Improvements

Machinery, Inc. has taken a turn for the better as of this week. My supervisor has decided that it is now time for me to share my tedious phone support duties with the other two contractors, so I now spend two days per week doing phone support, two days hanging out in the TPS building making house calls, and one day per week on project work.

In other news... I've posted my car for sale on Craigslist. I really dig that car and hate to sell it, but I really want to start working on a car that I can take to driving schools and track days. Most tracks won't allow convertibles.

And last but not least, I re-hung the dartboard in the studio. I've found that throwing darts while listening to trance music at nosebleed volume gets me pointed in good creative directions.

Bad Choir.

At Machinery, Inc., I have the misfortune of being stuffed into a cubicle near a conference room. Normally the conference room is an inoffensive neighbor, but today there is a "choir" using the room to practice. I put the word choir in quotes, because it's actually just a group of about 20 people in there who look serious but couldn't harmonize their way out of a shopping mall.

To complement their lack of musical ability, they've got truly horrid taste in music. Run-of-the-mill Christmas carols? Nay. They've got what has to be one of the most cheeseball versions of Jingle Bells I've ever heard, complete with roughly twice the original number of words stashed into each empty space not already filled with lyric. Inane little "cha cha cha" things crammed in whenever they should be inhaling for the next verse. And they've taken Jingle Bell Rock, a tune that should be done with a bit of cheese, and turned it into a downtempo, comatose dirge.

Don't get me started on their version of Sleigh Ride. Should the song really include three verses of monotone spoken word chants? No. Not good.

Once in a Lifetime

And you may ask yourself
What is that beautiful house?
And you may ask yourself
Where does that highway go to?
And you may ask yourself
Am I right... am I wrong?
And you say to yourself
My god... what have I done?

Have you ever been stuck in traffic or waiting in line at the DMV or sitting at your desk at work and found yourself wondering how in the hell you got to where you are today?

A very good friend of mine once gave me this little solid steel plaque that says "What would you do if you knew you could not fail?" On the surface, it seems like one of those cheesy motivational sayings, on par with the dangling kitten that needs to "hang in there". But I keep that little plaque on my desk and have thought long and hard about that question. What would I do if I knew I could not fail?

The Studio

I haven't posted about the studio lately - time for an update. In list form. Because I love lists. Especially numbered lists.

1. Got my PD100 DVcam back from repair today... good news.
2. Got it back to the studio and realized they broke the autofocus when they replaced the drum.... bad news. Three more weeks 'til it comes back.
3. Thanks to Alex, I have a sweet 12 channel audio mixer, a delightful audio compressor/limiter, and more cords than I could shake a six foot chunk of coax at.
4. Put a rug down on the floor to try to soak up some of the echoes - need more. Anyone have some acoustical foam squares they want to give me?
5. Have started the hunt for lighting and furniture. This is the space:6. Need to figure out what to put in that space to make it a cozy little interview spot. Director's chairs? A sofa? A life size statue of myself? Naked? Under a spotlight?
7. I need a decent video lighting kit.
8. Did I mention that the studio has a whopping TWO power outlets? I hope they've got a beefy breaker in this joint backing 'em up.
9. Thanks to Craigslist, I found a dude who wants to share the studio with me - he'll be working in here during the day until 4:30. Split the rent. Still not sure what kind of work he does.

So that's where things stand right now. Shooting for the first show sometime in late November or early December.

Don't Worry About the Government

I see the states, across this big nation
I see the laws made in Washington, D.C.
I think of the ones I consider my favorites
I think of the people that are working for me

I hate the City of Minneapolis. More specifically, I hate the City of Minneapolis police/traffic/towing/impound Nazis.

My hatred for the City of Minneapolis Nazis started about 15 years ago. At the time, I owned an old beat up pickup truck that didn't get driven very often, in addition to a car that I drove daily. One day I came home from work and noticed that the truck was not in the parking lot where I had left it. I wasn't too concerned - I just figured a friend had borrowed it or had played a joke on me and moved it. After it was gone a few days and nobody I knew would admit to having touched it, I reported it stolen.

Three days later, The City called me to say that my truck had been parked illegally and impounded. If I wanted it back, I owed The City for the towing fee and two days of storage. Evidently the fact that I had reported it stolen before they towed it did not matter - I had to pay The City to get my stolen truck back. AND, since the thief had dumped it in a tow-away zone, I also had to pay the parking ticket.

Gee, thanks Minneapolis.

Monday afternoon, I came home to find my car missing. Since I am a big fat procrastinator on such things, and have been taking the bus to Machinery, Inc. every day and not driving my car much anyway, I let my car's registration expire. Yep, I'm an idiot. So I figured that it probably got towed. But why hadn't The City given me a ticket first? Isn't it a little drastic to impound a car for expired tags before at least issuing a ticket first? Evidently not, in the mind of The City. I even wrote The City a futile email just to voice my discontent:

I don't expect anyone to care about this comment, but I want to say that I think the City of Minneapolis is out of line for towing my car for expired tags.

I wholeheartedly admit fault for letting my tags expire, but to tow my car without giving me a ticket or some kind of warning first is ridiculous. Why is the City so harsh?

Sincerely,
steve

Surprisingly enough, I got a reply 20 minutes later:

Dear Steve,

We appreciate you e-mail. I apologize that you vehicle was towed. The reason why the vehicle was towed away without a ticket is because you were given a great length of time to renew the tabs and they were not renewed. The DMV gives an additional 30 days after the tabs expire to renew. The city gives you additional time on top of the 30days to renew the tabs. The warning in this case was not have the tab renewed when they expire. I apologize again for what happened to you vehicle. If you choose to dispute the ticket you can contact the violations bureau at 612-348-2040.If you want to view the city ordinances on this issue you can go to our web site at (www.ci.minneapolis.mn.us/cityhall/laws/ordinances/) and look under title 18
If there is anything else we can help you with please contact us. Thank you for emailing the City of Minneapolis.

L Anderson
Minneapolis 311
Office: (612)673-3000
Email: minneapolis311@ci.minneapolis.mn.us

I'm not sure I understand L's explanation, but hey... at least someone in the Nazi organization cares enough to reply to my email. I was tempted to reply with a comparison and contrast of the English usage of the words "you" and "your", but decided against it.

Anyway, today I called in sick to Machinery, Inc. and wasted the entire damn day at the DMV and The City impound lot (which, coincidentally looks a little bit like a concentration camp for cars). $174 for the tow and impound.

Here's the best part: when they towed the car, I got a $112 ticket for expired registration, too.

Fuck you, City of Minneapolis.

Psycho Killer

You start a conversation you can't even finish it.
You're talkin' a lot, but you're not sayin' anything.
When I have nothing to say, my lips are sealed.
Say something once, why say it again?

I've gotten to where I am in life and done fairly well, if I do say so myself - by keeping my mouth shut. I was once told by a cow-orker that before she knew me well, she had thought I was one of the smartest people she knew, an impression based almost solely on my habit of not opening my yapper in meetings unless I knew what the hell I was talking about. I was flattered, despite the backhanded nature of the comment.

I've noticed that if you make a habit of speaking only when you've got something worthwhile to say, people will shut the hell up and listen to you. Imagine that.

Too daunting.

Astute readers of this blog will notice that I've not been writing much lately. Not for lack of something to write about - oh no - this time I have so damn much to write about that the task of getting it all out in something resembling a coherent post is just too damn daunting of a task.

So I'm not gonna do it. I have enough responsibility in my life. This stupid blog is supposed to be fun - I'm not going to turn it into a chore. You can't make me.

Phbbt.

bad blog boy

I know I have been falling down on my bloggerly duties lately. I assure you, dear reader, that I do have a lot of good stuff saved up in my thought-addled brain, just waiting to be sprung. I just need to find the time and motivation to spring it.

Until then, here's a picture I shot of Melba driving der wigglewagon on Saturday:

Uberupdate

So many things have happened since my last post:

1. Had an excellent weekend of driving on an stellar track
2. Had many great meals and conversations with good friends
3. Bought two cameras for the Show
4. Picked up the keys to the studio

I'll post details for the track weekend, and pictures of the studio too. Pictures from the weekend are in my Flickr account - see the link to the upper right.