it’s my birthday. I’ll post later tonight…but it sucks having a dry throat and being stuck at a lame-ass conference for your birthday.

Sigh. At least I met a cool, goth-club-going keyboardist who is one of the few individuals at this conference. Think lots of puffy, old white guys and gals (WASPs is the right thought here) and you’ll know the sort of hell I’m going through. Which is sad, because improving how well you develop software should be something everyone’s interested in.

so some of you noticed that it’s halfway into February and I haven’t posted the January song yet.

Truth be told, I have been so caught up in restoring my Voyetra 8 that it’s gotten what little time I have at home to screw around. But I fully intend to get it online shortly. It’ll be more like the end of February will see two simple, short compositions uploaded, perhaps < 1:30 each. We'll see. But I'm just pissed as all hell that my company is forcing me to be in Kobe tomorrow night. Valentine's Day evening. And I can't even spend it with the one who matters unless I spend about Y30,000 ($228 by today's rate) to get her there and back. And then it's barely enough time to have a super late dinner and sleep together! ARRGH! PISSED OFF!!!

So some of you know I work for DentsuFUSE K.K., a wholly owned subsidiary of Dentsu, the largest advertising company in the world. So we’re walking over to one of their millions of buildings for a meeting. Over the entrance to the door is . . .

. . . a chiseled representation of Janus. Significant? You betcha.

Garbage was INCREDIBLE.

My GF and I were right up at the front, just a bit house right of center stage. Shirley Manson was cool, even in the somewhat androgynous outfit. When she took her suspenders down a bit, you could see her nipples. I think those of us in the first few rows spent most of the concert staring at them. :)

My ears are still ringing a bit, but that was a great fucking concert. Wish it was longer than about 100 minutes tho — when did rock concerts get so short??

My favorite bit: In between songs, this girl next to me, about my height, is reaching towards the stage and saying “Shaaa-reee!!!” at the top of her voice (which isn’t that loud) in a very pleading voice. After a few songs, Shirley turns to her and says “I hear you, what is it darling?” The girl couldn’t respond, and didn’t call her name again in the concert. It’s the classic Japanese conundrum . . . desire to interact with fame, then when the chance presents itself, having absolutely no clue what to do. At least my GF knew to say “You’re Welcome!” when Shirley said “Thank You!” to the riotous applause she got.

for Japanese vendors who work hard and do their job right. It’s a refreshing change from the idiots I worked with while at Spike. N.B. Don’t ever do business with a reseller in Japan named Rikei.

Now to finish these paragraphs for my 70P 53KR17 proposal!

twice a day! EXCELLENT! I can’t wait!!! (Too much green tea, ack!)

Just remember: because your office is in Tsukiji (Tokyo’s fish market) doesn’t mean EVERY sushi place kicks ass, but most do. :)

What a day it’s been…not only did I end up working my ass off until like 10PM on stuff for a proposal at work (yipes!) but I came home and typed up a chip list for my Voyetra 8 synthesizer. On Crow’s recommendation, I should replace all the early 80s vintage 4xxx CMOS chips, which means desoldering and replacing about 73 chips, each with an average of 12 or 14 pins. It’s gonna be a lot of manual work, but it’ll be so worth it when this thing is done. There’s nothing better than taking something rare and broken, and turning it into something rare and valuable. Heck, I’m even thinking of customizing parts of the machine!

So, with any fortitude on my part, I’ll end up in Akihabara over the weekend, clearing out some of those parts vendors of their analog mux chips. wheeeeeeeeee! and maybe I’ll meet my friend and pick up the oscilloscope he’s gonna let me too.

And next weekend — Garbage, front row seats! Yippeee!

So, in the process of getting ready to upload a January song (it’ll just be a simple warmup, nothing fantastic, and won’t appear til mid-February because I am still working on technical glitches) I’m repairing and transcribing a rare manual for my OEI Voyetra Eight synthesizer.

Yes, those Voyetra guys. They started off making synthesizers. Very cool stuff, but very oddball hardware design, making it a bit difficult to fix. And there never was an official troubleshooting guide, so the one I have is a rarity (and apparently buggy as hell.) So here’s to the rest of you owning (or wanting to own!) one of these things. Perhaps my manual will help you out a bit.

I’ve decided, this year, I’m going to write one song a month and upload it for public fun. Unfortunately, I decided this pretty late in January, so I don’t have much time!

Hopefully by the end of the week…perhaps it won’t be anything more than a simple piano recording this time.

The Japanese word madogiwa refers to employees of a company who have been “demoted” by their management. Yet, because of restrictive Japanese labor laws, they can’t be fired — so they receive a salary for doing nothing all day.

What do you think of that? Would you accept a role in which you do nothing, but get paid a salary — and yet have to live with the humiliation of telling your friends you’re in this despicable position?