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Just checked...no video version of the Extra Terrestrial Live album...good news is that in 2010 they will be playing a gig about 30 minutes from me...on a weekend evening!

In the late 1980s I saw them play at a small night club in Austin that later burned down..."The Back Room".  The crowd was somewhat rowdy with broken beer bottles on the floor, but my date was hot with her braless and silky attire and her hand in my pants pocket.

Extra Terrestrial Live, a fine sampling of BOC performances, recorded about the time they appeared on early MTV in concert.

I wish I could find it on video.

I have 2 'letric geetars now (Fender Strat that I modified with a HotRails pick-up in the bridge and a Gretsch knock-off of a Gibson Les Paul with a Bigsby arm) and this song was the first that my instructor gave me to learn the chords to.

Then I found the movie on the cable service and watched.  I agree, good flick.

Amazing to me was how moving playing the song was - I nearly cried.

So I have my raised beds, and I got to thinking that I might put one to use to get greater cacti growth with less effort overall than the usual parade of pots in and out each year.  The idea is to plant certain members of the cactus collection into the raised bed after the last frost and leave them there all spring and summer.
Then in fall, dig them out and stored them with their roots naked until the following spring.

Has anyone else at this forum tried such?
What were the results?

Loose soil that holds some water but that also drains well has given me much success with this plant.

I have mine in a raised bed and I never have to water the bed.
The bed is in the shade, so it doesn't get dried out.
I have filled the bed with composted leaves and grass clippings.

The plants themselves were rooted in water with a bubbler.
They were transplanted indoors into a potting mix of kiln-fired clay and coconut coir.

After the last frost threat had passed, they were transplanted into the raised bed.  The bed is mulched with grass clippings to help retain moisture.  They get slow release fertilizer.

I don't like sand because it is inert, dense, and inactive.
It doesn't hold moisture, it retards drainage, it offers no nutrition, and offers no ion exchange capability.

The kiln-fired clay holds moisture, but being angular, it does not pack well.  Both it and the coconut coir wet easily and drain easily, but having being wetted, hold some moisture.  By draining easily, air is pulled in to keep the roots happy.

What can be gained from Datura not available by other means?
And is the risk worth it?

The Huichol simply chewed the fresh or dried buttons.
Maybe a tea.

But any sort of acid/base/solvent extraction tek is certain to lose a portion of the other alkaloids and alter the experience so that it is not a peyote experience, but is not a mescaline experience, so then why bother, as you won't know what you have or had.

http://www.kusi.com/weather/colemanscorner/19842304.html

Let me illustrate. I estimate that this square in front of my face contains 100,000 molecules of atmosphere.  Of those 100,000 only 38 are CO2; 38 out of a hundred thousand.  That makes it a trace component.  Let me ask a key question: how can this tiny trace upset the entire balance of the climate of Earth?  It can’t.  That’s all there is to it; it can’t.

Oh, yes it can.  The atmosphere is very thick and carbon dioxide is a very effective absorber of infrared radiation.  Your analysis is flawed by failing to take into account these attributes.  Instead, you included the attributes that support your point of view.  This analogy should be rather effective with this audience.  Your approach is like that of saying a tab cannot affect you mind since it is mostly paper, but those similarly few LSD molecules can surely have an affect despite being a dilute and minor component of blotter paper.  This analogy should be rather effective with this audience.

http://www.kusi.com/weather/colemanscorner/19842304.html
May I stop here for a few historical notes?  First, the internal combustion engine and gasoline were awful polluters when they were first invented.  And, both gasoline and automobile engines continued to leave a layer of smog behind right up through the 1960’s.  Then science and engineering came to the environmental rescue.  Better exhaust and ignition systems, catalytic converters, fuel injectors, better engineering throughout the engine and reformulated gasoline have all contributed to a huge reduction in the exhaust emissions from today’s cars. Their goal then was to only exhaust carbon dioxide and water vapor, two gases widely accepted as natural and totally harmless.  Anyone old enough to remember the pall of smog that used to hang over all our cities knows how much improvement there has been.  So the environmentalists, in their battle against fossil fuels and automobiles had a very good point forty years ago, but now they have to focus almost entirely on the once harmless carbon dioxide.  And, that is the rub.  Carbon dioxide is not an environmental problem; they just want you now to think it is.

Smog is a different concern than global warming.
Solving smog has no effect on carbon dioxide levels or greenhouse effects.

I cannot see how the combination of deforestation and increased consumption of fossil fuels could not lead to an increase in carbon dioxide concentrations, and how judgment of such activity could lead to any conclusion other than it is at least somewhat due to mankind's activities.

http://www.kusi.com/weather/colemanscorner/19842304.html
If Al Gore and his global warming scare dictates the future policy of our governments, the current economic downturn could indeed become a recession, drift into a depression and our modern civilization could fall into an abyss. And it would largely be a direct result of the global warming frenzy.

My mission, in what is left of a long and exciting lifetime, is to stamp out this Global Warming silliness and let all of us get on with enjoying our lives and loving our planet, Earth.

Or there is the real possibility of adopting other forms of energy that relieve the US of reliance upon resources located outside our borders and new economic activity begins as new technologies are developed, produced, implemented, and marketed.  The automobile replaced the horse and buggy without economic collapse.  ipods replaced CD players without economic collapse.  Airplanes replaced trains without economic collapse.  Changing a source of energy will not cause economic collapse.  Speculation for a commodity bought and brought to within our borders is a greater threat to our economy.

But maybe we need to quick thinking we are so entitled to all we want, when we want, how we want, and start balancing the consumption of our share.  What makes American's so entitled to the resources we consume?

Doing so keeps the impoverished poor.  If developing countries can never afford the resources needed to develop their societies since Americans drive up the prices, then these countries stay impoverished.  But if our consumption was lower, then these countries could better afford more raw materials and could better develop.

I haven't seen ANYTHING eating on my plants (salvia, peppers, tomatoes, and basil) this year.

I have been watering/feeding with compost tea, and now with yeast added.
I have also been spraying occasionally with the compost tea.
Occasionally I water with diluted urine and hydrogen peroxide.
To supplement any missing nutrients (what could be missing from decomposing plant matter and my own liquid mineral stream) I do add Epsom salts (why is that plural? They're/it's one compound.) and some Peter's plant food for blooming (high P content and many trace minerals.)

But to not have to agonize and choose over which pesticide to spray is a really welcomed treat this year.

It seems the bugs don't like the smell of the compost or something.

Ed Rendell for VP?

As for Colin Powell, that poor guys was fucked over having to go to the UN, not knowing his credibility was going to be ruined for the sake of the rest of those imbeciles.

That salvia needs high humidity is hogwash.

I kept mine alive in my dining room all winter without a humidifier.

The RH inside the house had to be about 35% or lower.

They just went outdoors this week.
This weekend they are starting to acclimate to their usual bedding location.
Next weekend they go from the terra cotta pots into the ground.

These plants are going into their 4th year.

I dig them up and/or root some cuttings late every year.

The first winter I put them in the basement with a grow light and humidity.
The next winter I put them in the basement with a grow light, but no added humidity.
This winter I did not put them in the basement under a grow light, but just kept them in the room with the most sun.
They made it.
Scrawny and flimsy, but healthy enough.
No rot and NO BUGS.
In the basement, bugs were always a problem.

Of course, the first few days outside meant some leaves were lost, mostly to wind since the stalks were flimsy.

So I pruned the stalks back some and new leaves are coming out and branches have started forming.

Another 12-foot bed of salvia soon.

The point is that they don't need a lot of fussing.

Worth the view.

Saw them in Chicago many years ago with a college buddy I was visiting when I was there.

Then saw them in Las Vegas later with that who became my ex-wife.

I had been able to read music at one time and even sang in choir (not to say that my voice was hitting the right notes, but I tried).

To augment the artistic side of this, I will try learning some academic aspects by means of a music theory class from the local community college.

I might even meet a chick or two, and this IS partially about that.
Engineering credentials is not going to get me chicks.
Not that my lame musical talents will either, but I think being more balanced - with my attitudes and capabilities, my challenges and patience, my choices of pursuits and pleasures, will help me find the next right someone and maybe even some just for fun before then.

Not to discredit the true musicians at all, but I am no Bob Dylan who was determined he would be a landmark music maker and song writer, much like Jack Kerouac was determined to be writer of substance.

My teacher is a guy my age who has been playing a long time.
He is about my size.
His enthusiasm is amazing...he really seems to enjoy teaching.
He told me that despite all his skill and ability teaching has improved his guitar playing after he became an instructor 2 years ago.  Thus he is still learning and he appreciates being an instructor, I am not just a small money machine.  Frankly the $1000 I'll cough up in lessons over a year seems like a bargain, that sort of money can so easily be blown on crap that offers no joy whatsoever.

For 15 years I have toyed with the idea in my head that I should take guitar lessons.  Finally I have taken the plunge to do so, thus last weekend I bought a used Fender Stratocaster and a small amp.

I had my first of weekly lessons on Wednesday, so now I am simply learning to fret to get the fingers stronger and calloused.

I am enjoying this challenge, as I haven't played a musical instrument in over 30 years.   Practice in the morning and evening is allowing a new skill to be acquired, and I haven't acquired any new skills in a LOOOOOOONGGGGG time.

I am so thrilled that I finally did this.  I was afraid it was too late, but such is not the case.  My fingers and mind are learning.  Of course my fingers are lean and long enough that this simply cannot be a physical impossibility, rather the only reason why I won't get this is a lack of commitment and discipline.

WOW!

But, oh shudder, the insecurity of being in front of my instructor nad not knowing how to do this already.  What a stupid mental game that is!  Of course I don't know how to play guitar, so why be embarrassed, that is why I am there.  But I have become so accustomed to being good at what I do that the notion of starting an endeavour without instant success is very oreign to me.  Thus in additional to the mental challenge of making music, I have a psychological challenge of letting myself suck hard for a while.

Cheers.

(Oh yeah, my divorce is final, big deal...I have guitar to learn and weight training for my body.)