Monday Meanderings - 11.27.2017

I'm well into a tryptophan-induced haze as I write this; that's what turkey and dressing, cranberry sauce, green beans, sweet potatoes, Waldorf salad and a slice of pie will do to you. $11.49 at Luby's for a traditional Thanksgiving dinner. Pecan pie 75 cents extra.

Yep, we joined several hundred of our closest friends for our Thanksgiving meal again this year. No cooking, good food, no clean-up and thankfully no leftovers. Or more importantly, no siren calls from those delicious pies left on the counter, just begging for one more slice to be eaten, with a double scoop of ice cream, of course. One simply does not throw out un-eaten pie.

And we again thought of that very first Thanksgiving, just Barb and I in Abilene. We had invited some college students over - kids who lived too far away to go home for the holiday. From somewhere, we had received a cooking tip about putting the turkey in a brown paper bag before cooking. Sounded good, so we got up at the crack of dawn to start that process, tucked the bagged bird in the oven, and went back to bed.

It wasn't too long before we woke to a house full of smoke and a turkey bag burned down to the juice line! We don't know what we did wrong - let the bag touch the oven, or something, In the mean time we have a scalding-hot, ash-covered, partially-cooked turkey to deal with, and guests on the way. We salvaged dinner, as I recall. Thankfully college students aren't picky, and it ended well. At least that's our recollection, and I'm going to stay with that version.

If you read blogs, I  recommend Sean of the South to you. Sean Dietrich is a columnist, and novelist, known for his commentary on life in the American South. Here's a bit of his biography:

"As a child, I liked to write. I filled up notebooks with tales of the high-seas, shameless vixens, and steamy scenarios combining both of the aforementioned. My fifth grade teacher found one of my notebooks and scanned through it. She told me I wrote with too many commas, and encouraged me to pursue a career in construction work.

That, old, woman, never, liked, me.

Years later, I learned my teacher had left the school. She took a job at the Piggly Wiggly as a cashier. I went to visit the old girl, to show her the man I’d grown into. She seemed genuinely glad to see me. And I was just as glad to find her wearing that red apron for a living.

After visiting for a few minutes, I realized something I’d never noticed before. Beneath her hardshell exterior was a regular lady, working from nine to five for pennies. She was doing the best she could with her life. Just like me.

Before I left, she asked me what kind of work I did.

At the time, I worked in construction."

Monday Meanderings - 11.20.2017

Okay, I got the heading correctly spelled and properly dated. For the record, I will not be writing this blog in 2701.

Don't you just love those days spent in overcoming technical challenges? For several years I have used a password manager that sat quietly embedded in my favorite browser. I had my log-ons and Barbara had hers and everybody was happy. Until Firefox followed Chrome's lead and kicked most browser extensions out, including my password manager. So everything had to be updated - and merged - no more separate files - and it's a pretty cludgy interface! And there was great wailing and gnashing of teeth in all the land.

Speaking of technology advances, the other night my phone began barking! Not the little yap, yap that you find in the ringtones - this was the attack Doberman in full throat! It seems my fancy doorbell purveyor has added a neighborhood watch to its app. When a neighbor posts an alert of suspicious behavior, the Doberman lets us all know!

And one more. Being a lawful driver, I often use Siri to accommodate my hands-free requests, such as add an appointment, or make a call. After one such request the other day, Siri said, "What would you do without me?"

Well, the author has approved my narration and the audio book is in the hands of Audible's quality control department. It's nervous time for me. I've jumped through all the technical requirement hoops that I know of; if they say it doesn't measure up, I'm not sure what else I can do.

It has been quite a learning experience for me. I far exceeded the 5-to-1 ratio of production to narration, but if I do this again (and that's a big if) I'll know how to go about it.

Monday Meanderingd - 11.13.2107

At the Learning Ally studios, the readers take a break at the mid-point of their session, and gather in the break room for a time of camaraderie and discussion. The sessions usually start off with "What are you reading today?" Wednesday, one of the readers was lamenting that his current book was chock full of Russian words and names - all of which have to be researched for proper pronunciation.

Another reader, an elderly, white-haired little old lady - soft-spoken, dignified and the epitome of Southern gentility - spoke up and said, "When I was with the CIA, they sent me to language school to learn Russian." Wait! What? We all looked at each other and almost in unison said, "You were with the CIA?" I don't think we could have been more surprised if she had said, "When I was President..."

Monday Meanderings - 11.6.2017

Yes! You all know I have been opposed to Daylight Savings Time for many, many years, and now there's proof that it's a bad idea. And I quote:

"The Monday after Daylight Saving Time ends in the fall is more dangerous than other Monday, according to a recent study published in Journal of Experimental Criminology. Aggregated police records from across the country show a slight uptick in assaults the Monday after we gain an hour in the fall, followed by a mirror decrease when we lose an hour in the spring."

Change the time - do the crime.

I introduced you to the term Boyborygmus a post or two back - a fancy term for stomach noise and growling. Here's another highfalutin word for a common problem: Xerostoma. You don't have to have much Latin to figure out this refers to dry mouth, and more.

Both these terms are important to me in the context of the audio book I am recording. The recommended mic really picks up the rumblings and gurglings of your stomach - and the pops, clicks, snaps and other associated noises caused by dry mouth. I thought it was just me, but a bit of research in the voice over community shows that it is a Really. Big. Problem!

There are countless posts on the voice forums asking for advice on what to do with mouth noises and an abundance of suggestions on how to ameliorate the problem. Suggestions on hydrating while recording (no coffee or tea, room temperature water only, no-sugar-added apple juice, sips only, swish and spit, at least 64 ounces 2 hours prior to recording [allow time for bathroom breaks], etc.). Eat Granny Smith Apple slices/don't eat anything before recording.

Brush/don't brush your teeth. Use XYZ mouthwash, exercise your lips and tongue, practice while holding a pencil in your mouth, lubricate with olive oil, talk off-mic/move away from the mic/move close to the mic. Did I mention Granny Smith apples? That advice is given so often you think it must absolutely be the answer. It's not.

Use/don't use software plug-ins for your recording program to de-click, or de-ess, or de-pop, or reduce noise, or... or...

Guess what? None of/all of the above works on a case-by-case basis. "Find what works for you" is the most often-given advice. And then do what everyone else eventually does: laboriously hand-edit the track and clip out the unwanted noise.

And thanks to my loyal readers, I was reminded what the mystery note "fajita bandit" meant. It concerned a news item about a man arrested for stealing $1.2 million dollars worth of fajitas. Of course, one has to ask just how someone can possibly steal $1.2M worth of fajitas? Walk out without paying? The restaurants will catch on pretty quickly. For that matter, who can possibly eat $1.2M in fajitas in a lifetime - even if you ate daily at the High Dollar Hyatt.

Turns out he was in charge of ordering food items for a school district, and for many, many years, he added fajita meat to the school's order and then diverted the goods to other restaurants, who thought they were buying from a legitimate purveyor. And that's the story behind both mysteries. Thanks.