frozen octopus

This year, I switched from storing individual notes in separate text files to a centralized system using Drafts and Dropbox. It's working so well that I am going to keep going with it for 2025.

The problem with my previous system was that I was spending too much time organizing and became anxious about the ever-growing number of files.

For my new system I need something that was as simple as possible. So I created a folder in Dropbox for each life context and set up a Drafts action to store thoughts with tags, dates, and locations in a single text file.

When I need to find something, using a text editor to search for information in a smaller number of files is so much easier. Using an app like nvAlt or Obsidian was working with the old way but the sheer number of files was making my brain hurt.

The benefits of this year's method is it's easy to find information in a manageable number of files. I've also been allowing myself to fix/tidy one or two things during each search session. That gives me that little jolt you get when you organize but I don't do it for hours like before.

I was hearing a weird voice mumbling something while I was doing some free-writing. For a second, I thought someone was talking loud through the floor, on our veranda or someone was talking on a mic outside.

Finally figured out it was someone on a Jazz album I am listening to is humming on the recording.

Watched a punk band, called Lolita #18, play their 35th anniversary show last night in Hibiya Park. It was around two hours, outside, and about 5°C / 41°F. Totally fun but my nose is paying the price today. I want to see them in a toasty live house next time. I am fancy like that.

It's weird how janky Shortcuts is at getting what you are currently listening to. I've never gotten the actual Music shortcuts to work on desktop. There is an option for getting what is currently playing with a Shazam shortcut but that doesn't give you the album name.

Shortcuts does run Applescript though. I did a little searching and found the script for getting what you are listening to. Very cool how quickly it grabs the result.

tell application "Music"
    if player state is playing then
        set currentTrack to current track
        set albumName to album of currentTrack
        set artistName to artist of currentTrack
        set albumYear to year of currentTrack
        set albumGenre to genre of currentTrack
        return "Currently listening to: \"" & albumName & "\" by " & artistName & " (" & albumYear & ", " & albumGenre & ")"
    else
        return "Music is not currently playing."
    end if
end tell

Getting this working is inspiring me to use Applescript more with Shortcuts in the future.

It went from hoodie to jacket here all of a sudden. It's almost hoodie in the sun, jacket in the shade but not quite. Winter is knocking. I will answer the door but will only talk with it at the entrance. Not quite "please come in" level yet. Autumn is still hanging out at our place.

There is a drum beat called a Half-Time Shuffle. Lots of drummers crow about the difficulty of this beat. I will pause as you go look it up on Youtube or wherever.

[hold music]

I decided to get my head around this beat. When I stripped away all the ornaments and mythology around it (ghost notes, shuffle, clips of legendary 1970s drummers, etc.), it wasn't so daunting.

Pattern

RLR RLR BLR RLR
K

R = right hand on Hi-Hat
L = left hand on Snare
B = R an L at the same time
K = kick drum

Approach

1. RLR is the easy part. BLR is the tricky part. I worked on those two for a while separately.
2. Looped RLR RLR. Fun to zone out and do that part for a while.
3. Looped BLR RLR. Found it less tricky when you start with the both hands part.
4. Looped RLR RLR BLR RLR. Did this veeeeerrrrrry slowly at first. Let my mind and hands get used to when success sounds and feels like. Then ramped up the tempo.
5. Added the kick.

Tips

• Every L should be a ghost note. Didn't worry about that.
• This should be played with a shuffle feel. Didn't worry about that either.

Getting the beat up in the air is more important than making it shiny. I can polish it up later when the muscle memory is solid.

Beats like these are legendary for a reason. I may never use it for anything but the skills needed to play a beat like this level up my playing forever. Not a lot of chances to use half time shuffles in punk songs, but that "BLR" section in this beat is effing genius. It's one of those patterns that can reset your hands back to normal if you drum yourself into a corner.

Ruminating on what my New Years resolution is going to be for 2025. Usually it is some sort of drum resolution. Last year it was to learn Jazz drumming. Did it for a solid month and it was an incredible feeling when I got a beat off the ground.

This year I was thinking of doing something like "for every album older than X, I have to listen to something that came out in 2025".

This is subject to change but fun to think about.

I have an  Apple Shortcut I run every morning cleverly named "Morning". When it is clicked, it sets me up for a new day. It chooses random dumbbell exercises. It chooses a random drum rudiment to focus on for the day. It chooses a random grammar pattern to study in Japanese for the day. It also prompts me to write one sentence for a One Sentence Journal.

Everyone's routine is different, so yours will be different. The shortcut recipe I lean on for this is this:

1. Add a text file to Shortcuts.
2. Fill the file with a bunch of things you want to randomly select from.
3. Put each thing on a separate line.
   In a new shortcut, add a Get file from folder action and point it to your text file.
4. Add a Split text by new lines action.
5. Add a Get Item From List action and set it to random.

The text files are so light and easy to mess around with. You can create an infinite amount of them. I use this pattern a lot to randomize daily things so notifications don't become monotonous.

Set up a Pomodoro timer called “Mini-Tomato" that is 10 minutes cleaning up files on the laptop and 10 minutes cleaning up the place.

Unnecessary, inefficient, and fun.

The experiment for the day is to use the Reminders app to remind me of random stuff in the future. When I stumble across some quote or cool thought, I am scheduling them in Reminders for random dates in the future.

The best time to plant a tree is 20 years ago.

The other thing I am scheduling are things like "One year ago you were thinking [thought here]" or "One year ago you wanted to ". It maybe cool to get reminded of where I was at a year ago to see how far I've moved pieces.

Two things I need to get sorted out for the plain text drum tabs are accents and buzzes. I did a little soul searching and digging around in Unicode.

Accents are easy to do with inverted breves from Slavic languages.

L̑ (U+004C with U+0311 - combining inverted breve above)
Ȓ (U+0052 with U+0311 - combining inverted breve above)

For buzzes I realized that if I do them, they are natural so I probably don't need to clutter up the patterns. If I really need them in a pattern, I can type a note about it under the pattern, for now. This could change in the future.

When I am out and about, I get ideas for drum patterns. Sometimes I am without pen(cil) and paper, but I always have a device (phone, watch, etc.).

I could draw music notation in a sketch app; I can't do that on the watch. I could record the beat doing some sort of beatbox with a voice memo app, but I am not going to be doing that on a crowded train.

This means I need some way to get drum ideas out of the brain and into the inbox with plain text. Using R's and L's and any other characters to get them somewhere.

The patterns will live on their own page and there might be an RSS feed in the future. I am still trying to decide how to handle that.

Patterns

I switched from using a 5B pencil to an F pencil. F definitely sounds more pencil-y. The "scritch scritch" level is a lot higher. I do like the dark line of the 5B though.

My current pencil next to the laptop status is now:

• F
• 5B
• a 5B that is barely holdable

My watch has an action button. You can set it to do things like "turn on the flashlight" and many other things. One of them is to "run a shortcut".

I finally got around to making a shortcut where I can dictate (or type) into Drafts and make a quick note. I set the action button to run that shortcut.

It rules. I can get a thought out my head and captured in seconds. I can do it on a crowded train without pulling out a phone. I can whisper the idea and it can still understand me.

Steps

1. Make a shortcut called "Action Button"
2. Add the "Get Device Details (Extended)" action and set it to "Device Is Watch"
3. Add the Dictate Text action
4. Add the Set Variable action, give the variable a name, and have it accept Dictate Text
5. Add the "Create Draft" action and have it accept your variable
6. Set you watches Action button to use your Action Button shortcut.

The only way I could get it to work was by using a variable. I tried to create a a Draft by accepting the dictated text directly and nothing would happen. Adding the variable step made it work. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Woke up today thinking about how much money hotels in Japan hotels are leaving on the table because of their tattoo rules.

One of the biggest attractions for vacation in Japan are the hot spring baths. A majority of hotels have rules barring people with tattoos from using the bath.

Estimations:

• estimated percentage of Americans with tattoos is 30%
• estimated visitors from America to Japan is between 1 and 1.5 million

That means around 400,000 Americans that visit Japan can't use the hot spring baths. Most don't travel alone so it's probably likely their group will choose a hotel that they can all enjoy together.

Let's use an easy price, like $100 for one night, to calculate.

400,000 people * $100 = $40,000,000 (or ¥5,981,400,000)

Rooms are more expensive than that usually. That number doesn't include food and drinks even. That's a lot of money left on the table because of body art rules.

Got some half-priced katsuo at the supermarket last night. Marinated it in sesame oil and vinager overnight. ¥200 tasted like ¥2000 for lunch today.

After watching a video about iterative thinking, it made me feel less bummed about trying ways to organize projects in my to-do system. The video reminded me to enjoy a failure because you get to try the next idea. Each attempt is a chance to level-up the skills.

Yesterday ruled. We went to see a friends photography exhibit at Tennozu Isle station. A very cool exhibition and nice to chill out by the ocean.

After that we went to see a legendary 1970s punk band called Totsuden Danboru at a live house called 七針 (nana hari/seven needles) near Hatchobori station. Such a cool spot to see a show.

One of my pinball philosophies is if you win a free game in pinball, you leave it for the next person. Better someone else comes along and gets the joy of finding it.

I usually don't have a better game if I play the free game so it's better to leave it and move on to a different machine.

Buying a pencil satisfies many needs for me. My hunter/gatherer genes get a chance to do something when shopping without spending tons of money. My brain/heart feels less guilty for stomping around a store and leaving empty-handed. My hands love it because holding a pencil is the closest thing to holding a drumstick in the stationery store.

I use them at home, work, and band practice. The only small drawback is that once they're sharpened down to shorter than your hand, the balance gets weird. At that size, they're cool for writing a tiny note or putting in an everyday carry bag. Mini-golf pencil-sized pencils are a pain for writing for five minutes straight, though.

My solution lately is that when a pencil gets shorter than hand width, it graduates to "cross-off" level. The longer pencils have to do the hard work of writing word after word on checklists and brain dumps. The short pencils get the honor of crossing off completed tasks and ideas. They stay in the flow until they sharpen away into oblivion.