“Struggle…
Posted on January 24th, 2009
Filed under: General,Music News — Karl Olson @ 5:01 am
another sign that God love you.” – Lupe Fiasco, “Real” from Food & Liquor
So, my grandfather has been buried in Duluth. That was last weekend for me. It’s still sort of weird to think about it. I imagine it’d be a heavier weight to bare if not for other goings on, though any time I really meditate on it it gets to me, and I cry.
My mom’s vision is currently messed up – a partially detached and torn retina tends to do that. She goes in for surgery next Wednesday. If you’re the praying type, now would be a good time.
I got a hold of Rai, finally dropped off her copies of Final Boss. Maybe with a little luck, we’ll actually get work done such that her album is done well before I go back to school. At the very least, she’ll have a laptop with XP on it, and thus a working microphone for recording. I think we have a much better idea of where it’s headed too, so that should also help in getting things done.
I need to start into sorting though which of the schools I want to go to. I have some days of nothing but long phone calls and boring office visits with college bureaucrats ahead of me. Thankfully, having friends to turn to at the end of those days, plus a good family and lovely girlifriend to talk to helps a lot. It helps me stay grounded, and that lifts me off the ground sometimes too.
It’s weird. Things haven’t been going great at all in a lot of ways lately. It’s been down right crap. Yet, it’s these troubles that remind that I am blessed to have so many good people around me who are there for me when I need them. I haven’t even tapped everyone on that account. I’m probably lucky like that.
To everyone who helps me out: Thanks.
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Blue Screen
Posted on January 11th, 2009
Filed under: General — Karl Olson @ 10:30 pm
Yeah, couldn’t get any courses worth my 6 thousand dollars (between rent and tuition) to take between waiting too long about registration and apparently a record number of students at the school. So, I’m back in Kirkland for atleast the rest of this quarter. I’m rethinking everything, but I think I’ve learned something from this: I can’t last minute anything. I need solid planning, I need to talk advisors, I need to visit campuses and I need to be real about my goals and limitations. I need to be willing to further broaden my horizons in regards to major and school too.
tl;dr: no school but that does not mean no action.
PS: I hate those stupid annoying Comcast HD Intervention adverts. So annoying.
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Have a panic attack [buy some wimax], relax
Posted on January 8th, 2009
Filed under: General — Karl Olson @ 12:24 am
So, other than leading a blog entry with a confused paraphrase of a recent Eminem freestyle that was basically my morning (no really,) I’m gradually getting school. I finally talked to an advisor to make sure what I’m taking actually means something (nothing in my field is available right now, but I can do some work, and I should still schedule another appointment later so I can take some of the outside the major essentials next quarter,) and I now have my internet needs squared away thanks to Clear, and it’s definitely a need, like so:
“Check it, [Ultraklystron] doesn’t just want [internet] now–that’s childish. He needs it, and when you need something, that’s a responsibility that only an adult of my maturity– [GOOGLE READER!]”
Enough paraphrasing. Anyways, I still have a few other kinks to work out (which I thought I had worked out, but man, it’s just been too long since I’ve been in the college game,) but god willing I’ll make this work somehow.
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Simple Things
Posted on January 7th, 2009
Filed under: General — Karl Olson @ 2:38 am
So, after my Burgerville post, I did a little shopping. To be fair, I’d already done a bit, but after getting some very basic groceries and few basic kitchen thing, I realized there were some holes in equipment. Some of this was pretty non-essential stuff – like a kettle (I could always grab a spare from home when I’m up visiting) and a sink plug – some vastly, vastly more essential (a knife and paper for my printer.) However, it was nice to get out again, and think a little.
Speaking of essentials, thank you linksys for letting me post this, if you know what I mean 😉 Nothing like a little internet to take the edge off of the ronery. Still, big doings to get done, well, today actually. I should try to get some sleep.
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One is the loniest number that you ever knew
Posted on January 6th, 2009
Filed under: General — Karl Olson @ 11:39 pm
I think I’ve just jumped from the tutorial to expert mode.
I miss my grandpa.
I miss my home.
I miss my family.
I miss my friends.
I desperately miss Danielle. Being alone in a studio apartment, shopping for groceries – these small things make realize just how much I love her, how much I miss her, and how well she compliments me. I really hope she can visit sooner rather than later.
Tomorrow, school, and getting my own internet (as even though I enjoy Burgerville, I can’t afford to make a habit of it, both physically or monetarily.)
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No witty tagline for this post.
Posted on December 31st, 2008
Filed under: General — Karl Olson @ 3:35 pm
This morning at about 9am, my grandfather on my father’s side – the person for whom I’m named – passed away at age 94. I’d be a liar to say it was unexpected, as he has been having health issues for the past few months, but that doesn’t make it any easier to deal with ultimately. I have no idea how this will play out with university in the mix, but I hope I can make the funeral. He was a great man, and it’s because of his wise investment that I even have the resources to go to school.
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99 (- about 90) Problems
Posted on December 30th, 2008
Filed under: General — Karl Olson @ 3:14 pm
So, if the rush to school wasn’t enough of a hassle, we can now add a dead APC to the stack. At least I caught it before I was in Portland (where, frankly, the price of tech is not nearly as sweet as Seattle. Atleast they’ve got a Fry’s.) Oh, and I still need to get the brakes on the red Escort straight. So fun*.
*=that was the joke.
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A comic about my current situation
Posted on December 30th, 2008
Filed under: General,Pictures — Karl Olson @ 3:06 am
Needless to say, I’m now busting my can getting stuff square. It’s gonna be “get the apartment, move in, go to school.” So much for having breathing room, not that the weather would have afforded me any anyway. I’d have been packed faster though.
And oh man, it’s going to be sweet to have basically a bed, computers/printer, a table for computers/printer and some tubs o’ clothes. Maybe some small electrics (rice cooker would be good to have, electric razor will come with, hopefully the apartment has a microwave.) By sweet, I imagine I’ll be up to Seattle on the weekends as time affords to get some other stuff down (like a dish set/silverware set.)
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Speaking of Nekodashi Being Back
Posted on December 25th, 2008
Filed under: Music News — Karl Olson @ 4:57 am
14 releases are up for download there right now, some of it even in a decent bit rate, some of it never available free previously.
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Nekodashi’s Back/Pay for downloads?
Posted on December 24th, 2008
Filed under: Music News — Karl Olson @ 5:27 pm
So, as many people know, nekodashi has been down for a long time. Well, I recently picked up the nekodashi.info domain and I intend to eventually put the site back up. Now, this where things get interesting. I don’t think I’m going to buy hosting explicitly for it – I’ll probably just have it redirect to a sub-domain here at karlrolson.com. As such, any music available for free would probably just be hosted on various file sharing services (probably zshare with mirroring on megaupload and rapidshare.)
However, there is a service called PayLoadz that allows you to sell downloads containing anything that doesn’t violate their TOS, including music. My question is, would people willing to pay to download my albums via this service? Keep in mind, this could get stuff like Revision4920 available separately from the Complete Collection, and could even used to allow people to bypass the wait and hassle of the free download sites as well. Theoretically, it might even allow me to monetize individual tracks too.
TL;DR: who here would be interested in paying for deliciously DRM-free, 320kbps mp3 (or I could even do FLAC for some of the content) downloads?