New Year's Day

 I got some good practice in last night and went ahead one more page in the band book. Using a number 2 reed is a HUGE difference from the 1.5's and I probably could have gone with 2's right from the start. After all, my trumpet experience has to factor in somehow. Awareness of what my mouth cavity is doing, for instance. 

I'll be ready for busking when I've got, say, ten good songs under my belt. And not junk like Amazing Grace but fairly good ones like Summertime and jazzy things like that.  

It actually wasn't *too* rainy today in that when I woke up around 4 in the afternoon, it wasn't raining. And it's set to be clear the rest of the night but of course it's the 1st of the new year so nothing's open. 

My beloved Asian markets might be open on Christmas Day but New Year's is a whole different thing. New Year's is much more important and some places ONLY close on this day. Interestingly, here on the mainland, there's not just "American New Year" and "Chinese New Year" but also Tet, which is... Vietnamese New Year I guess. 

Chinese New Year was always the best one back home, with some streets having actual drifts of red paper confetti from all the firecrackers and the air still smelling of black powder.  People today complain about fireworks in Hawaii but .... they're wimps. If it weren't rainy and since I'm not ready for clarinet busking yet, I'd probably have gone over to Century Center Plaza I think it's called, over in the Vietnamese part of town, just to see what's going on. Hopefully tons of firecrackers. 

 

New Year's Eve

 Surprise surprise Ken came by at about 8:30 tonight, hung out a bit, and wrote out my check for this week and last week. So I can deposit it in the bank on Friday if I want to. 

 It's raining, has been raining for a day now, and is predicted to be raining right through the weekend. Partially due to the rain, I'd slept through the day until something like 5 or 7 or something. 

Tomorrow's New Year's Day so of course nothing at all will be going on, with the rain. I have packages that *have* to go out on Friday, the 2nd, though.  So I'm thinking my game plan will be to take them to the big post office because it's closest to me, then if it's raining much I could continue on to Capitol and get on the light rail and take that to St. James where I can take a short ride to the bank, to deposit my check. 

 

 

New Year's Eve Eve

 After last night, I went to bed around 6 or 7AM, I could not get motivated to do much, but held out too long against going to bed, but finally did. 

One thing I did differently was I had some crackers with butter on them just before bed, and was generous with the butter. When I got up, I didn't have the headache I've been having. That's interesting.

I slept in until about 4:30 in the afternoon. I decided to just pack what I could, going from the stuff that's been sitting here longest. I amazed myself by being able to get everything out. One of the orders was a complicated one of a bunch of optical stuff, and I had to make up a "worksheet" of how much they'd paid for shipping and how much it actually cost, and refunded the guy $50 for shipping overcharge. It was one of those weird orders where regular FedEx wasn't available, only their economy service which just hands it off to the post office, or their 2-day service and I chose that. 

I sent everything by FedEx because by doing that, I didn't have to leave here until 7, giving me time to pack everything. And their economy service, which just hands the packages off to the postal service, doesn't cost much more than the postal service. It's useful at times like this. 

Once I had things sent, I rode up to 99 Ranch and did some shopping, and then went to Paris Baguette where I got a couple of pastries and a coffee. It was nice to relax and eat yummy pastries and listen to the family at the next table talk in a mix of English and Chinese with an American accent. The Baguette is a bit spendy but it's a great place to relax, hang out, study, be a family, etc. This is what the American places have completely forgotten. 

I rode back down to H Mart and got a few things, and got a few things for shipping, namely a sign that's laminated onto foamcore and a couple of small boxes. 

Interestingly, the train signal was going off, but while there was dinging and the red lights flashing, the gates were up and there was some guy dancing around and motioning cars through. The guy didn't have any safety clothing on, or a flashlight or anything, so I don't know if it was a crazy homeless guy or what, I just got on through there. 

I rode back here, put things away, then took the last of the stuff I put out last night, two tubs stuffed with junk the scavengers didn't want, put them on the bike trailer, and took them over by the bridge and dropped them off. So now the area's nice and clean. 

 

2.0

 After getting everything else done, including listing 20 of the 30 items I'd photographed, (I put the other 10 aside for now) I got a good practice session in, and used one of the 2.0 reeds I'd gotten a box of. It makes a big difference in sound! So yeah I was ready for the step-up. My facial muscles felt more tired, but that's it, and I'm up to page 15 in the band book now. 

Unfortunately, New Year's Day and the day before it will be rained out. So I guess I don't have to worry about working up to page 18 or so in the book when I'll learn the C in the staff note I need to play Auld Lang Syne. I'll just be staying in. 

I got up today and am glad I practiced before going to bed because my headache was bad. I packed 6 or so things, some large some small, and was about to head out when I got a call from Ken, who wanted to come pick me up and we'd go to the new storage place and pick up a load of small stuff to put on Ebay. I said I have to go mail stuff, and we agreed that I'd be back here at 7:30, ready to go. 

So I took the things and mailed them, got two tea eggs at 99 Ranch and a couple of things at H Mart including a coffee that I thought was black coffee but actually it had non-sugar sweeteners in it. Blech. I sat there by my bike at H Mart and ate the eggs, and drank just enough of the coffee to rinse my mouth. 

I picked up 5 boxes of a certain kind that I like to use for circuit boards, and got back here. I had time to get all ready to go, and got another call from Ken. He was running late because he'd gone to Walmart and picked up a bunch of things and then realized he'd left his wallet at his house, so he had to go back and get it. 

He came by a bit later and after moving some things around in his hoarder's dream of a truck so I had room to sit, we were off. Ken started going on about how I haven't seen the new place ... I had to correct him and say I certainly have, was with him when we put the first stuff in there, and was there with him at the side of the freeway as we picked up the plastic rolling rack he'd had fly off of his truck. Geez. 

We got there and Ken had trouble getting the lock to work and I said he ought to check to make sure it's the right unit and it wasn't, his was the one just to the left. 

We started getting tubs of stuff to put in the truck and right away I barked my knuckle so now I had this thing bleeding and kept having to put it in my mouth and feel the flap of skin that was loose - lovely. Plus my headache really hadn't given me a break all day and wasn't now. 

Once we had 6 or 8 tubs loaded I said, "This is enough; this is a good load" and we shut the unit and I'd made sure the tailgate on the truck was fastened (or Ken would happily drive down the street with stuff falling out the back). 

He'd learned his lesson though, and didn't go on the freeway. He took surface streets, and got fairly lost, with my having to give directions like he was here, to the shop, for the first time. All the while he regaled me with stories of how good he is at having a sense of direction. 

We got back here and loaded the stuff into the office here and then he wanted to just rest and have a cup of tea which I fixed for him,  and we talked about stuff for a while. I asked if he felt like going to Denny's and he said he still had Christmas leftovers at home. I had some ice water and the last bit of a can of peanuts while we talked, and eventually Ken was ready to go, and went. 

As for my pay check, I told him he didn't pay me last week so it would be a double one, and he said, "I didn't pay you last week?" and I said he sure didn't, and showed where I keep track on the wall calendar, with little boxes for each week that I check off. 

The thing is, Ken's short on money and his workplace is "out" for all of this week so he can't bug *them* until next week. I said I don't mind waiting until next week, that this is why I save a bit of money etc. As long as he can catch up because then it will be a 3X pay check. 

So far I've always been paid, even if sometimes I've been very glad I'm not paycheck-to-paycheck like Ken is. This is the nature of high tech, and as mentioned Ken has to bug his boss to get paid, so I can bug him to get paid. High tech isn't nearly as smart a thing to go into as something that's government, unionized, and preferably both. I make a bit over $20k a year, Ken's promised in the past that my pay might go up to $30k a year but that dream's long gone, and I bet if I did the lowest job at a hospital or at the post office or the DMV, I'd make $40k a year. 

I just need to keep chugging along until mid-2027 when I'll be turning 65 so I'll have Medicare, and can make the move back home and forget I've ever heard of electronics. 

But for now, this is the time of year when everyone kind of withdraws and you don't see them until March or April or so. It being rainy on both Christmas Day and New Year's Day is just happenstance, but the normal thing to do this time of year is to hide as much as possible, not be out doing happy things like busking. 

One thing I've got to say for the clarinet is, the case it comes in is so small that I'm pretty sure it will fit just fine into my "Chrome" messenger bag that I used to use a lot, and have had sitting in a box for some years now. That makes it a bit easier to carry around than the trumpet was,  and thus easier to just happen to have with me to fit an hour of busking in, here and there. 

So to finish up the working for today, I went through all of those 7 or 8 tubs of stuff that were piled in the office and kept only the things that can be sold, and as  I went  I pushed tubs of the stuff I'm not keeping out the door, so by the time I was done there was a nice group of tubs and junk out there and the first of the scavengers already picking over it. That tired me out so I'll list the remaining 10 things I have photographed, later. 

 

What a weekend

 For starters, I realized today that the last time I'd gone out to mail things and it had been wet, I'd come back here and rinsed the plastic tub and its lid, that I used to carry the packages in to keep them safe and dry. They'd gotten all kinds of junk on them from the bike tires. 

So I'd rinsed them, and leaned them up against the front of the shop here, and then was just thinking about getting warmed up, and well, out of sight, out of mind. So naturally at least after a day or so someone had decided they weren't wanted by me, and took them. It makes sense because I put stuff out for the scroungers all the time, and I'd gotten the tub and its lid by scrounging, myself. I liked that tub, though. 

Since it was wet and cold, and then dry and colder, I stayed in on Saturday and Sunday.  

Boxing Day

 What a funny name for "the day after Christmas" but that's what they call it in Commonwealth countries and it does roll off the tongue rather nicely. 

And it was wet, of course. Still, I go out and delivered packages to the post office and FedEx. I got wet but it wasn't too bad.  

I got some good practice in last night (early this morning) and need to, because to play the version of "Auld Lang Syne" I downloaded, I need to play the C in the staff, which it about 8 pages ahead of where I am now, I guess because you have to press down a bunch of stuff to play it, and there are low notes the writers of the band book felt are more important. 

I was wrong about Marvin Naylor stopping blogging. He'd just changed the format of his Wordpress page so that it looked like he had. When you go there you get pictures of his first and second book and only the most persistent will scroll down 2 screens' worth to find the blog entries. But they are there. It's kind of amazing how with the advent of the internet, everyone's forgotten the most simple things that kids used to learn, running a school newspaper, before they were adults. 

He certainly know his street characters well. There's an actual "street culture" in the UK that's completely missing in the US. Marvin can get to know various characters because they walk around like the street is their immediate neighborhood and they have the right to walk on it, instead of being a place where they're prey for cars and talking to anyone is dangerous/insane, like it is for proper Americans. 

But now it's time I wrote down some other things that have been weighing on me.  Between finding out that the one guy who's head and shoulders above all the others in the English-speaking shakuhachi world is an ardent Nazi, Ranban Sakamoto leaving in a matter of months and thus the core of the shakuhachi club going away, and the general unsuitability of the shakuhachi for anything but shakuhachi music. my interest in the thing is just gone. I just can't see myself spending time on it when the clarinet alone is a huge "world" and adding in the soprano sax like Sidney Bechet did, is an even huger "world". 

And speaking of whom, I found an excellent documentary on him and the music in it was amazing. It "goes right through me" the same way really good shakuhachi music does. 

As a trumpet player, of course my hero was Louis Armstrong. But he and Bechet both had that same bluesy sound, but of the two I prefer Bechet, in the pieces that are not so "commercial". He was not so "commercial", himself. He was smart enough to get out of the US, too. 

But this all presents a problem in that, I had a very good reason to retire back in Hawaii because there's one good shakuhachi player who lives there and others who visit all the time, and it's that much closer to Japan, the home of the shakuhachi. But if my interest in that is zero now and I'm playing the clarinet, now I don't have any more reason to live in Hawaii as I would anywhere else.  

This isn't to say I shouldn't go back there, it's just down to the kind of pros and cons that have to be considered about any place. Such as, 

Pros: It's about 30% cheaper than here, the weather's pretty nice, I grew up there so I am at least to some extent a "local" and I can speak the local patois. I know where everything is and a million little details of how things work and little customs and ways of doing things. I can literally re-live my childhood fishing and surfing and finding seashells at the same places. Music-wise, no one tends to think "clarinet" when they think of Hawaii but everyone the world over loves jazz, and clarinet's a good busking instrument for there, loud enough without being too loud. Japanese tourists would get a kick out of seeing an American playing jazz, as opposed to the probably much more technically competent jazz whiz who's Japanese back home.

Cons: As a white/white-appearing person I'll always be a 2nd class citizen to some, and some of those in positions of power. The couple of friends I still know back there (who are still alive and have not left the place years ago) are useless, likewise the two sisters I have there who hate me in the one case because I'm not a Jesus-freakie, and to the other because I'm not wealthy and didn't go to Punahou School like she did. I could only hope that those two, at best, leave me utterly alone. Oahu is a small island in the middle of thousands of miles of ocean, and not the least "con" is, it's still part of the US. Which is at present putting people into concentration camps and is not even letting people leave who want to (stopping cars at border exits and if your papers aren't in order or you're less than paper-white, you might get disappeared). You'd think Hawaii would be far away enough from most of the US that one could lay low there but it doesn't work that way, and Gestapo raids happen there, too. 

Now, I *had* a plan to get out of here. It involved converting to a certain religion and emigrating to a certain small nation in the Middle-East, which has very good P.R. In fact, very-very good P.R. People wonder why this small, well-funded (by the US) nation pumps out so much P.R. when for those who look, there's plenty of info out there to thoroughly debunk their P.R. And the answer is that for enough of the time, at least on some people, it works. 

I was one of those people. I actually believed the bit about it being a liberal paradise, and certainly free health care and language lessons and nice beaches and walkable bazaars and all that looked good. Hell I even thought the letters of their language looked cool and this last was good because I was studying that language. 

Well, a lot of history happens in a short time these days, and simply by existing through a few years' time, I was able to see that the P.R. debunkers are pretty much 100% right. This small nation gets the US tangled up in all kinds of trouble, probably got our idiot-in-chief elected, certainly re-elected,  and this tiny troublemaking nation isn't even a good place for its own people. All that nice liberal stuff, the free health care and women's rights and the big gay festival, will probably be gone in 10 years. Their "Iron Dome" is more like "Tin Dome" and it's only a fire hose of US money that's keeping the place somewhat functional and defended. 

In other words, I was every bit as deluded as no doubt a few were who saw "Socialist" in the National Socialists' name and heard about a few of their social programs and thought they were nice people. The branch of that small nation's religion, to which I was in the process toward converting, is the most liberal one, and person to person they are indeed very nice people. It took me a while to figure out that for instance, when ordering food for an event, they'd order from the most right-wing genocide-funding companies possible. 

There's only so much I could take. As part of the process I went to religious services and their book is read through yearly, a weekly portion at a time. So one gets a pretty good familiarity with it, and there's really not anything peaceful in it. You'd be hard-pressed to find the few things in there that are not  sociopathic and murderous. 

So some months ago I told them I'm "taking a hiatus" and "I can tell I'm not going to retire in country X"  and that's that. 

And that *is* that. In the meantime I'm watching history happen. Major media outlets bought by ... those highly supportive or actual agents of, this small country. The US being told to jump and how high at every turn. The "little guy" finding out, realizing far too late but at least realizing, that they're being utterly screwed over by a president who's our most supportive, ever, of this little troublemaking country. And this little troublemaking country doesn't give a damn if their game is evident, because Hey, they've got the presidency, they've got the media outlets, they've got massive financial power, what's the little guy gonna do?  

So yeah, my retirement plan turned out to be utterly horrible and the ABORT button's been hit on that one. But it leaves me in need of a better plan. My old plan was going to have me out of here mid-2027 I figure, and right now the plan I'm telling people is that I'll go back to Hawaii in mid-2027 because I'll be able to go right from Medi-Cal to Medicare and won't have any period where I'm uninsured and any little thing could clean me out financially. 

 

Wet, rainy Xmas

 I guess I made good use of the day, by sleeping through it. It's very wet and stormy out there so needless to say I've stayed in. 

I have to post a correction; Marvin Naylor is posting to his busking blog again and his has actual busking in it.