I'm going to have a custom t-shirt printed. I'm going to find an image associated with the Grateful You-Know-What, and the text will say "Grateful Unalived." Since it's getting cold I think I'll get a long sleeve T. Only other dorks like me will get it, although my girl Marnie would get a kick out of it, and she's not a dork. Maybe it'll raise awareness. Maybe it won't.
yerfacewillfreezelikethat
Thank you very much for reading my blog, but I'm really just trying to learn to type faster. Might be occasional nudity or profanity, or I might talk about crazy stuff. I may forget and mention something twice. This is an ad-free blog. Enter at your own risk. All images = CLICK TO ENLARGE.
Wednesday, November 20, 2024
Protest T-Shirt
Tuesday, November 19, 2024
AI's Progress: Dark Things
I've been following AI's progress as long as I've been blogging. Of course I can only observe what we're shown. I believe, like many others, that AI is light years ahead of what John Q. Public knows. I wouldn't be surprised if it's already self-aware. They tell us that hasn't happened yet but that it's a virtual certainty at some point. But is there a dark side to it?
To me it's an amazing tool, and it's here to stay, for the time being anyway. I do know that it's way more involved in our lives than most people realize. It can be used for good; it's coming up with new medical treatments and all kinds of ways to help us by the minute, and I've used it myself, but I also think it has the potential to be extremely dangerous, and I do believe there's a dark side to it...very dark.
I'm not alone in thinking that way, and before you call anyone paranoid, consider that the person, civilian anyway, most involved with AI, Elon Mush, has warned about it. That's rather ironic but I listen to what he has to say. I might not agree on everything but I listen. He's a smart dude.
Many years ago they were saying that one day we wouldn't be able to tell it from reality, and we're there. With programs such as Deep Fake and such they can create a video for example that looks perfectly real, although it never happened. That's not a good thing.
AI can scan a few seconds of someone talking, and produce a fake video, complete with proper mouth movements, inflections and everything else. They can make anyone say anything, and if they wanted to frame someone it's no problem. That's not a good thing.
The things my guys say about AI would truly blow your mind, but I won't go into them right now, because something just came up about AI that's truly disturbing. AI is now being used to create virtual "chylde p0rn." That's evil in most people's book.
BTW don't you love how we have to self-censor these days, when they know exactly what we mean? It's a joke. To them it's the principle of the thing. It's CONTROL they want, and you can take that to the bank.
Granted that in order for AI to create anything there has to be an imput; in other words you have to let AI know what you want it to do, but once it gets a basic outline it runs with it on its own. Does that mean that AI is inherently evil? Technically no, but it's open to debate.
I didn't watch the entire video that this image was taken from because I was starting to feel sick but I will at some point. I'm guessing that if and when people get caught with it, they'll try saying that since there's no real victim then there's no crime, and they'll probably get away with it.
This is disturbing and disgusting. It's not AI's fault that it was created in an evil world, but that doesn't say whether or not there was something dark to begin with. I know that sounds crazy to many people, but I can say, after looking into these things for over a quarter of a century that you can't rule ANYTHING out, no matter your beliefs or opinions.
If there's a shred of decency and if it's not too late, they'd alter the programming so that AI couldn't make that garbage, but I guess that can't be done. I wish we could eliminate the real shit too. That'll never happen, but we certainly don't need AI creating more, and possibly allowing people to watch it without consequences.
The thing is, it's susceptible to the laws of diminishing return. In other words most addictions get stronger with time. Some perv might start out with the virtual filth, move on to the real stuff, and the end result might be actual victims. They're also making lifelike robot babies, and they're not used for for wholesome purposes. It's unpleasant to talk about but people need to know this stuff so they can hopefully fight it.
We don't want to dwell on negative things but we absolutely need to be aware of them. There's still beauty, good people, sunsets, puppies and kittens and such in this world, but if you have a brain you know that overall it's getting more evil by the day. We certainly don't need AI making it worse. Stay vigilant. PROTECT OUR KIDS! Our kids are the future...future...uture...ture...ure...rr.
Monday, November 18, 2024
No More Men
This woman is one of thousands across the country who, because of the election results, say that they'll never again sleep with a man. Many of them suggest giving up men forever and becoming "Thespians." Okay.
When I see people like this I have to wonder if they're happy and at peace with themselves, and I have to think they're not. Why would you do this to yourself? The hair is one thing but that mouth...it reminds me of a Slipknot mask. Kissy face? No thanks.
So she's never going to sleep with men again. Hey, her body her choice, right? Speaking for myself, and countless men who still appreciate decency, common sense and beauty, it's noooooooooooo problem.
Sunday, November 17, 2024
Comment of the Day
She was describing the moment she supposedly realized that she was in the wrong apartment, and she said that she looked around and realized that it wasn't her couch or her TV. Oops.
My comment was: "And you may ask yourself, this is not my beautiful couch...this is not my beautiful TV...well, how did I get here?" I couldn't resist. Talking Heads fans will get it. Ha-ha.
The Mothership Connection, and Other Stories
For my money there's only two kinds of music- good and bad. The record companies needed to categorize music so they'd know which bin to put it in, so we got all the genres and sub-genres and it got ridiculous. Emo begat Screamo, Punk spawned New Wave and there's fifty shades of Metal.
I love examples of almost every kind of music, from Jazz to Classical to R&B to Rock, with a huge love of Progressive, later shortened to "Prog," but if I had to pick only one style to listen to and/or play drums to for the rest of my life, it'd be Funk.
There's so much feeling in Funk. It encompasses elements of Rock and Jazz, but it's its own thing. It has a "groove" as deep as the ocean. The coolest thing about it to me is the sense of "implied swing." You can be playing a straight beat, as in "Boom boom bap, boom boom bap," but it has a dotted-eighth or Shuffle feel to it, as in "Ba-dop Ba-dop Ba-dop." It's not played, only felt.
How it works is a mystery. As far as drumming is concerned, you're playing a straight beat but you're thinking Shuffle or Swing. It's a mind thing. They've actually done studies where the drummer will be playing one thing but thinking of another, and even though the other thing is not being played, the audience can hear it or feel it. It's extraordinary.
I have to mention one night when I was playing with an acoustic band called Noble Freeland. It was anything but Funk, but I'd try to inject some of that feel whenever possible.
We were playing at a local watering hole and it was packed. Some nights we'd outdo ourselves and take it to a different level, and for my money that was by far the most intense we ever played in all the years I played with them.
My good buddy Sam, a drummer-brother from another mother, was there. The whole room was dancing and the energy level was off the charts. I was playing a little stand-up rig with a small snare drum and tiny bongos and cymbals.
Something happened that night that I still can't explain. There was a different kind of energy in the room that I've never experienced before or since. I was standing on my tip toes and I felt like I was going to levitate, and maybe pass right through the ceiling and up into the sky. And no, it wasn't due to some substance...it was the Muse.
At one point I did this fill on the snare drum alone. If I'd been playing a regular drum kit I'd have played the fill on the toms but I didn't have any. I was thinking about toms though. I happened to look at Sam when I did the fill, and his eyes bugged out.
I was talking to him on the break and he was still bug-eyed. He said: "Man, when you played that crazy fill, I heard toms!" I told him that I was thinking about toms. That was wild and it flipped us both out. That's music for you...sometimes there's something extra going on, and it can't be explained. In my book the Muse is funky.
Sly and the Family Stone share pride-of-place in my Funk collection, and the tune Thank You (Fa Lettin' Me Be Mice Elf Agin) is ground zero for Funk, but it doesn't get any funkier that the band Parliament/Funkadelic, or P-Funk. If listening to P-Funk doesn't make you want to dance, you'd better check your pulse, because you may be on the way to meet your maker.
There's not enough space here to say everything I could say about P-Funk, but aside from Sly and a couple others, they put Funk on the map. I got to see them live once and it was life-changing. They made Funk accessible to white people. Great music has no color, or expiration date.
Saturday, November 16, 2024
Quote of the Day
"Let's face it, nobody can sing that sort of music like colored people. I mean I'm no Fats Domino." - Elvis Presley