Daily Log

Came down around 11. I put some ribs into a Korean marinade last night. Laura suggested inviting Janice & Tim for dinner. I'm waiting on confirmation before cooking more. If they come, I'll add some fried rice and a dessert to the menu. Otherwise I may just bake the ribs and make lima beans. So uncertain how much cooking I'll do today. Cool again, with high near 60F, so would be ideal to work on attic. Maybe build that dog platform Laura wants. I got little done yesterday, but did start a Substack post that collects some of my old Iraq War posts. Also some Loose Tabs.

I took the first step toward disposing of excess/unwanted books: I created a pile file for Kiosk Books. First book added to the file, and moved to the kiosk: PostgreSQL's Developer's Handbook (2002). Tech books seem like a good place to start, and this one literally on a pile, not a shelf. I also created an analogous file for CDs, currently empty.

Email (34 messages):

• I got a confusing message about changes to Thunderbird Snap and Flatpack, requiring some effort on my own sometime before June/July. Seems to have to do with the frequency of software updates, and how stable they allegedly are. Something else it's impossible to make an informed evaluation of, but presumably they're asking because they don't want to be held responsible for the consequences.
• Larry Blood writes that he didn't receive confirmation that I signed him up to the jazzpoll list. I did, but can't verify that the greeting message was sent to him. I jumped through various hoops, including rediscovering how to log into whm, to no avail.
• Substack (Explaining Inflation): +2 likes.
• TomDispatch: William deBuys: The Border Wall Thrives, the Borderlands Don't
• Substack: Three models for building community for your podcast
• Ryan Blotnick: "Maybe the hopeless messiness of the physical world has its own kind of charm though, no?" I took a picture, posted it on Facebook, send it back to him, saying "judge for yourself." He responded: "Wow! I like it."

Daily Log

Woke up early. Read some. Came down around 10:15. My progress through Tim Wu's The Age of Extraction is slowing down, probably because the book is getting more interesting. Noted this quote (p. 74):

That's why we might also say that the platforms today, whatever they may say, are really in the business of herding a rather mercurial and moody form of livestock (us).

I'm not sure how far we can pursue the livestock metaphor. It works on two levels: the motivation is to harvest by-products (like milk and eggs, or for people, so far, attention and money); and then there is the technique of herding (management, or manipulation). Note that the word "herding" does appear in some management lit/lore — often negatively, as in the difficulties of "herding cats" (in my experience, most often applied to programmers).

Nothing much to do today. Pretty cool at present (49F, high 62F), so one could work on attic if one was so inclined. I have several writing ideas, but nothing (beyond Loose Tabs) that I am committed to.

Email (24 messages):

• Laura forwarded a Boston Review "virtual event" with three people I'm not familiar with talking about "the way AI is changing the way societies, individuals, and governments make decisions." She got the tip from Kathy McAfee, and says she registered for it.
• Substack stats: 111 views, 1 like, 0 subscriptions.
• Tom Carson: You Are Number III: "The artist formerly known as Prince Charles and his consort Camilla crept into the United States on Monday, no doubt hoping they'd be misdirected to a mine shaft turned nuclear waste-disposal site."
• Ryan Blotnick: Sent me a yum code for his new CD. I should have the CD around here somewhere, but I can't find it, so I downloaded. Will review soon.

Daily Log

I posted my Substack piece on Explaining Inflation last night. I expect a lot of "TL;DR," but I think it's pretty good, with a lot of points, even if many of them could use elaboration. I didn't put the X/Bluesky notices out. I fixed that this morning, posting on Facebook as well. Music Week slipped a day, which is still comfortably within April. I'll compile that later today (or maybe tomorrow). Meanwhile, I have eye doctor this afternoon, so that will disrupt the day. Otherwise, not much happening. I'm working a bit on Loose Tabs. I feel like I ought to do a Books post. I still have a tab opened to do a Substack lookback on the Iraq war, which should make for a fairly easy post. And I could start with the house work.

Email (34 messages):

• Tom Carson: Tequila Shooters: on the White House Correspondents Dinner shooting, and conspiracy theories.
• Substack: post and shareable assets for "Explaining Inflation." Reactions: 1 like.
• I wrote to, and got a reply from, Elias Vlanton. Says he's been following Mearsheimer, Parsi, and Pape on Iran; recently went to St. Louis for first time in 7 years; goes to Greece twice a year; has created an archive of "US intelligence documents on Greece in the 1940s" which is now online at "an archival institute in Athens."
• Wichita Public Library: Two books renewed, so not due until May 15. I finished Cory Doctorow's Enshittification last night, and started Tim Wu's The Age of Extraction. The Doctorow book is very good. I'm hoping to just skim Wu, as it is largely redundant, but so far is proving interesting.
• Lots of download links, including Makhathini and Salvant, which I will probably stream in due course. A new Kalia Vandever album is being hyped as a "debut," so that's going to cause trouble.

I wrote quite a bit of introduction to Music Week, and posted this quite late.

Music Week

Expanded blog post, April archive (done).

Tweet: Music Week: 50 albums, 8 A-list

Music: Current count 45850 [45803] rated (+47), 10 [20] unrated (-10).

New records reviewed this week:

• Paulo Almeida: Love in Motion (2025 [2026], Dox): [cd]: B+(**)
• Angine De Poitrine: Vol. II (2026, Spectacles Bonzaï): [sp]: B+(***)
• Teller Bank$: Hate Island (2026, $357ENT): [sp]: B+(**)
• Abate Berihun & the Addis Ken Project: Addis Ken (2021 [2026], Origin): [cd]: B+(*)
• Yaya Bey: Fidelity (2026, Drink Sum Wtr): [sp]: B+(***)
• Julie Campiche [Solo]: Unspoken (2024 [2026], Ronin Rhythm): [sp]: B+(***)
• Dälek: Brilliance of a Falling Moon (2026, Ipecac): [sp]: B+(***)
• Damana: Rhizome (2023 [2025], Umulius): [bc]: B+(**)
• Marie-Paule Franke: Through the Cracks, the Light Is Born (2026, MariPosa): [cd]: B+(***) [06-26]
• Fuerza Regida: 111xpantia (2025, Rancho Humilde/Street Mob/Sony Music Latin): [sp]: B+(**)
• Barry Greene: Giants (2025 [2026], Origin): [cd]: B+(*)
• Jared Hall: Hometown (2023 [2026], Origin): [cd]: B+(**)
• Phil Haynes/Ben Monder/Peyton Pleninger: Terra (2025 [2026], Corner Store Jazz): [cd]: B+(***) [05-01]
• IDK: E.T.D.S. A Mixtape by .IDK. (2026, Rhymesayers Entertainment): [sp]: B+(***)
• Kathy Ingraham: Jazz Dreams (2026, Peirdon): [cd]: B+(*)
• Anthony Joseph: The Ark (2026, Heavenly Sweetness): [sp]: A-
• Kesha: . [Period] (2025, Kesha): [sp]: A-
• Jason Kruk: Beyond the Veil (2026, SunGoose): [cd]: B [05-01]
• Joachim Kühn: Joachim Kühn & Young Lions (2025 [2026], ACT Music): [sp]: A-
• M.I.A.: M.I.7 (2026, Ohmni): [sp]: B+(***)
• Mammal Hands: Circadia (2025 [2026], ACT Music): [sp]: B+(*)
• Liudas Mockūnas/Samuel Blaser/Marc Ducret: Twisted Summer (2023 [2026], Jersika): [sp]: B+(**)
• Ashley Monroe: Dear Nashville (2026, Mountainrose Sparrow): [sp]: B+(*)
• The Outskirts: Orbital (2025 [2026], Aerophonic): [dl]: A-
• Praed: Al Wahem (2026, Ruptured/Annihaya): [sp]: B+(**)
• Shalosh: What We Are Made Of (2025 [2026], ACT Music): [sp]: B
• Jae Skeese & ILL Tone Beats: The Good Part, Vol. 1 (2026, Griselda): [sp]: B+(**)
• Peter Somuah: Walking Distance (2025 [2026], ACT Music): [sp]: B+(***)
• Station Model Violence: Station Model Violence (2026, Anti Fade): [sp]: B+(*)
• Taroug: Chott (2026, Denovali): [sp]: B+(*)
• Katelyn Tarver: Tell Me How You Really Feel (2026, Nettwerk): [sp]: B+(**)
• They Might Be Giants: The World Is to Dig (2026, Idlewild): [sp]: B+(**)
• Viktoria Tolstoy & Jacob Karlzon: Who We Are (2025 [2026], ACT Music): [sp]: B+(**)
• Jessie Ware: Superbloom (2026, EMI): [sp]: B+(*)
• What You May Call It: Da Qi (2024 [2026], MechaBenzaiten): [cd]: B+(**) [05-08]

Recent reissues, compilations, and vault discoveries:

• Angine De Poitreau: Vol. 1 (2024, Spectacles Bonzaï) **
• Joe Henderson: Consonance: Live at the Jazz Showcase (1978 [2026], Resonance, 2CD): [cd]: A-
• Joe Henderson Quartets: Tetragon (1967-68 [2026], Craft): [sp]: A
• Ahmad Jamal: At the Jazz Showcase: Live in Chicago (1976 [2026], Resonance, 2CD): [cd]: B+(***)
• Yusef Lateef: Alight Upon the Lake: Live at the Jazz Showcase (1975 [2026], Resonance, 3CD): [cd]: B+(***)
• Art Pepper: Everything Happens to Me: 1959 Live at the Cellar (1959 [2026], Omnivore, 4CD): [sp]: A-
• Michel Petrucciani: Kuumbwa (1987 [2026], Elemental Music, 2CD): [cd]: B+(**)
• Cecil Taylor Unit: Fragments: The Complete 1969 Salle Pleyel Concerts (1969 [2026], Elemental Music, 2CD): [cd]: A-

Old music:

• Joe Henderson: The Elements (1973, Milestone): [sp]: B+(***)
• Kesha: Gag Order [Live Acoustic EP From Space] (2023, Kemosabe/RCA, EP): [sp]: B
• Ashley Monroe: Satisfied (2006 [2009], Sony): [sp]: B+(***)
• Gil Scott-Heron & Brian Jackson: 1980 (1980, Arista): [yt]: B+(***)

Unpacking: Found in the mail last week:

• Richard Gilman-Opalsky: A Fierce and Gentle Force (Edgetone) [03-15]
• Ize Trio: Global Prayer (self-released) [06-12]
• Myra Melford/Satoko Fujii: Katarahi (RogueArt) [05-15]
• John Pachnos: John Pachnos (Avgonyma Music) [05-15]
• Álvaro Torres Trio: Mairena (Fresh Sound New Talent) [05-01]

Daily Log

Got up early again. Two short chapters left in Cory Doctorow book, which I am so impressed with I'll eventually have to buy a copy. I will at least take a look at Tim Wu next. Came down about 10:30. Tried the Bobby Broom record, but it won't play. I wrote my way to the end of a Substack piece on inflation last night. I sent it to Art Protin and Laura. Art reads a fair amount of economics, so might tell me if I'm full of shit. Haven't heard back from either. At this point, that's not going to be a gating item. I've about reached the don't-give-a-fuck point with Substack, so I might as well throw out what I have. Music Week is due today. I'll run the cutover at some point, but I may not post until the Substack comes out (so I can mention it in the introduction). Nothing else for today. I go out to eye doctor tomorrow.

Email (25 messages):

• Semipop Life: Video & Audio: looks like singles. I did follow up and play the Katelyn Tarver album.
• Michael Steinman: I found a couple of his Substack pieces in the spam folder. Cleared them, and added him (Substack address) as a contact, for whatever good that may do. (Is that a whitelist?) I tend to delete his pieces, but sometimes I'll follow a music link. I certainly don't mind getting real writing from real writers.
• William D Hartung: Shutting Down the War Machine
• Mike Konczal: Cherry-Picking the Wrong Inflation Measures With Kevin Warsh: Offers 13 measures of inflation (meaning prices), where Warsh prefers the "trimmed mean" measures, probably because they are lower (2.33%, 2.64%) than conventional PCE (2.80%) and CPI (3.32%) measures. Konczal dislikes the "trimmed mean" measures not because they are low but because they lag and muddle CPI/PCE measures, leading to policy missteps (they are slow to detect inflation, after which they overcorrect).

Daily Log

Slept solidly, but got up early, not even making five hours. Read quite a bit, then came down at 9:30, feeling like getting back into my writing, although I attended to some computer tasks, jotted this down, and opted to work a bit on the jigsaw, until breakfast, anyway. Dog came down too, and is hungry and whiny.

Email (3 messages, it's early, but the hype falls way off on Saturday):

• Tom Carson: Ah-nold's Ghost (California gets back to the future).

Daily Log

Slept better. Came down 11:30. Expecting a severe thunderstorm around 5PM, with more storms in the evening, and possibly overnight. Currently 69F, partly cloudy. Radar shows scattered storms north and slightly west of here, I-70 between Hays and Salina, much more in central Nebraska. We're starting to get short on groceries, but can hold out through weekend. I'll probably spend most of the day at computer, collecting Loose Tabs, maybe writing my inflation piece for Substack. New video card works fine, but hard to tell if there's any performance improvement (should be, but probably unneeded). The new keyboard is more of a problem, but I'll stick with it for now. Keys are very clicky. Tricky to find my position. I'm getting a lot of phantom escape sequences, probably because the keys are higher, so I'm dragging my palm a bit on the bottom edge. [PS: There are two special function keys on the bottom row causing problems: one has four squares, the other has two rectangles in a box with two broken corners (suggests a menu to me). Evidently I can kill them off with xmodmap, assuming I can figure out the keycodes. There is also a program called keyd: "a system wide key remapping daemon which supports features like layeirng, oneshot modifiers, and macros."]

Next home project is to organize the electrical tools and components. I have two square tool caddies. I plan on filling one with AC tools, the other with cable tools. One has a little component holder, so I can put a few basic things there, but most will go into the new drawer units. Laura wants me to build a platform so the dog can look out the back window. This would be slid behind the couch, where she currently has a plant stand. I'm tempted to resist, having built steps and ramps for the previous dog that went unused. But I have leftover scrap from one of those that could work at the platform, so all I'd have to do is add some legs, then maybe cover the top with some carpet? (Did I have carpet already cut for that?)

Email (30 messages, most left from Friday):

• Robert Christgau: The Big Lookback: The Greatful Dead. Posted notice and archived article on his website.
• Jim Eigo is promoting a Substack by Anne Phillips called Survivor of the Music Business. Link here: "The music business was alive and jumping in the 1950's when I dared, as a singer, to leave Wyopmissing, Pennsylvania (Taylor Swift's hometown, too) and take off for New York City."
• Chuck Eddy: An Ocean of Calamine Lotion
• The Nation Daily: Trump and Hegseth are winning the war against their own military (Jeet Heer).
• Eigo is also promoting: 31st Annual Jazz Journalists Association Awards Finalists Announced in 40 Categories of Excellence in Music-Making and Jazz Media. I should probably look at these pieces, and maybe comment on them like I do the DownBeat polls.
• Robert Wright: The new Blob is even scarier than the old one.

Getting very little done today. We did get a pretty substantial amount of rain this evening. Why is this hard to check on the internet? A site called raindrop.farm says 1.42 inches or 1.57 inches, depending on zip code (67206 and 67212, today + yesterday, which was 0; but when I type in 67203, I get 3.45 inches). My own Ambient Weather gauge registers 0.0. It's partly obscured by a tree, so has always underreported, but appears here to be totally broken. Another site called precip.ai is showing hourly slices for 67203, at about 0.2 + 1.4 + 1.8 inches (3.4 total). They're also showing wind speed topping out at about 12mph (guests to 25mph).

Started to work a bit on the inflation post for Substack, so link here.

Daily Log

Woke up just after 9. Read some about antitrust actions against Big Tech, then came down at 10. I didn't really feel up to it, but today's a big day, with much to do. I'm hoping to finally get the carport railing done. We went to Lowe's yesterday, and then to Kohl's, coming home in time for the big storm. I bought the short (1.5-inch) lag bolts I needed, and also a jack-lift, which I hope to use to help raise the platform an inch so I can slip the blocks out, slather them with adhesive, and put them back into place. I need to cut some extra blocks to hold the raised platform while I'm down on the ground level lining everything up. Then we can lower the platform onto the positioned blocks, and the weight will effectively clamp them together.

I have five blocks in place along the outer rail. I need to cut two more for the side rails, and fit them the same way. The outer posts are attached to the frame with lag bolts, so none of that has to be touched. I still have to bolt down the inner posts, which means I have to open up the space to put the bolts in. I also have to lift the frame to squeeze some adhesive under the frame (there are no additional support posts there). I had been thinking I'd lower the near post ends before working on the outer rail, but maybe I should elevate the entire frame, then lower it piece by piece in fairly quick succession: the near ends, the middle of the outer, then the corners.

After that, the final assembly of the railing should go pretty quick: fit the ballisters into the base rails, then into the top rails, and attach the top rails with screws to the posts. I've already put the caps on, and won't have to remove them. I may try to clean up the pieces along the way, or just hose them down at the end. In any case, the tricky part will be getting the supports positioned and glued. The posts are already much more solid than they were before disassembly, and keeping the whole frame level should prevent future weakening by sag or leaning. Should be huge getting this chunk of work finished. We could move on to the attic, but I'm beginning to think that "out of sight is out of mind" there.

Email (35 messages):

• DownBeat: Focus on Europe! (Mammal Hands/Amalie Dahl/Camila Nebbia/Nik Bärtsch)

Computer hung/crashed about 1 AM. Screen goes blank, then comes back with flashing noise. You can see a patch of noise moving with the mouse, so it looks like the video card has its bits confused. This has happened a dozen or so times before. Figuring it means the video card is flaking out, I ordered a replacement: a Maxsun Radeon RX550, with 4GB GDDR5. It's a modest upgrade over the old ASUS card, but supports HDMI, and doesn't require its own power cable. Only change is that it takes up two back panel slots, instead of one. I dusted the box, installed it, and also swapped in a recently purchased Logitech mechanical keyboard. I've had it on the other machine for several weeks, but have hardly used it at all. First impression is a little clanky. Will take some getting used to.

After some miscommunication, I got Doug over to work on the carport railing. We basically got it finished. A couple pieces of trim are still unattached (more poorly attached), and I have a few screws left over, so I've probably missed some. I wanted to add some mid-span supports, but measurements are varied, and I didn't get them figured out. Some of the ballisters have locks. I think they're intended for the middle of the spans, but Doug held them out and put them all in the last span. I need to look at that. But I could just ignore these fine points and consider it good enough for now. Arambula still has to get the mini-split hooked up. That'll be the end of the roof project. Hopefully next week. Meanwhile, I'm exhausted and very sore.

I didn't get most of my email opened today. I'll catch up over the weekend. We're supposed to get another round of storms on Saturday. Maybe Sunday as well. Need to go to grocery store one of those days.

Daily Log

Got up at 10. Came down at 11. Doug came over yesterday. We got the carport railing frame up on the carport, assembling the three big pieces, and leveling them. He left as I was starting to secure the posts. First thing I discovered was that I couldn't use the 5/16 lag bolts I had bought, so I had to go back and exchange them for 1/4. After I got back, I realized I bought the wrong mix of 1.5- and 2.5-inch piece, so I'm going to have to go back today for more 1.5. I did get the outside posts secured. I still have to do the inside, then secure the leveling blocks (which are currently loose-fit). I'm thinking about putting roof cement on the bottom, and construction adhesive on the top. To do this, I'll need to raise the pieces an inch or so. I need to think about how to do that. Also, the posts near the house don't have supports — the 2x6 lays flat on the roof — so I'll probably just use roof cement for that. Rain today, with chances going up after 3PM, much higher 6-10PM. Doug offered to come over today, but I think I'll postpone to Friday, which should be nice, high 76F. We might get it finished then.

Email (30 messages):

• Mike Konczal: Is the Vibecession Homogeneous to Degree Zero? Why doubling the average price and every income might still leave people worse off.

Daily Log

Came down shortly after 11. Didn't quite finish the chapter on how Google employees tried to "don't be evil" after management had changed course on that score. Doug worked on yard yesterday. Covered up the bare spot north of the house with red ground cover. Watered the new grass seed. I worked on the railing. I eventually got the face pieces screwed into the planks, and I added a couple of mounting boards to hold the long piece together, and to mount the side pieces. I went out to hardware stores earlier, trying to find something to put on treated wood cuts, to no avail. I decided to use linseed oil for that purpose, so mixed up some, and dabbed it around. I bought a gallon (plus?) of Thompson's clear sealer, but didn't get into that. Most of the little work I managed to get done was at ground level, and was painful. Mostly cloudy today, currently 66F, high 70F. Storms on Thursday and Saturday, with a nice sunny day in between. Doug is supposed to come over this afternoon. I don't know whether I'll try to put some sealer on (would be good to do the bottom/outside sides, as the top/inside will be easy once it's in place) before we move the pieces up to the carport. I'm thinking about that.

But quite possible that we'll get the railing moved up. Next step will be to align the inside posts, then level the side pieces. I'll need to cut 4x4 posts for the beams to stand on. Measurements TBD. I've bought various adhesives to secure the posts to the roof material. Not sure what to use, or whether they'll work. I'm very sore, so I'm skeptical about how much I might get done. But Nothing else on the agenda.

Email (26 messages):

• "Ty" from Laura.

Daily Log

Woke up early. Read the chapter on DMCA 1201 in Enshittification, which is pretty much the same as his chapter in The Internet Con, and every bit as effective in making one's blood boil. The HP printer ink scam is one that hits especially close to home. I came down at 9:30. I got most of my platform boards cut yesterday, and loosely assembled. My idea is to build a platform out of 2x6 planks, which of course are actually 5.5 inches wide, exactly the footprint of the posts. It took me a long time to figure out the levelers on the posts, which use a bolt (with a large phillips head imprint) and two nuts. I couldn't figure this out until I removed the plastic post cover, revealing the mechanism underneath. Then I had to figure out the right wrenches to loosen and then tighten the bolt. Took a big chunk of the afternoon.

I did a bit of research on treated wood, and found out that I need two kinds of sealer: one for cut surfaces, because the anti-rot treatment only goes skin deep; another for the rest of the surface. I was advised against using linseed oil for the latter, as it would have to be reapplied, but I've found it works much better on the shed ramp than anything else I've tried. One reason I stayed up is that I need to go to the hardware store to buy these coatings. Two more considerations: how to attach the 4x4 posts underneath the platform to the mod-bit roof under. TJ suggested silicone adhesive, instead of drilling holes through the membrane. Internet suggests an asphalt roofing adhesive. Other one is how to secure the posts to the frame. Lag bolts seem like the obvious choice, but I wonder about using longer bolts with nuts under the frame, which would be less likely to tear loose. Given that the 4x4 posts are smaller than the 5.5-inch platform, I could position the posts outside (or inside) to open up space for some long bolts.

Doug is coming over at 2, to help on this. While I have the 2x6 planks cut, my plan was to add 1x4 around the outside, to keep the planks from bowing, and especially to tie the long (20-foot) south side together. I have the frame assembled in the back driveway, propped up on extra boards, but I miscalculated how high I had to raise it, so I have to add some extra height before I can attach the 1x4 boards (3.5-inches high). I'm also unclear whether the posts nearest the house have that much clearance, so I'll have to recheck that. I figure I'll move the frame assembly to the carport in three pieces, then assemble it there, figuring out at that point the height of the 4x4 posts to level the frame. I'm hoping to get the frame up on the carport today. I will probably have to test-fit the posts and bottom rails to get the positioning right. Then I need to figure out what to do about securing and finishing, before we can put the rest of it together. It got kinda beat up during disassembly, but at this point I figure I can ignore that. Hope to get it all done this week (weather permitting: good today and probably tomorrow, rain predicted for Thursday).

I started writing a Substack piece on inflation. I haven't had much time to work on it, and prospects aren't good. I'm beginning to think that my Substack venture is a bust (but maybe that's just the rest of my life). I had the thought yesterday that I always figured that the only thing that could make life not worth living was physical breakdown, but these days the world breakdown is nearly as alarming and disspiriting. At least I still have the option of tuning out.

Email (14 messages):

• Spotify is pushing something called Page Match, which allows you to play audiobooks from arbitrary pages, presumably so you can jump back and forth between physical and audiobooks.
• Tom Engelhardt: DECLINE!!! Alternate title: "You Dirty ORANGE Maniac! You Blew It All Up! Damn You to Hell!" Subhed: The President of Ultimate Destruction.
• Explain It Daily: What caused the partition of India? That's gotta be a whopper. Maybe I should add it to my inflation piece. Without peeking, I'd say that Britain realized that Indian independence was inevitable: Britain was bankrupted by the war, and there was too must pressure for independence to resist (and while this mostly came from the people, the US also wanted to dismantle Europe's colonial empires). But Britain decided to do this in the worst way possible. Congress had opposed, or at least dragged their feet on, the war effort, while Jinnah and his Muslim League had been supportive. Partition was an easy (for them, not for anyone else) way to reward Jinnah and punish Congress, so they went that way, with tremendous haste to ensure maximum strife. Besides, partition had worked so well in Ireland, and was also on the agenda for Palestine (a year later, but an initial proposal in 1936 had been derailed by the 1937-39 revolt, so the writing there was pretty clearly on the wall). [PS: OK, I peeked: "The British, who were weakening after World War II, decided to leave India and saw partition as a way to reduce communal tensions."]

Daily Log

Woke up at 11:15. Came down at noon. Doug is coming over this afternoon to work on the railing, which right now is sooner than I'd like. I spent some time Saturday, and a couple more hours Sunday night, working on attic. I got very little done, and I'm very sore today. We went to a GLC event last night. Their speaker was imported via zoom, a Tony Woods, talking about the swing to the right in Latin America. He's a professor in Colorado, also on the editorial board of New Left Review, with a couple of books on Russia (Chechnya: The Case for Independence, and Russia Without Putin: Money, Power and the Myths of the New Cold War). They usually cater a dinner before their events, but designated this one a potluck, and that lured me in. I had some oranges left over, so thought I'd make a pasta salad with oranges and smoked fish. I also baked a batch of cookies. But the session started as soon as we got there, so the food was mostly ignored.

Finished the fairy tale jigsaw puzzle last night. Laura has opened up another, working on the border. Not much I can do on it right now. I figured I'd skip Music Week this week, given that I only got to last week's on Thursday (April 16), but maybe I should go ahead anyway. Not many records so far (+8), mostly muliti-CD archival releases timed for Record Store Day, but two of those are A-, and I could write one of those "how am I feeling?" introductions. I'm mostly feeling helpless and hopeless.

Email (33 messages):

• Semipop LIfe: Polka, dot, moonbeam: Lots here I haven't heard: Fuerza Regida, Kesha, Excavated Shellac, Coroner, Slamdinistas, Summer Walker, Jeff Tweedy, The Shanghai Restoration Project, Kyle Dion, Castle Rat; have heard: Megan Moroney (***), Tommy Womack (A-).
• Tom Carson: Frankenride (paid only).
• TomDispatch: Liz Theoharis, Supreme Horror? "The case for asylum in these less than United States."
• M7.4 earthquake off the east coast of Honshu, Japan (100km from nearest location reference).
• Project Syndicate: Lonely Empire (Mark Blyth: "The Trump administration's overt imperialism has unraveled the global order of shared norms and institutions faster than anyone expectred," but "the US has very little to gain from a return to the law of the jungle."
• Sen. Roger Marshall: PBM Practices are Driving Up the Cost of Prescription Drugs. He's pushing a bill called the DRUG Act, which "would delink the price of a drug from the compensation a PBM receives to help curb this practice."

Daily Log

Woke up early again. Went to bathroom and read for a while. Came back to bed, and decided to give it another try. Not sure if I ever really fell back asleep, but it was 11:40 when I got up. I came straight down. Still pretty cool outside (63F). I worked on attic yesterday. Didn't get much done, but we had five 2x4 boards cut for the northwest section. I attached them, except that the end one doesn't rest on a joist, so has to be screwed into the frame. I cut three more boards to extend the section to the chimney, but haven't tried fitting them. I could work on that today, but I'm already sore.

Laura wanted to go to a GLC event tonight, perhaps just to socialize. Speaker is going to be some guy on a Zoom hookup, talking about Latin America, so I don't have much interest in that. But, possibly expecting a light crowd, instead of their usual catered dinner, they called for a pot luck, which I could take as an excuse to cook for an anonymous crowd. I have some oranges left over from the Greek, so thought of a pasta salad recipe with smoked trout. Turns out I actually have quite a lot of smoked trout (also some smoked salmon), as I found two more packages in our frozen-up deli drawer. I also found an old box of gluten-free pasta (mini-shells). Might be a good thing to make anyway. Other than that, I was thinking of cookies or brownies. I should be well equipped for either.

I'll have to see what Laura wants, when she comes down. She has her movie zoom group this afternoon. Their movie this week is The Long Goodbye: Robert Altman's take on Marlowe. I watched it with her last night. She proclaimed it great at the end. I made some retrospective sense out of it, but didn't like it in the watching. I'm not sure what other Marlow movies I had seen, but Elliot Gould didn't seem right, nor did much else fit. Watched another Morning Show episode later. Spent a lot of time on the jigsaw. I think I added one item to the Loose Tabs draft file. Sounds like the ceasefire has broken down, but someone probably made a ton of money on Friday, which may have been the main point. While Netanyahu remains as bloodthirsty as ever, I doubt that either Trump or Iran see much point in beating each other senseless. Their problem is that neither side can bear looking like the loser, so they insist on hyping "agreements" that the other side cannot admit to. I say both sides, but Trump is much the worse, not least because he started out in the wrong. But I'm not in any hurry to write about this, or about much of anything.

Email (9 messages):

• Dave Barber recommends Larry Blood "as a participant in the Francis Davis poll." I added him to jazzpoll and local email lists, and added his name to voter-log. I also created a new JCP26 archives folder.
• Substack: Congratulations! Notes on Everyday Life has 100 subscribers.
• Project Syndicate: How Trump's Crypto Push Is Undermining American Power (Jayati Ghosh); A New Security Architecture for the Middle East (Ahmet Davutoglu; hard to imagin what this is, as the major threat is from Israel and the US); Is the Iran War America's Suez or Its Gallipoli? (Yanis Varoufakis).
• Joao Madeira sends yum link for "new 4DR super-album." Code redeemed, downloaded.

Daily Log

Rain started around 2:30 yesterday, escalating to hail, penny-sized or less, but enough to nearly cover the ground in white. The hail let up after 20-30 minutes. The rain lasted a couple more hours. For us that was the end of it, although we saw a severe thunderstorm warning after 6 in Cowley County, southeast of here. News had reports of tornados and flooding, especially in Wisconsin. Bright and sunny here today, and much cooler: 50F at 10:45 AM. I woke up a bit after 8. Tried to go back to sleep, but couldn't. Got up after 10, read some, and came down. Reading Cory Doctorow, which is getting me to think even more than usual about tech business.

I didn't feel like working at computer yesterday, so I worked on the jigsaw, and watched some TV. While doing the former, I pieced together a scheme for a better replacement for Substack. As with all of my tech schemes, it is based on open source software, and a non-profit business model, with no resale of data or services based on user data. But to replace Substack, you need to come up with a scheme to pay content creators. The problem with Substack is that the creators are atomised: you have to sign up to each individually, with each trying to hustle a minimum $5/month from the few readers who can afford that much. So what about switching to a streaming model, where one subscription provides access to everything, and creators are paid based on some weighting of views? I quickly thought up a few dozen refinements of this basic model. The weighting is intended to gauge interest, so time spent, likes (what about dislikes?), comments, accessing links from, etc., can all be factored in. Subscriptions could be tiered, or variable, and big spenders' money could be routed to their preferred sources (with some redistribution). Contributors who want to publish free pieces could return their royalties.

I even thought of an alternate corporate model, where you sell shares to widely distributed "owners" (I was thinking of the Green Bay Packer model where no one is allowed to own more than 4% of the company), only instead of profiting, the "owners" would be obligated to cover the corporation's losses. Effectively, that makes the corporation a conditional charity, but the donors have responsibility for running the board, hiring staff, etc. — I'd also include some codetermination, a couple of board seats each for workers and users.

Then I realized I'd need somewhere to publish these plans, so I thought about setting up a wikiplans website, where I could sketch out my ideas and (hopefully) others could build on them (as well as add their own).

As for TV, Laura offered Hamnet, which I agreed to, although almost instantly she wanted to bait and switch. But I held my ground. We started it, but she quit before it got good, missing out on something quite remarkable (recasting Hamlet as a lament for a dead son, which works because, well, it's Hamlet). Later we watched episodes 3 & 4 of The Morning Show, where the soap starts getting real sudsy.

Email (9 messages):

• Robert Wright: Why Altman (and AI) is under attack: First the New Yorker piece, then the Molotov cocktail . . .
• Substack: new free subscriber (should make 100)
• Christian Iszchak: An Acute Case: 18 April 2026: nothing here I haven't already heard (although I had to check on the forgotten Robbie Fulks album).

I posted this on Bluesky:

Trita Parsi expects an Iran deal framework soon, and Israel to try to sabotage it. He adds: "If he really wants the deal, Trump will have to be tougher on Netanyahu than he has ever been before." Hard to do when Trump has the attention span (and possibly the spine) of a moth.

Daily Log

Slept slightly better, score 95, came down at 10:15. Big storm forecasted this afternoon, as a cold front sweeps through, kicking up storm cells starting (3-4PM) around here, which will eventually form a line trending northeast from north Texas up to Wisconsin. It looks to me like we may (or may not) be hit by storm cells, but the massive storm front will mostly be northeast of here, up toward Kansas City, and the evening storms will be north and east from there. Lawn guy is supposed to come over around noon, so should be done before the storms hit.

I tried to hose off the air conditioner yesterday. I figured it hadn't been done all year, and our service isn't coming out until mid-May, so I thought it would help. I eventually got the panels off, and shut off the electricity. I hosed off everything from the outside. Then I tried to put the panels back on, and had a lot of problems lining up the tiny sheet metal screws. Worst problem was when they fell out of the nutdriver, and I had to grope around the leaf litter to find them. I wound up losing 2-3 screws. Maybe I'll give that another look before the storm today. Aside from a bit of yard work, I don't have much planned. Music Week went up last night. Laura tells me Trump and Iran have a deal to reopen the Strait, this time with Netanyahu on board, so there should be a ceasefire in Lebanon. I haven't looked at any news yet, so we'll see about all that.

Email (40 messages):

• Mike Konczal: The Girlboss Takeover Has a Data Problem
• Tom Carson: In Memory of Baghdad Bob: We don't seem like the kind of nation to be ashamed of googling itself

Daily Log

Woke up early, barely registering four hours, 80 on the meter. Read the end of the Minshall book on manufacturing. I suppose I'll move on to Doctorow and/or Wu next, as I have both checked out from library. I do have to return the Mahjongg book on Friday, so I may have a look around then. We went out to grocery store yesterday. I had run out of distilled water. We went to an Italian restaurant, Napoli, before. We had the calamari and arrancini for appetizers, and both were excellent. Chicken piccata and veal sorrentino for mains. The veal struck me as pretty tough. We picked up some things for Zhanna, and delivered them on the way home. Watched Brokenwood. Came down at 9:30, but can't work on the jigsaw puzzle, as it is too near completion not to let Laura finish. I probably should have tried to go back to bed, but feel pretty woke up. Cool at the moment: 63F. Should stick to the 70s today, so this might be a good day to do some outside work; maybe even the attic.

I published Loose Tabs last night. Came to 17438 words. I should do the break on Music Week soon, and write that today. Still have some unpacking to do. I'm feeling very unambitious these days. But I did the Music Week cutover at 11:20 AM, +32 rated, including a late A- for Tanya Tagaq, an album Phil Overeem has raved about and I've only slowly warmed to.

Email (26 messages):

• TomDispatch: Steve Fraser, In Empire We Trust

I finally posted something on Saturday's dinner on Facebook:

Reunion Saturday with a close childhood friend I had little contact with for nearly 60 years. He traveled the world with the USAF, and suggested I might fix something Greek (or German; I went with Greek). I picked out some classics: pastisio (lamb & eggplant with penne topped with feta/bechamel), garithes youvetsi (shrimp w/feta), fasolakia (green beans with potatoes), horiatiki (chopped salad), and mast va khiar (cucumber with yogurt, an Iranian alternative to tzatziki). For dessert, I made a blood orange upside-down cake, served with ice cream, and bougatsa (I didn't get the latter done in time for Saturday, but it made the leftovers dinner on Sunday). Good to catch up after so long.

Music Week

Expanded blog post, April archive (in progress).

Tweet: Music Week: 33 albums, 7 A-list

Music: Current count 45803 [45771] rated (+32), 20 [29] unrated (-9).

New records reviewed this week:

• Juhani Aaltonen + Raoul Björkenheim: Nostalgia (2025 [2026], Eclipse Music): [sp]: B+(***)
• Rodrigo Amado/This Is Our Language Quartet: Wailers (2019 [2026], European Echoes): [dl]: A-
• Atlantic Road Trip: Watch as the Echo Falls (2025 [2026], Calligram): [cd]: B+(*)
• Mara Calder: We Stay Ugly 'Til the Pretty Decays (2026, Black Metal Archives Label): [sp]: A-
• Chicago Soul Jazz Collective: No Wind & No Rain (2026, Calligram): [cd]: B+(**)
• Paul Citro: Keep Moving (Home) (2024-25 [2026], Calligram): [cd]: B+(*) [05-01]
• Caleb Wheeler Curtis: Ritual (2025 [2026], Chill Tone): [cd]: B+(***)
• Fcukers: Ö (2026, Ninja Tune): [sp]: B+(***)
• Flea: Honora (2026, Nonesuch): [sp]: B-
• Sophie Gault: Unhinged (2026, Torrez Music Group): [sp]: B+(**)
• Tomas Janzon: Jazz Diary (2025 [2026], Changes Music): [cd]: B+(**)
• Kin'Gongolo Kiniata: Kiniata (2024 [2025], Helico Music): [bc]: A-
• Kinact: Kinshasa in Action (2026, Nyege Nyege Tapes): [bc]: B+(**)
• Gurf Morlix: Cobwebs & Stardust (2026, Rootball): [sp]: B+(**)
• Jim Robitaille Trio: Sonic (2026, Whaling City Sound): B+(**)
• Ted Rosenthal Trio: The Good Old Days (2024 [2026], TMR Music): [cd]: B+(***) [05-01]
• Fie Schouten/Vincent Courtois/Sofia Borges/Pierre Baux: Open Space (2025 [2026], Relative Pitch): [cd]: B+(**)
• Paul Silbergleit Trio: The Stillness of July (2024 [2026], Calligram): [cd]: B+(**) [05-01]
• Harlan Silverman: Music for Stillness (2026, Intentional): [bc]: B+(***)
• Slayyyter: Wor$t Girl in America (2026, Columbia): [sp]: B+(**)
• Sky Smeed: Live at the Rock House (2026, self-released): [sp]: A-
• Alister Spence: Always Ever (2025 [2026], Alister Spence Music): [cd]: B+(**) [04-24]
• Tanya Tagaq: Saputjiji (2026, Six Shooter): [sp]: A-

Recent reissues, compilations, and vault discoveries:

• Born in the City of Tanta: Lower Egyptian Urban Folklore and Bedouin Shaabi From Libya's Bourini Records 1968-75 (1968-75 [2025], Sublime Frequencies): [bc]: B+(***)
• Bill Evans: At the BBC (1965 [2026], Elemental Music): [cd]: B+(***) [04-18]
• Freddie King: Feeling Alright: The Complete 1975 Nancy Pulsations Concert (1975 [2026], Elemental Music, 2CD): [cd]: B+(**) [04-18]
• Cecil Taylor New Unit: Words & Music: The Last Bandstand (2016 [2026], Fundacja Słuchaj): [bc]: A-
• Miroslav Vitous: Mountain Call (2003-10 [2026], ECM): [sp]: B+(*)
• Mal Waldron: Stardust & Starlight: At the Jazz Showcase (1979 [2026], Resonance): [cd]: A- [04-18]

Old music:

• Dorisburg & Sebastian Mullaert: That Who Remembers (2023, Spazio Disponibile): [sp]: B+(**)
• Ted Rosenthal: Ted Rosenthal at Maybeck [Maybeck Recital Hall Series, Volume Thirty-Eight] (1994 [1995], Concord): [sp]: B+(**)
• Wordsworth: Mirror Music (2004, Halftooth): [sp]: B+(**)

Unpacking: Found in the mail last week:

• Terry Callier: At the Earl of Old Town (1967, Time Traveler) [04-18]
• Roy Hargrove: Bern (2000, Time Traveler) [04-18]
• Kathy Ingraham: Jazz Dreams (Peirdon) [03-16]
• What You May Call It: Da Qi (MechaBenzaiten) [05-08]

Daily Log

Came down at 10:30, after some reading. Out of distilled water, so we need to go to grocery store today. Only got a 95 on the CPAP. Got out my lightest T-shirt, and weighed in at 219.0. Still eating leftover Greek from Saturday, although the shrimp and mast va khiar are gone, as is the cake (but still have bougatsa, horiatiki, one more plate of pastisio, and a lot of green beans/potatoes). Closing in on Loose Tabs, so that may go up today. I still have a tab opened to my Iraq War journal. I was thinking I could dust that off and send that out to Substack, so that may be a diversion today. Still in the 80s, but we're due for a cold front and storms on Friday. Saturday will be cool enough to work in the attic, and Sunday should be nice to work on the railing. Tom James glued the edges down yesterday, so the surface is clear. Still need to get the mini-split reinstalled, but order for that is in. Did a lot of jigsaw puzzle work the last two days, so it's about half done. We watched A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms, one of the Game of Thrones spinoffs. I still don't buy a world where hierarchy is assumed (although not without a certain begrudging) and violence is sport for the otherwise jaded and comfortable. Presumably Martin intended to show that now we're far beyond that, but I doubt it was ever much fun.

Email (28 messages):

• DownBeat: Flea's Jazz Jones, on the cover, got a B- in Music Week.
• Tom Carson: No King of Kings: Trump does Jesus the way Debbie did Dallas.
• Logitech Pebble Mouse 2 delivered.

Daily Log

Went to bed fairly early (2:30 AM). Came down at 11:15. Warm again today, upper 80s. Music Week is being held back until Loose Tabs posts, which is in the "any day now" stage: not yesterday, probably not today, maybe tomorrow. Should cool down after storms Friday night, then back to 70F on Sunday, and for several days after that. Looks like Saturday would be a good day to work in attic, then Sunday would be a good day for the railing. I should hose down the AC in the back, since Hanna isn't coming out until mid-May. Wednesday/Thursday would be good days for that. I also want to start with some organizing in the basement. I bought a little thing with 20 plastic drawers that fits in the last open wall space down there. I assembled it, and piled four 3-drawer Sterlite cases on top of it. I want to fill them up with scattered hardware, including electrical supplies. I have four more larger Sterlite tower units with deeper drawers. I need to use them for bulkier items, but first that involves cleaning them out and moving the smaller stuff into the new drawer units. I also need to find a place for all the tools. Meanwhile, stuff needs to be thrown out, or at least reshelved. Some can come up to the transfer station, for recycle.

Still, I expect I'll spend most of today writing. I was interrupted by Tom James coming over to glue down some loose edges on the carport roof.

Email (45 messages at 4:00 PM; another day of slow reading):

• Wichita Public Library: renewed three books (so due May 1), didn't renew Nicole Wong: Mahjong: House Rules From Across the Asian Diaspora, so it's due April 17. I play a lot of Mahjongg on the computer, so I was looking for some background, especially what to call the tiles. I should look through it by Friday, and return it. I've been reading Tim Minshall's How Things Are Made: A Journey Through the Hidden World of Manufacturing, which is an interesting overview of the modern world. I haven't opened the other two tech business books, but should: Cory Doctorow: Enshittification: Why Everything Suddenly Got Worse and What to Do About It, and Tim Wu: The Age of Extraction: How Tech Platforms Conquered the Economy and Threaten Our Future Prosperity.
• Eye Care Associates appointment coming up: April 28, 3:30 PM.

Daily Log

Gretchen and Mike came over at 2 PM for rewarmed leftovers. I tried rewarming the pastisio in the oven, but that didn't work very well, so I wound up dumping it into my largest skillet and heating it up on the stove. I pulled out all of the shrimp, and rewarmed the sauce, before adding the shrimp back in to warm up but not cook much further. None of that took very long (aside from the false start on the pastisio). I spent the period between 11 and 1 making the bougatsa. The phyllo was finicky, as usual, with the sheets hard to separate, easy to tear. While messy, I managed to form three packets, then bake them. They didn't get quite as well browned as expected, but seemed to come out good enough. We talked. They left. I still had quite a bit leftover, but put it away in slightly smaller containers, and cleaned up. All I had for dinner was some horiatiki, plus the last of the orange upside down cake, and some ice cream. We watched A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms (4th episode, I think). I was feeling somewhat queasy. I went straight to bed afterwards, and slept to 9:30, with at least three interruptions (one of which I read some during: I'm about two-thirds through Tim Minshall's How Things Are Made: A Journey Through the Hidden World of Manufacturing).

Feeling ok this morning. Probably ate too much over the last two days. I should take it easy today. I'm not feeling very good about my writing, least of all today's tasks: wrapping up Loose Tabs, and cobbling together a Music Week. I doubt I'll get either of those done, and I'm not sure I even feel like trying. We have a new jigsaw puzzle opened, so I'm going to start today on that. I have started the day off with a new review album, first one of those I've heard in 2-3 days, so maybe I'll get back into the swing of things. We'll see, but as I said, I don't much care right now.

Email (33 messages at 10:30, some leftover from Sunday):

• Tom Carson: Frankenride: Preliminary. An empty post, aside for a couple opening quotes. Unlike the earlier "Frankenride," which appears to be a big chunk of new fiction.
• Tom Carson: To Epp Is Human: Eric Swalwell, Al Franken, and that poor schook with the boobies.
• Brad Luen: 100 best pro wrestlers ever. Only names I recognize are: John Cena (43); Andre the Giant (92).
• My bougatsa picture.
• Tom Carson: Roaring Twenties: Trump and Pope Leo do Cagney vs. Bogart. Jack Warner, producer.
• GLC April event: "In Treacherous Waters: Latin America in the Age of the New Right," by Dr.Tony Wood, April 19, 6:30, preceded by potluck dinner at 6.

Daily Log

Woke up at 10:45, and came down at 11:15. Terry Appelhans came over for dinner last night, a reunion of about 60 years. He recalls moving from South Main (two doors north of us) to out past Tyler Road in 1966. My memory places the move a couple years earlier. I fixed Greek food, and made quite a lot of it. His wife skipped the event. I was hoping that his sister Linda would join us, but she also had other plans. Another younger sister, Marilyn, seems to be around, but I only remember her as a small child. (Linda is my sister's age, and Rhonda, deceased, was my brother's age.) I'll write more about this later, but when I realized how much surplus food I would have, I asked Laura to arrange a leftovers dinner for today. She invited Mike and Gretchen over for, but they insisted on afternoon instead of evening, so we're doing it at 2PM. So I have 2.5 hours to get it all organized. Warming up the leftovers won't be much of a problem, but I started to make bogatsa. I made the custard last night, but still have to build the phyllo packets and bake them. I had thought about adding more appetizers, but at this point there's so much leftovers, and it's so good, that should be unnecessary.

Email (9 messages):

Daily Log

Came down at 10:45, after reading a bit. Just a bit of time to write this note, then I need to start cooking. I got the blood orange upside-down cake done last night. Some problems with the recipe. You cook the orange slices in a syrup, then pull them out and reduce the syrup another 5 minutes, but then it doesn't tell you what to do with the syrup. I actually doubled the syrup, because I wanted to make sure it would cover the orange slices. I did wind up using slices from two oranges. I zested the leftover ends, and juiced the ends, getting 3oz of juice, which seemed to be abou right (recipe calls for juice of 1 orange). After I placed the slices in the bottom of the pan, I brushed them with extra syrup, but still had quite a bit left. Recipe called for creaming the butter and eggs, but didn't call for more sugar, as is typically the case. I couldn't get the butter and eggs to form an emulsion, so I added a bit of the syrup, which didn't help. I gave up and started adding the dry mixture (regular and almond flour), and that mixed in fairly well, along with orange juice, zest, and vanilla. I scraped it into a 9-inch springform plan, on top of a larger baking dish (in case it leaked; btw, it did leak a bit). I cooled and flipped the cake,a nd it looks like it came out ok. I still had some syrup left, so I painted the top. I haven't tasted it.

I made the meat sauce for the pastisio. Came out very good. I also mixed up a small batch of mast va khiar (Iranian cucumber-yogurt, with scallions, sultanas, black walnuts, and mint). Not part of my original menu, but I was prepared. I was thinking that I'd do a leftovers feed on Sunday, where I could add extra appetizers. But Laura arranged for Gretchen and Mike to come over at 2 pm, so I won't have time to add much to the leftovers. I had considered doing a proper tzatziki for this, but went with my old standard.

When I get started, the main dishes should come together pretty easily. I can assemble the horiatiki in my spare moments. I need to make the cheese sauce for the pastisio, which starts with a roux (it's basically bechamel plus feta cheese). Meanwhile, I can heat up the water and cook the pasta, which is then divided between the meat and cheese sauces. So I should get it prepped early, ready to pop into the oven. The tomato sauce for the shrimp and the green bean ragout are both dishes that I can start early and keep warm until I need them. The shrimp will go in a hot oven just before serving. I prepped the green beans last night, so most of what's left is chopping onions, peeling potatoes, and opening cans of tomatoes.

That should leave me time to work on a second dessert: bougatsa. That's going to be trickier, as I need to make a custard, then wrap it up in filo dough pockets, and bake them. I figure I can get the mains going, then pivot to them, and bake them before I need to put the pastisio in. At least that's the plan. Our guest is a bit of an unknown, as I've only seen him once (at my mother's funeral) since 1970. But we were best friends once, so that should count for something.

Email (7 messages, not much):

• New Substack subscriber (previously unknown to me).
• RiotRiot on Parquet Courts.

Daily Log

Got up early again, but went to bed early enough I registered 100 on the machine. Thinking about cooking Greek tomorrow. I polled Elias Vlanton and John Chacona for dessert ideas. I'm thinking now that I'll make a cake (probably walnut, unless I can find blood oranges for the upside-down cake) tonight to be sure, then try the bougatsa tomorrow. I was confused by the "packet wrapping" technique, but the video helped. Tricky part should be the custard. As the main courses will be overkill for three people, I'm thinking we should have a leftover dinner on Sunday, perhaps augmented by some appetizers. Laura's gone to doctor. I need to write up my shopping list for this afternoon. I want to make the cake and the sauce components for the pastisio tonight. I can boil the pasta tomorrow, then prep the casserole early. The green beans and the sauce for the shrimp are long, slow stovetop operations, and the salad can be assembled on the side, so there's not a lot of work to any of those dishes, nor are the logistics daunting.

Email (38 messages; I did finally get down to 0 last night):

• Rodrigo Amado: link to download his new album.
• Robert Wright; The future arrived this week (and boy are we not ready for it!).

Daily Log

Woke up early. Came down around 10:30. I bought some concentrated vinegar last week, thinking I might use it to try to clean out the hood filters. I popped them out, and placed them in a roasting pan, with 2 c 30% vinegar, 12 c hot water. We'll see if that works. I'm planning on fixing dinner for Terry Appelhans on Saturday. I was hoping his sister Linda might join us, but she has other plans, so it may just be a dinner for three. We agreed on Greek. I have so much I want to show off there it will be hard to hold it down. I was thinking I'd make pastisio, baked prawns with feta, green bean ragout, horiatiki, maybe some mezze, plus something for dessert. I could do baklava, but that's a fairly big production. There's a walnut cake with syrup that's easier. I've also considered switching cuisines and doing tiramisu, or maybe some kind of torte. I spent much of yesterday thinking I'd shop and start cooking today, only to find it's still Thursday. No matter how expansive I get, I don't need to start until the day before.

Started to process the Consumer Guide yesterday, but didn't get very far. Also started to move my draft tabs into a Loose Tabs file, but again came up short. All I feel like doing these days is working on the jigsaw puzzle and thinking about cooking.

Laura was complaining about Kimmel making fun of "TACO" so I posted this on Bluesky:

While I admit that "TACO" is funny, not least because it takes a bully down a notch, but we should also be clear that what appears to be "chickening out" are actually rare moments of sanity: they invariably involve backing away from taunts and plans that are truly insane, and often evil.

Perhaps the worst effect of the "TACO" complaints is when Democrats chastise Trump for failing to achieve goals (Iran still has missiles, and the Strait) that could only have been achieved by diplomacy, which Trump precluded by going to war. The war itself was Trump's massive failure. Say that!

Email (barely looked at it all day, so now up to 166 unread):

• Checked spam directory. I wondered whether it would be possible to block addresses. It appears it is. I blocked a half dozen. I had to open them first, but the mailer didn't display images, and there was virtually nothing else in the messages. (OK, I blocked a couple dozen more, but I keep seeing more instances of titles I've already blocked, so many of the addresses I'm blocking are probably spoofed.)
• Semipop Life: Odds & Ends 152: Nearly ready for 2026, I promise.
• My post: Iran War: The Big Question; + shareable assets; reactions: 2 likes; new subscribers: Lou Jean Fleron, Nathan Phillips.
• TomDispatch: Michael Klare, One Blow After Another.
• Walgreens Rx ready for pickup.
• Substack stats for Iran War: The Big Question: 115 views, 2 likes, 0 subscriptions.
• TomDispatch: Nan Levinson, The War in Iran as International Terrorism
• Tom Carson: "It just gall Trump to his bone spurs that the Kennedys outdo him even as narcissists, and he can't stand Serious Pretending anyhow. Besides being profoundly unserious, he's actually lousy at pretending: just watch him whenver he's got to act solemnly concerned about anyone's welfare but his own, something Kennedy could pull off even right after someone shot him in the head."
• Mike Konczal: The Cross-Section of Non-Citizens and the Job Slowdown: Sub-industries with the most non-citizen workers are behind the jobs collapse, the recent rebound, and the wage deceleration.
• New NOEL subscriber.
• Robert Christgau: Consumer Guide: April, 2026.
• New on Substack: post templates, drop caps, live video controls, "refine your feed with clearer controls," subscribe homepage block, callout block.
• I ordered a Giantex Storage Drawer Cart, with 20 drawers (10x2). Arriving April 14-16. I need to sort out odds and ends, hardware mostly, in the basement, and I have some space for this. I have four other Sterlite towers in the basement, only partly full. I figure I can start sorting electrical parts into the new cabinet, then clear out the old ones, and start refilling them. Along the way, I need to put tools into chests and bags. I have at least three square "electrician's bags": one for AC wiring tools, one for cabling tools, maybe I'll use the third for plumbing. It's not quite as bad as it seems, but I need to work my way around everything.

Daily Log

Woke up around 11. Finished Scheindlin's The Crooked Timber of Democracy in Israel. Leaves me with a bad taste, not just for the theocratic parties, which seem even more grasping than the worst of the Islamist parties, possibly because their peripheral status frees them of ever having to develop any sense of responsibility for the whole nation. Scheindlin emphasizes the power hoarding of Ben-Gurion and his Labor Party legacy, without really noting that it was rooted in insecurity, and also the liberalism of Jabotinsky and Begin, which strikes me as mere posture, again rooted in weakness. I suppose we can blame this all on the lack of a genuine Palestinian left: one that could see the Zionist settlers as potential allies in throwing off British imperialism. But it's not like the settlers, from the start dependent on the British for protection, signaled any interest in joint action, let alone equality, or peace.

I find myself toying with a proposal to just give in and let Israel expel the Palestinians. At this point it's more important to snuff out the fire of militarism than it is to persuade Israelis to behave with any real measure of decency. That ship seems to have sailed. But no matter how I might try to couch such a proposal, reaction from all quarters will be frightful. Need to start a new book. Not sure what.

Email continues to pile up (113 messages, some going back to Sunday). I've scanned through the list, and see very little I want to open up, other than the Consumer Guide:

Daily Log

Tired last night. Went to bed before 3, and slept until 11, despite Laura having to get up for a doctor appointment at 9. Weighed myself, and I'm up again, to 219.4, so I need to work on that. I didn't get Music Week done, or even started, Monday. A friend fell and broke her hip and shoulder. She got out of the hospital yesterday, so we helped get her home. We were pretty well equipped for such things, so we loaned her a wheelchair, a couple walkers, and a transfer bench. We went out to the grocery store afterwards. Rather than lobbying for stopping at a restaurant, I picked up some fried chicken (thighs and livers), and pigged out. I've bought the livers before, but hadn't bought the greasy chicken (let alone made my own) for a couple years.

Still feeling very sore, probably from crawling around the attic last week. I left it up to Doug when to work next, and he hasn't called me back. If I get some time, and it's cool enough to work in the attic, I may try doing some work myself. I figure I can lay down additional 2x4s to support the extra decking. I need to figure out how much to cover around the chimney. On the south side, I want to add wings 4-feet deep from the central platform. For those, I want to use hard foam topped by underlayment. I'll need help maneuvering those, but the skeleton shouldn't be too hard. Maybe I'll just clear the loose fill and cut the boards, and let Doug attach them? I have a scheme to set up an exhaust fan to cool the attic off, so I won't close the gable event until we're done working.

Music Week today. Probably not much more. Playing Roger Miller right now.

Email (71 messages, still some unopened from Sunday): Didn't get to these either.

Music Week

Expanded blog post, April archive (in progress).

Tweet: Music Week: 33 albums, 5 A-list

Music: Current count 45771 [45738] rated (+33), 29 [21] unrated (+8).

New records reviewed this week:

• Aesop Rock & Homeboy Sandman: Miami Lice: Season Four (2026, Rhymesayers Entertainment): [sp]: B+(***)
• Ali & Charif Megarbane: Tirakat (2026, Habibi Funk): [sp]: B+(*)
• Elles Bailey: Can't Take My Story Away (2026, Cooking Vinyl): [sp]: B+(**)
• Chalk: Crystalpunk (2026, Alter Music): [sp]: B+(***)
• Stew Cutler & Friends: Under Cover (Mostly) (2025 [2026], self-released): [sp]: B+(*)
• The Delines: The Set Up (2026, Decor/El Cortez/Jealous Butcher): [sp]: B+(***)
• Elucid & Sebb Bash: I Guess U Had to Be There (2026, Backwoodz Studioz): [sp]: B+(**)
• Avalon Emerson & the Charm: Written Into Changes (2026, Dead Oceans): [sp]: A-
• Girl Scout: Brink (2026, Human Garbage): [sp]: B+(*)
• Irreversible Entanglements: Future Present Past (2026, Impulse!): [sp]: A-
• DoYeon Kim: Wellspring (2026, TAO Forms): [sp]: B+(*) [05-01]
• Erica von Kleist: Picc Pocket (2025 [2026], self-released): [cd]: B [04-23]
• Kronos Quartet: Glorious Mahalia (2026, Smithsonian Folkways): [sp]: A-
• Buck Meek: The Mirror (2026, 4AD): [sp]: B+(**)
• Fabiano do Nascimento & Vittor Santos E Orquestra: Vila (2026, Far Out): [sp]: B+(*)
• Nubiyan Twist: Chasing Shadows (2026, Strut): [sp]: B
• Bill Orcutt: Music in Continuous Motion (2026, Palilalia): [sp]: B+(**)
• Puma Blue: Croak Dream (2026, PIAS): [sp]: B+(**)
• Raye: This Music May Contain Hope (2026, Human Re Sources): [sp]: B+(***)
• Jill Scott: To Whom It May Concern (2026, Human Re Sources/Blues Babe): [sp]: B+(***)
• Aktu el Shabazz: As Seen on TV (2026, 766303 DK): [sp]: B+(**)
• Snail Mail: Ricochet (2026, Matador): [sp]: B+(*)
• Tyshawn Sorey: Monochromatic Life (Afterlife) (2023 [2026], Dacamera): [sp]: B
• Stu Bangas & Wordsworth: Chemistry (2026, 1332): [sp]: A-
• Thundercat: Distracted (2026, Brainfeeder): [sp]: B+(*)
• Mark Turner: Patternmaster (2024 [2026], ECM): [sp]: B+(*)
• Adrian Younge & Ali Shaheed Muhammad: Jazz Is Dead 26: Antonio Carlos & Jocafi (2026, Jazz Is Dead): [sp]: B+(***)

Recent reissues, compilations, and vault discoveries:

• Eddie Condon: Surprise! Eddie Condon at Town Hall, c. April 1944 (1944 [2026], Jazz Lives): [yt]: B+(***)
• Serengeti: Ajai 2 the Reimagine (2025, self-released): [sp]: B+(*)
• Serengeti: Universe (2022 [2025], CC King): [sp]: B

Old music:

• Kronos Quartet: Howl, U.S.A. (1996, Nonesuch): [sp]: B+(***)
• Kronos Quartet: Long Time Passing: Kronos Quartet & friends Celebrate Pete Seeger (2020, Smithsonian Folkways): [sp]: B+(***)
• Soda Stereo: Canción Animal (1990, Sony): [sp]: B+(*)
• Wordsworth and Stu Bangas: Two Kings (2024, Brutal Music): [sp]: B+(***)

Unpacking: Found in the mail last week:

• Bobby Broom: Notes of Thanks (Steele) [05-01]
• Marie-Paule Franke: Through the Cracks, the Light Is Born (MariPosa) [06-26]
• Phil Haynes/Ben Monder/Peyton Pleninger: Terra (Corner Store Jazz) [05-01]
• Joe Henderson: Consonance: Live at the Jazz Showcase (1978, Resonance, 2CD) [04-18]
• Ahmad Jamal: At the Jazz Showcaswe: Live in Chicago (1976, Resonance) [04-18]
• Tomas Janzon: Jazz Diary (Changes Music) [04-10]
• Paul Kahn: Willingness (Carl Cat) [06-19]
• Jason Kruk: Beyond the Veil (SunGoose) [05-01]
• Yusef Lateef: Alight Upon the Lake: Live at the Jazz Showcase (1975, Resonance, 3CD) [04-18]
• Mal Waldron: Stardust & Starlight: At the Jazz Showcase (1979, Resonance) [04-18]

Daily Log

I seem to have slipped a day here. Sometimes it's hard to keep track of the date, but I think I've been writing Daily Log entries every day. Still, checking the email shows that my April 4 entries were delivered on that day, so what is missing is Sunday, April 5. I find that I've opened very little of my April 5 email, but I do recall writing up a list of Project Syndicate titles, and I undoubtedly noted my Substack stats. Neither of those are to be found below. Most likely explanation is that I had an unsaved file that got wiped out when the system crashed last night. I've been having increasingly frequent crashes, where the screen freezes (at least once with no activity), then after a blackout period shows nothing but noise. I then have to shut down and reboot. I figure this probably means that the graphic card is failing. I should get a replacement.

I did publish the second part of my Iran War Questions series last night. I followed that with a bit of work on Loose Tabs, and I added December 2025 to the Streamnotes index (well, I only got part way through the artist index before losing my temporary buffer, so I have to recreate that). That probably means I can do Music Week today. Got up early, after sleeping poorly, so I don't feel up to much at the moment. Starting a new jigsaw, so maybe I'll take a break and work on that before breakfast. Playing Al Green.

Email (38 messages, including some from April 5):

• Substack stats for "Iran War: The Three Questions": 130 views, 4 likes, 0 subscriptions.
• Project Syndicate: some interesting titles: America Should Beware of Economic Hubris (Mohamed A El-Erian); Why Iran Is Beating America (Brahma Chellaney; I wrote about this in LT); Wars Fought for Fun Cannot Be Won (Timothy Snyder: "thinks the Trump administration's intervention in Iran is doomed because capabilities are dictating policy"); Why America, Not Iran, Has a Succession Problem (Stephen Holmes); When Fools Go to War (Federico Fubini).
• Explain It Daily? I never look at this, but the question is "What causes inflation?" Odds are pretty good that they are wrong. Glancing at it, they made the expected mistake, which is to confuse prices with inflation. Inflation will cause prices to rise, at least in the short term, but rising prices have multiple causes, like supply shortfalls and monopoly rents that have nothing to do with the money supply.

I figure I need to buy a new graphics card for my main writing computer (actually, fairly old at this point; I've built a newer computer, but rarely use it, and it seems to have some problems as well, but more likely software misconfiguration). First thing I thought I'd do was look back through my Amazon orders to see what I've bought in the past:

• [2016-11-19]: ASUS 2GB Graphics Cards R7240-2GD3-L: $54.99; this is probably what's in the computer now, although I also bought:
• [2018-07-07]: ASUS 2GB Graphics Cards R7240-2GD3-L
• [2019-10-31]: XFX Radeon RX 570 RS XXX Edition 1286MHz, 8gb GDDR5, DX12 VR Ready, Dual BIOS, 3xDP HDMI DVI, AMD Graphics Card (RX-570P8DFD6): $149.99; I also ordered a DisplayPort cable, so this dates the newer machine

These dates are sobering, but the older (2016) machine still performs more than adequately. The newer one has some obvious improvements (SD disk, more RAM, but I've never liked the oversized monitor).

When I asked Google for best budget GPUs for Linux, I got:

1. Nvidia Tesla M40 (12GB)
2. Nvidia Quadro P600/P1000
3. AMD Radeon RX 550/RX 460
4. Intel Arc A310
5. Nvidia GTX 1050/1650 (Used)

It noted that Nvidia uses proprietary drivers, but they are "stable." "AMD is generally plug-and-play with open-source drivers in the kernel."

Looking for AMD Radeon, I could get something similar to the old card (2GB) for $35.98. I limited the search to < $150, which offers:

• $139.99: Maxsun AMD Radeon RX 580 8GB dual fans
• $134.99: Mougol AMD Radeon RX 580 8GB GDDR5 dual fans
• $129.99: Mougol AMD Radeon RX 580 8GB dual fans
• $124.99: Radeon RX560 4G with 4 HDMI monitor ports
• $124.99: VisionTek AMD Radeon RX 560 4GB 50w bus power
• $119.99: VisionTek AMD Radeon RX 550 4GB low profile small form, dual DisplayPort
• $109.99: AMD Radeon RX 550 4GB GDDR5
• $88.99: AMD Radeon Pro W 3200 4GB GDDR5 low profile
• $79.97: MSI Radeon RX 550 4GB (renewed)
• $69.99: PowerColor AMD Radeon 550 2GB GDDR5
• $59.99: Mougol AMD Radeon R7 350 4GB low profile

This search started generating some Nvidia leads:

• $279.00: Tesla M40 GPU 12GB GDDR5
• $119.99: MSI Gaming GeForce GT 1030 4GB
• $70.63: MSI GeForce GT 710 2GB GDDR3 low profile
• $67.63: Gigabyte 2GB DDR3 SDRAM GV-N710D3-2GL

I wound up ordering the Maxsun AMD Radeon RX 550 4GB GDDR5 board ($109.99), not the cheapest but offers a small upgrade, seems to have low power requirements (50W, with a fan on board), has DVI/HDMI/DisplayPort, takes two back panel slots, PCI-Express x16, should just drop in. Lead comment was "runs great on my older Linux PC." But adds: "It should be noted that AMD GPUs do not support processing of AI LLMs locally where NVidia GPUs are designed to support AI processing locally." I'm not doing that now. When/if I do, it will probably be time for a new computer, with a major upgrade in power.

Daily Log

Woke up around 8. Read some, then went back to bed, and slept past 11, before coming straight down. I'm relieved to have gotten my Iran War piece up on Substack.

Email (16 messages):

• Substack reaction: 4 likes.
• Tom Carson Substack: Subscription PSA: "I'm charging for subscriptions, but primarily to fund my novel Frankenride." "However, some posts on unrelated topics (politics, pop culture, history, etc.) will be available for free, as will all reprints of old pieces of mine for the Village Voice, Esquire, and other outlets that I think are still worth reading." He's also talking about "wonderful early birds [being] grandfathered in automatically — I can't tell for sure — your existing subscriptions will be comped and all material will stay free as my way of thanking you for being here from the start."
• Michael Steinman: In case you missed it, a 57-minute YouTube of Eddie Condon at Town Hall, announced by Alistair Cooke, c. April 1944.
• Robert Christgau: Joe Boyd's Rhythm Revue. Wonder if I should buy Boyd's book (but I can't imagine having time to read it)? Wasted no time and posted notice on website.
• Sen. Roger Marshall: He is Risen! I guess Easter is coming.
• Checked on my X announcement of the Iran war article: 63 views, 1 like, 1 repost.
• Tom Engelhardt: "Sadly, I'm just not taking new authors out of the blue anymore . . . but appreciate your kind words about TomDispatch."

Daily Log

Came down about 11:15. I went to bed late, and woke up early, but held my position and went back to sleep, as proven by dreams. Got up, played the Beautiful South (two albums), and worked on the jigsaw puzzle. Some chance of rain today. I left the attic work question open, so Doug can decide when/whether he wants to work on it. I spent a little time up there last night. I decided I need to get a hoe out of the garage, as that would be better for clearing off the joists than the rake is. (The rake is better for moving and spreading large amount of insulation.) I also decided not to close up the gable vents for now. I'm thinking about putting an exhaust fan in one, to try to pull some air through. But today I need to work on the Iran war piece. Occurs to me that I should split it in half, running the first three questions first, then the fourth (with its subsidiary questions shortly after). I know that the second needs more work, but all I really need to do is factor in Trump's April Fools speech. And then point out that it doesn't matter whether Iran inflicts more or less pain on the US and Israel: the real harm is self-inflicted, as this war exposes the moral and mental rot of our so-called leaders, and to a large extend of America and Israel as a whole.

Email (38 messages):

• March Substack stats: 1 post, 96 subscribers (+5), 115 post reads (+108).
• Christian Iszchak: An Acute Case.
• Chuck Eddy: Foollow For Now.
• Amazon: 3 books delivered.

I published a piece on my Notes on Everyday Life Substack: Iran War: The Three Questions.

Daily Log

Came down 11:15. I got nothing done on my Iran war piece, and very little done in general: just a load of laundry, and a lot of Mahjongg. I was aware of April Fool's day, but still got pranked twice. Once was in WorldLe, which presented a map for a pair of islands I had never seen before. I initially guessed Mauritius, an island in the Indian Ocean, to get my bearings. The hint was 1798 km north, so I went with the Seychelles. The next hint was 78 km north. I looked at the map, and noticed a bit of similarity to two artificial islands off the east coast, the larger one called Perseverance Island. It wasn't available as an option. I asked Google, and it suggested Bird Island, which was much farther north, and also not available. I looked at the available list, and noticed a few things I had never heard of, starting with San Serriffe. I copied the drop-down menu and separated out two lists: one of islands I was aware of but didn't have a good sense of what their maps looked like; and one of places I had never heard of. I only suspected a joke when I started noticing obviosuly fictional places, like Narnia and Wakanda (and Atlantis and Utopia). Only then did I recall that last Apri 1, they screwed me over by looking for Transylvania — a real place, but not independent, as it is a region within Romania (which I guessed, and was close). For some reason I tried San Serriffe, and that was their answer. Here's an explanation.

The second April Fools Day prank turned out to be Donald Trump's televised "address to the nation," which was touted as announcing the end of the war, and elicited a big stock market bump, but didn't deliver. It did, however, freeze me for the day, as I contemplated having to revise my fourth answer. By disavowing any interest in reopening the Strait of Hormuz, Trump is essentially saying: we (including Israel) are going to bomb as long and as hard as we want, then back off for a while, but not negotiate anything, and return any time we find more things to bomb. On the other hand, the Europe, the Gulf states, anyone else, would be free to open the Strait themselves, which means they will wind up negotiating an agreement with Iran that the US and Israel won't directly be party to, but may (for a while) choose not to interfere with. In some ways, this is a very clever solution, one that allows Trump and Netanyahu to put the war on a back burner without having to concede any mistakes. On the other, it leaves Iranians very bitter, if at the moment rather helpless to do anything about it. I need to work this scenario into my piece.

I'm unlikely to get much done on that today, either. Doug is coming over this afternoon to work on the attic, so that will be my focus for today. I missed my March window for publishing, so a day or two now won't make much difference.

Email (30 messages):

• TomDispatch: Eric Ross, Forever War (Yet Again!)
• Tom Carson: Mar-a-Khargalot. Argues that Trump is not quite unprecedented, offering JFK's "Camelot" as a comparable.
• Robert Wright: New Dimensions of Dumbness in Trump's War.

Daily Log

Another short, uncomfortable sleep night. Came down about 11. Having a hard time getting going today. (Just wrote that at 12:22.) I did order three books from Amazon: Pyet DeSpain's Rooted in Fire (currently checked out from library, and the source of last week's Native American dinner, which worked out so well I decided it would be more efficient just to buy a copy than to write down all of the recipes I might want to make again); The New Native Kitchen (as DeSpain is a bit thin, I thought it would be a good idea to add a bit broader cookbook for context, and this one looked like a good fit); and Peter Fritzsche's Hitler's First Hundred Days (a subject I'm somewhat familiar with, but I figured a refresher would be timely).

Email (30 messages):

• I signed up for Tom Carson's Substack, "The Horrors of Love"
• Laura sent me edits for the Iran piece.
• M7.4 earthquake - Molucca Sea.

Mar 2026

May 2026