And Your School. Were you Programmed?

[Coil_Smoke]

Avoid The Vapors ... ?

I have always had mixed feelings about the vapors...

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[Coil_Smoke]

I saved that prank for my junior and senior years in public school. I was not the only one to deploy the purple crystal. The administration made several announcements asking for peace. We also had several toilet bombings. The cherry bomb blasts in tenth grade just made a mess but next year things got out of control. Eleventh grade brought the police state to high school. The good natured rivalry between "The Freaks" and "The Jocks" was inflamed by an increasingly militant administration crackdown on the freaks and police searches of our lockers. "Blockbuster" fire crackers went into toilets in the third floor boys bathroom and teachers lounge. The drains were blowed open real good. School closed that morning and very few people thought it was funny. We guys were inconvenienced by no bathroom on that floor for almost two months.

 

[LeeVanCleef]

Now that's a great story! Stick it to The Man! Or The Man's toilet bowl!

 

[Isaac Sauvage]

i'm not really sure what this thread is about, but i'll attempt to add to the noise...

i was lucky enough to get a jump on microcomputers back in a supplementary class in 7th grade, when the apple ][ was a brand new, big honking deal across the country, although not in the classroom yet. it was such a lovely, quirky computer, with lots of great games and utilities. some of them have -still- not really been tapped yet for mini-platforms such as android and ios.

i have a half-completed post / article somewhere picking underappreciated apple ][ gems. i wonder if anyone would be interested in that. maybe on reddit, i guess.

anyway, scott adams (and other text) adventures were huge at the time, so that was the kind of stuff i would program, along with some buddies. dungeons and dragons was a big source of material for that.

in high school, PC's were really picking up, and the school became chock full of apple ][e's and TRS-80's. few of us could afford those, however. we tended to buy commodore vic-20's and 64's, so i started a commodore club and set up a sharing system and i learned to program on those, too. i was still fooling around with that stuff up to the mid-90's, programming a tetris-varient with the aid of a compiler so as to achieve the desired speed via assembly language.

having some developmental issues, insecurities due to neglect (parents divorced very early) and moving too many times across too many countries, computers were sort of a missing link friend for me. of course that didn't help my results in school and learning how to socialise with my peers. i'm still kind of picking up the pieces from that.

 

[sleepy]

What I am hoping for is an inquiry as to how many of us were discouraged from what should have been Our Education while others were positioned to compete against each other. Like in my school. The Surfers (The Surfs) vs. the Cruisers (The Greasers).
And what others did about it. Or suffered. Or lost.

Maybe this:

Pinball Nirvana Forums - View Single Post - Sleepy's Midnight Cult Films

 

[GSGregg]

Iodine crystals reacting with ammonia; the origin of the South California Purples?

CTA ( 1968 )


EDIT: Ah, rats! Wikipedia says the album was recordrd in sixty-NINE.

 

[sleepy]

I thought there was a Chicago tune that mentioned "purple mountain majesty".
But I keep getting slammed by "America the Beautiful" when I search for it.
And when I include "Chicago" in the search, they slap me with, "That Toddlin Town".

No matter. Triiodide is a gas. My purple of choice is "Cassius", though it may be a grey day.
And I believe that the CTA song is all about "slow prospects".

 

[LeeVanCleef]

See, I always thought the lyric was "stripped-mined mountains majesty". I think I learned a different version.

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Hey, there's no link to the South California Purples. What the heck is that? Isn't that what the California Raisins were called before the sunlamp accident that changed them forever? Hey, remember when we, as a nation, thought it would be fun to spend money on California Raisins records and stuffed dolls? What the hell were we thinking?

 

[sleepy]

I know I was thinking of Cabbage Patch Kids. So they took that too.
And Teddy Ruxpin. And Then they returned to their strip-mining investments.
Paying hundreds of men wages in order to make them Billions.

This is their "local sandbox" just up the street from here. Vulcan Mines in Sun Valley, Ca.

https://www.google.com/maps/place/P...data=!3m1!1e3!4m2!3m1!1s0x0:0xd3770ab26475235

The map doesn't show it well, but this sandbox is more than 10 stories deep, and there are several locations in the area. The joke is, many years ago, the local Hansen Dam Recreation Center lake was stuffed with sediment. So, a volunteer provided his company services to dredge the sediment. Vulcan themselves have a conveyor belt that runs from the sandbox in the map all the way up to Hansen Dam a mile away.
The volunteer gets to keep the sediment.

Any bets as to why those folks are being so generous? And in the case of Vulcan Mines, why they would install a 1 mile conveyor belt up to the dam just to wash gravel?

 

[sleepy]

Double Post!

 

[GSGregg]

Hey, there's no link to the South California Purples. What the heck is that?

Side three, middle cut. If I ever get around to redoing the congealed grease on my record player's tone arm pivot, I'll play it and maybe post it (assuming my feeble brain can run a CD-DVD Writer....."I'd like to know...please don't tell me, please don't tell me.....")

Due to almost any album having one or two good tunes mixed in with filler crap, I hardly ever bought LPs...ELP, BS&T, Stevie, Sly, and early CTA / Chicago were exceptions---I have the first six.....

 

[sleepy]

Hmmmmm.....Mmmmm.....yeah.....no.....yeah.....yeah.....yeah.....
Callouses for Cassius?

 

[LeeVanCleef]

I'll be damned, Greg... that's a pretty groovy number! I wish I had heard this as many times as "If You Leave Me Now". So Peter Cetera's not showing up for Chicago's induction into the RnR Hall of Fame, Ritchie Blackmore has been asked not to attend by Deep Purple Inc., which wouldn't even exist without him. Every aspect of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, from the nominating to the Induction Ceremony, is overflowing with politicized horseshit, more than any other organization of its kind in the entertainment industry and has more humping, biting and ass-licking than the Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show. It is the worst thing to ever happen to rock and roll OR all the infighting and backbiting is exactly what you'd expect from the people who made your favorite music and you wouldn't have it any other way. How is it possible that two completely contradictory statements can both be true? Because, in the words of Shaun Cassidy, "that's rock and roll."

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[LeeVanCleef]

I couldn't help but wonder if Vulcan Mines was related to Vulcan Chemical outside of Wichita but, lo and behold, they changed their name to Occidental Chemical! Brilliant strategic move! Now Kirstie Alley and her gang of Hollywood pals like Arne and James Cromwell won't be able to find it and chain themselves to the front gate like they did in the '90s!
One night in the early '80s, a friend of mine and I decided to see if we could circumnavigate Wichita without actually entering the city limits. It took about six hours and one 12-pack to get even close to a just a quarter of the way around. In the middle of our journey, about 2AM, we see that huge chemical industrial park in the middle of nowhere, lit up like a million orange-ish/brown Christmas trees. A creepy experience.

 

[GSGregg]

I'll be damned, Greg... that's a pretty groovy number!

I'm glad you like it, and glad you found it; I'd have to record from the stereo's speakers across the ambiance to a computer mic, and I'm not sure I even have one. Plus, I played these albums so much in the day, the Rice Krispies would probably infringe.....

So Peter Cetera's not showing up for Chicago's induction into the RnR Hall of Fame

Pete eschewed the ceremony, or is HOF jealous over the long-term splash he made after going solo?

EDIT: Pardon me while I try for another Spider Championship on JP's Scared Stiff; I have ninety minutes until Madame Secretary and its pursuers come on.....

 

[LeeVanCleef]

Well, screw that, Gregg! I download! That means I'm about to play me some Diner while I wait for a friendly pirate to upload ep 2 of the HBO series Vinyl. Yep, a show about the record industry in the '70s. Turns out those crackles and pops you were talking about were most likely cocaine residue, which covered every record made in the '70s.
Will one of those pursuers be The Good Wife? Last season was so horrible that I didn't get past the 1st episode of this season. Now I feel kinda bad since they announced that they're closing up shop at the end of May.

Oh, yeah... Peter's people said he wasn't going to show up, something to do with what Chicago's people said and blahblahblah... rock'n'roll bullshit is all well and good... just ask any brothers who formed a rock band... but once the fistfights are replaced by lawyers, it stops being rock'n'roll.

 

[sleepy]

Chain myself to the front gate with Cromwell?? No way Man!
I've been placer mining myself. But the damned city keeps changing the crap they put in the recording...er...drinking water. Was a time when the city only used chlorine...because the runoff from the lawn sprinklers would then leach precious from the grounds of your fellow Americans.

In fact, Vulcan has been sending out their company street sweepers "as a public service"...

Let me tell you all about it Voltaire.

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[sleepy]

Hey! FUCK THE SME! FUCK THE WMG!
Why the Hell is YouTube enabling embed code for these videos
when the embed is Dead?

...oh. I goofed. My Firefox config > HTTML Refer was set to 0 (zero).
Nevermind...

 

[sleepy]

This street is just two blocks from here. There is a reason for the name of it.
Several blocks north, was once a mining community, 116 years ago.
But they were scattered to the four winds by robber barons, and by Edison when he
privatized the trade for his photo paper and film uses, as well as the need to misdirect the public away from self-sufficiency and towards service to industry. As Working Stiffs for a buck.

https://www.google.com/maps/place/E...2!3m1!1s0x80c291a94946c9ab:0xb0caae61fa78640c

 

[sleepy]

And you can bet, they won't teach it in school.

 

[sleepy]

Here's a better view. Where you see the "Modern Masters" building was the southeast corner of the mining camp. Two blocks north of the street map I previously posted.
Back then, it was open to all. In addition, the U.S. Government operated Assay Offices where you could send your materials for testing and, if of sufficient concentration and quantity, they would buy it. The California office was located in San Francisco. The U.S. Assay Offices, a branch of The Treasury, were discontinued in 1989.

https://www.google.com/maps/place/E...2!3m1!1s0x80c291a94946c9ab:0xb0caae61fa78640c

 

[GSGregg]

...The Good Wife? Last season was so horrible.....

I like Juliana, but that doesn't mean I can't smell soap opera. Also, I didn't mourn the departure of Will Gardener...after the first two or three seasons, I just kept watching because I had the habit.

She did a one-season thing previously called Canterbury's Law with Aidan Quinn (Elementary) as her husband, and I did mourn the demise of that one.When it comes to lawyers, however, you can't touch Spader and Shatner getting married to close out Boston Legal;

DENNY CRANE !!

 

[GSGregg]

What the.....? I guess Bill has a new nom de prune. (sic)

After resurrecting CTA, I got curious about album liner notes and how tiny the print would be on a CD 'jacket', then found a website with a lot of the same letters (chuckle):

http://aln3.albumlinernotes.com/Chicago_Box_Set_-_Page_1.html

This is a nice, thorough look at the history of the band, right from the seven horses' mouths (actually eight, counting producer Guercio). Page One is pretty long, and I expected to see '2' at the bottom---but there are EIGHT! If, however unlikely, someone gets through page 2, viewpoints will be found on how another Evil Empire (Columbia Records, that is) treated some of its people.

Is the Clive Davis fan club still operating? XD

I think I'll chip through the eight pages and become somewhat better informed about the good old days.....at least it's shorter than a Peter F. Hamilton novel!

 

[LeeVanCleef]

Hey, if switch-hitting is good enough for Bruce Jenner... istoles: Gregg, that site looks amazing! I may get lost in it and never come out!

 

[GSGregg]

I had no idea you were ambidextrose. Glad you like the site!