Internet Radio Sucks Syphilitic Donkey Dong

How the fuck am I supposed to avoid my life by losing myself in my work if I don't have a good soundtrack?

Last.fm: I now need to restart Spotify and Last.fm (in that order) after five or six songs.  And it's now impossible to skip something when the YouTube selection is some fucked-up cell phone-recorded live performance of an artist who consistently does awful live performances.  Anyone who has had the misfortune of seeing J.G. Thirwell (Foetus) live knows what I mean.

Spotify:  No equivalent to Last.fm's randomly playing my library.  The closest I get is playing it in alphabetical order or by length of song.  It keeps dropping songs I've repeatedly added.  Is there an upper limit to the number of songs you can have in your library?  Not only do they have a shitload of ads, they have a shitload of ads featuring people using Auto-Tune, so I have to keep turning off my speakers.  Upgrade?  With what money?

Pandora:  Sounds like a CD player on permanent skip.  Plus huge gaps in their database of artists.

KEXP and other stations that still stream now that iTunes doesn't carry them: The CD-skipping effect isn't as bad as Pandora, but it's still bad.  And more talented idiots are using Auto-Tune when they don't need to, so I have to turn off the speakers.  But the taskbar doesn't show me the song title unless the cursor is on it, and that is delayed anyway, so I keep missing parts of other songs.

Satellite radio: It comes with my satellite TV service, so, radio on the TV.  Not Internet radio, but close enough.  In addition to being mostly genre-specific, and I like a lot of variety, I'm stuck with things like nostalgia and jazz stations because of the increasing use of fucking Auto-Tune.

What's my problem with Auto-Tune?  It physically hurts.  Fingernails on chalkboards don't bother me.  Sirens don't bother me.  Auto-Tune causes eardrum-shredding pain.  It has to be an autism thing because my daughter and many of her friends have a similar reaction.

I don't understand how someone singing in an empty room with bad acoustics while failing to harmonize with Stephen Hawking is supposed to sound pleasant.  Especially if they're singing off key, because it doesn't fix that.  Why the fuck do people like Megan James (Purity Ring) and Lauren Mayberry (CHVRCHES) use it?  Their voices don't need any help.

Fucking #whitepeopleproblems #firstworldproblems

Sleepwalking in Saint Regis

Sunday night / Monday morning (05 October / 06 October) I was on another nocturnal mission.

I awoke yesterday with a really bad headache and overall sense of malaise.  When I let the cats out I saw the side door to the shop/outbuilding/garage was open.  It was pretty obvious what happened.

I couldn't tell if I had driven anywhere, as I no longer record the mileage - that served its purpose by determining I do sleep drive.  I had rolled down the driver's side window - something I often do when sleep driving, or just sitting in my pickup while in that twilight state.  I suspect I did drive, as the truck seemed to be not quite where parked it.  As I no longer trust my memory all that much, I can't be sure.  It would only matter if I kept a diary of these events, continued to log mileage to know for sure if I drove anywhere in my sleep, and attempted to match hangover symptoms with activities.  Perhaps with the help of strategically placed webcams.  But to what end?  I don't do this nightly.  It happens once a month, if that. 

Regardless of driving or not, I didn't hide the garage-door opener this time, and that's what really matters.

One thing I have been tracking is how my sleep pattern is really different when I sleepwalk, even if what it typically is changes.  These days I usually wake up 2-3 hours after going to sleep, drink some water, go back to sleep anywhere from one minute to over an hour later, and repeat the process every 30 to 60 minutes after that.  When I wander around at night I don't wake up for five, six, even seven hours.  The only other time I'll sleep for six or more uninterrupted hours is if I take a benzo.

Interrupted sleep is normal for me.  For most of my life a typical night was four hours of sleep, 5-60 minutes of being awake, two hours of sleep, 5-60 minutes of being awake, an hour of sleep, then waking up and figuring out if I need more sleep our not.

If my now-unreliable memory is to be trusted, I slept through the night as a child only when I woke up with a bad headache and otherwise feeling sick.  As opposed to all those times I woke up, sometimes on the floor, after a night of the normal sleep pattern, feeling really sick after the scary dreams and having wet the bed.  Now I know those to be signs of having had one or more severe nocturnal secondarily generalized seizures.

That stopped when I was nine or ten.  The partial seizures when I was awake, presenting as visual distortions, continued until I was 24 (that was 1986) and took lithium.  The generalized seizures returned, the partial seizures got worse, and nothing has been the same since.  But I was also flipping the fuck out with bipolar disorder and other stuff was going on, so it's not entirely lithium's fault.

This Place Ain't What It Used to Be

I've been ill for over a week.  It's whatever the fuck I had last time, only worse.  I may not be the only person in the area with it, as my newspaper neighbor - the only person interested in the Missoulian who lives beyond the end of the carrier's route (AKA my property) - has been letting his papers accumulate in his box as well.  That rarely happens.  A few other services no longer go much further than where I live, as a couple of trash bins and a mail box have sprouted just over the cattle guard (think supersized storm drain).

My neighbors put their house up for sale a couple years ago and it sold, along with a couple others that have been on the market for at least 12 years.  Next door (i.e. 100 yards from my house) there are goats (which I'm OK with) and a passel of kids who seem to be home-schooled.  Given this is Montana my money is on their not being vaccinated.  Fortunately I had my shots earlier this year, and I know the pertussis vaccination works for at least eight years; and I didn't get rabies after handling a rabid bat that drooled on an open cut after getting the rabies series.  I'm not all that worried, it's just the principle.  Plus I could be wrong, and they've had all their shots.  Even if they don't get flu shots I'd get it anyway.

What really bothers me is some asshole with a boom-boom car moved here.  Why the fuck would someone who drives one of those things move out here?  The only scenario that makes sense is he lives with his parents, they moved here, and it's not his idea.

Thursday I badly needed groceries, so I managed to make it to Saint Regis to get some food, and grabbed the mail and newspapers on my way back.  When I get inside I notice that not all of the papers are there.

I didn't get the paper on Friday.  Today I felt well enough to get the papers this morning, and found only today's.  My neighbor's box had only last Sunday's.  The carrier never removes papers.

Someone has been lifting the newspapers.

What's next, the mail?  I don't get the mail every day, and when I do get it I usually do so when I'm walking the cats around nine or ten at night.

I moved out here to get away from that sort of shit.

The bright side: less culture shock if I ever manage to get the money to move to Seattle.

Mind's Eye Blind

This has been bugging the shit out of me since I heard it a few of nights ago:
http://www.bbc.com/news/health-34039054
I've always taken "mind's eye" and "to visualize something" as metaphors.   As in, "The only time you see anything when your eyes are closed is when you're dreaming." Or if you have some kind of special gift that let's you do that.

Then I heard that story and learned 95% of the planet can conjure up an image of some sort if they want to.

This isn't a side effect of meds or complications from kindling due to seizures and mood swings.  I've never been able to visualize shit.  My entire life.  

While it explains my nearly-nonexistent visual memory, I feel really cheated. If most people can close their eyes and see their past or what's written in a book why the hell is television so popular?

I don't understand why this is bothering me so much, it just is.  It's not as if something has been taken away from me.

Full sensory dreaming doesn't make up for.  Especially now, with my memory being so fucked-up I'm having difficulty differentiating between real experiences and dreams.

If I could visualize things behind closed eyes I would probably spend every day in bed remembering a life less fucked-up than the one I have now.  I can't tell if that would be a better way to deal with things or not, because by not trying it's impossible to fail.  I don't know how much more failure I can deal with.

Epilepsy Walk with Me.

Given how hungover I feel today I'm convinced that some of my sleepwalking events are complex partial seizures.  

I can divide the events into two broad categories:

Doing something marginally useful (exercising, light housework, etc.)

Doing shit that makes absolutely no sense.

When I do something in the first category I don't always wake up with a hangover, or it's a very mild hangover, so I'm not sure if whatever happened was due to epileptic activity.  Assuming the sleepwalking is a separate form of brain weirdness in the first place.

When I do something in the second category it has to be related to epilepsy.  Like last night, when I moved the trash bin.  I had put it out for collection in its usual spot.  During some long-ass complex partial seizure I got up, went outside, and moved it 20 feet.

Oh well.  At least I woke up.

Why Bother?

I have been so fucking depressed for the last six, maybe seven months.  I don't know why I bother getting out of bed.  Sisyphus had a more meaningful existence.

Disc Earth

What was the 19^th century equivalent of Intelligent Design?  Pretty much the same thing, but with the added bonus of not just an Earth-centric universe, but a Flat Earth-centric universe!  Ladies and Gentlemen, I give you Disc Earth:

(Click on it to see it at full size on Wikipedia Commons.  You need to see it at full size to truly appreciate the the full-on, gonzo, Bible-based pseudoscience.)

Really.

I guess that, like today's believers in a 6,000-year-old Earth where everything was created, as it now is, by their version of God, they are incapable of understanding science and just refuse to admit that.

C'mon folks, it's not that difficult.  Once upon a time I used to be a top-flight programmer, now I can't code my way out of a paper bag.  I'm now unable to grasp the finer points of the mechanics behind how the Internet works.  I have absolutely no clue about how a lot of stuff works.  There should be no shame in admitting you just aren't able to understand something.

The same applies to everyone who does understand science.  Stop looking down on people who can't get it and accept that some people never will.  That doesn't make them any less worthwhile as people.  They can probably understand or do things you can't and never will be able to.


Antique space maps via bOINGbOING and Atlas Obscura.

America: Love It Or Leave It!

Asleep at the Wheel - No Ambien Required

Looks like I'm sleep driving after all.

Where do I go and what do I do?  I didn't go very far last time, as Saint Regis is farther than a 2-mile round trip, and that was the difference on the odometer from the last time I intentionally went somewhere and when I left to get some groceries this morning.

This probably explains what happened to the missing garage door opener.  As I didn't put it in the freezer I must not have considered it to be important.  Or didn't think it needed safekeeping.

It also explains a couple of occasions why my keys and driving glasses weren't where I thought I had left them.  My meds- and brain cooties-impaired memory may not be as meds- and brain cooties-impaired as I thought.

I'll leave myself a note in the car about the opener.  Maybe I'll be able to find it the next time I go for a somnambulistic excursion.

Retail Therapy

It's a fucking struggle to do anything.

I've been trying to buy groceries for over a week.  Even shopping online is too much effort.

Yet at the same time I feel as if buying a bunch of kitchen gadgets will solve all my problems.  I haven't thought like that for 13 years.

Once upon a time I could go garage saling, looking for obscure utensils.  Even if it was something I'd never use, a couple of cheap, culinary geegaws would frequently cheer me up.

Now that it's no longer a good idea for me to do any cooking more complicated than rice, the urge to buy kitchen gadgets is a sick joke my brain is playing on me.

What would really be useful: updated glasses.  The depression has reached that point of intensity and duration where it permanently affects my vision.  This has happened to me often.  I can go years without needing an adjustment in my lens prescriptions, or maybe just minor ones.  But there comes a time during these long-running periods of intense depression when my vision will begin to rapidly deteriorate and I need a significant change in my lenses.

The problem is: there's no point in seeing an eye doctor until it's over, as my eyes are just going to get worse until this episode is over.

I'm well aware of outdated lens prescriptions triggering depression.  That's not how it works with me.

Of course this has to hit me this time of year.  I'm much more depressed when the sun is out.  I've tried going nocturnal, but it doesn't work.

I'd really hate my life if I bothered to care enough about it.

Artifact from the Big Iron Age

This is what coding looked like from the 1980s through early 2000s.  Back when I could code my way out of a paper bag.  

There are probably all sorts of legacy systems still running on RPG, nurtured by tenured programmers who have no fear of ever being fired, because they are the only ones who know how the damned things work.

File Under: Why Bother?

Banging my head against the wall trying to make the wiki software do something that it probably can't do.  More likely can, but I just can't see how.

But it's a more attractive proposition than working on other stuff, because it reminds me of my life from 20 years ago when I could code my way out of a paper bag.

And I didn't hide from dealing with non-work aspects of said life. 

Working on something other than Crazymeds seems pointless in any event.

You're Killing Me, AdSense

Seriously Google?  Three ads for Dunkin' Donuts on the Wellubtrin page but only one on the Remeron page?

Don’t you read what I write?

At any dosage it will make you crave doughnuts. Seriously. You will want to invest in Krispy Kreme stock (or maybe something along similar lines that isn’t tanking); as Remeron’s antagonism of the serotonin 5HT2C and H1 receptors gives you the munchies for carbohydrates and sugars like you were 16 and smoking the best pot ever in the parking lot of a strip mall with a 24-hour doughnut shop beckoning you with glazed and jelly-filled ecstasy. People dipping spoons into a bag of sugar and eating it as is – not unheard of when on Remeron. This stuff is nothing more than legal marijuana, and if I knew crap about biochemistry I could probably prove that crazy statement.

People who take Wellbutrin don’t want to eat anything. It’s the “happy, skinny, horny pill”, remember? People who take Remeron want to eat doughnuts all day long.

Since writing the above comments on the Remeron page I've learned Remeron is also a 5HT1A agonist, and that is a key part of the sugar-and-carb-craving MOA.  I know this because my daughter and I each take a different TCA, and we both added BuSpar to our cocktails.  BuSpar + TCA = Remeron, and we've been craving doughnuts ever since.  It's hit me a lot harder, probably because there are gluten-free doughnuts she can eat, but none that I can.

This post is brought to you by:

The Remeron Made Me Eat It t-shirts.

And we're back.

The rebuild is 95% complete. I've reopened the forum. It will be slow going until morning, but better than nothing, right? 

Offline Means Offline

Some bug in the forum software has allowed people to log onto the forum and read it while it was offline COMPLETELY DEFEATING THE PURPOSE OF TAKING IT OFFLINE TO SPEEDUP THE REBUILD!!!! THANKS LOADS, EVERYONE!!!

I've had to put in a hard restriction of the forum to my IP address.  Hence the 403 forbidden message.

No wonder the maintenance during some of the upgrades took for fucking ever.  That wasn't cache weirdness I was seeing in the online users list.  Those were people logged on when I said not to be logged on.

Forum & Blogs offline

The Crazy Talk forum and blogs are temporarily offline until the fucking rebuild/resync of the new RAID array is done.

The Wiki may go offline as well.

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Update: at 61% rebuild/resync. Noticeably faster with forum offline. 

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Update: 78% complete.  Now I have to figure out if we're in the land of diminishing returns or not.  When it comes to keeping the forum offline.

What the FUCK?!?!

I don't know what the fuck is going on with #Crazymeds, and why it's taking forever for pages to load.  It could be one or more of:

The new ads on the forum 
Another disc drive problem
All the bruteforce attempts to hack the server we've been having lately

The upgrade is an unlikely cause as the problem is site-wide.  I'm having problems with telnet as well, but I see wiki pages OK, albeit slowly.  

I'm having lots of connectivity problems in general, as some sites are freezing, timing out, etc. and some aren't.  Lunarpages support pages aren't coming up, but others are.  gmail and G+ take forever to load.  Tumblr isn't showing up.   I can't connect to the ad server sites to temporarily disable the ads on the  forum from that end since I can't get to the forum admin page without timing out.

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UPDATE:

I was finally able to get a connection to the Lunarpages support site. It turns out that a second RAID array was needed, because the forum is getting so huge. It's taking a long-ass time to sync all 120G of the data. Hence everything being slow as molasses.

As of 4:00 PM Mountain still-not-on-daylight-insanity-Time (2300 GMT) The rebuild/resynchronization is at 55%. Expect the long-ass response times to last well into tomorrow. 

Crazymeds Down

Crazymeds is down.  Looks like a hardware failure.  I'll keep you posted.

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UPDATE:

OK, we're back up. There's a faulty drive.  A new one will be installed 1600 PST (2300 GMT) Friday 19 March.  Expect some more down time, but the guys at Lunarpages are really quick about swapping drives, so it won't be too long. 

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That should read Thursday (AKA Today) 19 March.  I've been unstuck in time lately.