The Light of Day

Death, taxes, and nazis

I have to admit, Turbotax has made leaps and bounds in the enjoyability department since my rantings of a couple years ago. Not only didn’t they take all my money, they managed to not take all my time either. Great jaerb, guys! New York state is a little weird, though…

So, are they asking if I got paid to be persecuted by Nazis? Or paid to persecute Nazis? In either case, I don’t think this pertains to me. Yes, I’m sure there’s a serious, non-funny explanation for that one, but, like, don’t harsh my buzz, man.

Anatomy of a family, through the lens of song

In innocenter times, while my mom, dad, sister and I were on one of our summer road trips, we jointly composed “Bubbles” as a game to pass the time:

Bubbles are the
Wonderfullest
Because they’re (or “they are”)
Round and poppable
But my friend
Henry says
He hates them
Each day

The idea (I don’t know whose it was) was that one person would sing three words, then the next person would add three more words, and so on. Because I have such a clear memory of how things went down, I can now distill its components to correlate them to our individual personalities:

Mom (Sandy): “Bubbles are the…”

Mom has always been the most innocent of the four of us. She never ever uses swear words of any caliber, let alone any nasty or cynical expressions, and she “just wants things to be nice”. Obviously she started this song with the intent to pay homage to something nice and happy.

Heather: “…wonderfullest. Because they’re…”

As we grow older, we lose our inclination to make up words like this. Well, some of us do. I remember that she thought her turn was done after contributing the “w” word, an easy error to make since it was the same number of syllables. But we had to coax two more words out of her. Later this warped into “because they are”, but I will insist all the way to my deathbed that it didn’t start out that way.

Me: “…round and poppable.”

Always a correct, literal, and scientific description from me. I mean, what else are bubbles? Wet, I suppose. Soapy, perhaps. But most importantly, what defines a bubble (and makes it more wonderful than anything else), is its roundness, and its capacity to be popped.

Dad (Fred): “But my friend,”

I don’t know what this says about my father, except perhaps “my friend” may have been the kind of thing that would be in a song he would hear on the radio. He could have initially meant it as “But, my friend,” — meaning we’re addressing the audience as “my friend” — but obviously we didn’t interpret it that way at the time. It’s not exactly bubble-specific, but that’s a good thing, because it opens the rest of us up to re-thinking the larger context of what we’re singing about.

Mom (Sandy): “Henry says, he…”

Who the hell is “Henry”? The only Henry we knew was Henry of “Henry and Amy” fame, who I’m thinking (but not sure) were grandchildren of one of my grandmother’s friends, and who Heather and I had to keep re-getting to know, because we only saw them once every two or three years. But I think this song is less about him, and more about “The EveryHenry” in all of us. Yes, I’m over-thinking this.

Heather: “…hates them, each…”

You could stereotype Heather as a child with a negative attitude — her first word was allegedly “no” — but to be fair, this line had to be something negative in order for the “but” to make sense. We just didn’t know how deep into negative territory she would go with it. At least it’s only Henry who is hating the bubbles. Really, that’s okay — we can’t all love them. Different strokes for different folks.

Me: “…day.”

Sure, I had credit for two more words, but the song was over (or was that the fun-ness of the game?). Besides, my father didn’t even get a second turn. Why should I be greedy?

Add this to the list

Y’know something I want for Christmas next year? A globe. I haven’t seen a globe in something like twenty years. How can you be sinister, and plot world domination, and go “bwahahaha”, without a globe to furiously spin and poke at with your crooked finger, indicating all the territory that one day will aaaalllllllll be yours? Nothing against Google Maps, but I don’t think it has quite the same effect.

Miracle

Multiplying the loaves and the fishes.

For those of you who like to keep current on the mundane aspects of my life, the consumable items pictured above (at least those on this side of the looking glass) have been the staples of my special “bread and tuna” diet, a practical survival strategy throughout my infamous eight-month “lost weekend” from the workforce in 2007. I have re-entered said force, but the diet remains prudent while I play catch-up. In addition to the pictured items, the diet is supplemented by water, vitamin pills, cereal, coffee, soda, and the occasional excursion into madness, in which I am defeated by the irresistible urge to eat out.

I am supposed to get my first paycheck this week.  (Please don’t let something go wonky with the deposit!) Until then, no such excursions into madness are permissible.

I’m currently reading a book about the history of animation (thanks, Santa!) and it’s helping to unclog my brainstorming pipes; even though I’m not lifting techniques directly from the pages, the mere fact that I’m reading about them helps my own ideas to swim around in my mind more freely.  Does that make sense?

In the meantime, be sure to chew something for a little longer than usual today… and while it’s smooshing around in your mouth, think about how awesome it is to eat.

Happy new year!

“An average level of candidness”

These are my results for one of those “no right or wrong answers” tests given by a local employment agency. I’d make fun of it, except I have to admit, it’s pretty accurate. (The stress management bar should have a little cartoon stick of dynamite at one end and a sparkly flame at the other.)

There must be a planet for me out there somewhere, though, because if the people in my society weren’t so damned “ambitious and assertive”, i.e. pushy, then I wouldn’t have anything to stress about in the first place. Anyway, now that everyone is so well-equipped to methodically assess my fundamental character flaws, does anyone want to offer an actual remedy for them?

No, seriously, the truth is, they don’t want you to be a total flake, but they want you to be just enough of a flake that when you’ve worked hard on something and then your supervisor destroys it in front of your eyes, your instinctive reaction is to smile and say, “rock on, boss”.

From the management

Dear Mr. Handy,

It has come to our attention that you are in love with yourself. The term for this is narcissism. Actually, it’s been painfully obvious all along, but your most recent posts just push it to a new level. Please rectify this situation at your earliest convenience.

Sincerely,

The Management

I don’t know… I mean, yeah, I’m self-absorbed, because you do kind of have to create and maintain your own little universe if you want to be prolifically creative. But I think what I’m in love with is music… and the idea and process of original music, which, in order to be original, has to be related back to me… am I wrong?

Ultra-rare “bootleg” - for the diehards only

A 1996 attempt to toss together a quick “pop song”. Do you really want the backstory? No, I didn’t think so. I’m simultaneously grooving on it and embarrassed for myself. Never one to hog the embarrassment, I’m generously passing it on to you.

I have a much higher quality copy of this demo on DAT tape, but this is from a cassette I ran off, and apparently is missing a guitar that comes in at 2:13. I’ll save my rant — about begging permission to borrow equipment just to be able to preserve music that I put all the work into — for another time. (Suffice to say, owners of expensive toys should be lining up to beg me to deflower their devices with my fertile and horny music.) Thankfully that’s mostly a problem of the past, with songs like this being the rare exception. I think I mixed it down quickly and then re-used the quarter inch tape for something else.

Anyway, the real reason I dusted off my cassette deck in is so that I can do some side-by-side comparisions between certain old demos and how the songs sound today. Might be interesting for ya. For one song in particular, I have not two, not three, but four progressively evolving versions…

Two links and a random question

First of all, a couple of links.

Soundsnap is a site where you can upload and download lots of sounds. The terms are that you don’t have to pay for any of them, or even give credit, as long as you’re using them in something and not just redistributing the raw sounds to make money off of them. I signed up for a user account there, and have uploaded three odd sounds that happened to be collecting virtual dust on my hard drive. People actually seem to be downloading them, so it will be interesting one day to hear one of my boings or bleeps in an unexpected context.

Freelance Switch is a blog for people making the jump to freelancing. Notbythehour.com, which is associated with Freelance Switch, features a free PDF book about creating passive income streams. Say no to wage slavery.

Random thought: something that’s been bugging me for years now. A while back, I was browsing through a pamphlet listing “continuing education” type courses available in the area. One course was called something like “How to completely disappear without a trace and not be found by anyone, ever”. Another course was called “How to find absolutely anyone, anywhere in the world, no matter what”. They were both taught by the same instructor. Obviously they both draw from the same pool of concepts. The unavoidable question, keeping me awake every night for years until my brain a-splode, is this: Who wins? Shouldn’t at least one of the courses be subtitled, “unless they took my other course”?

Earth-shattering news

I revised most of the descriptions that pop up when you mouse over my categories.

I just didn’t want to wait until 2009 for anyone to notice.

Sorry for shattering your earth so early in the morning!

Sampling 101

Congratulations to long-time Handyfan Jeremy C. Ellis for submitting the closest (a.k.a. “only”) guess as to what my next video would be about! I hinted that the first two letters were “S” and “A”, and Mr. Ellis ventured “salad“. In a way, Jeremy is right… if you think of it as a salad of sampling!

The two main ingredients in this week’s salad are: a set of orchestra bells, and a common rubber band. (Learn the trick that sets the pro ‘bandists apart from the amateurs!) It’s topped off with a dash of my odd personality and musical know-how-what-when-why. (And it took way too long to edit — but hey, all’s well that ends well.)

Jeremy: you have until midnight 6/20/07 to claim your prize. What? That was last week? Ah, better luck next time!

Dark night of the wallet

On behalf of anyone whose life path has ever taken a dramatic twist over one lousy (wonderful) little four-letter word, I would like to thank whoever had the good sense to sign, initial, key, click, or do whatever they had to do to finally approve my unemployment benefits. Oh, believe you me, a great weight has been lifted. (And if I had checked my bank account two days ago, I would have felt the relief that much sooner. Eh, what’s another 48 hours of nervous tension after the past three weeks.  Actually, what makes it funny is that I actually physically went to the bank on 5/22 to deposit two small non-work-related checks — I wonder if those first two unemployment deposits reflected on the balance on my receipt, and I just didn’t bother to look at it.)

Although I’m presently too euphoric to even be functional, tomorrow I shall celebrate by foregoing my bread and tuna diet and eating at a freakin’ restaurant. I’ll even have dessert. And leave a nice tip. Hallelujah! Anyone in the area up for mexican?

Another thing I promised myself I would do once this was settled: I’m going to write a nice letter to the people I worked with and worked for. No, I’m not being sarcastic. I had some of the nicest coworkers, and an unbelievably tolerant, understanding, wise, and good-humored supervisor. There was love in that office. Unfortunately, some “important” people, who didn’t know us personally (but were sure to spam us with reminders about how exciting it was that one of them had a new title, or came up with a new acronym — don’t get me started on those!), wouldn’t get off our backs, and insisted on meddling with what should be an easy job and making it difficult for no reason.

One last thing: if you work in any call center, anywhere, and you hear rumors that your calls are going to be monitored by something called “Hyperquality“… run.

How to turn a table lamp into a ceiling light

Or, “unemployment is the mother of truly desperate invention”.

No, it’s not that dark in here — I used a fast shutter speed so you could see more detail on the light itself.

Hanging behind it on the end of the flourescent fixture — which I refuse to use — are a Christmas toy soldier ornament, and some kind of clay insect thing that supposedly brings good luck. (Maybe I should have paid more attention to season 4, episode 73 of the Brady Bunch, in which Bobby finds an evil tiki that causes Greg’s surfing wipe-out, a visit from a large, hairy spider, and a back injury for Alice.)

Speaking of things that are evil and bring bad luck, here is a not necessarily final but not terribly rough either mix of Tea Time Pow Wow:

One last peek at an unforgettable verbal trainwreck

Before I give my old copy of Ayn Rand’s The Romantic Manifesto a better future than it deserves — in the “free books” pile rather than the wastebasket — I just wanted to take a final morbid glance at this… um… well, just read it.

The products of America’s anti-rational, anti-cognitive “Progressive” education, the hippies, are reverting to the music and the drumbeat of the jungle.

[…]

A brief word about so-called modern music: no further research or scientific discoveries are required to know with full, objective certainty that it is not music. The proof lies in the fact that music is the product of periodic vibrations — and, therfore, the introduction of nonperiodic vibrations (such as the sounds of street traffic or of machine gears or of coughs and sneezes), i.e., of noise, into an allegedly musical composition eliminates it automatically from the realm of art and of consideration.

[…]

“Because I felt like it” is not a definition or validation of anything.

There is no place for whim in any human activity — if it is to be regarded as human. There is no place for the unknowable, the unintelligible, the undefinable, the non-objective in any human product. This side of an insane asylum, the actions of a human being are motivated by a conscious purpose; when they are not, they are of no interest to anyone outside a psychotherapist’s office. And when the practitioners of modern art declare that they don’t know what they are doing or what makes them do it, we should take their word for it and give them no further consideration.

- Art and Cognition, 1971

Thank you, Aynny-baby. Not just for hammering that final nail into the coffin of my embarrassing Rand phase… but had you not spoken out so courageously, we’d all be listening to gears and coughs right now.

*cough*

…

… hey, that was kinda catchy. I think I’ll call it “Symphony for a Rational Industrialist“.

Coming attractions!

… I will restore the “P.S.R.” video.

Left to right: Paul Ceppaglia, Jeff Lewis, and myself, in a 1994 video for the mock-rap song, “P.S.R.”, which Jeff and I wrote while simultaneously bored, depressed, and prone to hysterical giggle fits. Illicit substances may have provided some inspiration.

(Look at how freakin’ long my hair is!)

Stay tuned …

Lessons in internal parenting

So I’m off work, at the drug store, pickin’ up some snax, and my eye is frozen for a moment on some pads of paper. One says “sketch pad”, the other says “drawing pad”. (You’re probably expecting me to go on a sarcastic rant here about the difference between “sketching” and “drawing”, but you couldn’t be farther from the truth, so pipe down and let Uncle Keith finish his story.) So I realize what’s happening - it’s my inner child. I pull myself away from the art stuff and go back to my snack cruise, but I can hear the little child whining faintly somewhere inside me.

My first thought is that this is a tug of war, and that maybe buying some cheapo “art” stuff would be the more spiritual and living-for-today choice. My second thought is, “no, Keith, if you really want to draw or paint you have stuff at home”. My third thought is “WAAAAAH I WANT PAPER AND FINGERPAINT AND PLAY-DOH”.

Keep in mind, I am not a cold-hearted bastard with a dead soul. But I did have to set some boundaries. “Okay, inner child, tell you what. I’m going to stand here for a few minutes, and you can pick out maybe two things that you really want, and I’ll buy them.”

Well, you know what? The little brat couldn’t make up his mind. He just kind of looked around at everything. He didn’t seem to have any idea what he wanted to do with the supplies when he got them, either, and I of course had visions in my head of fairly ugly and uninspired splotches of color on a few sheets of paper stashed away in a drawer somewhere, while the rest of the paint and paper collected dust.

Finally, I said, “okay, just do this. Form a mental image of the stuff in front of you. If you still want something from here in the next few days, I’ll come back for it.”

That shut him up good.

When mishearings compete with actual dialogue

Christy: “Why, oh why, did I wake up with the ‘Duck and Cover’ song in my head?”

Keith: “Hmm? A Dokken cover song??”

:|

Actual message scrolling across the bottom of my television screen:

… TEACH AN ADULT TO READ OR SPEAK ENGLISH. BECOME A LITERCY VOLUNTEER. (phone number) …