The Summer Drum

Summer's almost gone, you Doors fans, dang hippies!

The summer is almost over. And what a hot summer it was. Too hot. The planet is experiencing the worst global warming ever. But that's not the point of this blog. 

Today I went to guitar center to play some real live drums, a real drum set. The first week or so I've only had a practice drum pad, which was too expensive, 30 bucks! For wool. 

Okay, so I've been intimated by drums forever. 

In fact, when I first played drums the first day at guitar center I was so self conscious that when people came into the room I stopped the cymbals and silenced them with my hands like Bill Bruford LOL.

But you can learn to get confidence on a new instrument. I just started playing the best I could and somehow they were impressed. The guy even asked to hold my stick to see if there was magic in it. He tried it and he wasn't that good. 

Two weeks later I went back more determined but when I sat on the kit I was still self conscious and fearful. 

Then I remembered some rock song with a 16th note hi hat pattern, it was like a Zappa thing or something. Or like Deep Purple's Ian Pace. So I hit the 16th note pattern on the hi hat, then copied it across the entire kit, from the hi hat, to snare, to toms, to cymbals, and walaaaaaaaaaaah, polyrhythms are born! 

Then suddenly I was playing lighter and faster, and I was starting to get more jazzy. 

Just goes to show you that you need practice really to have the confidence. They go hand in hand. 

I don't have much time to practice, what with working 48 hours at the retail gig, but the time I do use, is spent with great listening and patience, that I sort of can copy things somehow. Must be all the practice from guitar. 

Get me a different drum for every different emotion, it's go time. This is like therapy lol. Cathartic. 

Primal Instinct Ready for Deployment

Hello, World. [computer science] 

No, really. Bom gia! 

Here I'd like to write a short update on life and some ideas that have reverberated throughout my memory. 

First, I'm starting to start to ditch my electronics more and embrace nature. I've been experimenting with playing a lot less video games, and now I've finally reached the point where I think I can stop and not feel like I'm missing out. How did that happen? 

Well, you see, I was having extreme computer issues. Minor problems, not hardware issues, just software issues. In the process, I learned a little bit more about software and how to fix them when things aren't handshaking. I had more fun learning and fixing the problem than actually playing the game. Therefore, I don't really need to play the game anymore. Capeesh? 

I even started turning off my phone and not leaving it in my pocket when I'm on the work floor. Much better, mucho gusto. Why? Less distractions. Less anxiety. Better performance.  

Second, I'm starting to enjoy nature more, despite the 100 degree California heat. If you haven't read my post on what its been like being on foot in the hot sun all the time, look no further, and read this post here here. There are a lot of good mentions in that post about how to deal with 100 degree heat, on foot, working, eating, and more. 

My body is starting to respond. The first couple trips of adventuring in 100 degree heat were so brutal, so brutal in fact, that I could hardly really walk without feeling the weight of a thousand suns. [Lol], no, but it was fucking hot and I felt like a ton as a result. The answer to this problem? Well, you might not like this, but you just gotta fucking man up and not wimp out and just fucking overcome it like a boss you fucking weakling. 

Your body feels weak and sluggish in the 100 degree hot sun because its hot, yes. But also, you've grown fat and weak, living on the American fat of bougies society, and now you can barely walk in 100 degree heat. That's the truth of the matter. The answer is to go primal and go back to nature and ditch video games and porn marathons, your endless cable news TV, your VR, your alcohol. Stop being a fuckin' biomass. 

If you want some inspiration, I recommend watching this cartoon on cartoon network called Primal. It's really cool and shows what man is really like when he isn't weighed down by the limitations of the 21st century and its bourgeois rulers. 

But what do I know? I'm a guitar player hippie who should've been around in the 60s, not now. Yet here I am, and there you are, reading this for some reason, staring into the either.

I see now the limitations put on myself and others and am pushing through to the other side of human activity and intersubjectivity through my armchair sociology. 

I see nature as something I've always loved, even as a child mediating under the stars. But I also know that nature is nasty, brutish, and short. So the long and short of it is, yes, nature is good, but it is no replacement or substitution for God or food for the soul. It's just something out there for you to enjoy. To really get spiritual healing you have to go much farther and do much more. 

Go do something you beautiful goon. And don't forget the water bottle this time. 

p.s. time keeps moving but its always in a circle, endless, starless, until it disappears within being and nothingness, and the cycle begins anew

-your friendly neighborhood retail philosopher