Right Side Out

Oakland Considers Marijuana Tax

Here’s a little something I concocted on my lunch break today. Did this with the samples that come with GarageBand. Talk about a hoot! I was laughing myself silly while I put it together. I’m surprised my co-workers didn’t come ask me what was going on. I hope you laugh as much as I did!

Actually, this is here, but I just updated my new layout to accommodate my MySpizzle song player doohickey over there, so you’re probably hearing it already.

This has been a tough few months. My kid’s turning 18 in 8 days and he’s been being “crazy”, which has been stressful, to say the least. I’ve been frustrated with my life in terms of feeling isolated and trapped in the hellhole that is Phoenix, Arizona. It’s not so bad if you never go outside, but you can’t not go outside. Thank mankind for air conditioning!

My stress almost did me in yesterday when I blurted out some expletives at work. That could have been a huge problem for me, but thankfully my manager was understanding. He’s a good guy, and not just because of that. Suffice to say, I felt pretty stupid for the rest of the day and it really got me thinking about how I’ve been acting lately… lately being the wrong word actually… I’ve been acting like a cranky bitch for a long time and last night I decided it’s time to stop that!

So I’m working on it. One of the things about life is that we are never at a loss for things to improve on when it comes to who we are. I don’t think we’ll ever attain a continuous level of “self-perfection” (by our own standards, not necessarily “perfect” in an egotistical way, if that makes sense). There’s always something to deal with.

It comes down to identifying the points that cause problems in one’s life and deciding which ones you can tackle and change, and which ones you cannot. Then you have to prioritize and plan out what to do about each. For me, my main issue has been not being able to do music with others, but I have been able to do it on my own still, and that has indeed been a life-saver. So while I might not be able to share music with other musicians in the same room as me, at least I can still write/record mine. My MacBook Pro has made doing that much easier, by the way. MBP comes with Garage Band, which is an incredible recording tool, considering it comes with the Mac. I’m saving up for a copy of Logic Studio, though. That’s the bomb. I’ve had some good feedback from a few online acquaintances, which I appreciate very much. I’m not sure yet which direction I’ll go in that regard.

I can’t change the heat, but I can stay inside and look forward to “winter”. Here it’s not winter, just a slightly cooler version of summer. There are no seasons in Phoenix, which lends a great deal to depression. I keep reminding myself that I won’t be here forever, and one day I’ll get out and move somewhere that has trees, life and seasons. Oh, my sweet Austin, how I miss you!

I’ll say this: Environment has a HUGE impact on one’s disposition. HUGE.

As far as my kid, all I can do is my best to guide him along in the right direction and give him the best advice I can. He’s doing well, all things considered. Day at a time, one day at a time.

More later….

Yep, it’s true! I’m writing a non-political/non-cannabis post! This is a special one because it marks the very first thing I’ve ever written on a Mac! And it’s MY Mac! The other day I happened on the Apple website and watched the videos about the design and build quality of the new MacBook Pro and man was I floored! I decided then and there that it was time for me to finally give in and start saving up for a new laptop (my old Dell Inspiron died a couple of times and is now out to pasture in the local dump). When I saw that Apple offered 12 months same as cash I figured I’d see if I could qualify, and lo-and-behold! Now I’ve got my sweet new piece of outstanding machinery on my lap, connected through my hidden, super-fast wireless router and I’ve never seen my blog load so damn fast in my life! Way too cool.

I’m just getting used to my MBP and will soon buy a copy of Logic Studio so I can start recording with it. My main use will be recording, art (Photoshop) and writing, as well as blogging and stuff. This is the 17″ version, by the way. The “big boy”, if you will. But it’s actually smaller than my 17″ Inspiron was. And… it doesn’t appear to get hot like the Dell. That’s great because my Dell would end up frying the crap out of my lap (haha! Pun intended) Getting used to the way the delete button works (it works the same as the PC’s backspace key) and figuring out how to skip/delete words at a time, go to the end of a line, etc., is proving to be challenging and quite fun, actually. 

The beauty of this laptop, and the quality of it, are so far superior to any PC-based computer that I’m just totally blown-away. You DO get what you pay for. 

Time to go play around with some of the apps and see what she can do…. :)