OTRSS/Log/2003g

October Surprises

Start Off With Non-Technical Stuff

* Look up Heritage Irish Crystal and Michael Kennedy Ceramics.
* Look up Bradford Flowering Pear. See if any apple-peach-plum-pear trees are deer resistant. And crabapples. And rose family fruit trees that might grow here. Or ask Ginny.
* And access KRAPP'S LAST TAPE.

Wednesday 1 October, home.

Got a call from Dr Jim Bui early morning. no odd results on heart monitor thangy, nothing abnormal. [Scans prove: NOTHING IN MY HEAD! and NOTHING IN MY HEART!] So I'll be referred to cardiologists and they'll try to figure out what to do next. If anything. Maybe nanobots will rebuild me. Right.

And I'll be scheduled for a butt-cam session early in December - excuse me, sigmoidoscopy. [You can always tell if there's old folks around, they talk about their butts.]

Then down to Jackson for the usual - I've finally been able to walk around town again - milder weather, but more clouds would be welcome, softer light, less glare. Limber-up my shutter finger, exercise my eyes, stretch my gait. Woo-woo.

Yesterday we stomped around down the hill from the trailer park, I got pictures of old machinery. An interesting junked car down there that I snapped, a French car with the model name Lysée (it's a Simca) but a websearch turns up no car model named Lysée - hmmm.

Thursday 2 October, home.

TODAY: I'll try to putter about as much as possible. Tomorrow, Friday, will be Maureen's PT and Gym and I'll try to skip on the Jackson run.

Meanwhile we're slowly getting our stuff together for our journeying - the current fantasy is, we might actually get to go travelling during the month of November. And since I'll be taking shortwave radios etc I'll probably want to dig up a 2004 edition of WRTH or PASSPORT TO WORLD-BAND RADIO.

I heard an interview with Sting today, his new album has among other things a song about a psychic car thief. That inspires the idea of writing song-cycles about psychic miscreants, who steal things, do bad things, and feel the psychic lives of the victims, owners, etc. Yeah, songs about various psychics and psychos with specialized obsessions.

And it wouldn't hurt to start recording my songs, and also to start burning CDs of my dictated tapes and our rather large cassette collection.

If you procrastinate long enough, you'll never run out of things to do, and you'll always have a reason to live. —Anon.

FOCUS: To focus attention on that I'll have to focus less attention on this politics shit. Luckily the California election is in just a week, Then I can stop thinking about that. Yah sure. Oh yeah, we gotta mail in our absentee ballots, make sure we're counted.

On a totally different subject: check the CD topos for the Sierra passes, look at 3D renderings. We want to be sure to take along the map CDs when we're traveling in November and beyond - who knows where we might go? Before then I should find out if the Goliath Toshiba will overtax the power invertor in the RV. So a new invertor might be on the GET list.

Besides all the TO-DO stuff for around here. Well after this weekend the trailer should be gone so at least there'll be a sheltered place to park the car when we're out traveling. We're thinking of various ways to have a shelter over the back porch, we want it as cheap and optimal as possible.

DREAMS: On a totally different subject, I wonder if I should start writing down the subjects of my dreams, my focused dreams? With everything else that's going on I don't know if I really have time to do that. Ah time, it'd be nice to do something vacation-ish where we just go somewhere and plop, relax, like we've done briefly in the past. Like those camping trips pre-RV - with the RV it's too easy to keep going down the road. On those earlier trips like up to Medicine Lake with rattlesnake-bitten Valkyrie, where we had to stop in several days in one place. I look forward to that kind of sojurn.

Friday morning, 3 October 2003, home.

Note on the car: it's a Simca Aronde Elysée. I guess the first E broke off. A bit of googling doesn't reveal any hot interest in collecting same, so I guess I can just ignore it now. Or not. Nearby is a cart, a WestCoaster made in Stockton. It's a shame that this old iron is just sitting there, deteriorating.

Time to prioritize future travels. It looks like we might get November free, so we'll check the long-range forecasts and flip a coin - warm heads, north to Washington etc; cold tails, south to Canyonlands etc; and if the coin rolls away, explore the Death Valley area, it's nice and close, won't take much gas. Maybe ooze our way down towards Joshua Tree and Anza-Borracho too. Quien focking sabe.

Saturday 4 October 2003, home.

A pleasant day, weatherwise and eventwise. All early morning, surf and research hardware. Then a nap, and as we're about to take off we find the Airfloat's purchasers busily changing its tires. Tomorrow is the big day!

Later morning, we're off to West Point for the Lumberjack Days community festival, including a menacing street fair, limited car show, bizarre parade. Street fair: some crafts and crap, lots of toy (and real) knives and guns. Car show: a couple dozen highly-polished jalopies and street rods. Parade: the transsexual lawnchair drill team singing a medly from WIZARD OF OZ; the CAPTAIN HOOK pirate ship float dragging an alligator; the oldtimers having a gunfight in the street; etc. We can definitely tell we're not in Sonoma-Marin any more. (Note: West Point is a rough place known for rowdies-pobrecitos and drug labs. But it'll be gentrified, slowly...)

Then a slow spin downhill thru Sandy Gulch, Glencoe, Mokelumne Hell, Paloma, Campo Seco, Buena Vista (missed the turn to Pardee Dam, cut across and arm of Camanche instead), Ione, Martel. A bit of business in Jackson, then slowly climbing past Jackson Butte, Clinton, Mt Zion - Lake Tabeaud [TABOO!], Pine Grove and on home. No hu-hu.

Sunday 5 Oct 2003, home.

Busy day. DL'd Nick Drake music all night (next night too), got up just as Airfloat buyers and workers arrived. After much grunting & groaning & gearshifting, it was gone. The excavator did some more land sculpting, then we finished cleaning up and hosted the abuelitas for dinner. I didn't have to cook tonight. Pleasant. In the morning I'll see if the money's in the account. But we need loads of gravel, stat.

Meanwhile: research DIGITAL INFRARED and DIGITAL ULTRAVIOLET and DIGITAL FALSE.COLOR and DIGITAL LOMOGRAPHY DIGITAL SPYCAM etc. Shall I also be looking for (electro-)optical image enhancers? Just how much nifty cheap hardware is enough?

Monday 6 October 2003, Ridge Road Nursery.

Ah, a hot day but not hot enough for swimming. Did more camera research this morning, then down to Jackson for the usual and a bit of strolling around town acquiring images and stuff. And then the important stuff: CAST OUR DAMN ABSENTEE BALLOTS.

Now we're heading back uphill, we stopped at the nursery to see what to do with all the new exposed ground, after Jason's tractor work yesterday. Mulch and humous (not hummus) and grasses and wildflowers that the deer won't devour. And holly for the berm around the propane tank. And yada yada.

That evening, back home: Getting engrossed in searching for infrared filters, wideangle and telephoto adaptors, other goodies to tack onto the new cameras. Another fun obsession, hunting down this stuff. Too bad Spiratone is out of business.

But things are moving right along. Got a mandolin gig-bag today. Yippee.

Post-Election Blues

Wednesday 8 October 2003, home.

Sunday: Hauled the trailer away.
Monday: Drove down to Jackson, etc.
Tuesday: The guy from Cousin Gary's came out to see about what work is next for the house. Then there was that lousy election.
Tues.nite & Wed.morn: Got online, ordered cameras & batteries & memory - spent 1/3 of the trailer $$$. Now need a web belt to haul gadgets around.

Wednesday midday: To Kaiser-Roseville for a cardiology consult with Dr.Pham. Nothing definitive; she'll order an echocardiogram, a sonogram of my heart, sometime soonish, see if there's any damage. Otherwise, a nice day. Now, dash back to Jackson.

Wednesday evening, home: So. Got back to Jackson from Roseville via Ione with no automotive mishaps, and I dropped off Maureen at PT / exercise. And right there at the entrance to the Amador Medical mini-gym is a woman with two unusual large housecats in harnesses and leashes. They are Bengal Cats, she says. Gorgeous mellow animals. And she extolls them at some great length. She breeds and sells them. Rather pricey for Jackson?

I sashayed downtown Jackson stealthily snapping pictures and running a minidisc recorder, catching ambient sounds that later disappeared. That woman in the antique shop talking about how her pet pig kept attacking her dog, and her cat attacked the dog and the pig. Turning to me, waving her arms to demonstrate the action. Hmm.

I drove and observed. Stopped out past Jackson Gate, saw a vividly grafitti'd small shack, went over to take pictures, also snapped the adjacent rock-gravel-cement yard. As I walked over a big guy angrily approached from the rockery, asking who I was, why don't I answer? I said I was deaf, was just taking pictures of the shack. He said, "I'd like to get that fucking Mexican who did that!" I thought of asking him if maybe a Salvadorean was to blame. But discretion is the better part.

So we're back home and we just consumed a pizza; and finally the gravel guy called and he says he'll be out tomorrow to check-out the scene, estimate the costs, and maybe we'll have some new gravel next week. Hopefully it won't rain before then, turn all this loose clay dirt into gluey impenetrable mud.

Sunday 12 October 2003, home. A recap:

Thursday I ordered a Panasonic DVD copier, it'll work much faster than channeling videos thru the computer, and with its Firewire link I should still be able to use it as an audio-video interface. Bummer: the gravel guy didn't show, and we had skipped a Drama Class show to wait for him. Kittra got 1st prize, and we missed that. Bummer.

Friday we went to Jackson for the usual. Spilled busloads of tourists (probably a casino flock) and swarms of bikers roaring thru town, busier than the usual Friday. I went to Manny's for veggies - haven't seen Manny around for awhile - heard someone ask how he was - turns out he has cancer and is not doing well. Bummer. Is there anything useful we can do?

Saturday was a big day. We rolled into Volcano for the annual Firehouse Chili Cook-Off. Ate many differnt kinds of chilis. (Maureen sez my own is better than any of those. MORE BEANS!) It was all a benefit for Amador County firefighters. Then continued down to Sutter Creek for the Jug Band Festival. Well, the jug bands we heard weren't really very good, and they weren't in a very good location, and they didn't have much of an audience, and it wasn't very much of a festival. But we had fun strolling around quaint old Sutter Creek.

Sunday we shoveled a little dirt, getting ready for some gravel to dump on it. (And the gravel guy finally called back, sez he'll be over tomorrow evening.) Otherwise we're taking it easy, moving things around. Oh yeah, yesterday in Volcano we bought a big painting of Navaho women balancing Acoma pots on their heads. A gorgeous painting, and really inexpensive. So we've been pushing things around in the Great Room again, trying to best show what we have. I think we're attaining some success there.

Soundings: The last few times I walked thru Jackson and Sutter Creek I had the minidisc recorder running, trying to capture town sounds. But somehow only the last occurance is actually recorded, the prior tracks get overlaid. That shouldn't be happening. And having the little lapel mike clipped to a cargo-pants pocket doesn't work too well, picks up too much clothes-rustling noise. Have to devise a better recording technique, because I *do* want to capture ambient sounds, sounds of where we are when we go traveling. Gotta work on that.

Time Marches On

Thursday 16 October 2003, walking up the ridge.

M's at home painting the living room and waiting for the gravel guy to show up. I'm doing the stroll. She's been getting her exercise and I haven't, so now is a good time - a gorgeous day, nice temperature, too cloudless but otherwise superb. I've been rather consumed lately by what passes for photography, so I thought I'd whip out some hotly spontaneous and hastily-considered meditations: THOUGHTS ON PHOTOGRAPHY.

PHOTO-PENSEÉS: click here

Sunday 19 October 2003, home.

Yesterday we crazed & lazed about til noon, then drove to the Ridge Road garden center for mulch and seed. Will rototill Real Soon Now. Then took a pleasent spin upcountry, Bear Creek Lake via Spur 9 to Mok River past grand vistas and autumnal Sierra color and rocks.

Back home, we opened UPS'd packages - laptop memory and M's camera (Sony P10) arrived fine, but box for my camera (Sony V1) contained no camera! Just a non-Sony power supply with bare wires, USB cable, software CD and manuals (for V1 and U60). Called Frys immediately, they apologized and said they'd ship a real camera immediately. Sure hope so...

Today we spread mulch. Or do we? (No, not really.)
Tomorrow we take it easy. Or do we? (Yeah, sorta.)
Then we hide out from all those damn flying saucers.

Wednesday 22 October 2003, home.

Yesterday we had early excitement as Kaiser called to cancel and reschedule my heart appointment. We eventually awoke, drove to Kaiser-Roseville for Maureen's medical date, then cruised around greater Sacramento (an oxymoron) looking for electronics and gifts.and wines and warp drives.

Certain goals were met. Others were not. So it goes. Almost like real life, eh? But unlike TV or politics or religion or other entertainments. I need to write on that: REAL LIFE FOR TOTAL MORONS. A handy guide to reality. Reality is whatever bites your ass. If it hurts, it's probably real. Entertainment can be real too, if it hurts enough.

Today we take it easy. Or do we? (Yeah, where possible.)
Tomorrow we spread mulch. Or do we? (It could happen.)
Then there's another mad dash to Jackson & Sac. Tedious.

Thursday 23 October 2003, home.

Got an email from CostCo this morning, they're shipping the DVD copier. Today is the 23rd. I ordered it on the 9th. That was TWO WEEKS AGO!!! What focking century do these drones inhabit, that they sit on an online order for TWO WEEKS!?!?!? That's my first and last bit of business with CostCo Online. Focking morons...

Other than that it was a beautiful day, except for having to struggle with the Monorail, trying to reinstall Win95 and Win98 and new drivers because it stopped recognizing the LPT-port scanner. I *DO* have some images to scan and that's the only hardware left that supports the beast. Oh yeah, we also spread mulch and extracted our alien implants, nothing important. No story here. Look somewhere else.

Friday 24 October 2003, home.

Struggle with Monorail again all night, crash late, jump up early for dash to Jackson (Physical Therapy) and Kaiser-Sacramento (Echocardiogram). Maybe I can get a copy of the videotape and use the imagery creatively. Maybe monekys will fly out my ass. Maybe not.

Otherwise, a hot day. Zip around festering Sac, snap pix from the car window, sweat like an atypical pig, head for home thru thick air. Will this sweltering summer ever end? Why do humans sweat while pigs don't? Why insult the pigs?

Arrive home to find two boxes on the porch: the actual Sony DSC-V1 camera (it works) and the Canon S9000 printer (aint't tried it yet). Cheapass Canon Corp doesn't supply a USB cable. Cheapass corporate retards. (grumble grumble) And some cables cost more than the printers. At least Fry's came thru with the camera.

Arguing on the InterNet is like being in the Special Olympics. Even if you win, you're still a retard. —Anon.

Almost Hallowe'en

Wednesday 29 October 2003, on the ridge.

The day before the day before Hallowe'en, walking up the ridge. Actually walking up from home to the Simca to look for its chassis number.

Another ordinary day down to Jackson, the usual. It's cooling off a bit now, still the air was pretty warm and cruddy and almost industrial / commercial down there, like bad zoning or Hell's higher classier suburbs but with the usual cast of characters.

This focking hot season is SUPPOSED to break tomorrow, we SHOULD have rain, and it SHOULD get cold, and we SHOULD feel better. That'll certainly make for better walking, breathing, photography, sex, etc. When it happens. If it happens. MAKE IT HAPPEN!

Relieve us of the humiliations of the weather. —Lord Casey

Tomorrow will be another focking miserable exhausting 300-mile dash down to focking suburban Novato, a day I don't look forward to but what the hell, it's necessary medically and financially, if not emotionally.

I am now at the Simca, the serial number is: 674765. It's an Aronde Simca, bla bla, made in Francey, type 90A. 1300 kg total weight, doesn't give the engine size. The engine is literally a rat's nest - take pictures of this, in normal light and infrared.

And when I get home, experiment will all that infrared and posterization crap. So many new features on the Sony DSC-V1. So many errors to make.

Thursday 30 October 2003, at home.

The day before Hallowe'en. A long hard slog down to Novato thru Sacramento and all. It got cold in Novato. From there over to Emeryville, another slog. Around and around in Ikea, didn't find all we were looking for. A really hard slog back from Ikea. We get home and the DVD burner and computer memory have arrived, sitting in boxes on the front porch, so all is not lost.

Friday 31 October 2003, at home.

Hallowe'en morning. A couple days ago it was still pretty hot. But today we have snow on the ground at six in the morning, temperature in the 30s. No, not a dusting of snow, a layer of hail. But I didn't hear anything during the night. Not surprising.

More Stuff I Still Ain't Done Yet

Ongoing To-Do List

Look for one-ear headsets for our AudioVox walky-talkies. Research musical chorusers for voice and guitars. A pickup for the mandolin? Put network card in Monorail, integrate into network, reinstall scanner. Order shelf cabinets from Ikea. Find online granola supplier. Answer email. Process and post DSRB+ scans. Plus everything else I ain't done yet.

Put excess memory (Sony and Toshiba), unused electronics, and Mobility E1000 docking station on eBay - help pay for some of the newer goodies. Hmm, can I ship these out by the end of the month, so we can leave?

Upload the CALICO PRINT covers and other DRSB material - upload. Print some Guatemala pictures. Check web for a powered antenna for the Ericsson cellphone. And get a hearing aid. And my own cheap domain.

Get bicycles ready; setup TV & audio in the media room; find the passive antenna tuner. Arrange remaining gear & power supplies for the (probable November) extended trip and beyond; gather all manuals & hookups, make sure it all works.

Transcribed Notes: Might Escape, Briefly	<< BACK << (( INDEX )) >> NEXT >> CONTENTS NOTES: transcribed October Surprises Post-Election Blues Time Marches On PHOTO-PENSEÉS Almost Hallowe'en Ongoing To-Do List THEMES: songs 2 Close 2 Far Do The Worm You Just Have To FINDINGS: thoughts LISTINGS: stuff ACCOUNTS JOURNALS index Guatemala Journal Eat It! Food News Go2: Odd Moves Ridge Rat News River Rat News Desert Rat News Recall/Candidates Recall/TheBabes SkeptiLog: Sightings (Note: click all images) THEMES 2 CLOSE 2 FAR There's a buncha people smokin' out in front of the bar There's a buncha people smokin' out in front of the bar They don't look at me as I drive by in my car I don't drive too fast and I don't drive too far And I don't look too far ahead ... DO THE WORM Ya crawl around here, ya crawl around there Ya crawl on yer belly damn near everywhere [chorus:] Ya do the WORM [wavy sound] [4 times] [instrumental] ... YOU JUST HAVE TO You don't have to tell me that you're so sad You don't have to tell me that I'm so bad You don't have to act as if you've gone mad You just have to take your clothes off You just have to take your clothes off You just have to take your clothes off ... FINDINGS Was Condoleeza Rice given control of Iraq so that when the oil tanker named after her makes port, crews know to load it first? "It's not who votes that counts, but who counts the votes." --Josef Stalin Do you know who counts your votes? Do you care? We have argued a bit about the current administration, about how best to describe Dubya et al. We have compromised on "lying sacks of shit." We both think this is a fair assessment. Tomorrow is another day. And then another. And another. And another, "It's turtles all the way down." Don't get fooled again. One Nation, Under Surveillance Like religion or other demagogueries, PostModernism collapses under the weight of its lies and bullshit. As if anyone notices or cares... Is Craig's List better than eBay or just smaller? Why? LISTINGS Camera Stuff To Get * light sturdy tripod: Hakuba MAXi-343E * remote control cable: Sony RM-VD1 * IR Filter: Hoya 72 or Wratten 89A * neutral density filters * ~~filter adaptor rings~~ * wide-angle lens adaptor * ~~cheap external flash~~ * some cheezy spycam? (Too bad I gave away the old gear when I gave up chemical photography) Definitions: * Intellectual: doesn't watch TV * Anti-Intellectual: does watch TV * Bright: atheist * Dim: believer * Woody: sexual (male) * Ready: sexual (female) * Greeny: sexual (vegan) * Right: might * Might: right * Reciprocating: taking Cipro again Musics: * Gonzo Chip Music * neuton plattenspieler * All Music Guide * DNA Genoma Music * Church of Coltrane * Ishkur's ElectroMusic * MIT/EigenRadio * Streaming Techno * MonstroMultiMedia * HighVoltage SIDs Regurgitations: gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak gak
October Surprises Start Off With Non-Technical Stuff * Look up Heritage Irish Crystal and Michael Kennedy Ceramics. * Look up Bradford Flowering Pear. See if any apple-peach-plum-pear trees are deer resistant. And crabapples. And rose family fruit trees that might grow here. Or ask Ginny. * And access KRAPP'S LAST TAPE. Wednesday 1 October, home. Got a call from Dr Jim Bui early morning. no odd results on heart monitor thangy, nothing abnormal. [Scans prove: NOTHING IN MY HEAD! and NOTHING IN MY HEART!] So I'll be referred to cardiologists and they'll try to figure out what to do next. If anything. Maybe nanobots will rebuild me. Right. And I'll be scheduled for a butt-cam session early in December - excuse me, sigmoidoscopy. [You can always tell if there's old folks around, they talk about their butts.] Then down to Jackson for the usual - I've finally been able to walk around town again - milder weather, but more clouds would be welcome, softer light, less glare. Limber-up my shutter finger, exercise my eyes, stretch my gait. Woo-woo. Yesterday we stomped around down the hill from the trailer park, I got pictures of old machinery. An interesting junked car down there that I snapped, a French car with the model name Lysée (it's a Simca) but a websearch turns up no car model named Lysée - hmmm. Thursday 2 October, home. TODAY: I'll try to putter about as much as possible. Tomorrow, Friday, will be Maureen's PT and Gym and I'll try to skip on the Jackson run. Meanwhile we're slowly getting our stuff together for our journeying - the current fantasy is, we might actually get to go travelling during the month of November. And since I'll be taking shortwave radios etc I'll probably want to dig up a 2004 edition of WRTH or PASSPORT TO WORLD-BAND RADIO. I heard an interview with Sting today, his new album has among other things a song about a psychic car thief. That inspires the idea of writing song-cycles about psychic miscreants, who steal things, do bad things, and feel the psychic lives of the victims, owners, etc. Yeah, songs about various psychics and psychos with specialized obsessions. And it wouldn't hurt to start recording my songs, and also to start burning CDs of my dictated tapes and our rather large cassette collection. If you procrastinate long enough, you'll never run out of things to do, and you'll always have a reason to live. —Anon. FOCUS: To focus attention on that I'll have to focus less attention on this politics shit. Luckily the California election is in just a week, Then I can stop thinking about that. Yah sure. Oh yeah, we gotta mail in our absentee ballots, make sure we're counted. On a totally different subject: check the CD topos for the Sierra passes, look at 3D renderings. We want to be sure to take along the map CDs when we're traveling in November and beyond - who knows where we might go? Before then I should find out if the Goliath Toshiba will overtax the power invertor in the RV. So a new invertor might be on the GET list. Besides all the TO-DO stuff for around here. Well after this weekend the trailer should be gone so at least there'll be a sheltered place to park the car when we're out traveling. We're thinking of various ways to have a shelter over the back porch, we want it as cheap and optimal as possible. DREAMS: On a totally different subject, I wonder if I should start writing down the subjects of my dreams, my focused dreams? With everything else that's going on I don't know if I really have time to do that. Ah time, it'd be nice to do something vacation-ish where we just go somewhere and plop, relax, like we've done briefly in the past. Like those camping trips pre-RV - with the RV it's too easy to keep going down the road. On those earlier trips like up to Medicine Lake with rattlesnake-bitten Valkyrie, where we had to stop in several days in one place. I look forward to that kind of sojurn. Friday morning, 3 October 2003, home. Note on the car: it's a Simca Aronde Elysée. I guess the first E broke off. A bit of googling doesn't reveal any hot interest in collecting same, so I guess I can just ignore it now. Or not. Nearby is a cart, a WestCoaster made in Stockton. It's a shame that this old iron is just sitting there, deteriorating. Time to prioritize future travels. It looks like we might get November free, so we'll check the long-range forecasts and flip a coin - warm heads, north to Washington etc; cold tails, south to Canyonlands etc; and if the coin rolls away, explore the Death Valley area, it's nice and close, won't take much gas. Maybe ooze our way down towards Joshua Tree and Anza-Borracho too. Quien focking sabe. Saturday 4 October 2003, home. A pleasant day, weatherwise and eventwise. All early morning, surf and research hardware. Then a nap, and as we're about to take off we find the Airfloat's purchasers busily changing its tires. Tomorrow is the big day! Later morning, we're off to West Point for the Lumberjack Days community festival, including a menacing street fair, limited car show, bizarre parade. Street fair: some crafts and crap, lots of toy (and real) knives and guns. Car show: a couple dozen highly-polished jalopies and street rods. Parade: the transsexual lawnchair drill team singing a medly from WIZARD OF OZ; the CAPTAIN HOOK pirate ship float dragging an alligator; the oldtimers having a gunfight in the street; etc. We can definitely tell we're not in Sonoma-Marin any more. (Note: West Point is a rough place known for rowdies-pobrecitos and drug labs. But it'll be gentrified, slowly...) Then a slow spin downhill thru Sandy Gulch, Glencoe, Mokelumne Hell, Paloma, Campo Seco, Buena Vista (missed the turn to Pardee Dam, cut across and arm of Camanche instead), Ione, Martel. A bit of business in Jackson, then slowly climbing past Jackson Butte, Clinton, Mt Zion - Lake Tabeaud [TABOO!], Pine Grove and on home. No hu-hu. Sunday 5 Oct 2003, home. Busy day. DL'd Nick Drake music all night (next night too), got up just as Airfloat buyers and workers arrived. After much grunting & groaning & gearshifting, it was gone. The excavator did some more land sculpting, then we finished cleaning up and hosted the abuelitas for dinner. I didn't have to cook tonight. Pleasant. In the morning I'll see if the money's in the account. But we need loads of gravel, stat. Meanwhile: research DIGITAL INFRARED and DIGITAL ULTRAVIOLET and DIGITAL FALSE.COLOR and DIGITAL LOMOGRAPHY DIGITAL SPYCAM etc. Shall I also be looking for (electro-)optical image enhancers? Just how much nifty cheap hardware is enough? Monday 6 October 2003, Ridge Road Nursery. Ah, a hot day but not hot enough for swimming. Did more camera research this morning, then down to Jackson for the usual and a bit of strolling around town acquiring images and stuff. And then the important stuff: CAST OUR DAMN ABSENTEE BALLOTS. Now we're heading back uphill, we stopped at the nursery to see what to do with all the new exposed ground, after Jason's tractor work yesterday. Mulch and humous (not hummus) and grasses and wildflowers that the deer won't devour. And holly for the berm around the propane tank. And yada yada. That evening, back home: Getting engrossed in searching for infrared filters, wideangle and telephoto adaptors, other goodies to tack onto the new cameras. Another fun obsession, hunting down this stuff. Too bad Spiratone is out of business. But things are moving right along. Got a mandolin gig-bag today. Yippee.
Post-Election Blues Wednesday 8 October 2003, home. Sunday: Hauled the trailer away. Monday: Drove down to Jackson, etc. Tuesday: The guy from Cousin Gary's came out to see about what work is next for the house. Then there was that lousy election. Tues.nite & Wed.morn: Got online, ordered cameras & batteries & memory - spent 1/3 of the trailer $$$. Now need a web belt to haul gadgets around. Wednesday midday: To Kaiser-Roseville for a cardiology consult with Dr.Pham. Nothing definitive; she'll order an echocardiogram, a sonogram of my heart, sometime soonish, see if there's any damage. Otherwise, a nice day. Now, dash back to Jackson. Wednesday evening, home: So. Got back to Jackson from Roseville via Ione with no automotive mishaps, and I dropped off Maureen at PT / exercise. And right there at the entrance to the Amador Medical mini-gym is a woman with two unusual large housecats in harnesses and leashes. They are Bengal Cats, she says. Gorgeous mellow animals. And she extolls them at some great length. She breeds and sells them. Rather pricey for Jackson? I sashayed downtown Jackson stealthily snapping pictures and running a minidisc recorder, catching ambient sounds that later disappeared. That woman in the antique shop talking about how her pet pig kept attacking her dog, and her cat attacked the dog and the pig. Turning to me, waving her arms to demonstrate the action. Hmm. I drove and observed. Stopped out past Jackson Gate, saw a vividly grafitti'd small shack, went over to take pictures, also snapped the adjacent rock-gravel-cement yard. As I walked over a big guy angrily approached from the rockery, asking who I was, why don't I answer? I said I was deaf, was just taking pictures of the shack. He said, "I'd like to get that fucking Mexican who did that!" I thought of asking him if maybe a Salvadorean was to blame. But discretion is the better part. So we're back home and we just consumed a pizza; and finally the gravel guy called and he says he'll be out tomorrow to check-out the scene, estimate the costs, and maybe we'll have some new gravel next week. Hopefully it won't rain before then, turn all this loose clay dirt into gluey impenetrable mud. Sunday 12 October 2003, home. A recap: Thursday I ordered a Panasonic DVD copier, it'll work much faster than channeling videos thru the computer, and with its Firewire link I should still be able to use it as an audio-video interface. Bummer: the gravel guy didn't show, and we had skipped a Drama Class show to wait for him. Kittra got 1st prize, and we missed that. Bummer. Friday we went to Jackson for the usual. Spilled busloads of tourists (probably a casino flock) and swarms of bikers roaring thru town, busier than the usual Friday. I went to Manny's for veggies - haven't seen Manny around for awhile - heard someone ask how he was - turns out he has cancer and is not doing well. Bummer. Is there anything useful we can do? Saturday was a big day. We rolled into Volcano for the annual Firehouse Chili Cook-Off. Ate many differnt kinds of chilis. (Maureen sez my own is better than any of those. MORE BEANS!) It was all a benefit for Amador County firefighters. Then continued down to Sutter Creek for the Jug Band Festival. Well, the jug bands we heard weren't really very good, and they weren't in a very good location, and they didn't have much of an audience, and it wasn't very much of a festival. But we had fun strolling around quaint old Sutter Creek. Sunday we shoveled a little dirt, getting ready for some gravel to dump on it. (And the gravel guy finally called back, sez he'll be over tomorrow evening.) Otherwise we're taking it easy, moving things around. Oh yeah, yesterday in Volcano we bought a big painting of Navaho women balancing Acoma pots on their heads. A gorgeous painting, and really inexpensive. So we've been pushing things around in the Great Room again, trying to best show what we have. I think we're attaining some success there. Soundings: The last few times I walked thru Jackson and Sutter Creek I had the minidisc recorder running, trying to capture town sounds. But somehow only the last occurance is actually recorded, the prior tracks get overlaid. That shouldn't be happening. And having the little lapel mike clipped to a cargo-pants pocket doesn't work too well, picks up too much clothes-rustling noise. Have to devise a better recording technique, because I do want to capture ambient sounds, sounds of where we are when we go traveling. Gotta work on that.
Time Marches On Thursday 16 October 2003, walking up the ridge. M's at home painting the living room and waiting for the gravel guy to show up. I'm doing the stroll. She's been getting her exercise and I haven't, so now is a good time - a gorgeous day, nice temperature, too cloudless but otherwise superb. I've been rather consumed lately by what passes for photography, so I thought I'd whip out some hotly spontaneous and hastily-considered meditations: THOUGHTS ON PHOTOGRAPHY. PHOTO-PENSEÉS: click here Sunday 19 October 2003, home. Yesterday we crazed & lazed about til noon, then drove to the Ridge Road garden center for mulch and seed. Will rototill Real Soon Now. Then took a pleasent spin upcountry, Bear Creek Lake via Spur 9 to Mok River past grand vistas and autumnal Sierra color and rocks. Back home, we opened UPS'd packages - laptop memory and M's camera (Sony P10) arrived fine, but box for my camera (Sony V1) contained no camera! Just a non-Sony power supply with bare wires, USB cable, software CD and manuals (for V1 and U60). Called Frys immediately, they apologized and said they'd ship a real camera immediately. Sure hope so... Today we spread mulch. Or do we? (No, not really.) Tomorrow we take it easy. Or do we? (Yeah, sorta.) Then we hide out from all those damn flying saucers. Wednesday 22 October 2003, home. Yesterday we had early excitement as Kaiser called to cancel and reschedule my heart appointment. We eventually awoke, drove to Kaiser-Roseville for Maureen's medical date, then cruised around greater Sacramento (an oxymoron) looking for electronics and gifts.and wines and warp drives. Certain goals were met. Others were not. So it goes. Almost like real life, eh? But unlike TV or politics or religion or other entertainments. I need to write on that: REAL LIFE FOR TOTAL MORONS. A handy guide to reality. Reality is whatever bites your ass. If it hurts, it's probably real. Entertainment can be real too, if it hurts enough. Today we take it easy. Or do we? (Yeah, where possible.) Tomorrow we spread mulch. Or do we? (It could happen.) Then there's another mad dash to Jackson & Sac. Tedious. Thursday 23 October 2003, home. Got an email from CostCo this morning, they're shipping the DVD copier. Today is the 23rd. I ordered it on the 9th. That was TWO WEEKS AGO!!! What focking century do these drones inhabit, that they sit on an online order for TWO WEEKS!?!?!? That's my first and last bit of business with CostCo Online. Focking morons... Other than that it was a beautiful day, except for having to struggle with the Monorail, trying to reinstall Win95 and Win98 and new drivers because it stopped recognizing the LPT-port scanner. I DO have some images to scan and that's the only hardware left that supports the beast. Oh yeah, we also spread mulch and extracted our alien implants, nothing important. No story here. Look somewhere else. Friday 24 October 2003, home. Struggle with Monorail again all night, crash late, jump up early for dash to Jackson (Physical Therapy) and Kaiser-Sacramento (Echocardiogram). Maybe I can get a copy of the videotape and use the imagery creatively. Maybe monekys will fly out my ass. Maybe not. Otherwise, a hot day. Zip around festering Sac, snap pix from the car window, sweat like an atypical pig, head for home thru thick air. Will this sweltering summer ever end? Why do humans sweat while pigs don't? Why insult the pigs? Arrive home to find two boxes on the porch: the actual Sony DSC-V1 camera (it works) and the Canon S9000 printer (aint't tried it yet). Cheapass Canon Corp doesn't supply a USB cable. Cheapass corporate retards. (grumble grumble) And some cables cost more than the printers. At least Fry's came thru with the camera. Arguing on the InterNet is like being in the Special Olympics. Even if you win, you're still a retard. —Anon.
Almost Hallowe'en Wednesday 29 October 2003, on the ridge. The day before the day before Hallowe'en, walking up the ridge. Actually walking up from home to the Simca to look for its chassis number. Another ordinary day down to Jackson, the usual. It's cooling off a bit now, still the air was pretty warm and cruddy and almost industrial / commercial down there, like bad zoning or Hell's higher classier suburbs but with the usual cast of characters. This focking hot season is SUPPOSED to break tomorrow, we SHOULD have rain, and it SHOULD get cold, and we SHOULD feel better. That'll certainly make for better walking, breathing, photography, sex, etc. When it happens. If it happens. MAKE IT HAPPEN! Relieve us of the humiliations of the weather. —Lord Casey Tomorrow will be another focking miserable exhausting 300-mile dash down to focking suburban Novato, a day I don't look forward to but what the hell, it's necessary medically and financially, if not emotionally. I am now at the Simca, the serial number is: 674765. It's an Aronde Simca, bla bla, made in Francey, type 90A. 1300 kg total weight, doesn't give the engine size. The engine is literally a rat's nest - take pictures of this, in normal light and infrared. And when I get home, experiment will all that infrared and posterization crap. So many new features on the Sony DSC-V1. So many errors to make. Thursday 30 October 2003, at home. The day before Hallowe'en. A long hard slog down to Novato thru Sacramento and all. It got cold in Novato. From there over to Emeryville, another slog. Around and around in Ikea, didn't find all we were looking for. A really hard slog back from Ikea. We get home and the DVD burner and computer memory have arrived, sitting in boxes on the front porch, so all is not lost. Friday 31 October 2003, at home. Hallowe'en morning. A couple days ago it was still pretty hot. But today we have snow on the ground at six in the morning, temperature in the 30s. No, not a dusting of snow, a layer of hail. But I didn't hear anything during the night. Not surprising.	# DAILIES # * Sun 12 Oct: Telepathic giant squids all around. * Mon 13 Oct: Jackson: PT, Lomography, beer * Tues 14 Oct: Shovelwork; gravel soon; fix car. * Wed 15 Oct: Abducted by UFO; dumped later. * Thur 16 Oct: Gravel and gemstones poured out. * Fri 17 Oct: Gravel is spread; Lomo detected. * Sat 18 Oct: Lust-mulch-drive-cams-Frankenstein. * Sun 19 Oct: Open mind, spread mulch, shut mouf. * Mon 20 Oct: Tussle with hard/soft warez; Jackson. * Tues 21 Oct: Roaming Sac for relief and warez. * Wed 22 Oct: Tussle with system; M does Jackson. * Thur 23 Oct: Tussle with mulch. M does Sutter Crk. * Fri 24 Oct: Tomorrow is just around the corner. * Sat 25 Oct: All your deers are belong to us. COWABUNGA!
More Stuff I Still Ain't Done Yet Ongoing To-Do List Look for one-ear headsets for our AudioVox walky-talkies. Research musical chorusers for voice and guitars. A pickup for the mandolin? Put network card in Monorail, integrate into network, reinstall scanner. Order shelf cabinets from Ikea. Find online granola supplier. Answer email. Process and post DSRB+ scans. Plus everything else I ain't done yet. Put excess memory (Sony and Toshiba), unused electronics, and Mobility E1000 docking station on eBay - help pay for some of the newer goodies. Hmm, can I ship these out by the end of the month, so we can leave? Upload the CALICO PRINT covers and other DRSB material - upload. Print some Guatemala pictures. Check web for a powered antenna for the Ericsson cellphone. And get a hearing aid. And my own cheap domain. Get bicycles ready; setup TV & audio in the media room; find the passive antenna tuner. Arrange remaining gear & power supplies for the (probable November) extended trip and beyond; gather all manuals & hookups, make sure it all works.

Journals: 2003(8)

Transcribed Notes: Might Escape, Briefly

CONTENTS

ACCOUNTS

THEMES