Hello Again

Sunday, January 27 2007
25:16

With two weeks since my last entry, what to write about? Did a birthday dinner for my Dad last weekend. Went on a field trip to Tukwila this week. MB left for Boston on Friday, will be back next Sunday. We've had two TTA rehearsals now for this season; next one is Wednesday. We are looking at a possible space to move to in Phinney/Greenwood. It has a lot going for it but a daunting and ever-growing list of concerns that we need to get completely ironed out and nailed down before signing a lease. This has to happen in fairly short order.

I'm currently looking at many different options for acoustically treating my living room. Given the odd shape of the place, the bass modes aren't as lumpy as they would be in a box, however they still can be pretty strong. The most egregious however is a bunch of muck in the lower midrange – not really sure what causes this. Resonance between the floor and the underside of the bar? Between the floor and the ceiling? On many recordings it's only noticeable once in a while. However, piano recordings are almost entirely unlistenable. And the third issue is reflections off the side of the bar, screwing up the image. I think the first step will be to treat the bar reflections w/ abosorbing panels. I'm also thinking of putting "flatfusors" (absorbing and diffusing panels) behind the speakers, on the ceiling near the reflection points, and on the "back wall". Given that the back wall has an obtuse angle in the middle of it, that means one that's not really behind me but is parallel w/ the wall behind the speakers, and the other half which is pretty much orthogonal to the line from the left speaker to my head.

I think I've spent about four hours today doing this. And I still will have left bass management. I'm hoping that a good sized tube trap in the right front corner will help out a lot there.

I've been picking up a lot of cds lately. Some of the usual stuff, plus also I'm a bit more inclined towards remasters, especially SACD or DVD-A. I was able to do an interesting test yesterday – the remaster of Music For the Masses has a CD and a DVD. The DVD has various things (a short film, some 5.1 mixes, etc) including a 24-bit stereo version of the entire album. I put the CD in the Rotel and the DVD in the Oppo, queued up the same track on each, and hit play simultaneously. I could then switch back and forth between them using the preamp, albeit with a click-pause-click that was jarring. So, 24-bit DVD in the super-value does-it-all-for-not much Oppo, and 16-bit CD in the costs-four-times-as-much-and-only-plays-CDs Rotel. Within any psychological "noise", I couldn't hear a difference. Which may mean that there was no audible difference between either the two data sets or the two players; or, it may mean that they essentially cancelled each other out. This is also in the as-yet-untreated room, so there were issues there that may have masked things.

I tried a similar comparison between the original CD pressing (in the Oppo) and the remastered CD (in the Rotel), but the volume levels were so drastically different that it wasn't nearly as useful. I am eager to get two exact copies of the same recording (I guess I could burn a disc. . .actually I've done that w/ a couple already), and see if I can hear differences just between the players.

Mid January Update

Sunday, January 13 2008
22:40

A very good weekend. Slept in on Saturday – though accidentally – but then got some coffee and made a sandwich, did some domestic chores. Went out to look at a potential new TTA space, it is good but has some serious things that would need to be nailed down in the lease. Then, home to hang out with MB for a while. We went over to Newcastle for a coworker's "game night" party, it was actually only slightly geeky and mostly a nice little party evening where we also played one game of Cranium (better than I thought it would be, lots of fun actually) and one game of Balderdash (which is great). I got lost trying to get out of the maze-like housing developments (the ones up in the hills in the Eastside are just horrible, they have to follow the lay of the land and such). Finally found my way out to "real" street, on the back side of the hill though actually, so got to tootle around a couple miles back to the parkway. Got home a little after 1 I think.

Today, got up at around 10:30. We tried to go to Sr. Moose for breakfast, but it was packed and there was a mob of around 20 people outside waiting for tables. So, we went to Than brothers instead. Pho makes a pretty decent brunch. Off to the farmer's market after that, so MB could get some gifts for friends, quite successfully. Then we walked down the locks. It was a gorgeous day outside – and not actually very cold, I think it was in the 50s. Blue sky and all that, though the mid-day sun was actually just barely hanging over Magnolia hill. Anyway, that was good, watched some ships there, saw the fish ladder (no fish), checked out the gift shop, and looked at some of the trees in the park.

After a snack we hit the road for Ikea. I needed to get some new slats for my bed – the arched ones are actually pretty dumb in the fact that they create a low-point in the middle of the bed, so you essentially fall downhill to that point which is no good. MB was looking for various bits of furniture, and I had my eye out for a few things I needed too. We were mostly successful finding what we wanted, but then several bits were out of stock. Also I found a really great rug – after finally deciding I liked the black one well enough – so I grabbed that plus the slats. MB got a dresser and half of a table (the legs, the top was out of stock). Once we got that home and unloaded we went to the Hi-Life for dinner, which was yummy as always. Pumpkin ravioli, roasted beet salad, carrot soup! There were some folks at the next table from Rhode Island and it turned out that MB and they knew several people in common, as well as many places and things. That was great. Now back here for some dessert and maybe guitar practice.

music: Radiohead - In Rainbows (just got this, needs more listening); Gtrstrffe; Failure - Magnified

This week

Monday, January 7 2007
24:06

There was a fire in my building Saturday night. MB and I got back from dinner, to find a mildly flooded parking garage. As we walked around to see where the water was coming from (dripping through cracks in the concrete. . .) I ran across a man who seemed to know something about what was going on. I asked if there was a flood, he said "there was a fire". It was in a unit on the 5th floor, in the kitchen I guess, at the other end of the building. So that unit and the ones below it had water damage, as the sprinklers had gone off. I guess the water made its way all the way down to the bottom of the garage. Eek.

Dinner before that was very good. We went to Café Flora. Definitely someplace we'll be going back to. Sunday was a pretty slow day, tried to do some shopping and was only somewhat successful at that. Then home for a snack-y dinner and a game of Scrabble.

Tonight, a meeting for TTA: what next? we need to find a new space, pronto. We will have an 18-show season from March to July. Where, we don't know yet. Whee!

music: Talking Heads - Speaking in Tongues; Led Zeppelin – box set, disc 2; Red Sparowes - At the Soundless Dawn

Newy Ear Sieve

Tuesday, January 1 2008
23:13

2008. The party last night was great. Not a large crowd but enough to reach critical mass. Chris put his bartending skills to good use to improvise with the somewhat spotty selection of booze and mixers I had on hand. Everybody brought food and most brought drinks, so there was plenty all around. At midnight someone put on The Police Live! disc one, a perfect selection, and then the lights were dimmed and there was lots of dancing. People seemed to have a great time. I don't remember when it wound down, after 1 I believe. MB and I did a quick clean-up – not much more than that was required, then it was time to hit the sack.

Woke up hurting this morning – not enough water last night. So, I had a pretty icky hangover, managed to eat some toast and drink some water then read for a bit, then just went back to bed. Woke up at 4:30 PM like a new man! so we went out to Than Brothers for some Pho, that was yummy. Watched some music DVDs after that, then had some ice cream and played Scattergories. Got my pictures uploaded and now here for this. Back to work tomorrow.