Rainbows & Rim Ride 29Nov17

Caught some and lost some on the Arkansas River tailwater below Pueblo Rez. Flows were too low @ 75cfs IMO. Viz is still not great. I did wrangle a good ~19"er to net above Valco - took the Awesome Midge. Others nabbed BWOs like the FoD and Silver Surfer. Being near the reservoir did allow me to also grab a ride on the south shore. I started pretty late and while I did finish in the dark, the ride was fun - especially the 5 mile Inner Limits segment.

Dancin' In The Desert 20Nov17-27Nov17

Kala & I hit the dusty trail to the Sonoran Desert for some fun with friends and family. The drive was uneventful and into outstanding late fall weather in Phoenix. We dropped off a couple of cases of French burgundy to our excited friends Steve & Anne Gordon. I played a round of golf with Steve and one of my oldest and dearest friends Jesse Swisher - I sucked but Swish could still hammer the pellet mightily. We also hit "Top Golf" the next day where I was much better at playing the goofy target shooting game. We enjoyed Thanksgiving with my sister Letha; Matt Coffin even flew in for the occasion - a rare sighting. I got the old Microtest exec staff together with wives (L>R in back: Mark Barmettler, Mark Johnston & Shirley, Dave Coffin & Kala Marietta, Maria Marinick & Michael, Susan Sciacero; L>R in front: Jim Sciacero, Heather Hittel & Paul). We missed Mike Sierra of course but had a raucous good time at Jim & Susan's. I rode Brown's Ranch with Jim & Michael - I like the saguaro flipping us off and the 4 Peaks (elevation 7.5Kft) between us. The next day I rode Trail 100 (my old stomping ground behind our house in PHX) with Michael. It was very cool riding in the Sonoran Desert again. We also caught up with Karen Koenig and Jimmy as well as her kids. While we ate and drank at some good spots in Phoenix, Karen's gazebo was a really keen vibe with spa, fire pit, stocked beverage cool, TV and more - perfect outdoor spot in the desert for much of the year, including late Nov. I liked her sign and being near New Mexico allowed tasting a number of Cumbre brews - like the special Project Dank.

Also, mainly for documentation, Thanksgiving is a time when we get to see MLC's main HS mates. Here the Peregrine Partners are convened again. L>R: Matt Coffin (skydiver & big data code jock), Matthew Brantley (federal lands law enforcement), David Vadnais (satellite comms firmware jock), and Mitchel Yohanan (mechE master's degree pursuits).

True Wireless Birthday 21Nov17

"When I'm 63" - oh wait, I'm still a year away, John Lennon. Kala grabbed me the keen replacement for the Kanoa failure... the Sony WF-1000X true wireless earphones. I am excited and have used them a number of times already. They sound great, fit me well (listening or riding) and come with a decent complete charging and configuration solution. While they are noise cancelling, I can disable that circuit and go straight to native sound driven by these closed (nobody knows to what I'm listening) dynamic 6mm drivers. There are integrated mics for taking calls when on the phone. A single charge lasts decently and there are two more full charges from the USB recharged battery in the case and there is a good auto-off feature which saves battery life further. These display typically good Sony build quality  maybe even exceptional. One thing I don't like is that there are no custom HiDef bluetooth profiles supported - but the sound is still awesome and true wireless is a spectacular upgrade compared to wireless buds having ear-to-ear wiring or a capsule holding the battery and electronics... they only weigh 1/8 ounce each.

Rod & Ride - Not Quite 14Nov17

What a great day for a rod & ride in Pueblo so I turned the Crusher around  after grabbing the Subway sammy. With the Foundry racked, all set I thought, though a little late departing @ 10:15am to assure I'd catch some of the late AM fall BWO hatch. No matter... except at Fort Carson exit on I25 I remembered I left my fly boxes up on the tying desk... ARGH. I headed back home again and got the bugs. I arrived at the PT just before noon and fished ~3hrs and caught a half doz rainbows, including one super-fat 18"er (in hand) and another decent 18"er (release). The #22 FOD, #22 blue glass bead silver surfer and #22 black beadhead candy cane were the most productive. Visibility is improving a bit to 8" but flows were up significantly from when I checked yesterday evening to hatch the plan. I felt the second increase while I was out on the water. I was off the water departing Nature Center at ~3:15pm and up at the Lk Pueblo parking pretty quickly. I was hungry so had to eat and change into bike stuff - at 3:50pm I checked sunset timing and found it'd come at 4:20pm... ARGH. I chose to head home rather than ride the darkness. I need to implement better as I think the plan was perfection. Oh yeah - when I left Kala said, "Why are you wearing Greg's shirt?"

Desktop Audio Upgrade Extraordinaire 11Nov17

Mud season is dangerous. I've nearly cleared the shelves of old audiophile gear from my last 20 years. While I thought I did due dil on pricing pretty thoroughly, tonight an item I set up for auction on eBay sold for the Buy-It-Now price of ~$200 in 2 minutes. That's kind of the definition of "leaving $ on the table." It was my Sony MDS-JB940 MiniDisc deck from the early 2000s. Mini-Disc (MD) was a cool and really tiny removable format for mobile audio after cassette was eclipsed and before flash memory crushed optical and rotating magnetics for good, and Apple released iPod, revolutionizing end-to-end ecosystems with iTunes (now a bane of most folks' existences). I had both a Walkman recorder/player and an MD changer for the car in addition to the deck - most discs though were prepared from CD rips using this deck.

To fund my next steps, I did sell off the stunning Shure 846 IEMs with a custom made balance cable set... a loss for sure (heh heh) but I preferred the roundness of the Sony dynamic IEMs coming from my very high quality DAP anyway. An experiment where I lost some $$ but NP as I stoked about the new inbounds (see below).

That's not the main point of this entry however. I just placed all the orders needed to assemble what's perhaps my end game headphone setup. It may seem like my WooAudio Fireflies DAC/AMP driving a set of Audeze LCD planar magnetics, which some readers have audited, is that - but its not. I've been exposed to some new cans which are much more refined, and quieter for nearby friends. While I won't go all the way to Focal Utopia @ ~$4K, I will make a step up. And I've learned and heard the significant benefits of running a fully balanced system (see prior posts on balanced systems and cabling if interested). The good news, for the home budget, is that all the selling activity should cover the cost of the new system, though that is significant. The keen WA7 + LCD-2 setup will be moved to Silverthorne and my Schiit Vali 2 + Modi 2 Uber there now (along with a bevy of cool lamps) will be shipped to a lucky buyer or anchor my server Win7 machine (rarely used directly these days). Note the Audeze cans while sporting balanced cabling needed to be unbalanced from the Fireflies amp. I will test the LCD-2s balanced with the new AMP when it arrives...

So, what have I done? I've scored MrSpeakers Ether C Flow headphones (C=closed) with a 4 pin XLR balanced termination cable set and I'll drive them with a Schiit Mjolinar 2 hybrid tube AMP and I'll use a Schiit Gungnir Multibit DAC to turn bits to tunes. I know the tubes to acquire but they run $200-$600/pair so I may approach slowly. Interestingly, I bought LISST for the sockets initially - these are solid state "tubes." They are novel but I expect to quickly move to early 60's Telefunken, Phillips and Reflektor tubes for most listening. Balanced systems need to be so end-to-end, and the DAC has balanced outputs so I will run very short XLR interconnects between the DAC and the AMP. And, I can do a righteous compare of the Audeze and MrSpeakers planar magnetics with both driven fully balanced from the AMP to each ear of the headphones.

Ok, so patience and consservatism aren't my strong suit. I've got the first three pairs of new old stock (NOS) premium dual triode tubes coming too. I'm starting with  the German Telefunken E88CC, the Dutch Phillips E88CC D-Getter, and the Czech Tesla E88CC... all from the early 60's - but unused, except testing and matching. Show below is also the LISST solid state "tubes" coming stock with the AMP. These four may do it but I'd like to add pairs of Russian Reflektors, British Mullards, and US Amperexs just to see how they perform. I also bought some "socket savers" in order to facilitate rolling tubes through the amp more easily and without wear & tear on the AMP's sockets. They'll also allow the keen tubes to sit more proudly from atop the AMP.

Sortin' Through The Gear - Sources 10Nov17

Wow - CD, SACD/DSD, mini-disc HD, MQA... "we've" endured so many formats it's amazing. I own platforms which will record and replay any of these. DSD -  1 bit depth but ~1Gig wide was Sony's archive format - WHICH ULTIMATELY WAS FAR ECLIPSED. I have a dozen albums and 2 SACD/DSD players. It didn't make the grade but it does sound spectacular. I audited some shit as I prep for churn and I am excited someone will receive an auditing system beyond compare. I gotta retain the formidable Sony 9000es platform! But I'll offer up the Onkyo DV-SP1000. They read the same discs but the Sony is "older" and 10# heavier (more expensive to ship on eBay) - appropriate for the desk as a legacy disc player. Still, not often I'll play DSD discs ore even DVDs directly - but its a universal reader (for any formats/encodings invented prior to 2007). Sony, formidable dinosour. 

Update - I'm selling the Sony as the Onkyo has HDMI and I think the Sony will sell better. I did a very close A-B compare of SACD from the deck and DSD (derived from the same SACD disc) on a couple of recordings and I can not tell the difference. I did pay a service $4/disc to extract the DSD stream from the SACD and give me the digital versions of tracks - a special ~$20K "ripper" is needed to do the extraction. Here I compared the Byrds SACD vs the DSD extraction. Bits are bits I guess - objectivity is a good thing.

Cool Tunes 08Nov17

Wheatus recently released a new single from their upcoming album. It's pretty cool, "Tipsy" - "You're tipsy but you're sound my friend." Here's the live version from a club in the UK. Click on image for music video.

Tipsy - Brendan B Brown/Wheatus

Miley was recently the guest artist on SNL... always a treat for me. Here she does "I Woke Up In A Bad Mood" from her recent album. Click on image for music video.

I Wake Up In A Bad Mood - Miley Cyrus

It's very worth noting that "Thor Ragnarok" was a hoot. Kala and I went @ IMAX and really liked it - Kala not being a fan of the genre at all. Cate Blanchet was great and all the cameos were keen; some fine lines were heard include "Ok new Doug;" a key music highlight was the movie's use of Led Zeppelin's The Immigrant Song (after release this song "broke" Spotify for a day). Click on image for trailer and a little Zep'.

Thor Ragnarok | The Immigrant Song - Led Zeppelin

No Visibility Still On The PT & Gear Notes 06Nov17

I hit the PT again and it is still very turbid and milky. Fishing was slow but I managed to catch these nice 18"ers. Unfortunately 75% of the hooked fish ultimately broke off... grrr. They might've been big but I don't really know as they didn't surface or jump. The #22 Silver Surfer did the damage and I did see nice fall BWO bug-sign both during the late AM hatch and the spinners afterward. Just FYI, I'm trying this flashy blue wire "caddis" to try and cut through the milky water - didn't work... yet.

I used my new Simms softshell for the day as the temperatures were 42°-58° and it seemed the right light weight for that. It was perfect for the task but for one annoyance, the right cuff. While I typically really like velcro cinch-down cuffs, and for fishing I thought they'd be great to keep most water out, the "tab" tended to catch my free line on casts and slow the shoot.

Also in gear evaluation is a mental debate regarding fishing boot laces. My laces broke after only a month or so of use. Unacceptable; only the outside part failed while the core held fine but it still changed the nature and ease of tying. Greg mentioned kevlar which I thought was a good idea but reading reviews it seems they  could suffer similar failures pretty easily - at least depending on brand. I need for the sheath to stay in tact as much as the core. So, enter laces intended for fire fighters and hazmat boots - resistant to corrosion and the like... they are in the mail; we'll see.