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Happy birthday, Stretch! Here's a comic from 15 years ago.

As I have mentioned in Jacob's Jacobless Jacobing, I recently bought another micro PC for the purposes of installing Raspberry Pi OS (in this case Raspberry Pi Desktop.) The more I learn about smart devices, the more I want to return to monke build a proper standalone adblock/anti-tracking machine. Seriously. We live in a schizophrenic's nightmare. That 4K LG TV is like the offspring of the Five Eyes and Mark Zuckerberg. Your "Internet of Things" refrigerator is phoning home to China. A Russian has hacked into your washing machine. My solution to this Orwellian hellscape is try out a Pihole. Raspberry Pis, as devices, have become so cartoonishly expensive that it's actually a better economic decision to buy a low end micro PC (see above.) This thread will primarily serve as "lol, Knuckles thinks he's a linux geek" but will hopefully include at least a little useful info. The new micro PC, a Beelink SER, arrived today. I learned that the other low power micro PC I bought in 2022, a Minisforum UM350, is significantly more powerful than the Beelink. The former has a Ryzen 3 3550H (4 cores, 8 threads, better per-core performance, Vega 8 graphics) and the latter has a Ryzen 3200U (2 cores, 4 threads, Vega 3 graphics.) This is actually a good thing as the UM350 can pull up to 35W (I think mine is rated at 20W, but it's been ages since I looked that up.) The 3200U pulls 15W. Obviously, I will be running the Pihole 24/7 once it's fully set up. Also, I don't exactly need 3D graphic performance of any kind with it. The biggest surprise thus far is that I bought a unit that was not supposed to come with an OS and surprise, SUCKER! It's got Window 11 pre-installed. That OS is like a goddamn venereal disease. This evening I downloaded the Pi Desktop OS image. It's a svelte 3.4GB. I'm not sure I have the energy at this hour to format a bootable thumb drive and begin the OS installation process.

Short answer: The Pihole dev team are still hosting it and not updating it. I only ended up having Pi OS desktop running for an afternoon. I've now got a fresh install of Debian 13 on the Beelink, connected to a monitor that it actually likes. Also, last night, on a whim, I installed Unbuntu on a mid 2010 Mac Mini I bought from ...some Head-Caser or another years ago. It's got a sputtering Core 2 Duo, but it does have 16GB of RAM and a 512GB SSD. I think I'm going to use it to sing sea shanties.

Toyota's new GR GT and GT3 race car are coming next year - I've been "driving" it in Forza Horizon 6 already:

https://share.google/aimode/XuoXG0MBco66eDvJK

FTFY pkg install firefox

Grant Green’s Funk in France: From Paris to Antibes (1969–1970) Full

Mishima by Philip Glass, Kronos Quartet (1985) https://open.qobuz.com/album/0075597988956 Example: More Philip for fun. (probably should watch this at some point.) Followed by: Philip Glass: Mishima by Maki Namekawa 2018 https://open.qobuz.com/album/svzhtflbqsm9a Example: I really like the arrangement by Michael (also the conductor of Kronos Quartet above). Lends a more delicate nature to the work, also I like Piano. I didn't know Maki's work before this. Added things to my queue (now at 854 albums).

A couple of days ago marked the 10th anniversary of the passing of Don Buchla. While Bob Moog was the "kindly grandfather" synth designer, and Lev Theremin was "secret agent" one, Don was the "I did acid in the 60s and came up with such radical synth designs that 60 years later the industry is still trying to catch up with me" pioneer.

Futzing with the D200, special "thumbnail" edition: " These are the original resolution as shot. Nice CMOS CCD color science at least.

That's odd - I thought the Instax were for film, but I'm not sure why you need this instead of a phone camera.

Toshiba Aurex system from the late 70s:

HE90 "clone" first prototypes up and running as of yesterday: The drivers are all PCB based with 2um mylar diaphragms. They are about 3mm lower in height than stock to accommodate the cable entry and move the connections to the bottom of the drivers. The housing is resin 3D printed but this is the old version which has now been abandoned for a new one that has yet to arrive. Cables are King Sound (as I had some in stock) and allow me to fit it all in the same housing size as the original. The earpads are ones for the T+A Solitaire that are not a great fit but dirt cheap... so work just fine for this role. I've ordered new genuine pads but I'm not sure if Senn have any in stock. Next up is to refine the headband design and start to work on prototyping the metal back shell. Now I just wait on parts as usual... As for the sound, far from finished, even in prototype form but a HE90 with actual bass response... perish the thought!! ;)

I have been wanting a MOPAR B-body restomod for some time. Thought I would buy a partly built project or the like and built to suit. Couldn't pass up this 1969 Road Runner that was on auction and local. The wheels could use some work, but such is life... Not much of a show car guy so I need to put some miles on her... HS

RIP photographer Ian Berry. So many great shots over the years. https://www.digitalcameraworld.com/photography/photojournalism/rip-ian-berry-the-magnum-photojournalist-who-shot-the-only-photos-of-the-sharpeville-massacre-and-who-spent-more-than-seven-decades-working-hard-being-humble-and-insisting-the-job-was-never-about-the-gear https://www.all-about-photo.com/photographer/1228/ian-berry And for Dylan fans Also https://www.magnumphotos.com/theory-and-practice/ian-berry-intimate-portrait-serge-gainsbourg-jane-birkin/

RIP Ian King - one of the guitarists for the FU's, local Boston band from the 80's, and later Straw Dogs. Got to see the FU's in the early 80's (stayed FAR away from the mosh pit!), and oddly again this year when they were part of a punk show along with a band my friend manages. They had an intelligent cynicism, even some about the punk rock scene..... Old: New (I saw them around this time, at another location):

Holy shit. I just learned that a guy named Sebastian that I went to college with the 90s died of leukemia last month. He was 56. Sebastian was an interesting character. He was significantly dyslexic, and so was in college at a far later age than most of the students. The college we attended (Landmark) was specifically for LD students, so he didn't stick out that much. I had a strong if occasionally antagonistic friendship with him. I caught another student referring to him as "Sebbie" so I started calling him that. He immediately put the kibosh to that, telling me if I kept it up he wasn't going to respond to me when I talked to him. I complied with his wishes. Not that long after we watched Dumb & Dumber on Laserdisc (a huge deal at the time.) I saw the famous "Kick his ass, Sea Bass!" scene, and poor Sebastian had to deal with me calling him "See-Bass" for the rest of his time at Landmark. Apparently Sebastian had been sick for many years. He was, to put it charitably, a very heavyset fella in the 90s. We're FB friends, but he does fuck all on that platform (which is to his credit.) Occasionally family members tag him in photos and I had noticed that Sebastian had lost a shit-ton of weight. "Good for him!" I thought foolishly. Now, looking at his profile (it's his birthday today) it's clear he had kept losing weight and not for good reasons. Sebastian is not the first college chum I've heard about dying entirely too young. Hell, he's not even the first Landmark student. There was a guy named Alex Knowlton who died of cancer 2017 at age 45. Still, it's never not a shock when one of one's peers dies of a disease like leukemia.