canada. it'll feel like home. i'll go with that."
i need to carry a pocket drum machine with me.
the beer went down quick, so i was out into the smoking section within a few minutes, where i bumped into somebody willing to share - which was useful for the first act.
====
mind over mirrors were a synthesizer act with an unusual light show. they played on the floor, surrounded by this bright, glowing orb. this gave it the feel of some kind of ritual. on the one hand. it was a lot of overdone tropes, right - the spiritual indigenous european thing, trying to bring out your inner druid by ripping on the froese brothers. on the other hand, this was exceptionally well put together in terms of the space it covered in the spectrum, if not in terms of melodic complexity. i happened to be stuck in front of somebody that wasn't enjoying it, and the argument was apparent - there were no melodies, and minimal percussion. it was just sound. but, when you get enough bass out of the speakers to make it feel like the walls are going to cave in? you're accomplishing something. but, it's something that you utterly have to *feel* in order to understand. so, footage of the show would be entirely pointless. this is experiential, and recommended if you get the chance, but i will reiterate that my detour into the smoking section was pretty fundamental in my enjoyment of the set.
this set is similar to what i saw:
tortoise did not need to clear the stage, so they started almost immediately; i barely had time to get a beer. how was the show? really?
i have to admit that the last tortoise record that i really sunk into was standards. i found that the 2004 record was very much following in the footsteps of do make say think, but without the tension - it lacked a concept of grit, and kind of floated by. i did listen to the 2009 disc for a few weeks when it came out, but got bored with it almost immediately and never went back to it - the truth is that it just couldn't compete for space in my mp3 player. and, i was walking into the show without having heard much of their new record at all. but, i am very much familiar with their three classic records - and was hoping to see a lot more material from them.
the truth is that i should have known better. it's largely a question of who the guitarist was. the magic on millions and tnt was all pajo; at this stage, the differences in style between pajo and parker are really absolutely apparent and it's obvious who did what. so, it's not really fair to anybody to show up to a tortoise show in 2016 with jeff parker on guitar and expect them to run through twenty year-old material that somebody else wrote. i should have thought that through a little more closely.
i can't claim the same familiarity with their newer material, but it's....it's not written at the same level. see, that's the thing: if it was, i'd have the same familiarity. it's not due to lack of exposure. some of the stuff on beacons came back to me when they played it, but even so it was kind of fuzzy.
which is not to say it wasn't enjoyable. the display of drum wizardry, itself, was worth the price of admission! and, they played a handful of older tunes, too. it's just that it's not the same thing - because it's not the same band. and, one should have reasonable and realistic expectations when going to see tortoise with their current lineup in 2016. i need to point the finger at myself in walking in with unrealistic expectations.
so, it's still tortoise. it's still a good show. but, be reasonable about what you're expecting.
i'm disappointed in the lack of footage online from the show, but this is a decent representation:
i found myself in an overnight diner until 8:00 am, due to the late night saturday morning bus service. diners are always entertaining if you have the right approach to them: you get drunks & cokeheads battling it out with saucy waitresses that expect to be tipped in inverse proportion to their attitudes, and usually are. there's always some narrative to follow. they were good about coffee, there, which is about all i ask for. although i managed a free breakfast from somebody, too.
he walked over towards me..
"i'm going to buy you breakfast."
"no, i'm ok. i know i'm sorting through change, but my bank card doesn't work here so i only have what i brought with me."
"no, i'm buying you breakfast."
"but, it's not..."
"i'm buying you breakast."
*pause*
the waitress asks me what i want. i get a special. he's gone before i can pay for it...
"he didn't actually buy me breakfast did he?"
"yup."
"i don't look that bad do i?"
"no. you actually look pretty good. i think that's *why* he bought you breakfast, if you see what i mean."
"but i told him over and over. if that's true, it's kind of invasive. i mean, it's non-consensual. i...i should just be quiet, right. say thank you and forget about it."
"yup. just be like: thanks weird dude..."
"i think it's gotta be more about him. after i tell him, like, five times - that's not about me. that's salvation through works, or something. it's just that there are people who actually can't get breakfast. people that would actually benefit. i'm just stuck here overnight. i just spent money on food and concert tickets and beer...you know..."
"you should just say thank you."
"yeah. i should."
the sun was shining brightly when i left, although the temperature was a little chilly.
===
the ride back was a struggle to keep my eyes open, and i *did* nod off a few times before i got to the end of the aata route, and started walking up michigan.
it was literally the moment that i put my thumb out that somebody slowed down and picked me up - as though he'd been waiting for me. or perhaps waiting for somebody to be waiting to get picked up, anyways.
it was an older guy, in what i guess was his fifties. he claimed he'd been up all night, and he was definitely a little bit drunk - but he was also obviously harmless. he had stories about wild nights in his youth at the bar i'd been to, and seemed a little surprised when i told him the band sounded a little like king crimson - as though he wished he was there. it was a short ride up to the mcdonalds on the other side of the freeway, a quick thank you and a brisk walk away. if i set off any flashbacks, i hope they were positive memories, on the whole.
the bus ride back was non-eventful. and, i did eventually make it home safely - and then slept for a full 24 hours.
the backstory for this evening was mostly related to the question of whether getting to this bar and back, through a part of detroit i'd yet to enter, could be done safely. in the end, i believe i was overly cautious: the bar is perhaps on the edge of scary-town, but it's also a block from campus. it may take a few trips for my nerves to calm, but i do not believe that i am putting myself in any danger by going to this venue, so long as i do not stray too far in the other direction. that said, i would obviously prefer to go to other bars to see shows...
===
the first act consisted of a woman playing guitar. it wasn't very interesting. if it was trying to be atmospheric or ambient, it wasn't; if it was trying to be technical, it wasn't, either (at all). it was actually to the point where a little bit more proficiency could have helped it succeed in being better, as ambient music. bluntly: it was some generic country/roots riffs played through a reverb pedal, masqueraded as some kind of art. i don't mean like morricone. i mean like garth brooks. again: i don't know how this kind of thing gets booked.
i tried to suggest to the guitarist that she needs to add more to what she's doing in order for it to not be boring, but the suggestion was received poorly. so, i moved on.
===
guerrilla toss came on considerably earlier than i expected, which allowed me to make the choice of whether to stay for the headliner or not. when i got home, i realized that they had done their "normal set" at third man records, down the street, a little earlier in the day (i didn't know that was taking place; if i did, i would have went). it seems as though they refrained from recycling their set. i had been listening to their most recent record for a few days up to the show, but the choice to not recycle the set meant i didn't know much of the material. they may have actually played some new material - i don't know; i've bumped into them a handful of times over the last couple of years, and i've had a mixed reaction, but i wouldn't exactly consider myself a fan. my decision to go to the show was more experiential: it just struck me as something that would be good live.
in fact, my immediate impression was that they sound a lot better on record than they do live. i've checked out a few live recordings (including footage of the early set...) and the issue is actually persistent and obvious: it's the open room. this is a band that has a very tight, compressed sound. it has a lot of complexity all over the spectrum, but it's rooted in a very busy and very squished bass/drum combo. so, you basically want to see them in a closet. a basement would be ideal! any kind of space with any kind of reverb at all is going to hollow them out, and make them sound blurry. you don't want to give them any space at all.
there's some mixing decisions you can make to balance it out, of course - and they seem to refrain from making them. but, more than anything else, it's the open ceiling. and, that's actually something more general to keep in mind about the bar - it would be good for anything ambient, but bad for any kind of punk.
i'm not knocking the show. don't misunderstand. it's just that the acoustics were very unfriendly. and, they seem to be making that error repeatedly. see them in an enclosed space, if possible. and recommend it, too - if you get the chance.
here's a full set:
they were done a little after 11:00, so i figured i'd get time to at least sample the headliner. but, rangda took a good while longer to set up; i'm guessing that they probably came on around 12:00. i didn't have to catch the bus until 12:23, but i didn't know how long it was going to take to walk back to the stop or how safe it was going to be, so i took the safe choice and left about 11:45....
frankly, i wasn't really impressed by the samples. nor am i at all a fan of ben chasny or richard bishop [i'm a little more familiar with chris corsano]. if it was ten degrees warmer out, or an hour earlier (or an hour later) or i was more comfortable in my surroundings or ... then i would have stayed and sauntered down to a coffee shop and hung out for the night. but, as things were, i was experimenting with the feasibility of getting to this bar and back before the last bus, and setting those parameters was more important.
maybe i missed a great show. but, i suspect that i just missed some aimless jamming by some guitarists that have never previously impressed me very much.
i nearly missed this show by passing out early in the afternoon, but i was able to get there right before the set started. apologies to the opening act, whom i will probably catch with psychic tv in a few months. this was not an intentional snub.
the issue was made worse by the fact that it was a messy night in detroit, and the venue is a forty minute bus ride away from the downtown core. that likely slowed me down an extra half hour, both from having to walk a little more slowly and from the bus moving at a slower pace.
but, it's not as though i arrived at the venue late, either. this was an early start to an early night.
=====
i bumped into somebody in the smoking section that was on his way out, and he decided to share a little - which was much appreciated. he was voting for trump, based on the logic that the country is in debt and a good businessman would help fix the debt problem.
"first of all, the country is not in real debt, it's just an accounting identity..."
this produced a puzzled glance.
"...and, second of all, this is a guy that's declared bankruptcy repeatedly. so..."
he knew how to answer the second part, even if he didn't know how to answer the first.
"bankruptcy is something that rich people do to help them out of taxes and stuff. it doesn't mean he was actually broke. it's all a scam."
"that's true. but, the same argument leads to the conclusion that the country isn't broke - that it's really just a big tax scam. and do you really want to make a tax cheat president?"
somebody else butts in, before he can respond.
"i'm afraid trump will start a war because somebody will look at him funny, or something. he's unstable. it's scary."
"really? i think he might argue that the military budget is a waste of money. i think the most pro-war candidate is actually clinton. and if you really want to vote for an anti-war candidate..."
"....but sanders is saying he's going to take on the banks and stuff. how's he going to do that? he can't actually do anything he says he's going to..."
"actually, i agree with you. i think if sanders was really serious, he would have started a third party and tried to take congress. it's the congress that has all the real power."
"but, nobody will vote for a third party!"
"then, you're right - nothing can change. not if you can't see beyond the status quo. not if you insist it cannot."
i escaped the conversation at that point, and went in for a beer. and, they do have good beer at the loving touch - those raspberry blondes. mmmm.
====
her set was very good; her material is very strong, and she's just simply very talented. i'm only familiar with two of her records (tragedy, and the newest one), and i think all of the material came from one of those two discs. her band was composed of what were obviously studied jazz pros (drums, bass, violin), which gave the set a bit of a loose feel; this was actually a net positive over top of some of her more structured material, although a big aspect of the opening up of those tracks had to do with her keyboard shutting off mid set and needing to be rebooted. those old nord leads sound great, but they're getting to the end of their life cycles. hey, i can empathize with being a little bit skeptical about just buying a new keyboard. but, her synth actually really kept dying during the set.
so, when the synth crashed, the band would need to take over until it came back in, and then she'd need to bring them back in. this is of course perilous for any performing artist and could have been an absolute disaster. but, through luck or talent it actually worked out very well on this night by inserting these jazzy instrumental improv sessions into what are very high-end pop songs.
i can't predict when her synth will die; certainly not any better than she can. but, i would suggest seeing her if you get the chance.
this is a late review, which i initially intended not to do at all, but i do think that i need to, after all.
the reason i decided to not do the review was that i intuited that the band realized i was there, and tried a few antics with the intent that i would take notice of them. that's pretty shitty, and i felt that the proper response was to pretend i never went.
but, that would leave a gaping hole in the show review list, which is just punishing myself. but, i will not take note of any of the things that were meant for me to take note of. and, i would prefer it (moving forwards) if bands and venues would continue to allow me to be the unimportant fly on the wall that i want to be. this is a waste of time, otherwise. it's being written solely for historical purposes; i will stop publishing these writings altogether if i start to think that i'm developing any kind of an audience.
----
this was actually a really screwed up night (see the vlog, below), with all kinds of broken plans as a consequence of some bad advertising. i was actually hoping to take advantage of the scheduling to hit two shows, but the scheduling for both shows changed at the last minute, and i ended up only seeing most of one of the shows that i wanted to see, rather than both of them. it's life. things have worked out the other way more than once and will again more than twice.
---
the first opening act for the show that i did get to see was entirely pointless, and at the end of the set it just left me wondering why the bar owner decided to waste anybody's time with it. it was all muzak covers. just a total waste of time. i don't know how a band like that manages to even get booked...
---
this was the second time that i saw brothels. the first time, the show seemed really loose and haphazard - as though the songs were still being written. but, there was some potential if they could polish it a little. on this night, the songs seemed really compressed and a little too generic-punk-rock for my tastes (although the guitar tone was quite nice). the last song of the set, though, hit the middle point that i think they want to be aiming towards, hitting upon this incesticide-era sweet spot (think something like hairspray queen). abstract and noisy, but catchy and fun, too. the bassist claimed it's a side project for everybody, and they just don't spend much time with it. that's a shame, as that last track was hitting on something.
as far as i know, there is no media for brothels anywhere on the internet. so, i do wish i had caught that last track. alas...
====
the topic in between sets was trump and how to stop him, but the patrons didn’t seem to be particularly left-leaning, either. they seemed to realize that there was something unsettling about trump, but they didn’t really seem to be able to articulate it. the impression i got from them was more along the lines of the perception that the policies are already decided upon, so while trump may seem like an outrageous idiot, it wouldn’t really matter if he won – because the same legislation would get passed, either way. see, this is not an uninformed view, relative to the last thirty years of american politics. clinton and obama (and to a lesser extent, carter) have all carried on with the same basic republican game plan. so, why would anybody think it would matter if trump wins? this is a dangerous mindset, but it’s also a rational one – blame the people that brought us here, not the kids reacting to the situation!
so, quotes were thrown around, but as little more than frat-house shock value: “he actually said that!?”. the consequences of the words neither rung true nor false, but simply hollow. it was just another reality show, to be viewed from a distance with a gaped jaw rather than participated in.
but, something that got a bit more of a response was a discussion of the economic consequences of the proposed wall, and the idea that it will lead to massive inflation. a sampling of the response:
“i was hoping to get off ramen noodles after i graduate. shit. i guess i’ll need to put it off until i get promoted?”
that generated a laugh, and it was reflective of the general disconnected approach to the political process, the relegation of reality to fiction – the hyperreality that sets in when a guy that plays a joke on tv runs for president, and it looks like he might win. but, it also reflected the level of resignation that people seem to have to their place in the class hierarchy – even as they acknowledged the absurdity of the situation. if this is all you’ve ever known…
====
pop 1280 played a set with a split personality. when they were on, they were on. but, for whatever reason (no sound check? well, who do you blame for that?), half the set was out of time or out of tune. the singer was having a particularly bad night; he was having a really hard time staying in time. so, the takeaway was pretty lacklustre. the track i caught was probably the high point of the show, so take that as you may. for a variety of reasons, they didn't come on until after midnight; i left after about a half hour (i probably only a missed a song or two), because catching the bus was just more important than staying for a band that was having a bad night.
i finished the wipedown of deathtokoalas - as much as i can - from youtube on the 9th. i went on some adventures at the end of last week. i've been editing all week (i admit i was distracted by the democratic party primaries on the 15th). i'll be pushing through with editing until i've got everything i have uploaded, but i'm at least back on schedule.
when i get that done, it's going to be another week or so of clearing off rants from canadian online newspapers over the 2015 election cycle. this will be a faster run, i think, because it should be totally cross-linked.
i do believe that this is the last deletion operation, and that i should be able to get back to what i was doing by the beginning of april.
this has been lengthy. it will be about three months, in the end. but, the takeaway is that i really actually seriously have quit smoking cigarettes. and, that's worth a few months of low productivity in the long run.
it's something i had to do, eventually. and it's almost done.
if you're curious as to what i've been up to over the last two months, the place to catch up is over here. i should be back to the music pretty soon, though.
the power went out this morning, and it seems to have fried the
heater in the living room. this happened some time last summer, and it
wasn't a big deal because it was summer. but it's still winter. so, that
really can't be allowed to sit.
the last time it
happened, you just changed out the electronics. but, i need to ask - is
there something about the wiring that could be modified? i mean, that's
twice that it knocked out in an electrical storm.
things are continuing to move a lot more slowly than i'd like, but i ran into a conversation at the bar the other night that i'd kind of like to address.
if i'm such a shit hot musician, why don't i start a band?
and, it's really hard to explain to people that i just haven't met anybody i could work with. i've tried a few people. and, they all suck.
like, i don't want to just put together a band to be cool or make money or some other pointless thing. if it's not the way i want to do it, i don't want to do it at all. and, that probably means it will never happen, but i'm not particularly upset by that.
i'm somebody that actually values recorded music as of much greater value than live music. i know that's some kind of heresy, but i don't really give a fuck. it's really not of any great sadness to me that i can't get a band together; i'd really rather you listen to this music over headphones, in a quiet space, anyways.
recorded music has a sense of permanence to it. there's a sanctity to it. the cool kids don't understand that, but that's ok - it's not meant for them. i'm not loudly broadcasting myself as a nerd by some kind of accident. the accident was that people misinterpreted me as some kind of hipster. no. i'm a nerd. and, this music is designed entirely for nerds. if you're not a nerd, you won't appreciate it.
i mean, it would be fun, don't get me wrong, if i could find the right drummer, mostly. but, everybody i've found that has the right training wants to do metal, and everybody that i've found that's interested lacks the talent. my needs are just very specialized - i need a jazz/fusion drummer that wants to start a leftield progressive punk band.
but, like i say....it's not what i *do*. it's something i might like to do one day, circumstances permitting. but what i actually do is make recorded music to listen to over headphones. the reality is that essentially none of it was ever written with the intent of being performed, and most of it probably never will be.
and, that's not something to shy away from or be ashamed of.
there appears to be an issue with the water
pressure. it comes in and out, which is not the end of the world - so
long as it comes back, and it always does. but, it seems to be dependent
on the weather. it seems to slow down a lot when the temperature comes
down. that relationship has held this morning. so, i'm left to conclude
that maybe something is freezing over....?
i'll let you know if the pressure comes back when it warms up over the next few days.
(pause)
yeah,
i think that what's happened is that the heat upstairs was turned off,
and the pipes somewhere in the basement have frozen as a consequence of
that. i'm leaving the water running (cold) to try and de-ice the pipes.
it
was very nice last weekend. but, it's been below zero for the last
several days. and, there's no source of heat in the basement. so, if you
don't have the heat upstairs on, it gets very cold in the basement
(causing me to turn my heat up to buffer).
what i'm
getting across is that i understand that i have a lease responsibility
to prevent the pipes from freezing. i've had the heat on in the unit.
but, it seems like the heat is not on on the main floor. so, i need to
deflect responsibility for any burst, frozen or broken pipes.
(pause)
i
let it run for a few hours and turned it off because it wasn't making
any difference. also, the pressure is the same for both the cold and the
hot; one would think that a frozen pipe would affect one more than the
other, unless the frozen pipe is on the way into the building. i still
think the dominant factor is like the heat coming off upstairs.
i'm
just pulling out a correlation with temperature and making a guess. it
should warm up on monday. i'll let you know if the pressure comes back
before then.
so, i've done enough testing that it's clear to me that a lot (most...) of the posts that i'm making on youtube are invisible to everybody except myself.
that goes a long way to explain why the hit count came down. and, this is very sneaky - because i experience no signs of censorship. i can see my posts. if i go back to the page, my posts are there. i get no error message. but, if i log out of the site and come back, i can no longer see the posts.
that is behaviour that couldn't possibly be designed with anything other than political censorship in mind.
let's see if i can jam this....
i may have been targeted specifically because i had a habit of removing posts made to my posts. but, let's be clear about a few things.
(1) it was my post. i had the functionality to remove the responses to my posts. and, frankly, i believe i had ownership of those posts. no rules broken, there.
(2) i was actually very enlightened in the way i did this. i'm trying to save the conversations i had. that means plenty of people didn't get deleted - and there were plenty of interesting back and forths.
now, of course, some of the morons that ended up with deleted posts may disagree. but, that's a function of their idiocy - and the problem in the first place. just because they don't realize they're buffoons doesn't mean i have a responsibility to listen to them.
it's just another symptom, really. youtube was perhaps too good for it's user base, for a while.
i don't feel i have a choice but to stop posting here, seriously. they've reduced the platform to something that is essentially useless for anything but trolling. but, if that's what they want, they can get ready for some of it...
what i'm saying is that i may have gotten a very high number of complaints, because i deleted a large number of posts.
but, if you saw those posts, you'd understand - they were personal attacks, baseless insults, unsupported arguments and just flagrant idiocy.
the difference is that i didn't cry to an authority figure. i just removed the posts. then, the people that were posting nonsense and insults complained that their posts were being removed, and i'm the one that ends up getting silenced - while they keep on posting stupidity.
should i have reported them instead of taking matters into my own hands?
no.
the system was designed so that people could police their own content, and that was actually an ideal way to do it.
1) the owner of the video could decide if they wanted the thread there or not; if the owner of the video removed the thread, it appeared only in google+.
2) the owner of the thread could decide who was allowed to comment on the thread, and which comments were allowed to stand.
this allowed for people to moderate their own content - this is the anarchist ideal of self-moderation. it's easy to see why i liked it...
but, people didn't seem to understand the system, or thought that they should have the right to comment on other people's posts, whether they liked it or not. they weren't able to get the abstraction of personal property rights. so, they complained to authority figures, who had to step in - and i'm the one that got punished for it.
again: it's not a situation where i wish i had reacted differently. it's a situation where i'm learning that this is a bad platform, and that i need to adjust to it's failings.
the other option was that my content, while it existed, would not have been the pleasant conversations that people became accustomed to seeing my name attached to. instead, it would have been full of people posting personal insults, back and forth name-calling, strawmen arguments, unsupported arguments, stupid memes - everything else on youtube, essentially. and, then i would have stopped using the platform quite a long time ago. it was either that i cleaned these threads up and pissed a lot of people off, or that i didn't use the system at all.
and, you just have to laugh, right? people wanted in on my comments because they were high profile enough to be noticed. but, that relied on my ability to screen the garbage out. in the end, the garbage i screened out seems to have ganged up on me and has gotten me declared a spammer, out of spite.
but, i wouldn't have had anything worth noting if i had let anybody and everybody go ahead and vomit all over my posts.
in the end, i got nailed for using the system as it was designed, and actually succeeding in making it better, and the youtube comment system has remained a nest of absolute stupidity. if anything, it's worse now than it's ever been.
i can't regret that. rather, i have to point out that i'm a victim of stupidity.
listen: this is how the world works, right?
where's the alternate history where everybody listens to jesus, agrees and goes to smoke a fatty in the park?
mass idiocy is normal. intelligence is always persecuted.
they hate you when you're clever....
the reality is that any other outcome would be unheard of - astonishing.
really, i should be content in realizing that i'm lucky that i haven't been lynched, yet.
i'm almost done in clearing the page down. i should get close to 1500 pages in the end. it's probably 1500/2000 or so. i'm sure the lost ideas will regenerate elsewhere, eventually.
Saturday, February 20, 2016
it's now been six weeks without smoking, btw. and i'm feeling like i'm over it.
youtube just pushed down a character limit.
i think
it's as clear as day that they are shutting down comments - for
political reasons. they want this shut down before the election cycle
heats up.
as time consuming as this has been, i
actually waited too long to do it and have lost much more than i wanted.
the last few days of vlogs have dealt with this topic. i've got over a
thousand pages off, and have quite a bit more to go, but i've also lost a
lot of really interesting conversations.
with the character limit? it's over. it's useless. i'm moving to my own space - there's no other solution.
it's
going to be a while before i get back to work, unfortunately. but if i
had doubts about the worth of this, the character limit has reinforced
the need for me to be doing this asap.
youtube, as we know it, is on the verge of collapse. it's been too successful in spreading ideas. and, it's getting shut down.
bernie sanders may very well win the election. that is a failure of the propaganda system.
the result is just pointless clutter. and, i'm not going to pull back from it out of aesthetic - i'm going to push it hard, to demonstrate how bad it looks and why you should change it.
so, i will need to post five separate posts - part 1, part 2, etc.
nor will it allow me to post it as replies.
i am trying to post a comment on my own page, and it will not allow me to paste the entire thing in.
character limits?
wow.
getting worse and worse by the day, youtube.
do you know what character limits accomplish? they force users to copy and paste a long reply into multiple shorter replies.
it's an incredibly pointless, utter dick move.
here's
a tip: if my post is too long, don't read it. zero fucks given. and, if
i post too many long posts, and you don't want to read them? maybe you
should unsubscribe from my feed.
i can't even believe, really, that this is seriously a thing. it's so horrifically backwards and so remarkably stupid...
i wasn't crying censorship before, but i'm noticing that a lot of my posts disappear when i log out. meaning only i can see them. see, that's sneaky - it means i don't actually know that i'm being censored.
and that i don't know how long i've been being censored for.
listen: i don't want my content on somebody else's channel. that was never my intent. my intent was always to have a feed of content. comments are content.
the cross-link was just incredibly useful.
i've explained this already: i'll be vlogging my comments. yes, it's stupid. but, don't look at me, i'm just adjusting to a stupid system.
but, i'm not just figuring out that the videos are down and the content is evaporated - i'm figuring out that i'm not getting posts through. it's pretty random. and, when something like this is random there are two possible causes:
1) error. which is exceedingly unlikely. this is youtube.
2) active censorship.
i wanted to avoid that conclusion. i really did. but it's unavoidable.
i've been posting comments here for the last several months, hardlinked to google. flip through the page (or the koalas page), open a few links and tell me - how many of the links bring you somewhere other than the comment they're hardcoded to?
it's probably not google, exactly.
google has probably allowed full control over my profile to somebody at some ministry of information.
i'm not sure if my status as a canadian gives me more or less rights, here.
i hit my first post-smoking show last night, and how did i do?
well, i did have a few. three. although, i regretted it immediately and i walked out with no cravings. chances of a relapse - in the form of buying a pack - are zero.
the vlog for the night will come up at my site on feb 24th at 12:30 am. in the mean time, i'll do a written review here (which will get moved to the appropriate places, in time).
---
i ended up a little irritated at ritual howls, but i really ought to be irritated with the bar, instead. this isn't the first time i've seen the bar try and combine shows like this. they'll get a local band in on a touring band's bill, then essentially give the show to the opening act. and, i'm not exaggerating. the bar legitimately really seems to be very strongly biased towards the local bands, and essentially treats the touring acts as a kind of burden to deal with. it's this "we let you play here, you should thank us" kind of attitude.
the problem is really in the marketing. if you bill a show for a touring band, people expect they're going to be the focus. if you bill a show for a local band, people will expect they're the focus, too. what is really shitty is to bill the show for the touring band, and then go out of your way to co-opt it for the opening band. you're not doing that local band any favours by pissing off a possible new audience.
it's consequently really not fair to attack the opening act for setting up late and then acting like it was their show - it's the bar that enables this. this then forces the headliner to cut their set short.
but, it does mean that i was irritated and less than objective about the set as it was happening.
were ritual howls any good? the actual truth is that they really weren't much to take note of. at their best, they were yet another joy division knock-off. they weren't horrible, or anything - they were legitimately mildly enjoyable, but they were very much the archetype of an opening act. so, i would have absolutely preferred to have them play a shorter set earlier in the night, to allow for a longer set by the headliners (who have well over an hour of material). and, the fact that i've seen this happen twice at this bar, now, means that i'm less excited about going there.
they had a chance to allow a substantial touring act to play a lengthy set; instead, they gave the floor to a mediocre local act.
i need to acknowledge, though, that they brought their own crowd, and they made them happy. it's this scene of kids that is all about grasping on to an aesthetic. so, what they're interested in is time capsuling this forty-year old sound as a kind of a fashion trend. the less original you are, the better. they catered almost perfectly to this audience.
but, there's truly not a whole lot to take not of in what they're doing - it's a competent instantiation of a formula that's been done to death for decades.
we got a roughly fifty minute set in from disappears, who i think are a well enough known entity that there's not really much use in being descriptive. they did what they do, and they did it well. i was in the correct state of inebriation to enjoy it, and i did.
it just would have been nice if they weren't cut short by by bylaws and if i didn't have to catch the bus at 1:10 - although i'll point out that i would have certainly missed the bus to stay late, too.
there are longer and fully professionally recorded sets on youtube, but this is the closest to what the show was actually like. i caught some audio that will come up on my vlog next week.
