There is no joy in Kaufman . . . .

Well, the venue I went to yesterday was pretty much a bust. My sister and I have had booths at this parish carnival for several years, and have always done okay. Even last year, we did all right. Joy couldn't go this year, so I took some of her jewelry to sell along with my baby things and micromitts and cool ties.

This year she sold one pair of earrings. No rosaries (usually a good seller), no bracelets, no necklaces. Just one lonely pair of earrings.

I had a little better luck -- 7 cool ties, a onesie, a pair of mitts, and an apron. I made my rent twice, but that's it. I was glad to see the apron go -- we've had it for a couple years and no one wanted it, but this lady really liked it. But nobody bought any of the new mitts I spent so much time on in the last 2 weeks. :o( I happen to think they're great. Check them out on my Flickr.


It was sunny (a great relief after a week of steady rain), but so humid the sweat just rolled down my legs. All the music was in Spanish (and it all sounded the same to me), but the only decent group was the mariachis late in the afternoon. And all of it suffered from a bad sound system, which did absolutely nothing for my headache. My mother kept joking about paying some kid to unplug the amps.

I don't think I'm going back there next year.

The Missing Seconds

Ever notice that when you copy music to your computer, the tracks rarely end up the same length as on the cds?

I got several giftcards for Christmas and decided to splurge on books and movies and cds. Everything I got is an old favorite, just right for enjoying again and again, especially the cds. My original cassette tapes are over 20 years old and beginning to wow just a bit.

I put all of the cds on my computer so I could enjoy them while I'm online. As I was naming the tracks, I noticed that very few had the same time listed on the cd label. Some were a few seconds longer, some a bit shorter. And then there was the final track on one album, that was 30 seconds shorter.

That's right. Not 2 or 3 or even 5 seconds, but 30 seconds.

What I'd like to know is, where did all that time go? Is it being recycled to provide extra space for the occasional long-winded classical piece I copy? Is it going to add to the total run-time for my computer before it dies of obsolescence?

Or did it just get sucked into a musical black hole in the space-time continuum?









And yes, the answer is 42.