The parallels are striking and numerous

I practiced some last night, but felt sleepy pretty soon after starting so I didn't practice for as long as I've have liked to. 

I woke up in time to wash hair and shave and clean up, put on clean clothes, etc. And have coffee anyway if not the nuts. 

On the radio they were talking about the increase of hate crimes against LGBT people. It made of think of something that's been on my mind for a while. The parallels between Jews in 1930s Germany and LGBT people in 2020s America are striking:

(1) Both are a very small portion of the population. 1-2%? 3%. 

(2) Both are groups that Christians have decided their out-of-date book condemns. 

(3) Both are/were groups without a powerful nation-state behind them

(4) Both are groups that sometimes you can tell they're members of by looks, and often, not at all. Countless Jews have played Gentiles in movies, countless LGBT people have passed and pass as straight. I think this bothers hate groups but also gives them an excuse to pry into people's backgrounds, behaviors, etc.

(5) Both groups were well on their way to being fully assimilated and accepted by their societies. Many Jews fought bravely for Germany in WWI, as many LGBT people have fought for the US in all of its wars. In both cases, they were being accepted as "just another German" or "just another American".

(6) Both groups were/are being accused of harming children, with the Jews it was the old blood libel, with LGBT people it's "grooming" when it's very obvious that the biggest danger to children by "groomers" are right-wing religious leaders. 

(7) Both groups were/are being accused of being the source of pretty much everything that's bad. Stub your toe? It was "The Jews". These days? "The Gays". This is standard Fascist thinking, to simply things to the extent that the formula becomes, Get rid of this group and then everything will be great.

(8) In both cases, getting the hell out may be very difficult. It's well documented how difficult it was in the 1930s and 1940s for the Jews, and in the case of LGBT people here in the US, it's going to be similarly difficult. Most Americans don't even have passports. It's very hard to emigrate to another country unless you're under 40, have at least a million dollars on hand, and have a needed skill. I feel like I'm the only one who remembers how quickly the chuds set up armed checkpoints when covid started up, and how they were doing things like driving down the road shooting at people who were on their front porches - with no repercussions. Try even getting to the airport under those conditions.

(9) Both groups were/are accused by the Right of having hidden riches, hidden networks, hidden resources that they "deserve" to have taken from them. I believe one can expect the same program from modern-day Nazis, that for a while you can leave but you can't take much more with you than the clothes on your back. This may prevail for a year or so, then come the camps. 

(10) In both cases, there will be many who will not understand how dire things are going to get and that they must get out (or join the partisans, or something). "It can't happen here, this is Germany, the land of Goethe and Heine, we're civilized". "It can't happen here, this is America, we fought against the Nazis, we're the land of Democracy". Those who understand how bad it can get will be laughed at if they try to convince others to get out. 

I rode over to the bank post haste and was happy to see my branch had not closed, it had been "something wrong with the building; we all had to leave". I put my two checks in and the balance is within a few dollars of my calculations. 

I rode over to Whole Foods and there was the usual "Child Fund" or whatever generic name it is, booth set up. It was manned by a tall, large, friendly, Black lady and we talked about performing there and so on. She told me there's a guy who plays the ukulele there all the time, who plays later at night. I said I'd found that the later-at-night crowd was smaller but the people more relaxed and friendlier and the tips good. She said they'd stayed there with their booth until Whole Foods closes at 10, and she raved about how much better the late-night crowd was. 

I could have hung out and talked and joked around for an hour, but I had to eat so I went in and got some carnitas and grilled peppers and a bottle of water and fueled up. 

Then I walked over to Target, which is a bit of a walk but I need to get used to walking because when I'm back in Hawaii I'll probably be walking and taking the bus at least for a while. I went into Cost Plus World Market and looked around but didn't find anything I wanted, then Marshall's which was really stripped of the kind of shirt I was interested in, then went to Target where I got some tape, index cards, laundry detergent, that sort of thing. 

I walked back ... at least the walk is nice for looking at all the different plants. I got back to Whole Foods, got some eggs, and rode over to the Amazon place for bubble mailers, then meandered my way home. I found 7 books so that's good. 

I put things away and went back out to check the medical dumpster (nothing) and the veggie dumpster (Romaine lettuce and several hothouse cucumbers). 

There had been a ton of people out and around today, traffic was heavy, maybe it's payday for a lot of people or something. 

Cookies for breakfast

 I didn't practice last night, too tired. 

I woke up in time to ... well ... pack nothing because nothing had sold overnight. Our sales are *that* much in the toilet right now. 

I did some exercises, had coffee etc., then loaded up. The 8 small things that just had to go to the post office, two bags of trash, and a big bag full of about 40 bags of "Milka" chocolate chip cookies. I'd gotten those on Monday, where there were just boxes and boxes of them being thrown out. I'd put them, in boxes, by the trash enclosure here along with other scrap metal type stuff for the bums, and indeed the bums took some. 

But not all so last night I bagged up what was left, 80 or 90 packages, into two large clear bags, easy for a bum to carry on a bike. One bag did disappear overnight, but one was left. So this one went with me. 

I stopped by Tom's and James was out front taking cubicle dividers apart for the metal. I said I'd brought by some cookies so they can have cookies for breakfast. He was like, "OK" because he was deep into his task. 

I rode up to the post office and got rid of the trash and mailed the packages, then came back along my usual route, picking up lots of medicines and stuff from the EMT training place. I also found a box of donuts from a local place, about 10 in there, probably bought this morning by some boss and this was what was left. So I loaded them up too. 

Back to Tom's. I put the donuts on the outdoor table there and ended up hanging out with Tom for a while. He'd smoked some salmon when he was in Alaska and I had a couple good pieces of that, and we caught up on things. I was nice sitting and talking, but James had to be "managed" in his task of re-doing the tiling Tom had inside his place, so there was a lot of bickering between him and Tom. I finally left, saying to Tom it looks like he's busy, and I'll be by again. 

At least I left an almost-full box of "Emergen-C", orange flavor, with Tom for his wife, who's there because she's got covid. 

It's very warm and the AQI's about 130 so kind of hazy. 

I still like the idea

 I don't have many things to ship out so I decided to stay in today. 

I practiced last night but not enough as I was really tired and hit the sack. At least I got something close to 8 hours' sleep. 

I still like the idea of the glass flute, which is good as my order's in and it's on its way. Along with two books. I called Ken's wife and told her a package is coming to the house for me, and caught up on things. 

I'll have the flute next week and I'll also have avoided going to West Valley Music which, although the new store is much bigger, I find kind of depressing. The old store on Castro Street was a gas because there were always parents and kids in there and the 2-3 employees in there were kids themselves, barely out of their teens. It was a bubbly, happy place.

I did some looking around on YouTube and all the Hall glass flutes sound good. That roughly lines up with my remembering, that day in the Lark In The Morning store almost 20 years ago now, the one I tried being easy to get a note on and having a clear (lol) sound. 

Yeah I want to get out busking with the thing. I should be able to get up to some simple repertoire fairly quickly and I'm counting on getting points for "Is that a glass flute?!?!?!?" I know for a fact I got points for playing trumpet because it's shiny and not a guitar and trumpet is "hard". 

It might be thinking too much but I could probably make a career out of just playing Hall flutes. They come in a ton of keys and I can probably even play the large D flute if I get one with offset holes. They *can* be played chromatically and if I want to get good I'll want to practice going up and down the chromatic scale until I've got it down pat.  

Practice and another idea

 I listed 10 things last night, small things. Our sales are utterly awful right now. Like, we're at about 4 grand and we need to be at 6 to cover our expenses and actually operate in the black. I know we've dipped down this far but I don't know if this is something that happens each year around this, back to school, time. I suppose I should have been keeping a record on graph paper all this time and then I'd know. 

I practiced last night, just tons of long tones. The thing is, if I can build up the basic strength and stamina and good tone, the rest should be by far the easier part. I'm doing more like 12 in a row now.

I got up with plenty of time to have coffee and nuts and pack 12 things, and get going at my usual time. I just had to go to the post office as all the things were small. 

I had plenty of time to think, and I thought back to my visit to West Valley Music. Of course among their many other things they had some Hall crystal flutes on display, and now I thought about those. I'm really itching to get out there busking, but have held back for lack of repertoire and strength on the shakuhachi, and the fact that the shakuhachi I have is a pretty ugly hunk of plastic. 

But a crystal flute! I'm convinced that half of the people who tip buskers are "listening with their eyes", in the same way that to at least half of the eating public, a restaurant meal just doesn't taste good unless it looks good. A crystal flute would certainly look interesting. 

I'd commented to the owner of West Valley Music as I looked a bit wistfully at the crystal flutes that "I'm afraid I'll just break it". But what if I did break one? What if I broke a few a year? That's still cheaper than a re-pad on a concert flute. And while they may not be crystal (I'm unclear on what "crystal" is, really) they're made of borosilicate glass, good ol' lab glass. It's fairly durable stuff. I could get a piece of the clear plastic tube they sell at TAP Plastic and put a couple of end caps on, and I'd be able to carry it around just fine. Plus, Hall publishes a book on how to play their flutes from the beginning, and one of Christmas carols. 

If I have to learn a second flute besides the shakuhachi, the crystal flute would be a very good choice. I have a couple of major problems with the concert flute. Firstly, it's so long and the hands have to be curled around in such a way, that my left shoulder does *not* like it. (In all fairness, it doesn't like violin playing either.) Shorter flutes like the shinobue or a crystal flute don't give me this problem. Secondly, anything made of metal, plated with silver no less, and having springs and levers and pads and so on, will not do well at all in Hawaii's tropical environment. I don't want to mess around with anything that complicated. The shakuhachi is great, being a simple hunk of bamboo with some holes in it. A crystal flute is just a hunk of lab glass with some holes in it.

I actually had first blown into a crystal flute when I was still living in Sunnyvale, with a car and my own small business, selling on Ebay. I'd gotten interested in busking and had a feeling things were going to get worse, economically (they were, we remember it as the crash of 2008). I'd figured if I could find an instrument that works for me, I could go out busking and for every $10 I made busking I could make $10 less on Ebay until I was switched over. I'd not need the expensive apartment, the car, the credit cards... 

So I'd gone up to the Lark In The Morning store in San Francisco - yes, in those times, 15 years ago now, one could  do that. Just go into the store - and tried one. Not hard to get a note at all, and I believe it was easy to get a nice pure tone. This means it can also be played loudly, an important thing as long as I'm busking on the mainland. I remember being worried about breaking it if I got one though, which is beginning to sound more and more like not taking up the guitar because one might break a string. 

So I know what I'll be up to this week - getting over to West Valley Music to look at their crystal flutes, and hopefully they have the books too. Because if I get hopping, I can catch this Christmas season and New Year's eve/day and be set for next summer. 

And the upshot of the whole thing is, I have a crystal flute in G plus the two books I mentioned coming directly from Hall now. The Hall site recommends getting a flute in one of the middle sizes - being diatonic they're in different sizes according to key, and the C one is probably bigger than I want as a beginner. And I was able to get the decorative pattern I like most - none at all. 

I'm really itching to get out there busking again and the $120 I just spent is still cheaper than renting a trumpet to get out there with. 

 

 

 

Progress in practice

 The most important thing last night is that I practiced. I didn't feel like it but I cued up a semi-interesting documentary on YouTube and got to work. It's becoming easier to play the high notes, cleaner, for more repetitions. 10 times is becoming routine and I'm doing them for 12 often. 

I still felt discouraged about the body of repertoire I have or rather don't have, so I fiddled around with a few things, "Summertime" from Porgy and Bess, and "Hallelujah" and at least verified that I *can* play these things. Then I felt good about the whole thing. 

I think I'm at the stage on shakuhachi that I was on trumpet 10+ years ago when I was still living in Gilroy and was playing and practicing, but had a long way to go. I managed to get out busking a couple of times, was awful and didn't make much, but I had to start somewhere.

I'd prepared and photo'd 15 things to list on Ebay but pretty much ran out of gas after listing 5, so I set the other 10 aside and did my practice and then bed. 

I got up in time to have coffee and nuts, and grab two bags containing 10 cans of garbanzo beans, some pasta, rock candy on a stick, and even the by now rather well traveled daifuku, and two bags of trash and after getting rid of the trash on the way, swung by Tom's and dropped off the heavy bags. 

Then I rode up to Dai Thanh, then 99 Ranch, then H Mart where I locked the bike. I walked over to Sprouts and got two bags of pumpkin seeds, thinking that if I get two, I won't have to run over there so much. 

I got back to H Mart and .... they're all out of the macadamia nuts they sell. I drank a can of Mr. Brown out front and walked back over to Sprouts for some of their macadamia nuts, $10 a lb as opposed to what's got to work out to at least $15. (I tried them later at home and they're better too.) 

Then back to H Mart and around back I got some shiitake mushrooms and peppers and lots of bananas to take over to Tom's. 

I rode over to Tom's and knocked - he was awake. I handed off the bananas, and caught up a little. I asked him if he's recovered from the - and made a drinking motion - and ready to take on the week. He said he hoped so. He verified that he's going to have James living in back and going to go back into his drilling business with James as helper. I said I hope it works out well. 

I probably won't be seeing much of Tom now if he's doing his regular job plus doing his drilling business on the side. Plus I think another factor is: Tom wants a drinking buddy. We had lots of fun that evening we got shitfaced and listened to all kinds of music, but I didn't want to do that any more. Tom wants someone he can get all sloppy and shitfaced with. 

He's told me about following the trail of things he's broken when he was blackout drunk, making his way to the porta-john he has on the side of his building; finding the trail of destruction the next day. So he really likes to tie one on, and if James likes a good snootful which he may well, then it's a good match. 

I was really hoping I could get Tom out busking but that's not going to happen. He's reverting to what he knows, which as an Alaskan is collecting firewood and doing stuff with machinery like drill rigs. Just like I'll like as not be falling back on collecting seashells once I'm back in Hawaii and my interest in music goes back further than I can remember, too. 

I rode back along Old Bayshore/Zanker - lo and behold, there was what appeared to be a zombess carrying things in pillowcases shuffling along the opposite side of the road, it was something like 9 at night now and they're really everywhere at all hours - and got back in here and buttoned up for the night. 

Another day of my mild adventures

 I got in way too late last night to consider listing anything on Ebay. By the time I'd portioned out the beef and pork I got and put that into the freezer, and done a lot of other little things, most of the night was used up. 

I sliced up some mackerel I'd bought to leave it out for the birds, then decided to filet the nicest part out of each slice to use in soup after all, and put that into the freezer too. I need to prep fish like this so when I decide on fish soup I can just take the bag out of the freezer and make it just like I do with my prepped beef and pork. 

I'd put together two bags of books, by taking the ones I'd found during the week and putting in a few I was keeping for myself that I'd probably never read. I had those ready to go and I woke up at 3:30, with just enough time for some coffee and nuts and to get out the door at 10 after. 

I got over to the book store in time, and pretended to look very interested in their old paperbacks on the shelf by one of the fans so I could stand in front of the fan. This time around it was $7.50 cash. So I'm about a third of the way to paying off the Genki Japanese I book with workbook I'd spent about $70 on at Kinokuniya. 

I rode back downtown and over to the Peace & Justice Center little pantry I guess it is, and moved the loaves of bread to the bottom shelf and populated the top one with the leftover books. Some guys had a little table set up and told me there's a concert going on that I should come in and see, "We have some pretty good singers". I said Sure I will, but I have one more errand to run and will be back. I rode off. At least they'd given me a pound of walnuts in a bag, that my crow friends will appreciate.

Now I was hungry so I went to the new Lee's and got a pork skewer. That was $5 but was really generously sized. Back in the old days it would be a meal for two people if there was also rice. 

I rode down to Walmart and got things like a 6 pack of 600ml bottles of diet 7-Up, thus ensuring I've got soda to offer Ken for the next 6 weeks. And other odds and ends from paper towels to witch hazel. 

I found 7 books on my way back to Japantown, parked at Nijiya and went in and got some Black Black gum, a package of jalapeno peppers, and a can of Dutour black coffee. It was really busy because there was a "sake walk" going on so I sat at a table with two guys and one guy's girlfriend who was curled up trying to tune out the world, apparently. 

I enjoyed sipping my cold black coffee and talking with the guys, with one guy really. We talked about liquors and beers and different tastes, and the current state of ramen, and all sorts of things. He had the empty bottle from some whiskey that he said was hundreds of dollars a bottle. As I handled the bottle he encouraged me to pour the last tiny bit, like .25cc, into the cap of my coffee and try it, which  I did. "It's ... whiskey" I said. 

We sat and talked for a good long time. His friend had to find a place to throw up, and I suggested he go into Hukilau, "Just go in like you own the place - that's what I do". The friend headed off that way but when he came back reported that he'd in fact thrown up in the gutter somewhere. He'd drank "more than I ever have before" and I'm pretty sure what was the case with the poor girlfriend, whose face I never saw. 

I complimented the guy on his choice of a difuki from Nijiya, and said they're amazing compared to when I was growing up in Hawaii when they were smaller and you got a teeny little bit of black bean paste in the middle. He said the daifuki "predates us", that it had been sitting on the table when they got there. I said I'll take  it, to give to a friend who won't notice it's stale. 

We were finally a bit talked out and my coffee was finished, and I headed back here. I put the bike away, did my usual neatening-up in the parking lot and put the resulting bag of stuff in the HVAC place's dumpster, and settled down for the night. 

When the world is running down...

 ... You make the best of what's still around, according to Sting. 

I listed 15 things last night, horray for me. I practiced while watching an interesting old movie called "Fat City" about some boxers. Very good movie, I think. 

I got about 6 hours' sleep and woke up in time to have my coffee, clean up, and pack a couple more things. I took off for downtown and stopped at the post office to drop the packages off, then over to the bank. 

Which was closed. A sign in the door said it's "temporarily" closed and to visit their nearest branch in Walnut Creek. Considering it would take me a full day to travel to Walnut Creek, that's not happening. I tried depositing my check using the ATM but it was unresponsive. 

Right now I assume something happened like someone couldn't come in, or something happened with the computers or electricity or something. Banks are sneaky, though and although the people at my bank are nice it's still a bank. With banks failing right and left, maybe this is their sneaky way of saying they're closing up. 

At least my card still works, and I went over to Whole Foods for some roast pork, olives, and asparagus and a "lite" near-beer, 5 grams of carbs. I got that one because it's Athletic Brewing Company and so far I like their near-beers. 

I ate, then got on the #22 bus to go see West Valley Music's new store. It's not hard to get to at all, and it's much bigger than the old one - 3X the size, according to the owner, who was there. 

I asked if they still sold the "Maui Xaphoon" which she said they did not. I was hoping they had one, a demo one, that I could try out. The reason I've been interested in this is it' a lot of noise in a small, nearly indestructible package, and the thing was "invented" in Hawaii. The owner thought they were kind of a fad, and I said I'd read a ton of reviews and for an instrument that's supposed to appeal to kids, there are supposedly two big problems: a wide reach for a couple of the holes, and the built-in mouthpiece is large; made to use tenor sax reeds. 

I noticed a little sign saying Yamaha fifes are $7.50 or something so I said Hey I'll get one of those, play around with it, then give it to someone. But they didn't have those either. So it was a nice visit but didn't result in any sale for them. In fact their old store on a Friday evening would be a mob scene. I was the only customer in the place. The owner was the only salesperson there. 

I walked back the way the bus had taken me to the big shopping center with the 99 Ranch market in it. There are a lot of other businesses in there and of course the popular thing these days, several empty spaces. 

I went around behind 99 Ranch to see if Heaney Violins was open, which it was not. But at least they're still there. I went into 99 Ranch and it's pretty much the same stuff as my "home" one, and I just got a can of Boss coffee and drank that out front. 

I got on a #22 bus coming back and got off at the Maria stop to go to Mega Mart. I got a package each of frozen pork and beef, and a small package of celery. It was already getting dark and originally I'd planned to explore the place more but by this time I just wanted to do a quick in and out. 

Then I got on another #22 bus to go back to Whole Foods where I'd left my bike. By this time it was 9:30 or so. The skinny old hippie guy who's really into conspiracy theories and I'd listened a bit when I'd originally locked the bike up, but now, this late, he was gone. I got some eggs and a leek. 

I rode back here, finding a few books as I often do, and got back in here at almost 10:30 which is the equivalent of 1:30AM in the before times. Almost everything closes at 9 even on a Friday night here, so it was really quiet out. 

I got in here, put the bike inside, and checked out a box in the parking lot by the HVAC place. It was foodstuffs and I picked out several cans of Garbanzo beans, a bag of penne pasta, and some rock candy on a stick things for Tom. 

The thing is .... Today everything was ... weird. The bank being closed. The vibe was weird at Whole Foods. I rode on three different #22 buses and the drivers had the AC blasting to make it uncomfortably cold (a thing some do in winter to harass the homeless who ride the "22 Hotel") and were in a hurry. Normally the #22 just ambles along, and this is a real change. The drivers seemed stressed. 

Mega Mart was weird. There was one checker handling two checkout spaces for some reason, and I was glad I just had a few things to check through. Whole Foods when I got back there to get my bike (and some eggs and a leek) felt weird. It's Friday night, and in the past it was a night where there would be a fair number of late-night customers picking up more beer or wine, some chips, etc. It was a friendly time. This time it was really dead. 

Maybe it's just myself, feeling the doom. Maybe it's that it actually cooled down in the evening, down to 62 (of course it was 82 in here when I got home) and I could feel a change in the air. But my feelings didn't make the bus rides so strange, or make both West Valley Music and Whole Foods so dead. 

 

Heat avoidance day

 Ken came over last night and I  got my check, and I told him my theory, that our sales are down because with two of the "neon" (bulbs) out in the overhead lighting, our photos are coming out too dark. The gloomy lighting was bugging Ken anyway so we futzed around or more like he did, with me handing him up bulbs, and managed to get it down to only one out, and one of the new ones being a bluish-white one that it's almost like 1-1/2 of the others. 

After thanking Ken (rather profusely) for the help with the light situation we were talking and it came to me - I told him I just realized now that probably a factor is what I call the "back to school feeding frenzy". I'd noted that it was going on when I saw how quickly sweat pants had sold out at the local Ross. It makes sense! People are spending on getting their kiddos ready for the school year, so of course spending with us is down. But the brighter photos will sure help, I said. 

After Ken left I got 15 things ready to list but then decided I'd had enough by about 5AM, then settled in to practicing, while watching a 2-hour movie called "The Impossible" about a family's ordeal in the 2004 "Boxing Day" tsunami in Thailand. 

I did lots of long tones and I mean, I'm up to being about to do 10 in a row and even a bit more. So I did tons of those, trying to get the best, clearest tone I could. 

When I look at incredible players like Shakuhachi0 on YouTube, I can tell that kid - and yes he is a kid - has put in some serious time. He probably has a top-flight shakuhachi too but that can't make up for lack of practice. 

I finally went to sleep in the mid-morning, telling myself I'll sleep all I like and stay in, to avoid the heat I told myself. 

I got up at 4 or 5, I think closer to 5, and it was hot all right. No sense in rushing off to the post office for two things, and I was too late for the bank. 

I'm able to cool it down to 81 or 82 degrees in here if I don't do any cooking and don't exert myself. I've started more and more to check the weather in Honolulu and while "town" is known to get hot, it's a lot more livable than here. It doesn't get as hot, and it cools off at night. Most importantly, with no winter that gets below freezing to cope with, buildings are much better ventilated and tend to be about the same temperature as it is outside. Here, it's 15 or 20 degrees warmer inside here, so that as I type it's 65 degrees outside, and it's 82 inside. This is why mainlanders talk about 65 as being uncomfortably warm - it is for them because it means it's around 85 degrees inside their buildings. 

 

 

Tom's new BF

 I posted 12 things last night to round it up to 20 for the last two days, and didn't feel like I'd "run out of gas" like I did the night before. 

I practiced, doing tons of long tones. 10 on each note, at least. To build up strength, is my idea. 

I got up in time to pack things, plus pack up the approx. 30 lbs of dried figs and other stuff for Tom. On my way out I found out the neighbors had thrown out tons of office type stuff, computer mice and laptop docks and so on, all of it looking new. So I grabbed a bunch of that and put it in here then took off again, but this meant I had to go straight to the post office with no detours, I felt. 

I did so, dropping off the post office stuff, then doubled back to go to FedEx and popped into H Mart for one more try to get diet Sprite or 7-Up but no luck. I got a couple small bottles of Pinafiel fizzy water, one for Ken and one for me to try, at 99c each. 

I dropped off the FedEx boxes then circled around back to pick up two big sheets of "foamcore" then after tying those down, headed to Tom's. 

Tom was inside, sleeping, according to James. James had already sold the giant blower for $140 to the metal place next door and was busy tearing the motor that had been with it by the usual bum-tech means: Hammering on it with a sledge hammer, etc. The idea being to thoroughly destroy it and in the process, get the copper wire out to sell for crack, er, dog food ... yeah ... dog food. 

James and I shot the shit for a while, and I put Tom's two boxes of stuff in his kitchen. Bums tend to eschew any food they can't shovel directly into their mouth immediately, so rice and oatmeal, which need to be cooked, are pretty safe from 'em. As for dried figs, you're not a proper bum if you don't have a head full of rotting teeth, so again, hard dried fruit is fairly bum-proof. 

Tom seems to need a sidekick or three. James told me Tom's going to let him live in the room in back that Tom was going to set up as his office. Tom's office will be what's his office now, where he's got his computer, bed, etc. The front of Tom's place looks like a junk yard now, with rusty shit and tools scattered all over. Bum chic. I wished James well and took off. 

I got back here and put things away and set about putting the stuff in front of the trash enclosure into the HVAC's dumpster which will be emptied tonight. And went back to the neighbor's dumpster for another box of office stuff and an interesting Sony radio/CD player which almost certainly has an alarm clock function and thus might be pretty useful to me. 

Tom has told me that if needed, I can always stay at his place but it appears he plans to make it into a quasi bum camp and that's right out. If I become street homeless I won't become street homeless that quickly, and can arrange things to get over to Hawaii sooner. There's no way I'd want to stay at Tom's place given his choice of "pets".

This is not to say I might not be street homeless in Hawaii. At least the weather there is not actively trying to kill a person, and as a non-smoker, non-drinker, and non-drug-user, I'm thinking that if it comes to that, my time on the street would be short. There *are* a ton of programs for homeless and low-income people, which don't work for street drug ghouls but work fine for normal people. 

Of course I could just start hustling around selling stuff on Ebay again. 

Staying in and soaking in the doom

 I decided on a stay-in day today. I got 15 things ready to list but only ended up listing 8 of them as I just kind of "ran out of gas" and eventually went to bed, telling myself I'd sleep all I want. 

I woke up at 4, thinking it was 5. But it was 4, and I stayed in anyway. I found and packed things, although one thing has disappeared as things do so often around here. It wasn't even listed that long ago, and there are two of them actually, and just poof! Gone. 

If I end up selling on Ebay from Hawaii, firstly I'll follow Don Lancaster's rule of never selling anything I can't hold in one hand out at arm's length. In fact if I'm smart I'll just stick to seashells, jewelry, and books/ephemera because all of those things are pretty small and easy to ship. Seashells get a slight edge as I don't have to buy them to resell but just pick them up. 

I rather like the idea of running a business where my expenses are so low I don't even bother to write most of them off. 

Best of all being a business where nothing physical changes hands, which is why busking is such a good business. Get an instrument that doesn't eat strings, reeds, batteries, etc. and that's really the best. And don't be the kind of performer that "needs" booze/cigs/Kratom/crack/heroin etc. to ply their trade. 

And do a performance that's in keeping with the local culture. Trumpet's the winner on all these counts for the mainland, where "Look at me!! Look at me!!" is an esteemed personality trait. Hawaii, being more and more an extension of Japan, is the opposite. 

The heavenly Pacific Northwest

I listed 15 things last night, did some practice, the usual things. 

Today it was hot (it cooled all the way down to 81 in here overnight) and I packed what I could find, pack, and wasn't so big I'd need the trailer. It's Monday after all. 

I took off with about 8 things, and ended up behind a hee-yuge lady stuffing things into the chute ahead of me. I asked her if she was selling on Ebay, and she said she was using a service called Poshmark where she just sends the clothes to them and they take care of it. Of course after her, the chute jammed. She probably jams up the plumbing where she lives routinely. I just stacked my things onto/into the big stack of things by the counter. 

I rode up to Dai Thanh for chicory coffee and little cucumbers, then to 99 Ranch for yet another brand of wheat gluten to try, then H Mart where I planned to get some diet soda for when Ken's over. I'd decided the 12-pack of diet 7-Up would be the way to go, as while it's a bit expensive at $8 it would last me a while. I figured I'd get it and butter, but then I checked the butter there they didn't have "Producers" brand which I like. 

So I walked over to Sprouts where I got Organic Valley butter, which is supposed to be about the only brand that says grass-fed and actually is so. Then I got another bag of olives at Home Goods, which is fine except I realized on my walk back that I'd just spent too much to be able to get the 12-pack of soda. chances are Ken will just want tea, though, as he did on his last visit. 

On the way back from H Mart I thought I was being followed by a zombie on a bike so I started thinking about what to do about this. I was close to Tom's place so I rode over there and spent some time hanging out with James who had just gotten a huge squirrel cage blower with a motor, almost as tall as him and he's pretty tall. I'm still not clear how he got it to Tom's shop. We talked a bit and raved about the blower and James had that kind of "high" one gets when one's gotten a big, in this case literally, score. 

I took off for here, got in and put things away, burned this week's sensitive papers (anything with any address or data on it at all) and that was my day.  

The doom on Reddit is becoming more realistic. For instance, several years ago it was normal for people to talk about fleeing to the Pacific Northwest.

 https://www.reddit.com/r/collapse/comments/15xr3o4/my_region_hit_rank_1_globally_for_worst_air/

While the very worst air in that chart is in Canada, at an AQI of 1000, towns in the Pacific Northwest are right close behind. Summers of temps over 100 as a matter of routine, and every inbred neo-Nazi wanting to move to the New White Homeland, no thanks. 

 

Need to take steps

 Today was a stay-in day. I have about $32 to last me until next payday, but there's not much of anything I need to buy. 

I practiced "some" last night, including working out some of "Rainbow Connection". At the last shakuhachi club meeting, Rinban played it just to goof off and I knew what song it was because someone else mentioned what it was. The thing is, he's got tons more time in playing the shakuhachi, but in actual playing, I know from busking, you have to "put it across"; really get it through the the listening public what actual song you're playing. 

This is a real issue in busking. Red The Flute Player could play "Amazing Grace" and it would be unrecognizable. I could tell it was something, and it sounded kind of wistful or sad, but had no idea what it was until I asked him and he said it was Amazing Grace. 

The violin player in Santa Cruz, if he didn't have the printed music in front of him, would somehow lose all sense of counting or rhythm. He'd muck up Shubert's Ave Maria, a simple tune that owes as much to the comforting, swinging rhythm of it, like the rocking of a cradle, as to its beautiful melody. 

I even told the new guy at the shakuhachi meeting that even if he can't sound some notes or gets them wrong, as long as he keeps the rhythm he can get away with it. 

Ah, well the doom proceeds apace. Now much of Northern California is on fire it seems (the Bay Area here is actually central California) and on Reddit there were maps showing pretty much all the inhabited areas of the Hawaiian Islands are fire-prone. The windward sides of the islands are the small exception. Fires used to not really be a thing in Hawaii. The closest thing was the intentional burning of the sugar cane fields which is a normal part of harvesting. Those were spectacular and nothing else ever caught fire. 

I just looked up another old friend or acquaintance anyway, who never left Hawaii from the time I knew him and is far less of a fuckup than the two friends I've been corresponding with. Of course this 3rd friend has no discernible email address even though he has a company with a few employees. But he does have a physical address, two of them in fact, one for his house and one for his business. So I'll have to write to him. Considering his business, he might even want to hire me. 

But not having an email address or web page is to be expected. Hawaii's much more modern than the mainland, having things like "Direct Deposit" where your pay check goes right into your bank, but there are areas in which they're behind. Mostly in areas that don't matter, as depending on the internet for a living is really stupid. He deals with government a lot and big companies, and they all have telephones and fax machines and what more could you need? 

I need to take steps, every day, to further my goal of getting my papers in order and getting back to Hawaii and to, once there, not end up homeless *too* quickly. I expect some rough times (not as rough as they'll be if I stay here) but want to minimize them if I can. 

Anni de Plombo

 https://www.reddit.com/r/news/comments/15vs4py/shop_owner_shot_killed_over_rainbow_flag_outside/

At least the cops killed the shooter but while people are killing each other over flags in Ukraine, they're also doing so here. We are entering our Years of Lead, Anni de Plombo as it was called in Italy, our Troubles, and some would argue as evidenced by more than 1000 deaths a year due to political conflict, our newest civil war. 

I was up all night worrying two pieces of test equipment apart. Identical pieces which made it a bit easier but real bastards to take apart. At least there were some pretty neat, high-value parts in there. 

I was up in time to have a coffee and grab the two bags of books I'd made ready last night and get out of here to the used book store. I was offered $7 cash or something like $11 in trade, and took the cash. 

I had to take the books they didn't want with me of course, so I took those with me to Whole Foods where I got some sausages and asparagus and ate. Then I headed over to the Teen Challenge store and dropped the books off. Literally, as I'd just dashed in and put the bags of books on a table and one of them tipped and books flopped onto the floor. Oh well, their problem now, I got outta there. 

I rode up to Central Computers where I wanted to buy a new mouse pad but they were closed. Oh well,  I figured, I've got time to go to Kinokuniya and look for maybe some training stuff on learning the kana/gana, and I'll get a cold bottle of coffee in Mitsuwa too. So I rode back, only realizing I'd gone the wrong way when I got back to the Big-5 by Santana Row. Uhh, oops. 

I hadn't planned my day other than cashing in the books. While out riding I had been thinking that I'm not really enthusiastic about going to Nordstrom's to see if they have Olukai slippers, and maybe I'll just set aside the cash for 1/2 the price of a pair, and then get them next week. But since I'd screwed up going to Kinokuniya, there wasn't much else to do but, indeed, walk over to Nordstrom's after all. 

I locked my bike there and walked over. The time I'd gone into the mall and mainly into Macy's, it was depressing as hell. Dead, dead, dead. But this time I had to walk past tons of stores and the place was hopping. Nordstrom's was fine. There were actual customers in there, and I was able to walk in, veer to the left, and find a pair of Olukais that fit me. Tried them on to make sure, paid, and was out of there. 

I poked around a few stores but the mall's pretty boring unless you have a specific mission to get a certain thing, and even then it is. 

By the time I got back to my bike it was starting to get dark, and I realized the Chidori Band concert I'd planned to go to tonight started at 7 and it was almost 8. Oops. 

I wended my way back, going through San Pedro Square once I was downtown again. They've stopped having loud bands there and have it shut off to cars so it's just people walking around and no loud music. In other words, ideal for busking. And there was not ONE busker, or even beggar or anything. 

Other than San Pedro Square, it was surprisingly dead and it was very quiet and peaceful on my ride home. This is not counting the zombies of course, of which I encountered the stumbling, mumbling, yelling, barking, and even roaring varieties. 

I found a few books to get my next batch started, some from a pile of stuff left out, there was an electric kettle of the same type I use, in other words a good one, a rolling bag of the type you travel with, a Brother sewing machine, and such useful things. 

I got back here and checked the time - 9PM, the equivalent of midnight in the before times. I put the scraps out for the bums from the equipment I'd taken apart and there was a bum nearby after I'd taken half of it out so I got back in here and buttoned the place up while Mr. Bum, somehow, carried the stuff away on his bike, then went back out and put out the other half. I don't know how these bums do it but I suppose with enough meth all kinds of things are possible. 

There's a high layer of cloud that's distinctly brown. In keeping with the decay of the internet, www.purpleair.com is pay-only now but according to www.airnow.gov the AQI is only about 30 which is really good. 

 

 

Friday - hot - storm coming in

 I woke up in time to pack three more things and get going, dropped postal service packages off at the post office downtown, then went over to the bank to put my pay check in. 

Then I went to the Amazon place for lots of bubble mailers, and over to Japantown for some shopping at Nijiya. I was checking some eggs to make sure there wasn't a broken one, and the egg must have already been cracked, because when I put my thumb in the little slot to open the package, one of the eggs broke. It was looking to get pretty messy, as the egg kept running out so I ducked into their back room and put the package of eggs in the sink and washed my hands off. I told the guy about it - "It happens all the time". 

My plan had been to mail post office things on my way out downtown, then get back in here in time to pack a guy's motor and take it up to FedEx. And it would have worked if it weren't for those kids and their dogs, oops, I mean, if the guy wasn't impatient and told me he'll just buy a new one locally as it's really hot and he can't wait. So I canceled the order and it's automatically re-listed. 

Thursday

 I sorted out 10 things to list but didn't list them. I practiced last night, concentrating on long tones. I can do 10 in a row now. I figure if I can develop the basic ability to blow, the rest is just refinement. 

It's hot, what else is news? I tried sending a link to my friend Pat and of course it didn't work - tried to send it again another way which may or may not work. 

The internet is getting slow, slow, slow. Takes many minutes for things like Ebay's front page to load so I start it loading and do something else while it chugs along. Our sales are in the toilet again too. 

I packed one more thing (our sales are really slow) and left here with enough time to get rid of some trash and stop at Nijiya and get some hard-boiled eggs, raw fish, and a can of black coffee. I ate those and chewed gum, while I checked one of the free libraries then went over to the temple and sat over on the side, doing long tones. 

When I heard people I checked the time and it was time to go in. The guy from Palo Alto wasn't there, neither was the guy I sold my trumpet to, but the head of the choir was there - he's decided he'd like to learn the shakuhachi - and the new kid came too. 

We went through a number of songs and it went fairly well. The lady recorded us because there's something coming up on Sept. 10 when the idea is we'll play a song everyone will know. I didn't see the video but I heard the playback and we sounded surprisingly good. 

When the new kid was settled in I handed him the book I said I'd give him, and after the playing was over we all got to talk a bit. Mainly about knowing Japanese, or not. One guy lived in Japan for a couple of years and said for all the school he'd taken in that language, he found he knew almost nothing about regular old day to day communication. We had a bit of a good old gab fest then everyone split up - see y'all next month. 

I rode around to a couple more libraries and found more books, so I can probably take some to the used book store on Saturday. 

On my ride home I stopped at a light at 6th and Taylor, and thought I saw movement in the plants with little white flowers near me - I thought I'd seen a mouse or mice. It turned out to be two hawk moths, honestly the size of mice (mice are actually pretty small) working the flower bed. It was really cool to see. 

 

 

Feckin' hot and my back is trashed

 I woke up at 4 and it's hot, of course. 

I listed 10 things last night to get that over with, then put a bunch of things away and we're talking a couple week's worth as I'd only put away some the last time - I still had to finish my project of moving things around to make a dedicated shelf for gas regulators - wow we have a lot of those. 

And in the process I fucked my back up, I don't know how but here I am. 

I did some practice and am building strength and endurance, slowly. I also worked out at least the first line of "Seiya" which is a wonderful song so I'm very keen in getting that one down pat.  I'm lucky to get in an hour of practice a day and while that's good, it's not going to make me an accomplished player. That will have to happen when I'm done here and can make the shakuhachi essentially my job.

It went that way when I did that sport. I messed around with it a bit, off and on, since I was a kid. And looking back, my talent was evident although I had no idea at the time. I was able to flourish in it when I ended up with a year off and unemployment and savings to live off of. Then the sport could come first, and I had plenty of free time besides. Looking back, it was an amazing time. No internet to monopolize one's time.

And for a little doom-time cheer, heeeeeere's Paul Beckwith! 

The TLDR is, things gonna get worse and soon. He's talking about us blowing through the 1.5C "limit" in the next year and actually blowing through the 2.0C "limit" of warming since the 1850s when the industrial revolution started. 

So, to paraphrase Al Franken, What does this mean for Alex Carter? Maybe I should move to British Columbia, where it's nice and cool? Nope! According to someone living there, commenting on Reddit, it's well over 100 degrees there. Or move to the Great Lakes region, where it's only forest fires and Nazis that will take me out? 

The whole thing's a laugh. Hawaii's not ideal but it's home, and as I've told Ken, I'd rather be there for the end than anywhere else. 

I had to take some aspirin and wait for it to kick in, then packed two things, once really large and one more like medium. Those went to FedEx, and I found packing materials on the way back. And two little things I think I can list for $50 apiece so that's a nice little surprise. 

I got back here and did a fry-up of eggs, jalapeno peppers and some gluten loaf, and after eating that got a call from Ken - he's not coming tonight. 

This is why I'm glad I got the big things out. I can take the small ones with me tomorrow on my way to the shakuhachi club meeting and anything else that sells won't be due to be shipped until Monday. 

 

Birds vs. cats

 I photo'd up 20 things to list last night then after listing 10 of them realized it was 6AM and I should wind down and get some sleep. 

I did a little practice. Practicing when I've taken care of all other responsibilities and am tired out is not optimum. 

I had a weird dream where things had become how the gun manufacturers want them to be. Guns, guns, everywhere. You had to carry a gun or you just weren't with the times. Society was miserable but there were guns for sale everywhere. There were display cases like you see jewelry and sunglasses in, but with guns and ammo and associated things instead. I was wearing my Glock, of course, trying to at least be subtle with it under my shirt. I was going into a store - guns etc were sold at all stores - to, I think, buy a gun for Ken as a birthday or surprise gift. 

It's a good hot one today and at least I was going to send a motor off to a guy who needed it ASAP. He messaged me today to cancel the order as he was going to just get a new one locally - he needed it for his HVAC system and it was "too hot" to wait. 

So I stayed in and was able to keep it as cool as 85 in here. I checked the Honolulu weather and it's cooler than here by a degree anyway. Here, one has to have winter, spring/fall, and summer clothes. There it's one set of clothes and that's it. 

The Lahaina situation continues. 99 official deaths and they've only just gotten started - it's being likened to a modern Pompeii. It appears there's only one way to survive something like that and that would have been to get out a day or two ahead, decide you really feel like going camping on the windward, wet, side of the island. You'd have to be really jumpy to do that for what everyone was making out to be a routine small grass fire or two. 

I'm thinking that being jumpy is the only way to go, though. I look at the backpack I got to travel with, a nice dull Prussian blue color, and thank myself for getting it and not the rather garish "Cotopaxi" pack I was considering. It looks like anything any local blalah might have saved over from high school or community college. 

I thought more about Pat and his 5 cats, and my older sister who I don't think has that many but doubtless has at least a couple. The closest thing to a bond I ever had with any animal was that I was really into birds, especially their ability to fly. I guess the adults picked up on that as we ended up with a pet parrot that was officially mine. All the poor thing did was live in her (we think) cage. Looking back I wish I'd pushed to let that poor bird have as much freedom as possible. I could get away with a lot if I pushed at it. 

It's also probably why I ended up being a member of the Audubon Society - the only impoverished member likely, of this decidedly upper-middle-class institution. I've realized that I love birds, birds and bugs, those are my buddies. I even looked up the Hawaii Audubon Society and will probably join once I'm back and have a stable address. 

The water takers

 I listed 20 things last night and did some practice. That's all I can do is practice, practice, practice. I watched a fair amount of shakuhachi videos last night too, including an interesting run-down on a number of different shakuhachi made out of different materials from the humble Yuu to the Aireed "Katana" which is made of aluminum. The most intriguing was the Ellis Flutes one made out of ebonite which Ellis isn't selling right now but may in the future. 

The situation in Maui continues... even incidental videos where the camera is panning around a scene will show shapes in the rubble that look exactly like a pair of charred and ash-covered legs... on the radio it was mentioned how people coming in for medical care were all grey, covered in ash, except for their mouths which were red from being burned. 

How the town of Lahaina became such a tinderbox is being much discussed, and it seems that when the Hawaiians were running things, it was lush and green with taro ponds and lots of trees. 

So I propose that the name Haole for white people, these days considered to mean "without breath" but actually meant "of iron" or "who brought iron", go out of fashion and "water takers" come into fashion. They take the water. 

The town I lived in when little, Hawaii Kai, was once also lush and green and is very desert-y now. The large lagoon there, Kuapa "pond" was once a colossal fish pond, and when I was little Portlock Road was positively jungle-y in places. 

I got up in time for coffee and nuts,  and to pack all the things - all small ones. They all went to the post office and I wen to 99 Ranch where I got some wheat gluten loaf and some jalapeno peppers. Then over to Sprouts for pumpkin seeds. 

I ended up in line for a while behind an older Black guy and two little kids, his grand-kids maybe. The kids were acting up a bit, and the guy said he was "Teaching them how to shop. I've been shopping since I was 8 years old". I said I'd been shopping earlier than that, and that when I was five, my older brother, six, had stolen a little package of salted peanuts that was ten cents, and my mother made him go back and pay for it. He looked at the kids and said "See?" and then told me that of course the homeless can steal 900 and something dollars and walk right out etc. 

I replied that what places like Target will do, though, is they've got really good cameras and they'll track you, and once you steal more than that amount, now it's a felony and they'll get you. He said that as ex-military he knew it was a lot deeper than that, that it was a plan to get rid of the homeless people ... I asked what branch and he said Marines and we did the fist bump thing as he headed off to the self-checkout where a lady working there had called out to him to help him out. He might be a known character there. 

Then to Home Goods for some olives, and back to H Mart where I'd locked the bike for some macadamia nuts. Then rode back here not finding anything in the way of packing material but there never is on a Monday.

I fried up a couple of eggs and slices of a poblano pepper I'd just gotten from the veggie dumpster, and then some slices of the wheat gluten I'd just got from 99 Ranch. It's a different brand than the first time I got it there and I like the other brand better as it's got a lovely "wheaty" taste. 

I got a long email from my friend on the big island, showing his replies to a long rant sent to him from our friend on Oahu. The Oahu guy, Dave, is hopeless. For starters he's got conservative brain-rot, and that's almost impossible to reverse. His last couple of emails to me were pretty loony tunes, so I answered back with sarcasm, and that's exactly what Pat, the big island guy, did also. 

I replied to Pat that Dave's not going to change. Honestly, Dave apparently knew everyone in both the electronics and the "pro audio" field in Hawaii and he must have alienated everyone. If he weren't a complete jerk he'd have friends making sure he's taken care of, but he's trying to live the conservative ideal, lone wolf, no help from anyone and he turns down help from anyone who offers it. 

Pat's just as bad in his own way, though. Like he managed to lose a big house on the North Shore of Oahu that he had all paid off. Now he lives in a cheap barely legal ... structure ... and on the kind of budget I'll be on, about a thousand a month and food stamps. But somehow he just has to have a car. And while he's so doctrinaire a vegetarian that my even mentioning fishing offends him, it's just fine for him to have a car and he also keep 5 cats so not only is he doing his part to trash the environment and kill off native birds, but some quick Googling shows me that my meat/protein consumption is about the same as that of two cats. This means meat, cheese, fish, that sort of thing. So he's in effect supporting something like two meat-eating people by keeping five cats. 

 

 

Hot day in

 It was a hot one so I stayed in.  Not much going on. 

I spend too much time reading through such cheerful subreddits as r/collapse, r/homeless, r/povertyfinance, etc. I guess on one level I feel like I'll learn some tip or clue that changes how I do my life or something. This never seems to happen though. 

One pattern I see is that for most Americans, it's not just supporting yourself, you have to support one or more cars also. If you don't support one or more vehicles, you quickly end up homeless, carless, living in a hut made of pallets and tarps, and living off of food banks and "bum feeds". 

But - a huge pattern I've started thinking about is while there are sure a lot of people with degrees or experience in some field, a huge number of the hard-times stories are from people with, effectively, no skills at all. Not even interpersonal skills or the "gift of the gab". They had no career-mindedness at all, drifted through high school, etc. I'm not going to fault anyone for not graduating high school if they had to get to work, as that's how my life went, but you can always GED it and go to junior college or trade school or even a 4-year college if your SAT is good enough and while I don't remember my score even I was able to take the SAT. 

Another huge pattern I've just noticed that spurred me to write this is, of all the sob stories I've not read any where the person had serious skill at a musical instrument, or at anything artistic and I'm going to include in "artistic" not only painting and drawing but even things like wood-carving or hand-lettering of the type used in traditional sign-painting. 

Are people "burying" these skills and resignedly moving into their car or the local tent camp or homeless shelter? When you're in extremis you reach for anything so I can't believe this would be the case. I have to conclude that people with some kind of real skill are not ending up homeless - or homeless enough to cry for help on Reddit - at all. 

They're either taking that skill and going out and using it, or their skill enables them to network enough to not end up on the street. Or, I have to say in many cases, they're middle-class or better and our class system, so adept at preserving itself, is simply not allowing them to fall too far. 

My father, for instance, should have ended up homeless. But pure WASP Ivy League graduates are not supposed to end up homeless in our class system, and indeed although he probably didn't do any paying work from the age of 50 on, he lived quite comfortably, owning a car and living in his aunt's old apartment which according to Zillow is worth just under a half-million dollars. My mother of course died in illness and poverty because the class she came from allows for that to happen. 

So maybe the kind of people who get themselves born into the social class where things like 10 years of classical violin training or making the Junior National Team in tennis or understanding the difference between impressionism and fauvism are the norm, are taken care of in some mysterious way. The ruling class, even the lower reaches of it, can't afford to have them captured by the other side, their class enemies. 

But I like to think that a skill or area of expertise is protective merely because it allows a person to build up a network of other people who are doing fairly well.

Another Saturday at the mall

 I got about an hour's practice last night and I am getting stronger. I guess every demanding instrument is like this. In most cases the student starts out playing trumpet or violin or classical guitar or something when they're about 10 years old so the part where they don't sound great is done with by the time they're in high school. 

I woke up time for coffee etc. and took off at 4. I had a big bag of books hanging off of each handlebar, and made my way to the Recycle Book Store to cash 'em in. I had high hopes for this batch, as it included books that I thought were pretty nice. But I got a mere $10 cash. 

I took the slightly-lighter bags back with me to Whole Foods where I got some sausages and asparagus and a bottle of water. Kenny was at the till, and I told him about how I'd checked out dd's discounts and found it to be Meh but that Crossroads Trading Company is amazing. He's really into knowing the best stores to bargain-shop at. He had trouble understanding the odd name of Crossoads though, and where it was, so I said next time I'm by I'll pick up a business card from them for him. 

I ate my sausage and asparagus at one of the picnic tables with a guy sitting at the end, who was drinking Grolsch beers and diddling around on his phone. When I finished, I made some friendly comment about the weather or something, and off we went, talking. 

It turns out he's Dave who works for The Metro - or the overall company that publishes The Metro, I'm not sure. I told him how I'm actually old "Poison Pen Carter" who's written a few of the "I Saw You" things, which the editor told me they loved. We both raved over Gary Singh's articles, my favorite being "Where The Signs Spin". 

Dave, who was finishing off the 4th beer in the 4-pack, was there to enjoy the day, riding over on his old cruiser bike, and had to meet a guy he was giving San Jose Jazz tickets to. He had to go back to his house, which was right by where I was going, "Antiques Row" on San Carlos. So this guy was not only buddy-buddy, but stuck to me like glue as we rode out, heading for the Burbank district. 

I intended to turn left at Sunol but we went right past it. No problem, though, as I could turn left at Race. Dave was dead-set on going down this angled street which I'd tried once and gotten kind of lost, so I insisted on going down Race and he went off down that street to go to his house, where he was to meet the recipient of the tickets. 

I rode to the Teen Challenge thrift store to drop the books off. I was told by the Black guy running things there to take the bike inside because "There are cats around here who are really quick...!" but I was just dropping 'em off so that's all I had to do. 

Crossroads was just up the street so I locked the bike there, went in and got a business card and a couple of their little flyers, then actually walked back to Teen Challenge to see what kind of stuff they had - it's meh. The 99c store there was interesting though, I got 3 cans of "lower salt" corned beef with an expiry date in 2027 for $3 each. I figured it's a good use for the book money. 

Then I went up the road for the other goal of the trip, to visit Fjallraven again. I parked at Big-5, went in to find they don't have Scotch Guard, then walked over. Santana Row was super busy. It kind of reminds me of Ala Moana Center back in the day, when it was the only game in town if you wanted to do some serious shopping. It also reminded me that I really didn't like the crowded old Ala Moana Center when I was a kid. 

I picked out a small bag from Fjallraven that I can keep flute parts and important smaller things in and got that. I checked out H&M which is rather horrible. I thought I might get some T-shirts there but after that I think I'll just pick out my nicest three Muji shirts to take to Hawaii. 

I checked out the Japanese pens and paper store - whoo-eee, Fjallraven prices for some cheapo pencil cases etc. - and Tommy Bahamas was closed early for some reason. I'm still on the fence about buying some Olukai slippers and was deciding against it but it turns out Olukai is donating sales from their web site to Maui fire relief so at least I want to get a handle on what size/style I want. 

I rode back to Whole Foods and got some eggs and cheese and Kenny was there so I gave him the business card etc from Crossroads. He was really happy to get the stuff and it's only fair, as when I'd gotten the sausage etc. he'd only charged me for the bottle of water so I'd eaten for free. 

I rode home, picking up several books on the way, and by now it was dark so I'm glad I'd put new batteries in my bike headlight. I didn't think I'd be out until dark but there I was. 

I should add that I rode through San Pedro Square and didn't see any buskers or beggars or anything like that. The only buskers I saw were the lady singer on one corner by Santana Row and some hollering Christian loon on the opposite corner. There wasn't anyone doing anything at Whole Foods, either. 

I'm not gonna say buskers are extinct in this valley but they've become very very rare. 

Trimming

 I got 20 things ready to list last night, which took some work as in finding them, cleaning them, taking something apart, counting parts out, testing a few with an ohm meter, etc. 

Then  I settled in for some practice and did so while watching an anime that was over an hour long so it was probably a decent amount of practice. 

I got up in time to pack all the things that had sold and took off a bit earlier than usual. I'd found some parrot bill clippers I thought I had but had bought them so long ago that I wasn't sure where they were, so it was a nice surprise to find them. I stopped on the bridge over Coyote Creek and trimmed the trees where they hung down, making it difficult for people walking on the sidewalk there. I'd wanted to do this months ago and even asked Tom if he had some clippers I could borrow but he didn't. 

The post office drop-offs went fine (I had none for FedEx) and I rode up to Dai Thanh for a can of chicory coffee and some other things.

When in doubt, hang it up

 I did my FedEx and post office run yesterday, came home with plenty of packing stuff,  practiced last night, listed 20 things (I had 20 lined up that were easy) and of course got my check from Ken. That was chancy as I called him and asked if he was coming over, and he said he thought it was Tuesday. 

We talked for a while and it was a nice boring evening except that Ken had "the gurgles" and had to use the bathroom a couple of times. I'm glad I always have it clean when he comes over. 

I offered Pepto-Bismol, soda (which he accepted), even offered to fry up a couple eggs for him but he was OK with just the soda. 

The Maui fire has been horrible. The official death count is 36 but it seems it will become much higher. The fire traveled super fast - 15 seconds to get down one lady's street for instance. Leeward Oahu gets fires now too, plus there are some fires going on the leeward side of the Big Island. When I was a kid, fires were just not a thing other than the occasional house fire (like Ross's house up the street on Portlock Road) and of course the cane field fires which were intentional as it's part of the harvesting process. 

The best thing was, I rigged up a gadget to hang up my new backpack so it's up and out of way while still being "right here". I could set it up as a "go bag" as it will be once, essentially, when I make the Big Move. 

I woke up in time to have coffee and do things like shine my shoes and clean up a bit, and got going first to the temple to drop off my August pledge, then over to the bank to put my pay check in (I had $10 more in there than I thought I had, apparently). 

Then I went to Black & Brown where they told me the aloha shirt wasn't what they're interested in, but I might try Crossroads up the road. So I rode up there, went through their process (it's a busy place) and got about $15 cash. I'd have gotten about $25 trade but while they have a lot of neat stuff, there's hardly anything I need to buy in this "countdown" year. 

I decided since I was most of the way, I might as well go to to Mitsuwa Marketplace. I rode as far as Guitar Center, used their loo, then stopped in at the McDonald's that's on the other corner from Starving Musician. I guess the dollar, er, $1.25 menu is a thing of the past now. A regular burger is $2.50. I decided on a double quarter-pounder with cheese, and a small unsweetened tea. Ordering is done using a kiosk and it's nice to see technology I used almost 30 years ago in Japan has finally reached here. It was pretty nice being able to pick out what I wanted, and the price, after rounding up for Ronald McDonald Charities, was $10. 

The burger was really good too. I just ate the burger patties and not the buns. In this way McDonald's can be a good place to fuel up for the keto dieter on the go. The unsweetened tea even tasted good. 

I rode over to Mitsuwa's after eating and was even early enough to go to Kinokuniya before they closed at 7. I wanted to find some educational material, maybe a poster for learning the kana or something. I got the Genki level 1 textbook and workbook and those cost me $70 so that's enough extra spending for this week. 

I went into the main store and found about $20 worth of things to buy, then rode back out to Stevens Creek, and decided that Marukai Market isn't so far away, is it? So I rode over there. It *is* far away. Again I spent about $20. At least now I might have enough cans of butane for my Iwatani stove to last out the next year as one lasts me 2-3 weeks. It bugs me that places are charging over $2 for other brands when you can get actual Iwatani cans at Marukai for $2 each. 

I went into Daiso to look around but their prices are crazy. Everything's overpriced! I got a little scrubber thing I think will be handy for scrubbing my head/hair and even that little piece of plastic was $2. 

Now I had a long ride home but at least it was downwind and downhill, and it being almost 9 at night, traffic was pretty light. Of course there were zombies to avoid but all of them seemed to be slow walkers and pretty easy to evade. 

I got back here and on the radio (on NPR) was some upper middle class lady talking about her lift, classically trained singer to astrophysicist to mother to TED Fellow, yadda yadda. I mean what's the matter with us poor people?? Why are we so lazy?? Yeah, fuck those people. 

This is why I don't feel guilty about not giving any money to NPR. The last time they had a really big money-hustle going on, it turned out to be for a huge new building or headquarters or something and I think that's fine, maybe the old one was decrepit or too small or something, but why not come out and talk about it? No just hustle a lot of money from us little guys then go "Oh, yeah, we love our new palatial headquarters...". 

Wikipedia's the same way - I actually donated $10 or something and then it turned out they were doing censorship or something. Never again. 

 

Lahaina leveled

 The city of Lahaina on Maui has burned down. I've seen the photos and it looks like something from WWII. Leveled. 

Houses, stores, hotels, bars, the big banyan tree (banyans are juicy sort of trees and it's hard to imagine one burning but here we are) boats, yes even boats moored offshore were catching fire and burning. People had to jump into the ocean to escape the flames and the Coast Guard rescued at least most of them. 

It's easy to say it must be arsonists or those dirty rotten homeless people and while homeless people are dirty and rotten indeed, this was just wind from the hurricane a few hundred miles away and dryness. 

Something like 7000 people are displaced, and the only good thing if it can be called so is that the weather in Hawaii doesn't try to actively kill you so they can probably get away with living in tents for a while. 

What's really bad though is not only all the history (Lahaina was a big whaling town) but there went all the older housing, 100 years old and more, that's grandfathered in and tended to be affordable housing for the working class. I was able to rent a room for $150 a month or so on Oahu in the 80s because it was all older places, one actually built as the owners' residence upstairs and a rooming house downstairs. If Lahaina is rebuilt, it will be upscale condos or something and the working-class there will have to live in their cars, commute insane distances, live 4 to a room, etc. in the way they survive here in the Bay Area. 

But getting closer to home, I'm just going to paste the link for the whole discussion here:  https://www.reddit.com/r/preppers/comments/15mguq8/lessons_from_the_syrian_civil_war/ it's worth reading all the comments. It's also one of many, many, many clarion calls for non-Fascist Americans to get the hell out if they can. Take what's "valuable and light" and get the hell out. 

And if like myself, you can't get the hell out (only the most wealthy and elite Americans can do so) then at least try to find some hidey hole. I believe it was Elie Wiesel who mentioned in the updated edition of his book that not far from where he'd started out, there was another schtetl, or village, that was so far back in the boonies that the Holocaust passed it by. If he'd only been one village more remote....

As an example of something like this, on the US mainland in WWII, close to all the Japanese-Americans were put into camps, including people with as little as 1/16th Japanese ancestry. Meanwhile in Hawaii, 2,000 were interned but this was out of huge population of them. No place was safe, but some were safer. 

In the same vain, if you were a Jew in Lithuania or Poland, your number was probably up. If you were in Italy or Portugal, you stood a much better chance. No place safe; some places safer. 

I'm finding it very useful to have the backpack I plan to use, on hand. I spent some time last night working out how I'm going to carry my flutes (3) and shakuhachi (2) and out of the three flute cases  I have, I think I'm going to keep the one nice one and scrap the other two. Two flutes can go into shakuhachi sleeves of which I have two, and the shakuhachi I have, being Yuu's and nearly indestructible, can travel in plastic sleeves. 

I also practiced last night, taking my time but the practice stretching out well over an hour. 

dd's ddiscounts dduh

I uhh, I guess I listed 10 things last night, practiced a bit (long tones and Oumano Oyako which I sight-read I'd not played it in so long, and it didn't go badly). 

I got up in time to pack 9 small things so I'd not need the trailer. I shot up to the post office and dropped 'em off, then rode up to Capitol Expressway and over to a shopping complex that has along with some small shops, a Dollar Tree and a dd's discounts. Kenny at Whole Foods had said I should check dd's out but it's like a lower-grade Ross and I didn't find anything to buy. 

And it's not for lack of trying. A lady working there was pushing a cart full of empty boxes and when some fell off I helped put them back on, and asked if they have small Ziploc bags. "They're right behind you" she said, and they were, in sandwich size etc. I said I wanted the little ones, "like you put drugs in". She said they don't have those. "How am I supposed to sell my drugs neatly without 'em?", I asked.  I'm sure that lady had a laugh telling her family that one at the end of her day. 

The Dollar Tree was decent though. And it's not a bad ride down from where Dai Thanh market is. 

On my way back I locked the bike up at H Mart and walked over to Ross, and found a pair of sweat pants that looked good. And I remembered that Tuesday is seniors' day so I'd get a discount - making the purchase of the pants possible as they were about $17 with the discount, and the new list price being $40. 

I got back here and tried them on - they fit. So I'm fixed for that and since sweat pants are nearly unknown in Hawaii and I never wore them until I lived on the mainland, I can say I've bought my last sweat pants, probably ever. 

Dunbar's number

 I didn't list anything last night, nor did I dig things out of the warehouse. I *did* put almost all of the already listed things away, so there's that. 

I practiced some more, long tones, and went to bed. 

I woke up around 3:30 or 4, had my chicory coffee and nuts, and packed the two things that had to go out today. Not just get packed today, but be delivered and checked in, today. Ebay is really on top of things like this and I found out long ago I can't simply pack things and sit on them for a day or two. Ebay can tell I'm doing that. 

I had room for one more large-ish thing that  I could carry without needing the trailer so I packed that too, and took off. Since they were all just FedEx things, I dropped them off at FedEx. It was seriously hot today but by the time I'd gone out it was down to 83 degrees and there was plenty of wind. 

I decided I had enough time to go to Dai Thanh Market so I rode up there and picked out some things, and waited a long time in line because everyone else had decided to go there too, and it was almost closing. Not a biggie, though. 

I rode back and realized I ought to pick up some macadamia nuts at H Mart so I got those and then came back here. 

I cleaned up the parking lot a bit and tossed the stuff in the HVAC place's dumpster, washed my hair (especially in warm weather it's nice to do so out front if I remember to do it when I come in) and was done being outside for the day. 

My pal Dave in Honolulu keeps going on and on about the "new world order" etc and I told him how it's all either nonsense or nothing to worry about, and asked him if he has any other hobbies than ranting about this stuff. The truth is, he hasn't. 

So of course I had to shoot an email to Pat on the big island to ask him how his lumber and car situation is going and to kvetch a bit about Dave, and say How come Dave can't be more like Eran, a guy who's just the nicest guy in the world and who I've checked up on and is still being a super nice guy, holding tech activities for kids and hobbyists. 

Dave, by contrast, has "burned his bridges" with just about everyone he's known, it appears. 

Once I was back here I started thinking about the concept of Dunbar's number. This is the number of other humans a human can keep some kind of a relationship with. It's based on the human brain size and is commonly accepted as being around 150, although some say that through most of our history human "bands" would have been about half to a third this number. 

In any case if more people know you, and know you're a decent person, the more willing they are to help you, as you've probably been helping them in various ways all along, if you falter in some way. 

Re-arranging

 I'm so glad I got my little Fjallraven pack. Now  I can see that if I want to carry 2-3 concert flutes plus two bulky Shakuhachi Yuu, I need to improvise the concert flute cases out of the picture. 

The shinobue flutes will just have to go. Only the shortest is short enough to consider packing. 

I have three fancy shakuhachi covers I bought from Mejiro in Japan but it looks like I might want 1-2 more. I'm thinking the concert flutes, in pieces, will go into clear plastic tubes with end caps from TAP Plastics then into shakuhachi covers. The shakuhachi will go into shakuhachi covers of course, and the lone smallest shinobue, if I take it, has its own cover. 

Since sales on Craig's List are so slow, San Jose Taiko probably has some donations coming. 

After listing 15 things last night I did some practice. I got out one of the concert flute headjoints and did some tones on that. Long ago I did a lot of that and for some reason actually got worse at it over time - being able to blow the low note and then the octave up. I actually got where I could barely get the high note. 

Now I could do it with ease. In playing any sort of flute, I think there's a whole apparatus of muscles and nerves that we're not really even conscious of and never will be of most of it. It needs to be used where it never really gets especially called upon in regular life. This apparatus can tire easily because of this. The solution is consistent practice over time. 

Tons of sports are like this. Golf for instance. Tiger Woods was noted for working out and staying fit, but that was more to stand up to the rigors of the professional golfer's life than to directly make his golf game better. The only way to improve that was lots of golf. 

In the same way, the only way to get to a good sound and decent level of skill on the shakuhachi is going to be lots of shakuhachi playing. A lot more than I'm doing presently, where it's a half-hour or many an hour's practicing at the end of the day when I'm tired out from all the things I have to do. 

Since I'm not going to keep the shinobue flutes I won't need a flute holder to keep them and the shakuhachi all hung up on the wall, so I decided I'd try to return the stuff I got to make a holder. I got out of here around 5, and took the stuff over to Lowe's. The nice lady there explained that since so and such a date, they can't do refunds, not even for store credit, without a receipt. Fair enough, I thought. I said I may have been short of enough cash and "bit the bullet" and paid using my card, after all, and the lady said "Let me scan all the things and we'll try" and it actually went through - I'd paid on my card and it was refunded back onto my card. It was about $57 so well worth the effort. 

I got a gallon of Windex and paid for that using the self checkout, and was on my way. 

I rode to H Mart, locked the bike, and walked over to Sprouts where I got a couple of "sugar free" beef sticks, er, "beef" "sticks" and ate those. It was really hot outside so I sat in what used to be an indoor area to sit and eat but what I think is mostly an employee area now. Oh well, it was cool in there and I figure as long as I'm not in the way and don't leave a mess, I'm OK. 

I went over to Ross and looked around. The sweat pants are wiped out as it's "back to school" time and parents are buying 'em up. I did find a pair of Quicksilver slippers for $7 so now at least I have some Hawaii type slippers to wear and get my feet used to them again. These are about one level above Locals, that cheapo brand everyone loves in Hawaii because they're cheap, you can get 'em everywhere, and they're a very basic slipper with no fancy wide strap or anything like that. Something only a local would feel comfortable wearing for hours and well, they say Local right on 'em. Quicksilver is pretty local, as the guy who founded the company was our old next door neighbor in Pupukea. 

I've been looking for places that sell Olukai slippers but those are about $75 and do I really want to spend that much? I want to be pretty low-key when I get back home. So for $7 I might have solved that problem. 

Fjallraven

 It took me hours to worry apart a piece of equipment I wanted to sell the parts of, because someone wanted to buy it and have it shipped to Europe, which I tried to discourage them with bothering with, but they weren't deterred by my turning down their offers and bought it full price. So I'd tried packing it and the size and dimensions were not anything any shipping service would take. And the way the thing is built, it needed some padding. 

So I canceled the order, refunded the guy, and decided last night I'd take it apart and along with some other things, list the parts on Ebay. Well, it took me hours and for the last couple of modules, I had to actually get the hacksaw out and make cuts in the front panel and bend the aluminum aside, etc. all while not scratching the modules. Sheesh! 

After that I practiced some long tones and went to bed. 

I woke up at around 3, had my coffee and so on, and was outta here a bit after 4 with a heavy Walmart bag of books hanging off each handlebar. To save a bit of time,  I think, I took Hedding to The Alameda and then over to the book store. The guy there offered me $15 cash or $20 trade, and I noticed they had a few new copies of "The Kindness Of Women" by J.G. Ballard for $15. So I got the cash and the book - it's the sequel to Empire Of The Sun.. It's always fun going there and one of the guys there and I had a great talk about Ballard's books. 

I rode over to Whole Foods and got hard-boiled eggs, asparagus, and kalamata olives. My sneaky little trick was to go to the sushi counter and ask for two packets of "soy sauce" - low salt, of course. Whole Foods middle-class White culture distilled, and one White belief is that seasoning your food will hurt you somehow. Or excite animal spirits, or something. At least since covid all seasonings were removed from the store. Salt, pepper, Bragg's Aminos, salad dressings, you-name-it. Because if you season your food, you'll get covid and die. But the sushi counter will always give you "soy sauce" if you ask nicely.

I got $100 cash back when I paid and ate, at one point watching some very road-weary looking cyclists come in from, apparently, some long trip. So in the process of tossing my trash and going back in, I talked with them a bit. They'd done a big loop around Palo Alto and we talked about bike clubs for a bit like the Western Wheelers and the Almaden Cycle Touring Club. 

I went back in for some dental floss and got another $100 back, then went out to the bike, thinking out what to do with the bags of all the books - most of them - the book store didn't want. There was a lady there with a table for Teen Challenge and while the guy with the big cargo bike and his kid didn't want the books, the lady sure did. She'll sell them in their thrift store. So I handed them over and this is good to know because whenever I sell some books, if I can come up with some errands that takes me over that way, it's not hard at all to drop them off in front of the Teen Challenge thrift store which in fact I passed shortly afterward. 

On my way to the Fjallraven store in Santana Row. It was pretty warm but I knew it would gradually cool off and there was no need to hurry. I parked the bike in front of Big-5 and went in and looked at slippers, and finally realized I don't want to try any on with my bare feet. I told the friendly guy there, the manager I think, that I'll have to come back with my "toe socks" that I have that have a split in them for slippers. We talked a bit and he said it was OK for me to leave my bike out front for an hour or so. 

I walked over to Santana Row and wow, was it busy. I always figured it was one of those places where people who come over as tourists from Asia come to load up on things to buy to take or ship back home. And that's a large factor, but there were tons of affluent looking white people too, and some Indians. The restaurants were all full, and they all charge Santana Row prices too. This is why I ate before going. 

I looked in the Arc'teryx store first because I came to it first and ... meh. The Fjallraven store is neat though. There's one pack called a Kanken I think, that's popular with school kids in Europe but for some reason in fashion for grown-ups here and they had a wall of 'em in every color. Those have a big red and white logo on them too, pretty juvenile looking. They also had a nice display of the "raven" backpack. Those come in 20 and 28 liter size, and I'd decided on the 28-liter one.  I picked out the one in dark blue.

That was easy, I paid my $130 and got a big bag to carry it in, then I wandered around the store to look at all the smaller bags they have, things like toiletry bags and bags that hitch onto the one I just bought, and so on. They're spendy as everything there is, and I may or may not go back for one. One of the guys there and I talked about pants, as everyone in there was wearing tons of Fjallraven stuff and he was wearing some rather colorful pants. "A few years old, this color is discontinued", he said. He told me about how he'd gotten this pair of pants he thought were surgical scrub pants, that were his favorites. I said I'd had a pair of older 5.11 pants I'd bought at a garage sale and I'd loved them until one day I'd noticed "things were awfully breezy" and found they'd split at the crotch. He said that's what happened with his. I said he could always buy more, at a uniform store which there are a few of around town. He'd never heard of a uniform store and wrote that down. They're sure to have scrub pants. 

I walked through the rest of Santana Row and the only other cool place, to me, is the Japanese stationary store. So I have two places that are interesting and useful to go there. Plus the Big-5 there is a pretty nice one. 

I saw one busker, a lady set up with a microphone and backing tape, camped out on one of the corners between the Westfield mall and Santana Row, so host to huge crowds of people going back and forth. On my way back, there was one of those Christian pests with big signs, berating people, and I almost missed it because they were quiet, but a couple of bearded guys with a little stand set up and a sign saying something like "Islam Is The Truth - Free Quran". It's nice to see some variety. 

I found some books at the various little free libraries on the way back, and did some shopping at Cardenas Market. I also found a Revere Ware pot, a medium-sized deep saucepan which is one of the rarer ones, with the lid. This will be perfect for steaming veggies in the steamer basket I've got but haven't used. People just .... put things out, and I didn't take the other Revere Ware saucepan, just this one which I've got a definite use for. 

I messed around with the pack a bit and it appears I may not be taking the shinobue flutes with me to Hawaii. I have to carry the two shakuhachi I have, and either three, or the best two out of the three I have, concert flutes. Shinobue and shakuhachi are different enough that I might be better off just concentrating on the shakuhachi. 

If I want to make noise there's always the concert flutes and for this reason I've kept a series, 4 books, of a British flute "method" based on learning popular tunes. As opposed to old Trevor Wye, who uses obscure stuff to force you to pay attention and read the music, this series has the student playing the Beatles and so on as soon as possible. I won't take those books with me to Hawaii but I can at least learn a bit from them - how to bang some enjoyable tunes out. 

Selenium

 Last night I listed 15 things and got some practice done, lots of long tones. Every time I seriously practice, I gain some insight. It's very clear that it will take years to sound good, but also that every practice session counts. As I've mentioned, if that guy from Palo Alto started at age 60, and now gets a really good sound at age 67, it means that if I work hard, maybe in 7 years I'll also get a really good sound. 

Last night was quite the odyssey also, even if it was just from my desk here, in front of this screen, typing on this keyboard. First, I was really set on buying a Cotopaxi bag to travel with. Sure they're funky looking, but I found it hard to shake the fixation on having a unique looking bag. (Even though if I want my bag to stand out I can always put some bright tape stripes on the straps.) 

Well, REI making it clear they don't want me as a member sort of nixed that. Since I can just walk into the Fjallraven store they've got my business as it stands now. (And granted, REI offers a ton of different things I'll never use like equipment rentals, "adventures", used equipment sales, and rebates I don't care about.)

The other thing is looking for discussions of Brazil nuts on r/keto. It turns out they have a *lot* of selenium in them. Enough so that eating more than 1-2 a day isn't all that healthy. I was eating an ounce a day. One of the discussions even led to an episode of House, M.D. where a CIA agent has been imprisoned or something in Brazil and apparently ate a lot of Brazil nuts, resulting in selenium poisoning. 

They *are* tasty and what they're really good for is chasing pills. If you're swallowing pills and they don't want to go all the way down, there's nothing better than a chewed up Brazil nut for making sure everything goes down.

So now I don't have to worry about buying Brazil nuts again as I'm sure I have enough for the next year. I'm glad I read r/keto and like to look things up because I could have gone for quite a while eating an ounce of the things a day and gotten rather ill. 

I rushed off to the post office to ship a lot of things, stopped at H Mart to lock up the bike and use their loo, then walked over to Home Goods etc. Ross didn't have any new clothes but  I got some more olives from Home Goods. 

Back at H Mart, I got a few things like TP and they had a package of lobster claws on sale so I got those. On my way back I just picked up packing stuff from the computer repair place's dumpster and nothing from the medical dumpster. I got back here and did a lot of putting things away and re-arranging things and eventually settled down and made an excellent lobster claw curry with some shrimp in it too. Yum! 

 

Can't beat it for the price

 I listed 15 things last night but was just too tired to practice, and went to bed with the idea of getting a full 8 hours' sleep. 

I woke up at 2:30 or so, and had time to do a haircut and a bath. My clippers have some adjustability to them and since they cut much better without using the "shoes" I don't use them. For some reason I had my adjustments mixed up and had them on the shortest setting and as I was cutting my hair, starting from the top, I thought, "Why's it coming out so short?" then realized my mistake. So I cut it super short all over. It still can't be beat for the price.

Then I did a full bath, which is a hassle but not that much of one, and something I should do every week. Such is life in Silicon Valley, you need to make far more than I do to have access to an actual shower. Joining a gym is one way to do things but that takes time, money, plus you have to convince the people running the gym that you're not just using it for the showers or they'll kick you out and cancel your membership. This is why I haven't joined either of the two gyms near me. It's easier to just get out the tub and scrub down with hot water (heated in the ol' tea kettle) and Simple Green. 

I took off for downtown the usual time, my head feeling wonderful because with my hair this short I can feel every little breeze, and wondering why my neck was itchy. I'd forgotten to wipe the back of my neck with rubbing alcohol after shaving it. Luckily I carry wet wipes with me on the bike these days. 

I deposited my check in the bank - it was dead-on the the penny this week - and then went to Whole Foods.

I got some asparagus, various Middle Eastern things like feta cheese and olives and such, and had that with some water, and it was quite a meal. After eating I took off for Walmart mainly for "Shout" for my laundry but got some other things too. 

I got bubble mailers at the Amazon place on my way back, then fought the wind back here and put things away. I started right out again for H Mart and Ross and so on. I found some olives in Home Goods, but Ross was out of the sweat pants I'd bought that fit so well. I should have gone right back the next day and bought a second pair. I got some pumpkin seeds from Sprouts and checked their nut and seed prices in general. 

Then I walked back to H Mart where I'd left my bike and went in, but since they were out of the diet soda I like to have on hand for when Ken comes over and all I could think of to buy was some garlic, I felt kind of silly just buying garlic. Then I remembered that I'd been thinking of getting a new saucepan and Lo and behold they were something like half price. 

So I got back here loaded with all kinds of stuff and had over a dollar in change in my pocket which means I'm living my life right. It was 9:30 when I got in, the equivalent of being out until half past midnight in the before times. I used to be out that late, too. I'd get done at the bank and go to Whole Foods, eat and relax, then play a bit there and over by the Old Spaghetti Factory, often until midnight. 

Now, being out at 9 is scarily late. I say scarily because of course the zombies were out when I was coming back. I narrowly avoided a zombess muttering to itself, dressed in the usual dark, muted colors complimented by filth. Even downtown, there are these nice bike lanes and still I had to veer over into the traffic lane and ride there to avoid a zombie in the bike lane. If Gavin Newsom can set up camps and put the zombies there, he can ride just that all the way to the Presidency. 

I had plans for this weekend. This was the week I was going to join REI and buy the backpack I had in mind for the trip back to Hawaii. I could not find anything about how to join in-store, and figured it's probably online only. So I went online, added a membership for $30 to my cart, but could not go further because I was not already a member. I went around this way a couple of times and could not find any other way and although I wanted to be a member, apparently they don't want me to be a member. 

The ever-helpful Google for reasons known only to itself but helpful to me, showed as other stores selling the brand of backpack I was kind of set on, that I doubt really do. One of them was even a company Fjallraven store; a competitor. However, I'd kind of heard of that brand and was intrigued. 

I looked around on r/onebag and r/backpack and it seems like I could do a lot worse. And Fjallraven seems to be opposite in styling from Cotopaxi, the maker of the one I wanted to get from REI, as Fjallraven packs are all in dull, non-exciting colors while Cotopaxi stuff is rather garish. I guess it's all those times flying with a checked bag that I liked the idea of a bag that doesn't look like anyone else's, but I plan to r/onebag it on this trip. 

It took a lot of thinking to get to the conclusion that just taking a carry-on is the way to go. It means my flutes will travel with me, but not a laptop as I won't take one, and my flip phone and its charger are small enough that if I take them, they won't take much room. I'll have to sacrifice my Swiss Army knife and a Swiss Army "rescue" knife that's super neat but that I have hardly used, never carried, and while it seems like a neat one for digging around in tide pools, a cheapo diving knife would be a better choice. 

There are a ton of things that won't make sense to take with me, like my hair clippers and shaving stuff and all kinds of things I can just buy when I'm back home there and come out ahead of what checked bag costs are. The airlines charge for all kinds of things now. Having the pack I plan to travel with in my hands means I can put my flutes and things in and see how much I can carry. I can strip things down pretty far or I might actually get to keep a few things. It will also motivate me to get ready for the trip, mainly "Sie papieren bitte" things. 

A passport takes months but if I give myself a year to get these things taken care of, I should have my papers well in order by the time it's time to go. But things like that, like a passport, are small and easy to carry. So beyond the flutes I should have room for things. I just need those papers in order too because depending on how crazy things get in this crazy country, I may decide it's a fine time, in 2025 or so, to take a vacation in somewhere that's not the US - it will be so much more touching to watch the second January 6th type thing happening from far, far away. 

Getting back to weekend plans, the Fjallraven place is in Santana Row so I can just ride my bike over. And the pack they have that I'm interested in is quite a bit less expensive.