Cooking With Sound

I finished another piano piece yesterday and stuck it on Youtube. Here it is. Love those free photos.

I had about half of that when I got up yesterday morning, and I was having problems because the harmony is weird, but I knuckled down and got it done. I had a music lesson scheduled for today, and I did not want to show up empty-handed.

My teacher says this is written in G harmonic minor. I’ll take his word for it.

I think I would go to my lessons just for the conversation, even if I didn’t learn anything. My teacher is an extremely interesting guy, and we have a lot in common. He has a math degree, and his dad was either a physicist or an engineer. I forget which. He’s a conservative Christian. He has an “interesting” family, as I do. He spent years doing transcriptions for music publishers. If you see a “recorded version” book of some rock musician’s tunes, there’s a good chance my teacher wrote it.

He’s always telling me not to underestimate myself. That’s good to hear. I don’t have any real training, and I don’t have enough character to study theory with any kind of intensity, so I don’t know much about the technical side of music. It’s easy to feel like I’m not going to write anything worthwhile. But he keeps telling me the ear is what matters.

Evidently, a lot of tedious musical training is intended to give untalented or inexperienced people something many people already have: the ability to know what’s good when they hear it. I didn’t realize that. I thought everyone could tell what was good or bad, or what was discordant. My teacher says that is not the case. Today he told me it was a waste of time for me to study certain things, because they teach things I already have.

I studied under a classical pianist for three or four years, and while it was a great experience, I did not learn what I needed to learn. I learned a little bit of sight-reading, and I mastered (sort of) several tunes, but I never got to the point where I felt at home inside written music. I didn’t develop the ability to transcribe.

I got a lot of terrible advice. I talked to my teacher about it today. People told me that if I played scales, everything would start to make sense. I learned all the scales. I got to where I could play any major scale with my right hand while playing any other with my left, and I got absolutely nothing out of it. He says he’s not surprised. He studied guitar scales until he could rip them off at 10 notes per second, and he didn’t get anything out of it either. He says the main reason to learn scales is to learn sets of notes that sound good together. Some people are not born with this feel for harmony.

He says he gets in a lot of arguments with people who push the theoretical approach. They assume he’s against it because he doesn’t know anything about it, but then if they start quizzing him, God help them. He knows everything, backwards and forwards.

Today he told me he has taught a lot of people who got degrees in music and were still unable to write or do the other things they wanted to do. Apparently, many music instructors teach ABOUT music without teaching people how to make it or feel it.

This makes complete sense to me. Music existed before theory existed, just as the physical world moved and changed before physics existed. Notation and theory are very clumsy compared to music itself. It takes a great deal of knowledge to notate what people like Ella Fitzgerald have done instinctively.

Like I told him at my lesson, I can sit down and hear a SYMPHONY in my head right now. That’s not a problem. What I need is the ability to write it down.

Here’s what he told me today:

Sounded great, my friend and using harmonic minor and hearing it so well is something I hope you do not take for granted. You are cashing in on some great influences to hear something that isn’t easy to hear and most people struggle with it for a very long time before their ear can even come close to what you can already do. NICE!

If I were plodding along with a method or a course, I would not be writing music yet, and I would have no idea that I had any potential. It’s wonderful to get a little confirmation from a real expert.

I have two challenges to overcome, as far as I can see. First, I need to man up and master timing. Sometimes I avoid writing complex passages I can hear in my mind, because it’s too hard to do the notation. I think it would be smart to study drums, although I’m afraid I’d kill myself after a week. I really do not like drums. But drummers can–well SHOULD BE ABLE TO–play any written rhythm you put in front of them, so presumably, a person who studies drums will have timing by the throat. Second thing: I need to get intervals under control. If you know how intervals sound, and you know how to write rhythms, you can write music on the fly.

Right now I tend to write things with fairly simple timing, and I try to be somewhat repetitive. That’s because it’s self-indulgent to write one original measure after another. Nobody wants to hear that. If you hear a nice musical idea, you want to hear it one or two more times before the piece ends. If every passage is a fresh variation, the audience gets cheated. I try to keep things simple because I’m trying to write popular music, not Chopin, but sooner or later I’ll want to do something a little more liberating.

It’s good to have a teacher who believes in me. I love what I’m doing, but I don’t have his competence, so I’m not as good a judge of my ability. When I hear good things from a source that can’t be assailed credibly, it gives me motivation to do more work. I’m supposed to be doing written interval and key exercises. I actually did a little this week. He gives me great advice all the time, and I do about 10% of what he tells me to do, so eventually, I would like to start doing more.

It will be interesting to see where this goes. I have six tunes registered with the LOC right now. A year from now, it should be at least thirty, and they will be more complex.

God will give you the desires of your heart. He didn’t create you to be a cubicle slave, unless that’s your thing. He is not a bad boss. Trust in him, get to know the Spirit, spend time in prayer, and good things will happen. Give it a shot. You’ll be surprised.

Always Nice to Get Constructive Feedback

I’m getting trolled again.

I guess I should be honored. After all, “Blessed are ye, when men shall hate you, and when they shall separate you from their company, and shall reproach you, and cast out your name as evil, for the Son of man’s sake.”

Someone who is so concerned about discovery he or she (I will use “she,” arbitrarily, since “he or she” is tiresome) won’t even use an Internet handle is coming to my blog and posting comments ridiculing the Holy Spirit and, of course, me.

I don’t understand the anonymity. I don’t go after people. I’m not going to get in the truck and go shoot someone. I don’t even engage them on the Internet. There is little to fear from me personally. I can understand using a handle, but if you won’t even go that far, you’re overdoing it.

I think she may be an anti-Semite. She made approving reference to a name which appears on a weird, obscure, anti-Semitic blog.

I’ve received 2 trolling comments. It may be that they came from different people, but I don’t think so.

Summary:

1. Prayer in tongues is stupid and crazy.

2. My music is really bad and will never amount to anything.

3. I am conceited because I think my music is better than the worst music I’ve heard on TV.

4. I claimed I was going to be a famous humorist, and that didn’t happen.

5. It’s good that I didn’t have kids.

6. I am insane.

I think that’s most of it.

I don’t think I claimed I was going to be a famous humorist, although I did have hopes. If that had happened, I would have been lost. I’d want nothing to do with God. I’d be spending money and living for myself. I’d be praying for three minutes on a good day. Thank God it didn’t work out.

When I saw the last comment, the obvious Bible verse came into my head: “Blessed are ye, when men shall hate you, and when they shall separate you from their company, and shall reproach you, and cast out your name as evil, for the Son of man’s sake.”

Criticizing someone for praying in tongues is reproach for the Son of man’s sake. Jesus died partly so we could be saved, but also in order to give us the gifts and fruit of the Holy Spirit. His primary mission on earth was to make it possible for the Holy Spirit to live in us and make us like Jesus. This is a horrifying thing to Satan. It’s the reason he killed and tortured early Christians. Once the Holy Spirit was driven out, persecution dropped off, and the church went mainstream, with much less opposition. When people insult you because you’re obeying God, you know you’ve hit a nerve. Satan doesn’t activate his puppets for nothing.

I used to have endless trolls. I was something of a troll myself. By that I mean I engaged in pointless carnal disputes, and I went out of my way to provoke foolish people. I try to avoid blogging about politics these days, and I think it has reduced the troll population, but not all trolls are political. Some hate God. And they hate God’s people, for no reason.

I don’t plan to approve troll comments. That may seem unfair to people who think everyone has a God-given right to have their point of view published, but as I’ve said for many years, my blog is not a forum. If you want to insult me, do it with your own money, somewhere else.

I also block troll IPs. A stubborn troll can always find a way to get here, but I might be able to discourage the weak ones.

It’s kind of remarkable that a person would show up to hit me with discouraging lies, when the things I’m writing are so non-confrontational. I understood it back when I was making fun of Al Gore and the BDS people. When someone attacks you or someone you idolize, you may get angry. But this nameless person is angry because I pray in tongues and because I like the music I write. That’s strange.

The music is going really well. With God’s help, I have figured out how to come up with original melodies, so it looks like I’m going to have a copious supply of material. More than I know what to do with. When God says our cups run over, he is not kidding. I’m not going to be able to finish all the tunes I come up with. I’ll have to start doing triage. If things keep going the way they are, I’ll end up with a tremendous library of original music. My hope is that some of it will be accepted and used, but it will be nice to have, even if I’m the only one who enjoys it.

My new Internet friend may not like what I’m doing, but my teacher–an actual musician with outstanding credentials–does. Here’s something crazy. He composed a new tune and put it on Youtube. At my last lesson, he said I had inspired him. If it weren’t for me, he probably would not have done it. That’s amazing! God used me to wake someone up. And the worship leader at my church is also excited. He composes, but he has been putting it off. Now that I’m doing what he’s supposed to do, he says he has new motivation!

As for prayer in tongues, the things that are happening at my church are astonishing. My pastor has been teaching about the Holy Spirit. Suddenly, he’s telling us things I tried to tell the people at Trinity Church for several years. The things that got me ostracized are now being proclaimed from the pulpit, by an authority figure. The leadership at Trinity Church had no respect for me or the Holy Spirit. The whole operation was a mechanism intended to promote the pastor and his family, and they did not want to spook people. Now I’m at a church where the Holy Spirit is taking over.

On Tuesday, the pastor had us pray in tongues as a group. I would guess we went about 15 minutes. I didn’t know what to say. I was watching a dream come true. The shoots are coming out of the ground. The final fire is lit, and this time, Satan will not be able to put it out, because this time, God is not going to rely on man to keep it going. It’s like the restoration of Israel. In the past, Israel’s situation depended on how the Jews treated God. Now it’s different. In order for prophecy to come true, God has to get in there and make things happen, regardless of how badly his people behave. It’s grace this time, more than before.

My own prayer life gets better and better. Sometimes I get so far into the Spirit, I feel as though my attachment to the physical world is almost broken, and I tell God I’m ready to leave if he wants to take me. I get new breakthroughs in faith and revelation all the time. Every time one comes, I think it can’t get any better than that, and then the next one comes, and it’s better.

Things keep improving. God has made it clear that certain things are going to happen for me. I wish everyone could get what I’m getting. It’s so easy, but people reject it. Or they never find out about it.

One of the things that comes out in my music is the sorrow over the people who aren’t going to make it. In nature, many are born, and few survive. Even in the moment of conception, millions of sperm cells die, and only one survives. In the kingdom of God, it doesn’t have to be like that. Provision has been made for all of us. But most of us will not know God, and most of us will go to hell. There isn’t much we can do about it. If the situation could be fixed, God would have taken care of it. Many of the people I see around me now are going to disappear permanently. I won’t know them much longer.

I am starting to see unsaved people as unreal. In a way, this is correct. Is anything real, if it doesn’t last? The unsaved show up for a while, make a little noise, and then vanish for good. A person’s life shouldn’t be like condensed breath on a windowpane, that appears for a minute and then dissipates. But this is how most lives go. The unsaved matter. But their presence is temporary, and the things they do will be erased, as though they had never happened. Ten thousand years from now, who will even think about them?

I don’t plan the music I write. The tunes come to me, and I write them down. I don’t think they express some true “voice” within me. They’re not what I expected to write. Maybe God is expressing something through me. I hope that as my skills improve, his music will come through me more clearly and in better quality. I can’t wait to see what’s ahead.

Pray for the trolls. In God’s kingdom, like the fairy tale, a troll can live under a bridge, but she won’t cross it.

Now With Added TULIPS

I finished a new piece of music, applied for a copyright registration, and stuck it on Youtube.

Here it is. I hope you like it.

I got the photos from a public domain photo site.

It’s funny how this works now. Sometimes I wonder if I’m going to get anything written. Then I pray, and I get to work. I usually put in about 90 minutes, and then I feel God’s peace descend on me, and I realize it’s time to quit.

I got myself a new digital piano. The toy keyboard I was using was driving me nuts.

Some of the computerized instruments can be shrill. Hopefully real musicians with actual instruments will play it some day.

Psalm 37:4.

Sow a Seed at the Library of Congress

Yesterday at church a couple of friends showed me a banner that had been created for a campaign called “I Love my Church.” They wanted to protect the design, and they were talking about the money involved. They were talking about thousands of dollars. It has been maybe eleven years since I practiced IP law, and I’ve forgotten most of what I knew, but I knew enough to tell them the figure was a little high. My first boss loved money more than air, and he only charged $120 for a copyright application.

I thought about the music I’ve been composing. It’s all on Youtube. People have suggested I protect it. I turned on my PC and researched it. It turns out getting a copyright registration is easier than ever.

You don’t have to do ANYTHING in order to get a copyright. Everything you create is automatically copyrighted. But you may have to prove priority in court, and back when I was practicing, the federal courts wouldn’t even entertain a suit until you showed them a copyright certificate. Getting an official registration is smart. It’s also cheap.

I’ll tell you what I learned. The Library of Congress (the folks who are in charge of copyrights) has a new (to me) website. The location is http://www.copyright.gov. If you have a musical recording (or anything else) you want to copyright, this is where you go. Depending on the nature of the work, you may be able to upload a copy electronically, so you don’t even have to buy a stamp.

You have to create an account, and any information you supply will be in the public record. You’ll have to give them a mailing address. It might be smart to get a P.O. box.

The fee is $35 per work, but you can cheat. If you write 300 songs, you can put them in one body and call them one work. I had one tune that was finished in 2012 and three that were finished in 2013, so I grouped them separately and applied for two registrations.

The ins and outs of the process are extremely confusing. You’ll have to figure out which category to put your work in, and you may find yourself pulling your hair out before you’re done. I’m a lawyer, and it drove me nuts for about an hour.

If you create a musical composition, turn it into a recording, and master the recording yourself (as I did), you can cover all three things (melody, recording, and production) in one registration. You don’t have to send them sheet music.

I’m not charging for this info, and you’re not my clients, so it may be totally wrong. Don’t rely on it. But it may be helpful to people who have stuff to protect.

It’s very exciting, having those certificates on the way. I’ve never registered anything before. Not on my own behalf. Now if I turn on the TV and hear one of my tunes playing, it will be easy to turn the perpetrator into my employee, taking the royalties and doing no work, apart from what I’ve already done.

I don’t think this will happen, but you never know. A lot of the crap you hear on TV is not as good as my work. A sleazy jingle writer could find worse things to steal.

I’m going to have to leave my tunes on Youtube as long as possible, because they will also be evidence of priority. The copyright certificates will provide the years in which things were written, but they won’t provide dates. What if some goof copyrighted one of them right after I uploaded it? I’d need something to wave in the judge’s face.

I suppose it sounds a little arrogant, suggesting someone might want to come after my obscure, simple tunes. Think of the bad music you’ve heard on the radio. If that garbage can be stolen by infringers, so can my work.

If people end up paying for my work, it means that right now, God is giving me wealth. I have to make sure I don’t leave it out on the curb for people to steal.

God has helped me understand that copyright is the best form of IP protection. To get a patent, you have to do a gigantic amount of work and spend thousands of dollars, and you get a limited period of protection. Trademarks aren’t useful for most people, and they’re a lot of aggravation to get. To get a copyright, you spend five minutes filling out a form and uploading a file, and the copyright will outlive you. And creating a work of writing or music is WAY easier than inventing something. To a person who understands the mathematical nature of the world, it should be obvious that there is huge potential in copyright, and a bigger return for the effort.

In other news, I’ve had a big faith breakthrough. I’ve learned a few things.

First of all, prayer in tongues keeps paying off. It’s the single most powerful, most important thing I do. If I ever got to the point where my life was so crazy I had to make hard choices, prayer in tongues would be the last thing I gave up. Everything I’ve believed about it has proven to be true. Everything. The more you do it, the better off you’ll be, in every way. It will fuel your life and put a foundation under it.

Second thing: last week, God showed me that when I’m struggling to believe, I shouldn’t necessarily think about the big prayers he has answered. I’ve found that it’s more helpful to think about the little prayers he answers consistently. Does God help you find your car keys every time you pray? Think about that when you pray for him to heal you of cancer. God spoke the galaxies into existence. He can put a new leg on you just as easily as he can tell you where your sunglasses are.

This is much more powerful than it sounds. Try it.

Third thing: when you pray in tongues, keep this in mind: the words are God’s, not yours. God is speaking. He is using your voice, but it’s still him, and his words have power proportional to the faith you supply as you speak. If you think about this while you pray, your faith will be supernaturally increased. Somehow, the Holy Spirit responds to it. He will rise up inside you and support your faith. Your mind will be “stayed” (propped up) on God, as Isaiah said: “Thou wilt keep him in perfect peace, whose mind is stayed on thee: because he trusteth in thee (Isaiah 26:3).”

This is not a feel-good tip or a motivational tool. It is not carnal, like the garbage the self-help preachers teach. It is a key to supernatural power.

God has set his seal on some things he is doing for me and some people around me. He has told me this in faith. When your faith reaches a certain point, God will stamp a prayer as “done.” I’m not going to list the things that are coming my way, but I know they’re done. He has sealed things for me before, and he has come through. I think the funniest example was the Coral Gables pickup truck ban. He told me he was going to defeat the people who were trying to bring it back, and even though they voted to restore it, they failed. I have to admit, I laughed. These people were so sure their carnal efforts mattered, and they got so wound up. But it was all a waste of their time. They might as well have stayed home.

Don’t expect it to happen if you neglect the gift of tongues. God has gone to great trouble and pain to put a weapon in your hand. If you won’t use it, don’t whine when you fail. God is not a puppeteer; he will not pick up your limp body and move the limbs and the tongue to cause you to do and say what you should in order to be blessed. He has done so much already; he has taken a thousand steps toward you. If you won’t take one step toward him, you are not worth saving. If you won’t take the easy path he has provided, he may not help you. He may literally allow your enemies to murder you. You would not be the first.

Listen and Dream of Lunch

I published a new piece of music. As I have said elsewhere, it’s not really the kind of thing I wanted to write, but it was too good to throw out.

I’m surprised how well the composing is going. My teacher told me not to underestimate myself, and he’s right. Yesterday I listened to a piano piece written by Rachmaninoff, adapted by Kreisler, and played by Ashkenazi. It was horrible. I could not understand why Rachmaninoff wrote it in the first place, although I did recall something he once said. Someone asked him what inspired him to write a certain piece, and he said something like, “Two hundred dollars.” I am too lazy to Google the exact quotation.

Much of the classical music critics, conductors, and musicians have chosen to preserve and play is really bad. I may never write anything that will become famous, but I’m positive I can produce work which is better than the worst things great composers wrote.

Anyway, here it is.

NEXT CHALLENGE!

I got my latest musical composition whipped into shape. I want to make it longer, but the basic idea is finished.

It’s a really sad piece. It makes me think of the way believers are going to have to leave others behind. I named it “Out of Sodom.” Maybe I’ll come up with a name I like better.

I put it on Youtube, with a bunch of photos I hope are in the public domain.

I’m starting to feel like I’ll be able to write good music whenever I want. Things are breaking loose.

It’s so great to be able to do the things I’ve always wanted to do. God opens doors, redeems, and restores.

Follow the Pillar of Fire

I want to pass on a little advice. It’s a piece of knowledge that has been useful to me.

As many Christians know, the Bible is like the Constitution (or any other set of laws). It provides many benefits, but you won’t necessarily receive them unless you apply. It’s like the Fifth Amendment. The cops can’t question you after say you want an attorney, but if you don’t assert your right, they’ll question you anyway. There are many things God will do for you whether or not you ask, but on the whole, it’s best to make your needs known and stand on God’s promises.

Here’s a promise which is particularly useful: “The steps of a good man are ordered by the Lord: and he delighteth in his way. Though he fall, he shall not be utterly cast down: for the Lord upholdeth him with his hand.” That’s Psalm 37, verses 23 and 24. It’s clearly a general promise available to all. It doesn’t say “a good Jewish man” or “a good man who sacrifices at the temple” or “a good man with freckles.”

Lately, I’ve been bringing this promise up in prayer, more than once a day. I ask God to honor it until the next time I ask. I believe prayer is like manna in that you shouldn’t rely on yesterday’s ration, so I think it’s important to ask repeatedly and not to expect the prayer to keep you going for the rest of your life. There are some things you only have to ask for once, or which you can stop asking for, once God confirms he will do what you want, but it pays not to take chances.

I remind him of similar promises. The Bible says that when your father and mother forsake you, the Lord will take you up. It says you will hear his voice behind you, telling you which way to turn. It says he will lead you in the paths of righteousness for his name’s sake.

I also ask God to lead my enemies onto the points of their own swords and to hold them there until they repent.

What I’ve found is that when I make this request, things go better. There is less dead time in the day. I get things done. I spend less time goofing off or wandering in confusion. Life is more organized. There is less stress.

This prayer got me over the hump with CAD software. As I wrote earlier, I’m finally able to use it. And it has also led to greater musical productivity. I’m getting all sorts of good melodies written down. I really think I’m going to get to the point where I’ll be selling music. It’s going to be good enough to publish. That’s amazing. Music can be extremely lucrative. You only need one successful work to keep you fed and clothed when you’re retired.

I suggest you try asking God for guidance, daily. See what happens.

I’m very excited about music, because I’ve come to realize that writing music requires the same gift as cooking. It’s really no different. When you write recipes, it comes from inspiration. You’ll be sitting around thinking about other things, and suddenly you’ll imagine a flavor or a texture, and the way to create it, and you’ll write it down and try it. Your imagination tells you what will taste good, and your work only serves to confirm it. When you write music, melodies that “taste good” to the ear come into your mind, and all you have to do is write them in musical notation. If it sounds good, it IS good. That’s the only test.

I find that God is as willing to give me tunes as he is recipes. And here’s one great thing about music: you don’t have to make a mess in order to create it. You don’t have to drive to the store and buy food. You don’t have to wreck the kitchen. And when it’s done, you can preserve it forever, and you can email it and publish it with very little effort.

I don’t know how I would go about finding a market for music, but I’m sure there’s a way. When I have a portfolio built up, I should be able to do something with it.

I consider myself a writer and a creator of music. I think those are the things I should focus on. The other stuff is great, but I believe it deserves less priority. No one will ever pay me to run a lathe, and no one will ever draw closer to God while listening to me make a pizza.

I’ll put up the piece I’m working on now. I was shooting for something resembing a spiritual, but it has more of a classical sound. I love classical music. There’s no reason why I can’t enjoy writing it. I know it’s not fashionable, and composers are expected to come up with inventive new forms of music no one can stand to listen to, but only a moron would say the genre is exhausted. There is a lot of classical music, but only some of it is truly great. There is still a big need to fill. I’m always frustrated because my favorite composers (Chopin, Debussy, Rachmaninoff, and Beethoven) didn’t leave more work, and I’m sure other people feel the same way.

Chopin actually had some of his works burned when he died. Unbelievable.

This piece isn’t done. It’s very short, and there are lots of things I may want to do with it. But it does show that things are going well.

12 31 E Minor Piece

Get connected to the power supply and see what God will do for you. I think he is leading a lot of people out of the spiritual dark ages.

Observations From the Life of a Runaway Slave

More stuff is breaking loose in my life.

For as long as I can remember, I’ve wanted to be able to use tools. I wanted to be able to fix things and make things. A few years ago, I started making it happen. I got a table saw, milling machine, lathe, welder, and a bunch of other stuff. I’ve enjoyed it tremendously, but it seemed like I was being restrained. I was never able to make myself come to terms with CAD software, and there were essential things I chose not to buy, because I was cheap.

Over the last couple of months, I’ve returned to the workshop. I’ve spent some money; a low four-figure sum. I picked up a few little things that made things much, much easier, and plans I had put on the back burner are beginning to come to fruition.

I also got started with CAD. Og and other Internet friends gave me advice about this a few years back, and I tried a few things, but I got nowhere. It was very frustrating. I’m not going to say what my IQ is, but it’s sufficiently high that you would think mastering a piece of software would not be beyond me, and I was completely confused. I could have fixed the problem by spending tons of money on training, but I already felt a little queasy about the money I had spent on tools.

A few weeks back, I started looking at the programs again. Og had recommended Allycad and Alibre Design, and I looked into other things, like Turbocad, Autocad, and Draftsight. I wanted 3D, because I don’t need the aggravation of trying to picture a pile of 2D drawings as an assembled machine, so I ruled out simple, free programs.

I signed up (again) for a free Alibre trial, and once again, I was utterly flummoxed. I could barely draw a line. If you ever want to fully grasp the meaning of the word “counterintuitive,” try this software, or any CAD software. Alibre publishes a book of step-by-step exercises, and I downloaded a few pages, but it turned out the book is completely obsolete. It goes with a user interface which bears little resemblance to the current version and is currently unobtainable. I was going to give up and get Turbocad, plus training, but then I found the Youtube video that appears below.

That guy does everything wrong. Anyone who produces training videos knows that you go step-by-step, and you include every detail. He doesn’t do that. He flies, and he leaves things out. And it WORKS. Watching the video, I managed to draw an oddly-shaped tub with chamfered edges.

That was a breakthrough. Using what I had learned, I was able to go through the first three exercises in the Alibre book. I managed to translate the old interface into the new. Here’s a useless and unrealistic part I created (but did not design).

I say it’s useless because you can’t really attach the flat piece to the handle and axle that way. If it’s a press fit, the thickness of the metal can’t go to zero around the inserted portion of the metal, and there is also nothing there to allow a real-world weld. But that doesn’t matter. I drew it successfully, so now I have a foothold in the world of CAD. I’m ordering the rest of the design book. And I bought the program, which, “coincidentally,” was on sale for 50% off this week.

This may seem unimportant, but it’s a huge leap. The actual work you do when you make things is of trivial importance. What really matters is the design. Most of the act of creation is mental. The actual cutting and welding…that’s just housekeeping. I would rather design a thousand parts and make one than make a thousand and design one. If I can use CAD, I can exercise my creativity, and I can keep the results forever.

You can do all sorts of stuff with CAD. I don’t know much about it, but my impression is that you can send designs by email, print them, use them in patent and product submissions, have parts made from them, and even send them to machines that crank the parts out for you. Compared to anything that existed thirty years ago, that is godlike power.

So I’m happy about that. And I’m getting interested in 3D printers. They make actual parts from sturdy plastic, at a cost which is not prohibitive for a hobbyist. My gut tells me that as the technology advances, ordinary CNC may go the way of manual machining. Who knows what they’ll be able to do with lasers and plasma in the future? Today it’s plastic. Tomorrow, you may be able to cut metal on a printer, in your own house. And prices are dropping. In ten years, everyone will have a 3D printer, or they’ll have them at Home Depot, to be engaged at affordable prices.

This is exciting. It gives individuals a level of control they’ve never had before. Democrats are already wetting their pants over it, because it will make home gun manufacturing easier. There isn’t one thing they can do to stop it. They can pass laws, but we all know how well gun control laws work. And the First Amendment will guarantee that people will be able to pass designs around.

Sooner or later, technology is going to make us so powerful that Democrats are going to have to give up on controlling the means and look toward improving the man. And only God can do that.

I am not interested in printing guns, but the possibility shows how powerful the new technology will be. The printing principal is packed with potential. It provides mankind with a type of leverage that rivals the mental augmentation of computers. In fact, it’s the reason computers exist. If we couldn’t print circuits, the PC would be impossible.

So the CAD thing is good news.

Here’s another thing: I’m getting more original music. I used to have a constant flow of variations on existing tunes, but I wasn’t really able to write original music. Common sense told me the same gift had to be the source of both types of music, but it wasn’t happening for me. Lately, that has changed. I get original tunes more and more often. I got several over the last few days, and they’re not bad. Composition is like cooking with sound, so if you know what tastes good to the ear, you should be able to write good music. I’m going to write some worthwhile stuff, if God stays with me.

I used to be bummed out because I didn’t receive original tunes. Now I realize there’s a new danger. Soon I’m going to receive more tunes than I can finish. What do I do then? I keep reminding myself that it’s better to waste than to want.

It’s wonderful to be able to budget and economize, but truthfully, I don’t think that’s what God intended for us. I think he wanted us to live in such abundance that things would serve us, instead of lack that requires us to serve things. If you have too much, you can focus on what you’re doing. If you have too little, you have to focus on getting more. You shouldn’t serve the dollar; the dollar should serve you. I would rather have more than I need and have to give things away or even throw them out than not have enough. It’s better to receive a hundred tunes and write three than to receive and write one.

Here’s a hard thing to accept: God is not against waste. Or at least, he reckons waste differently than we do. That’s my opinion, based on my observations. Consider the loaves and fishes. Did God pass out just enough? No, he gave the people so much, they had baskets of scraps left over. Consider Solomon. God gave him so much, he really didn’t know what to do with it. Consider the way America used to be blessed. We fed the world, and then we let crops rot, because we had no place to put them. God told the Jews not to harvest every square foot they planted. They were ordered to leave crops untouched, in case the poor wanted them. What we call “waste” is a symptom of abundance.

This principle is found over and over in the Bible. We are told that he who waters will be watered. We’re told that being stingy will make us poor. We’re told that when we’re asked to carry something one mile, we carry it two. God ordered the Jews to give up about 14% of every work week, plus holidays, in times that were very, very hard, when every penny counted. I believe we’re supposed to have and give more than we need. Otherwise, there will always be gaps that aren’t filled.

I don’t think God wants me to work hard. I think he wants me to have ample time to pray and minister every day. I believe that every hour I spend in prayer saves me hours of work, just as the sabbath made the Jews more successful. And I think God is going to give me many more tunes than I can complete. I am an heir, and this is how heirs live. Our cups run over, our yokes are easy, and our burdens are light. Or God is a liar.

I think excessive devotion to work is a Satanic notion. It seems very natural to expect people to earn things. The problem with that is that God wants to give us things that are greater than what we can earn. I believe we limit him when we insist on earning.

Think of the beggar the disciples healed. They didn’t ask him to do their laundry or make a pilgrimage on his belly. They touched him and healed him, for nothing, and he got the use of his legs back. If he had had to earn that, he would have stayed on the ground for the rest of his life.

A while back, some Obama underling told the press the Bible said, “God helps those who help themselves.” Clearly, this person was not familiar with the Bible. The Bible does not say that. It says you shouldn’t be lazy. But it doesn’t say blessings come primarily by, or with the prerequisite of, great effort. Not unless you’re cursed.

Adam didn’t earn the title to the earth or his life of ease in Eden. Noah didn’t earn preservation in the Ark. Lot didn’t earn his angelic rescue. Samson didn’t earn his strength. Gideon didn’t earn his improbable victory. These examples are shown to us to make us understand that faith, submission, and humility are what bring us blessings and power.

Offhand, I can only think of one person in the Bible who thought he had earned his blessings, and that person was Job. And God set him straight, but good.

Satan wants us to think we have to earn things. With this lie, he gets us to devote way too much time to work and way too little time to prayer. And then we don’t get what he promises. For example, you may get rich, but your family may be messed up because you weren’t around to pray for them and teach them.

Prayer is job one. I’m sure of it. Quite literally, prayer is an investment. It is the seed God gives the sower, and in your season, you will get the harvest.

I feel much freer than I did before. I feel like the restraints are being removed. In ignorance, I buried myself in curses, but God is washing me clean and killing their effects.

Spend time praying in tongues every day. Try to make it add up to at least an hour. And pray for God to guide your steps, leading you to the experiences you need to have. Good things will happen. It may take time, as a tree takes time to bear fruit, but it will happen.

Marvel at my Video Skills

Here is the more-or-less final version of my second original composition. I decided to name it New Dawn, after my church, and after what I think God is up to in the world. I had to use Youtube. Couldn’t figure out any other way to put in on Facebook. Hope you like it.

Psalms 37:4
Zechariah 4:6

They had it Coming

My former church has finally gone completely insane.

Today they welcomed Kim Kardashian. Yes, the Kim Kardashian who poses nude. The sex-tape Kim Kardashian. I don’t know if they took her into the green room so she could bless the pastors with her wisdom, but she tweeted about her presence at church, and they proudly re-tweeted it.

People are saying it’s wonderful that she went to church. Uh…no, it’s NOT wonderful. Not unless she repented. Churches are supposed to welcome REPENTANT sinners. The other kind screw churches up.

Think of it as an immigration problem. Say you live in a Christian nation, and Muslims start showing up. When there are 50 of them, it’s no big deal. When they’re 50% of the population…big deal. You’re going to have Sharia law, honor killings, an end to the pork industry, lots of terrorism…it will be bad. When sinners come to a church and don’t change their ways, and their numbers get too high, they convert the church. Not that this would be a big change for Trinity. It’s barely a church as it is.

I was furious when I heard about this. It’s bad enough that the pastor sucked up to R. Kelly, who narrowly avoided conviction on a statutory rape beef with video evidence. Do they really need to use Kim Kardashian to prove they’ve made it?

The name “Kardashian” used to be associated with top-notch legal representation. Those days are gone. Now it connotes promiscuity, nudity, stupidity, and shallowness. As the good book would put it, it has “become a proverb.” Why would any pastor be proud this person came to his church? Only a desperate self-promotor or a feckless infant could think this was a good thing.

It would be wonderful if Miss Kardashian went to a church and told everyone she regretted all the dumb things she had done. I’d be the first to welcome her. Well, actually, I think a woman should do that, just to be safe. But I would be all for it. But for her to roll in and out with no evidence of change…how is that a victory for anyone?

I really blew up about this on Facebook. The gloves are off. I said the leaders of the church clearly did not know the Bible, and I posted a long series of verses about respecting persons. The pastors are like children. It’s as though they had never heard of the Bible. This stuff is obvious to teenagers who read the word, but these adults don’t have a clue. Or they just don’t care, which is looking pretty likely.

Some lady tried to “correct” me, saying I should not “touch” God’s “anointed.” That’s sad. Preachers have succeeded in brainwashing many Christians, so they will cover up their pastors’ backslidden behinds. They say all sorts of curses fall on those who speak up. But God didn’t curse Jesus, Paul, Isaiah, Micaiah, Malachi, Peter, Jude, Jeremiah, Samuel, Nathan, or any of the other Biblical figures (or if you’re Catholic, figurines) who spoke up. If you took the negative remarks out of the Bible, the remaining text would be a pamphlet.

She said I should only correct people privately. But she said that publicly, which is a little hard to explain.

As Perry Stone teaches, there is a difference between “anointing” and “gift.” A person who is anointed has God’s authority to do some job or other. He has God’s approval. Anointing is not always permanent. God anointed Saul, and he took the anointing away. A gift is a natural or supernatural ability. It may persist when the anointing leaves. This is why truly foul preachers sometimes continue to function in their gifts. It helps explain why some very bad churches stay very big for quite some time.

Anyway, a preacher who teaches false tradition and serves his belly is not acting under an anointing. Not in my book. And because they commit their sins publicly, it only makes sense to correct them publicly. Besides, the leaders of Trinity Church know exactly what they’re doing wrong. People have spoken up. They just don’t care.

God is not going to stand up and give me leprosy for criticizing people who milk the poor and lie to them. If he did things like that, John the Baptist would have exploded. Repeatedly.

Quite honestly, I think these people are idiots. I have tried to show restraint. I’ve said I disagreed with them. I’ve said they were off the path. But after a time, you have to start using terms like “idiot.” Even Jesus did it. After a certain point, mildly critical language just doesn’t do the job. If you speak about foolish people too respectfully, there is a danger that other people will not understand just how foolish they are. “I’m going to try Trinity Church.” “DON’T!” “Why not?” “They’re…missing the mark.” “Well, I’ll just check it out.” “THEY’RE IDIOTS! THEY’RE IDIOTS! DANGER! DANGER!”

I think God takes a similar approach. He starts by sending you little hints. Then he sends people to correct you. Then he might let you get a physical illness. He might let you suffer defeat. Eventually, if you keep pushing it, he buries you in burning sulfur and pitch. Or he sends you to hell.

I wish I had never heard about this. I don’t want to spend the rest of my life reflecting on the stupid behavior of a group of carnal ministers. But there it is. And I don’t investigate this stuff. People bring it to me.

How about some positive news? Today Apostle Michael Tomasulo visited my church. My denomination, or whatever it is, is big on apostles. They seem like the real thing. They have shown up and said some very solid, very impressive things. Mr. Tomasulo is one of them.

I met him on his last visit. He’s an EE (electrical engineer). I was building guitar amps at the time, so I was really glad to meet him. I have a lot of weird interests, so it’s always comforting to meet someone who can relate. When I meet a person who shares one of my interests, it’s like meeting someone from home. Which is odd. And I can’t combine all, or even most, of my interests in one friend. I have to have an assortment. The gun friend. The cooking friend. The physics friend. The law friend. And so on.

Today he lit into TBN (he can’t stand watching it) and megachurches that teach self-help and motivational gibberish. LIKE TRINITY. He said exactly what I was saying to my prayer group three years ago. I said we didn’t need Dr. Phil and Oprah. I said motivational speakers were not what God wanted for us. He said these things today, even referring to Dr. Phil and his mothership. I saw a preacher on TBN say the same things last year (no word on whether his body has been found). God tells all of his people the same things. The church is unified, as Jesus prayed it would be. It’s just scattered. Like golden tickets in a pile of worldly Wonka bars.

Before he spoke, and before I knew what he would talk about, I put this on Facebook: “At my old church we had great motivational speakers who promised God would make us rich if we gave them money. Here at New Dawn Ministries, we have to settle for prophecy.”

Lately I’ve been getting back into tools, and I’ve started watching engineering lectures. Engineers don’t know where formulas come from. Physicists do, but they don’t know what to do with them, so I’m hoping to bridge the gap a little. I’ve been watching EE and ME stuff from NPTEL (Indian universities) and other sources. Today I decided to ask Mr. Tomasulo a few things, to see if he could steer me in the right direction. So far I’ve learned how much a truss can hold when the beams have been tempered in a tandoor.

Lo and behold, it turned out he wanted to talk to me. He remembered that I had been building tube amps. We started talking. I kept trying to tell him how much I admired engineers for knowing how to do USEFUL things, and he kept trying to tell me how much he admired physicists for knowing the root causes of stuff. Anyway, it turned out he was considering supplementing his income with EE work, and we started talking about amps. I told him it might be possible to generate some money building amps, and now he wants to come check out what I’m doing. Even if it goes nowhere, now I’ll have a friend who is almost a physicist. An EE is really not that far off. They are not the dumb engineers. What they do takes brains. They don’t seem to realize that, though.

An EE is actually more useful to me than a physicist, because a physicist wouldn’t know anything new.

We talked for quite a while, and unfortunately, his wife was standing right next to him, and she was bored so severely she required medical attention.

So here is what happened today. As a former physicist and amp builder who was recently told he had the anointing of a prophet and teacher, I met a guitar-playing EE apostle who wants to build tube amps. Tell me that’s not a weird day.

I want to introduce this guy to my dad as “Apostle Mike,” and I’ll insist he call him that. Come on. That’s irresistible. “Glad to know you, Mike.” “APOSTLE Mike, Dad.” “Uh…”

“Dad, I’m going to Five Guys with Apostle Mike. Do you want anything?”

I guess I’m stupid. That cracks me up.

But hey, it’s what he is.

I think if I could pick a job, it would be prophet. Apostles have to travel. Prophets can hang out in their garages and mess with tools most of the time, and every so often, they pop out, go to the local church, and say something that scares the living daylights out of everyone. Then they go home, and people leave them alone. It’s like Punxsutawney Phil, only holy.

“An earthquake is going to destroy the city next week, and afterward, an omer of organic dove’s dung from Whole Foods will cost as much as an Ipad 2. Plus God is going to give Deacon Fred a withered foot for playing Powerball. See you later, and stay off my lawn!”

I’m not positive my expectations are totally realistic. But it’s my understanding that a prophet can command a she-bear to eat punks that get on his nerves. That could be really handy.

I Must be a MIDIanite

Crazy stuff is happening. A few years back, I got myself a grand piano and learned to play it, but I gave up because I couldn’t remember things I learned. Recently, I’ve started playing again.

I started taking guitar lessons a few months ago, and gradually, the emphasis switched from learning guitar to learning composition. First thing I knew, I was using Finale every day, and I found I preferred composing for the keyboard. Once that happened, I needed a MIDI keyboard to help me, so I bought a little-bitty one, and for reasons too dull to go into, I also set up a cheesy Casio keyboard beside my chair.

Now I have a couple of pieces written, and I find that to really understand and sharpen them, I need to play them. So in fits and starts, I’ve started sitting down at the grand piano.

It’s really something, playing a piece I wrote. One of my character quirks is that it’s harder for me to get interested in other people’s creative ideas (even Chopin’s) than my own, so now that I’m studying my own compositions, I feel much more connected to what I’m doing.

I got rid of my digital piano several years ago. It’s pretty clear that was a mistake. I’m going to need another one eventually. I may even have to get rid of my beer fridge so I’ll have room. Today I looked at prices, hoping they had gone down. They have, if you take inflation into account. But not enough to matter. ARRGH.

I guess it’s okay, though. I’m sure the piano I got rid of is inferior to the ones they sell now.

It makes me nervous to consider the possibility that I might be able to do really well at something new. I don’t want to put up a lot of crap theorizing about my potential and then find out I’m wrong. But I keep comparing my musical ideas to those of successful composers, and I am pleasantly surprised. I have a lot to learn, and in some ways, I’m restricted to pretty simple ideas, but I think I have the main thing I need, which is an inner voice that gives me good original music.

I don’t know what to think about this. If things keep going this well, there’s no reason why I won’t find myself generating a sizable body of useful music.

God guides and restores. The more you give yourself to him and get to know him, the more he repairs you and squeezes the most out of your remaining potential. You can’t expect it to happen if you live for yourself and have no prayer life, but if you persist in pressing into his kingdom, remarkable things will happen. I believe God has set his seal on certain promises he has made me, and based on the progress I’ve seen, it looks like I’m right. It’s a little scary, but I can’t deny it.

I don’t understand why the music I write is so different from what I expected to write. I thought I’d be coming up with religious music with a lot of soul, but so far, it’s all classical-influenced pop. I don’t mean it can’t be used for religious purposes, but it seems to be in the same broad class of music as things like Classical Gas.

I suppose one reason things are going this way is that it’s very hard to get a computer to swing or shuffle. Maybe I drifted toward whiter music because I’m not ready to cope with beating soul out of a CPU.

I’ll keep posting stuff as I write it.

Throw a Dollar in my Guitar Case

I’ve been fiddling with the new tune I wrote. When I wrote it, I chose to make it a little repetitious, because I thought people would want to hear the hooks more than once, but it was sounding a little too monotonous, so I messed with it. I added some cello to the introduction. I like it, but it sounds a little dissonant. I think the piano samples Finale used may be slightly flat!

Anyway, here it is.

Viola da Gamba Am Noodling 10 28 12 with 11 11 changes

Not What I Expected

When I started writing music, I thought I’d be doing something bluesy, but I keep writing things that are sort of like classical. I just finished one tonight. “Finished” is not quite right. I got it up to an acceptable length, came up with a beginning and end, and stopped. I can fix it up later.

I was thinking it might be useful for my church’s dance team. With that in mind, I repeated the catchier parts instead of writing new ones. I figured that if people were dancing to it, they would want some repetition.

I remembered to pray for help before I worked on it. That makes me happy. I don’t like engaging in a task without praying first, but I always forget.

When I started, I tried to write it using the viola da gamba sound from Finale. I have loved the sound of this weird instrument ever since I saw Tous Les Matins du Monde, which is a really depressing French movie (I repeat myself) about musicians. It’s like a cello, but it has seven strings. It turns out the Finale version refuses to do anything other than pizzicato, so I used a cello sound instead.

Here it is. I’m thrilled with it. Looks like a good first draft to me. I can’t believe I wrote it. It doesn’t seem like my personality at all.

Viola da Gamba Am Noodling 10 28 12

Breakthrough has me Butchering Standards

I have a new music teacher.

Longtime readers will remember that I bought a grand piano in 2003 or 2004. The main purpose was to learn about music so I could compose, but I ended up learning to play a few things and focusing too much on becoming a musician. After a few years, I quit. I forgot things as soon as I learned them, so at any given time, I had a repertoire of four songs. And I could not sight-read well or write music competently.

A couple of years back I started working on the electric guitar. I built most of a Telecaster, and I built a few amps. I worked on sight-reading and other skills. I went through two teachers. I got to the point where I could play a few things, but I wasn’t any closer to composing.

I started looking for a real teacher. Someone who really knew what he was doing. I checked out Craigslist, the center of all knowledge and enlightenment (after Wikipedia and Fark). I found a guy who wrote long, opinionated ads. He seemed to be truly disgusted with virtually everyone else who claimed to teach people how to play the guitar. He explained why their methods were a waste of time and money. He provided wordy insights into his personal philosophy of music teaching. Stuff I didn’t really need to read.

I was impressed. He reminded me of me.

As I told him later, I like opinionated people. Some are opinionated because they’re just stupid, and I’m not real fond of that group. But others are opinionated because they have had it up to HERE with BS. I figured anyone passionate enough to write an ad like that was someone I needed to meet.

Eventually, I called for an appointment. He wouldn’t give me one! Instead I had to talk to him for about half an hour, explaining my goals. Then he made me spend a week writing down goals and influences. I had to create two Word documents and send them to him.

Finally, I was cleared to go for a lesson. I drove all the way to Davie, and when I knocked on the appropriate door, an enormous human being answered. At first I thought he had to be standing on a box. But no, that was all him. We shook hands and got started.

The lesson went like this: I showed him what I knew, and he told me it was wrong. Then I showed him something else, which I was really pleased about, and he told me that was wrong, too. By the end of the lesson, I had learned that I was doing the following things wrong:

1. Playing position
2. Guitar position
3. Right hand position
4. Left hand position
5. Holding pick
6. Fretting
7. Picking
8. Foot tapping
9. Breathing

I think there were some other things I was doing wrong, but I can’t remember what they were. As far as I could tell, there was not ONE thing I was doing right.

Here’s something weird: he seems to share the personality of my buddy Aaron. If Aaron were a non-Jewish musician, he’d be this guy. It’s freaky how similar they are.

He gave me an exercise straight from hell, to enable me to stretch my left hand, and he told me to play the same scale a billion times in different positions, at glacial speed. And home I went.

I worked on this crap for two weeks, and the net result was that I was no longer able to play the guitar. I mean, I could not play ANYTHING. My fingers missed the frets. I forgot entire passages. My left hand was in constant pain, because I was using a couple of shriveled muscles I had never used before. It was bad. But I had faith, because he seemed to know absolutely everything there was to know about music. Plus he once spoke on the phone with Billy Gibbons. I was sure I was headed for a wax on, wax off moment.

My third lesson was last week. I could not play a thing, but we spent a very long time talking. This is how the lessons go. I barely touch the guitar. We discussed the correct mindset for making pizza. We covered our mutual disdain for Prince. And after a while, we got onto conservative politics. I told him it was hard to hold the guitar the way he had told me to hold it, because it rested on my pistol. From there, we moved into a discussion of things like labor unions and Chick-Fil-A. He’s way out on the right, which probably explains why he’s not a famous musician. He has played in some worship bands.

Last week, we got off on sight-reading and composition. He told me something I had never heard before. He said it was a mistake to start with sight-reading. He said I should start by transcribing things. I told him I would try, but that the software was a pain to use. He told me the problem was that I was using software in the first place. He said I should transcribe things on paper. That had never occurred to me. In the past, I tried to compose things on the computer so I could play them back immediately and check them out.

A day or two later, I decided to try transcription. But I hate transcribing on the guitar. So I sat down at the piano with some blank paper, and I started working on “Somewhere Over the Rainbow,” in C major. I was amazed at how much I knew about music. I thought I had forgotten it all. I managed to write and play a very coherent version, and then later I made up a left-hand part.

You can’t imagine what a breakthrough this was for me. When I first started studying the piano, it was because I had music in my head, and I could not write music fast enough to capture it. It drove me nuts, especially at night. I’d lie in bed with wonderful original music playing in my head, and it would keep me awake for an hour and a half. When I started transcribing, I saw that there was finally some hope that I could save some of it.

I texted my teacher with a question, and he called me up. I told him I had bad news. He had driven me back to the piano. He didn’t care. He thought it was great. He helped me out with a few clues, and I fired off some files by email, so he would know what I was up to.

I am accomplishing squat on the guitar, but I’m finally getting a grip on music writing. And I learned something else: the software isn’t so bad, if you write the music on paper first. You use a pencil, and then you have a stationary (or stationery) target. The notes are written down, so they don’t vanish while you’re cursing Finale’s horrible interface.

I’ll post a MIDI file, so you can see what I’ve done so far. I’m thrilled with it. I’ll write more variations, but as far as I’m concerned, this is a wonderful start. The left hand part reminds me of Bach, and I’m no Bach fan, but I’ll take it.

Over the Rainbow Transcription

Now I have hope that I’ll succeed at this, so I have new motivation to go forward. And the music in my head is back. I laid awake for quite some time last night while variations of “Sweet and Dandy” roared through my mind. On the one hand, it was annoying, but it was also intoxicating. I know I can do this.

http://youtu.be/GopekAOMCE4

God is a restorer. If you’re on the wrong path, he may put roadblocks in front of you, and when he’s ready for you to succeed, he can remove them so fast, you won’t believe it. You may have a problem you think is insurmountable, but the answer may be a change you can make in five minutes. If someone had given me the right advice about music in 1998, I’d have a pile of original compositions by now. The advice was all I needed.

I’m practically beside myself, thinking about the things I’ll do. I feel like I’ve been turned loose in a toy store.

I know this will go somewhere. Sooner or later I’ll come up with something fit for use in a church. It’s only a matter of time. That will be a huge milestone.

It’s more evidence that prayer in tongues straightens out paths. The more I do it, the better things go. I knew this in 1987, but I didn’t get serious until about five years ago. So much time wasted. Since then, the progress has been continuous.

Try it yourself. You have nothing to lose.

Plus a Pork Tour de Force

I should be working on my amp cabinet, but I just can’t. I’m high on pork.

I made an impulse buy at Costco the other day. How shocking. They had two pounds of smoked pulled pork for eight bucks. How could I turn that down? Besides, I think I would buy a leaky bag of anthrax spores if it said “Kirkland” on it.

Today I decided to prepare it.

I was considering putting it in a calzone. It would work as lechon asado, so I could make pan con lechon with Swiss cheese. That’s an unbelievable sandwich. Or I could experiment: BBQ pulled pork calzone.

In the end, I went with Texas toast.

I made a loaf of homemade bread, which takes about four minutes of work. I threw some cole slaw together, and I bought a baking potato, which I nuked (cheating) and then stuck in the oven to finish. I made my own BBQ sauce, and I sliced an onion.

I fried the onion in some old beef fat/peanut oil I used for fries. I used cast iron. I tossed the pork in, flambeed it in Jack Daniel’s, and tossed it with sauce. I fried two slices of bread in butter, which is just plain wrong. Then I sat down and ate.

Oh, man. I can’t describe it. As sold by Costco, the pork is not quite as good as pork you smoke on your own. But it’s more than adequate. It’s tender, and it has a nice hickory flavor. The stuff I put in it just melted into the meat. The bread was crunchy and drippy and buttery and yeasty. I think I may faint.

The cole slaw was also a cheat. I bought shredded cabbage and carrots in a bag and added my own stuff. I don’t think it makes much difference. I can’t shred cabbage any better than a factory can.

The potato was not quite right, but the wonderful thing about potatoes is that screwing them up can make them better. This one ended up with parts that were a little too chewy, and it may sound stupid, but they were wonderful. If I were cooking seriously, I wouldn’t go near the microwave, but this was just lunch, and the potato was great.

This sandwich was so good, it was sobering. Sometimes food makes you giddy. When it’s really good, it’s almost scary. It will make you serious. It will make you wonder how good food can get. That’s the situation I am dealing with today.

I can’t believe God lets me cook like this. What is the purpose? I can’t eat it all. I threw out a lot of my lunch because you can’t eat like that and expect to live.

I have an idea. My new church is thinking about feeding the poor. I’m all for this, and I’ll help, PROVIDED they do it right. There is no reason the poor can’t have the best food in Miami. The cost of food has no relationship to the quality. It’s all in the preparation. I’m thinking pulled pork sandwiches might be a good way to go. At most, the pork will cost $1.50 per pound. Homemade bread is almost free. Sauce ingredients aren’t expensive. Neither is slaw. For three bucks a head, we should be able to pretty well stun the poor, as well as the volunteers and anyone else who comes around.

We would need a couple of chafing dishes plus a big propane skillet. That’s about it.

Speaking of the poor, I learned something about a local nonprofit today. My old church has a charity wing. I know someone who went to them for help. He claimed they sat him in front of a computer and showed him links to places that could help him out. Did they give him money or groceries? He said no, although he had given money to the church in the past.

In the recent Pentecost fundraising drive (“Five Victories of Pentecost”), the leadership said they were going to give the special Pentecost offerings to the poor, via their charity wing. I ran that by my dad, the non-Christian attorney. He said, “So he’s paying HIMSELF.” The conflict of interest was not subtle. If you run a church, and you ask the congregation to give money to a charity, and you run the charity, and the charity pays you, what are you really doing? Maybe you’re not taking any money out, but what if you are? Shouldn’t donors be told how much and for what?

Out of curiosity, I Googled, and I came up with a PDF of some Canadian government documents. They say the church’s charity wing lost its nonprofit status in Canada in 2010, because they failed to respond to requests that they open their books and show that they were doing what charities do.

Okay, let’s be fair. This could be irresponsibility. This would not be a big surprise, given what I have observed personally. So far, what I’ve said doesn’t prove dishonesty. But here’s something one of the letters said: “The Organization’s only expenses for the period under audit were for non-charitable ‘Professional and consulting fees.’ The Organization did not report any expenses in support of the ‘ongoing programs’ as described in question C2 of its T3010s.”

You run an outfit which is supposed to be a charity; it’s supposed to give stuff to the poor. But as far as the Canadian government can tell, ALL–not some–of your expenses are for “Professional and consulting fees.”

You can see why it disturbed me. “Consulting” is a good excuse for organizations to funnel money to people who don’t really do anything of value. Michelle Obama made huge money “consulting.” And I think it’s fair to assume that none of the fees mentioned by the Canadians were paid to the poor (who are rarely hired as consultants). If a charity pays consultants, yet it gives nothing to the poor, what, exactly, is the point of the consulting? What are the consultants helping them do? Consultants are supposed to give advice. I think the obvious suggestion would be, “Stop giving all of the money to consultants and professionals and give something to the needy.”

Other websites say the charity received six figures a year. How can all of that money go to consulting and “professional” services?

Maybe there’s a legitimate explanation, but it doesn’t look good, does it?

A full-blown grifter–a charlatan with no intention of doing anything but getting rich–might leave a trail just like this. Money in, no services provided, and lots of expenditures for vague “fees.” So while the PDF doesn’t prove anything crooked is going on, if something crooked WERE going on, it would not look much different. I have decided to show the PDF to some friends and see what they think.

In any case, it shows I was right to quit giving them money. A long time ago, I realized they asked for money and then told donors nearly nothing about how it was spent. By “nearly nothing,” I mean I did not receive accountings showing how much money was taken in and how it was spent. I cut them off, apart from church offerings. I found transparent, trustworthy ministries and charities to give to.

They didn’t tell me where the money went. That’s bad. Reputable charities send out reports accounting for their donations. But failing to cooperate with the government of Canada…that’s another level of bad. It shows they don’t deserve money from anyone. If they’re that irresponsible or incompetent, how can you expect them to spend their money effectively?

What if they’re really helping the poor? Shouldn’t they keep books that prove it? What’s the down side? Jesus told us we were to keep quiet about giving, but he was referring to individuals, not ministries. Besides, before Pentecost, the pastor got up and told the congregation he and his wife were giving a thousand dollars in the Pentecost drive. Obviously, he is not concerned about hiding his good deeds.

This isn’t the only nonprofit that keeps things quiet. Kenneth Copeland refused to open his books when Congress came calling. On Youtube, there’s a video in which Copeland explains that Congress is full of evil people who do Satan’s bidding, and that he, as God’s representative on earth, is not accountable to them. That’s not really what he said, but it’s not that far off. If he’s not open with Congress, he’s not open with his donors, either, because if the donors had the information, it would have been impossible to keep it away from Congress, so he would have complied.

How can anyone give money to a man like that? What possible reason could he have for refusing to tell retirees and people on disability what he does with their money? He is incredibly wealthy. It didn’t all come from penny stocks and brilliant commodity trades made on a pastor’s salary; I guarantee that. Why won’t he tell us how he got where he is?

It’s sad, but Christians are so brainwashed about submission to authority, they can’t see it when the devil himself walks up the aisle and picks up the collection plate. Jesus said we should be as harmless as doves, but he also said we should be as wise as serpents. A man who won’t explain himself to his flock has no business handling other people’s money.

I pray for God to help the leaders at my old church get it together, but I also pray he throws them out and brings better pastors in. I hope they improve, but I don’t think the congregation should suffer while they learn. They’ve had a long time to get it right, and it’s not right for thousands of people to have poor leadership just so a few folks can hold onto their jobs.

My faith tells me God is replacing them, and as I have noted before, the scuttlebutt is that the head pastor is on his way out. I didn’t hear about that until after I prayed for the leaders to be replaced.

In other news, my latest amp now almost has a home. Here’s a photo.

I am not a great upholsterer, but it looks wonderful. I don’t know how to handle the inside corners in the ivory panel. I am considering experimenting with a heat gun. The vinyl will have to be stretched, if the job is to look professional. As it is, I may have to mask it with some sort of metal or plastic things I screw into the corners, over the vinyl.

The amp sounds magnificent. I can’t stop playing it. It sings. I still have some 120 Hz hum to get rid of, but it’s not bad enough to be a major concern. Once I get it fixed, I’m moving on to my 4-EL84 version.

Stay away from that Costco pork. I am just now starting to come down.

More

I’m really not sure what’s going on. I have been re-reading the Canadian government’s documents, which you can find here:

Link to Canadian gov’t documents.

The organization that had its nonprofit credentials revoked is headquartered in Miami, and it belongs (or belonged) to the head pastor of the church. But it doesn’t have the name the church’s charity wing uses. The Canadians were puzzled by this, too. In trying to get information, they looked at the current charity’s website.

Now I have to wonder: is it even the same outfit? Is it possible they let this organization lapse (irresponsible, but not inherently crooked) while setting up the new one? That would explain why they ignored inquiries from Canada.

If we were talking about a responsible organization like The International Fellowship of Christians and Jews, there would be no questions. They publish and mail an annual report to their donors, and it accounts for all of the money they receive. I know Rabbi Yechiel Eckstein’s salary, because of that report. With my old church and its affiliates, who knows? Maybe they generally let people look at their books, but for some reason, they decided to shut Canada out. Maybe everything they do is legal and ethical. I have no idea. I don’t recall receiving any annual reports.

The organization the Canadians disqualified used this language in describing its purpose:

[T]o evangelize and educate young people and their families regarding drugs, suicide, and moral values

That doesn’t sound like what the current charity is purportedly doing. As far as I know, they occasionally round stuff up and send it to Haiti, and as I’ve said, they refer poor people to organizations that give them assistance. So maybe it’s a different body entirely.

Here is how the charity’s website describes its activities:

When a person in need enters our office we will immediately hear the person’s need and respond with appropriate resources. Often the response will be a referral to another resource. [Italics mine.]

Anyway, I don’t want to be unfair. The church’s charity has one name, and the organization in the Canadian documents has another, so they may be different entities, and it is completely possible that the church’s charity is doing more for the poor than I suspect.