Zappa.com

Almost nothing happened. I collected some tax documents. We have not done our own taxes for some 20 years, as my wife has self employment income, and we use an accountant. But we are actually ready this year in February. Hope we break even at least. It varies from year to year.

and I shoveled an inch of snow.

Briefly considered making a break for it and visiting Paris for the last show of the Dir En Grey tour. Work cooperates but unfortunately I couildn't get transportation to work.

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^^^^^ Bugger! ^^^^^

They'll be back.....

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Hey Punk, where you goin' with that passport in your hand?

I take care of some 30 bluebird boxes in a park in town. Yes, I am qualified! I am in fact a Master Naturalist. Though I might give up the title in a year.

Anyway, we have no budget, so my daughter gave me 4 new boxes for Christmas. I will be replacing the worsts four. One today. It is just one screw on the pole to replace the box. Picture from last May.

Sorry about the giant picture. Here are some chicks just hatching. Link will give the photo.
https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-8DCWiz7B5OQ/ ... G_3663.jpg

Tero has a new forum fan

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Here is the new box on the prairie. There are 6 along a tree line, I am facing away from the trees. The indian grass has mostly fallen over. It is as tall as the box in parts when growing.

^^^^^ Excellent pic's Tero ^^^^^

Master Naturalist awesome

We're privileged to be surrounded by bird life at home, as we speak pecky Becky,
the neighborhood peahen that has become a part time resident in our mint bush,
is at the window watching Attenborough on TV.....

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Hey Punk, where you goin' with that passport in your hand?

Here's a picture from Dortmund that I wanted to share: this is the window of "Idiots Records" in Dortmund:

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Home from the Dweezil Zappa concert, what a great show!!!
Took the train to Portland, very cool old train station there.



Hoofed it for a while into the Old Town Chinatown area of Portland, some really neat buildings and artwork.


Our first experience with a "micro hotel room" (these are more and more popular in cities with limited space) and it was surprisingly comfortable! A roomy 116 sq ft! (that's me try to duck out of the picture because there was NOWHERE ELSE TO GO.)


Time for the show!!
Long line!! Great to see so many people out to see Zappa music!!
Outside looking in:


Finally inside!!


Hey look who is in the lobby waiting for us!


Inside the venue!! This place is cool!! more people are starting to show up!


The band is on stage!!


And......The Man of the Hour has arrived!!!


gotta go... the show is starting!!

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“Listen to everyone, read everything; believe absolutely nothing unless you can prove it in your own right!”

^^^^^ Very nice! ^^^^^

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Hey Punk, where you goin' with that passport in your hand?

Thanks GG! We had a great time!!

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“Listen to everyone, read everything; believe absolutely nothing unless you can prove it in your own right!”

Cool pics Cory thanks for posting...

Thanks! and no problem!!!

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“Listen to everyone, read everything; believe absolutely nothing unless you can prove it in your own right!”

Woke up at 7.55 a.m. Woo-Man slept. Made coffee. Started the pc. Did the dishes. Played 2 Stevie Wonder songs on YouTube. The Woo-Man awaked at 9.15 a.m. Breakfast: eggs, cheese, bacon, tomatos, jam. Discussed the news. Enjoyed weekend. Watched a movie: Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri. Ate raspberry tarte. Said goodbye to Woo-Man. Cooked potato cauliflower soup. Listened to Americana music. Drank beer and Kümmel. Assorted the record collection. Does this kind of life look interesting to you ?

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What's the ugliest part of your body ?

Well, not much. I like the outdoors, and since we have no exercise equipment, my winter activity is just walking. Getting up to 40 today. Since the mud is still frozen, it is easier to walk those paths now than a month later. Only the bike paths with the gravel are useful then. And I might even take the bike out soon. It's the wind on the prairie that kept me from that.

Income taxes done. Property tax on the house half paid. They give you the option of one or two payments.

When we get thru July, maybe that Hot Rats vinyl can be my reward for good finances. I don't really need it. Just showing off. That and Apostrophe will be the only vinyls I will ever add.

Maybe not interesting, but certainly familiar!!

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“Listen to everyone, read everything; believe absolutely nothing unless you can prove it in your own right!”

Started reading it on June 29, 2018.
Just finished the book, now, Feb. 18, 2020.
That's a lot of washroom breaks!!

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You're probably wondering why I'm here
(not that it makes a heck of a lot of a difference to ya)

It's been an oddball day.
1 fixed film material and talk in pyjamas, for 90 minutes presentation on birds
Not my idea for a class, other speaker backed out. I am before the "bee lady"
2 was ready to file away tax papers, noted an error between last year and this year. One bank provided form is wrong
3 took the two papers to accountant, will visit bank tomorrow
4 bought apples and frozen pizza
5 tried to pay a bill, but my wife had the check books
6 read books. Played a CD I burned yesterday. I have the tracks in a play list but we still use CDs for the most part, and there is nothing blue tooth set up
7 a lot of nothing to 4:30

It did not snow as promised but was a crap day for outdoors.

Also, took out my credit card from the Amazon account. A test. I am planning to get any books from a real store and electronics from Best Buy. I can still compare prices.

Old joke:

Yesterday, attended a friend's funeral whom I hadn't seen for about 20 years. Not that we were angry with one another. On the contrary. We just went our own ways and lost touch.George Carlin is right: People will say the most pleasant/ass-kissing things about you once you are a corpse. Rhonda, a former co-worker, I hadn't seen for the same amount of time and I walked in together after signing the guest book to offer our consolation to the mother. She made a huge social faux-pas when she asked her son died. OUCH! Bad form for someone you just met 15 seconds earlier. Nobody should attempt to pry into the private life of the deceased and ask an already emotionally upset close family member how her youngest son died six days earlier. He was 47. Alcohol related.

He was 2 years younger than me but looked -in my opinion- much older. Destroying a body takes time but it can be done if you work at it. The drinking and/or whatever other factors played havoc on his appearance so that no amount of makeup and filler could offer a convincing disguise.

In a cruel twist, after the service was over, the priest said there would be a celebratory gathering at a near-by bar with pizzas & two kegs of beer paid for in advance. Put together by the mother and her other son. Say what?! When a person dies of diabetes do we hand out candy bars? Family in denial which is to be expected.I just stuck with ice water on this occasion, because I didn't feel the need to self-medicate with a depressant.I mean really, Aren't funerals depressing enough?

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When my old boss died of diabetes (the disease had left him seriously handicapped: blind, legless and needing kidney dialysis) his family had the grandest goodbye I've ever seen - carriage with 4 horses, tour past his home, old home, old farm up to the church, 2 hour service with live professional singer, pigeon release at the church, carriage tour to the cemetery, service there, another pigeon release, and then a meal together.

At the snackbar. I didn't attend but the pictures show the next of kin having chips/French fries and other deep-fried snacks.

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I've written columns for a Finnish-American paper for some 30 years, now maybe 6 six a year. It seems to survive with the Florida retirees, but even the website is down. The current subscribers and locals that get copies in a few stores will continue. I visited the office of this paper some 50 years ago in Minnesota.

I spend a couple of hours over the weekend trying to fix the Finnish wikipedia entry for it to have at lest some detail. It was not a political paper from 1970 on, they were either conservative or leftist before that. With the Internet there is no need for news or advertising your church or club or event. Anyway, they were very reluctant to use my memories as a reader. it was not "facts." Finally the Wikipedia reviewers allowed me to put in two external links to the entry. I did not contact the owner of the paper. If he ever looks at the Wikipedia entry of his paper, he will recognize my work. I tried to be neutral.

Only Wikipedia entry I ever got going from scratch was deleted as not relevant enough. Relevance is counted based on the number of citable published references on any topic. Ten is a good start.

I've edited the Zappa entry in Finnish successfully. Mostly the YCDTOSA 2 entry.

A couple of months ago I began empting some storage units I've had for far too many years, thankfully I was in the industry, also for far too many years, so the cost is free to minimal.....Todays carton contained 40 + label-less video tapes.....
the first tape to hit the machine had an ancient Columbo episode
The Bye-Bye Sky High I.Q. Murder Case
Guest Staring our old friend Theodore Bikel as the murderer.....
with Jamie Lee Curtis - Waitress.....

So quaint.....the nostalgia's killing me.....

I foresee a few hours of trawling through these tapes looking for the missing home movies
that may or may not exist any longer, due to years of relocations a lot of stuff
was scattered to the four winds.....

Only conservatively 150 tea chest cartons of god knows what to go.....

I found 15 real far out 'n' groovy glow in the dark 70's purple corduroy
bean-bags that, after years of being showered in break 'n' shake glow-stick juice
and stuff at countless psychedelic party's then "stored" for 20 plus years, they now
resembled a science experiment that has gone very badly wrong.
Weirdly I'm 100% certain that we only ever had ten of those beans-bags, we got
them custom made, now we have 15.....
I know a guy with access to an environmentally friendly hospital furnace so it was
hand me the hazmat bags and ba bye scary and possibly procreating bean-bags.....

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Hey Punk, where you goin' with that passport in your hand?

Related to the previous post, me at 16, the Nick Drake look. Though I would not hear of Drake for 20 more years. I followed that newpaper through its boom years, when immigrants from the entire 1940-1970 period read it.




At that time I only had Hot Rats. At 17 I also had 200 Motels, then Chunga's revenge.

Going birding soon. It is just a few degrees above freezing. i may get the garden hose out to wash the car after, when it gets over 40 degrees F.

Took 3 seniors to see some birds. We tallied some 30 species. Bufflehead: