Morning.
It’s Tuesday night internet and, I swear, I had the best of intentions… I swear.
Someday it would be interesting to chart the frequency of my posts here on sounds familiar against the density of my work calendar for a given week. I’d be willing to be there’s a high correlation between days and weeks when I’m absolutely slammed at work and those which go void of writing here. Not because I write at work, but more because my brain gets overwrought during the day and isn’t readily available for writing at night. If I had I had it my way I’d still be posting every day.
I did write some over this extended weekend, so I’ll go ahead recycle that as content now first:
Monday morning and I’m not at work. The weather outside is unbelievable, and I’ve already been productive enough with the weekend and general, and my scant waking hours today, that I’m deserved a tiny break. So the house is wide open and Jesse Colin Young’s “Song for Juli” shuffled up on the iPod (I had to take a break from my marathon Beatles tear, read more about that below).
I wrote last week about the Beatles’ albums leaking in their new remastered format, and since then I’ve been listening non-stop, analyzing and enjoying (but mostly enjoying). The remasters came down in FLAC (as any self-respecting lossless files would), but in order to get them on the iPod they needed to be transcoded to ALAC (Apple lossless) format – the only lossless codec the iPod understands. Since transcoding removes all the song metadata, I have to re-tag all the resultant files. After all that, I was finally able to load the lossless files on the iPod, in their full sonic glory, and lock myself away in an imaginary room with headphone walls and a nice wide stereo image painted across my brainscape. And, no sooner had I got the stereo remasters loaded on the iPod then did the mono remasters leak.
So there I was, Saturday, home by myself (well, Keaton is napping). I’d just converted and loaded the entire mono and stereo boxsets onto the iPod, and it was time to play them loud. I started with Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band in it’s original mono. How the bass didn’t wake up Keaton I have no idea… but the plodding bottom-end of “Fixing A Hole” has never sounded more in-the-room. I can hear nuances in the double-tracked vocals on the White Album moreso than ever before. Makes me want to hear it on an audiophile rig (which my setup is not). In the forums online, there are already fierce (for online forums, at least) debates ongoing about what sounds better and what sounds worse. But, for me, one listen to “I Saw Her Standing There” at top-volume seals the deal… I swear I could be hearing a studio playback.
Monday this past three-day weekend Sharaun took Keaton for the morning so I decided to go for a bike ride. I did a short five mile loop and made a stop at the local REI to pickup some supplies for the month’s-end backpacking trip in the Columbia River Gorge. It was supposed to be just a ten mile loop there and back, but while there I got a text from some friends saying there were headed into town for a ride and wondered if I’d want to join them. After a texting volley I found out they’d be arriving about four miles from where I was in about twenty minutes – perfect. I rode to meet them, then did a ten mile loop around a local lake (this area is so fantastic for riding… trails everywhere and you hardly ever have to be on the road). Home again after that and before I knew it I’d been gone for three and a half hours and ridden twenty-eight miles. The day was so fantastic weather-wise, I felt like I could just go forever and ever.
I guess I’m outta here now. Nothing more has come in the 40min I’ve stared at this page. Goodnight y’allz.
Also written on this day...
- getting used to it - 2018
- not the week for writing - 2010
- baked away the day - 2008
- tied to the mast - 2005
- what's the number for green beans? - 2004