Sun Escape

Trader Joe's Line on MLK
The weather’s brightened up a bit here in New York. Just in time to hear the Southern Cali whiners crying about a little rain and a tornado watch.

With more time on my hands, and this nicer weather enticing me to get out, I’ve been shopping more at our only Trader Joe’s. This Monday, the line was longer than I had ever seen it since they opened in 2006. The last thing I need is to squeeze past unnecessary carts and old people trying to get less than 12 items so I can cut my line waiting time.

Washington Square Dead Zone - Click 2 Expand
I went today and despite the bad economy they still had food to sell me. As I was checking out, the floor manager and I got to talking about the weekend business and I was told TJ’s closed record sales on Monday of $218,000. Over the three day weekend they closed a killer half a million dollars in sales. Maybe it’s a good thing they are still a private company….

On the walk back, I went through Washington Square park. They’ve torn up the whole east and south sides of the park now. It’s horrible to look at and I only hope the city puts everything back just after the spring rain subsides. I still have a set of petanque balls that need tossing.

I’ve been playing around more with Photoshop, taking advantage of some Preset Actions and trying out some different compositions. For the most part, I think they aren’t that successful. For instance the below is a little over exposed and heavy on the contrast so it just doesn’t feel right to me. I gave up tonight as it’s close to midnight and needed to post something and get rested for tomorrow.

On a music note, I found a few data discs my sister had given me several years ago for Christmas. I appreciate the exchange of new choons, but I recall this particular year, I had a stack of over 15 with a mix of Jazz, House, Electronic, Goa, Trance, Down Tempo, Breaks, Psychedelic, Rock and Reggae music. My taste has evolved and I’m not that into the Trance, Progressive, electronic as much anymore so nearly half the discs I’ve grown out of favor. Finally I loaded the Reggae and Jazz which never gets old for me and found a new band I’ve never heard before: Midnite (Roots reggae from St. Croix). Here’s 2 tracks from early in this past decade. One is a shot out to those in Haiti struggling for survival and the other is for those news media outlets that refuse to cover the human suffering because they can’t get past their own political bias to support fellow humans regardless of race, beliefs or political background.

Midnite – Suffa Ra (right-click to download)
[audio:https://austinvegas.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/01/Suffa-Ra.mp3]

Midnite – Propaganda (right-click to download)
[audio:https://austinvegas.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/01/Propaganda.mp3]