Dio's WorkshopWelcome to my brain. It’s messy. It’s interesting. And it’s all connected if you stick around long enough. "Believe Nothing: no matter who said it, even if I have said it, except it agree with your own reason and common sense. Siddhartha Guatamo, the Buddha.
And there is a lessonin’ afoot. I saw one article today (last night??? its gettin blurred with the speed of things right now .) that was harping on one of the ‘investigators of DOGE’ being only 17yo, and fresh out of highschool with no degree,,,,
Um,,,, Yeah,,, Elon put out word for ANYONE with the SKILLS and interest to apply,,,, NOTE,,, not a damned thing about degrees,,,, He also had a TweetX about ‘Show us your code, can you do the work?’
This kid has probably been coding since he was toddlin’,,,,, Who better to go through the code of all the systems in USAID’s department? He’d spot an irregularity from the break room and be on it like a pitbull on a porterhouse steak.
they have never seen what 10 of these guys and 3 pots of coffee can achieve.
I have
Mountains get relocated.
Lord above I danged near threw a disc in my neck I was nodding agreement so hard, while reading that article. Do, go read it if you haven’t.
DC has no CLUE what they are getting hit with,,,,
Live
LAUGH
Love
Learn
LOAD
BTW, I am not claiming to be “high functioning autist” I have worked around enough of them though. the people that Bad Cattitude is talking about make me look like a neanderthal with brain damage,,,,
UPDATE UPDATE UPDATE
You know you are over the target when the flak increases tempo!!!
I present the following for consideration.
DoGE isn’t a real agency,,,,
WRONG. It was enacted by EO DAY ONE!!! Has no budget so needed ZERO approval of CONgress, has no deepstaters running its show, and DOES have a finite mission directive and timeline. ALL of its employees are volunteers with NO compensation. I heard there was an offer but it was going to come from Musk himself, not some budget line item approved by some agency in the halls. Basically, the offer I heard was a percentage of the ‘money saved’ through due dilligent detective work would be paid BY MUSK to the detectives, but I don’t know how ‘real’ that offer was,,, could have only been rumor, AND, likely is, to keep the DoGE within the rules of the Constitution and off the scope of SCOTUS.
And that last is EXACTLY what Screw-em-more is trying to get kicked in: He has no clue how to deal with this other than lawfare and propaganda He is trying to get his army of useful idiots to scream and cry enough to get SCOTUS involved. IMO, it ain’t gonna work: Trump and Musk had time enough to figure out the loopholes (hence, no budget, finite mission and timeline.) His gravytrain is under attack and he ain’t likin’ the looks of his future.
GOOD!!! Get scared Chucky, get VERY SCARED. We are getting EXACTLY what we voted for and the reaction is GLORIOUS!!!! ALL of the Rats are squealing and hissing and showing us what needs attacked next.
Always loved sound. Didn’t know that until I was playing once and found out I made more money mixing than I did playing (and I hate stage life, all those faces looking at me,,, Butterflies doesn’t even begin to describe my reaction,,,)
And of course, having lived that life, (even though I blew most of my hearing out in the process,,,) I LOVE hearing good music and the better the ‘reproduction’ the more I love it.
Found a ‘new’ type of speaker being touted on out there in the matrix. I had heard rumors of it while touring, but no one really knew much about it, except the REAL sound engineers (the guys that made the line arrays that I was playing with at the time. Truly incredible sound design in those things,,, more on that in some other post.) And I didn’t really run in those circles. I will NEVER lay claim to being a sound engineer,,, I was at best ‘tech’, making sure the tools all worked and then mixing the signals the band sent me into something that didn’t make your ears bleed. (Sorry Wayne Brady,,, Learning curve bro!!! yet another story for another post,,,,,)
The build and testing (of different components and surfaces) Hella good vid edits in this one, and if you have exterior speakers, you WILL hear differences.
I’m tempted to make a pair myself. I have a killer amplifier system that incorporates a 400w Subwoofer with satellite speaker hookups: and the desktop monitors I have ‘kindasus’ ,,,, Scratch that, DEF SUS. They make noize, fill background up, but for listening pleasure,,,
Fail
When I was a wee brat, we had a full system at home, Marantz component system, with these montsrous tower speakers, and I (when no one was home of course) would try my damnedest to blow the voice coils in those towers. My favorite at the time was BOSTON, anything BOSTON, (Rush would come later but with the same results) And, so I had been told, you could hear that system a half mile away, CLEARLY….
Wonder why I got into live sound, where 50000watts was commonplace (even more on some tours) Toss in those line Arrays,,,,, Hoo-boy was I in heaven,,,, (Me being me, I live for challenges, and when I was chickenwinged into MONitor world, I found NEW challenges and found I prefer being backstage with a much smaller audience: The Band! Different world, but the sound, IMO, way better and more personal.)
Oh, the days of THIS
as my office are long gone, but the memories remain. I just need more dB to enjoy the same way I did then. (and yes, I REALLY do know what all the knobs and buttons do,,, Thats a pic of a Midas XL4-52 12 buss FOH console. I used one as a monitor desk for 3 tours. Much prefer the loggy faders of Midas over the linear faders of Yamaha.)
Little story about Midas desks. Remember this guy?
He lived(s) in Indian Hill Ohio,,, thats just outside Cincy proper,,,, Way up on a hill overlooking the river. He had built a home studio in his basement and bought a Monster Midas Desk through the company I worked for. We went to deliver it and couldn’t. We had to hire a 80′ crane to come in, and hoist the desk OVER the house to the back doors to get it inside. Craziest install job I had ever been involved in.
Anywhoossss,,,,
DML system,,, 180degree projection, Proper placement should (!) eliminate cancelation effects you get with ‘piston’ type voicecoils. Balance the crossover of sub/mids,,,,, (they suggest using a tweeter for the 6k+ range,,,, I can barely hear those anymore anyway, If I make a system loud enough that I can hear those freqs, it sounds screechy/peircing to others,,,,) (THIS is why I no longer mix for a living, not that I wouldn’t if I could,,,)
I’m feeling some of my old groove coming back,,,,, May even wanna pick up a bass again…. LOL (like I have any callouses left to play for darned,,,,)
And I ain’ta talkin’bout the poli-ticks,,,, (though more on that towards the end.)
Its early February, and we are already experiencing a ‘spring snap’,,, Temps are supposed to be in the mid 60’s low 70’s for the next week and half,
This is roughly 3 weeks early in these parts. Me thinks, the ‘snaps’ are going to be longer than usual, and the drops inbetween are going to be colder than usual with sudden release: much like these past two weeks have been.
This is the sort of weather that gets people killed. Sickness the usual culprit, but in other ways as well. We have already had TWO kayak deaths here’bouts thanks to ‘springlike weather’ calling the unprepared and naive to water. ME: I KNOW WELL what cold water can do to a body: I have gear for it. I don’t go out in ‘just above freezing’ water with 60 degree air temps without dressing for that water temperature. No sweatshirt’n’jeans cowboy antics from yours truly. I know that the intial plunge is going to SHOCK you into an inhale that usually does you in on the first go-round. IF that doesn’t get ya, the sudden cramps as your body pulls warm blood from appendages to the core, will.
Near as I can tell from reports, the two deaths are due to exposure/hypothermia, because they weren’t prepared: either in the head nor in the gear. My condolances to the families, but I can only hope thier loss will help others be better informed further down the road. (I DO try to educate people when I am asked about ‘off season’ boating. I can tell, only a small percentage listen,,,,)
NOW, on to the shenanigans of falling aircraft, fire blooms in mid-air and in street intersections. The one that happened in DC,,, All I can say on that one is “sumpin’ stinks”,,, What? I can’t say. Too many possibles of incompetence that have a taint of “Deepstate interference” in them.
As for the one that went down in Philly,,, I think that one has a more ‘natural cause’: In the one video with sound, you can hear the turbines screaming, all the way into impact. My take is that something happened to plane or pilot, and what we witnessed was a full-Throttle Dead-stick ‘landing’. Considering they were in take-off mode, reaching for cruising altitude, the full throttle thing makes sense, Then something went wrong. Pilot dead at stick? controls failed to respond? Ice on wings? Ice in hydraulic fluids (that control the surfaces)? One pilot in comments somewhere ruled out the icy wing thing, and seeing how they never made it over 1300′ with ambient temps in the mid forties, I would concur. BUT, the other items could still play a role.
Plus, there is a record of that company with another incident involving that, or similar plane,,,, There may be underlying circumstances. And this situation IS where FAA gets to shine a bit and earn their pay. (Question for others in the know: Can a black box survive a direct hit to concrete at 400mph, followed by a firestorm of spilled fuel? Guess we will find out eh?)
Nominee hearings? My take: If you hadn’t seen the masks fall from their faces before, I certainly hope you can see it now. The attempts to corner the nominees into traps of “yes/no” answers when the circumstances are grey like the fogs on the Thames in October,,,, And the nominees returning fire with allegations of corruption,,,, Sweet pup of DOG, the kabuki is running STRONG,,,,,,
and so are the liberal tears,,,,,
and its only been TWO FRELLIN’ WEEKS!!!!
and for those naysayers that wanna harp on OrangeMan BAD
That last,,,, ‘Take a blowtorch to this whole diseased temple of thieves, traitors, & pedos, burn it to the ground and piss on the ashes‘
FUCKIN’ OORAH!!!!!! When I read about some DC appartachik complaining about needing to commute for 1.5hrs because they are no longer allowed to work from home, and then wail about ‘DIE’ is dead, our entire department is DIE!”
man, the goosebumps of pleasure just can’t be tamed!!!!
Gonna be strange year, but one that I think is going to carry forward into
Apologies to all: Last eve was a catharsis I was in need of and had no idea. Pulled ALL of the scabs off old (REALLY old) wounds and let some pressures off. Admittedly, most of those old wounds were self-inflicted, and the ones that weren’t directly “muzzle to big toe” self inflicted, were due to actions I started (here, have gun, shoot me! sorts )
And even with a fifth of rye down the gullet, I awoke NOT HUNG OVER,,,
and in a much better frame of mind about my current position in space-time.
Lonely? Yah,a little bit,,,, been 16 frillin years since I lived with anyone else, other than furry buddies. Won’t lie about it, sometimes the walls aren’t your best friends when the dark nights get longer. Add in some silly glitch in the matrix that brings up hauntings and ghosts of the past,,,
yah, bad night.
Much better mornin’
Went to the lake today. Even had Lyssa on the water for a short spell. TOO DAMNED COLD. That wind cutting across a mile of open water was sharp like razors and what little mist was up was hitting like a full auto pellet gun. Shit hurt!!! Ducked back to shore FAST and called it good. Even with proper gear, there is still exposed skin, and by the time I hit land, my exposed skin looked bright pink, like I had been smacking it repeatedly.
And that cold ass water hitting the open nerve endings on my exposed digit end,,,,,,, PURE TORTURE.
Masochistic, I am not. (ok, somewhat, but not to THAT level,,,,,)
Even thought about, what with the weather being what it is, ‘may be time to put the boats up for a couple months,,,’ Problem with that,,, I’m lazy. If at least one isn’t ready to go, on Buffalo, I won’t go when there is that perfect window of oppurtunity. Fact is, I may even ADD a boat to the Buffalo since there may be white water days with Brudda B n crew. THOSE happen in literal spaces of hours, not days, and if y’ain’taready,,,, MISS.
But right now, its build fire in stove (even though its in the Forties outside) and get my chilled old bones warmed up a bit. T’ain’t 20 sumpin anymore and I feel the cold deeper and longer than those long gone days of yore
Apologies,,,, Let me explain where I am at, so you can have a sense of what went wrong.
I had an email from “Classmates” saying someone had tagged my yearbook picture. Dunno who, and at this point, ignorance IS bliss.
I made the mistake of following the link and saw THREE pictures
My first Real Girlfriend (and if it means somethin’, I still have a ‘love letter’ from her: forty flippin years and several long term relationships and a failed marriage later, I still have it.)
My FIRST and I ain’t talkin’ GF, though that too
And the Girl I have always had a crush on, whom was also my best friend in the tightest of ways, totally platonic, though I have often wished otherwise.
(I was gonna post pics, and probably could since they are in the public domain already, but, NO, I only post pics when I have been able to ask permission, never otherwise.,,,sorry; y’all gotta use your imagination this time out.)
You can’t go Home again, IT AIN’T THERE!!!
Forty years agone, so many stories to tell them,,,,
and I probably never will. Of all the people in that school, those three were the only ones I would wish to meet again, but there is so much water passed under this bridge I stand on. I can argue that my perceptions of ‘then’ and their perceptions of the same, are NOT the same as mine. Memories fade, discolor like the old kodachrome paper, and emotions ‘evolve’ with time.
I could always spin a yarn, I could captivate with stories; but I was Never serious enough, about any one thing, to pursue,,,,
her
hence the drinkin’
I thought I had forgotten,,,,
dusty in here,,,,
and they say women are romantics,,,, HA!!! Women are pragmatic; its the dudes that get all mushy with the ideas of romance and chivalry, duty, honor,,,, In a round’bout sorta way, we all wanted to be that Shining Knight,,,, No,,, NO round’bout about it,,, we all did; some just hid it better.
Sometimes, and I strongly feel this to be the case here, its best to leave the past, in the PAST. If one of those three Femmes from my history were one that tagged me,,,, Probably best that we maintain that gulf of time. I have changed beyond what I was then, many times over. Those changes may be for the better, but I would rather the memories I have, not be tainted by a new meeting and possible disharmony between souls.
We LIVE ( and eventually die)
We LEARN (and forget what we learned)
We LOVE (and lose sometimes)
We LAUGH (and often cry,,,)
And We keep on LOADIN’, prayin’ its for naught.
The PATH remains, always.
((later date,,, Talk about a self-fulfilling prophecy,,,, Leave the past in the past,,, better for all involved…)))
(((Further update 05162026: with the advent of AI/LLM’s, I found out that the femme that reached out was up to some nefarious shit; for what reason, I’ve no clue. Its not like I carry much weight and financial value in the world. But the deception has come to light and I feel even MORE jaded for it. Still the hermit Curmudgeon, and more so now.)))
Now, I’ma gonna break that up into two parts, driving with the last part FIRST “So who are we saving it for?”
Damned good question. We know that our progeny are going to inherit what we leave, in pretty much the exact same state as we had it, since the time-line is too short to do SERIOUS change,,,
We are also finding that the little bit of this-that, that certain groups hollar over, are actually ‘nothin’burgers’ in the grand scheme of things. We do far more damage to OTHER lifeforms than we can do this rock we inhabit (currently) We nearly wiped out certain breeds of whale in the pursuit of lamp oil as example. We have wiped out some forms of birds, such as the passenger pigeon, back in the beginning of the last century.
And we have been finding that species extinction is a whole lot more common than those that WE as a species have caused. Its a natural thing, even if we sometimes ‘put our thumb on the scale’.
So who are we saving the Earth for? It gets a little grey in the grand scheme of things, or in certain timelines; like Epochs,,,,
I recall one discussion over coffee in the wee hours after the clubs had closed,,, (way back in my past life as SOundDood,,,) We were discussing nuclear weapons and how damaging they really are. One of the peeps in the discussion was a undergrad Engineer, and was usually the silent one, but on this, He jumped alive and debunked all sorts of garbage thinks.
One was some idea that we could ‘split the earth in two’ with our weapons: the person even went so far as to describe what they thought would do it. Dropping the largest nastiest weapon into the Marianas Trench and detonating when it hit bottom, wherever that is. Engineery type slammed that one fast. Explained that the pressures of water at those depths would TAMP the explosion and about the most you would get would be a big “Burp” of radioactive steam and gas at the surface HOURS LATER,,, And probably a lot of dead fish from the limited concussion spike. At worst, it would start some seismic shit and might be ‘felt’ around the world, but more likely, not even that.
Then there was the “waste the entire surface of livable earth”,,, that one got a nod, but quickly turned into, ‘nope,,, maybe for a few years, but Earth bounces back fast,,,,” (note: the next night, he brought photocopies of Hiroshima /Nagasaki b4 and after pics to prove his points) “we, as humans might get wiped out, but in 10 years, not a trace of the war other than rubble.” All one need do is look to Chernobyl and how the wildlife and habitat are back to normal; that happened in only a few short years. No Hyper-mutant Bugbears or xenomorphic freaks running in the woods there: the wolves look like wolves and the squirells are still tree clowns of normal size.
Seriously, even the damage we cause in strip mining (and there are more than a few MTR projects left over from the 50-60’s in this area to use as example) is quickly absorbed ONCE WE LEAVE THE AREA TO ITS OWN DEVICES. Yah, it takes some time, but even in the short span we inhabit this rock as individuals, one can see the change. Plant a tree when you are ten, and by the time you retire, its ready to be harvested for lumber. Most living things do not live at the same pace. A dog lives for 12-18 years. A horse might go 30. Mules may live 50. People are averaging around 80 these days
And the earth is 8 BILLION* years old,,,,
8,000,000,000/80 8.0*10(exp9)/8*10(exp1) ,,,, Our lives are one one hundred millionth a percent of time compared to the earth,,,, your eye blinks are roughly that percentage of your life,,,, We are but FLEAS on the surface of this planet. Smaller than that even, when you compare a flea to the size of your dog, vs our size in comparison to the whole of earth,,, Maybe we make this planet itch in our doings, but I would say, in the grand scheme of things, we aren’t doing THAT MUCH, at least not to the rock we live on. As I mentioned, we do more damage to each other and other species than we could ever hope to inflict upon this rock. (and the other species are just as much ‘FLEAS’ as we are, just not as obnoxious about it,,,,)
And if modern Geographical evidence is to be believed, this rock has gone through MANY changes and only a few of them have been hospitable to life as we know it. Many periods in our rocks time period, where the surface was nastier and meaner than the surface of Mercury or Venus. We just happen to be lucky enough to be in a ‘good spot’ in our rocks time.
(*an arguable point for certain, and NO, I am not going to go into that rabbit hole that some christian sects go, saying the earth is only 12,500 years old,,, too many points I have valid points against, and most of the ones that do believe that crap are leftoid indoctrinated shits that don’t WANT to hear any evidence otherwise,,,,” believe what I say or you are Heretic!!!!” )((Update: getting numbers backwards in me mind. Universe is supposedly 8 billion years old, Earth is a mere 4.3billion Y.O. my numbers are off, but my point remains ‘close enough’ from ‘simple hooman perspective’,,,,))
Ah,,, and now its time to pick apart the first part of Sarahs quoted statement. I won’t say she is Wrong,,,, Its a statement based on empirical evidence,,, BUT,,,, Its unprovable, in either argument: “You can’t prove a negative” You can only make suppositions (in both orders)
I propose that the Earth, and every other stellar body (that isn’t frozen solid rock, aka our moon and that may be wrong as well.) is alive in some fashion. Sentient? thats a very tightly defined term using only empirical evidence. When a ‘being’ has a lifespan in BILLIONS of years, who is to say it isn’t sentient? It may ‘think’ or ‘live’ on a different frequency level, one we can’t really detect with our current state of tech, but that does NOT mean it isn’t alive. What if the beings ‘eyeblink’ takes 250,000,000 years to achieve? What if ‘being sentient’ the earth isn’t even aware of us, except for the occasional ‘itch’ we give her as we dig into her skin for our resources?
And I think we are going to find through Quantum mechanics that even the peices of gravel in your driveway have a certain amount of life to them,,, it just moves MUCH much slower than us FLEAS,,,
That was the only part of Sarahs article I took exception too. I understand the statement; I just had to be the contrarian and point out my opinion of the matter.
It was the early part of the Tweens when the political divisions of the United States reached irreconcilable differences. Ted, a burnt out computer programmer, and Jim, a double amputee combat vet, reverse engineer the pentagons drone program and create a rebel air force. While traveling the country helping others defend what is left of the country, they run afoul a most evil woman intent on creating a serfdom within the country.
A beginner’s guide to going off grid. how to evaluate if you even want to make the attempt. written by the curmudgeonly author of this blog and his dog
Dio's Workshop 