We Will Overcome?

I woke up at 3, and shaved, shined my shoes, and gradually prepared to get out of here, which I did at a bit after 4.

First stop was the "blessing box" on 6th in Japantown where I dropped off that unusually large potato I'd scrounged and two sodas that were with the pipe tobacco, and a 1-oz baggie of pipe tobacco. Someone had taken the hook and eye right off of the door for some reason.

Then I went to Nijiya and got a Dotour canned coffee and a couple breaded fried fish, and sat and ate in front of the Ethiopian church there on 6th. After eating and drinking and picking my teeth and starting to chew some gum to get my mouth really clean as I rode downtown, I jumped down to 4th to another "blessing box" and put another 1-oz bag of pipe tobacco in that one.

Then I rode downtown, looking for people who might want some pipe tobacco. I gave some to a guy, camped out in dirty quilts with (I think) his girlfriend, and gave them two bags of pipe tobacco. The last one went to a tall black guy in St. James Park. I found out last night that if I take the "snack" size of zipper bags and stuff some tobacco in, they end up right around 1 oz. It's a nice size and it's easy to pack a half dozen or so before heading downtown.

I also had the foil shaver all packaged for return with me but when I went to the Amazon hub, it was closed today. So I'd just carry it with me. I rode around, up by Bike Express where it looks like they got their plywood panel put in OK behind the shattered glass, and down 1st. I felt like playing in front of the opera house but there was just no one around.

I rode down to Johnny Rockets and played a bit there, We Shall Overcome and We'll Meet Again and no one seemed to even notice. Then I heard a guy yelling about how great it was and thanks, and looked around. "Look up!" the guy said, and he was looking down from an open window in the apartment building there. So, someone noticed.

I then rode town to the MLK library, because what better place to play We Shall Overcome? There were protesters on the street there, and I set up in front of the library and played We Shall Overcome and no one seemed to even notice. Then the protesters all started moving East.

I surmised they were headed for City Hall, so I took a circuitous path over to there. There were a lot of people there. I wandered slowly, looking for what I thought was the best place to play, to make use of the acoustics of the structure there. I was going to play facing out from one of the circular walls, to project the sound. But suddenly the protestors started singing We Shall Overcome, and in the right key too. I quickly got the cornet out and started playing, and the crowd actually started coming my way like a big wave.

As I finished the 2nd verse, an old retired hippy type lady came up and gushed, "This is the spirit of the 60s!" and asked me to play again, so I did a third verse. And another older lady came up to say she'd like me to quiet down and I said, "Yeah, I know, there's going to be a speech and I don't want to interfere" because that's what the crowd was doing; it was gathering for speeches to be given in the curve of the wall there. So I put the horn away and the 2nd lady was glad I understood.

There's a sort of ramp you can climb that's built into the circular wall and I went up there so I had a bird's eye view of what was going on. Speeches were given, and it was all pretty peaceful until there were some pops because the police were shooting some rubber bullets or something (someone said it was because someone threw stuff at the cops). I put my safety glasses on and started to leave, but when the popping didn't keep going on, I stuck around a bit.

I saw a police trailer come in with some kind of large white ... things. And I saw some large zip ties ready to go, and I decided to buzz out of there.

I went over to Whole Foods and parked my bike in the rack but didn't bother to lock it. And I set up standing in the grass beside the sidewalk, and played for maybe 20 minutes. No one even gave any notice. I wanted to get people used to my playing there again, plus I wanted to see what the reaction would be. Would I get told not to play there? Would people toss crumpled bills my way? Would I get any thanks? I got just absolutely nothing. I still played my best. Then I packed up and as I was leaving, I said to the Whole Foods guy there who was ushering people in, that I hope my playing wasn't a bother. He said it was not at all, but that it was "beautiful".

I tootled over to Target and sure enough, it's closed and most of that mall is. L&L was open, but they no longer serve lau-lau so I have no use for them. Some tattooed skanky chick on a bike was in front of Target and we ended up talking, riding slowly along. I told her how it's funny, that I'd just "shopped the hell out of Target" a few days ago and here it is, closed. I told her about Walgreens that has a lot of stuff and a place called Medex on Santa Clara that's got tons of stuff, is run by Chinese people, and has classical music playing inside. She wanted to know how to buy things online without a credit card, and I told her about buying a pre-paid card or an Amazon gift card and using those. We went down as far as Petsmart and we parted.

I rode back through Little Italy (all one street of it, eh?) and looked at the menu at Paesano's. Ehhhh... too expensive for me. I went through San Pedro Square and up Santa Clara, and there was one of the other La Victoria's (I think there are three) and got a Super Taco again. This time I got a fork and a spoon, and they gave me corn tortillas I guess because I rolled the R when I said "carnitas".

I ate in The Ally. The Ally is this ally behind a row of stores, and at the other end is Splash, one of the area's surviving gay bars. Ron the Recorder Player used to hang out there all the time. "Hey, let's go to the ally!" he'd say. There was a nice place to sit, and in fact if there were a chair, I could have sat at a nice Cold War era desk that was sitting there. There's a row of dumpsters there I'll have to make a point of visiting, because it looks like Cool Stuff(tm) shows up there all the time. I remember Ron always being in arts and crafts materials because one of the stores the ally is behind was a Ross. This time, I saw two bused neon signs with possibly good power supplies that I didn't want to bother with, and a front wheel for a bike. It looks at least as good quality as the front I have on my bike now, with a hell of a lot less miles on it.  I actually left it sitting in the dumpster while I ate, but when a guy on a bike came by who looked like me might take it, I ran over and grabbed it and hung it on my bike handlebar.

I rode back over to the protest and those big white things the cops had trailered in were roadblocks, and the whole thing seemed pretty calm. They had an area blocked off to cars, but except for the line of cops within the cordon along Santa Clara, you could go in and out on the other three sides. There were some of those awful Bible-thumper types ranting away with a bullhorn, so I figured I'd out-noise them with a more positive message, and I parked right there and played We Shall Overcome, the Sesame St. theme, and Kum-Be-Ya. The Christians tried to co-opt what I was doing and make it look like I was with them, even when I was playing Kum-Ba-Ya and in the pauses, giving the guy next to me the finger, jabbing it in time. I even blew out my spit valve on him but he didn't seem to notice. So I packed up and went across the street to the far end of the demonstration to be far away from those nuts.

I actually had a couple of people thank me for my playing, say it was beautiful etc. The crowd was lined up on the City Hall side of Santa Clara and on the City Hall plaza, and the cops were lined up on the other side. What was happening was, periodically, some cops were kneeling with the protestors. I got in a talk with an intelligent guy with a grey ponytail, about how when I was a kid, we had a book called "America" by Alistair Cooke, and in it was a painting of George Washington, who was kneeling. There were great cheers and clapping when some of the cops took a knee.

There's a curfew at 8:30 and I was getting close to leaving. A guy came up and complimented my playing and said he hopes I'll do it some more. Just then, three gals walked by, kinda Asian-Hispanic looking, with one of them yelling and ranting all kinds of trumpish stuff. So when she want by me, I said she's crazy and then called out "Cuckoo! Cuckoo!" and that enraged her. She turned and started to charge and one of her friends body-blocked her and got her turned around again and they walked away. Some of the demonstrators got mad at me, "That's not necessary! That's counterproductive!" and my only defense was, "She's a trumper!" and that settled them a bit. Then I got my horn out and played some more We Shall Overcome to round out the night. I probably should have said nothing, but in the end, all I did was imitate a cuckoo clock; it wasn't like I called her a bitch or anything. And once I was playing I think the people saw that I was adding something constructive.

I was now about 8 so I took off for home. The dumpster on 10th had these things that I think are Indian cucumbers. I took one out of curiosity. They turn out to be "Kerala" cucumbers and far past their prime. With much effort I could harvest the seeds and toast them, but that's about it.

I got back and took the cornet apart and put it in water with some Dawn. Time for a cleaning.

Then I cooked some dinner. Beef with eggplant. I had some scrounged eggplant on hand, and tried boiling it first before frying and that makes it soak up a lot less oil, but they get really mushy. Still delicious, because it's eggplant. And just a touch of Vegeta on the beef makes it really delicious.

Then it was time to cut up the almost 6 lbs of spare ribs I'd bought, so I put on an "entertaining" live feed of a Los Angeles TV station on YouTube, got out my little Chinese food scissors and got to work. The result was 14, 4-oz bags of beef all ready to go, at a cost of $2.50 a serving, making the beef effectively $10 a lb. The numbers all came out very neatly. And I've got 6 little bags of fat and bone for the birds.

Eating around town

I'd put practice first before everything last night, with the result that I was doing my Ebay listing pretty late, but it all got done according to schedule and that's what matters.

I woke up at 3, did some touch-up on my neck trying my beard trimmer some more and the foil shaver, and tried doing a shave with the foil shaver. I think I can see why the commercials always say "Just as good as a blade" because it's not really. For shaving, not as good as a razor and shaving cream. It's not even as good as those little disposable straight razor things they sell in Asian stores; those are perfect for zapping those renegade neck hairs. So I'm returning the foil shaver, and luckily the amount I'll be credited will buy me a new bike bag set.

I took off at around 4, and stopped off in J-town to put trash into trash cans and then put a package of napkins and some odd face-washing strips I've been given as a free sample at the Amazon pickup a while back. They're supposed to get rid of blackheads but I think the idea is to have the perfume in 'em so strong you no longer can even think about your blackheads.

I went right over to Lee's Sandwiches and after a lengthy wait, got a chicken and rice with fish sauce plate lunch and a bottle of water, and went over to the same place, under the same pepper tree with a really massive trunk, on 6th street and ate. It wasn't as good as eating with a friend, but it was pretty good.

After eating, I rode back down to Santa Clara street and by City Hall, where there were protesters lined up with signs and people in cars honking to show their support. So, a little noisy but no problem. I rode down past my bank and it didn't look like it was messed with, and rode down to Whole Foods and locked the bike up. I walked up to Ace Hardware and got a large bottle of Slime, which cost a bit over $15. Wartime prices, man.

Walking back, I got into a nice conversation with a guy who had one of those bikes with the huge tires on it. He and "his husband" had traveled all over, and I guess a fair amount of it by bike. We talked about bikes, and covid haircuts, and all sorts of odds and ends. It was pretty nice. We told each other to "Stay safe" and after putting the Slime in the bike bag I went into Whole Foods to buy some expensive roasted salted nuts, a fizzy water, and a shrimp cocktail. Once you get to the front of the line, there's an employee routing you to whichever register will work for you, like cash, or card, or card and cash back etc. I told him I was going to use my card and get cash back, but when I checked out the option for cash back never came up. I told the checker it was no problem though, and I'd just do it next time. I want to get my emergency savings back up to $1000, as I'd taken $100 out yesterday.

I went over to Diridon Station and sat at "my" place there, and had my shrimp cocktail and fizzy water, and it was really nice. There was a window open there and some Diridon employee was working inside, but they didn't seem to be bothered by me.

I rode back downtown and decided to ride by Bicycle Express because of all the college students around there, always tossing interesting things out. Amazingly, Bike Express was open, well, not really, they were closed, but since all I wanted was a couple of Tip Top Touring bike patch kits, they happily sold me those. Then I mentioned wanting replacement nuts for my rear wheel because the ones on there seemed to be getting a bit worn, and the "Gandalf The Bike Wizard" guy (my name for him) fixed me right up. They were in the process of replacing the glass in their front door, which had been broken, with pieces of plywood.

We talked a bit about the difference between demonstrators and opportunists. Why bust up the best bike shop in town, really "the peoples' bike shop"? The lady said something about their yelling something about free bikes. They'd also busted up Pizza My Heart, the FedEx place, a cinnamon bun place, etc. all local places. I circled around a bit, and decided to get a slice from Pizza My Heart and went in and got one. A slice of "Big Sur" is $6 now, but it's really good. I sat on the wall by Circle-A skateboards eating my slice, and there were people walking by who sounded like they'd been in the demonstrations and were done for the day now.

I wandered down there and the demonstration was at the library, then after a bit of shouting etc we all moved down to City Hall. There was lots of chanting of slogans, and there was a sort of central point where there was bottled water and things people might need, and someone had a bullhorn. There were a lot of cops, and more kept showing up, and eventually the police chief said this is now an illegal gathering and everyone must disperse. There was not a lot of dispersing, but I dispersed, and looked enough like Joe Normal that I was able to go from the City Hall corner to the other side of 4th street and kind of wander down to the end of the line of cops and ask if I can go through there, and the cop at the end said, "You wanna go through? OK." and kind of swung aside like a gate and I went through.

I actually circled around and tried to get a good view of things without being in the area that the cops might "kettle" and eventually settled in right next to the Chevron sign on the corner where the Chevron station is. There was an older Hispanic guy there too and we got talking. He said one thing people don't know is that George Floyd and the cop who killed him knew each other. They'd worked as bouncers at the same night club. He also said that the SAP Center parking lot is full of police vehicles and a few helicopters, "These people don't know what's waiting for 'em".

There was a skinny white kid in a white knit cap who was mouthing off and shouting and really doing his best to try to start trouble. He was making 90% of the noise. One kind of cute moment was when a sort of SWAT van came in, that I guess has handled and running boards on its sides, and it loaded up with cops and then drove away like a mother possum with an especially large brood. The cops had some people in those zip tie cuffs, and I'd seen a sheriff's bus drive in, and I also noticed a helicopter circling overhead. "You know what that means? That means I can go home and watch it on the live stream" I said to my friend, and took off.

But not right for home. I rode over to the SAP center and looked at the parking lot and yep, lots of police vehicles, some fire, and a lot of ambulances. The helicopters he'd seen were undoubtedly in the air by then.

The ride home was ho-hum, which is just how I like it. The wind had been going to opposite way so going downtown was a real slog, but coming back was really nice.

And right around the corner of the building here I found a small refrigerator used to hold "snus" which is snuff, and apparently fresher if kept refrigerated, and 7 pounds of "Red River" pipe tobacco in a box, with each 1-lb bag slashed open. So there was kind of pipe tobacco everywhere. I balanced the small fridge on my bike and got it back here, and walked around again and grabbed the box of slashed pipe tobacco bags and took that back here. It turns out your standard blue Lowe's bucket will hold 7 lbs of pipe tobacco, if you pack it down. I just poured it in there, tamped it down, and I have a lid that seals fairly well. I'm thinking of bagging it up and having some handy to give to street people.  I'm not a big fan of smoking, but people do, and this would be appreciated.

Once I was back here and could check, it turns out the George Floyd and his murderer may well have known each other. They worked in different capacities, one being a cop and the other a security guard, so they could well have crossed paths.The whole thing's what the English call a massive cock-up, as the other cops watched the guy get murdered right in front of them without doing anything, and the murderer was known to be a "dirty" cop and the department didn't do anything.

Despite watching too much Bob's Burgers and other inane things on YouTube, I got a decent practice in. And I figured out what was wrong with the strap on my cornet gig bag; I'd had it adjusted all the way short. My plan to take the cornet downtown and play at various places, and I worked on "We Shall Overcome" to perhaps play that for the demonstrators.

I've started to notice the weirdest thing when playing my Irons exercises though. In my midsection, for higher notes I'm pushing "down" while for lower notes I'm pushing more toward my backbone and not so much pushing as making the air column as long as possible, like clarinet players do when playing the lowest notes. A lot of trumpet playing is learning to use muscles you normally never think about, and I feel I may be discovering something that the top players know about.

Freaky Friday?

Again, as always, I'm glad I went downtown and put my check into the bank, etc. on Thursday rather than today, Friday. Because there are demonstrations downtown and according to Reddit they're smashing cars etc.

I was up until 7AM again. I had a huge software update to do that took forever, and more time now to finish it up. I packed the last 10 packages and just wrote on them what they are, thinking I'd print the labels and put them on in the morning, and then realized I could print labels while the update was downloading, and did that.

I actually did a ton last night, re-arranging some stuff in the warehouse, and at one point with the work and the heat, I went into the office and felt like my visual field was greying out a little so I cooked up some beef with vegetables and ate that. I swear my own cooking is getting better all the time.

Oh, and I didn't practice last night, waiting too late to get started and then realizing that in this hinky neighborhood, it doesn't pay to literally trumpet that I'm in here.

I was up around 3, had time to pack a thing the buyer and me had gone back and forth over so I wanted to make sure they were taken care of, and headed out at about 4:45. It was windy as all fuck out there. The winds was in the opposite direction of what it usually is, so the ride down to the post office was a joy, but coming back was awful. Wind and tons of stuff from trees and tons of it got into my eyes. I wore my mask all the way home too because that stuff tears me up when I breathe it in.

I found some neat stuff, "hunting" with my bike trailer and getter stick. Before heading out I'd taken that white lettering vinyl and covered the bottom 1/3 with it, so when I'm carrying it drivers can see it more easily. Today's finds to slap onto Ebay: A set of Jeep wheel center cover thingies, and an interesting press, like imagine a Badge-A-Minit press but for some industrial purpose. And about the biggest potato I've ever seen. Potatoes are not on my normal diet so I'm not sure what to do with really.

I got back and put things away, and got a pair of real-deal shop safety glasses out of my tool box and cleaned the dust off, and set out w/o the trailer, wearing my mask and the goggles. It was great; like a holiday for my eyes. I think I might get into the habit of keeping them in the bike bag to use whenever needed.

I also took a long threaded rod, used to hold wire reels together, 22 inches long and 5/8 thick, with a nut kind of glued onto the threads on one end. A handy tool for picking bubble wrap out of dumpsters, pushing "Push To Walk" buttons it turns out, and also a handy weapon if I run into bum problems. So when I'm out with the trailer I'll have my getter stick, and when I'm riding without the trailer, I'll have this.

I'd also gotten out a $100 bill and cleaned my debit card with electronics cleaner. I rode up to H Mart and decided I was going to shop the hell out of the place. I got a smaller cheap Korean pot than the large cheap Korean pot I got for boiling water, this next size down will be for boiling other things like eggs. The only package of beef of the kind/price I like was almost 6 lbs so I got that, to the tune of about $35. I got three bottles of booze and what's funny is, when I got back and checked the receipt, I only got charged for two. And a fair amount of other shit. Of course my card didn't work there; it hardly ever does. The total being $98-odd, it was nice to pull out that crispy $100. 

I loaded it all on the bike and rode for home. The safety glasses+mask set up is pure win. But the wind! I had to walk the bike partway along Brokaw and I can't remember the last time I've had to walk the bike up a hill. It was nuts. I was OK going up Junction, but once I got to that little bit of road from the cement plant to Rogers, I had to walk it again and at the corner I had to actually push it hard into the wind. Crazy.

I got back here, and saw a guy at the ice cream place who looked approachable. I got talking with him and he's had endless trouble with the homeless around here. Typical Hispanic, he's had a hard time refusing them use of his water and some free ice cream, and I told him about the piss incident, and how I handle the bums, explaining the concept of the "Teflon wall". Don't interact, at all, period. Don't even acknowledge that they exist. If they're acting up, call the cops. I said they keep bugging him because he keeps giving them stuff, just like you'll keep having raccoons around if you leave food out. I told him when they ask for free ice cream, to tell them "his boss says no" just say "It's the new policy" and so on. Just make up some imaginary orders from above. I told him how they'd broken the faucet off in front of our shop, and I'd simply capped it off and then painted it to look like it's been that way all along. I hope I've taught him a little good old Anglo-Saxon meanness, because that's what it takes to deal with bums.  I told him about my practicing trumpet (Hispanics love the trumpet) and hope it doesn't bother him etc., and he said it's fine. And so now I have another friend and ally.

Hitting the target

When I think about it, the packing the day before yesterday would have been easier if I'd stuck by my schedule and packed at least some of the things on Sunday. Then, last night, I'd not have been up until 6AM again doing listings, if I hadn't gotten involved in watching all these short documentaries about bicycle messengers of all things. I did, last night, find the things I need to pack tonight, so I have them staged ready to go.

I woke up around 2, made an iced coffee, and finally was out the door at 4:45. First stop was the blessing box in Japantown where I deposited a package of napkins. Then I went to the bank to put my check in; $350 this time because Ken put an extra $50 on "because we've been doing so well".

Next was Whole Foods, where I got a package of Haig's falafel and a shrimp cocktail, and a bottle of fizzy water. And $100 cash back. I rode over to "my" place to eat at Diridon Station.

My cozy little place had some stuff there and no one was around. Couple of bottles of .... I looked at the label, it was 99% alcohol, distilled from sugar cane. One was half-full and one hadn't even been cracked. Wow, I thought, this could be used in an alcohol stove. I put it in my bike bag. Just then I heard a sort of "Hey", and a large, kind of scruffy, Mexican guy came up. As soon as I saw him out of the corner of my eye, I took the bottle out of my bike bag and started apologizing. Typical Mexican, he was really mellow about it, as I explained I'd seen the stuff there and thought someone had left it, and he said he understood, and I asked him where he got the stuff and he said a store called "Chaparral" over on 21st street which is heavy duty East Side and I'll have to check it out. There was a disorganized pile of a small carton of milk and fruit and other things, and he tried to gather it together and I got out one of the heavy duty plastic shopping bags I carry and gave it to him, then gave him another one for later.

Every day it's the same old thing - variety. I sat and ate my falafel and my shrimp cocktail and washed them down with fizzy water and it was really pretty nice. There was a security guard around but he didn't seem to be too worried, especially when I hung my Whole Foods paper bag off of one handlebar and put all my trash into it. The little birds got two pieces of falafel and the shrimp tails.

Next was to ride over to Target. I had quite a shopping list, things like a hand mirror, nail clippers, foot powder if they had it, that spray for pet urine, yadda yadda yadda on and on, and eggs. I was able to get everything on the list other than those travel size packs of "wet ones" and I only spent about $55. Hell, I bought two cans of foot powder at about $8 each and the pet (and people) urine spray was $10 but I wanted the best.

I noticed toilet paper still wiped out but those large packs of paper towels like I'd just gotten at Lowe's were there, and there were the Pur cartridges that fit my filter,  and I was even able to get a replacement of my Oxo spatula which I really like and use a lot, and I've been thinking, sooner or later it'll break because they always do.

I saw masks for sale at Whole Foods and at Target, but high priced. I actually picked up a nice mask someone had thrown out in front of H Mart, next to the trash can. One of the elastics had broken and they'd tied it in a knot, which probably didn't work well. But I can fix it. So I'll have my black "old faithful" mask, and this red and white patterned one. What's funny is, I only noticed today that on "old faithful", the wire that's supposed to go over the nose had migrated to one of the ear straps and has probably been that way all along.

Masks are going to be the new fashion accessory, like ties, or like hats used to be. I'd not mind having a mask that matches whatever shirt or jacket I'm wearing on a particular day.

I also saw lots of bike traffic today. Plenty of bums of course but lots of normal people. The more people are out biking, the more notice there will be of how awful motorists are to cyclists, so this is good.

I got back and put things away, then got my "getter stick" and went around by Grill'Em and got some nice white vinyl sticker material that's used for vinyl signage, and some X-ray film boxes that are good for shipping flat things like manuals. I also got veggies out of the veggie dumpster, some tomatoes, cucumbers, and a stalk of celery. I got back again and made a big salad with the nasturtiums I had sitting in the fridge, tomato, and cucumber. Perfect hot weather meal. My dressing is just Kewpie mayo, sesame seed oil, little pepper, bit of shoyu and Worcestershire sauce, and a some apple cider vinegar. I guess I'd call it "wing it" dressing.

Some good news I guess: my ear is just about normal now. I think it's the Dettol that fixed it, although I used way too much at first. Now I just make sure to wash it when I wash my face, and do a final wash with just a little Dettol over my face and ears, and rinse right afterward. It makes me wonder if Dettol, if I'd known about it, could have helped me avoid the whole long saga of expensive antibios that didn't really work. As for my silver coins, I'll make colloidal silver.... later. I just have 'em socked away for now. I have the silver nitrate solution socked away too.

Crazy Chrissie talked at the ice cream truck guys and then set up right in front of here ... and actually started painting her car. She'll probably do some meth-y thing like paint half and then sand it all down again.

I feel less like I've got a "bug" too, and don't feel stuff rattling around in my chest any more. I still have a little bit of stuff, and I find singing while I ride my bike helps bring it up, so lots of people got treated to a bit of "We'll Meet Again" as I rode downtown. Maybe I should mix it up with a little "Paper Moon". 

'Bye, Kyle

I woke up at 3, made an iced coffee with instant coffee (I really need to brew a cup the night before) and had my vitamins, etc. With this hot weather just the coffee is fine, considering I put heavy cream in it.

I needed to get out of here by 5, and was out the door at 4:45. Crazy Chrissie was out there, washing her many-shades-of-primer POS car. I thought she was masking the windows off to paint it, but to her, apparently, it's not about the painting; it's about the prep.

I was relieved to not find bum "dooks" or anything like that in front of the shop, and because Mr. Bum had promised he's laying for me, I bought my "getter stick". I'd been wondering about doing this anyway, since I'm not going into stores when I've got the bike trailer, and the stick would probably be safe leaned against my bike in any case, as afraid of germs as most people are.

Uneventful ride to the P.O., uneventful drop-off at FedEx, found some packing materials, and made a 2nd trip to a dumpster by Grill-'Em for more packing stuff, a couple pieces of interesting metal grating, and a varnished wooden box that says "HEADPHONES". Someone on Ebay will want that.

I'd noticed Kyle's car over in the Smithfield parking lot, so on my way back with the headphone box, I stopped for a chat. We talked about all sorts of things, and it turns out he's part Japanese, those relatives all in good old Honolulu. I told him about the bum-piss incident, and he told me that in a few days Smithfield will be done closing up shop, and he won't be guarding there any more. It was to be our last contact. I said I was really glad I'd gotten to know him and he said likewise. Maybe I should have tried to get a business card from him, now that I think about it. Great guy.

But a nice thing that happened is, when I'd dropped off the first load of packing stuff and was heading out with an empty trailer, there were a bunch of the Serv-Pro guys out, working on the one guy's beloved Saturn wagon. I got talking with them, by laughing and pointing to my bike and saying "Es me truca!" (This is my truck). One guy decided it was "Ford F-150" and then it was "Ford Two-Pedal and we all had a laugh. I used what Spanish I know, "Un poquito" (A little) and the short squat guy I mostly talked with (he has the best English I think) is a co-owner with the tall thin guy. He was impressed that I'd bothered to learn at least some Spanish, and I told him about my being an English teacher/apologist on the side when I worked with Viet Namese and Cambodian work-mates.

I told him about the bum-piss incident also, and he said it's a dangerous area, and he'll watch out. Also I asked about Nazi Boy, and it seems the flashy truck belongs to "A Mexican" so I'd been mixed up. Nazi Boy's still driving his little shitty car I guess, and has not been around. As with Kyle, we expressed our utter distaste with white supremacists. So now I've got some new friends. The guy also said he'd seen when I had the door open, "How neat and organized it is" and I got bashful and said, "Well, I try!". He said I ought to learn Spanish, and maybe I should. I may not get anywhere and live what's left of my life right here in California, and Spanish is an easy to learn language. I doubt it would be much work at all.

I cooked up some bacon and eggs - this bacon I got most recently is some kind of off brand and it cooks and even tastes like Canadian bacon. It doesn't leave any grease in the pan at all.  So I cooked a double serving to use it up.

I got all geared up for a practice, and played some really great "We'll Meet Again" to warm up I guess, then got into my Irons exercises. I did the first set of 'em and was partway through the next set of them when Ken showed up.

Ken brought a bunch of stuff to list, some Amazon items I'd ordered, and a big box of packing tape. We looked around for that one thing I can't find and eventually just had to give up. I refunded the customer and said if it turns up we'll re-list it and notify him. Then I made Ken some water with lime juice in it and lots of ice cubes, had the same, and we just sat and talked for a while. Rocket fuels, how the homeless ought to be treated, various planes and things seen in the movie Strategic Air Command, and the histories of various surplus places, and lots more. We agreed that this work here is very close to being in college, with some things M-W-F and some T-Th and how there's no real time clock. We like to talk things out.

I saw one guy right through fast on a bike but no sign of Mr. Bum. He normally zooms by fast so it's easy to miss him, but at least he didn't hang around.

I've put two things in my Amazon cart: Another bike bag set like I've got because mine is getting pretty tired, and a Ka-Bar knife. The Ka-Bar knife is because sometimes you just need a big scary knife, and also nostalgia: I had one when I was 12 and loved the thing.

And that's where my paycheck goes...

I woke up at 3. Sure enough, I'd gotten a phone call that despite my phone both making a (not very loud admittedly) ring and vibrating, and being under my pillow, I'd slept right through. It was FedEx, apparently, wanting to schedule a pickup.

The holiday having kind of messed up my "class" schedule, this being a packing day and not a shipping day, but that package to China had to go out, and also I decided to pack an oscilloscope made in Tektronix's glory days when they built things by the pound. The box was 36 inches long and weighed 50 lbs.

I put these things on the bike trailer and took off at 4:45. Traffic's back to some extent, and the ride up to FedEx was uneventful. I dropped the boxes off and decided that since I have an empty bike trailer, need paper towels, and had seen those really big packs of them at Lowe's, I'd try taking my bike + trailer right in, toss one of those big packs on the trailer, boogie on back to the contractor's checkout which I always use, and be out of there with my prize before anyone has a chance to say boo about a bike and trailer being in there.

And it went fine, except the contractor's checkout closes at 2:30, another weird "wartime" early-bird thing. I got in line at a checkout that's not self-checkout, was told I'd cut the line, apologized profusely, and got into the back of the line. It was next to where the towels were stacked so I put another pack on the trailer. The place was very busy, I think because over the holiday people had come up with all sorts of lawn and garden plans, and were there to get the stuff they needed.

So I've spent all but about $9 of my pay check this week. 

I didn't find much for packing materials on the way home, nor dumpster veggies. I did find two slices of pizza,that if I were a pizza-eater I could re-head and eat with no harm, but I avoid pizza so I put them out for the crows, who were starting to zero in as I left. I found a couple of neat bright yellow microfiber cloths too. It looked like a place had used two to wipe something down then two to get the final dust off before shooting some paint, and had tossed the final-dusting ones out along with the first-pass one.

I actually have 40 things to pack, and I feel far less stressed about it than before, because this is a packing day, and all I am allowed to think about is packing. I will not allow myself to think about listing, because that's tomorrow, as it's one of my M-W-F "classes".

I rolled up the roll-up door to cool the place down, and was putting things away when I bum I see around here zooming through on his bike, zoomed by, close. I didn't think much of it, but he circled around and was asking me for 50c, or a bike seat, or "something that will only take 30 seconds". I didn't say a thing, just rolled down the roll-up door really quickly (I'm glad I've experimented with how fast I can move the thing) and closed the latch on the side I was on, then rushed to the office and shut the office door and put my metal shelf up against the mail slot which I do so random bums can't see in.

The bum was yelling about how I'd better  "watch my step" and that he was going to be looking for me in the morning (joke's on him, I'm never out in the morning) and then poured the contents of his piss-bottle into the mail slot. That was .... disgusting but it's the threats that are the most worrisome.

I called 911 and while I was waiting for the cops wrote an email to the landlord so he knows there are bums around here pouring piss into mail slots, then the cops came by and we had a good long talk, and then they went off to see if they could find the guy, and I wrote an email to Ken telling him the scoop.

Cleaning up bum piss is disgusting, but it sure beats not cleaning up bum piss... I got that all cleaned up, then relaxed a bit and then realized I really only had until the ice cream trucks stop making noise, to practice. So I got part of a practice in, but really, I played a lot yesterday. The Taps, jamming with my guitar playing friend, the hour and a half in the park... so a little part of a practice is OK.

But all this time I had time to think. When I'd first moved to this area, to the old building, I'd had a few run-ins with a bum who matches this one as far as race, build, appearance, and behavior (banging on building walls, threats). Those times I'd called the cops too. There have been no run-ins for at least five years, but it looks like he's at large again. In a way it's a relief, because he's a known quantity. I kept a gun handy to shoot him then, and I've got one handy to shoot him with now. I think the guy's just crazy, and I actually thought he'd been bumped off by now or put in prison or the rubber room.

The cops and I had a good talk about this, that a normal person, if they end up homeless, some friend or relative or someone will help them out and they'll use the help. "Hey, I've got my summer cottage and it needs a paint job and some work, you can live there and work on it while you get back on your feet" etc. And the person will do just that - work. But a "career" homeless person will trash the place and then probably burn it down. "That's all they do is take, take, take" - one of the cops.

I got part of a practice in but then the ice cream trucks stopped making noise and when they stop, I need to stop. I'd done a lot of playing yesterday, what with Taps, jamming with my guitar friend, then playing for an hour and a half in the park.

I cooked up the best mackerel miso soup I've made so far, and then started in packing Ebay things. It was 30 things not 40, but very frustratingly I can't find the biggest item. How can something that big get lost? Still, I feel a lot less stressed because although I did do a FedEx run earlier, this is a packing day and all I'm to think of is packing.

Unfortunately the packing kept me up until 6. I also needed more clean clothes so I did a "load" of laundry which is 6 socks, 2 t-shirts, a pair of shorts and a pair of undershorts, and another thing or two. It seemed even easier this time though, and using my big cheapo Korean pot I was able to boil enough water to get the wash water up to warm rather than tepid.

I did my bit

There's some guy who wanted everyone who can play it, to play Taps at 3:00 sharp today - it's called Taps Across America. So last night after doing Ebay stuff I shined my shoes, washed my hair and shaved, and got in a good practice session. This will depend on whether I wake up in time, I decided.

I woke up in time, around 2. I made a coffee and listened to a couple of Army players play Taps on YouTube to make sure I had the right swing to it, and left at 3 sharp with the trumpet.

First stop was J-town where I dropped off a bag of trash and had a nice conversation with a mailman who, surprisingly, was working today. We talked about our time in service. He'd been in the Marines and kept getting deployed to war zones. Of course my time in service was pretty easy as there were no wars going on. He said he'd finally left the service because he was sick of repeatedly being sent to really gnarly places.

Next stop was the blessing box where I dropped off some toe socks I don't need any more, and a package of napkins I'll never use.

I'd researched the monuments in St. James Park and decided I'd like to play Taps from the Robert Kennedy memorial, but when I got there and rode around, there were bums everywhere. Where there were not bums, was in front of the post office. So I set up there and tried to get warmed up. I honestly think I over-practiced last night, because I just could not get high notes. I tried playing some lip slurs to get warmed up and get up there, and it just wasn't happening. I played Fanfare For The Common Man as a bit of a preamble, and then right at 3, I played Taps with the 1st and 3rd valves held down, the low version, but it works. Moments after I was done, the church bells started going, so it was nice how things synced up. I'm not sure the bums or the lone security guard who was wandering around noticed or cared, but I did my bit.

I packed up and figured I'd ride around a while. I rode up 4th to Williams and then down 1st and paused by the Stritch, but there was a gaggle of bums set up there. There was also a gaggle of bums set up right across from Caffe Frascati.

I jogged over to 4th again and tootled along, and heard an electric guitar - Guitar Guy was there, playing. We said Hello and I parked the bike and started digging out things to give him. A cable and a connector adapter I'd been saving for him, and other things like a book of matches, some zip ties, an a P-51 can opener.

We jammed for a while, where I found the notes that match what he's playing, and then sort of played backup. It went pretty well. We talked about our time in service, in Korea especially. And them jammed some more. We talked about Miles Davis and Reggie Conyers, the trumpet busker who knows classical tunes and travels around. My friend said he used to run a restaurant right there in San Jose. We both hope he's OK.

It was all going pretty well, but there are tons of bums downtown and more and more of them started to collect around, and a bum-ess came up and I guess he was old friends with her and she had cigarettes, so they got all involved talking and I said I have to go, so we waved 'bye and I took off.

Downtown was just full of bums, some splayed out on the sidewalk or a bit of grass, trying to stay cool. Also lots of cars parked but running, with their drivers staying cool using the AC. It was just bums and zombies everywhere. Too hot for the screaming crazies it seemed, though. 

I didn't want to take any more money out of my bank account. I'm down to having saved only $50 out of my last check, so I had about $6.50 in bills, a few quarters, and $3 of it in dimes. I thought about my options and went over to TAK Market and got a tall PBR and one large Slim Jim and two little ones. I'd have another poor man's picnic in the park.

I rode over to the park, which is on 7th, and saw a nice tree to sit under, but it was at the "yuppie" end of the park with the nice white people and their retriever dogs, and figured I'd last about 5 minutes there, drinking a beer. So I rode to the scruffier end, and found some nice shade by the restrooms. I was much entertained watching a black guy who looked like a very devoted athlete, but quite short, do all kinds of drills that he maybe learned in football. Sprints and jumping up and off of a bench, and all kinds of crazy footwork. So I had my Slim Jims and some beer, and was much entertained by things like this.

Once the Slim Jims were gone, I decided I'd play, just songs, and make it my practice. I started at 4:30 and played until 6. I just worked on a lot of different things, and it was pretty fun. No one seemed to mind, one way or the other. Once it was 6 I played that "Good Night" song from the old Lawrence Welk show, and packed up.

On my ride home, along 10th street, a car slowed down and they tried to hand me a Krispy Kreme box, probably full of donuts, through their window. "You tryin' to give me the beetus?" I said and the box was pulled back in. Come on, do I look that scruffy? That's a $120 gig bag on my back, with an almost $500 trumpet in it. My hair's cut, and there are no bags of cans hanging off my handlebars. Sheesh!

Speaking of hair cuts, I'd picked up my foil shaver from the Amazon place, so I have that to try out when I've got time.

Dinner was an interesting dish, fried eggplant with bacon. It turns out eggplant, at least when cut crossways, soaks up oil like no one's business. I had to use a lot of oil plus the grease the bacon produced. It came out good, needless to say! I've got an idea though. I want to try cutting eggplant the other way and see if it's still so oil-thirsty.  It could also be another good argument for getting an air fryer.

I got 12 things listed on Ebay, all of them things I've found out on the street or from the welding place throwing that tub of stuff out. In the middle of it, I packed a package going to China, and did something new - I was sent a bunch of forms from the buyer in China, had to assemble a rather complicated "form sandwich" into one of those clear envelope things that sticks on the box, and I'll take it up to FedEx tomorrow. The buyer wanted to have the FedEx truck come by the shop here, but it would probably come at some time like 9AM and I'd be sleeping like a dead man.

3AM snack: nuts, Parmesan cheese, some of the diet 7-Up I'd bought for Ken, and some celery off of that stalk I'd picked up from some discarded stuff left out by Bike Express. I'd taken the really green stalk, put it in some water and let it sit at room temperature, and it's crispy and good (I washed it well). I used to do that at the rural place; pick a few collards or some chard and put them in water, and they'd be nice and fresh hours later or even the next day when I was ready to cook 'em. Picking my vegetables from dumpsters and roadsides is certainly a shift of gears, but it's working out well.

A nice Sunday

I drank a bit too much last night and watched "Atomic Cafe" and then some of "The Day After", the full version which I believe I'd not seen, so there were these additional scenes all through.

I woke up at 1 or 2, then went back to bed to sleep some more until 5. I decided I had about $12 in quarters left and I'd go up to 99 Ranch and spend 'em on a bottle of booze and hopefully have enough for a couple of tea eggs.

I rode up there, on the way deciding I'd use my card and buy two bottles of booze, then use some quarters for tea eggs. All went well with the card, booze, and in addition a can of Mr. Brown and a neat tin of tea bags, but by the time I got around to the tea eggs, the bakery stand had closed.

So no tea egg picnic out back. But that was OK because there was an RV parked right by my favorite place under the pine trees.

I wanted to see what all the police and fire equipment was about last night, with quite a bit of street blocked off, so I rode over there. News sites are absolutely poisonous and nothing can be found from them and I don't know any cops, so I wanted to snoop around and look for signs of a fire or something. But there was nothing. I decided to go into the barbecue place there, buy a snack, and ask them since it was right there. This is the third time I've gone into that place and tried to just buy something, and every time they just utterly fuck up. Mainly by looking at me like I'm a potted plant and utterly ignoring me. A toothless homeless hag in there said something about a shooting, and I think that's what had happened since there was no sign of anything else. "Fuck this place though" I said as I walked out.

I decided I'd go full-on trashy and buy something from Weinerschnitzllxyz, and then pick up a beer from TAK. Wiener-shitz-hell had these things called jalapeno poppers which are cheese-filled jalepenos, and I wanted the chili/bacon/ranch one, and the people working there are such tards I had to stamp my foot and yell out "Chili" Bacon! Ranch!" to get them to understand. If I find the patois of the underclass difficult to understand, I wonder if they find me difficult to understand also? In any case, amazingly, they didn't fuck up the order.

I then went over to TAK. I still had ... plenty of quarters,  so I had a very pleasant transaction of quarters, 10 of 'em, for a tall PBR, and they wanted the others so I got $3 in dollar bills also. What nice people.

I decided that maybe I'd have my beer and poppers back at the shop here and headed home. As I passed the park, I thought maybe I'd try having my little picnic there. There were not many people around at all. I set up at a picnic table with my Mr. Brown on the table and my beer down on the seat beside me. For trashy junk food, those poppers were pretty good. A couple were discussing self-cutting hair, and I started to talk with them and the gal came over. She's a retired teacher and the guy's a friend, and they'd done a huge bike ride. It would even be a long ride for me. I told them about my own self-barbering, and to check YouTube for ideas, and so on.

We talked on and on. It got dark, and she (Chris) told me I should watch out because that park has a lot of dangerous people. She said she's had to call the cops a lot, and I told her how I'd called 911 just last night. I said as long as they're there I'll be OK so we talked a bit more (by now I'd shown 'em my beer and gotten a laugh) and I finished my poppers and drank more of the beer. I put my trash away and left the beer, still about half full, for whoever wants it.

She lives in that big Habitrail for yuppies that's alongside the park, and I gave her my number because she's learning the ukulele, and I said we could play music for uke and trumpet. "Oh, I'm just a beginner!" she deferred, and I said I'm fine with beginner music. There are great tunes that are beginner tunes, like Aura Lee. She and her friend Mike and I sang a little, and we parted, I made my crack about the place being a Habitrail for yuppies, and indeed, out front, there were sketchy people hovering around. Imagine paying high rent or a high mortgage to live in something like a pretty boat but one that has sharks hovering all around.

The ride home was uneventful, and there's a thin sliver moon out that's really pretty.

I got back, raised the roll-up door to let the hot air out of the building, and ran around finding the things I need to pack, and that's enough for today because tomorrow's a holiday. Dinner was beef with the 2nd half of the scrounged broccoli and mushrooms and garlic.

Mandatory Fun

I drank more than I should have last night, but *less* than the night before. The dreams were weird, trust me. I was up late/early listing Ebay things and didn't go to bed until, again, about 7 in the morning. I woke up at around 10, due to Crazy Chrissie using some really loud tool in front of the Mr. Softee.

Chrissie's got a generator, a sander of some type, and puts so much time into sanding her car down that I'm amazed it's got an exterior skin any more. She doesn't paint it, just does the prep part, over and over. Come on, Chrissy, you can trade a few skanky blowjobs for some paint, can't ya? Even a brush job with house paint would be better than the Bondo and grinder wonder that's mottled like a giraffe with light and dark grey patches.

I went right back to bed and woke up at 2. I debated going out at all, then did the stuff I didn't do last night like wash my head/hair/arms and shave, cleaned up in general and put on some fresh clothes.

What I did not do, was take my cornet with me. My ear's really improving but my cheek still looks angry and I'd rather not be out there looking like a menace to public health. I'm aiming for Monday, it being the actual holiday in this holiday weekend.

I rode to Japantown and stopped at the blessing box, and neatened it up, and put in a book and some "institutional" packets of painkillers and cold pills we had around here and never use. Then I waited in line at Nijiya and while I waited, a skinny white zombie came staggering up, and looked like he might hassle the people in line so I gave him the death stare and got my less serious pepper spray out. He gave me the finger and eventually just sat on one of the benches slumped over.

I got a bento and a cold can of coffee, and paid using my card since I have zero cash right now. I ate on a bench across the street by that large white abandoned building, but it turns out, that's where tons of old people take their walks and hang out on a weekend. I got to listen to some fun old-people conversations while I ate.

After eating I went over to the Amazon hub and picked up my back-up pair of Crocs. Then I just rode around, looking at various places. I rode by Cafe Stritch, where I want to do some playing just in memory of the place. But it's become a bum hangout, and I overheard part of a scratchy conversation about "Bike Trailer Bob" and "2-dollar whores". I realized I'll play down there all right, but in front of the opera house, to make use of the great resonance there.

I then went by Paseo de San Antonio and I heard a harmonica, and the player sounded really good. Not sure if it was just someone's car radio, but it sounded live so I circled the light rail station, zeroing in on the sound. I found the guy, an overweight guy who looks like a friend and his girlfriend used to describer her, laughingly, "BMW" for Black, Mexican, White. He had a beat up BMX bike and a missing front tooth, and he sounded really good. I pulled up to congratulate him for being so good, and to say that I'd gotten this really nice harmonica, a Suzuki Manji, but never learned to play it; playing trumpet instead.

"You wanna sell it?" he asked. After much fumbling around I got a pen out of my bike bag, and he got out the iPad his mother had got him since his phone broke. He lives in low-income apartments on 2nd. I didn't get Bob's number just his name, but he got my number and I'll just wrap the harmonica well and keep it in my bike bag. We sort of hammered out a price of $40 and if we can get back together, I'm going to say, "Hey, I'm not gonna take your money, the government just gave me $1200, I can't take your money. Just have it". He needs it more than I do, that's for sure. I thought he might be one of the guys who plays at the Poor House Bistro, honestly. Instead he's just some poor-ass fucker with a missing front tooth, who must really love playing the harmonica to get that good.

That's how the natural society Marx wrote about, works. If you're good at something, others will help you. I was considered to be talented at art (I was not, just had a lot of exposure to it) so I was always having art materials shunted over my way. The kid who's good at guitar will always get someone's closet guitar they never played. If I didn't have a trumpet and had no money, I could jump on Trumpet Herald and someone would give me one. It's an instinct that capitalists try to pretend doesn't exist.

I've given away pennywhistles, recorders, even a cornet that I was given, twice. The first recipient was too lazy and too much of a smoker, and said he couldn't get a sound out of it, and I got it back. I then gave it to a buy I found at this gas station place where you have a card for that place and fill up your gas or diesel, so there's no attendants. This guy was practicing in the back of the place. I tried to teach him "Saints" with mixed success as I'd not been practicing that much myself. He had one of those cheap Jean-Baptiste horns and I gave him the cornet for a back-up. I never saw him after that, though. Maybe he was embarrassed that he couldn't play better. I hope he's doing well, wherever he is.

The train came and Harmonica Bob got on, and I rode around a bit more, trying to find different streets than I usually use. I decided to visit the Little Free Library that's behind Bad Boys Bail Bonds, and took out a book of short stories that might be good reading when the internet goes down. I noticed the little door on the front was loose somehow, and got my Swiss army knife out and checked the screws - half of 'em were loose. So I tightened them down, and the door worked better.

My vegetable dumpster on 10th wasn't out, but up around the college-student area I'd found a nice stalk of celery that's only a bit floppy and have it standing in some water now to firm up. And a head of broccoli that's a little foosty but no worse than when I've bought it at the store and kept it a bit too long before using it.

I didn't see the guitar guy playing in front of his house but I think he waits until the sun goes down so he's not got the sun in his eyes. There were a fair number of bums and crazies, and one angry crazy who was yelling and cussing and waving a long stick, I gave him a wide berth.

I got back here and Crazy Chrissie had water running all down the parking lot, washing her shitty-shit mobile, and now she's masking it off like she's going to paint it. With a roller maybe? And now she's driven off in it with it half-taped. Meth: Not Even Once.

It was 6:30 when I got back, and I relaxed a bit after putting things away, and I decided I'd not quite had enough fun, and besides, if I'm to play music on Monday, Memorial Day, what if it's hot as hell and I don't feel like playing then?

So I got the cornet and discovered that the strap I have on the cheesy little gig bag I have for it isn't long enough, but the whole thing fits in my bike bag OK. I also took about $12 in quarters because I planned to first go find the guitar guy, because now the sun would not be in his eyes, and maybe we could find some musical common ground and play together a bit. Then I'd go to TAK Market and buy something, probably in liquid form.

So I took off and where the guitar player was, there was obviously a party or a "quincinera" which is a girl's 13th or 14th birthday, or something, going on in back of one of the houses, and I think the guy was practicing up to play at that, and was playing at that now. It was a happy sound.

I swung by TAK and there were too many questionable characters hanging out around the front, so I decided Why not just go downtown? Show those bums hanging out in front of the Stritch they can't take that area away from musicians. So I set up in front of the opera house, and started in playing "We'll Meet Again". Wow, was I ever rusty as far as setting up on the street and not fucking up a song. But I kept working at it, and at one point a guy came out of one of the bars there and got into a nice car that was parked right there at the curb, and asked, "Is that 'We'll Meet Again'?" and I said it was, and that I'm glad he could recognize it. He said he had it put on his father's grave stone.

I kind of lost my composure then and managed to mutter that that's why I'm out here, and had to turn around and closely examine the posters on the front of the opera house while I got myself together, and then got back to working on it. This, though, is why I could never be satisfied being a sign painter. I just can't imagine someone saying, "Gee, 'NO PARKING' that's exactly what I had put on my father's gravestone!"

I wasn't sure what reactions I'd get to my playing, but other than that one guy, no one showed any notice. I went over to the Paseo de San Antonio and played by the closed theater, then The Old Spaghetti Factory, then in front of that wall that's the corner of the Starbucks in San Pedro Square. By this time it was just a bit after 9, and I figured time to head home.

I rode by the old post office and there was a bum-ess with her little camp in the doorway, having a really psycho fit and hitting the door really hard. It was bad enough that I called 911 and of course the 911 op wanted to know her race and all kinds of stuff, but hopefully the cops or an ambulance or both showed up because that gal really needed some time out in the rubber room.

My last stop was Japantown. It was very quiet with a few people moving around, and I set up by the spike-shaped monument on Jackson and 5th. I played "We'll Meet Again" a couple times pointing one way, then pointing the other. And that was it. I packed up and rode over to TAK Market which didn't have any "types" hanging out, and the gals inside were playing really boistrous Indian music. I told them the music was great and I ought to get my cornet out and play along, and they thought that was great too.

I looked through the store to see just what they have, and they even have rubbing alcohol, given it's in small bottles and they're $3 each. I finally chose a bottle of Pliny The Elder which was $7-odd, in quarters. They said, "We like your review, too!" so they figured out I'm the one who just wrote a glowing review on Google.

Riding back on 5th, there were a lot of flashing lights like an accident or police incident, so I skipped over to 4th, and one end of the incident was there too. So something big happened that involved a lot of fire trucks and some police. I'll probably find out on Reddit tomorrow.

Dinner was beef with scrounged broccoli, scrounged poblano pepper, and garlic. It was delicious. Not only great ingredients but I seasoned it with about equal amounts of "S&B Seasoned Pepper" and "Vegeta", both of which contain good amounts of MSG. 

My Hawaii Rant

When I was just turning 6, we (family of 7) moved to Hawaii.

Now, Hawaii is a place that's been promoted and over-promoted since it was a place for the whalers to get drunk and chase girls, and especially in the 20th century it's been promoted so hard that history has often taken a back seat to fantasy narratives. Like the idea that the Hawaiians were peaceful and loving and all that bullshit. Yeah, when they weren't spearing and eating each other...

The book "Anatomy Of Paradise" was written before things got so politically correct, and there are good descriptions of the early days in Hawaii and what kind of people the Hawaiians' rulers were. In short, they were savages. They'd have a dog cooked up, a servant would plop it down on the table, and a king or prince etc. would eat the whole thing. While the (white) observer had to sit and watch them eat, because regardless of whites' disgust of eating dog, it was a way to show the king had all the power. The scruffiest Bedouin in his tent would offer a visitor at least some hot water and chick peas.

No, by and large the Hawaiians and Pacific Islanders are a mean bunch, and if you are not family or someone they think they can get something out of, you might be fun to throw rocks at, or worse, for amusement. I'm not going to try to recount all the bad memories and experiences I had there as a kid and as a young adult. I've really seriously considered going back there to retire, and I just can't.

It'd be a horrible place to be, anyway. Not only the bad memories but the fact that although I grew up there, speak the local patois, know the local customs, and all the things that make you part of a culture, I was, and would always be, a hated outsider. There's not much socializing here in California because life on the mainland is not about socializing but working, but at least I'm not a hated outsider. I can walk down the street, go into any store, use the post office or DMV or library or what-have-you, with no resistance. Paperwork isn't delayed due to the sound of my last name. I don't get hassled by cops.

But what really amazes me is, this thing that's going on lately, where whites try to ... learn Hawaiian Pidgin? Why does some upper-middle-class kid who went to a good college, now want to sound like a plantation worker from Waialua? Why the actual fuck?  Other than jokingly, I don't see whites taking on the Scots-inflected Jamaican accent. It's well understood that you can't "become" a member of  a distinct group if you're not .... part of that group from the start. You can move to Japan and learn Japanese, but you'll always be that white person who's pretty good at Japanese, and that's that. And everyone's happy with that.

But whites move to Hawaii and try to "become" Hawaiian somehow. It doesn't work, and when push comes to shove, you'll eternally be that "fucking haole". Jews learned this in Europe and this is why they have their own country now. White South Africans are learning this lesson on an ongoing basis, and essentially don't have a country any more. Many are still back there, but they know sooner or later they'll be chased out, or worse.

Growing up with such an awareness of needing a place where you can say "This is my home" is why I went here to California, where I do have some family roots, for what that's worth.

I'm not WASP enough to move to England and say that's my country, and not Lithuanian enough to go there and say that's where I'm from. I *am*, however, if I convert, according to ye olde Talmud, as Jewish as any Jew (OK maybe not a Cohen or a Levi but good enough) and am perfectly welcome in Israel. There are Jews of every complexion, from pale Polish Ashkenazi to dark Ethiopians, and even Chinese Jews. But I'm in a really sweet spot, of looking European with "something extra".

I miss Hawaii but over time one tends to forget the bad stuff, the hunger, the bleakness, the threats of violence, the knowing that because of your race you're destined to only do the work no one else wants to do. The beautiful beaches and places I had to myself have since become inundated by tourists and now with the virus, it's Hawaiian cops happy to hassle "haoles" for ... being there. The nastiness will come out, mark my words. My sisters will be OK I think, one being married to a cop and the other to a military officer/lawyer. They'll have connections to stay safe or get out.

I was considering New Orleans but .... it's the South. It's pretty but ... it's the South. It has good music but ... it's the South.

What's in the future for Hawaii? Bought by the Chinese? They put all their economic eggs in the basket of tourism and now the coronavirus, like mice, has torn that basket to shreds. People there can go back to farming if they don't mind living like early 20th century Okinawans, which wouldn't be bad but not everyone's cup of tea. Loss of tourism could easily cut the population in half in a very short time. They'll just leave.

In the end it's just too small and far away from everywhere else. The history of Pacific islands having hard times and half the population eating the other half is a long one. There are even T-Shirts in Hawaii saying 'Haole: the other white meat'. Yeah they're a barrel of laughs that way. 

A liberating schedule

I packed items, 29 of them actually which used to be as many as we sold in a week, until about 6AM when I just ran out of gas. I drank probably a bit more then needed and finally hit the sack at a bit after 7. I had totally weird dreams, basically a compilation of a lot of stuff I worry about.

I woke up at 8 after 4, and I needed to be out of here at 5 like the proverbial cat of the scalded variety. I had time to make my coffee and take my "vites" and have a few chocolate chips and a walnut or two, and was out the door with a very loaded bike trailer at a minute before 5.

I noticed the nasturtium patch still there, so maybe my coughing fit wasn't noticed, but  I didn't pick any because I've got a nasturtium salad in the fridge already. The post office drop-off went fine, and so did the FedEx drop-off, but the H Mart parking lot was like opening day. It was awful! Before leaving, I'd "fortified" a bottle of ginseng drink with a little of the Chinese white liquor I'd bought yesterday and since they didn't have "my" brand, I got some other stuff that was maybe a dollar more, with a picture of a bull on it. It turns out in the Eurasian area, vodka/liquor made from bisongrass is a thing. That would explain what's probably a bison, on a green label. It's rather awful. So I'd contemplated coming back up after I'm done using the trailer to buy some more of the right stuff and since I'm out of cash, I'd go up to 99 Ranch where my card works. But after seeing the parking lot frantic scene, I congratulated myself for thinking ahead and shopping yesterday, and decided I'll just learn to appreciate bisongrass.

I checked my usual places for packing supplies, and saw some nice long boxes from car shocks over by "Grill-'Em" so I came back, unloaded the trailer, then headed out again with my "getter stick" and got 'em. Coming back around, Kyle the security guard was locking the front gate at Smithfield and said hi. We talked a bit, he's not been avoiding me or told to do so, but is staying more near the back because the place next to them that used to be a big scrap metal operation, has been broken into. Not only that but there are "a couple people" living in one of the big empty buildings, and they'd already cut the fencing separating that property from Smithfield.

He gave me my book back too. I'm glad there was a brisk breeze blowing across us to any droplets between us would be blown away at right angles because I sure don't want to give him the 'rona. I've definitely got symptoms and wish I could get tested. I told him to just toss the book over the fence, that it'd not hurt it, but he handed it to me through the gap in the gate. I was just careful to only touch the book and not his hand.

The front of the ex-scrap-metal place has a car-sized hole in it, so someone used something to just ram on through. It's a huge property, and I suspect it will develop into a large homeless encampment, with fights, fires, drug OD's and all the things essential to bum life.

I came back in here, noting Crazy Chrissie with her two cars out on Rogers Avenue, another gal sleeping in a car several doors from me in the complex here, and the usual nogoodniks prowling around in their cars that look OK until you notice things like poorly repaired dents, rear windows painted black etc.

I'm really happy I came up with my schedule and thought it over while riding. It's not inspired by jobs I had, because in those it was the same thing every day. Serve ice cream or pump gas or clean dog kennels etc. No, this is inspired by the kind of schedule I had in college. I started out with a strict M-W-F shipping schedule. That's the day I load up things packed the day before and take off like a shot for the post office etc. It's like having a M-W-F class. Other classes might be T-Th, and those are the days I do shit like pack 29 #%%#$%^ items. Sunday's a packing day too, to "study" for the M shipping day. On shipping days, since all I've done is load up the bike and go on my little route, when I get back I list 10-20 items on Ebay. So, M-W-F are two "classes", shipping and listing. Sunday, Tuesday, Thursday, are packing days and I don't think about listing at all.

This is exactly how a college student goes through their week. Classes will be M-W-F or T-Th, and what does any respectable college student do on Saturday? Goof off, of course! That day I took off last week, treating that guy to lunch and just riding around without a purpose, was so much fun I am going to require myself to have a day off every week. Then on Sunday, any decent college student kind of has a day off, but they're also doing homework for their Monday class, in this case it'd be packing for my shipping "class" on Monday.

This is going to be very liberating, because all this time I'd been doing my work pretty much when I "feel" like doing it, with the result that I'd have all these things I need to do kind of hovering around me and making me feeling overloaded and miserable, and much more so with our greatly increased sales of late.

Now, all I have to do is wake up on a given day, and I only have to worry about the things assigned to that day. And on Saturday I am required to think about nothing and to go out and have fun. It will literally be mandatory fun.

I cooked up bacon and scrambled eggs with one of my scrounged poblano peppers chopped up in the eggs - really good. Those are expensive in the store, and the only caveat about them is they can be really spicy before they're cooked. As in, I should see about getting at least some food service type gloves to wear when I cook with them. 

I got a call from Ken because we've got to solve a snafu with this large ugly thing we shipped ... then had a regular old Chatty Cathy long call like we used to do years ago when I lived much farther away. Good old times. I told him about my new college student inspired schedule.

I then got in a good practice. I was able to do all my Irons exercises, and did some real work on the old WWII song "We'll Meet Again". By this time the ice cream trucks had left and Crazy Chrissie and some other bum were out there, with Chrissie in bum heaven sanding on Bondo patches on the minivan, and I guess on her car too. They never paint, just sand. I didn't care. Let 'em hear my fucking annoying trumpet exercises and me fucking up "We'll Meet Again" they know I'm in here.

It was a good practice, even with my clearing junk from my lungs. And I've developed a theory of how trumpet players progress. First they think it's "the lips" then eventually they discover it's tongue level, but what's really going on is it's a whole system and I find I'm playing with my midsection. It's not squeezing inward, either; it feels more like down. I believe this is called "support" but this is using my abdominal muscles in slightly different ways for each note, making it easy for the mouth and lips. I've only made this discovery and been aware of it in the last week or two.

Dinner was beef with some garlic and scrounged long Vietnamese green beans. I'd thrown out the "American" green beans I'd scrounged because they were actually spoiling, where the long skinny ones were just drying out a bit. It was easy to snip 'em into little pieces with scissors, throwing away what I didn't want, washing the pieces, and having them ready to go in a bag in the fridge. It was quick, easy, and delicious. I think I can get used to this scrounging/foraging way of getting my veggies. 

One Dollar Becomes Three

Awake at something like 1 which is early for me. Tries to sleep or "relax" some more but it didn't really work. Got up at 2, did neck exercises, and got my lazy ass out the door at 3. The lunch truck was there, at the front of the complex, and the only cash I had on me was a $1 bill in my shirt pocket, so I figured I'd give the lady the $1 because I'd bought that half-burrito that time before that was $2.50 and she'd let me have it for $2 because it's all I had.

I rode up and parked the bike and she called out to me, "Helloooooo...." and I fished out the dollar, which somehow had become three. So I paid $3 for another $2.50 half egg and mystery meat half-burrito and I think she was happy I'd remembered the 50c. I sat one one of those parking lot space stops, tossing out the pieces of potato (carbs) and part of the flour tortilla (more carbs) so the birds had a snack later too.

That hit the spot, and I got going to the bank. Put my check in, then went over to Whole Foods. To have something to buy I got some more Ca-Mg-Zn pills, a large bottle of Italian fizzy water and a canned double latte thing called "Black Medicine". And got $100 cash back.

I went and sat in front of Diridon Station because there was a nice planter to sit on the edge of, and it was in the shade, and no one was around. For some reason the "Black Magic" made my tummy hurt, so I poured half of it  at the base of a tree.

I rode over to the Amazon place and picked up my little bottle of 0.1 molar silver nitrate solution, my Morakniv "companion" fixed blade knife which looks very handy indeed, although it's a lot smaller than a Ka-Bar. And a spare pair of those Fiskars scissors I like so much. And some padded envelopes to use in packing and shipping.

I was making great time, as it was only a few minutes after 4. I rode over to Bike Express, where there were a few people in line to go in, and a black zombie homeless guy staggering around. He started to stagger into the shop, then staggered back out and as he went past me I grumbled, "Just keep going, Zombie Guy, and go bite someone down the street!". Actually I'd prefaced that with more out loud, "If there's one thing about this town, it's all the fucking zombies!"

That's the great thing about a bike. You've got speed on your side; you can veer around the shirtless crazies and slow walkers and all the types of undead that are out there now.

Bike Express had ONE pair of 16-inch tires, "We don't have 1.75 but we have one-and-three-quarters". They had some tubes and rim bands, and tire levers but Pedro's not Park, and as for Cat Eye lights, they don't sell those any more and the guy went on about how they're junk. They're not junk, but I didn't want to argue.

It all came to $93-odd. Bike stuff adds up! I was glad I'd pulled a full hundred out for my bike shop visit.

I rode back by way of Japantown, parked/locked the bike *and* tires a distance away from Nijiya market and got some things there and $40 back. Then I rode, slowly because of the bags and tires hanging off of the handlebars and because of the strong wind, over to the veggie dumpster on 10th street. I got eggplants, pickle-type cucumbers, and string beans.

I got back, put things away, answered questions on Ebay, and ordered the light set I'd have bought at Bike Express, off of Amazon. Eventually I ate the bento I'd bought at Nijiya, and rode up to H Mart to buy things so I won't have to go out at all over the long weekend. That went well, and I think it was a good idea because the markets will be crazy busy over the weekend, and I'll only have to go to the post office and FedEx and not go into any market.

My shopping left me with $1 and a few pennies, and sniffing around for packing supplies on the way back, the crazy guy who argues with the world in Vietnamese was hanging out by the electrical lighting place as he sometimes does, over at the other side of the parking lot. I wanted to be nice to him but not approach, so I took the dollar out and rolled it up and motioned tucking it into the hole in the top of a traffic cone that was there, made sure he saw me doing it, and then left it there for him to get.

That was actually the second dispensing of a dollar to a bum today, because when I was leaving Japantown, by the Buddhist temple there was a guy messing around in this weird little niche in the building and I thought it might be this guy who's crazy and seems to have some kind of a crush on the new, female, pastor there. He shows his love through death threats and vandalism. Anyone who sees him around the temple is supposed to call the police, and let the temple officials know too. The guy had his back turned to me, messing with whatever he was messing with in a shopping cart in that niche, so I said something like, "Hey wanna dollar?" and got a dollar out and gave it to him, and that let me look him over. Not the guy. He thanked me and said "God bless you" so not a Buddhist either.

Coming back from this H Mart trip, I stopped by another veggie dumpster I know of and got a real haul. Green beans, bell and poblano peppers, so I'll have to do some veggie washing and trimming tonight.

I think the problem with my ear is too much Dettol. Yeah it's swollen but it's a different kind of swollen. When it was swollen from cellulitis, it was dark colored and kept cracking and bleeding very easily. In this case it's just plain swollen where I've been putting the Dettol on. I did some reading and it's quite possible to over-do it with Dettol. So I'll dilute the Dettol I have in a little bottle and use it more sparingly. But at least I don't have to go through the hell of visiting the ER (my only way of seeing a doctor) to try to get those green pills again.

I packed some things that really should have gone to the post office today, then took a food break: a can of sardines and then a cucumber and nasturtium salad I dressed with cider vinegar, sesame seed oil, a little salt and pepper, and what turned out to be too much mayonnaise. But I like mayo anyway and it was delicious. And this was made with a bag of nasturtiums I've had in the fridge about a week. 

I didn't practice because this packing really needed to be done, plus my less than optimum time management, I guess. I think I will have to start following an actual schedule because the increased sales are kicking my ass. So I drew one out on an index card that has me keeping to a M-W-F shipping schedule, packing on Sunday, Tuesday, and Thursday, and listing on M-W-F because on shipping days I'm getting out of here with a load pretty early and then have the evening relatively free. The gold standard, from which I've really departed especially lately, had been listing two batches of 25 items each, or if it's large things more like 12. But this way, I'd list 3 evenings a week and it would be 15-20 items. I was trying to do a system of 10 items an evening but that's not gone well at all. The beauty of the system I have on the index card is, I can, on each day of the week, know exactly what to do.

2nd covid cut

Woke up at 3 or so. For someone who values being lazy as much as I do, I was pretty productive last night into early morning.

I "high graded" the tub of stuff I'd snarfed from the welding place (they'd left it out front) and wow, there are tons of older Windows install CDs, game controllers, a laptop, yadda yadda tons of good stuff to slap onto Ebay.

I also, being too damn tired after doing a bunch of packing, to list anything, so I go my new fancy schmancy hair clipper out and did my 2nd "covid cut". It came out pretty well except for some neck pubes. No, not the under the chin kind, these are on the back of my neck and are thicker and curly like damn pubes. My barber used to use a little electric shaver to get that stuff, so I need to see about getting one of those or maybe shave 'em with my razor. For some reason clippers don't get them.

I got all cleaned up and changed into some clothes I'd washed with that plunger thing and the clothes feel at least as clean as if they were washed at the laundromat and maybe a bit cleaner. So that's another win.

I also ordered another toner for my printer because in 3-6 months when I need one, maybe they might be hard to get. It won't hurt to have one ready to go here. "Speedy Inks" ones are good and it was still under $20. And I ordered another pair of Fiskars scissors that I use all the time here. They do have a finite lifetime of maybe 6 years. Another thing to store away.

I actually got out of bed  at 4, had my coffee vitamins nuts chocolate etc., answered things on Ebay, and was out of here with a loaded bike trailer at 5 after 5.

I've made a big decision regarding my trash. The household stuff, egg shells and vegetable trimmings and the usual junk, will go in market bags I stick in whatever dumpster I find handy. Anything with labels or writing will go into the trash at the post office. No one's digging in that trash can at the post office with the door that snaps shut, so that "sensitive information" stuff will be taken care of there, meanwhile I don't care if Harry The Hobo finds my kitchen trash at 2AM and goes through it looking for cans. No need for a shredder, or to have Ken shred it at his work, or a thing I tried about a week ago, burning it. Less hassle and better OPSEC.

I pulled into FedEx first, where there was a fat stereotypical "Karen" type lady I'd have to skin past (she wasn't wearing a mask either) on the sidewalk, so I said, "Look out Karen, coming through!" in response to which Karen didn't move or anything. I just had one FedEx box to drop off and that's why I went there first.

Also, I'm not all that clear on whether the post office is closing at 6 now, but I know FedEx does. In any case, I rode out of there one box lighter and stopped at the nasturtium patch to pick a salad. Which I did, but I got a coughing fit that was unbelievable. I had to squat at the curb and cough and spit a few times. Geez, I hope the people letting those plants grow don't feel like they've got to spray them down with bleach, or worse, pull them up. A swig or two from the "fortified" ginseng drink I had with me seemed to stop it.

I went to the post office and dropped packages off, then I rode around the back side of the post office complex, looking for plants. I saw some malva growing happily in the shade, and what I'm pretty sure is a young salsify. But this was not worth it, because CostCo is part of that complex and there are tons of angry people driving in and out. Absolutely not worth the risk. I did, however, spot a patch of salsify growing in front of the P.O. complex on Brokaw.

The rest of the trip was just going along, like a bee collecting pollen, picking up packing materials. I had quite the load on the bike trailer by the time I got back here. One nice find was a pole like you might find in a large walk-in closet, made of some kind of wood that's really strong. Other than the nasturtiums and a sprig of mint I'd gathered, I found no veggies worth taking home.

My finances, it turns out, are not that robust and are best thought of like a tide pool with a small, delicately balanced ecosystem. I was paying at least $30/month for drinking water, and my Pur filter has that down to about $5 or $6 a month. Not drinking alcohol saves me a lot of money so I need to get back to that. Even though veggies aren't a big expense, if I can get by on gathered/scrounged ones, it might make a big difference. My foraged veggies seem to be a lot fresher than what's from the store, and it's good practice for worse times.

Speaking of delicate finances, I just spent $76-odd on a Wahl foil shaver from Amazon. The way my barber would take care of the "neck pubes" was to use a foil shaver back there, since the things seem to be trimmer proof. And, I might decide I like using a foil shaver for regular old shaving.

I cooked some bacon and eggs, then hunted down a bunch of Ebay items to send out, so I can just pack them tomorrow instead of hunting for them and packing.... which gets frustrating. Then after watching too much stupid stuff on YouTube, I got some practice in.

Not much, really, because I decided to learn the WWII song "We'll Meet Again" and made some pretty good progress. It was not much practice, but I think that song would be good to play around here. I printed out the lyrics and eventually found a version sung according to the lyrics, the end of the movie "Dr. Strangelove". It seems ol' Vera changed the lyrics a bit when she was singing to all those soldiers, and it's annoying to read one thing and hear another.

That's how I learn a song like that, by playing and singing it. I feel that if you don't know the words it can make it hard to play the song with the proper expression. It also makes me wonder if I ought to look at getting some kind of mic and amp set up. I thought about this a while back, since singing takes less of a push than trumpet playing, and lots of trumpeters also sing. I didn't know it but I had pneumonia and thought I didn't have what it takes, and I'd just sing instead. Then, to keep my hands busy I'd get a ukulele, and I started going to ukulele sing-along things that were held in various places. I'm really glad I got that, and the pneumonia, out of my system because ukuleles are stupid and annoying.

But singing's OK. One night at Cafe Stritch one of the local trumpeters played a request, "East Of The Sun, West Of The Moon". He did not really do it justice, and since then I've been itching to play and sing it in there, but then the Stritch stopped having the Sunday night jam when just about anyone could get up there, and now of course it's closed, probably permenantly.

I got on their stage exactly once. They were playing a song called "Now's The Time" by Bird, largely taken from a song called "The Hucklebuck" and it has that little riff that the chorus plays, and there were lots of saxophones there that night and a group of 'em lined up and played that little riff, and I went out to my bike, got my 1937 King cornet out of the bike bag, made sure I could play the riff, and went back in. That's all I wanted to do: Play the little riff and be a supporter. In that short time the gaggle of saxophonists had evaporated and it was "my" turn on stage. I don't remember what I played; it wasn't much. And that was it; my career at the Stritch.

In the interest of learning to sing, I'd joined the local Buddhist temple which has a choir, and started singing with them. I sold my trumpet stuff to a guy in the adult Buddhist class, and figured I'd just be a singer. Who always had this little cough.... But anyway, we worked hard on this Michael Jackson song, about kids, and even had the Mountain View temple folks over because we were going to sing this all together at this big Buddhist teacher's meeting where the theme was something about children ... then the movie about Michael Jackson and kids came out, and the whole thing was nixed. I'd stopped going to choir practice by then, and heard of what a cock-up it was at the adult Buddhist class. The theme at the big meeting being children, I suggested why not sing the song that goes "The ink is black, the page is white, together we learn to read and write" the 1960s version which would be a terrific song, and by then it was too late and I'd dropped out of choir because I was too busy getting over pneumonia....

The point being, I've thought of singing before. 

Meanwhile on this fine night bum antics ensued. A Cadillac(?) stopped and some scumbag got out, and took one of the small size pallets from outside the welding place. Why? Maybe firewood. Crazy Chrissie came and went and did Crazy Chrissie things, like get an actual power drill out with one of those sanding disks, and sanded her shitty primer-and-Bondo car so ... maybe the patterns will be a little bit different? When your name has the honorific "Crazy" attached, your motives can be obscure...

I cooked some beef with the last of my green onions, some garlic (I think I'll still buy garlic) and that was dinner, so I have two nasturtium salads in the making in the fridge now, along with some nice mallows, but at least everything is keeping well. 

And, lots of Dettol is not helping my ear. It was painful where the lobe meets the side of my face when I woke up, and now it's swollen and red, warm, etc. I tried something I did a while back, "heat treating" where I make a mug of hot water, and he have it as hot as I can stand but not hotter, and press that against the ear for a while. I have another place on my cheek I'd treated with the tea tree oil which burned it, but I think I accidentally inoculated it with whatever's in my ear, so I heat-treated that too. I've got silver nitrate coming by Amazon, and the heat-treating worked fairly well in the past, but if push comes to shove I guess I'll go to O'Conner Hospital's ER because they've got my history and tell them the green pills worked but the mupirocin cream was expensive, never really worked, etc. What I really needed was a 2nd course of the green pills. What helps long term is not drinking alcohol. 

30MPH Wind?

Up at 3. On the radio they were saying the wind could get up to 30MPH and the standard Hawaiian trade winds are usually around 20, but that's one reason for not going out today.

I was going to charge out and deposit my check and buy tires, tubes etc for my bike trailer, but I only got about 6 packages packed last night and kind of ran out of gas. I drank too much last night but it was probably 30% less than what I drank the night before. I need to taper back down because drinking is so utterly bogus.

I think what's gotten me in trouble is drinking beer. I actually think the sugars in beer make it more addictive or add an extra load on the liver or something. With straight liquor like er guo tou jiu, which is basically Chinese vodka, you're dealing with just alcohol alone. It can be diluted, and tapered down. 

I've got a stuffy nose, had a sore throat last night, still have some "junk" in my lungs, and if my sense of taste goes then I'll know for sure I've got the 'rona. My coffee and chocolate etc. tasted funny and it was like the coffee didn't have flavor at all just "hot".

If I pack packages today, I can do the Wednesday part of my M-W-F shipping schedule tomorrow and then go downtown on Thursday.

I feel pretty crappy but packed some items to ship, and then made some bacon and eggs which *tasted* good so that's a 'rona symptom I don't have right now. 

Eventually I got around to doing a practice. By this time the ice cream trucks were gone and it was like a meeting of the bums outside. Crazy Chrissie was out there with her shitty grey car, there was a shitty minivan with the obligatory Bondo patch on its side, and the two drug cars, one black and one white with utterly blacked out rear windows, and all the bums hanging around and socializing or whatever it is they do around here. Screw it, I decided, hope they like hearing Irons exercises.

So I tooted away so they know I'm in here, but what's funny is they eventually wandered off to other  bummy places to sleep their bummy sleep, or fight, or whatever it is they do. Honestly, if I were out of a job, mayyyyyybe had a car to live in, etc. in other words if I were a bum, at least I'd want to do window washing or window painting to have something to do. But then if I were a bum, at least I'd have my trumpet and cornet, or could sweet talk a music shop into renting me one, or a pawn shop into selling me one, or someone on Trumpet Herald to get me one, and I'd just play trumpet all the time. Maybe with some window-washing and window painting mixed in.

I practiced for just about an hour, so that's good. When I was done, a large cockroach was treating the drips of, er, spit, that I blow out of my horn's spit valves like his own personal buffet which was as hilarious as it was disgusting. He got squished. 

Victoria Day

... Which means not a damn thing in the US. However, given that a picture of The Queen Herself is on one side of the silver coins I got, I have to think a kind thought about Old Queeny.

I was going to stay in because I thought it would be wet out, but it was dry, and beautiful out there. Also, I'd told a customer I'd mail their projector bulb today, so even though I only had a few packages packed, I was out the door at 5.

I dropped off the packages (they've put a new handle on the chute at the post office, we'll see how long that lasts) and did some shopping at H Mart. Because of this weird new economy, pots and pans are expensive, but H Mart had some big cheap aluminum pots perfect for boiling water.

I'd done a load of laundry last night because I'm just about out of clean clothes and am starting to stink. And it's hard to clean up without clean clothes to change into. It all went tickety-boo, except that I discovered that two full kettles of hot water in the mix brings the water all the way up to tepid. Two electric kettles full is one liter, so I wanted something that holds maybe two liters, that I could use on my Iwatani butane stove. This large Korean aluminum pot is perfect. It can probably hold 3 liters. And it was only $12 or so.

I also got a beer, a roasted "yellow corvina" fish, other odds and ends, and in the end of course my card didn't work. And somewhere I'd spent some money, so I didn't have as much cash as I thought I did. So I put some things back, but certainly not the pot, the fish, the beer, or a package of Yakult.

I rode around the back and found a shady curb to sit on, and enjoyed my fish and about 1/2 the beer. I've wondered why this particular fish, corvina/croaker, is to popular in that market but this one was really good. Close to the flavor of a Hawaiian fish called a weke moana, which is my all time favorite.

I had the pot to "up" my laundry game, and my next step was go to to Lowe's which I'd not been to for several months, and the idea was to get a piece of hose that might fit one of my funnels, to use a funnel-and-hose system to get water from the sink in the bathroom to the tall trash can I'm doing my laundry in. But I decided to just get a PVC elbow and a piece of PVC pipe, and try that. I also got more batteries including C's because when the power was out yesterday, I found myself wondering how many C's I had for my emergency radio. Scotch-Brite pads, a Lowe's bucket because why not; it all came to about $41.

I scrounged a few boxes and things, including from Sanmina but this time it was a pretty quick grab and go, and "harvested" a slightly but not too foosty bell pepper from one of my veggie dumpsters. So beef and pepper tonight I think.

I did other things like took some fennel from a fennel plant that grows near the CalTrans yard, and gathered 15 salsify seeds from the plant growing by AAA. And in the complex here, the guys in the welding place had left two tubs out, one with all kinds of electronic stuff and one with some old fans. I took the one full of 'tronics in here, and will list the good stuff on Ebay.

I guess we're going into an economic Depression but what I went through in the 70s really felt like a Depression. I was underweight and undersized, and at one point had one "good" T-shirt and that was borrowed from the gym teacher at high school. This is probably why I never got into "prepping" when I was much younger. You'd think, hey, going through hunger, danger, etc. would make a person a natural prepper.

But I survived a level so low that saving or preparing was futile. Anything you saved would be taken from you. If you got food you ate it right away. If you earned a few dollars to buy a dozen eggs and a can of chili to make a dinner for your group, you bought it and cooked and ate, then and there. Anything you tried to save, would be taken by someone bigger, stronger, smarter, with less morals. So it was literally hand-to-mouth.

I suppose this is how it was in the original hunter-gatherer societies. There was no saving-up or holding back if anyone was hungry. I could not think of saving money behind if my sisters were hungry.

But the way society is set up now, it makes sense to be a prepper. The government even occasionally encourages us to prep, in case there's an earthquake or something.

If I'd only been moderately poor growing up instead of really fucking poor, I'd have kept more of a "pantry" and done more of my own cooking. I should have had bags of flour etc under my bed in my poor college days, but I think I had the mental assumption that any food stores would be stolen by the people who owned the rooming house because they had a key to my room. I subsisted largely on take-out type food I could eat in private in my room and safely store in my stomach.

People talk about their Depression-era parents washing and re-using aluminum foil, I guess I was at the level of learning what leaves can be used instead of aluminum foil, and don't ever buy aluminum foil because it will be stolen. (Banana and ti leaves can be used in the place of aluminum foil in a lot of applications by the way.)

I was just getting ready to do some practice when Ken came by. I thought he might come by tonight because it's not raining, and after writing out my pay check, he and I got to work moving this big ugly "liquid scintillation counter" from where it was, to the back of his truck. Then we dug out a high voltage power supply he wants to use for testing all these ignitron tubes he's gotten in, and we opened it up and had a look inside. I said, "Well, the two main factors with a high voltage power supply will be the fact that capacitors age, and dust and dirt are conductive - but then why am I telling you this? I'm just a technician and you're the engineer!".

I made Ken a cup of tea and we talked about the usual techie stuff. Ken did this really amazing "TED Talk" about water purification systems and I had to bust out laughing, and say he'd better stay healthy and live to be 100 because we're gonna need him.

Ken took off, and I decided I've been missing too many practices, so I've got to practice some trumpet. I got in a pretty intense half hour, doing the Irons exercises I've been doing. And my endurance was a bit better than yesterday's practice. I was just finishing when my phone rang - it was Ken, saying he'd found my package of bike tube repair kits I'd ordered on Amazon. They'd gotten hidden under stuff in his truck. Maybe my crack about his "Archeological filing system" in that thing that make him want to clear it out a bit. I went on Amazon and cancelled my request for a refund.

Practice done, I cooked up some beef with the bell pepper I'd scrounged, and the second course was the rest of the "7th street" artichokes. I seem to be keeping my veggies stocked pretty well, just scrounging and harvesting. I've got salsify buds, mallow leaves, and the makings of a nasturtium salad in the fridge.

Ken had brought by my bottle of Dettol, and also what looked like a scary notice from the IRS. It was that letter from Der Fuehrer people have been getting, and I said I'm glad to get it, to keep as a souvenir. "It's like getting a letter from Nixon, or Hitler himself!" I bubbled.