delivery-tomorrow-skz1

The misty/dark forest wall tapestry is arriving tomorrow via USPS. It is a rather large piece of wall decor, and it will take up the majority of my wall behind the easy chair. A very cool looking piece, too. Very “Black Metal” (or it is in my mind, due to the appreciation of nature within that sub-genre of Metal, and also because this tapestry looks similar to the cover art for the documentary *Until The Light Takes Us* (which is a badass film)).nnThere’s more decor I want for my apartment. In particular, my living room. And I am wondering if I should keep a dark/nature theme with it (perhaps get some antlers/skulls of some kind (an animal skull that already died of natural causes, of course)), or if I should opt for a more eclectic/artsy approach to the decor? Right now, it is very “veteran’s hall mixed with log cabin” type of decor in my living space, but I want to get away from that, make it more modern, sorta. There is a (limited edition) poster/print I see on Present & Correct that is running for ~$40 that utilizes a lot of geometry and neon colors (80’s style) that could go just outside the bedroom door, but…hell, there are infinite possibilities with what I could do with the space. nnAnyway, I am not too worried about it right now. Just want to get the tapestry and get it hung, and see how it looks. Lookign forward! :)nnThis is the most decorated my apartment has been in my entire adult life, though. Looking good, proud of it.nnNow, having coffee and sort of getting my head straight because I hadn’t had coffee today besides the camp coffee from this morning. I had a Monster Lo-Carb (tisk tisk, shame on me) earlier, but I poured out half of it, because that ish is too strong. Not to mention that it is not even a legit food product – just a can full of chemicals.nnThe coffee however, quite nice.nn**Audio stuffs**nnHaven’t talked about audio gear in a *long* time. Mostly because there have been other priorities (and there *still* are). But, just this month (November) I *tried* to order a Schiit Magni headphpne amplifier ($100), but after ALL the form fills and whatnot, it rejected my debit card. Not because I didn’t have funds on it, but because the debit card sometimes gets recognized (or “flagged”) as a pre-paid debit card, which is annoying, but something that I am going to get fixed very soon. Either way, I DID try to make a music (gear) purchase in November, and it didn’t go through, and I didn’t feel like spending $150+ on an iFi Hip DAC/amp, or a FiiO Q3 DAC/amp (which would have been option #3 and option #4. nnSo what about option #2?nnThat would be the HELM Bolt USB-C DAC (with MQA, because I use Tidal for streaming). It runs at $120 (pre-order), and it *should* be a ready product by the time I have the funds to get one. I’ve been eyeing it for a very long time now, and I think I would really enjoy it. Minimal, would *always* be plugged into the headphones (my AT set), and it is supposed to offer amazing sound quality. Plus, it is just a USB-C “dongle”, so I wouldn’t need a surface to set it on, or have to have it plugged into the wall, or anything like that. The Schiit Magni would have offered better sound quality, especially if I had paired it with the Modi DAC (people (audio nerds) rave about that combo), but until I get my debit card scenario straightened out, no Schiit orders for me, lol! And chances are, I will get the HELM Bolt, and just stick with that – no further upgrades in that department in the foreseeable future.nn**online services**nnYes, I have more to say in this very blog post (a long one, I admit). Mostly about online services. I have to pay for a Premium account on ProtonMail, because I have used 86% of the free storage the service provides. I am A-OK to do this, because then I get free Proton Drive (beta) access, which I am pretty excited about, as well as a discount on Proton VPN (which I will just do a bundle of both services for a year *when* I make the upgrade). So, this is a good thing, but, still an added (yearly) expense, so, I think I need to cut out some yearly expenses.nn1) I will cancel the majority of my (unused) domain names (no need for the renewals for the majority of them)nn2) I will do a once-per-year, large deposit onto my Linode VPS, so I can just *keep* using it with both **Thanx** and the open source blog I am starting up, as well as pay for the $2 per month backup of **Thanx** nn3) I will also cancel my Carrd.co account soon. This will be somewhat of a pain, because I sometimes test out HTML/CSS stuff on that service, and make small time prototypes of things I wanna make, but, it comes in at $60 per year for a Pro account (fairly generous, to be honest), and I cannot justify the cost with my finite funds. :/ I still 100% **love** Carrd, though.nnAnd that is about it, I think, in terms of online services that I actually pay for. I have W.a, of course, and I paid for five (six, actually) years of Pro membership over a year ago, so I do not have to concern myself with that for a while.nnOK, done with this coffee. Be back soon!