Weekender #18

• Myna bird update: and then there were none. It seems like the last baby myna has left the area. While I’ve spotted a bird that looked similar to baby myna, I couldn’t confirm as it didn’t come into the driveway where I could get a closer look. It had taken a liking to hanging out in my driveway over the last few weeks, but wasn’t seen at all this week. Handsome has also been MIA. Not surprising, since the new myna couple that took over this territory are very protective of the area. They’ve run Handsome out of the driveway every time they catch him there. He does come by toward the end of the day when the coast is clear to get bites of Pringles or French fries if I had any left over after dinner. I do my best to hold off the new myna when he comes by. He’ll usually eat 2-3 chips before leaving. I’m a bit sad about the whole situation.

  • I’m hoping with the last baby gone, He’ll be able to find a new mate and maybe try to re-take the territory again.

  • It seems like his new territory is the neighbors house in the back, as I’ve spotted him hanging out on their roof several times over the last few weeks.

  • In other news, I can hear the sounds of more baby myna coming out of the nook in the roof of my other neighbors house. It’s the same space that Handsome and Shpeedy used before the new mynas took over the territory. I guess it’s only a matter of time before more myna babies show themselves.

• Summer has officially started for me. I find it hard to believe that the school year is over and Hawaii is slowly coming out of the pandemic. I can tell tourism is slowly coming back by the amount of traffic in the neighborhood. There’s also a lot more cars at the malls, and restaurants look crowded when I stop by to pick up our take out order. Audra and I had our first meal at a food court a week ago. It was nice to finally eat a meal in the middle of running errands instead of having to plan our errands around food and taking it home to eat.

• I had a few goals for the summer, one of them is recording some music instead of constantly building or working on other projects. We’ll see how that goes. I have 3 or 4 guitar pedal projects I’d like to complete as well as finishing up a guitar build.

• With recording music over the summer as a goal, I dove into programming some effect patches into my Boss GT-1000 CORE this week. I’ve never enjoyed the programming of effects patches via computer, but I’m forcing myself to do it with this unit. I’m hoping to create a few core sounds and from there, I should be able to customize it for whatever I’m working on. There is a slight learning curve, but I’ve gotten the hang of it. The hardest part for me is ear fatigue. Listening or playing a riff or chord over and over again to tweak a patch can get tiring.

• WWDC is in a week and I have some thoughts about iPadOS that I probably should sit down and write.

• I finally picked up new shoes after wearing out my pairs of Mizuno and Brooks shoes I purchased prior to our trip to Japan in November 2019. I wanted the newer Mizuno Wave Riders, but the shop we go to didn’t have my exact size. They did have my size in the Mizuno Wave Inspire, so I decided to give those a shot this time around. These have more support that the Wave Rider, which is more of a cushioning shoe. So far, so good.

• Apple Music now has Nakayama Miho’s full catalog of music for streaming. The first album I listened to was CATCH THE NITE, which was on repeat in my car back in 1989. If you like late 80’s dance with old school synths and drums mixed in with lots of digital reverb, this album is for you. Listen: Apple Music