BIGmog's BIGblog

It's been a few years since I picked up my bass guitar. It was fun to learn but less fun to play. The issue I had is that not many songs are written for the bass. It's more of an accompanying instrument as part of a band. To address this, I attempted to join a band but it fell apart after 3 weeks when the lead guitarist realized he was way better than the rest of us. No matter. Playing in a band wasn't my plan anyway. I just wanted to jam and stretch my creative side.

A podcast on guitar history made me consider playing that instead or maybe taking it a step easier with a ukulele. The question I hadn't yet answered was: what type of music do I want to play?

As a youth, I had a Casio digital keyboard. It was more of a toy but that didn't stop me from teaching myself how to play some video game music on it: Zelda, Final Fantasy, Mario, etc. Those 8-bit songs often relied on melody to take advantage of the limited sound capabilities. Perhaps now, with a proper instrument, I could re-learn those songs.

After a few attempts, I purchased a used Roland digital piano from Facebook Marketplace. Equipped with instructional books, smart apps, and a bounty of online videos, my quest is underway. I started 3 weeks ago and learning a lot. And unlike the bass guitar, I can already play an actual song.

Much has transpired since the previous update. Firstly, the vacation to France. Having reviewed my daily journal of the trip, I don't have anything especially insightful to detail. Paris was nice but very crowded. The smaller towns we visited along the Seine river cruise were much more pleasant. Each day, I ate croissants, wore a Breton shirt, and read about Napoleon. I came to appreciate Monet as more than the "water lily guy". I got sick but pressed on with the aid of pharmaceuticals and strong coffee.

Any first visit to Paris is going to be cliché. You can't not see the Eiffel Tower, Arc de Triomphe, and The Louvre Museum. Now that I've crossed off those obligatory sites, a second trip would be quite different. Someday I hope to see it that's true. Until then, I can enjoy brioche, calvados, and impressionist art here at home.

In a week, I'll be underway for a vacation in France. A transit strike prevented my previous attempt to visit via the chunnel from England. This go I've opted for a different mode of transportation; a river cruise. During my trip through eastern Europe a year ago, I noted how the Danube river offered this curious means to traverse the region. Online research (and perhaps commercials on NPR) sold me on trip that I could take together with my mother.

She has fond memories of visiting France as a young woman and would occasionally reminiscence on it. A bit of coaxing was necessary for her to get a passport. Once that pre-requisite was completed, the trip was booked and the countdown begun. We start in Paris and then cruise the Seine River to Normandy with various stops along the way for wine, cheese, history, and art. While I usually travel solo, it will be nice having someone to tour with.

I still plan to journal but expect to compose long hand rather than take a laptop with me. Upon my return, I'll collect those thoughts and write them up here.

I had made it 47 years in life without buying a dining room table of my own. 15 years of those in my house with the designated area for one. As a bachelor with negligible cooking skills, there was little benefit to eating alone at a table and not in front of the TV, at my desk, or over the sink.

On frequent occasion I considered this equipment as a standard adult purchase but never was able to find one that matched my preferences and space. So defeated by this quest that I nearly built a custom table myself until I discovered how expensive lumber was.

Next, I browsed Facebook marketplace for a used table as an inexpensive and greener option. While plenty of people are selling their furniture in preparation for moving, many don't think to include the dimensions or other noteworthy details.

That pushed me back toward the professional furniture sellers with verbose search filters allowing me to home in on a table that fit the bill. It now sits in my small dining area with the tease of a proper dining experience until I compliment it with chairs. Allow me another decade or so to complete that.

2024 was a bumpy year. A terrible start with the loss of Lefty stared to improve with the prospects of a new relationship. It ended abruptly and my woe continued. To get through this rough patch, I traveled extensively. First domestically to Milwaukee and then internationally through eastern Europe.

Upon returning, I now was faced with a considerable decision point. I opted to stay put and get another dog. It was emotional at first but over the summer, we grew closer and now he's settled in.

I took a brief trip to Seattle on Memorial Day to close out summer.

Fall was the season of a woodworking class and the great deck rebuild project. It's not finished yet but it's at least usable again.

Atypically I did not see any concerts this year but I did squeeze in a few shows: Nunsense, Rubicon, Chicago, Hairspray, Meow Meow.

The end of 2024 has been especially exciting and I hope to have more to say on that into 2025.

The company that I work for is struggling lately and that has resulted in temporary furloughs. With the unpaid time off that I now have, I decided that I could take on the big project of rebuilding my deck. The deck is as old as the house built in 2001. In addition, it was built poorly and cheaply. I performed some small repairs and maintenance over the years. I could have continued with that to extend the life a bit but decided to start from scratch.

Youtube videos are great at convincing you that anything is possible but often omit the unexpected challenges. Knowing these can be deceptive, I contacted 3 professional deck contractors. Only 1 responded and they quoted me around $20k. That is a considerable sum for me. I could do it myself for about 1/10 of that price (plus some blood, sweat, and tears). Why not give it a try?

During the construction, I'm learning a lot about deck building and maybe something about myself. Perhaps this is part of a mid-life crisis to want to build something. Or maybe I just want to get some new tools and feel manly. Self-psychoanalysis isn't productive and it doesn't matter anyway. I need a new deck and I don't want to spend a ton of money for it.

The furlough won't be long enough to finish the entire deck. I'll have to complete it over nights and weekends for the next few months. I can accept a slow pace so long as I can finish it.

So how was the convention? A bit disappointing. The show is 4 days long and I had scheduled for 2 days but only needed 1. To be fair, it’s not so much the fault of the event but more on me.

In my younger days, I would go to E3 and was thrilled to see all the new games and would wait hours to try them. I have no such patience any longer. There are several issues here: First, some of the games at the convention are already available to play in the comfort of your home as demos on Steam. Worse yet are the games that are already fully available. Why are people so patient to play such games in a crowded, noisy, environment with the very high risk of getting sick?

But that isn’t the case for every game. There are some unreleased games that are playable. Many of those are scheduled to be released in the next 3 months however so why not just wait for that? It’s only marketing and they entice people to wait for hours by throwing in swag. I used to go after swag so I sorta get it but it’s all just cheap junk now. A free sticker or keychain is a $2 gift for 2 hours of your time. Not worth it.

Finally, there are indie games that are early in development. I like talking to these creators about their games. Unfortunately it was just way too crowded and loud for this. I spent about an hour in this area of the convention and that’s all I could tolerate.

The convention has more to offer across the street in another building. That building is much larger with plenty of space for all. I went to some panels including a talk with Xbox head Phil Spenser. They had a variety of other attractions such as Jackbox Games, an arcade full of Japanese games, tournaments, table top games, etc. These probably would have been fun with a companion. Solo I only perused them to try and fill the day. At least there were no lines. I spent more time tending to StreetPass on my 3DS despite having no use for them. An event like PAX is the only place to get them.

The event I was most looking forward to was the game music concerts but even those were a letdown. A concert is more than just the music. It’s a show and that include elements like lighting, costumes, dancing, stage design, video, special effects. Video game bands don’t usually excel at those aspects. They too often lack a frontman / band leader with enough charismatic or flair to really entertain an audience. They used to hold concerts in an actual theater. Now they just hold them in a giant room on the convention center. The bands performing were all competent musicians but below-average performers.

I ended up leaving even earlier than I needed to. Instead I walked around Seattle more and chilled at the hotel before an uneventful flight home. I wore a mask during most of my trip and I’m still feeling okay so I hope that I avoided getting ill. If I ever decide to attend again, I’ll go on Sunday / Monday when it’s less crowded and I’ll go along with a friend.

The typical morning walk with Buster was slightly atypical today. Chasing after bad bunnies is normal operating procedure. In the previous night, a poor rabbit was killed by a car but the driver at least had the decency to move it from the road to a yard. The corpse was intact so I let Buster get a good smell up close of what he'll never catch alive. Curiously he wasn't able to detect it even 2 feet in front of him. Maybe dead rabbits aren't smelly enough.

After that it was back to tracking live rabbits. There are plenty of those to drive Buster wild. In the course of sniffing them out, Buster actually nearly lead me to a fox. I've seen foxes around here before but I'm not about to let Buster get near one. We may have ruined the fox's hunt by spooking off its prey. To try and make up for it, I went home and used a shovel to move the dead rabbit into the cover by a tree for the fox to have.

Rabbits are harmless and foxes can be real pests. Still, I'll let nature handle that while we humans and our pets live in the comfort of the indoors.

Part of the goal of blogging every day of my European vacation was to improve my writing skills. It takes time to write well however and that has made me not want to write at all. Still, I feel I should jot something down for the history books.

First is the topic of the new dog. It's been 2 months now since I rescued him. Chasing rabbits is in his blood but it's causing a few troubles. He will get into neighbors' yards that aren't well fenced. Nobody has complained yet but I feel bad when he trespasses and forces me to do the same to collect him. The more critical concern is when he runs blindly into the street after a rabbit does. For his own safety, I can't let him go after the rabbits around the street. He doesn't like that and will pull hard to try and give chase. He's not that heavy but he has a low center of gravity and 4 legs. With that build for torque, I have to brace myself to avoid losing my footing.

As an attempt to distract him from chasing a rabbit into the and/or pulling my arm off, we're jogging a bit. He's not made for running though so it's more of a trot for me. I imagine we look ridiculous going down the street, me in a half jog and a basset hound bouncing along behind me in a pathetic attempt to keep up.

Clicker training is ongoing and I'd forgotten how much patience that requires. I think as Buster learns commands, additional commands will come easier to him.

The final note on Buster for today is the mess he makes. It's not terrible, I've gotten re-acquainted with living with perpetual dog hair. The slobber is a new challenge but it's limited to feeding time. After that, a brief mop is enough to clean up. His ears are long enough to be a mop too. Those too need occasionally cleaning but he likes having it done so it's easy.

More topics to catch up on coming soon(ish).

I took Buster to the dog park today for the first time. He seems to miss other dogs and I wonder if his old home had those. We went early morning to avoid a crowd and test his social interactions with fewer dogs. Buster played with them by running and barking a lot. Given his big mouth and short legs, more barking than running.

I'm also testing him off leash in my yard and he is doing well. Scent hounds follow their nose but they aren't fast so they don't wander too far. My bigger concern is that he could go into the street but I'm in a small cul-de-sac with limited traffic.

Ultimately, just as with my dog before, I don't want him to feel trapped. He should be free and want to come back to me. That's evidence that he trusts me as the pack leader.