Pain versus pleasure - which one is the beneficial feeling?

[somewhat a Bryn Mawr-esque styled sort of meditation, upon societal ”… umm, stuff” I guess]

At times, 

I imagine that people are trying to get a hold of me, remotely. I’ve come to associate the premise of an actuality of this sort of thing having become a viable belief, or reality, even, in the lives and minds of people. It amounts to, I would suppose, a greater actualization of some degree, or threshold - albeit, only a given measure and extent of identity or persona, I would say. On top of that, it is a limited-use basis concept to stage aspirations and beliefs upon, given the ongoing presence of human shortcomings and failures in life, of all sorts of various forms that exist - the year, at the time of this writing, being 2022 A.D. 

Imaginably, at some point in the future, human personality shortcomings and abnormalities (disorders) would be undone and conquered, as it were, much earlier on, in the core education topics and subjects which are covered in school, or prior to school-age learning. Also, imaginably, there possibly are limited demographics of people who are brought up, of this more faultless form of a human, in learning. 

It made me question a notion, this previous time that this perhaps otherwise “delusional” sort of belief, as it stands, as for myself: ought I act upon a call for help, given a premise of absolutely non-verifiable synchronicity? What if I show up and it ends up being an inappropriate hour? What if people are stalking me, out in public, or something like that? On one hand, I’ve been a faulty-enough person, to imagine, for myself, that various people or entities would have it out for me, and that these types of validated or seditious indulgences - take your pick: are potential realities of exclusion that a person would have to go through. In an ideal world, we would more verifiably capably determine, more fluidly, and insightfully, whether or not a person has entered our lives, or persists there, for that matter, for our benefit, or for the sake of consuming us, as a resource of flesh, and of a subjective design, rather than a project of labor, and trials of development, perhaps, that a human could aught be. 

In this instance, I was “somewhat” challenged, for this outreach premise to have occurred, to me, of a completely introverted and “directed energy” sort of basis about it. The person had had what might seem to have been a trivial problem, yet numerous seditions exist upon this given premise - on one hand, it’s a “most obvious” sort of request to have, for a person - forgoing blurting it out, on one hand. “We all have this need,” some people might think, yet it’s very difficult, I find, to truthfully discern, whether or not somebody would display a given “human” trait of need, or shortcoming, as it were, unless we, ourselves, are the superior intellect and visceral discernment figure, in the human dynamic concerned here. In other words, it’s not until we become a superior critical mind, on a topic, that we become the appropriate person to resolve the problem, for others. 

It’s confusing, a bit, to think deeply, and to wrap the mind, effectively, around this subject basis, since it implies that we capably accept burden, which stands against a more “simple” and pleasurable life, being lived out, however temporary that it may be, for that we help others, yet it’s somewhat unclear, on one hand, whether or not extending this help, unto a person, could potentially develop in to a symbiotic, mutually beneficial sort of engagement and interaction, whereas some people are simply lacking in morals, whereas other people are unduly burdened, and whereas they “would” help somebody, whereas other people “would” help, or offer their help, and the circumstances amount to that they offer a less desirable solution than a better-positioned, more aptly capable person could offer. 

The corollary to this topic is that we would have a difficult time discerning whether or not a service offered to a person is even necessary to a person who is in a position of a greater extent of maturity - of many, or at least several - measures of “need” that a person has, whereas we become more ethically considerate, and capable, of acknowledging, and tending to needs of ourselves, others, society, etc., for attaining a higher degree of serenity and maturity. On one hand, sometimes we’re coddled, of some form, even in to our adulthood. We’re given graces of forgiveness; sometimes people look the other way - that’s the way my mind works, in any case. 

On this day, however, the topic of “Reclamation” was the outstanding decree, and seeming spirit, of the moment. I became a paranoid schizophrenic, of this basis, of an even earlier (oh, yeah… I forgot) premise that had been established, of that it was riot preparedness day, out where I started my day, for doing my daily rounds. To be certain, it was a shaky mindset, of all sorts of battering about, that I’d taken in, to wind up eventually finding my way home, while fitting my day in to various “demands” and threats upon me, of my home life, [somewhat], that it is - stuff such as that I need to get home at a certain hour, that I’m sometimes held at fault for things that had already been discussed, that appear to be my “fault,” for having acted out, violently, whereas I’m also being treated as a sort of “false idol” of some sort, of various measures of merit and attainment - in essence, it amounts to that I develop upon aesthetics practice and material attainment. 

I understand. It’s an easily fault-worthy thing to be guilty of - materialism. On the other hand, I “could” still be an unapologetic, relentless drug addict, and be the subject of distributed humor, in circles of superior displays of having attained a greater degree of maturity on the subject. The latest joke being something, essentially, like “oh, yeah. This guy. He looked like he had a thermonuclear explosion happen in his face.” Ha. I know the guy, for that matter. 

Sometimes, that sort of guy challenges me. Should I help someone who has absolutely no cares for etiquette, on top of a viciously seditious and remorseless attitude, simply because I’m a better person? Hopelessly devoted Christian dogma would largely suppose “yes,” that I do show unconditional love, turn the other cheek, and offer graces of forgiveness, etc. On one hand, displaying charity had been shown, in Pew Research, in previous years, some study and analysis (statistics, as it were, or is), of measures of virtue, in various forms, that distinguish people of a higher social class. That was ten years ago, however - what does it matter? - that’s somewhat the sentiment on my mind, yet I don’t quite expect that people would give me a hard time, in life, about stuff that had happened 10 years ago, or further back. On one hand, I was criminally incompetent, and I did criminally incompetent things, although I did pay the price, in doing so - some of these folks would disagree, and they take it upon themselves, in remote sensing applications, to personally abuse me, and threaten various measures of personal space and security that a person would typically assume, in life, for having locked spaces, a quiet personality, and a generally modestly considerate lifestyle. Who would imagine that absolutely all people surrounding oneself is, here and there (oh, how cute, right?), so casually interested in stealing and defiling “my” (i.e. supposed, or given “person’s”) property and personal, private space? 

Perhaps I’ll update further, some time soon. I’m getting cold, and I’m outdoors, at the moment. It’s sunset.

Some hallmarks of the times: 

It is near to the time of having been Easter, and subsequently, Ash Wednesday and Good Friday had come to pass, as well. Now is the time of Lent, where people in the Catholic religion are presented with the challenge of giving up some sort of worldly attachment. In practical terms, it’s a virtuous premise. My criticism of this premise is that sciences, of various ones, had been primitive, or pre-science, so to speak - sorts of knowledge base and philosophy about them, whereas in the past several hundred years, or so, sciences had begun to demand the rigors of objective proof, of an incontrovertible nature. Another corollary issue about this premise is that drug abstinence becomes an obvious claim of a needed thing to give up, for Lent, whereas in the twelve steps and self-help paradigm, the saying is that we strive for progress, not perfection. Ostensibly, a particular group of individuals, archetypal sorts, imaginably - get rebuked, and abandoned, during this period of time, every year, for the fact that drug use, and everything that comes along with the subject - commonly would become a sacrificed habit, or practice - a worldly thing that had been disavowed. The slighted one’s revolt, in response, and a person such as myself becomes a target for stalking, and I get let loose, of various elaborate ruses of the mind, at a costly rate to the establishment, for the nature of the fact of the matter - being that I only latently, perhaps, come to understand that I’m being robbed of my conscious mind’s continuity and sensory experience, whereas life seems to happen seamlessly, as though I’m not having some sort of lapse of consciousness, similar to an epileptic event. Today, for example, my non-laced shoe strap tightener constantly became loose. Another thing that happens is that my asspad becomes loosened, from between my butt cheeks. It gives me the impression that I’d been violated, somehow. It’s an issue of concern, because it’s a noticeably “just had” occurred, sort of thing - that doesn’t happen every day, yet it definitely happens over and over, on a day like this. Perhaps for the sake of confessions being wrought out of me, for some sort of “somebody’s” pleasures? Perhaps. I would, ostensibly, be the one to confess, in honesty, and I commonly do that, since it had been requested of me. The problem is that some people are not ready for honesty, and they react against the season of self-sacrifice with antisocial behavior. 

Then, there’s the odd flows of vehicular traffic, and there’s simply more people out on the streets. On one hand, it’s all basically opposition to self-sacrifice, but how could a person identify, with certainty - the perpetrators, while there’s such diversity at stake, out here, in Los Angeles, California, USA? On one hand, the strangeness definitely happens. The side-chained narrative of paranoid beliefs is the supporting mechanism that thwarts complacency, although, to reiterate - these strange things “are” definitely happening. Technology is established, at this point, in time, sufficiently such that a person’s mind could conceivably - at a great cost, be robbed of one thing, such as time, whereas it would seem, nonetheless, that “nothing” had happened, yet some changes that are incontrovertible seem to keep happening, regardless of that such detriments to self-sufficiency and upkeep would typically otherwise be uncommon. 

I’ll update more, in a bit. It took me from sunset until 11:00 p.m. to get home, today. 

Update: 6:48 a.m., April 29th, 2022

Moving forward, to bring this all to a point, of some various sorts; I’ll try to do that, here. First of all, given how commonly my overseers, or perhaps, at times, my directed-life designers, as they might be termed - given how often some of these people have as much as sensory insight, as much as I do, or more - about my surroundings, because - let’s face it. This is high tech stuff. People could be teaming up on me, while looking at what I see with my own eyes, while knowing what I’m thinking about something. Most commonly, it’s about “losing” something, for example, amongst my mess, otherwise known as my crumbs and knickknacks. Conceivably, they have a database of when I was last in knowing possession of the object, and it’s databased somewhere, easily accessible for them. On one hand, it’s my punishment, for doing something improper, perhaps, which I do, somewhat, and I’m otherwise allowed to float by, for the day, in general. So they try to make me believe that somebody had stolen my stuff, or moved it around, or something, while I was out, while I used the restroom, or was bathing - stuff like that. They tell me that my housemates had done it, to invoke suspicion and ill-will towards them. Sometimes it works, hence I’d broken some holes in the drywall, here at the transitional living home. Yet, I hold my anger, and aggression towards others, because… hmm. Because of various things, yet, I suppose that the most prominent reason is that I’d like to not fall out of form, and do something uncharacteristic, in another part of my life, more important than the material world; crumbs and knickknacks of my room, as it were. 

Which brings things to a pertinent second point: people who practice “anything,” I’d say, or even just “do” something - are likely to “do” that thing, of some offhanded slight, perhaps a social faux pas, for example, and conceivably, it would slip out, at an undesirable moment, such as when an opportunity arises, for that it’s an uncomfortable thing, which is a realm of un-knowingness, I’d say. That being the case, when we’re uncomfortable, we don’t quite always know what to do. Hence, as for myself, I was a self-injurer, and I punch the walls, because I get that upset. Some of these people get me that upset. Over time, the message slightly comes across, I’d suppose, or I get bigger, tougher, I get better “lines,” in remote sensing, for persona development and marketing purposes, and I have to be okay with that good enough is good enough. I have to consider that other people aren’t doing so great, such as the guy who had the… yada yada yada sorts of stuff to think about. A lack of restraint is an undoing of a man or woman, alike. It makes people nervous, amidst the presence of such - a lack of restraint. It signals danger. It causes people to become uncomfortable, and frightened of showing up where that sort of thing happens. It makes people judge the superficial. 

Alright, that’s my little morning’s update, for the time being. That’s as much as I have in my mind, at the moment. 

Ooh! A big one, really quick:

These sorts of things, in needing to be surveilled, polls run, people queried, reactions and responses taken - the cumulative effect of it all is that it drives the need for Daylight Savings Time, which, on one hand, we benefit from, here in California - we somewhat bask in the indulgence of having a long, warm or hot day, from spring until fall, largely, and it’s a largely vertical expanse of land, our state of California. It’s a popular destination, yet with people so commonly rioting about, in the streets, and following people around, it gives the entire place a poor reputation, and we used to have a huge tourism industry, as a source of revenue. 

Anyhow, the Daylight Savings Time “belief” thing is one of the “beliefs” lobbed at me, to establish my paranoid persona | identity, au jour. On one hand, people seem to combat and warmonger around town, with the basis of burgeoning California’s place, in benefitting from Daylight Savings Time, but it’s unkind to other states, other nations, who get the short end of the stick, with short days, colder weather, and embattled trade provisions being made out, as a result. Take the European Union, for example, particularly in the context of the Russia | Ukraine war going on. There had seemed to be, anecdotally, for example, a bargain-rate cosmetics ingredients supplier, which I’d discovered on the net, and I came to find out that they didn’t accept payments from the United States, even though their website said that they do. It was disappointing, because I was hoping to get a good deal on some hard-to-find ingredients. 

All that being said, we’re generally not as productive as, say, farm workers, for example, who do labor, by the day - I know farm work. Several years ago, I went out to work on a farm. Now I’m a bit nostalgic for that opportunity, and on one hand, I’ve got to print some flyers up, and distribute them, and see if I can round up some work. 

People who don’t care, don’t work, I suppose. 

Okay. That’s all, for this re-update. Thanks. 

Some updated observations: Saturday, June 25th, 2022:

As I’m out trekking, in a nuclear watershed South Bay community, I encounter that I’d found a slight diversion in what would have otherwise been my standard route, out to the place I need to attend to, for a pickl app gig, and I made a turn down an earlier, more nested street than the main street, where most of the non-local traffic might likely enter through. I sat down for a moment, having spent a fairly time-consuming amount of the day in resting, in intervals, already, whereas, for being out and about, and for trekking, I encounter various pitfalls and hazards of inefficiency in performance. Here, the problems had amounted to establishing warmth (not so much, since I’d largely been on the move), maintaining hydration, which I managed well, come morning, when I woke up rather cold and apathetic towards moving around, due to subsequent inflammation - by making good use of my fleece-lined pantyhose that I got, from Amazon, by setting them, fairly fully, yet not completely all-over, which I found to feature good protection against hypothermia, while being on the move, yet also good insular warmth, from the fleece, which is both cushiony and absorbent, while the elastic synthetic outer layer provides easy wicker penetration and breathability. Now that I’m closer to my destination, I stopped to have a sandwich: peanut butter and green tea cookies, and I started to cool down, a bit, which was accompanied by a reminder of that I had stopped approaching my destination as a result of becoming electrically exhausted - the kind of exhaustion that merits that the muscles can no longer be flexed; me, as a load-bearing laborer, for trekking with bags. On one hand, the same weight can still be carried, yet, simply not so, in the case of that the various bags’ centers of mass remain the same, and I didn’t quite feel like rearranging the bags’ belongings, as it was already late at night, and also because it had been a long day (a long week, in fact, in preparing myself to pursue litigations, of a personal nature, for having been put out of my home). I was told that my better opportunities for managing the worth of covering ground, towards my destination - on foot, for the fact of that it didn’t really seem as though buses were running, and for that I may have literally been an acute targeted victim of stalking, for various or unknown reasons, since last night, or yesterday, being that there was also associated unrest in downtown Los Angeles - the more unlawful gathering sort of unrest having happened at night, whereas I left, for the South Bay, to complete my pickl gig.

New Developments in the South Bay (updating)

Since

I haven’t been receiving unemployment deposits on to my CA EDD (California Employment Development Department) debit card, any time recently - perhaps since early spring, this year, or so; I was upright and cautious enough to get through the whirligig of what had been the heyday of Pandemic Unemployment Award benefits, in addition to standard unemployment benefits, as well as Federal Disaster Aid benefits (something like that), which had made mid-2020 through Q3 of 2021, or so, an illustrious gilded pigeon-egg golden (imagined 🤔) phase for fragrance and aroma ingredients procurement and some product development along those lines, for iPigeon.institute as well as IoTpigeons.eco. I had done some bungling preliminary work on branding the fragrance-interested arm of the enterprise, as iPigeon Aroma Company, but so far, it’s not had a foundational establishment to ground ideas, from out of it, or retail-ready product line, to present to testers. I’m a bit overextended, in other words, but I’m working out some of the latent consequences, such as uncanny neck pain (I’ve been developing what’s been described as an expert technique - perhaps quite niche, since I do “oxen” types of hauling labors, lately, and even more so than I might, otherwise, since I’m flat out on the streets, and looking for a new place to call home - a board and care facility, in this instance, rather than a transitional living home (whatever that means, 🙄 it ended poorly, I must say). At any rate, I’ll update the advanced next cracking video series, for the specialization in self-help | pressure point healing that it attends to, in blood circulatory wellness. It’s not quite massage, and it looks pretty jacked, but I’ve been finding it necessary to correct myself in public; strange that I might appear to be, for doing that sort of thing, but nonetheless, it’s not necessarily my fault - the dirt on the topic was that it felt like there was electrical lines running underneath the floor in my room, and I’m not quite all that much paranoid, like, a for real squirrels type of paranoia 🫣, plus, there was marijuana being grown in the garage just below me: my room was ostensibly adjacent to the corner of the ceiling of the garage. Strange developments from out of that sort of thing can be found on my Twitter feed.

Now, 

though, I’m out in the open air, and these charges that I’ve been cracking out, illegal that they’d been called, have been getting normalized, and attenuated, for being pressed out of my joints and connective tissue. I’ve also had the good fortune to be able to try out, for product reviews that I’m hired for, and I feel that they’ve largely been fairly okay, and sometimes better than just imagining that they might be working. It’s been a boon to my enterprise developments, post-Covid-19 gilded age era type of thing. 

So, I got out of town, this evening

and I’m over in the South Bay - a nice diversion from the business and chaotic identities that make DTLA such a hyper-vigilant real squirrels type of reality basis life - I’m out, feeding the pigeons, guys are wondering, this and that, sometimes they want to fight, or catch me sleeping, vulnerable, which sucks, because I really do “have to” sleep outside, and I can’t really accommodate people trying to rob me and ask me questions in my sleep. It’s just rude, and I have to see people when I look at them, and being a stalking victim really makes a superficial me, out of myself, which I’m okay with, for the most part, yet the not okay stuff is still just not okay, at the same time. On one hand, it couldn’t possibly be okay, but I’m also committed to paying my taxes down for running a pigeon-feeding bum enterprise-able lifestyle thing, pigeons that they may be - they do need to eat, and I have been getting a lot of oversight accommodations to the stuff (that I do). Feeding the pigeons, and stuff. 

So, I’m thinking, wow - that’s pretty awrr rawr rough and tough, on a pigeon-feeding bum, but for this past year, being that the Covid-19 pandemic emergency basis had been established, I figure - they got a good assessment on me, some professional person who took a good look at what I do, and what basis for tax code things pertain to me, and I guess I can’t really say that I haven’t been a pigeon-feeding bum, and I made all sorts of claims about things on Twitter, and I can’t afford to look like an idiot, for very long, and try to talk my way around things, over at the finance office front counter, or something. There’s got to be some way I’m worth this money, and the Los Angeles City Office of Finance had arranged to have businesses be allowed to make reasonable offer accommodations of some sort, to get the taxes paid, and get the city running, and stuff. I’m not a complainer, but there could obviously be some improvements done and made done - I figured, in my case, I could keep it kinda bum-basis “looking” kind of thing, and I offered to clean up the streets of south Los Angeles, which are notable for regular, ongoing, and mass site dumps of trash and garbage, all around town, to a large degree. It’s a shoddy notable characteristic of the place, and I run a “clean-up” blog, for that matter, that I hadn’t really updated, for most of all of the year that I’d been keeping it up, as far as last year. The blog got tons of hits, though, relatively. I figured I ought to nurture the clean up thing, on that end. It was really a Trump-era aspiration to fulfill, and I was big on supporting Donald Trump, as President, for the good that I saw and knew of him, from what I could discern, and infer, as far as who he is, or might be - even though it went against the grain, so to speak, as far as most of my Facebook friends were, as opinionated people, at the time. 

But now

I’m in the South Bay. Things are a bit more reserved and upscale here, as far as presentation and as far as “the rules” go. Out here, in at least a few of the South Bay cities, a person could (and I had) be stopped and taken in, for example, by the police, for smoking tobacco in public. I got a misdemeanor charge dropped, after attending and participating in supporting 12-steps activities and groups, amongst many uninterested (or otherwise interested - in “other” kinds of stuff - a lot of it stalking-basis kinds of things: fairly distasteful, in my opinion). I’d met the lovely young ladies who’d warned and cautioned me against doing this and that, sort of thing - even though it would seem enticing and like, that things could be like I imagined they were - like, first date night kinda stuff, but back then, to be honest, I was a much different-minded sort of person, and I thought that various more so thing that I’d like to do would wind up being rewarding, whereas I was just setting out on my early illustrious homeless years, speckled with incarcerations, involuntary hospitalizations, and more homelessness. Here and there, I got to (or tried to) grab a boob, and stuff, but even that kind of fluff got further and further away from being likely to have had happen, and, at some point, I just stopped trying. I worked up some self-sufficiency, and resilience, counting on this pigeon-feeding bum thing, and associated blogging efforts - along with the fragrance and cosmetics line developments to come: by all means, appreciable materialism that I’d been fortunate enough to have gained capital in, and hopefully, will continue forth, in maintaining a hold of - there’s been some nasty disputes about my “actual” ownership of my purchased property, and just tonight, in fact, they’re planning to riot in DTLA, and piss on the trees I’d been trying to nurture and fertilize, out there, rather than that they just don’t show up to downtown, at all, by night, to do that, but for some reason, they seem to feel emboldened by that sort of display and destruction - part of it, on at least one person’s mind, having that he’d taken particular issue with me, for personal reasons - reasons of dislike towards me, towards which, I’m like, “…” well, nah. I’m just, like, nah… about it. But he was doing something, not telling me about it, and apparently, my stuff is “gone.” Quite a hostile takeover, but I’m working out the legalities and jurisprudence consequences of the matter, for as much time as I can devote to it. It would be a significantly closely held loss to the enterprise and my productivity. 

Anyways, 

there’s some cool new developments out here, this area being neighbored to the Ballona Creek | Los Angeles River project, which begins at the beginning of Marina del Rey, at the south side edge of Venice Beach, winds through Playa del Rey, and here, in El Segundo, perhaps some groundbreaking work, where the Raytheon establishment had “seemed to” have formerly been (remember the rocket man news articles? (add citation - note), a new commercial hotspot development had popped up, over just short months that it’s been, since I’d been here - I love the Del Amo Fashion Plaza Nordstrom, here - it’s my favorite 😍, and there’s also a huge water main - perhaps some exciting work that’s new, and ground that’s been laid for some new sights to see, and development sites, as well, that pertain to the Los Angeles Watershed development program and progress, thereof - I’ll venture out more, towards the shore, from here, and update with more reports, as I come across new things that I notice, out here.

The El Segundo Golf Course, (I’m not sure of what it had been named, previously), is now a notable TOPGOLF establishment. It looks great! I ought to really try out this spot, since it’s been newly renovated, and make use of my Turnway padded foldable golfing bag, which I had been using for carrying around my gardening tools. It’s available on Amazon for $78.99. It’s got great wheels on it, and it can support at least 15-20 pounds, traveling on even the streets and concrete, for miles at a time, without fading out on the wheel support. 

I overnighted at the El Segundo Plaza. Not much all that new, there, but I did have a penchant for the place, given that there are power outlets available outdoors, with lighted trees, in the parking lot. The lights shut off on me, though, along with the electricity. Perhaps I ought to check on that, moving forward, at some point. Hopefully it wasn’t something that would be a significant fault of mine, but I’ll look in to it. Come morning time, I woke up, and the people in the locality wound up having various appreciable offerings and leave-outs for me, which I detailed on Twitter:

Downtown Los Angeles’ new pigeon babies - May 2022.

In most cases,

A typical pigeon that a person would come across is simply a standard pigeon. Over he years, however, with some dedication, investment, and care, the creatures become slightly diversified, of their physical appearance, in various ways. Here, in this article, I’ll document some of the images of the young, whom I can identify, of the season’s offerings of pigeon and sparrow babies, of some notable distinction in their appearance, compared to the standard varieties of wild pigeons or sparrows that are to be found, as adults - whom may, themselves, be newly homed or released birds, whereas I also attempt to manage the general day-to-day presence and feeding of the birds, within the Downtown Los Angeles area. I’m beginning this documentation at the end of May, 2022, a well-enough point in the season for babies to have hatched, been fed in the nest, by their parents, and now, they’re capable of getting out and about, and they’re capable of feeding themselves. They would also have taken on enough plumage to demonstrate their fully-adult appearances. 

2022 - Doe eyes and soft pastels, and a squirrel pigeon.

During this season, at the end of May, when I began documenting these birds, for the season’s developments, in the birds’ appearance, I noticed that some of the young, whom I could identify as fledgling pigeons or sparrows, had taken on some development around the eyes, as more pronounced, or outlined - in some cases, nearly decorative and cosmetic changes had seemed to have become established. On one hand, my task management capability here in town is somewhat a quite broad and challenging effort to fulfill - I’ve gotten up my daily small-localities visitations up to a definite 5 areas, whereas there are easily perhaps anywhere from 75-200 or so birds that show up to eat. Some breeders and pigeon specialists are capable of establishing very regimented and impressive defined features in their birds, such as alternating feather color on the wings, for example, but I’m not particularly going for that type of establishment, in these birds - mostly just focusing on keeping them fed. One of the challenges is that the birds seem to be getting poached, or targeted, for capture and abuse - I currently had recently taken in “Virgil,” so-called, a pigeon whom I found, out on the street, about a week ago. I found him with string, hair, and a metal spring tied around both of his feet, and fortunately, I was able to win his trust, take him home, and assist him, as best I could, in removing the objects that were binding his feet, although his skin was already very inflamed around the trauma areas, and the string bound the skin deeply, more than I cared to injure the pigeon with, in attempting to remove the string any further. 

June 2022: Cheetah zazzles and more doe-eyed pigeons.

Three doe-eyed pigeons; one, perhaps, a parent.

The new era of handheld USB(-C) [Li-ion battery-chargeable - sometimes] home and garden small appliances. (Updating)

It’s been about high-time for some change in our domestic lives, tech and lifestyle-wise.

It’s more than ingenious - the feeling of charging a device, on the same basis; the same cord, if you will, as we had gotten used to charging much more familiar things, in our metropolitan lifestyles, powered by e-commerce giants such as Amazon. AMZN (Nasdaq). It’s the empowerment of the consumer, by simplifying the essentials in our lives; it would seem both inevitable, as well as incredible, to consider.

Here, I’ll showcase several devices, offered on Amazon, which make use of USB-C power and Li-ion batteries, just like the latest smartphones, tablets, and laptops that we use, and have come to expect - have a compatible and universally recognized power supply. Okay. I might include a few Micro-USB devices, just because - it’s not been fully integrated in to the manufacturing process of some of these devices that I’d come across yet, but for the sake of inclusion in to my lifestyle marketing pitch, here, I’ll include some of the stragglers, and perhaps update this article in the months and years to come (originally posted in May of 2022). 

Tool Daily - Grass/Hedge Trimmer - $31.99 

This is a beauty of a USB-C chargeable device. It makes the task of gardening so much more relatable for our daily lives, which had become stalwart stand-off events, in the context of being glued to web browsing, newsfeed tidbits, and social media finger-flipping, trying to find some way to make use of technology for our benefit, especially for those of us who had been unemployed, here, in California, during the pandemic. With that notion still fresh in our minds, with many people, here in Los Angeles, still wearing masks, the tendency, for the jobless, is to search and strive to find some way in which we can monetize our particular individual strengths and skill sets, without sacrificing our dignity, or personal standards in how we expect to be treated - I’ve been there, before, in feeling pulled, by the hand, in pursuing some sort of superficial escape from daily strife and instability, of a casual offer of friendship, I’ll say, gone awry. Be certain - this sort of lifestyle accommodation is by no means a trap that we must face, for all our lives - for the willing-to-work demographic, there are social institutions in place for the sake of bettering our lives, through government programs, for example, which “sustain” us, at a minimum, and they provide us with regular reminders of that life ought not feel completely hopeless; in this case, I chose gardening services to offer to clients, on craigslist, as my occupation du jour, to pursue. People have been generally forthcoming, in the small numbers in which I am reestablishing a new professional identity, after many years, in my late 20’s, in to age 30, or so, which marks the time in life in which I once again significantly fell from grace, and failed, in professional and personal circumstances. It’s virtually bound to happen, for some of us aspiring and practicing entrepreneurs, of a self-styled “business.” Yet, as millennials, give or take, we’re coming of age, in to our 40’s, now, and it would seem to be less “affordable” to continue forth, in doing anything, of an irresponsible and unaccountable nature, within the scope of professionalism. The consequences are real, but rest assured - there are good people out there, within the community, who are willing to hire the right person, on craigslist - it happens regularly, but don’t just search for gigs, or jobs - that’s my advice; try out the services section - it only costs $5 to post an ad for something that the poster might specialize in, and the elves will go to work, behind the scenes, checking user intent, trackable data, perhaps, and the marketing identity of the user, and hopefully, those things will have checked out alright - have you been offering user data to developers, for example? Certain allowances, rather than disavowals, in the subject of data sharing - are invaluable, to some entities - there are rewards and programs offered for the willing contributor of a desirable marketing demographic. For example, I started getting in to white blood cell donation, for $250, every five weeks, as well as research studies, which are more randomized, rather than reliable, as income sources, yet I’ve landed a few, in the past several months, via my Facebook feed, which - all of a sudden, somewhat, turned in to a precious marketing resource of opportunity, as for myself. In my experience, the vast majority of craigslist transactions are well-executed, on both ends, although people are wary of flakes, and it might take a bit of practice and intentional composure, on the service provider’s part, to maintain the job’s basis. Check out my blog article on some best practices in composing a classifieds ad, such as on craigslist.

Cefrank Store - 8 x 1 watt | 10 slot 5v 2a 6,000k LED Spotlights - $42.90

People who have become acquainted with my historical social media (Facebook) data, which is publicly available, would attest to my fascination with effect lighting, within the scope of personal interior design and decorating. This sort of pursuit had formerly been largely fulfilled by the likes of IKEA - yet, on Amazon, we see a much more open-air market sort of competitiveness, with manufacturers being capable of dealing direct, from as small as a single individual, potentially - capably marketing their goods, and having Amazon provide fulfillment features, such as processing the payment, advertising sellers’ items on third party platforms, such as Google Shopping, and, at times, the shipping is also handled, perhaps partially so, or perhaps, that Amazon even provides warehousing for some of sellers’ products. Amazon truly does it all, in fulfillment, within their umbrella of organizations and brands. 

Much more than might be realized, and yet, how far had Amazon come, since the days of Jeff Bezos’ bootstrapping young, talented aspirations, coming to light, with his stacks of books, at hand, and with books, having been the basis, initially, of Amazon’s premise, for consumers. People might even forgotten Amazon’s beginnings, from what it has become, as a company. 

The expanse of product offerings extends in to yet more miniaturization of a commonly-beloved decoration staple - the spotlight, or track lighting, nearly (or, it could be used as track lighting, in a pinch) - here, offered as an 8 x 1 watt array of LED lights, on a swivel base, with holes for screws, for installation, and screws included. It’s elegant, in its simplicity, and what could be more cute, or more tasteful? 

Here, the performance and quality of spotlights, compared between IKEA and Amazon’s offering, through the Cefrank Store, sees the Amazon seller’s offering as a higher quality aluminum casing design, versus memorable plastic spotlight LEDs, with fewer slots offered (4, versus 8 lights, with this seller, and 10 slots available, in total) - the Cefrank Store’s offering also rounds out to a cheaper price than IKEA’s comparable offerings - granted, I didn’t bother to check their latest offerings in miniature track lighting, I’ll say, but I had previously purchased their track lighting, back in 2010, or so. I’m eager to get to a professional camera and lighting store, to nab some great colors, in terms of lighting gels, otherwise recognizable as clear, colored sheets, for the sake of filtering (and thus, changing) the color of lights. 

AICase Store - Biometric Fingerprint | Thumbprint Authentication Lock Box - $39.99

In the days of free-wheeling and open access on the internet, for so many possibilities of life, including new methods and means of perpetrating crimes upon victims, I wound up relating to this neat-o device, as a means of effecting greater security, on top of that this lockbox works great with most of my product line, which happens to be fragrance extracts and isolates, as well as aroma chemicals. The device is made well enough to evade most intruders’ willingness to intervene in a person’s say about what constitutes appropriate and sociable interactivity. The design is sleek, with a view-roof, at the top of the box, to keep belongings in view. The lock itself is just a slotted rod, but it does the job, well enough. On top of all of that, the device’s documentation claims that the box will stay charged (via USB-C) for around 2,000 openings of the box, upon authentication, with a built-in 280 mAh Li-ion battery. Best of all, the impressive significant basis of this particular lockbox is that it is fully run by fingerprint or thumbprint biometric authentication, reminiscent of an Android smartphone or iOS | iPadOS device. It’s truly a beautiful thing.

“Sunset” lamp, with 16 color variations, by Yicen Trading Co., Ltd

This lamp, available on Amazon, is unlike any other lighting product I’d ever encountered. It’s simply amazing, right? The coolest thing about it, aside from the lighting aspect, is that it can be taken around, with you, on a mobile-cool stuff lifestyle outing, perhaps involving a feature piece of artwork, or doing photog work for a client, where this lamp would illuminate both the subject and the background beautifully - and it can all be done on USB (it’s actually the only possibility - [USB-A]). Although I hadn’t set it up, at the time of this writing, my idea with this lamp, initially, as the name implies, is that I’d implement it, plugged in to a timer, perhaps, to simulate the sun’s rise, in the morning, rather than have it as a sunset effect, although, upon considering it, why not? The device is quite sturdy and well-made, and it is a bargain at $25.99 (although at the time of writing, it’s being offered for $17.99). It’s arguably the most beautiful light available in retail, especially for the price. 

Hanging out with the USC dumpster pigeons, a displaced Los Angeles local pigeon flock.

Being that 

I’ve been doing this pigeon-feeding thing for about 5 years now, on a regular basis, by this point, I’ve come to track the progress and movements (or whereabouts) of some of the flocks and even some of the individual members, between flocks. It’s important for diversity to flourish, as well as for the fact that they have an opportunity to take in differing diets, from other feeders, although I try to treat my flocks that I cover with special consideration - I offer them bread with rich, sweetened dairy products - soaked completely, with a bit of water. It gets tossed out to the birds in a broad swath, and they come to recognize the food, and the feeding gesture as a welcoming and non-threatening deed, for them, since I’m not particularly trying to get them to be comfortable with coming in to close quarters with their feeders - there are still people who are trying to trap the pigeons, at this point in time; I figure that this will continue on, for years to come. 

In any case, however, I do like that this particular flock, which used to be “homed” over at Hoover Park, by USC, I would imagine - since I don’t see the flock over here, any more, 

The USC dumpster pigeons’ previous daily setting, out at Hoover Park.

is now at a more public-transit frequented location. Perhaps it’s simply easier for them to find food, here, and the employees at Dirt Dog do offer them daily bread, I’ve observed, although it’s tack-dry bread. When I encounter that the bread had been tossed out to them, on some days, I take it and re-wet it, to ensure that the birds get some essential fluids in them.

Although they’re not quite as well-positioned, on the way to becoming wildlife | domesticated birds, out in the public sphere, that could be changed, over time, with some dedication and care, as far as their nutritional intake and supplementation goes. I suppose that that would be my job. Be sure to check them out some time, just off the Ortho Institute Expo Line Metro Train Stop.

How to compose a proper personals and classifieds ad for success.

Last night, I wound up nearly accepting a “hang out” offer, from some guy that sat near me on the train home from Santa Monica. 

The first premise, at issue, here, is that I generally take issue with “guys” and “hanging out,” somewhat as a flat-out decree, being that people who pay attention to me, personally, and as a person - generally, (post-university years, especially) are the types of people who failed at school, they have nothing to do except bet on that I’d be an unrelenting gay hooker, and they sit around, drinking alcohol, taking drugs, laughing amongst themselves with a notion as trivially slight as that, and some forces of networking and psychology get put out, on the loose, and eventually - the victim of such intentions having played out, in life, become the rhetoric upon which demographic typologies are forged, and a litany of followers ensue - as casual stalkers, out on the streets, somehow - “just” how, I’ve never bothered to figure out, but people wound up treating me a little bit differently, today; some guys, for example, and they greeted me, whereas more commonly, it’s typical for people to ignore me, out on the streets. It hadn’t always been like this, I can recall. Here and there, I recall a time, yet not the place, off-hand, where people would greet each other,, much more commonly than we do, in these times. On one hand, Covid-19 caused us to be conditioned for social distancing to have become the standard. The anarchists rebelled against this sort of premise, and they proceeded onward with assaults upon people’s personal and private spaces alike, and even more people than ever started finding ways in which they could keep to themselves, or gather in more exclusive circles than ever - I, for one, being particularly isolated; introverted, by nature, that is, to say, couldn’t possibly suit the sort of personality type discussed in articles that featured accounts of discrete Covid-19 circles being established - I’m a bum; a pigeon-feeding bum, as my most prominent sort of bum, and it’s generally taboo for people of the middle or upper classes to associate with a bum, by and large, although here and there, small tokens of acknowledgment are witnessed, such as considerate food or drink offerings are left out, and, in many cases - recyclables are left out. It’s suggestive of that people would like to see a working person, as well as a hungry person, out of the sort of people who have wound up at the end of their rope, in life - so to speak, and who else, but an otherwise unhoused person would have to seek out novel accommodations of food and general interests? For one, a stalking victim would have to, a knave, a mentally I’ll person, here and there - a few, or several types, that is to say. People who were observing me, earlier today, noticed that I was acting out imprints of having been a bum, whereas I had just secured confirmation of that I had a promising serendipitous moment happen for me, in finding a client for my gardening services offer, which I’d put up on craigslist, the other day. My budget is tight, but it’s only $5 for a services ad, and I figure that craigslist features a rich trawl of both interested, as well as valid - employers, for jobs, big and small, as well as clients of all sorts - I’ve personally landed several thousand craigslist gigs, to be sure.

Historically, craigslist had been acknowledged as one of the Big 5, of the internet - inclusive of Google, Apple, Microsoft, hmm… I don’t remember the other one, but craigslist had been notably mentioned, in my encounters with content, on the internet, of having that distinction. Today, it apparently stands in the top 20 - not bad.

Product Review: Liberty Natural - Licorice “anise” Air Freshener.

 Recently, I’ve been having a significant hankering for the scent of licorice, and for designing fragrances around a licorice fragrance. That being the case, and being that licorice, in and of itself, is not all that much thought, per se, in perfumery - I came up against some challenges, during the course of my inquiries in to what “stuff” available there could possibly be, on the internet, as far as licorice extracts, etc., of various sorts, for example. I was searching for a licorice absolute, which apparently had been made available, at some point, in the past, at a very small number of suppliers, I’d discovered, after fairly rigorous extents made, of “search,” as it were. At this point, however, I did not discover any supplier for a licorice absolute. 

After discovering Liberty Naturals’ Licorice “anise” Air Freshener, I’d put a small amount of thought into it, and I figured, “hey; they do fragrance extract products fairly well, I’d suppose that this product is fairly well enough, if they say it is an air freshener.” On one hand, that was a fairly well enough thing to suppose, as it turns out, since I purchased the bottle, and it says that it contains 100% essential oil. In some sense, on the matter, getting one or another fragrance extraction, per specimen or per species of plant, will give the creator of a fragrance ingredient, isolate, or extraction product - various options, on one hand, various outcomes, on the other, with variable desirability, with cases in which a particular “this or that” sort of solution that works for one type of plant, winds up not being desirable or ideal, for a different type of plant. In this instance, perhaps a licorice absolute isn’t quite desirable, in industry-informed “types,” such that there could be, upon the topic of licorice, as a fragrance. 

LibertyNatural.com’s product, Licorice “anise” Air Freshener.

I get it. A person finds themselves significantly hooked - fetishistically, even, in a sense, when it comes to some sort of purist decree, or something like that, on a licorice search, of all things. Sure, there’s star anise, fennel, and maybe one or two other things (in short), that smell “like” licorice, and on the other hand, this product ☝🏼 “is” fairly much licorice, and it says that it is licorice essential oil, for that matter. I suppose that star anise and fennel might be slightly distinct, but perhaps not. I’ll have to look in to that matter, at some point in the future. 

The company isn’t quite the quickest to ship things, but they are, as a basis, a farm, as a business, and I’d suppose that the people who work and manage the operation make a slim taking, on a sale, and that much of the time and attentions paid to things, of their business dailies, for example, end up being tending to the farm. But if you end up purchasing from them, please don’t give them a hassle about anything - they do ship their stuff they have listed, and it’s standardized and pure as any other decent supplier. They do also offer other licorice-like fragrance products, in their online offerings. Perhaps I’ll look in to experiencing those, as well, at some point, and I’ll report back on this topic. 

Just buy it from the site I told you to purchase it from, not some other place - you’re reading this, and I know how it is - having that feeling as though good enough isn’t good enough, when it comes to a licorice fragrance. This one is perfectly good and fine licorice fragrance, and perhaps there couldn’t be better, for that matter.