On non-leap-years, the date/day relationship in February is identical to the date/day relationship in March, excepting the last three days, obviously. The first Monday in February this year is the 7th, and so is the first Monday in March.

Useful!

–Howard

In ripping some of my classical music, I’ve re-discovered a simple principle of sound recording: if you want the quiet bits to sound quiet, make ’em LOUDER.

This is exemplified in a comparison of my two “O Fortuna” recordings. The one I first purchased back in 1994 is a standard classical recording in which the engineers try to faithfully capture the exact sounds of the orchestra and chorus. It’s disappointing because after the powerful opening chorus the levels drop to where you have to turn the volume up to hear what comes next. Then you blow out your speakers when the punchy bits come back.

The second is one I bought on iTunes, and it’s the “OperaBabes” recording. It’s classical music with Pop/Rock production sense applied. The opening is like a thunderclap, but when the ladies and chorus back off to hushed tones, you as the listener get yanked all the way onto the stage so you can hear them. In short, while the overal levels, as measured in decibels, stay within a much smaller range than they do in the first recording (up towards the TOP of the 90dB range of a CD), it SOUNDS like there’s more dynamic range. This is because you can HEAR the whispers.

There are obviously multiple schools of thought on audio engineering. Some audiophiles will tell you that the first method (leave the levels alone, and use the ENTIRE 90dB range of the CD format if the music has that kind of range in it) is better, because it’s somehow “purer.” Me, I’m about accessibility. Audio recordings are an illusion to begin with. A good audio engineer is a master illusionist, and will convince me, when I close my eyes, that I’m right there.

–Howard

This morning, while spooning gooey, soft-boiled egg-guts into my maw, Patches (the 22-month-old) began begging for “nummy egg.” I gave him a bite or two, but this three-egg breakfast was MINE, and he’d already been fed, so I didn’t give him nearly as much as he wanted.

I drop my shells into a bowl as a finish scooping them out. There’s a good 2/3 of the eggshell still intact when I do. So picture those shells.

I finish my last egg, push the bowl away, and begin working on a little bit of sausage. I look up to see Patches desperately licking out the inside of one of the shells, and making slurping noises while he was doing it.

What can I say? My barbarism has been outdone by the animal instincts of my toddler son.

Just a quick update. Friday morning’s soft-boiled eggs were even MORE perfect than the batch from Thursday, but that’s because I screwed up the first time. See, I was trying to get a little more runny yolk without leaving lots of gooey white, so I was experimenting with the timer.

It turns out that 3 minutes of boiling is not enough. I cut into the first egg, and it gooey-gushed all over my hand.

Remember my comment about “throwing them against the wall to see if they’re done?” Well, I couldn’t resist dropping them into the sink to see how they splattered. It turns out that an under-cooked soft-boiled egg splatters pretty well, AND yields a satisfactory “SPLUTCH” noise as it does so. And the sink is easier to clean AND easier to explain than the walls would have been.

4 minutes of boiling, that’s the ticket.