November 5 1997, Wednesday

So I lay there stroking my eyebrows, marveling at how soft they are. Have you ever taken the time to appreciate the exquisite nature of eyebrows?

I


t's hard to get into online journals that began just a few days ago. I think this is because I fear I'll feel I've been cheated for my involvement the moment I've read an entire archive. A long and involved history that I can't possibly read in one sitting makes a journal more like the person writing it: full of nooks and crannies, facts and figures if only I choose to go looking. I know a lot more about some of my favourite long-time journal keepers now than I did several months ago. Accordingly, I've made some alterations to the descriptions on my journal link page. By the way, the journal link page is officially closed to suggestions. Generally, I read a journal for weeks or even months before I mention it there, and that's the way it should be.

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A


fter work, I suffered from strange insomnia. I absolutely couldn't sleep. I tried everything: beer, orgasms and "transcendental" meditation, all to no avail. That was a first. Usually I pass right out after a night at Comet. So I lay there stroking my eyebrows, marveling at how soft they are. Have you ever taken the time to appreciate the exquisite nature of eyebrows? Believe me, I had lots of time.

So I got up and did some electronic tinkering. I haven't done much down and dirty electronics of late, so it was nice to break out the soldering iron and start twisting out screws. I'm just as good at all that stuff as I ever was.

The hope was that I could run each through different sets of effects and expand my music-making possibilities.

My cheapo Yamaha music keyboard uses the same 12 volt power supply as my 4 track, so if I want to use them at the same time, I need another power supply. I managed to arrange a way to power the keyboard using an old computer power supply. That was all pretty straightforward.

Next I investigated within the keyboard to see if I could find the separate signal traces for the lead and accompaniment sound sources, which are inextricably mixed together by the time they leave the black plastic housing. I managed to find the traces, and so I built separate audio jacks for each. The hope was that I could run each through different sets of effects and expand my music-making possibilities. In the end, though, it seems as if the act of placing a load on one of the traces has subtle and irritating effects on the other trace and vice versa. I could be wrong. Even so, I was able to generate some interesting sounds.

So here I am at Olssen Hall, it's coming up on 4pm, and I still haven't slept. But I'm feeling kind of weak. Maybe I'll go take a super long nap now.

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The prisoners themselves seemed to be fairly content with their lot, especially since there were a good many women there as well as men.

W


ow... I just had a conventional eight hour period of sleep. But it was a little hard to get to sleep even this time. I succeeded after having fantasies about being on top of a domed skyscraper in a torrential windy downpour.

As I slept I dreamed I was going on a cross-country bike trip with some friends, I don't recall exactly who. We were heading south on a summer day, until we came to a confluence of the James River and some other river. There we found a prison island, which was none other than the infamous Alcatraz. We waded ashore and became official visitors. The place was ruled almost completely by the prisoners themselves; guards cared little about what they did to each other. The prisoners themselves seemed to be fairly content with their lot, especially since there were a good many women there as well as men. But in the end, many of the prisoners turned out to be affiliated with the tough guys of Charlottesville. A group of them attempted to attack me with wooden sticks as I lay sleeping. I eventually found myself standing in the middle of them, gently mocking their inaction as they waved their sticks at me and did nothing. Then the clock radio went off. This time it really was a song off of Psalm 69 by Ministry.

one year ago
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