We didn’t think either cat would take to the little basket thing on the side of the new cat tree, but a few days ago Jen picked Lily up and put her in it and now Lily gets into it without any prompting from us. Success!
Basket Cat
Author: robertjames1971
I'm wicked tall.
(Non) Daily Haiku for You #143
Today’s haiku for you is brought to you by fantasizing about home improvement projects.
Do we paint the house?
Do we do vinyl siding?
How ’bout the kitchen?
2024 RPM Challenge Day 2/29
What did I post on that dumb music project Tumblr account as a summary for day two of the RPM Challenge?
Day two was not as productive as day one, but I got some stuff done and I am pleased.
I put rhythm guitars onto one song and also gave that song a melody. Later in the day I added song idea number five and finished the MIDI bass and MIDI drums and gave the whole thing a complete song form.
Day three has already seen some progress, but you’ll read about that tomorrow.
Musical Meanderings
Yup. A decent haul on day two. One new song format, one song’s worth of rhythm guitars, and one vocal melody without lyrics.
Similar to yesterday, I wrote my summary of day two after I did some work on day three. I put rhythm guitars onto two songs this morning after breakfast. Hopefully I will have some more melodies and maybe a lyric or two or three at some point today. I won’t be able to do an early morning car vocals tomorrow, but I should be able to do it on Monday so I want to have a lot of stuff available to work on by then.
Pics!
To-Do Lists
I make a lot of to-do lists. I post a lot of them here. I don’t really have an issue with failing to complete everything. My issue is finishing everything in a timely manner.
How about an example? Okay. Let us say I made a list of things for today, Saturday. Hypothetically it would be a short, manageable list of achievable things. If I put my nose to the grindstone I would clear the list over the course of a day. Instead I get distracted and I procrastinate and some of the things get punted off until Sunday. The same thing happens on Sunday. I make progress, but the last item or two gets punted off to Monday morning. Then it happens again, on a smaller scale, and the last thing gets punted to Monday after work.
Everything gets completed eventually, just not on schedule. None of what I’ve written so far answers the actual question though so let me think for a second. What is something on my life’s to-do list that never gets done? I never hit a huge mega lottery. That’s been on my to-do list since I first learned what a lottery was. I haven’t completed it yet, but one of these days….
Carl Weathers
Sad to hear that Carl Weathers passed away. I first new him as Apollo Creed in the Rocky flicks. Later he was Chubbs in Happy Gilmore. Arguably the greatest sports movie of all time. Most recently he was Greef Karga in The Mandalorian. He was the guy who thought that Baby Yoda was going to eat him. ’Member that? Yeah, I ‘member.
I was looking forward to seeing more of him in that recently announced Mandalorian movie. It will be lesser without him.
Rest in peace, Carl Weathers.
Jealousy
It is 8:30pm and the cats are napping. I know it’s really early but I had a crummy night’s sleep last night and seeing the cats dozing has made me terribly jealous.
(Non) Daily Haiku for You #142
Today’s haiku for you is about our weekend plans.
Going to Vermont.
Someone’s having a birthday.
The big twenty-one!
Bertha Redux
Bellana has a plant that she named Burt. It grew from a clipping taken from her step mother’s mother’s plant. During the pandemic lockdown Burt ended up at our house for a short time. Bellana cut off a clipping and Jen and I grew a new plant with it. We named it Bertha.
Bertha was a frequent source of blog posts for a while, but I haven’t been sharing any updates lately. She’s still alive and kicking, but she’s definitely having a rough go these days. A bunch of her leaves have died, while new ones are still sprouting. If I keep her watered she does okay, but she’s so big now that we don’t really have any place to put her and I fear she’s close to the live/die tipping point.
With the goal of keeping some form of the original plant alive forever, I took two new clippings this morning. They are in Harry’s room in a glass of water sitting next to the window. Unfortunately the weather is so gloomy and awful there isn’t a lot of sunlight to be found. It should get better over the weekend. Here’s hoping the two clippings grow some new roots and I can pot them both and have two more chances of keeping the original plant alive for all time.
Wish Bertha’s kids luck.
2024 RPM Challenge Day 1/29
Every February I try to post daily RPM Challenge updates on a Tumblr page that I set up a thousand years ago and only ever use to try and track daily updates of music projects. Why? Why do I do this? Why do I even keep this Tumblr account? What the hell is wrong with me?
I find that I post to that page for a week or two and then I fall off and eventually forget all about it. It’s lame. I am lame. You could probably tell that by all the lame posts though, so I don’t expect anyone to be surprised.
Anyway, I posted the day one summary this morning even though I have already done some work on day two today. Whatever. Since I am a content whore I will quote the Tumblr post here because… ya know… reasons. I guess.
The RPM Challenge is underway once again. Will I manage to post daily updates here? Probably not. Oh well.
Day one went really well. I managed to start four songs before I punched into work for the day. Three of them were multiple riffs/changes that I noodled out on guitar. The fourth was just a bass/drum groove that I worked out on my iPhone.
After work I added bass and drum parts (MIDI) and a song form to two of the three ideas that started on guitar. I started adding bass and drums to the third but was unable to finish.
And that is my wrap up for day one. I’ve already done a little work on day two.
Musical Meanderings
There you go. There is my day one summary. I mentioned the morning stuff here yesterday but the after work stuff should be new news.
As for today? I put rhythm guitars (two guitars through two amps each for a total of four tracks) onto song idea number one. I didn’t have time to add them to song idea number two too. Maybe this evening. We’ll see.
For the Birds
I cook a lot, but I don’t cook a lot of stuff. Does that make sense? It will.
I am a meat and potatoes kinda guy. Unfortunately for my family and their diet, when I cook I cook like a meat and potatoes kinda guy. There are only a few dishes that I am competent enough to prepare without supervision. If I had to pick a favorite it would be boneless chicken breasts. In the oven, in the air fryer (that’s been my go-to since the early days of the pandemic lock down), once in a while on the gas grill outside (though that often ends in fiery destruction), and on even rarer occasions in a frying pan on the stove. I could seriously have chicken for dinner every night and not complain once.
Side dishes are a little more varied, but I get into ruts in that area too. Lately it has been instant mashed potatoes or instant stuffing (Stove Top) or maybe a canned veggie. Sometimes I get a little more elaborate and air fry some mini potatoes or a fresh veggie. For a long time (before my gastric bypass surgery) it was almost always a quinoa and stir fried vegetables thing that my wife taught me to make. My new stomach and I have a tough time with quinoa now though so if I make it I can’t eat it. Jen likes it though so I have no problem making it, and I should make it for her more often.
In the interest of mixing things up, for the last few weeks we have been using one of those internet delivery meal prep services a few nights a week. Jen signed us up for Dinnerly. So far we’ve been very happy with it. They send us a few meals on Fridays and we usually cook them together. Jen does most of the heavy work, but I help her where ever she needs. Even with the service, most of what we make is chicken. Chicken is my favorite thing to eat as well as cook. Just call me a bird brain, right?
Inside the Red Head's Head 