Saturday, August 12. 2023

[Cornflake]

Good morning. We got a smattering of rain yesterday afternoon. Diane rushed out of the house to enjoy the novelty of it.

This morning my son and I will resume assembling some shelves that I bought from Amazon a couple of months ago. This kind of thing isn't my strong suit. I'll also be making a Mexican pork stew for dinner. The recipe looks like an ordinary stew with a couple of roasted chiles added. I can handle that.

Enjoy your day.

Wordle 784 3/6

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[theevan]

Umpteenth day in a row with record high overnight low. 83 and super steamy.

"Air You Can Wear"

Off to Camp Pearl for Wendy's oldest sister's 80th. Which has turned into a full-blown family reunion. Bob's bring Mr. Dobro, as well as the two briskets he did over the last 30 hours. I'm bringing Mr. Nylon and well as Mr. Plastic Macafferri. 2hr 45 min drive.

His sister, Willeen, is a very fine classical pianist and teacher. One of her students, a half-Indian boy from the Cajun countryside is now a UCLA grad and Hollywood session musician. He is VERY impressive.

[drlj]

Steamy today. Rain is iffy this morning but likely this afternoon. Unless that changes. Who knows?
A doe and her twin fawns were in the yard yesterday. The fawns still have spots but they are fading. They were oblivious to the noisy golfers on the tee.
Coffee time.

[paleo]

Good morning from the Cedar Rapids airport. No, I'm not running away, my friend Sue is arriving from Florida this morning.

[Marty]

Good morning 

61F-81F Sunny.

Shop this morning and maybe an errand or two this afternoon to get out and enjoy the nice weather.

Pretty good storm yesterday with a TON of rain and pea sized hail. Don't think it damaged my truck but it did scare the bejeez out of poor Riley. He got stuck outside once during that kind of storm and had to wait it out under a car.

[howard lee]

What a glorious and needed sleep I just had. Didn't spring from bed until 9:00. It was great. We had dinner at a Dominican place in the neighborhood that's a couple of clicks up from the diner-style Dominican place we visit sometimes. The churrasco was cooked perfectly, with yellow rice and black beans. We ate in the outdoor shelter with mild breezes blowing and just enjoyed the heck out of it. I almost felt a pang of guilt thinking about the people who have lost their homes and possessions in the fires on Maui.

Have a good day, all.

[Marshall]

Outdoor gig this afternoon. 3 hours under a beer tent. Supposed to be a hot sunny day.

[amanajoe]

Aug 12, 2023 9:04:11 GMT -5 Marshall said:

Outdoor gig this afternoon. 3 hours under a beer tent. Supposed to be a hot sunny day.

Same here, but 2 hours under an awning in front of a barn in Amana. Joe and Debbie Byrd are going to join me, so we’ll play kind of round robin. The time should fly by. 

Possible visit from Todd before hand today. 

[Cosmic Wonder]

Morning all, up and at em. Prepping some brisket for smoking tomorrow, and cleaning the grill. We have some friends coming to dinner.

Mike
Wordle 784 4/6

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[Tamarack]

Sunny and breezy after morning rains. Daughter and granddaughter headed to a pool party, Dawn and I headed for a bike ride on a path that includes a high-arching bridge over the Grand River. Will take my gravel bike to better keep up with Dawn on her ebike. I don't even try to keep up on uphill stretches.

[PaulKay]

I spent the morning doctoring our latest audio files.
Eric and I both agreed we played the song too fast and wanted to do them over at a slower tempo.
Well I discovered that the software I used for transcribing (Capo) will also export the slowed down version. So I was able to shave off 15% off the original tempo and save it back to an mp3 file.
Like magic, I fixed both songs with the click of a button.

Here's Midnight Hour Blues at 85% of the original tempo

Here's Good Time Charlie at 85% tempo

Unfortunately I can't fix the video tempo.

[billhammond]

Back from banking and a trip to Pollo Campero in West St. Paul, from which I brought home some of their most excellent fried chicken, plus beans w/ chorizo, and a tall cup of their sweet/tart hibiscus iced tea, which they call Jamaica. PC got its start in Guatemala but now has locations worldwide. Their citrus-laced grilled chicken is terrific, too, but there was a 20-minute wait for that.

Indycar race this afternoon, from Indy! It's on the IMS road course, not the oval, an interesting circuit that does use a short section of the oval for a high-speed "straight." Perennial also-ran Graham Rahal is on the pole, good for him.

"Saturday Cinema" on the local classical station played Cliff Edwards as Jiminy Cricket, singing "When You Wish Upon a Star" -- man, such a voice that guy had! Very troubled life, died penniless and had lots of demons.

[brucemacneill]

Hope you're enjoying August. It's hot and humid here but the pool is a little cooler than the air. My neighbor and his girl friend have been using our pool more than we have but the girl friend lives up in Fairfax and went home a few days ago. While they were over here for swimming and Scotch O'clock a week or so ago he asked me if I had a video of me doing "Early Morning rain" by Lightfoot because he likes my version. I checked my computer but guess I never made one. I told him I'm not in shape for performing now but I hadn't made a video in years but I'd try to remember how. I had to use my tablet as a camera, which took some figure out time, a couple of days and did capture an attempt at the song though not a great try.I found some video editing software on my computer, I hadn't used in years and then had to connect the tablet to the computer and copy the file but I couldn't get the tablet to talk to the computer. After a day of research for that I found that the USB cables I tried didn't connect but the third one I tried worked and I got the file transferred yesterday morning. Then I tried posting the video on Facebook but it said the file was too big so I tried to put it up on Youtube instead, knowing I could post a Youtube link on Facebook. I hadn't used Youtube in years either so had to find my signon and password and the upload stuff has changed but about 1:00 pm I had the video on Youtube. I did manage to post the link on Facebook. Within an hour or so I had 23 likes so if you want, here's the link to show I'm still trying to play.

[epaul]

Those old fingers can still fly! Good job!

[Dub]

Aug 12, 2023 11:33:15 GMT -5 brucemacneill said:

… a video of me doing "Early Morning rain" … here's the link to show I'm still trying to play.

Bruce, that’s a great job. Thank you for sharing that. It put a big smile on my face. I’m so happy that you’re still at it and I totally sympathize with your efforts to navigate the technology.

Please keep at it.

[brucemacneill]

Thanks, guys.

[Dan McLaughlin]

Continue to have good ones.

[Hobson]

Back from Fry's (Kroger), where we bought groceries and got the RSV vaccine. The pharmacist said that we were the first ones she has done and they got the stuff last week. I opined that it might be because their website says they don't have it yet. They also have the flu vaccine, but it's a bit early for that and I don't like getting two at once. I know you can do that, but if I have a bad reaction I want to know what it's from.

I did fine driving in spite of my weird vision in one eye. The brain tends to adapt.

I played a bit of guitar yesterday for the first time since we left on our trip on 8/1. Just been too busy. Hoping to devote more time to it today.

[david]

Nice playing Paul and Bruce.

My office work is now done and coffee is consumed.

I need to fix the sump pump that pushes the AC water out of my basement. The tech who installed it glued it all together so now I need to cut it apart to clean the drain line and potentially replace the pump, then reglue the rigid lines. I am having trouble finding someone to work on it and this is not in my wheelhouse.

It will not be a good stretch to be without AC so I anticipate many trips to the hardware store.

[Rob Hanesworth]

Aug 12, 2023 11:33:15 GMT -5 brucemacneill said:

Hope you're enjoying August. It's hot and humid here but the pool is a little cooler than the air. My neighbor and his girl friend have been using our pool more than we have but the girl friend lives up in Fairfax and went home a few days ago. While they were over here for swimming and Scotch O'clock a week or so ago he asked me if I had a video of me doing "Early Morning rain" by Lightfoot because he likes my version. I checked my computer but guess I never made one. I told him I'm not in shape for performing now but I hadn't made a video in years but I'd try to remember how. I had to use my tablet as a camera, which took some figure out time, a couple of days and did capture an attempt at the song though not a great try.I found some video editing software on my computer, I hadn't used in years and then had to connect the tablet to the computer and copy the file but I couldn't get the tablet to talk to the computer. After a day of research for that I found that the USB cables I tried didn't connect but the third one I tried worked and I got the file transferred yesterday morning. Then I tried posting the video on Facebook but it said the file was too big so I tried to put it up on Youtube instead, knowing I could post a Youtube link on Facebook. I hadn't used Youtube in years either so had to find my signon and password and the upload stuff has changed but about 1:00 pm I had the video on Youtube. I did manage to post the link on Facebook. Within an hour or so I had 23 likes so if you want, here's the link to show I'm still trying to play.

Bruce, your "deteriorated" playing is better than I could ever hope to achieve. Keep at it.