i never vomit. i think that was the first time since moving to windsor. legit.

i bought a coffee a few hours ago, and there was a leak at the corner. i was about to walk into a grocery store when i noticed. i didn't want to trail coffee around the store, so i chugged it on a pretty empty stomach.

i'm guessing that's what came up. otherwise, i caught a bug somewhere. hope not.

extra large size.

01-09-2016: updating the alter-reality

tracks worked on in this vlog:
http://therealinri.blogspot.ca
https://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/album/period-1

alter-reality update

i have finished the listening through the sansa, as well as the first run through the laptop. i don't see any use in updating this here because it's monotonous. it's in the vlog.

but, i'm also pushing forward with the alter-reality for the day.

1) new blog post:

sept 1, 1996

there is no code to get into enriched classes, but i wish there was one....

happy new year!

well, it's not really the new year, i guess, but it kind of feels like it. the roman calendar is heliocentric and resets when the sun reverses course and starts coming back towards us. how did we escape the victorian era without reconfiguring the calendar to the start of the school year, anyways? there are new beginnings to be found in the innocence of youth. yet, maybe such a concept of yearly rebirth was a little too pagan.

it's labour day tomorrow, which means i go back to school on tuesday. i'll be starting grade ten. it's not just a new year, though: i'm also being sent to nerd school. yuck :(. this is not consensual!

it's a little bit of my own fault, though. i tend to fool around in class. a lot. while i get almost solid As, the kids i'm distracting are not doing nearly as well. one may kneejerk into blaming the kids with the lower marks, but i've actually been fingered repeatedly as the root cause of the distractions. so, i'm a kind of an enigma. they haven't been able to figure out what to do with me; while they ought to expel me based on my behaviour, they just can't justify it because i'm an A student. what happened around the end of last year was that a cabal of teachers conspired with my parents to take me out of advanced courses and put me into enriched classes. the argument is that i'll be less bored that way, but that, more importantly, i won't be so much of a distraction to the students around me. everybody should win out...

...except that i know that the reality of it is that i'm actually going to be even more bored because i'm going to have to hang out with the nerds all of the time. the thing is that the nerds aren't really nerds. if they were legit nerds, i'd probably like them. the legit nerds are all in the advanced courses. what the enriched class "nerds" actually are are really the rich kids and they're actually mostly wannabe jocks. these are the kids that walk around in sports jerseys but can't make the school team. the only reason that most of them got separated out is because their parents demanded they get special treatment. there was no testing. there were no interviews. entry to enriched classes is dependent solely on maintaining an A average and being recommended by a teacher, which only happens with outside pressure. there are plenty of students in the advanced stream with higher grade averages.

how do i get out of this? well, i didn't have the choice. my parents would never do this to me under normal circumstances, but the cabal of teachers was absolutely insistent and they ultimately relented. the only way out of this next year is to get Bs this year. nobody's going to care, right? nobody's going to check my grade ten marks, right? i'm already thinking about a scorched earth policy...

what about the last week?

well, i picked up the new pearl jam record, no code. to be entirely honest, i'm kind of still processing it. i'm not too young to remember early pearl jam, but i'm pretty close; i was ten years old when ten was released (oddly enough...) and not really a fan of what i interacted with. i liked jeremy, but it was a distant appreciation rather than an active experience. i didn't like the other singles nearly as much. you have to understand that the headspace i was in at the time was not very open to anything that might be interpreted as "heavy metal". the reason is that i was growing up with a set of influences that saw metal as the refuge of violent drunks and uneducated losers. it took me a few years to realize that i was actually conflating an idea with it's anti-thesis and that my inability to differentiate between pearl jam and guns 'n' roses (and grunge and glam, more generally) was really just youthful ignorance on my behalf. in fact, pearl jam was exactly the kind of rock band i could get into, i just didn't realize it. i was eventually able to get into vs a little near the end of it's run, but it wasn't until vitalogy was released that i was actively converted into a fan. on some level, and notwithstanding my age, i may be a better actualization of what the band really desires as a fan. but, that itself - combined with my near violent aversion to 80s metal - makes me a very atypical listener. i actually tend to prefer their more experimental tendencies, as well as their punk sensibilities, over the cliches and muscular riffs. of their four released records, i like ten the least! but, the thing i like about pearl jam the most is actually the lyrics.

i'm finding this new record to really be pretty good on the few listens i've had over all night civ 2 sessions. it's kind of uneven, though, and i'm not sure how it's going to ultimately hold up as a result of it. vitalogy was also uneven, but it wasn't as pronounced. see, the flip of that is that some of the high points on no code are just that much stronger. the irony is that this exaggerates the weakness of the weaker tracks, which makes it less cohesive, overall. i'm still enjoying the record, mind you. i just wish they had cut a few of the slower tracks out. i don't mean the artsy ones, i mean the rural ones: off he goes & around the bend, specifically.

something, i did listen to a lot of in the early 90s, though, was REM, who were definitely my favourite band. so, i'm super hyped about the new REM album. i didn't like monster as much as their older stuff. it seemed kind of shallow, to me, in comparison. it didn't breathe or flow and kind of got boring under the monotony. but, i really really like the new single...

i don't know who the female singer is, though. is she actually singing or is she just an actress?

i've also been spending a lot of time in the recording studio in the basement. on the last update, i wondered out loud whether i should keep waiting for band members or just go ahead and start recording on my own. i've decided that i will be recording songs on my own with the intent of teaching them to other people when they're done. in fact, i have already finished my first song! in my next post, i will provide links to stream my very first song, recorded in my basement studio over the last week.

http://therealinri.blogspot.ca/1996/09/there-is-no-code-to-get-into-enriched_1.html

2) second part of the blog post:

sept 1, 1996

external links to recorded music

this is my very first recording!

i initially wrote this song in the wee hours of a morning in 1995, where it was recorded for future use by notating it on loose leaf (using a mix of tablature and chord blocks). it was slowly mutated into a final form over the next few years through solitary performance, and was eventually recorded in the summer of 1996.

the dream in the song is something that actually happened, although the concept was exaggerated for the track. there is a clear underlying misanthropy. but, it's more hands-off than the term usually implies. the song is not about starting fires, it's about not interfering in fires that are burning. all young people contemplate ways they can make a difference and "save the world" - literally or figuratively. but, is the world really worth saving?



i've also set up a youtube channel...
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCXlH5Ds5mqClkdAUFJwQCNQ/

http://therealinri.blogspot.com/1996/09/external-links-to-recorded-music.html

3) the alter-reality bandcamp site is now up and running:
https://jnrj.bandcamp.com

4) the alter-reality youtube page will be up soon, too:
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCXlH5Ds5mqClkdAUFJwQCNQ/

i'll be back to listening soon, too.

the new youtube rules are not going to bother me, because i don't upload for the cash, anyways.

but i think, in the end, that youtube may find that the family-friendly market is less lucrative than it thinks.

this is an error. it could produce a set of serious competitors.

i don't have a problem with it. people just don't get the business model.

youtube is selling advertising space, not acting as a speech platform. they give you a cut of their revenue, but they don't even have to, really. it's just an incentive for you to upload. in the end, you're just being used as a conduit.

the actual financial transaction that occurs is that youtube sells space in your videos to advertisers. it's consequently entirely up to the advertisers as to whether they want to be associated with your videos or not. i think that's in their rights. and, if the advertisers don't want to be associated with you? that's their choice.

imagine your girlfriend breaking up with you because she doesn't like your politics. is that censorship? no. you have every right to keep talking. she just doesn't want to hang out with you.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gbph5or0NuM

this playlist may increase in size.

no biggie.

30/31-08-2016: listening phase completed (mp3--laptop-speakers) and looking ahead for sept shows

tracks worked on in this vlog:
https://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/album/period-1

there's actually no reason that you couldn't have a 20th note, you just couldn't express it in terms of quarter notes because you get an infinite series. it's convergent. but it doesn't help the notation.

you couldn't count it, but you could feel it.

i flipped my fraction over and thought i had an answer (i do this, flip the fraction over, to myself all the time), because i'm actually used to dealing with these kinds of weird conversions as a relic of writing drum sequences in a scorewriter. there's lots of ways to convert weird signatures. the series just has to terminate. it doesn't here, but that's just bad luck.

if you split the bar into five equal temporal spaces, each one will be four fifths of a quarter note. .8/4 = 0.2. so, a 20th note would be 20% of a quarter note - which is 40% of an eighth note and 80% of a sixteenth note. indeed, .8*(1/16) = 1/20. you can't notate this using western music theory (because the series happens not to terminate....), but that doesn't mean it's undefined or unplayable

80%(1/16th) =
160% (1/32nd) =
1/32nd + 60%(32nd) =
1/32nd + 1.2(64th) =
1/32nd + 1/64th + .2(64th) =
1/32nd + 1/64th + .4(128th) =
1/32nd + 1/64th + .8(256th) =
1/32nd + 1/64th + epsilon =
3/64th + epsilon

you simply couldn't hear 80% of a 256th note. that's indistiguishable from human error.

so, a 20th note would be indistinguishable from a triplet of 64th notes. that means that 4/20 would be four triplets of 64th notes.

....which is a blast beat.

http://thehardtimes.net/2016/08/29/stoner-tech-metal-band-trying-really-hard-write-song-420-time/?fb_comment_id=1161463340592034_1163796750358693

if you want to watch or take part in pornography, go ahead. what do i care? and, you don't need my permission, either. just don't insult my intelligence by referring to your pornography as 'art'.

if you want to go to a strip club, go ahead. just don't pretend that you're going to a 'concert'.

...and if you want to let your kids watch strippers on tv, that's your choice. well, at least it is in the sense that you own the tv. your kids aren't your property. just, stop fooling yourself into thinking it's a 'music video'. it's not. they're strippers. and it's porn.

29-08-2016: some listening done between rants & raves (mp3--laptop--speakers)

tracks worked on in this vlog:
https://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/album/period-1

i'm just getting through the listening phase through my laptop without phones, and i have to publicly plead yet again: don't do it. this isn't a cheap laptop. and i'll acknowledge, even, that the highs sound pretty good. but you just simply get no bass out of laptop speakers, and you need bass.

when it comes to audio, your laptop is a fucking potato. stop.

and don't even think about using your phone...

i've never stated, in public or private, anything other than that my only regret was that i put my transition on hold way back when. i don't regret anything else that happened. and, i wouldn't do anything else differently. but i do very, very much wish that i would have dealt with this properly back in 2002.

the intent was to stop for a few months. that turned into a few years. and, it became financially difficult to pick up where i was.

it was a huge mistake....

....but i mean the choice to suspend was a mistake. x > y. sure. but, it's only that part that i'd reverse, if i could. then, we'd have to see what would happen from there....

yes: a lot of the things that happened would not have happened had i not paused. that is true. but, given that i did pause, i don't regret what i did. what i regret is only that i paused.

i simply can't know what the alternate path would have been, or how similar it would be to what actually happened. so, i can't say anything else. i can only look at the choices i actually made. and, there's really only one i'd reverse.

i'm sorry if that's not what you think, but i need to reiterate: i've never stated anything else. anything else is just in your head.

again: quality v quantity misunderstands what i'm doing. the question is whether i'm being thorough in documentation, or haphazard about it. this is not a film production, it's a vlog. how detailed am i being?

another way to put it is that i don't really have control over the viewing quality of my life, nor am i particularly concerned by it. what i have control over is how meticulous i am in building a historical document.

i went from not being able to sleep to crashing really, really hard. we had some rain move in. it does that to me. i haven't been able to stay awake for more than a few hours at a time the last few days. i feel awake, but we'll see.

j reacts to a dream about genetic factors in gender identity

i've been over this a few times: i really don't think that gender is genetic in the sense that there's a gene for liking skirts or a gene for liking cars. rather, i think it's partly hormonal and partly experiential. the only serious genetic determinant going into somebody's gender identity is consequently the way that their bodies regulate hormones.

that means that there actually might be an observable physical trait that i demonstrate that has something to do with things, which is the fact that i've never grown a single hair on my chest in my life. this is actually very rare. the categorization of "apilose" means "less than 6%".

...and i'm not exaggerating. nary a hair. ever. in my entire life.

(i'll remind you that i'm nearly 36. it's never going to happen.)

how does that happen? well, here's the truth: this is androgenic hair. that is, it's presence is triggered by the release of testosterone during puberty. humans demonstrate lots of variation, as a species. so, some dudes release huge amounts of testosterone and end up looking like hairy man-apes. others release a lot less and just end up with a little baby fuzz. and, yes: some women release enough testosterone to end up with hair on their chests and faces, too.

the fact that i've never grown any chest on my hair at all ever means that i didn't go through that testosterone flush. i can't tell you why not with any real certainty, but it's almost certainly genetic. note that my dad was a typical hairy italian jew.

and, hence this is where one needs to look at the genetic basis of things, for me. as mentioned: i think this is overly facile. it's not that easy. it's at most one of multiple factors. but, if i was a geneticist, that's where i'd be looking: the genes that regulate hormone release during puberty.

as an aside, that makes the issue reducible to a "hormonal imbalance" and the treatment of hormone therapy rational. but, it also means that the ultimate truth here is that i very much had a choice in correcting the imbalance: that i could have equally well chosen to pop testosterone pills. the ultimate choice here, at the end, has to be experiential, when seen that way.

26-08-2016: listening progress, but short day (mp3--sansa--440-IIs & mp3--laptop--speakers)

tracks worked on in this vlog:
https://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/album/period-1

24/25-08-2016: good progress in listening (mp3--sansa--440-IIs)

tracks worked on in this vlog:
https://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/album/period-1

slept through the tornado

i slept through the rain - you could tell it was coming down, certainly. and, i'm a bit north of it's path. enough that i don't expect to see any damage.

it's a little unnerving, though.

www.cbc.ca/news/canada/windsor/tornado-windsor-lasalle-1.3734826

i'll be damned.

http://www.faradaytents.com/

listening is moving slower than i'd like (as always....story of my life....), but i just want to update that i am 100% certain at this point about what is happening with the distorted audio. there's no longer any ambiguity at all whatsoever.

for some reason, the cord in this specific pair of headphones is picking up a charge. it's very easily grounded - all i have to do is touch the tips. but, it's audible, too. because i'm just that type of audio nerd...

the issue, of course, is not persistent. it will sometimes stop, which is why i had so many false positives. i'm still going to need to do a lot of testing to figure out exactly what it is that is creating the field and whether certain pieces of equipment are acting as catalysts or not.

but, the basic reality that i'm living in some kind of magnet is now beyond question. what i'm going to do about it is a little less clear.

i'm opting strongly for building a tent to place around the recording space.

09. the summer of final reconstructions, pt 2 (inri012-inri013 + listening over distractions) (dvd 9)

20/21/22-08-2016: struggling to listen (mp3--sansa--449s/440-IIs) amidst insomnia and catastrophe

tracks worked on in this vlog:
https://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/album/period-1