Facebook rants...

I am sad today.

I unfriended a friend because of the hateful things being posted on Facebook. Painting with a broad brush, and assuming everyone who doesn't believe the same as you is evil doesn't solve any problems. I don't go to FB for the bullshit political stuff, and am firmly convinced that NO THINKING PERSON'S mind has been changed by any political post. Some may feel they are "getting something off their chest," but it just comes across as more hateful ranting. There is already too much of that out there.

I don't have to believe the same as you to maintain a friendship, but I also don't have to read constant nastiness. I am on Facebook for the FRIENDship... cute kitties, boats, guitars, and uplifting posts. Life is too short to spend any of it with nastiness. Truly, I understand why many folks have moved on from that place. In the meantime, I will not respond to any political crap, nor "If you agree..." stuff.

So, in that spirit, here's an image of Izzy, just being her pretty self...

 

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This blog is a political bullshit-free zone. 

Take me out to the ball game...

Spring training is happening all over the Valley of the Sun - the Cactus League is in full swing as the Major League teams determine who stays and who goes.  It is a great opportunity to see professional baseball at a reasonable price.  Our game today: the Cleveland Indians vs the Milwaukee Brewers.

$5 to park; buy one, get one free for the tickets to the game.  Joan and Dan picked up tickets last Saturday (the deal applies for local residents).  We got there an hour early and got a close parking spot.

One of the souvenir stands tried to lure Joan in...

I was more interested in the eating options: one place advertised a Cincinnati Chili Cheese Dog... I know what I'm having.  Professional Sports Stadium prices have come to the food vendors at the spring training games.  We bought some food and headed to our seats.

Along the way, there were people playing beanbag in one of the open grassy areas...

They understand who their winter visitors are.

We have great seats: 10 rows up, right behind home plate...

A sunny day, and our seats were in the sun, to start.  It was cool out, though, so the sun felt good.  A very young girl from Cleveland sang the National Anthem - she was great.  Play ball!

The stands were not full...

Back to the game...

Four innings in, almost two hours had passed.  The game seemed to be moving slow.  The pitching was less than stellar on both sides, but the Indians were walking a lot of batters.

Oh, look - the moon...

Like other professional games, there was the occasional tossing out stuff...

And, no game is complete without the tossing of the giant fries...

OK, back to the game...

A grand slam in the 6th inning put the Brewers way ahead...

It was pretty clear where this game was going.  By this time, our seats were in the shade; with the breeze, it felt down-right chilly (not the Cincinnati kind).  The seats began to thin out as people left, or moved to seats in the sun (what you generally try to avoid here).

We hung in there with our seats.

No, that's not me.  Steeee-rike!

By the ninth inning, it wrapped up fairly quick...

Final score: Brewers 14, Indians 4.

Not much of a crowd to fight to get out of the parking lot - most had left earlier.  We enjoyed the outing.

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So the day doesn't go by without some Izzy content: a couple shots I took of her this morning, before heading to the game...

Studying...

No, not taking a test.  Good thing, because I think I will need a bit more practical experience.  "Practical??" you're thinking?  Yeah, not my strong suit.

That owners manual on the new recorder... over 150 pages.  Looking at the buttons on it, it doesn't look like it should take 150 pages to explain all it does.  Until you get into it.  Stereo, mono, 4-track, multi-track.  Metronome, tuning, 50 different effects, but only when recording multi-track.  You can send the signal through the unit to a computer or record tracks on the 32 gig SD card.  You can "punch in and out" on select parts of a track to record over... I say "you," because I haven't figured out all that stuff.  Yet.

Other than a few short tests, I've only done the one raw recording.  Complete with assorted background noise, because... there is always background noise in this RV park.  I'm thinking it may be when we get back home before I'll have the necessary quiet to do it up right.

In the meantime, I am studying up.  In case a stretch of quiet breaks out.

NRD...

You know about NGD (New Guitar Day); even NBD (New Boat Day)... today is NRD (New Recorder Day)!

A year or so ago, Joan asked me to record some songs for her.  The best I could come up with for equipment to record with was the built in mic on my iPad Mini.  Not exactly hi-fidelity.  I have been looking for a compact recorder, preferably something that could do up to 4 channels.  All my research led me to the Zoom H4n Pro.  I ordered one from Sweetwater; it arrived today...

Check it out: an actual paper owners manual.  I have been looking through the PDF on-line manual, but it makes more sense when you have the recorder in hand.

I was surprised at how small it is.  Yes, I saw plenty of them on-line, but it seemed bigger.

I put the batteries and SD card in, and turned it on.  A quick "Mic test, one two."  Yep, it works.  I got out the new X20 to try a quick guitar recording... exactly one nano-second after pressing record, a neighbor fired up his Harley.  Not a quiet one.

I waited for him to pull away.  Looking at the mic level meters, I could see the overhead fan in the bedroom was being picked up by the onboard mics.  Turned it off.  Take two: I did an abbreviated song, then listened to the playback... oh, goodness - much better than recording with the mic on the iPad and the PA.  I think I am going to enjoy this... and the X20 has such beautiful tone; I hope I can capture the essence of that.

Recording in the motorhome is going to be less than great: plenty of hard surfaces in here... and noise that you don't even notice (tuned out: traffic, airplanes, etc) gets picked up by the mics.  You can set a "lower level" for recording, that the mics won't pick up below that level.

There are a lot of options for the quality of recording, from CD quality to studio quality.  Probably overkill for anything I will record, but I am looking forward to giving it a try.  Before getting any further with it, we are off for the afternoon with Steph and Dan.

I'll post something here after I get a little better with the post processing (files are huge).  It may be a while.

Big city traffic...

Not talking about getting out on the scoots.  This was a shopping excursion to Walmart.

If I had a People of Walmart bingo card, I could have gotten a blackout in this one trip.  Where do all these people come from??  Not just "these people," but the sheer numbers.  Every aisle was crowded.  And not just retired folks (like us) - plenty of young people.  And pregnant women... do OB-GYN doctors prescribe walking at Walmart during the first 8 3/4 months of pregnancy?

I am also convinced that old women gather at Walmart, with a battle plan to block every aisle with their shopping carts.  They are very efficient... if there is only one cart in an aisle, the pusher of that cart is almost guaranteed to have an ass that is 1.314 times the width of the cart - this way, they don't need two cart pushers to block an aisle.  Seriously, they are good: cart at a diagonal, ass at full width - no one is getting through!

Joan likes to study the ingredients of some of the toiletries she buys - making sure that it is dolphin-free and has the right amount of fluxgate capacitors in it.  It gives me time to wander.  And play head-games with the aisle blockers... I can see them at the far end of the aisle, moving in time with me.  Like a running back, I fake a forward move, then double back... sliding down the previous aisle like Tom Cruise in Risky Business... well, except I wasn't wearing just a shirt and underwear.  I also had socks.  It is important to try to fit in.

Getting an aisle all to myself, I get to peruse.  Snake repellant - we don't have that in our local Walmart back in the Tropical Tip.  Just more fun in the desert.

When you do finally make it through the checkout lane (do people really think that 30 items is less than "15 items or less" in an express lane??), the aisle blockers (much like roller derby) continue their craft by leaving their carts to free range in the parking lot... some are only 10 feet from the cart corral... SO close!  Being able to see the cart corral from where you leave the cart does not count.

The Semi-finals...

Talking about the Gravity Cruiser challenge.

Today was the day that both of Steph's science classes competed for distance with their Gravity Cruisers...

They got to have about a half hour of final fine tuning, then... time to put it on the line!  The top two finishers from each class will go on to the finals next week.

Yes, we were finally able to convince Joan to run her Cruiser... with no test runs, she would have been in the finals.  No, she is not competing against the kids.  ;-)

Fun day, but I was about worn out after two classes of this.  Then, it was off to Dan's school (about a mile away).  It is brand new this school year, and certainly looks it - nice facility.  It is a "performing arts" school... no, they are not dancing in the halls like the TV show Fame.  But, they do have expanded music, art and theater options at this school.  Dan gave us a tour of the whole place.

Steph had a reading program this evening at school (Dr. Seuss's birthday today), so we took Dan out for supper; ran some errands.  Now, my butt is really dragging.  Being around all this youth stuff wears a guy out.  ;-)

Lots of movement...

Today is March 1st - a new winter month in their desert southwest.  Lots of rigs heading out, new ones taking their place.  I would imagine this will be the busiest month of the year for this RV resort...  Spring Training is happening at baseball parks all over the Valley.  There will be a big FMCA (Family Motor Coach Association) convention/rally in Chandler (southern Phoenix area) this month.  And, just a bit too soon to head north for most of the winter visitors.

We get to stay put.