A few years ago I sourced some LED T-8 “replacement” tubes for an art project, and I keep finding new uses for them. They are powered by straight mains voltage into two pins on one end only, so they’re very easy to use in unconventional locations / arrangements. Latest light installation:
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Sith squirrel duel?
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excuse me: “rift sawn”
so, we didn’t know what this was when we started, the client had lurked a bunch of kitchen remodel content and found it. my boss heard of it as something premium but didn’t actually know.
there’s two different, somewhat contradictory explanations but anyway this is how they isolate the straight grain. the quarter sawn is really pretty, one of our pieces seemed closer to that
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The upper diagram seems to make more sense to me. Every board is a “radius” so the grain would all be straight.
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yeah, I wonder if the results are good the other way and what the difference is. it seems like the “better” way would require specialized equipment and the easier way could be done with the same mill as plain-sawn but with extra shuffling around of the log
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I mill my own lumber, and split it out into workable pieces, so all mine are more-or-less “rift-sawn,” although “riven” would be a lot more accurate. Riven then put through the planer. But the end product looks like your “rift sawn” example.
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And @Wayward, I received mine, too!
I wonder, is this Jefe’s nemesis? 
(Gorgeous card, @KeybillyJefe !)
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We got ours today, too! Love it!
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never you mind 'bout that…
Apocalypto is and has been my nemesis, perhaps throughout many lifetimes.
you will all be visited by him again.
in the meantime, so glad this relative newcomer is well received.
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Our mail carrier hates us, apparently
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ours, too. but then, i do abuse my dear letter carrier, as does the mum. mum is on such a Temu bender i may have to take her phone away (no. i won’t do that.)
but the post person has taken to packing mum’s Temu shit into letter trays and leaving them on the porch.
i take those letter trays with my postcard mailings back to the PO, and get eyerolls.
i just love this “mail art” thing! (not sure the USPS loves me back.)
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Very well recieved indeed!
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I’ve gotten two, but have been so busy that I have neglected my manners. Thanks @KeybillyJefe
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Not to be too cocky about it but I got the latest postcard 
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Black Ceasar.
that is a name with long time connection to the upper keys.
he was a legendary pirate who, at some tellings was an escaped enslaved man of the Carribean, or at turns, a never enslaved free Garifuna man.
either way, this incarnation of Black Ceasar is a wiley figure in the street chicken flock to where he even calls out his name in his crow… “I-am-Black-Ceasar” alongside his brother, Kevin, who crows “flip-the-breaker” at the predawn hours from the trees right outside my bedroom window…
i am made insane by these creatures. that i make accurate portraits of street chickens is my dealing.
these are the images of my torment.
Hieronyomus Bosch had it all wrong.
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Some twenty years ago my sister opened her hair salon, and I had the idea to record a DJ mix for her to play there. I recently came across that unfinished, long abandoned (because, me) start of a mix on a forgotten hard drive, and I decided to do it up proper, two decades too late.
The parameters were simple: Strictly 80’s. Strictly Synth-Pop. Strictly 12" remixes.
Step one was going through what I had, step two was requiring what I used to have but no long have (bless you, Soulseek), and step three was finding what I never had but should have had because I would have loved that shit (bless you, Discogs). ALL IN LOSSLESS FLAC FORMAT. Then I random shuffled it all, listened to it every day for weeks, and weeded out the tracks I just didn’t like until I had narrowed it down to a final pool of
OVER 240 SONGS.
I then ran all those through iZotope RX to bring them to the EBU R128 standard loudness level of -23 db LKFS, because some were ripped from vintage vinyl with full dynamic range and some from horribly loud and limited modern digital “remasters” (don’t get me started). Then I imported them all into Ableton Live to do the mixes,
because I AM NOT A DJ.
These are FAKE DJ mixes. I programmed the cross-fades, tinkered with the eq’s, and edited the transitions all in Ableton Live, BUT I didn’t use the beat-matching algorithms that didn’t exist yet back in the 80’s. All the tracks are warped strictly re-pitch mode like a vinyl record on a turntable.
So - here is the first mix of I don’t know how many more to come: 15 tracks (or is it 17?) from 8 different artists, clocking an hour and 36 minutes. The track list is blurred out so you can be surprised, if you want:
80’s SYNTH-POP 12" REMIX MIX
VOLUME ONE
1980-1981
Please remember to mention me in tapes you leave behind
The Korgis - Everybody’s Gotta Learn Sometime (12" Alternate Version)
Visage - Fade to Grey (Extended Version)
The Human League - Don’t You Want Me (Special Extended Dance Mix)
Depeche Mode - Just Can’t Get Enough (Schizo Mix)
Heaven 17 - Play To Win (Extended Mix)
Visage - Visage (Extended Version)
Soft Cell - Bedsitter
The Human League - The Sound Of The Crowd (Maxi Version)
Heaven 17 - (We Don’t Need This) Fascist Groove Thang (Full Length 12" Mix)
Depeche Mode - New Life (Remix)
Ultravox - All Stood Still (12 Inch Version)
Soft Cell - Tainted Love / Where Did Our Love Go
The Human League - Hard Times / Love Action (I Believe In Love) (12" Version)
Tom Tom Club - Genius of Love (Long Version)
Ultravox - Vienna (Full Length Version)
This set is not super “mixed” but I hate the “cram in 30 seconds of as many tracks as you can” approach. The tempos were so disparate there weren’t many beat-matching opportunities anyway, so it’s more of a radio show than a dance floor set. I made three different attempts and picked the one that sucked the least.
If there’s a synth-pop 12" remix from 1980-81 that you think is missing and should be in here, please let me know and I can add it.
More in this series will be slowly forthcoming. I’ve got 29 tracks from 1982 that I’m working over right now.
I hope someone out there enjoys this music, in spite of my clumsy presentation of it!
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