Hey Martin, how are you doing?

Hey!, thanks for asking.
 It's been awhile hasn't it. I mean you've said how you're doing in the small talk way and all, but not in the, how you're doing way.
I guess so yeah, it's easy to not go to in depth sometimes and just not talk about it. But I'm doing alright, things have been really nice lately. There is some things that could go better, but nothing that is actually bad.
Yeah? Same here I guess. There's always things you want to do or want to happen, I mean, we're both pretty wishful people and it's hard to not make goals or have high expectations. I'd say that we've been doing quite a bit of things that are productive and we should be proud of that.
Oh I totally agree, like the other night I totally came up with a sweet chord progression. I was just sitting at Colin's and I just hit this chord I like that's all dissonant and stuff but this time I actually found a way to finish it. So later I made a simple drum beat and started recording it. I'm totally in the mood to play and make music this summer, even more than last summer. It's probably because I now have the means to do a lot more than ever before.
I just actually got Panda Bear's first and second albums and I have been appreciating the first as it's really simple and is his first solo recordings, which is what I'm going through. Of course his are amazing and all, but I have hope for myself.
You will totally make a bunch of sweet songs this summer, and have a finale show for your friends. It'll rock their socks off.
You think? I dunno. I mean, I'm not even sure what my music will sound like, but thanks for that.
Yeah, not a big deal. And other things? How is work going?
Work is going much better than it has other weeks. This week has been so busy that it's gone by super fast. I spent a lot of time trying to get this one thing to work and now that it does I can do some sweet things. Although my team member and I hit somewhat of a snag in that we now have to share code and we have to set up that which will take a bit because of the way large companies work. I really like working here, it keeps surprising me. I see a lot of people that I am starting to recognize and every one is really nice. Yesterday I was reading Catcher in the Rye and I was letting the people get back in from the patio because the door was locked. I dunno why, but it just killed me every time they tried to open the door and I would let them in.
You're reading Catcher in the Rye? How do you like it?
Oh, man, oh, boy. It is the perfect book for me to be reading right now and I am in love with it. I don't want to talk too much about it until I'm done, which will be today or tomorrow. But it is totally amazing, have you read it?
I'm actually reading it right now as well, it's decent.
Well, I love it. I like reading books I love because I read them really fast, and that's how I know I love them. But then they are read and done too quickly.
I hear ya.

<silence>

So, what have you been doing lately?
Well, I usually do something everyday after work, in the past week I've had a bonfire, went to rock the garden, played poker, went to uptown, and driven around. It's been busy and fun. I don't know what I would do otherwise. Seeing people is just something I love.
Yeah. I actually should get back to work, but it was really nice talking to you.
Alright, we should totally do this again sometime.
I agree.
Bye!
Cya.

Why am I paying an 800% markup?

So I decided to goto work earlier than usual. I don't have to be here until 9ish, but I got here at 8:30 today. It means I get to leave earlier later, which is nice. I never really eat breakfast at the house because my family has the oddest assortment of expired and stale cereal ever. And strawberry milkshake poptarts. So anyways, I went to work and went to the cafeteria to give their breakfast a little looksee. Doughnuts were about a dollar each, but the choices were between crap and gross, I vouched for something else. I saw that they had a shelf with those little containers of cereal, so I thought about my options and  opted for frosted flakes. The box was 85 cents with tax. I grabbed some milk, which is free for employees until the end of the month. I sat down and ate and of course read the label of the cereal as if there was something I've been missing all these years of eating cereal. I saw that the box was 1 oz, and I started thinking about how many ounces were in a box of cereal, or even the malt o meal goodness bags. I just looked it up. There are about 21 ounces in those bags. If I assume that the price is around 3.50 dollars a bag, that is 16 cents an ounce. Consider that you have to use milk to make the cereal good, that's, let's just say, another 10 cents for milk ( I like a lot of milk). That's 26 cents a bowl of cereal. That's actually really cheap, wow.
From all this, I've decided that it will be in my best interest to bring a bag of dry cereal and eat it for breakfast. But that won't work for long, or I assume. Because Thomson is going to take away the free milk and free fruit tuesdays to give money to food shelves. What a waste. Now I don't hate food shelves or anything, but I just think they should think about how many people drink the milk and get the positive health benefits from it. Everyone will have broken bones and osteoporosis within a year. Well, maybe not, but w/e.

Rearrange words into : A Answered Ring Rotor

I think I am going to rearrange my basement today. Like, make it more applicable to making music. Lately I've been impeded by the lack of ease making music brings me. I have to walk across the room back and forth between the computer and my instruments. So that will be my project today. Just in case you were wondering.

MOS DEFinitely risky

This post is about this: http://thepiratesdilemma.com/punk-capitalism/mos-def-launches-album-on-t-shirt

The blurb: Mos Def is releasing his latest album through a t-shirt, buy the shirt, get the album.

The front is the cover artwork, and the back has the track listing, the tag has a download link to get the songs. Is this a brilliant move or just some clever antics to make a point. I'd say a bit of both. Ever since Radiohead released In Rainbows as pay as you want, artists have been looking for a way to connect with the modern world of distribution. Nine Inch Nails had their Ghosts album released through the Internet with a huge turnout. Danger Mouse just recently sold blank CD's with the text: 'For Legal Reasons, enclosed CD-R contains no music. Use it as you will.' Now Mos Def has taken his (or his publicist's) approach to creative releases.

From what I get, it is making a point to the music industry who's idea of combating losses in CD sales is to sell more t-shirts. And when t-shirts cost at least twice that of the CD, sure, that's a good business model. But what about the fans that have to fork out $50 to get a CD and a t-shirt? Is that fair to them? Hardly. I'd say that instead of worrying about losses in CD sales due to pirating music, worry about making the artists happy and giving the customer what they want. I know I would want a T-shirt that is a statement, and Mos Def is definitely making a statement here. Well done.

In the eye of the beholder, holy crap it's a beholder, RUN! ARgh it's killing me with it's eye! NOOOoooo.....

I just heard a guy say "yeah, I was at home and took a picture of my silverware, sold it for a million." He was referring to a picture on the wall that is a dining room set. It is black and white and in my opinion really, cool. But that's because I'd say I respect the things that go into a picture. Then I started to think about if some people use art as an outlet or just a means to make money. If you could sell something you made for 1,000 dollars would you? Probably, right? But what if it took you a day to make and you could make the art everyday for the rest of your life? Then you are "selling out" in my opinion. But a lot of people do that. They take pictures everyday and if they end up with one that they can reprint and sell, they have a living. I think, at least in our times, the ability to take a picture and sell it are phenomenally high. I can take 1,000 pictures and have them on the internet the same day. Out of 1k pictures, there just has to be one or two for me to recoup the cost to charge my battery and the time it took to shoot. It seems kind of unfair to the photographers of old who dedicated their lives to learning all the finer points of development and the physical work needed to make a picture. But it's still art. It hasn't changed the quality per say, just the amount, and as a result of that, the noise and signal ratio. Of course, there is the limiting factor in price of high quality equipment to take the pictures. I don't have a very expensive camera and so I am limited to taking close range shots and so if you put the money in, you have an advantage. But even that is shrinking with cheaper digital SLR cameras. Camera phones are starting to be higher quality than digital cameras were four years ago. So, can we say that the picture you took isn't art if you didn't pay big for a camera? No, of course not. But there is already so much extra fluff out there that I feel the professionals are loosing their foothold in photo publishing.

If I have no time to kill, I don't kill my wallet

So I've been busy recently, as my parents put it work hard, play hard. Except that I do them on the same day. Whatever, it works out. But one of the things I usually spend my time killing is researching things that I want to buy. I really want to buy a lot of musical things right now, and the only reason I'm not is because I don't have the time to find what is the best. I fell in love with this (http://tinyvid.tv/show/t5v1inpguy9t) song/artist yesterday and I can't imagine how fun it would be to use a loop pedal to make music. I also want a sampler to make more electronic music. It kinda tough right now because the music I want to make is stuck between folk/acoustic and electronic/dance. They are kind of on two sides of the spectrum so yeah. But the keyboard I bought from woot has been wonderful so far, even being used live to play kids by MGMT. So I am torn to what I should buy next. This is why I shouldn't get paychecks or get statements saying "hey, here's some money."

The singer is a crook

So, I had one of the best lunches today. I got the Mongolian grill special today and it was sooo tasty. Pea pods, onions, mushrooms, peppers, and chicken all sauteed together and a szechuan sauce on top. It was spicy but I like spice so it was good. I read Catch-22 while eating too so it was fun. I kinda decided that I am going to read Catcher in the Rye after Tasha recommended it and I went looking for it this morning to see if my family owns it and my dad said it was a good book as well. But it's in storage somewhere, so I'll have to go digging or something.

<break>

Just got back from a talk they put on for the interns and it was quite boring. I was trying my best to stay awake and I did a good job compared to like 4 other people. The guy next to me was doing the classic head twitch and he was getting like 4 inch twitches off, impressive. But I realized that I'm having a pretty great day today. Work isn't anything interesting and being difficult, but whatever. Tomorrow I'm going to get a bonfire set up with friends and we will cook hotdogs and it will be great. Then on Saturday I'm going to Rock the Garden with Meghan and that will be an amazing time. Freaking Solid Gold, Yeasayer, Colexico, and the Decemberists. So great.

I also started making mixes for people in my head and can't wait to put them into a huge overachiever project that probably won't amount to what I want. But it will be quite grand.

Anyways, back to work.