Not Fun

So, with Karen at work and Megan in Grinnell and Alex at home and me at work, this is not fun. The white circle indicates Iowa City.

And no, that's not what I wanted to write about in my 1700th post on this blog.

Ringo is Lars and Lars is Ringo

"Avenged Sevenfold drummer Arin Ilejay has hailed his Metallica counterpart Lars Ulrich as "the Ringo of metal" - saying he's one of the most underrated musicians in the world." More often than not, I read about how he is "overrated" as a drummer, mainly because (gasp) he is human and (gasp) he may not play every song every time *perfectly* or to the standards of those who think all the band does is show up and play 3 hours and bitch about growing old.

Bandmix Ad I just Saw

This is the type of ad I would have liked to have seen in summer 1988, prior to starting college. Of course, none of the bands mentioned existed back then <smirk>

"Looking for a solid drummer with an awesome modern hard rock/alternative rock style. Strictly focusing on originals. Influences include, but aren't limited to (Incubus, STP, old school Staind / Limp Bizkit / Korn, Red, BB, etc.). For an idea of what we are about check out some of out stuff at [snip]. We are looking for someone with a good positive attitude and high energy stage presence . No drugs. No drama. Having a good voice is a plus, but having the drive to go out and do everything you can to succeed is a necessity. Our main goal is to be able to quit our jobs someday and play music full time, but we are only as strong as our weakest link. So with that in mind, sky is the limit."

Blitzing the Inbox

Megan keeps getting emails from colleges that, apparently, want her to attend *their* college. Some of the techniques used by the college's Admissions department are well-thought out. One shows a graduation class on a raft and talks about their on-campus beach and a 97% graduation rate. I commend the college for creativity. Megan actually intends to attend UNI next year in pursuit of a degree in elementary education.

It is sometimes difficult for me, as a graduate of Mount Mercy College with a minor in Secondary Education, to encourage her. I still have that awful shitty student teaching experience taste in my mouth and even though it was during the fall of 1991 and so much has happened to me since then that has been positive in my life, I find myself suppressing an "all in" attitude. This is my issue and I need to get over it. I realize that teaching is in the blood as Mom was a teacher for 40 years and for many years, I wanted to fill the empty voids of young minds with grand ideas about literature and writing. Student teaching destroyed me in so many ways and, I guess, now that I consider myself rebuilt into a technical writer, I don't have the will to rip the wounds open that have mercifully healed over the last 23 years.

Again, though, this is my issue. I pray for Megan's success as a teacher and I believe she will do awesome.

My Rights

Apparently, there's a movement emerging that places my right, as an American citizen to say what I want, in jeopardy. Why? Why can't people with opposing points of view come together and figure out their disagreement. We have to somehow find good within the hearts of our enemies, both at a global country to country basis as well as in the daily interactions in life. What kind of a sick earth would we have if we all just got along?

I Hunt, Therefore I Am

My absolute least favorite Metallica song is "Of Wolf and Man" on the Black album. I don't really like the groove, the lyrics, or the melody. It's just not a song I would choose as either their best or brightest piece of music. I have felt that way since I first heard the album in 1991. I don't mind that James Hetfield sings, "I hunt, therefore I am" in the lyrics but, apparently, there are a lot of people
that have a problem with it apparently.

Here's my take on it. I don't own a gun. I don't plan to own a gun. I realize that hunting is a passion of a lot of people. I realize that gun ownership is a right I enjoy as an American citizen. I appreciate that if I wanted to own a gun, I could. Simply, it's my choice to not own one.

That leads me to James Hetfield. I don't really care if he owns a gun, if he likes to shoot bears in the wilderness, if he likes to go to Russia on a hunting expedition, as he discussed in the "Some Kind of Monster" movie, or even if he narrates a television series about hunting bears. That's his passion outside of Metallica. All of the members of Metallica have passions outside of music. Drummer Lars Ulrich sold off a bunch of his paintings (also shown in the "Some Kind of Monster" movie). Guitarist Kirk Hammett likes scary movies. I admit to not knowing what bassist Robert Trujillo does for fun outside of Metallica, which is sad because he's been in Metallica now for a decade.

All that said, do I really believe James Hetfield should *only* focus on Metallica and have no other interests? Should he only pursue a hobby that I, a music fan, grant approval for him to do? That's insane. It is also the perspective I have when I read about the protests that came prior to Metallica's concert in England. Hetfield should follow his bliss and do what makes him happy.

Reconversion Update

Prior to shutting down the 3 devices that were used to rip CDs from Friday night until today (Sunday) at 1:10 PM, I ran a DIR command to get a count of the number of MP3s I created by ripping the CDs. The result of that DIR command is 2175 MP3s and 156 base folders. I made great progress but now it is time for me to shower.

Last Night

1. Creeping Death
2. For Whom the Bell Tolls
3. Wherever I May Roam
4. Sad but True
5. Fade to Black
6. Cyanide
7. The Unforgiven
8. The Memory Remains
9. One
10. Master of Puppets
11. Nothing Else Matters
12. Enter Sandman
13. Whiskey in the Jar
14. Seek & Destroy

Christ or Punch

As I mentioned previously, Five Finger Death Punch / Volbeat / HellYeah / Nothing More are playing a concert in Cedar Rapids on Saturday, September 20. I found out at supper last night, Karen asked about going to a Christian conference in Des Moines that same weekend. Oh. It's *that* weekend? Hmmm. Do I choose Christ or this?

Some Tunes from Metallica

I *really* want Metallica to tour North America after visually skimming through this recent show. They are tight and I love it! I also hope that when they do tour, it is at a point in life where I can take Megan and Alex to the show.

Missing You When I Look at You

We are taking Megan to Grinnell today. She leaves for Europe on Thursday morning and comes back Friday, July 18, 2014, at 9 PM. I hope she has a great trip and I hope she realizes how precious it is to be where she is during the trip. Father Page blessed her last night at 5:15 Mass.

Booking a Band

I am having a flashback to the era of my life from February 1992 through February 1995. It was during that time in my life where a lot of significant life events happened. In chronological order, and with several events left out for the sake of making a point:

1. in February 1992, I sent out my first cover letter and resume
2. in April 1992, I graduated from Mount Mercy College,
3. in June 1992, I proposed to Karen, 
4. in September 1992, I was hired at my first permanent full-time job at APAC, selling AD&D insurance
5. in November 1992, I asked for a temporary leave from APAC to work a scoring position at ACT
6. in January 1993, I stayed at ACT when they were awarded a contract to process federal financial aid applications.
7. between January 1993 and January 1995, I applied for pretty much any job that was even remotely related to writing. 

This is my point. I sent out I don't know how many cover letters and resumes. If I could go back in time, I would have created a tracking file for each I put in the mail. It seemed like an endless process.

And today, as I look around at the Facebook pages and websites of various bars that book bands in the Cedar Rapids / Iowa City corridor, I am sending out what basically amounts to a cover letter / resume combination. I am hoping that someone that receives my email watches the Uncle Rico video of "Ring of Fire," watches the videos of me playing drums on this blog, and concludes that they need to book us.

The truth is that it now seems we should have been looking into bookings almost as soon as I joined the band. One venue's next open Saturday night is Saturday, January 24, 2015. That's a long ways away! Another venue said to contact them in January because their 2014 calendar is booked. Another venue books bands 6 months at a time. I had been hoping for something before the end of the summer, but that doesn't seem realistic.

Sweetness to the Ears

There's something about watching your son play drums that simply cannot be explained. The U of I drumline camp ended last night with a final concert. I recorded audio of it, with my phone, and Karen recorded some video. Alex played really well and I was happy to hear his instructors tell me he was a good kid. I think he's a good kid so it's sweetness to the ears when someone that has only known him for less than 7 days tells you that you have a good kid.

Another thing that is going on is that I have made considerable progress with the CD reconversion. On the Elkader PC, I've ripped 227 MP3s.
On the Toshiba laptop, I've ripped 173 MP3s.
On the work laptop, I've ripped 205 MP3s.

Doing the math, that's 605 MP3 files that have been added to the CD reconversion project. I'm working on Spindle #30 and "only" have Spindle #31 remaining of my spindles. Then I move on to the 200 CDs from Indy and the 990 CDs in the racks. I started ripping the CDs on the rack because the majority of those CDs are not CD-Rs so I don't have to do any manual work, like looking up artist and album information online because Windows Media Player is looking that up automatically and using the online database to fill in that information for me. I have 34 CDs remaining on Spindle #30 and three being ripped concurrently on the aforementioned devices.

I'm being summoned for breakfast.

Convert all Tables to Text

Because I just spent (too much) time looking for this, I am hoping this blog post will be easier to find.
http://howto.wikispaces.umb.edu/Convert+all+tables+to+text
Sometimes you need to remove or convert tables in order to process your content in another tool. Word has no automatic "convert all tables to text" feature, so to avoid selecting and converting each table by hand, you'll need to use a macro like this. Simple paste the following code into a new macro (from Word 2007's Developer Tab, which you can enable in Word Options).

Sub AllTablestoText()
'
' AllTablestoText Macro
' Macro created by Jarosław Michalak
'
For Each aTable In ActiveDocument.Tables

aTable.ConvertToText wdSeparateByCommas, True

Next aTable

End Sub


Macro written by Jaroslaw Michalak from the ProZ Forums. He notes:

If you need another separator, you might replace the "wdSeparateByTabs" parameter with:
wdSeparateByDefaultListSeparator
wdSeparateByParagraphs
wdSeparateByCommas
or even put a custom separator:
aTable.ConvertToText "*", True

Missing Boy

Found!

There was a boy who had a "strict regimen and required to do 4,000 strides on an elliptical trainer without break", the boy had to pee or poo so he stopped. When the stepmother found out, she tattled on him. The boy was afraid how his father would react so he hid. And wasn't seen for 11 days.

Great Songs I'd love to Play in a Band

Control

---

Blurry

---

Lit

---

Adelitas Way

---

Crossfade

---

Otherwise

---

Skillet

Skillet

---

Three Days Grace

---

Shinedown
1

2

3

---

Tonic

---

Music Reconversion Status

As of Friday, June 20, 2014, my music count was
51844 File(s) 274,732,368,654 bytes
As of Friday, June 27, 2014, my music count is
52942 File(s) 279,323,192,282 bytes.
  52942
- 51844 
    1098 added in a week.

This One Time, at Drumline Camp, I ...

Slapping Fingers

The Supreme Court has declared that President Obama can no longer fill high-level vacancies with temporary appointments while Congress was out of town. He did this because the relationship between Congress and President Obama is a dysfunctional mess. Just yesterday, Speaker of the House John Boehner filed a lawsuit to sue President Obama. Do you really think they are going to get anything done?

More Metallica Haters Surface

The Metallica haters are out in full force under this article in which "the members of METALLLICA were asked about how long they think they can keep performing before it's time for them to finally retire from the live stage." Their response centered around the physical demands of being a touring musician.

Top Commenter Heath Miller shows true ignorance about the life of the band members when he commented, "...This whole band has been crying and complaining ever since they became mega millionaires. It must be rough to have to play guitar three hours a night, and make millions for it. I wish I had those kind of troubles." Try playing guitar three hours a night for the majority of 30 years. How many hours have the members of Metallica spent on a stage and how many hours, Mr. Miller, have you spent on a stage playing guitar? I would venture a guess to say the number of hours are not equal.

 

Ugly and Good Bayside Covers

Ugly cover. Sorry for the pain inflicted.


Good cover. I like the groove they find.

My Kingdom for that Extra $1000 I Want

Over 2200 DVDs and 700 CDs - $1000

Do I Care?

Alex has been attending the University of Iowa drumline camp this week. On Monday night, when I picked him up, he asked if we had plans for the night. I had just talked to Karen and the only plan I knew of was to have roast for supper because we had not eaten it on Sunday night. I asked why. He said that the drumline camp had rented the University of Iowa Recreation Building from 7 - 9 and he wanted to go meet up with his friends.

Friends?

I was impressed. I was told recently that I don't make friends easily. I was told by this person that I am friendly to people and I talk to a lot of people but as far as real friends, I don't do that easily. Or well. Or whatever.

Thus, when I heard Alex use the word "friends" my ears perked up. He talked in detail about the new friends he had met. One of them likes Spaceballs and either the same one or a different friend knows my friend's son in Burlington. Alex asked if he had seen the movie "The Goonies" because they were talking about it.

All of that led to us going to our eye doctor appointments and then, immediately after, driving home to North Liberty, eating roast with Karen, and then Alex and I getting back in the van to go the University of Iowa Recreation Building. Almost as soon as I parked, Alex was off in front of me to go into the building. It was one of those "I'm so excited and I can't believe you're walking instead of running to get to where we are going" type of situations. Alex raced off and I followed.

When Karen and I were chaperones for Megan's prom in May, we came in the entrance where I came in on Monday night. That's how I knew there was a television in a pseudo lounge where I could hang out. On the television, the College World Series baseball game was on. I couldn't find a remote control to change the channel so I was watching Virginia and Vanderbilt play during what this article describes as a "disastrous 3rd inning." Do I really care about the College World Series? No, I do not. I was saddened to watch the fall of Nathan Kirby. I had never heard his name until Monday night. I hope he recovers from the game and redeems his image before the CWS is over.

Death by Caffeine

http://www.caffeineinformer.com/death-by-caffeine

Unnamed

I had these songs in my head this morning.


I dreamed that I won a contest where I got to jam with Metallica when they were on tour and this is the song we played. The riff at 5:00 sends chills down my spine every time I hear it.

Grammar Police

:) It's okay. I understand. However, it is accurate. Notifications is in the plural form. The description of the notifications is rather long, but that cannot be helped. 

See if we remove the description, it would say, "This reminder aims to help you avoid possible interruptions in your online testing due to update pop-up notifications.

The alternative is to say "pop-up notifications" twice, as shown below:

This reminder aims to help you avoid possible interruptions in your online testing due to quarterly Java Critical Patch update pop-up notifications and other pop-up notifications.

This is redundant. 

Thanks for the feedback! 

On Fri, Jun 20, 2014 at 11:20 AM, wrote:

Don't kill the messenger, but someone on the grammar police pointed out the following:

This first section does not sound right to me. Seems like they need to add “the” in front of quarterly or make update plural.

This reminder aims to help you avoid possible interruptions in your online testing due to quarterly Java Critical Patch update (and other) pop-up notifications.

Stats and More

I was up until a little past midnight working on a DOS batch file to give myself an update on the files and folders that exist on the MyCloud drive. I have multiple partitions and now I have DIR commands to tell me information about the files / folders on each partition in a single batch file. The code is below, more for my future reference than anything else, but before I get to that, here's something interesting. The first file that was created by the code below has a date stamp of 12:10 AM and the final file that was created has a date stamp of 5:03 AM. This means that I will need to *not* expect to run this specific batch file and expect a quick response. What I may do is split it up into multiple files and then have a master batch file that will run individual drives. I haven't designed that yet so I have no further details about that.

My count for today is: 52339 File(s), but that number is somewhat misleading when I think about the cleaning up that needs to be done. Specifically, here's a random folder. The files in bold are duplicates and need to be removed.

Directory of y:\music_shell\Music_reconversion\NineDollarMelonBaller\I'll Give You Something To Cry About

06/11/2014  09:16 PM    <DIR>          .
04/13/2014  10:32 AM    <DIR>          ..
12/07/2013  12:50 PM         4,111,513 01 Fry the Bastard Tuna.mp3
12/07/2013  12:50 PM         4,111,513 01-Fry the Bastard Tuna-NineDollarMelonBaller-I'll Give You Something To Cry About.mp3
12/07/2013  12:50 PM         3,367,168 02 Zen Book of Lyrics.mp3
12/07/2013  12:50 PM         3,367,168 02-Zen Book of Lyrics-NineDollarMelonBaller-I'll Give You Something To Cry About.mp3
12/07/2013  12:51 PM         3,432,637 03 Ex.mp3
12/07/2013  12:51 PM         3,432,637 03-Ex-NineDollarMelonBaller-I'll Give You Something To Cry About.mp3
12/07/2013  12:51 PM         5,988,847 04 Third Wheel.mp3
12/07/2013  12:51 PM         5,988,847 04-Third Wheel-NineDollarMelonBaller-I'll Give You Something To Cry About.mp3
12/07/2013  12:52 PM         5,339,995 05 One Bedroom Apartment.mp3
01/24/2014  12:29 PM         5,339,995 05-One Bedroom Apartment-NineDollarMelonBaller-I'll Give You Something To Cry About.mp3
12/07/2013  12:52 PM         5,623,138 06 His Evidence.mp3
01/24/2014  12:29 PM         5,623,138 06-His Evidence-NineDollarMelonBaller-I'll Give You Something To Cry About.mp3
12/07/2013  12:53 PM         3,815,026 07 Paperthin.mp3
01/24/2014  12:29 PM         3,815,026 07-Paperthin-NineDollarMelonBaller-I'll Give You Something To Cry About.mp3
12/07/2013  12:53 PM         3,968,065 08 Underwear.mp3
01/24/2014  12:29 PM         3,968,065 08-Underwear-NineDollarMelonBaller-I'll Give You Something To Cry About.mp3
12/07/2013  12:53 PM         4,480,141 09 Celery Cap.mp3
01/24/2014  12:29 PM         4,480,141 09-Celery Cap-NineDollarMelonBaller-I'll Give You Something To Cry About.mp3
12/07/2013  12:53 PM         7,686,871 10 Hyde.mp3
01/24/2014  12:30 PM         7,686,871 10-Hyde-NineDollarMelonBaller-I'll Give You Something To Cry About.mp3
12/22/2013  12:35 PM            12,745 AlbumArt_{00000000-0000-0000-0000-000000000000}_Large.jpg
12/22/2013  12:35 PM             3,011 AlbumArt_{00000000-0000-0000-0000-000000000000}_Small.jpg
12/22/2013  12:35 PM             3,011 AlbumArtSmall.jpg
12/28/2013  12:54 PM                43 desktop.ini
12/22/2013  12:35 PM            12,745 Folder.jpg
              25 File(s)     95,658,357 bytes

---

DOS Batch Code

REM | 20131230
REM | Create date folder
cd\
e:
cd e:\music_shell
cd e:\music_shell\(_______Date
SET Today=%Date:~10,4%_%Date:~7,2%_%Date:~4,2%
mkdir %today%
REM | Begin commands for the entire music_shell folder
cd\
e:
cd music_shell
dir e:\music_shell\*.flv *.mp4 *.web* /s /od >e:\music_shell\(_______Date\%today%\videofiles_music_shell_2TB.txt
dir e:\music_shell\*___* *-* *_* *___* *--* /s /od >e:\music_shell\(_______Date\%today%\needtofix_music_shell_2TB.txt
dir e:\music_shell\a* b* c* d* e* f* g* h* i* j* k* l* m* n* o* p* q* r* s* t* u* v* w* x* y* z* >e:\music_shell\(_______Date\%today%\allfolders_music_shell_2TB.txt
dir e:\music_shell\*.mp3 *.wav *.wma /s /od>e:\music_shell\(_______Date\%today%\mostrecentcount_music_shell_2TB.txt
REM | Begin commands for the music_reconversion folder
cd\
e:
cd music_shell\Music_reconversion
dir e:\music_shell\Music_reconversion\*.mp3 *.wav *.wma /s /od>e:\music_shell\(_______Date\%today%\mostrecentcount_Music_reconversion_2TB.txt
dir e:\music_shell\Music_reconversion\*.flv *.mp4 *.web* /s /od>e:\music_shell\(_______Date\%today%\videofiles_Music_reconversion_2TB.txt
dir e:\music_shell\Music_reconversion\*___* *-* *_* *___* *--* /s /od >e:\music_shell\(_______Date\%today%\needtofix_Music_reconversion_2TB.txt
dir e:\music_shell\Music_reconversion\a* b* c* d* e* f* g* h* i* j* k* l* m* n* o* p* q* r* s* t* u* v* w* x* y* z* >e:\music_shell\(_______Date\%today%\allfolders_Music_reconversion_2TB.txt
REM | Begin commands for the music_youtube folder
cd\
e:
cd music_shell\music_youtube
dir e:\music_shell\music_youtube\*.mp3 *.wav *.wma /s /od>e:\music_shell\(_______Date\%today%\mostrecentcount_music_youtube_2TB.txt
dir e:\music_shell\music_youtube\*.flv *.mp4 *.web* /s /od >e:\music_shell\(_______Date\%today%\videofiles_music_youtube_2TB.txt
dir e:\music_shell\music_youtube\*___* *-* *_* *___* *--* /s /od >e:\music_shell\(_______Date\%today%\needtofix_music_youtube_2TB.txt
dir e:\music_shell\music_youtube\a* b* c* d* e* f* g* h* i* j* k* l* m* n* o* p* q* r* s* t* u* v* w* x* y* z* >e:\music_shell\(_______Date\%today%\music_youtube\allfolders_music_youtube_2TB.txt
REM | 20131230
REM | Create date folder
cd\
f:
cd f:\music_shell
cd f:\music_shell\(_______Date
SET Today=%Date:~10,4%_%Date:~7,2%_%Date:~4,2%
mkdir %today%
REM | Begin commands for the entire music_shell folder
cd\
f:
cd music_shell
dir F:\music_shell\*.flv *.mp4 *.web* /s /od >f:\music_shell\(_______Date\%today%\videofiles_music_shell_2TB.txt
dir F:\music_shell\*___* *-* *_* *___* *--* /s /od >f:\music_shell\(_______Date\%today%\needtofix_music_shell_2TB.txt
dir F:\music_shell\a* b* c* d* e* f* g* h* i* j* k* l* m* n* o* p* q* r* s* t* u* v* w* x* y* z* >f:\music_shell\(_______Date\%today%\allfolders_music_shell_2TB.txt
dir F:\music_shell\*.mp3 *.wav *.wma /s /od>f:\music_shell\(_______Date\%today%\mostrecentcount_music_shell_2TB.txt
REM | Begin commands for the music_reconversion folder
cd\
f:
cd music_shell\Music_reconversion
dir f:\music_shell\Music_reconversion\*.mp3 *.wav *.wma /s /od>f:\music_shell\(_______Date\%today%\mostrecentcount_Music_reconversion_2TB.txt
dir f:\music_shell\Music_reconversion\*.flv *.mp4 *.web* /s /od>f:\music_shell\(_______Date\%today%\videofiles_Music_reconversion_2TB.txt
dir f:\music_shell\Music_reconversion\*___* *-* *_* *___* *--* /s /od >f:\music_shell\(_______Date\%today%\needtofix_Music_reconversion_2TB.txt
dir f:\music_shell\Music_reconversion\a* b* c* d* e* f* g* h* i* j* k* l* m* n* o* p* q* r* s* t* u* v* w* x* y* z* >f:\music_shell\(_______Date\%today%\allfolders_Music_reconversion_2TB.txt
REM | Begin commands for the music_youtube folder
cd\
f:
cd music_shell\music_youtube
dir F:\music_shell\music_youtube\*.mp3 *.wav *.wma /s /od>f:\music_shell\(_______Date\%today%\mostrecentcount_music_youtube_2TB.txt
dir F:\music_shell\music_youtube\*.flv *.mp4 *.web* /s /od >f:\music_shell\(_______Date\%today%\videofiles_music_youtube_2TB.txt
dir F:\music_shell\music_youtube\*___* *-* *_* *___* *--* /s /od >f:\music_shell\(_______Date\%today%\needtofix_music_youtube_2TB.txt
dir F:\music_shell\music_youtube\a* b* c* d* e* f* g* h* i* j* k* l* m* n* o* p* q* r* s* t* u* v* w* x* y* z* >f:\music_shell\(_______Date\%today%\music_youtube\allfolders_music_youtube_2TB.txt
cd\
x:
cd x:\music_shell
cd x:\music_shell\(_______Date
SET Today=%Date:~10,4%_%Date:~7,2%_%Date:~4,2%
mkdir %today%
REM | Begin commands for the entire music_shell folder
cd\
x:
cd music_shell
dir x:\music_shell\*.flv *.mp4 *.web* /s /od >e:\music_shell\(_______Date\%today%\videofiles_music_shell_2TB.txt
dir x:\music_shell\*___* *-* *_* *___* *--* /s /od >e:\music_shell\(_______Date\%today%\needtofix_music_shell_2TB.txt
dir x:\music_shell\a* b* c* d* e* f* g* h* i* j* k* l* m* n* o* p* q* r* s* t* u* v* w* x* y* z* >e:\music_shell\(_______Date\%today%\allfolders_music_shell_2TB.txt
dir x:\music_shell\*.mp3 *.wav *.wma /s /od>e:\music_shell\(_______Date\%today%\mostrecentcount_music_shell_2TB.txt
e:
cd e:\music_shell
cd e:\music_shell\(_______Date
SET Today=%Date:~10,4%_%Date:~7,2%_%Date:~4,2%
mkdir %today%
REM | Begin commands for the entire music_shell folder
cd\
e:
cd music_shell
dir e:\music_shell\*.flv *.mp4 *.web* /s /od >e:\music_shell\(_______Date\%today%\videofiles_music_shell_2TB.txt
dir e:\music_shell\*___* *-* *_* *___* *--* /s /od >e:\music_shell\(_______Date\%today%\needtofix_music_shell_2TB.txt
dir e:\music_shell\a* b* c* d* e* f* g* h* i* j* k* l* m* n* o* p* q* r* s* t* u* v* w* x* y* z* >e:\music_shell\(_______Date\%today%\allfolders_music_shell_2TB.txt
dir e:\music_shell\*.mp3 *.wav *.wma /s /od>e:\music_shell\(_______Date\%today%\mostrecentcount_music_shell_2TB.txt
REM | Begin commands for the music_reconversion folder
s:
cd s:\music_shell
cd s:\music_shell\(_______Date
SET Today=%Date:~10,4%_%Date:~7,2%_%Date:~4,2%
mkdir %today%
REM | Begin commands for the entire music_shell folder
cd\
s:
cd music_shell
dir s:\music_shell\*.mp3 *.wav *.wma /s >s:\music_shell\(_______Date\%today%\mostrecentcount_music_shell_daughter.txt
REM | dir s:\music_shell\*.flv *.mp4 *.web* /s /od >s:\music_shell\(_______Date\%today%\videofiles_music_shell_daughter.txt
REM | dir s:\music_shell\*___* *-* *_* *___* *--* /s /od >s:\music_shell\(_______Date\%today%\needtofix_music_shell_daugter.txt
REM | dir s:\music_shell\a* b* c* d* e* f* g* h* i* j* k* l* m* n* o* p* q* r* s* t* u* v* w* x* y* z* >s:\music_shell\(_______Date\%today%\allfolders_music_shell_daughter.txt
REM | Begin commands for the music_reconversion folder
cd\
cd C:\Users\Hanson\Desktop\Date
SET Today=%Date:~10,4%_%Date:~7,2%_%Date:~4,2%
mkdir %today%
REM | Begin commands for the entire music_shell folder
cd\
w:
cd music_shell
dir w:\music_shell\*.mp3 *.wav *.wma /s >C:\Users\Hanson\Desktop\Date\%today%\mostrecentcount_music_shell_daughter.txt
REM | pause
REM | dir w:\music_shell\*.flv *.mp4 *.web* /s >C:\Users\Hanson\Desktop\Date\%today%\videofiles_music_shell_daughter.txt
REM | pause
REM | dir w:\music_shell\*___* *-* *_* *___* *--* /s >C:\Users\Hanson\Desktop\Date\%today%\needtofix_music_shell_daugter.txt
REM | pause
REM | dir w:\music_shell\a* b* c* d* e* f* g* h* i* j* k* l* m* n* o* p* q* r* s* t* u* v* w* x* y* z* >C:\Users\Hanson\Desktop\Date\%today%\allfolders_music_shell_daughter.txt
REM | pause3
REM | dir w:\music_shell\*.mp3 *.wav *.wma /s >C:\Users\Hanson\Desktop\Date\%today%\mostrecentcount_music_shell_daughter.txt
cd\
c:
cd C:\Users\Hanson\Desktop\Date
SET Today=%Date:~10,4%_%Date:~7,2%_%Date:~4,2%
mkdir %today%
REM | Begin commands for the entire music_shell folder
cd\
q:
dir q:\*.* /o /s >C:\Users\Hanson\Desktop\Date\%today%\mostrecentcount_all_son.txt
dir q:\*.flv *.mp4 *.web* /s /od >C:\Users\Hanson\Desktop\Date\%today%\mostrecentcount_videos_son.txt
dir q:\*___* *-* *_* *___* *--* /s /od >C:\Users\Hanson\Desktop\Date\%today%\mostrecentcount_fixers_son.txt
dir q:\a* b* c* d* e* f* g* h* i* j* k* l* m* n* o* p* q* r* s* t* u* v* w* x* y* z* >C:\Users\Hanson\Desktop\Date\%today%\mostrecentcount_allfolders_son.txt
dir q:\*.mp3 *.wav *.wma /s /od>C:\Users\Hanson\Desktop\Date\%today%\mostrecentcount_music_son.txt
r:
dir r:\*.* /o /s >C:\Users\Hanson\Desktop\Date\%today%\mostrecentcount_all_smartware.txt
dir r:\*.flv *.mp4 *.web* /s /od >C:\Users\Hanson\Desktop\Date\%today%\mostrecentcount_videos_smartware.txt
dir r:\*___* *-* *_* *___* *--* /s /od >C:\Users\Hanson\Desktop\Date\%today%\mostrecentcount_fixers_smartware.txt
dir r:\a* b* c* d* e* f* g* h* i* j* k* l* m* n* o* p* q* r* s* t* u* v* w* x* y* z* >C:\Users\Hanson\Desktop\Date\%today%\mostrecentcount_allfolders_smartware.txt
dir r:\*.mp3 *.wav *.wma /s /od>C:\Users\Hanson\Desktop\Date\%today%\mostrecentcount_music_smartware.txt
s:
dir s:\*.* /o /s >C:\Users\Hanson\Desktop\Date\%today%\mostrecentcount_all_public.txt
dir s:\*.flv *.mp4 *.web* /s /od >C:\Users\Hanson\Desktop\Date\%today%\mostrecentcount_videos_public.txt
dir s:\*___* *-* *_* *___* *--* /s /od >C:\Users\Hanson\Desktop\Date\%today%\mostrecentcount_fixers_public.txt
dir s:\a* b* c* d* e* f* g* h* i* j* k* l* m* n* o* p* q* r* s* t* u* v* w* x* y* z* >C:\Users\Hanson\Desktop\Date\%today%\mostrecentcount_allfolders_public.txt
dir s:\*.mp3 *.wav *.wma /s /od>C:\Users\Hanson\Desktop\Date\%today%\mostrecentcount_music_public.txt
t:
dir t:\*.* /o /s >C:\Users\Hanson\Desktop\Date\%today%\mostrecentcount_all_mom.txt
dir t:\*.flv *.mp4 *.web* /s /od >C:\Users\Hanson\Desktop\Date\%today%\mostrecentcount_videos_mom.txt
dir t:\*___* *-* *_* *___* *--* /s /od >C:\Users\Hanson\Desktop\Date\%today%\mostrecentcount_fixers_mom.txt
dir t:\a* b* c* d* e* f* g* h* i* j* k* l* m* n* o* p* q* r* s* t* u* v* w* x* y* z* >C:\Users\Hanson\Desktop\Date\%today%\mostrecentcount_allfolders_mom.txt
dir t:\*.mp3 *.wav *.wma /s /od>C:\Users\Hanson\Desktop\Date\%today%\mostrecentcount_music_mom.txt
u:
dir u:\*.* /o /s >C:\Users\Hanson\Desktop\Date\%today%\mostrecentcount_all_kevin.txt
dir u:\*.flv *.mp4 *.web* /s /od >C:\Users\Hanson\Desktop\Date\%today%\mostrecentcount_videos_kevin.txt
dir u:\*___* *-* *_* *___* *--* /s /od >C:\Users\Hanson\Desktop\Date\%today%\mostrecentcount_fixers_kevin.txt
dir u:\a* b* c* d* e* f* g* h* i* j* k* l* m* n* o* p* q* r* s* t* u* v* w* x* y* z* >C:\Users\Hanson\Desktop\Date\%today%\mostrecentcount_allfolders_kevin.txt
dir u:\*.mp3 *.wav *.wma /s /od>C:\Users\Hanson\Desktop\Date\%today%\mostrecentcount_music_kevin.txt
v:
dir v:\*.* /o /s >C:\Users\Hanson\Desktop\Date\%today%\mostrecentcount_all_hanson.txt
dir v:\*.flv *.mp4 *.web* /s /od >C:\Users\Hanson\Desktop\Date\%today%\mostrecentcount_videos_hanson.txt
dir v:\*___* *-* *_* *___* *--* /s /od >C:\Users\Hanson\Desktop\Date\%today%\mostrecentcount_fixers_hanson.txt
dir v:\a* b* c* d* e* f* g* h* i* j* k* l* m* n* o* p* q* r* s* t* u* v* w* x* y* z* >C:\Users\Hanson\Desktop\Date\%today%\mostrecentcount_allfolders_hanson.txt
dir v:\*.mp3 *.wav *.wma /s /od>C:\Users\Hanson\Desktop\Date\%today%\mostrecentcount_music_hanson.txt
w:
dir w:\*.* /o /s >C:\Users\Hanson\Desktop\Date\%today%\mostrecentcount_w_daughter.txt
dir w:\*.flv *.mp4 *.web* /s /od >C:\Users\Hanson\Desktop\Date\%today%\mostrecentcount_videos_w_daughter.txt
dir w:\*___* *-* *_* *___* *--* /s /od >C:\Users\Hanson\Desktop\Date\%today%\mostrecentcount_fixers_w_daughter.txt
dir w:\a* b* c* d* e* f* g* h* i* j* k* l* m* n* o* p* q* r* s* t* u* v* w* x* y* z* >C:\Users\Hanson\Desktop\Date\%today%\mostrecentcount_allfolders_w_daughter.txt
dir w:\*.mp3 *.wav *.wma /s /od>C:\Users\Hanson\Desktop\Date\%today%\mostrecentcount_music_w_daughter.txt
x:
dir x:\*.* /o /s >C:\Users\Hanson\Desktop\Date\%today%\mostrecentcount_family.txt
dir x:\*.flv *.mp4 *.web* /s /od >C:\Users\Hanson\Desktop\Date\%today%\mostrecentcount_videos_family.txt
dir x:\*___* *-* *_* *___* *--* /s /od >C:\Users\Hanson\Desktop\Date\%today%\mostrecentcount_fixers_family.txt
dir x:\a* b* c* d* e* f* g* h* i* j* k* l* m* n* o* p* q* r* s* t* u* v* w* x* y* z* >C:\Users\Hanson\Desktop\Date\%today%\mostrecentcount_allfolders_family.txt
dir x:\*.mp3 *.wav *.wma /s /od>C:\Users\Hanson\Desktop\Date\%today%\mostrecentcount_music_family.txt
y:
dir y:\*.* /o /s >C:\Users\Hanson\Desktop\Date\%today%\mostrecentcount_y_daughter.txt
dir y:\*.flv *.mp4 *.web* /s /od >C:\Users\Hanson\Desktop\Date\%today%\mostrecentcount_videos_y_daughter.txt
dir y:\*___* *-* *_* *___* *--* /s /od >C:\Users\Hanson\Desktop\Date\%today%\mostrecentcount_fixers_y_daughter.txt
dir y:\a* b* c* d* e* f* g* h* i* j* k* l* m* n* o* p* q* r* s* t* u* v* w* x* y* z* >C:\Users\Hanson\Desktop\Date\%today%\mostrecentcount_allfolders_y_daughter.txt
dir y:\*.mp3 *.wav *.wma /s /od>C:\Users\Hanson\Desktop\Date\%today%\mostrecentcount_music_y_daughter.txt
z:
dir z:\*.* /o /s >C:\Users\Hanson\Desktop\Date\%today%\mostrecentcount_dad.txt
dir z:\*.flv *.mp4 *.web* /s /od >C:\Users\Hanson\Desktop\Date\%today%\mostrecentcount_videos_dad.txt
dir z:\*___* *-* *_* *___* *--* /s /od >C:\Users\Hanson\Desktop\Date\%today%\mostrecentcount_fixers_dad.txt
dir z:\a* b* c* d* e* f* g* h* i* j* k* l* m* n* o* p* q* r* s* t* u* v* w* x* y* z* >C:\Users\Hanson\Desktop\Date\%today%\mostrecentcount_allfolders_dad.txt
dir z:\*.mp3 *.wav *.wma /s /od>C:\Users\Hanson\Desktop\Date\%today%\mostrecentcount_music_dad.txt

That must have hurt

From Fox News First Newsletter
When a Brazilian man’s daughter-in-law refused to go into a party because she saw a small animal crouching by the door, he took charge and swatted the varmint away. Antonio Rodrigues Mororó made a slight miscalculation, however. What he believed to be a possum was really a porcupine. How do you say quills in Portuguese? Metro reports: “Instead of scaring the animal, he ended up with 400 porcupine quills in his hand. Despite going to the local hospital, where he received three shots of anesthetic, the pain continued. Mr. Mororó was forced to get a tetanus jab and a course of antibiotics afterwards.” If you’re having any troubles today, just check out the picture of the varmint swatter’s hand before doctors did their work.

The Tunnel Shortens

When I checked the status of the copying of files from the MyCloud drive to the new external hard drive last night, I noticed that Windows Media Player is rearranging folders based upon its settings. Since it's too late to change those settings now, I plan to use a utility to compare the source folder on the MyCloud drive to the destination folder on the external hard drive. Easily, this copying will be done when I get home as there were less than 300 folders remaining when I checked its status before I came in to work.

After the files have been copied to the new external hard drive, and prior to resuming the actual ripping of CDs, I will run a DOS batch file to get an updated count. Because of Uncle Rico rehearsal on Monday night and Alex's baseball game last night, I haven't done any actual ripping of CDs since last week. I guess you could call it a break from the conversion as a focus on the administrative task of copying files.

A bad spring for America

Bill O'Reilly spells out how America has had a bad spring and goes through a long list of how bad things have been lately. He concludes his Talking Points memo with these words:
"So let's review. Putin violates international law, gets away with it. V.A. betrays American vets. The President trades five Taliban war criminals for a suspected U.S. deserter and doesn't tell Congress. Iraq may fall to al Qaeda and the southern border completely out of control. Those are facts. No ideology involved with this analysis. It has indeed been a very harsh spring for America."

As I read that, I wondered, "What else can go wrong?" 

Possibility

Normally, if a tour like the Rockstar Energy Festival is out and about in the Midwest, there's a concert in Chicago, the Twin Cities, St. Louis or Kansas City and, usually, it seems like it is scheduled for a Wednesday or some other day that is impossible to even be possible.

Enter Uproar with a date a mere two hours from home, on a Saturday. Hmmm.

Yeah... about that.

I kicked off copying files to the new external hard drive on Friday morning at 6 and though that by today it would be done copying. Nope. Last night, when I returned home after Uncle Rico rehearsal, it was barely over 33% complete. There was bad weather last night so it pained me to cancel the copying with 1000 folders copied out of a total of 2770 folders. Today, I kicked off the copying job again with the hope that it is done by, oh, Friday.

Thus, what I thought would be news I could share this morning or even last night is not present.

More details forthcoming as they develop.

Music Piracy

Byron Stephens makes sense. Who is that? He is the author of the following comment in response to this article:

---

There is another side of this coin as well, back in the old days before Napster, we would trade tapes that were recorded from a original recording and that is how metal got it's start in America, especially Thrash. Hell, Metallica owes their entire career to tape trading because Johnny Z got a copy of their demo from a friend that found it at a flea market. (There is absolutely no irony there) We would get a demo from a band that handed it out for free then it would be copied hundreds of times and passed out to an entire network of fans connecting through ads in fanzines (the internet before there was an internet.) at parties, between friends, and at shows, etc. We have always had technology that allows us to share music, from tapes, to CDs to file sharing, it's really all the same thing. Is it right or wrong? That is up for debate and your own moral compass. I am just pointing out it's nothing new and the technology to copy music has always been available. Is giving your girlfriend a mix CD pirating? It's technically illegal but everybody does it. Also if you do explore the torrent sites you can find stuff that is out of print and rare stuff like imports, b sides, etc. Stuff that is not available on any of the pay outlets. The only place you can get Pantera's back catalog pre Phil is on the torrent sites because they don't want to admit to even being a band before 1991. So if you want to support your bands, go to shows and by their merch, and most likely they will have their CD available for sale and I would imagine the sale of that CD will bring more money to the band than buying it at the big box store or net outlets. So bottom line is as long as there is a free internet. blank CD's and a way to copy music there will be piracy and most of us will partake. We know how to support our favorite bands and should do so, but if I can get another rare Kyuss B side that is not available anywhere else then I'm gonna do it.

---

I write about ripping my 4,884 CDs to MP3 or converting my 1000 cassettes to MP3 on this blog. I have an enormous music collection. Why? The three most common ways I have ever come across new music are:

1. Received music for the purpose of writing a music review. I did music reviews for well over a decade. Since I don't actively seek out music to review, this method has rapidly declined.
2. Borrowing a CD and ripping it / trading music. This has been done since back in 4th grade with JR when we would put our cassette players speaker to speaker to get "the latest" songs. Since then, I've traded cassettes as well as CDs. The latest example is when I ripped Margaret's CDs last month.
3. Purchasing / receiving music as a gift. The sub-categories I immediately think of are garage sales, buying music at Slacker's in St. Louis, and buying music during NCYC in Indianapolis in November 2013.

So, I get it.

Poor Hilary

Benghazi just won't die a miserable death. Hilary's book doesn't clear up the controversy of who said it was a video that caused the attack. Additionally, she's being criticized for talking about finances.

See You Later, Not Goodbye

It's funny how life goes sometimes. The way my brain works is that when something happens, I reflect about similar events in the past. I find it easy to compare / contrast the past event with the current event. I'm doing that this morning. Our friends and neighbors are moving today so I'm thinking about past events when I was confronted with the reality that I would not see someone on a daily basis like I had in the past. I have been in the same situation countless times in my life and it doesn't get better or easier the more it happens.

The specific event I'm thinking about is when I was leaving the band Old Stew back in November 1992. As you may recall, Old Stew was the band I had put together while in college to play the Mount Mercy College talent show. I have captured several memories about them elsewhere on this blog. Anyways, when I was packing up my drums for what would be the final time, Shoebox, our vocalist, looked at me and said without the usual easy-going edge in his voice, "This isn't good-bye, this is see you later. Don't say goodbye." At the time, I honestly thought I would see him again so his words made sense. However, to the best I can remember, that was the last time I have seen him. I remember him so fondly whereas other people / friends have come in and out of my life and I don't remember them as specifically as I remember "saying see you later" to Shoebox.

Earlier this morning, shortly before 6:30 AM, I posted the following picture on Facebook with the text in the white box. I sincerely hope life is good for the Rainey's in New Hampshire and equally sincerely hope our paths cross again. I said "see you later" to Ron, Margaret, Wade, Sally, and Mary. I don't think I said the word "Goodbye."

Every Word in Star Wars ... in alphabetical order

As the release of Star Wars Episode VII nears, here's something mischievously fun. Every word in Episode IV in alphabetical order. 43 minutes.

How Am I Doing on my Goal?

On May 1, 2014, I wrote that I had a goal to write my 2001st post on this blog on 1/1/2015. To that end, my goal was to write 50 posts a month. In May 2014, I wrote 57.

Victories and Defeats

First a victory for the Tea Party. Eric Cantor was up for re-election in Virginia against a newcomer named David Brat. The Tea Party got behind David Brat and now the House Majority Leader is no longer in that role. This article by Ann Coulter points out that he lost by 11 million votes. That's astounding.

As potential presidential candidates jockey for position, Hilary Clinton's name keeps coming up. The other day, in an effort to portray herself as "common" she stated that she and Bill were "dead broke" when they left the White House and the backlash for that statement was quick and pointed. This article argues she won't even run for president but the first comment added to the article by a reader doesn't buy it:

Absolutely wrong. You are generalizing, you are forgetting who Hillary is. She has an insatiable appetite for power, it's all she's pursued all her life. She has an ideological agenda that governs her life that compels her to try to implement it. She's run for president before, she's not going to let this opportunity go to waste. She arrogantly believes the world owes her this.

Personally, I don't know if she believes the world owes her anything. I do believe she will run and I do believe because the Republicans can't resolve their inner conflict - Tea Party v. non-Tea Party - there will be a tighter race than expected. Another reader added this comment to the article:

Even if she did run, I doubt very much if she'd win.
Historically, unless the President is going out with very high favorability marks, the next person running on his party does NOT win the White House. The people want change.
LBJ (D) got it only because Kennedy was assassinated. Nixon (R) followed him. Carter (D) followed Nixon. Reagan (R) got two terms and was well liked, so Bush Sr. (R) won his election and then governed poorly. So we got Clinton (D), who despite his flaws was charismatic enough to win two elections, however, Bush Jr. (R) succeeded him instead of Gore (D). Now we've got Obama (D) who's approval is sinking like the Titanic and so is his party. It is highly unlikely any (D) would win the Presidency this next term.

I surely don't know what is going to happen.

Moving Forward

I did purchase the 2 TB external hard drive yesterday for $80 and at midnight, I started the copy job from my network folder that stores all of my music to the new external hard drive. I checked the status of the copying this morning at 6 AM. According to the time stamp, it took Windows XP 18 minutes to actually begin copying files because the "created date" for the earliest / oldest created folder is 12:18 AM. There were 129 folders created. I am not overly confident that it will be done copying when I get home tonight. There are at least 2700 folders that are in the source directory.

As I mentioned, I have an issue with duplicate files in my music folder. I ran some DOS batch files to get numbers that further clarify the issue.

2s = 39
3s = 1902
4s = 1165
5s = 516
6s = 217
7s = 74
@s = 2590
     6503 these are duplicate files that include duplicate .ini files, duplicate .jpg files
- 52627 this was my count yesterday - HOWEVER, it does not include .ini files or .jpg files.
  46124

Anyways, the conversion project for CDs is quite possibly going to be less important as Karen and I talked about scanning our photos in preparation for Megan's graduation party. We talked about how to approach it. I would like to scan the photos for an entire photo album. I haven't gone further than that to plot out what it will take to get all of our photos to digital. I don't even have a count for how many photos we have because they are all in bins in the storage room. I think what we should do is scan each photo, regardless of who is in the picture. I thought Karen made a good point in that we will be further ahead if we consider that in 3 short years, we will have Alex's graduation as well. That plays into the idea of scanning every photo we have and, somehow, tagging the .jpg file so that we can locate the appropriate picture. I don't really know if it is going to be practical to separate pictures into separate folders by who is in the photo. Say there's a folder for Karen, a folder for Megan, a folder for Alex, and a folder for me. The next picture to be scanned is a photo of Karen, Megan, and Alex. What folder does it go into? You're thinking, "Ah! Create a folder called "Family" and put the photo in that folder. That would work, temporarily. The next photo is of Karen, Megan, and Megan's friend. Does that go into "Family" or does a new folder get created called "Friends" to store that folder?

That's why I think it's probably going to come down to assigning tags to each photo. There can be a code assigned to each photo album, like P-1, P-2, etc. and there can be a folder for each photo album, but it's really going to come down to how well are the pictures tagged. I'm not really interested in spending a lot of time renaming files. I don't really give a damn if the file name is really odd or that it is impossible to say who is in the picture by looking at the file name. It's going to be so much easier to add the following 18 tags to a photo of Karen's family:

1. Alex
2. Karen
3. Megan
4. Paul
5. Louis
6. Jean
7. Barb
8. Danny
9. Anna
10. Dave
11. Chris
12. Emily
13. Rachel
14. Adam
15. Mark 
16. Susie
17. Jonathan
18. Tyler

I cannot imagine a file name that would have those 18 names in it. Then it would get even more complicated because there would be more than one picture with all of us in it and because you can't  have the same file name in the same folder, what then?

That's why I'm thinking I need to better research the freeware for adding tags to photos.

Farewell WMP?

In additional conversion news, I have my eyes set on Media Monkey as a replacement for Windows Media Player. I'm also cautiously looking at Tag&Rename - music files tag editor as a way to get my file names in some sort of order. In the past, I discovered that if I didn't have values in the tag fields, like Artist or Album, this type of tool would use a blank. Now, if it would have added text like "Need Artist Name" or "Need Album Name" as a visual cue that work needed to be done, I'd have been happier!
Editor's Note: As of 2/1/2017, I continue to use Windows Media Player.

Replaceing the Deceased

Today, I am picking this up for $80. It was posted on the Iowa City Craigslist site 2 months ago and I intend to use it as an additional external hard drive for the conversion projects.

Brand New (sealed) WD My Book Essential 2TB USB 3.0/2.0 Desktop External Hard Drive

Ask for $80
Cash and local only.


PRODUCT DETAILS
Western Digital External Drive with USB 3.0 Connectivity - Stream movies and Internet video to your HD TV

Put your digital life on the sleek, high capacity My Book® Essential™ external hard drive. With WD quality and USB 3.0 and USB 2.0 connectivity, this drive is designed for today with tomorrow in mind. Visual backup software and password protection with hardware encryption ensure your data is protected. Lightweight and easy to carry, this drive is ideal for fast storage to go.

2TB
Dual USB 3.0 and USB 2.0 compatibility
Up to 3x faster transfer rates with USB 3.0
Protecting your data with automatic, continuous backup
Password protection and hardware encryption
Dimensions 6.5"L x 5.3"W x 1.9"H (2.6lbs)
2-year limited warranty