Sat Feb 1 = The only thing left to do to the two-hour video of my Thousand: Roast Arizona Lou Special is to remove 22 seconds of the show at the 1:26:53 point where the the audio guy unwittingly played copyrighted music, Life In The Fast Lane by The Eagles. With the song segment, YouTube will not allow my video to be seen.
- That accomplished, I'll do my shopping list and grocery shopping while the 1.5-hour is processing and uploading to YouTube. It will be good to get all the source and related files off of my computer because they take up 117gb, which is 12% of my
XPS
Dell XPS-13 computer with 13.3" touch screen, 60WHr Integrated Battery, Windows 10, Intel 7th Generation Core i7 CPU, 16gb memory and 1TB SSD
hard drive space. The resulting 2-hour video file is only 10gb, still a significant 1%.
The Roast video turned out to be a nine-week project. Mostly for my own reference, without the wrong turns, here is the ideal sequence:
Combine separate files created by each camera that split the show into separate files (syncing with body mic audio if necessary)
Produce each result to get the full show as one large file from each camera
Pick the best source for the audience (in this case it was the audio from Camera #1)
Auto duck the audience audio, using the PA audio (comedians' track) as the control track (Sensitivity = 50%; Ducking = 80%; Fade out and Fade in both set at .1 second
Increase the volume of the comedians' track with the CyberLink-15 key frames
Produce the video with the combined audio of the comedians' mic and the ducked audience mic to get the Final Camera #1 file
MultiCam: Load all four camera fines and sync all by audio
Set the audio as from the Final Camera Camera #1's audio
Start Final Camera #1 video playing in a different window by Windows Media Player in order to anticipate camera shake during the MultiCam work
MultiCam: Record the show selecting the appropriate cameras. Then click OK to return to the editing screen
Shorten my body mic recording in the ICD to the last of the show through the post-show portion
Add that audio track to CyberLink's time line and sync by audio
For the post-show body mic audio, switch from the Final Camera #1's audio to the ICD body mic audio by creating four CyberLink key frames in both sound tracks and switching to minus infinity db as appropriate
Produce this video. This is the finished video... except it has 20 seconds of copyrighted music at 1:27 between comedians Don Dorio and Dustin Cade, which prevents the video from being seen on YouTube
Remove the offending 20 seconds (it was mostly just a blank stage anyway)
Produce this video and upload it to Youtube
Here's the result:
- I'll save all the source files for the show on an external hard drive so, if I have time and inclination I can re-do it with a slightly immproved sound and no camera shake.
Sun Feb 2 = This morning I got my revised Thousand: Roast Arizona Lou Special video active on YouTube. Tomorrow I'll switch to the new video on my Comedy Home Page. It's still not perfect, so I've taken notes to shorten the audio ducking response times and eliminate some of the camera shake, which was the result of my camera guy being over zealous in tweaking Camera #1.
- Late Lunch Comedy at
Pho Cao, Vietnamese restaurant in Scottsdale was sparse due to the Super Bowl LIV. There was only an audience of 14 which included about 8 comedians. They liked my Middle Child/Stan routine; the first time I did it there.
- Major progress with my van wiring this evening... for my ceiling fan. With the help of a 24" zip tie, threading rods, a magnet, a paper clip and a little gumption and ingenuity, I strung kite line from the drivers sliding door jam to the rear passenger-side ceiling duct through which I drilled a 1/2" hole for the wire. Tomorrow I'll buy some bell wire and pull it through, with an additional, temporary kite line in case things don't go as expected.
- Oh, yes, the Chiefs defeated the 49ers 31-20 in the Super Bowl. You can tell I'm really a fan. I didn't even know who was playing until I checked the score before bedtime.
Mon Feb 3 = Comedy this evening was at Devil's Advocate with my Cheap routine
Tue Feb 4 = This morning I binged on a bunch of the best Super Bowl LIV commercials.
- This afternoon I had my semiannual eye check. Dr Pyritz found only my needing a slightly stronger, by one diopter, prescription for distance vision.
- This evening's comedy was at the Crescent Ballroom - my second time there. My Middle Child routine went over pretty well. It is always a good room run by Matt Micheletti.
Wed Feb 5 = Today I redid my Road Tour poster with a QR Code linking to the latest update online. I also redid my Announcement slips with the new poster on the back.
- I made a small emergency gym kit with a wash cloth, small towel, antiperspirant, comb, brush and hair glue. I'll carry it in the van in case I end up at a gym without my gym bag.
- Thank goodness this does not happen often: This afternoon I had a slight anal accident, so cleaned up my sweat pants, put them in the laundry and pulled out an old pair that has been hanging in my closet for about 54 years. Of course the elastic was toast, so I threaded in new. Sweats have not changed, you know.
- In the van department, I hooked up the battery combiner temporarily and tested it. Works like a dream.
- This evening was Toso's for my Cheap routine. Went well.
Thu Feb 6 = Today I added glass coverage to my van's AMICA Mutual insurance. Speaking of my van, I used my Mileage spreadsheet to determine that I spent $14,825 on gasoline for my old van, the last five years since starting comedy. That's an average of $3,177 per year. For the last 18 years that I kept track of my gas costs with the old van, I spent $45,879, which averaged $2,549 per year. Before starting comedy I didn't do a whole lot of local Phoenix driving, but did go on annual kiteboarding trips - mostly to
.
- This evening I drove down to Chandler and did my new Cheap routine.
Fri Feb 7 = At noon I took my new Sedona Kia to the dealer for its first oil change and the installation of an after-market remote start kit, which cost about $750. Expensive, but I need to be able to start the van from the back when it's hot and my
needs to be charged. They gave me a loaner car. I'll only put about 14 miles on it, going to the gym.
- Selling some of my Wittmann land has become a moving target. The buyer keeps changing what he wants. Oh, well, that happens when you deal with humans.
Sat Feb 8 = This afternoon I picked up my van from Earnhardt Kia, a mile south of my house. They did not charge me for the oil change and tire rotation. They even washed my van for me! That builds loyalty. Thanks, guys. This evening I experimented some with the van's new Remote Start feature and read the instructions.
- This evening it took me 12 minutes to enter the Kroger feedback/Sweepstakes and give them feedback about not offering Top Tier Gasoline.
- After that I pulled the wire through my van's ceiling for the little ceiling fan and moved the 100A ANL fuse up a couple of inches to give space below it for the automatic battery isolator relay which I am installing.
- Even later I finished the annual Consumer Reports Survey, emphasizing electronics.
Sun Feb 9 = Comedy-full day with three appearances and three different routines. It started at Pho Cao in Scottsdale for their Late Lunch Open MIc. Then I scooted off to the Phoenix Center for the Arts for the Infuse Open MMic variety show, then to The Grand.
Mon Feb 10 = Been working on my van: converting it from a regular minivan to a minimotorhome.
- Tonight was at Devil's Advocate in Tempe where I did some of my tweaked DR/Hand routine.
Tue Feb 11 = I have been finding time to make it to a gym only about three days a week... and then only for a brief, heavy workout. I am keeping up, though, with my daily 2-minute FAST exercycle sessions, typically getting my pulse rate up into the 150's.
- Being the first Tuesday of the month, I went to the Concierge Bistro for Matt Micheletti's monthly open mic. One of the best... if your name gets drawn from his bucket. I DID get drawn and, since it was my first time there, I did my Introductory Old Man Routine. The crowd liked the routine. They were great. A lot of non-comedians.
Wed Feb 12 = Negotiating with the buyer of my land near Wittmann through our respective realtors continues. The buyer has been adding things along the way :(
- I executed my monthly credit card payoffs in 20 minutes.
- This evening at Toso's I did my DR/Handroutine. It is always a good group of comedian friends who respect each other
Thu Feb 13 = For lunch I met
George & Cindy
my younger brother and his wife sold their house in Mesa, Arizona and are now in Christopher Creek.
at a Chick-fil-A at the 101 and Shea. Perfect! Cindy liked it, it's only 14.6 miles for me to drive and pretty good for them because they can shoot up to Christopher Creek from there.
- It's official. I will be appearing: Wed Mar 26, 2020; 7:30pm; Tempe Improv; 930 E University Dr; Tempe, AZ 85281. My last time there before leaving on my 2019 road tour.
- This afternoon, printing my newly revised Show Slips, I had to shake my printer's toner cartridge... for the second time, so I ordered a new large capacity cartridge; an after market compatible, saving about 37%. I hope it is a good one.
Fri Feb 14 = Happy VALENTINE'S DAY. You know I have been Patty Sanders' shopping partner through
. There was no answer the last time I tried to phone her so I left a voice mail. Today I learned, from her son Chris, that she died Jan 19th. Things like this, I think, help me face my own mortality. Patty is the first shopping partner to die while I was in town. All the others died while I was away on road tours. Guess they just couldn't live without me!
- I spent over an hour on the phone trying to get my new CPAP machine adjusted so my sleep wouldn't be interrupted several times a night with too high of a pressure. It was set to ramp up to 10". It has been a week and they have not corrected the problem. They say they MIGHT get it changed by Monday :( Since I need my sleep, I changed the pressure myself, to the 6" newly prescribed my my provider. Patients are not supposed to know how to change the settings, but hey, I'm a retired science teacher, and I figure out stuff.
- For my van, I got all more wires threaded where they are concealed behind panels - wires for my ceiling fan, the remote isolation switch for the
.
- Just before I worked on my taxes this evening, I checked out a bunch of videos from my dash cam.
The videos and correcting the camera's date and time took me about an hour. This camera has a host of features, but nothing about it is intuitive... sort of like my new van. In the process I found and corrected a misdirected link on my Technology web page.
- Then... there wasn't much time left for taxes, so I joined AARP. I don't agree with their politics, but membership is cheap and there are a lot of benefits.
Sat Feb 15 = I spent most of today filling out the 5-page seller disclosure form for the 1.25 acres that I am selling near Wittmann, northwest of Phoenix. The hardest parts were resolving two different versions of the legal description and researching the easements.
- This evening I got all the wiring hooked up for my van's
Sun Feb 16 = Who would spend $395 or a date stamp? Me, if the stamp was cool enough. I ordered the Reiner Speed i Jet 798 Date Stamp. It is an ink jet printer in the form of a wand. It sprays the information on almost any surface when you press the button and move the wand. Later I canceled the order because I found a much better deal from a company that does not require a commercial address for delivery.
- By the time I made some booking phone calls it was too late to get to Pho Cao early enough before the show, so I skipped the open mic for today. Instead I got my van's newly wired
charging/isolation system tested. Everything works great!
- This evening I did a short heavy arms workout at LA Fitness and did my semi-monthly grocery shopping at Winco and Bashes, solo (without a Duet shopping partner).
Mon Feb 17 = An urgent but unscheduled and unanticipated job today was correcting the 6-page Seller Disclosure I had sent to my real estate agent and then and filling out the 5-page Affidavit of Disclosure that pretty much duplicated the Seller Disclosure in different words. Thank you for all that extra work, AZ Legislature!
- This evening in my van, I tucked some wires neatly into a trim panel and then bought some grommets from Ace Hardware on the way to Devil's Advocate. My comedy there tonight was a rant about government irresponsibility stealing our money & their frivolous spending of it.
Tue Feb 18 = I spent the better part of an hour on the phone, mostly on hold waiting, trying to get things arranged for my trip to the Preferred Home Care CPAP clinic tomorrow.
- This afternoon I completed my van's ceiling fan installation, and is it slick! I can aim the fan and the wires are hidden. Also I added a grommet to the three wires disappearing into the trim near my
electrical panel.
- Tonight at the Tempe Tavern I did my new Dickie/Elections/Medical/Laws routine and then some of my Holding routine in the allotted seven minutes. I sold two T-shirts ($10) and my first sticker ($1). The guy who bought the T-shirt also got a free sticker by giving me his email address - another first.
- On the way home I filled up with gas. I mostly drove normally and compared it with the last fueling when drove conservatively. The difference in gas mileage was 2.48%, which means in my typical year I could save about $63. Hardly worth it, although I might lock the transmission in 8th gear on long, mostly level, freeways.
- My after-bedtime project was to tweak all five graphics for the my 2020 tours, pending the input of some professionals in the business. Graphics for the magnetic signs, publicity templates and posters.
Wed Feb 19 = I lay in the sun at noon today and signed up for My Air online and with my phone to track my sleep with my new ResMed CPAP machine.
- Comedy this evening was at Toso's as usual. On the way home I stopped by LA Fitness for my
poster trim
weekly trimming of my beard, eye brows and little quiff so I match my poster photos
and a short, slow heavy legs workout.
Thu Feb 20 = I spent quite a bit of time researching an ink jet date printer. It is about as big as pencil box.
- On the way to Grand Ave Pizza I stopped by the only NAPA store in the area that had the +/- 30A ammeter that I want to modify for monitoring my
.
- Tonight was the first night I reduced my covers from the winter four layers (below) by removing the giant beach towel.
knit sheet
bed spread
flannel sheet
giant beach towel, on the top
Fri Feb 21 = For my van project, I went to Fabric Depot and bought some trunk liner to put in my kite-storage compartment and some marine carpeting to go under my drawers on the driver's side just inside the sliding door.
- My stools, over the past months have gradually gone from loose to almost too firm to to the point that it is time to do something about it. This morning I started adding whole psyllium husks to my cereals. This afternoon I went to Albertson's pharmacy and with the advice of the pharmacist, used some glycerin. No, not there in the store... at home. They called it a suppository, but it looked to me more like a micro enema. It seemed to do the trick.
Sat Feb 22 = Boy did I get a lot done today... on my
van project
converting my 2020 Kia Sedona minivan to a mini-motorhome where I will live during my road tours
.
It was a woodworking day. I got the half inch counter leveling subfloor cut, that will go just inside the passenger sliding door.
- The biggest job was replacing the rear half of the bed's right frame with one that matched the new van rather than the old van. About a month ago, trying to make the old frame match, I cut out a square for the third row seat belt anchor so the bed would cozy right up to the wall. Big mistake that resulted in a lot of extra work. I had decided to remove the anchor and use its big bolt to anchor the bed. Then the problem was that the place in the bed frame for the big bolt was now the empty space of a square hole.
- This evening I pored over the escrow documents for the 1.25 acres I am selling near Wittmann.
Sun Feb 23 = I am continuing with my raw psyllium husks.
- This evening I went to see, nationally known comedian, Louis CK. He was pretty good. The audience loved him, giving him a standing ovation when he first walked out on the stage and again, at the end of his show, which interesting enough, involved almost no crowd work. He is touring across the country, rebuilding his career after an incident, which some think was largely trumped up. Yes, he addressed the issue effectively in a humorous way.
Mon Feb 24 = I didn't get a whole lot done today. I DID do my tweaked Viagra set at Devil's Advocate, and closed by pulling out at the last :)
Tue Feb 25 = I got up this morning a little after noon, rode my exercycle,fixed breakfast and ate it. By the time I checked my emails and signed up for two open mics at the Bird City Comedy Festival in late March, it was time to get dressed and leave for my appointment with Arizona Oncology. They found that my red blood cells are stable, slightly improved and still a little below normal. Nothing to worry about.
- Since I was in the area, I stooped by the little Senior Citizen Optom Care gym for the first time in about ten months and did a short, slow,heavy arms workout. I was surprised that I was still in their system :)
Wed Feb 26 = MyAir Resmed CPAP machine keeps track of my use information and sends it to the Internet. I can see the result on my phone or on my computer through myAir. MyAir mostly bugs me with emails that tell me what I already know so the emails are useless.
- I made it to LA Fitness for a heavy, slow full-body workout.
Thu Feb 27 = Nutritionally, today I decided to add a rounded Tablespoon of psyllium husks to my morning bran flakes or oatmeal and to try adding chia seeds to my bran flakes. I am already adding flax seed meal to my oatmeal. Google tells me that both chia and flax seeds are rich in a variety of nutrients. ... Flax seeds also contain significantly more manganese, copper and potassium. Chia seeds contain slightly fewer calories and more fiber. They also contain almost twice the bone-strengthening minerals calcium and phosphorus, as well as slightly more iron. - In the finance department, I logged onto my MINT account and found my credit score is 823 :) I also, hopefully, stopped all the pesky emails I get from them. Then I projected my budget through May and paid my property taxes :(
- Before going to bed I changed the humidity to #5 on my Resmed CPAP machine.
Fri Feb 28 = This morning I got all 23 pages of the closing documents completed, notarized and overnighted for the acre I am selling near Wittmann (NE of PHX).
- This afternoon I finally ordered the Reiner Speed-i-jet date printer after the vendor said that it kept the current date and time internally. The instructions for the unt were a little vague. I felt so stupid tonight, putting up the image on my website. For some reason I was not getting it to show up because: 1) I was updating to my local host but checking for the changes online. 2) I repeatedly forgot to add the .jpg image extension. I figure if I confess here the stupidity will be less likely to repeat.
- This evening I got the four wall-bed spacers glued in place for my van bed. I had to hole-saw four access holes for using a 24" socket extension to tighten the screws and bolts that will hold the bed in place.
- Before going to bed I did my blog's monthly roll-over to February in a record 14:24 minutes.
Sat Feb 29 = Happy Leap Year! I have been working hard on my taxes (uhg!). Had a nice visit with
Cindy
my younger brother George's wife
.
It took me 35 minutes to pay my property taxes online.
- In the comedy department, I made phone calls to El Paso for my comedy shows there, updated my Past Appearances list for this week's shows and named and download their audio files. Preparing for my comedy shows for veterans, I read about US wars throughout history.
- Since I am a member of AARP now, I used their website to find my BMI, which was 21.4. That is 1.4% below 21.7, the exact middle of the healthy range which is 18.5-24.9. So there!
- For my van project, I aligned the mounting holes for the bed frame
