Author: robertjames1971

I'm wicked tall.

Air Fryer: An Obsession

I cooked lunch for me and my wife today. I cooked it in an air fryer.

I am about to start cooking dinner for me and my wife. I am going to cook it in an air fryer. I just have to wait for the dishwasher to finish so my air fryer baskets will be clean, then I’ll start on dinner.

I think I might be a little obsessed with cooking in an air fryer. Is that even a thing?

The only thing left to do (apart for wait another five minutes for that pesky dishwasher) is to decide what music to listen to while I cook dinner in an air fryer. I’ve been listening to a ton of Tsunami lately. Also a pretty healthy dose of Throwing Muses. Maybe I should drift back toward prog. I’m thinking maybe some 80’s Rush… or maybe some 90’s King Crimson? I don’t know. Let’s just see where the world takes us, m’kay?

New Years Resolutions

I don’t have any set ideas for New Years Resolutions. Just the usual stuff. Do I want to do something different this year and actually define a single resolution for the year and then stick to it (as if)? I don’t know.

Here are some possibilities…

  • Make more music both with and without the band. We’re talking about starting the band-ball rolling again in January. Please please please let it stick this time. I really miss playing in a band and I really, really don’t want to have to find a new one.
  • Listen to more music. I need to pay more attention to the musical world around me and just listen to more stuff. Old stuff, new stuff, borrowed or blue stuff. It doesn’t matter. Just listen to more stuff.
  • Experience live music again. I went to two concerts in 2024 (I think). One of them involved my daughter. The other involved Iron Maiden. I need to see more bands playing live. I missed a handful of shows that in my much younger days I would not have missed. Getting old makes this difficult but I should at least try to do better.
  • Take more photos. Digital or film, it doesn’t matter. Take more photos. Learn more about taking photos. Learn new techniques, try new things. I have a medium format camera now and I have taken exactly one photo with it. Get off your ass and take more photos.
  • Be more social. Either with family or friends. Covid is over. Deal with it. Stop living like a fucking hermit, you fucking hermit.
  • Drive to Vermont to annoy the kids more often. Heh heh heh, yeah.
  • Adopt another cat. We’ve been a two cat household for almost two years. Is it time to resolve to adopt a third? Yes. Maybe. Probably not, but yes.

That’ll do for now. I’ll think about other ideas to add over the next few days. 2025 is four days away.

Trogly’s Guitar Show Documents My Guitar (Almost)

This is a recent photo of one of my guitars:

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Here’s a photo of me playing this guitar on stage with Lizardfish on July 2, 2016.

Here’s a crazy low-res pic of me playing the guitar with Break Even at some point between 2003 and 2005.

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Here’s another one for luck. Same bar but maybe a different date? No, probably the same date. If I had to guess it was August 1, 2003 at J Rags in Tewksbury, MA. Pretty sure that was the date. It was our first gig together.

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The guitar is a 1979 Gibson ES-335 Pro that I bought off eBay in 2000 for a smidge less than $800. It was a mess when I first got it. It has no finish on the back. It’s stamped a factory second. Most important, some previous owner was a heavy, heavy smoker and it was covered in cigarette grime and sludge. I managed to clean it (mostly) and I just fell in love with it.

A few minutes ago, the Trogly’s Guitar Show posted a video to youtube of a 1979 Gibson ES-335 Pro! My guitar! Well, not my guitar but my year, make, and model! Even the same color! Awesome! Trogly’s 335 Pro was a mess too, and all the greater for it!

Crud

The Bruins and Blue Jackets were tied at one a piece after one period. It’s the first game back after the holiday break. Finally, hockey returns.

I missed the start of the second period because I was helping my wife with something in her office. When I got back to the game it was 3-1 Blue Jackets. Crud.

Three seconds after I first checked the score Columbus scored again to make it 4-1. Double crud!

In Summation

One photograph to sum up your Friday morning:

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The space heater is on and it is working hard. It is helping, but it is not actually solving the problem of me being super cold while working at my desk in the cellar. Brr, babie. Brr.

Hockey Fan Stuff

I got a couple of Boston Bruins coasters for xmas. They are glass and look like hockey pucks and they are seriously cool.

The first thing I put on the new coaster? Why it was a Boston Bruins water bottle filled with grape juice, of course.

Back to Work

It was like a three day weekend except that it happened in the middle of the week. Now it’s Friday and xmas is over and I am back at work and it sucks.

Well… sucks is probably over dramatic. I feel more like I wish I had taken today off as well and given myself a six day weekend, which would have felt more like an actual vacation. I’m off again on Wednesday for New Year’s Day, and then we’re back to normal for a few weeks until we go on Jen’s birthday trip to Florida late in January.

I planned to work in the office today, but my cold is still a thing so I am working from home. I probably won’t hit my in-the-office-quote for December now, but being sick and not wanting to spread the bug is an acceptable reason for coming up a little short. I do feel quite a bit better, but I am far from over it. Worse, I have a cold sore on my lip now. Oh good.

Okay. Time to get caught up on all of the email that came in while I was out. That should take a while. Wish me luck.

White Balance

So yeah, white balance is a thing. I thought all of the photos I took in our living room had a kind of yellowish tint to them because that’s how we have our smart lights setup. Then yesterday while snapping some xmas morning pics I switched the camera into auto mode so I wouldn’t have to think about anything and that yellowish tint was gone.

Huh… maybe it’s not the smart lights. Maybe it’s me. Maybe I don’t know jack shit about photography. I mean, I knew that already but now I had proof.

So I messed with the white balance settings on my Z5 today and wouldn’t you know it, the tint is gone.

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How do you like them apples? I guess I am ready to upgrade from a Z5 to a Z9 now, right?*

*The Nikon Z9 is for sale via the Nikon USA website at the low low price of $4,999.95. Maybe I will get two of them.