Coffee for dinner

M., my old college roommate whom I have not spoken to in more than a decade, added me as a facebook friend. I was happy to hear from him and responded cordially of course. I'm still mildly freaked whenever old people from the past come out of the woodwork on facebook like this. I like to think you become more of yourself as you grow older, I still relate to M., and C., and D., like we are back in college. We did not get a chance to grow older and develop together. Maybe now is our chance.

K. left with her mom to go back to MI for the week, she brought the babies with her. So I have the house to myself. I swear, when left to my own device, I revert back to living like an animal. The house is still a mess, I haven't cleaned up like I told K. I would. I've been going to work and then coming home and not really using my time effectively, instead taking advantage of my temporary freedom to catch up with old friends. Me and J. went to the Blackhawks game last night, for instance, I had a few beers. It was good to catch up with him, which is a weird thing to say since he works in the floor below me.

I've been running, it's cold here in Chicago and there's a lot of ice on the ground, the farthest I ran was about 4-5 miles. I've been taking advantage of the Garmin to track my time and it's slow - I attribute it to all the ice on the ground, but also I'm out of shape since the marathon. I went to my guitar class, I'm actually learning a few things, but mostly I'm too advanced for the class as usual. I still enjoy going to guitar classes at Old Town School, I just love being in that environment with 'guitar' and 'music' people, even though their taste in music may be a bit too folk and roots-based for my taste sometimes.

So as I was telling my therapist J. at my session last weekend - I've been thinking of ways to maximize my productivity given the time constraints imposed on my life by the responsibilities with the new babies and with the baby we already had. I'm going to try my best not to give up my hobbies of running and songwriting, although time is very limited. A couple of decisions I came to: I'm going to start following Hal Higdon Novice I training program, which is much less intense than the Intermediate I that I used to train for last year's marathon - you definitely run a lot less and make use of cross training time more. I'll just have to make sure I'm monitoring my progress on Garmin and trying to train smarter, if not longer, maybe I'll see some results as in a better time in this year's marathon, maybe not. I'll just be satisfied if I can finish it. After all there's nothing really dependent on a stellar time in the marathon, just my personal satisfaction. That's all I have time for in my life at this time.

Another thing that was really concerning me was the idea of having to give up songwriting for good. Writing and recording an album, that's something that young people who are single and have a lot of free time (and quiet) do. It may work out that I may have to ditch that idea while I still have small babies to take care of, but right now I'm thinking, maybe like marathon training, I may have to adjust my expectations in order to keep this activity as a part of my life. I really don't want to do that as, like I said before, it would seem to me like a spiritual death, although that may be an overly dramatic way to put it.

So I'm thinking with songwriting, I may have to cut back the expectations I put on myself, like I said before this may actually result in my being more relaxed about music and I may actually take more enjoyment out of music with all the deadlines that I impose on myself taken away. It may actually result in fewer songs, but better songs, and I may still wind up with an album written. I previously had this arbitrary deadline of a song a week, and an album at the end of the year - I'm thinking of just letting those arbitrary restrictions go. I'm just going to play my music, play the guitar, work on Ableton when I feel like it. Still try to write songs, but there's no expectation that I have to write a song by a given deadline or even write at all. There's also this idea about how I want the music to be - I want it to be acoustic based, as was my original concept, before I got sucked into the hole of learning music production software and tinkering with loop based sequencers. Ableton is just a musical sketchpad and recorder for me. I don't have the time to explore remixing and creating experimental electronic pieces, much less trying to merge my love of electronic beats with acoustic composition. That's a very difficult thing to do, even for experienced producers and songwriters, I don't know how I expected to do it myself. I want my music to be acoustic based, acoustic guitar, a lot of fingerpicking, maybe all fingerpicking, think Nick Drake. Whatever additional instrumentation I create in Ableton should support that idea.

My mom called, I get the feeling she's mad at K. for some reason. I don't know how that happened, K.'s been a terrific daughter in law from what I can see. Who knows. It's interesting for me to think that perceived problems in my relations with my parents used to take up so much of my time and mental energy and now they barely register. I just have too much going on in my life to worry about things that aren't going to change, it's too bad that my wife and probably my kids will probably be affected by it to some degree.

Work going ok, I've been working hard, as much as I can. Work should be my primary concern in life, and if I'm not happy about it, then I should be spending all my time trying to improve my work situation by working hard at the job I've got, trying to improve my skills, etc. This is like pulling teeth for me. I feel so burnt out, I used to be so passionate about software engineering concepts and programming languages, and open source. I don't know where all that passion went. So I've decided even if I'd rather be sitting around playing guitar all day (I mean who wouldn't?) I still have to act like a professional at work, and honor my responsibilities to my family and work on my career even though I'd rather be doing something else. Those babies deserve a dad who is a success at his career, and who's providing a safe secure environment for them to grow up in.

I got a feeling the club can't use somebody to MASH IT UP!!!

Mash It Up (Cee Lo Green Vs. Kylie Vs. Lady Gaga Vs. Flo Rida) - Norwegian Recycling
Money to Brightside (Lil Wayne VS. The Killers VS. Drake VS. Thin White Duke) - Mochi Beats
We R Who We R Vs. Grand Theft Ecstasy (Paul Farah's Mashup) - Ke$ha Vs. Feed Me
I Got More Than A Feeling [LongVersion] - [MMM] MadMixMustang
Club Can't Use Somebody (Kings of Leon vs Flo Rida) - DJ FOX
Decalogue (The Hood Internet vs The 2000s) - The Hood Internet
Where The Streets Can't Handle Me (Flo Rida ft. David Guetta vs. U2) - DJs From Mars
Britney Bitch (Mc Marcelly vs. Britney Spears) - André Paste
Love Butterfly (Lady Gaga vs. Crazy Town) - DAW-GUN
Lump Sum Of Paris (Bon Iver vs Friendly Fires & Aeroplane) - The Hood Internet
Heartless (Fray vs. The Police & the Black Eyed Peas) - DJ Earworm

Quote

"Not all who wander are aimless. Especially not those who seek truth beyond tradition, beyond definition, beyond the image. "-Mona Lisa's Smile.

I Just Wanna Love The Way You Viva La MASHUPs!!!

Dynamite Pressure [queen & David Bowie Vs. Taio Cruz] - Dj Tripp
United State of Pop 2010 (Don't Stop the Pop) - DJ Earworm
Just Stop Believing - Lady GaGa VS Journey
United State of Pop 2008 (Viva La Pop) - DJ Earworm
Smells Like Ke$ha's G6 - Ke$ha vs. Nirvana vs. Far East Movement vs. Britney Spears
Virgin O'Riley (Madonna vs The Who) - Go Home Productions
I Wanna Bulletproof Dancer (La Roux vs. Robyn vs. Whitney Houston vs. Taylor Swift) - Titus Jones
Airplanes Countdown - DJ Schmolli
Big Booty Bitches In Miami (Bombs Away vs. LMFAO vs. Busta Rhymes vs. Sir Mix-A-Lot mashup) - DJ Schmolli
Love The Way You Lie in Paradise City (Eminem ft. Rihanna vs. Guns N' Roses) - DJs From Mars
Triple Double - Girl Talk

Return of the Return of the Undiscovered Self

So for many months I have not been posting more than these online mixtapes that I make on 8tracks.com. It's a new year and I'm going to go back to writing/journalling in this blog again hopefully. Writing is good for me, spiritually. In 2010 I tried to switch to journalling in a Moleskine notebook because I thought that this blog was too public, now I don't really care too much about that. The Moleskine turned out to be too cumbersome for me - I'm always online anyways so this blog always seemed the easiest way to keep track of my thoughts, I was always leaving the Moleskine at home, and it's too awkward to have to whip out a pen and write in a public place whereas I'm always messing around on my laptop. It's the 21st century - if Moliere and Hemingway had access to a MacBook Pro I think they would have ditched their notebooks. So, Cheers. Happy New Years to whatever readers I have left, if any. Cheers mainly to myself, this mission I'm on, to transform my life to something good, is constantly changing, and never ending. And it's more important now than when I first started posting journal entries online about how I'm dissatisfied with my life - because there's kids involved now who depend on me. I think about that every day, it's a heavy burden and I often feel as if I'm not living up to it. Maybe if I try really hard and not waste time anymore one day I'll feel as if I've succeeded. Even if I fail I still have to try.

The story of the past year of my life boils down to only a few main themes, as I'm just a simple guy and there is not a large cast of characters in my life and I live mostly in my head. If there's a protagonist in this story it would be me, and if there's an antagonist in this story that would also be me as I've always been my own worst enemy, as much as I try to convince myself that my parents screwed me up. I guess the basic premise of this blog is that we can determine our own destiny in this world, that any obstacle can be overcome with determination and hard work. The main people in my life would be my beautiful wife K., my gorgeous daughter N., and my new son (he's also handsome) J. There are also my mom, my two brothers, my various cousins, uncles, aunts, in laws, friends and associates that I know from work, the few friends I have left from my past, my therapist, various people from online. Anyways, my marriage is wonderful, my wife and my kids fill me with happiness every moment of my life. I feel like I don't have any time to work on my various friendships, that's just how it is. Also I feel like my relationship with my brothers has greatly improved in the past year, ever since they both moved back home with my mom after L. got a divorce. I'm really happy about that. My mom has been acting strangely for the past couple of years, ever since dad died. I don't know what I can do to improve my relationship with my mom other than just checking in with her whenever I can find the time and bringing the kids by.

The biggest thing that happened to my family last year was we got pregnant and J. was born in November. I feel that everything else that happened this year was a reaction to that event, planning for that event, the result of being stressed out or in denial of that event, recovering from that event, or contemplating that event. I'm still processing being a father of two, and having a new son. I feel like this will be something I will be working on for the rest of my life. But obviously it was a joyous event, he's just the chill baby, very different from his sister. And so handsome (of course). So I can't help but pronounce the year a success, despite how frustrated I may feel about lack of progress in other areas of my life. I'm an idiot. I feel like ever since we found out we were expecting in March, I was using our due date in November as some sort of line in the sand when I would be able to 'get back to the business' of life, whatever that means. I feel like I've been floating, and living in a state of expectation most of the year - which is a convoluted excuse for being lazy. And after he was born, we've just been feeling overwhelmed and unable to balance the demands of two kids with our career responsibilities and personal projects. I think we severely underestimated the work involved in raising two babies, the lack of sleep involved, the way the amount of cleaning and laundry seems to have exponentially increased. This situation is not going to change anytime soon, if I'm going to get any traction in other areas of my life I'm going to have to figure out some way to deal with it.

So this year I have 3 New Year's resolutions: 1. write and record original music, 2. find a better job and 3. beat my time in the marathon.

Other significant events in my life the past year: I trained for and ran a marathon in October. Weather conditions were brutal, and I didn't get the time that I had hoped for. It took me a while to come to grips with what this means to me - I feel like it was not a waste and plan to run another marathon in 2011. I got in great shape, lost weight, and had a lot of great experiences during my training. I truly love marathon training. I'll continue to post about running in the coming year, probably. My friend C. came to visit in July and we went to see the Pitchfork Festival. N's birthday party, a large number of children's parties in the fall due to all the babies in our family being born around the same time.

Music has not been going very well, mainly due to the demands of family life and career interfering with my music time. In order to write songs you need a lot of quiet time, away from distractions. It's just really difficult right now for me, I have to figure out how to work songwriting and recording into my life. I've been experimenting with late night and early morning songwriting sessions - the problem I think is the lack of sleep due to the new baby, I'm just not able to focus on music as much as I need to as I'm pretty much always sleep deprived and exhausted. I don't know how I'm going to do it, but I'd really like to realize the goal of write and record original music. I'll definitely post more about my struggle to create art in this blog as it's basically my only hobby and interest outside of spending time with my family and trying not to get fat. Very frustrated in my musical progress though - I feel like it should come more naturally and easily, and I spend way too much time overthinking the creative process. I also feel like I spent a lot of time this year learning Ableton Live, sound design and production, which I tend to confuse in my mind with the songwriting process, which is more important. This year I did manage to become very good at Ableton Live, which is not a small feat and took up a lot of time and research. I also became a better guitarist, despite practicing less due to spending time on Ableton - which I think is just a natural outcome of playing and would have happened anyway. I took a few classes at the Old Town School, a songwriting class and a music theory class and some others. So I feel like I learned an awful lot about the technical aspects of songwriting this year. I also wrote a few songs, I think I have about 20 songs written since I started my musical journey. That's being liberal and including some longer song experiments I did in Ableton throughout the year. So, some progress, but not as much as I would've liked. But I learned a lot last year, maybe I needed to learn more to get to a point where I can just create. Maybe I just need to drop any preconceived notions I have about the artistic process, or what I want my art to be about or sound like, there's definitely some type of internal block getting in the way of my creative output. One thing I talk about a lot with my therapist is my need to overcome my OCD tendencies and my perfectionism, which is really fear of trying.

Likewise, my career. I'm very very frustrated with my career, and really unhappy at my current job - I feel like I've been ignoring these issues for a long time, years. Even with all the stuff going on in my family life I feel like I could have made more headway in my career last year. I'm just lazy, and when I feel overwhelmed I just shut down and then nothing gets done, that's the basic truth about me that I have to always be mindful about. And I'm not like an unsuccessful guy at my career, I actually make a pretty good living, but I always feel at my age I should be more advanced in my career and be earning a larger salary. Definitely there are many who would love to be in the position I'm in with my career, but I have high standards for myself. This past year my previous managers were fired and I was put into another group with a new manager. This change at work has not resulted in increased job satisfaction on my part. I know what needs to happen in terms of my career - I need to work overtime at my job so that I'm feeling productive and on top of my job, I need to start working on certifications and personal projects that will make me a better developer, and I need to quietly start looking for a better job with an opportunity to grow in a more supportive environment. All of this takes time and focus, of course. Just like my music, I don't know how I'm going to make time for this stuff with the demands of two kids.

Also, I've given it some thought - and it has crossed my mind that my career is the most important thing, and that I could probably make more time for improving my career by letting go of my musical ambitions, maybe just play guitar in my spare time whenever I had the time. Or I could make more time for music, or at least not feel so guilty about all the time I spend on music, if I just accept where I am right now in my career and get too ambitious. I feel like if I give up music it would be a spiritual death for me. What I need to do is make time for music, but keep within strict limits of the time I reserve for music, and within the time I reserve for music really use that opportunity to create - this means allowing myself to create and not overthinking the artistic process or prejudging every song I create before it's even finished and allowing myself to finish my songs without judgement. This also means that I have to use my time at work more productively and not waste any time while I'm there, maybe reserve at least an hour or two during the day to work on career related research and stick with it, hopefully by steadily applying myself to the goal of improving my career and getting a better job eventually something good will happen. Definitely nothing good will happen if I don't work at it on a regular basis. This is a new life, and I'm never going to have the luxury again of being able to spend all day being really OCD and hack at some personal project, I have to adjust my way of thinking.

Get this rude f*king MASHUP waving up in the party, boy. Like, OMG.

What I've Done To This Dangerous Teenager (Akon vs. Linkin Park vs. Kardinal Offishall vs. Katy Perry) - MashUp Mike
Like OMG, Baby (Capital FM Summertime Ball Mashup) - deejay earworm
Rude Baptism (Rihanna vs Crystal Castles) - The Hood Internet
Bittersweet Electric Sky Touch (GlowTape!'s String Cheese Mash Up) - The Verve VS MGMT & Justice VS Kanye West & Lupe Fiasco
The Wavin Flag Mashup [Khaan vs. Kings of Leon vs. Matisyahu vs. Whitney Houston vs. Counting Crows vs. Gentleman vs. Jamaram vs. others] - Mashup-Germany
United State of Pop 2009 (Mashup of the Top 25 Hits of 2009, according to Billboard) - cool dj
Fuck the Kids (Eve Massacre Re - MGMT vs Soulwax vs Yeah Yeah Y
Give The Lying Boy Away (RHCP vs. Eminem feat. Rihanna) - MashMike teag
Get This Party Started (Mash-up) - The Ultra Girls
Komradz (Salem vs. 2Pac mashup) - Turbo City

I got summer on my mind

Gone For The Summer - Teen Daze
Pure - Blackbird Blackbird
Lately (Deuxième) - Memoryhouse
1088 New Theory - Washed Out
O Lilac - Wild Nothing
Shooting Holes - Twin Shadow
Fokionos Negri Street - Keep Shelly in Athens
STILL - jj
Empathy - Crystal Castles
Wide Eyes - Local Natives

Just like the movies, that's how it will be

Shine On, You Crazy White Cap - Teen Daze
Bored Games - Wild Nothing
Sleep Patterns - Memoryhouse
Third Wave - Work Drugs
KILL YOU - jj
Thanks Vision - toro y moi
Go Outside - Cults
Endless Sunset - Delorean
Slow (Van Rivers Remix) - Twin Shadow
Baby - Warpaint

lofi, dreampop, indie rock, remix

This Time Around - The Radio Dept.
Neon - Teen Daze
05 At My Heels - Twin Shadow
halo - ceo
Endless Spring - Houses
Calyer - Beach Fossils
Bermuda - Kisses
Golden Haze (Thunderlust remix) - Wild Nothing
Zebra ( Them Jeans Drum Edit) - Beach House
Texico Bitches - Broken Social Scene

I don't want to erase your memories

Youth - Beach Fossils
Learning - Perfume Genius
03_Love_Fade - Tamaryn
Running - Computer Magic
Erasers - Blackbird Blackbird
illuminata - ceo
David - The Radio Dept.
Memory Boy - Deerhunter
Burden of Tomorrow - The Tallest Man On Earth

Adrift in the shallows, a modest repose

Soak It Up - Houses
Live In Dreams - Wild Nothing
Daydream - Beach Fossils
08 Castles In The Snow - Twin Shadow
My Love For You Will Surely Be The Death Of Me - Of Oceans
Photojournalist - Small Black
Civilian - Wye Oak
Marathon - Tennis

You speak in tongues, I can't resist

Summer Holiday - Wild Nothing
Domestic Scene - The Radio Dept.
Hawaii (Niva remix) - Blackbird Blackbird
Still Sound - toro y moi
Let's Fall Asleep Together - Teen Daze
Children of the Revolution (T. Rex Cover) - Neon Indian
I Do Not Care For The Winter Sun - Beach House
Last Night At The Jetty - Panda Bear

dreampop, lo fi, rock, girl talk

Fax Shadow (Shlohmo Remix) - Toro Y Moi
PJ Harvey - Written On The Forehead - PJ Harvey - Written On The Forehead
Never Follow Suit - The Radio Dept.
Call Your Girlfriend - Robyn
Carolina - Girls
Oh No - Girl Talk
Got Something For You - Best Coast And Wavves
Derezzed (Breakdown Remix) - Daft Punk