Another week, another quick upload. Work has started and my free time is reduced. I’m keeping this post short.
Media Logs
Vlog
Github Study Respository
Link to my Github repository containing music notes.
General Session Records
| Date Session | Duration (Minutes) | Public Notes |
|---|---|---|
| 2025-08-10 | 63 | Berklee Vocal Technique. Lilli Lehman. |
| 2025-08-11 | 33 | Berklee Vocal Technique. |
| 2025-08-12 | 62 | Berklee Vocal Technique. |
| 2025-08-13 | 60 | Berklee Vocal Technique (30 min). Notating Singing for the Stars. |
| 2025-08-14 | 20 | Berklee Vocal Technique. |
| 2025-08-15 | 20 | Berklee Vocal Technique. |
| 2025-08-16 | 20 | Berklee Vocal Technique. |
| 2025-08-17 | 20 | Berklee Vocal Technique. |
Memories to Share
Shorting My Computer
At the moment, the primary memory going through my head is the one where I did something entirely boneheaded with my desktop computer.
When I was trying to upload my video files for this blog post, I mistakenly stuck my usb-c cord (the smaller type of cord that plugs into phones) into the larger regular usb port (the type you typically use for keyboard cords, for example) on my desktop computer.
There was a “pop” sound and my computer screen went black.
My adrenaline launched into action as I realized what I had done.
The outer casing of the usb-c male port is conductive metal and, when it hits the positive and negative connectors inside the inner female port, the usb-c casing closes the circuit between the two connectors. This causes a short circuit and power surge on the desktop machine.
In theory, a short circuit can send too much electricity throughout the motherboard, and even to the connected components, such as my hard drive.
Yes, my hard drives, which store all my journal entries, family videos, and art files from over the years, were in close proximity to the short circuit that I caused.
Furthermore, as I recently switched operating systems (a story for another time), I have a few weeks of data that I haven’t yet connected to my backup system.
When I attempted to reboot the machine, the desktop refused to recognize the primary hard drive.
Oh no.
The files for the operating-system launcher (called “Grub” on Linux) were corrupted.
I turned to Google Gemini AI and explained what happened.
You know how A.I. has that thing now where it is programmed to speak to you in a consoling and confidence-boosting manner? This was extremely helpful at this time.
Me: “I think I fried my desktop computer.”
Gemini: “That is highly unlikely. Launch your machine with a secondary USB hard drive and we’ll get to work.”
Over the course of two hours, Gemini walked me through one of the most technical processes of recovery I have ever attempted. We ended up rebuilding the boot system from scratch.
What machine am I typing this on now? My desktop.
Thank you, Google Gemini.
Robot fixed robot.
My machine is back up and running. In fact, the words, “back up,” are a good pair of words for what my computer is currently doing in the background: performing a new whole-machine backup.
My heart has returned to its normal rate, but my stress level is still pretty high, as I’m not sure that this is truly a closed case.
As a background: this usb-c into usb port isn’t the first time I’ve done this mistake. Rather, this is the second time. My desktop’s ports are hard to reach. The previous time I did this mistake, the issue with the hard drive recognition didn’t happen. I’m wondering why the issue appeared this time, but not previously.
Is the repeated nature of this short-circuit mistake causing system damage over time? I really don’t know. At the moment, I kind of feel like chucking this desktop into a lake and starting from scratch, just to be safe…
Plumbing
Last week, I shared a story about fixing the plumbing in my house.
Wouldn’t it be amazing if I could report that everything is working perfectly? What if every joint in my house was properly sealed, repaired, not leaking, and I could move on to solving another problem? Doesn’t that sound dreamy?
Ya. It’s not the case.
In total, I think I worked on about twenty plumbing connections last week. There were around six under the kitchen sink and fourteen under the bathroom sink.
Of those sixteen joints, I think seven or eight can be considered to be safely not leaking. Water is dripping out of the rest.
Sigh. This is the downside to the wonderful world of “Do It Yourself.” I think the professionals call this a “Do It Yourself Special.” Yep. My work is “special.”
Artificial Intelligence Transparency Report
No artificial intelligence was used for the writing or performing portion of this blog post.
I used Google’s Gemini AI to help me write a sql script to export my database records of my practice sessions into a .csv format, and convert that table into the above HTML table, as seen above.
How You Can Help
I need your help to become established as a teacher and storyteller.
Here is a link to a blog post that describes how a supportive reader can help me in my quest.
In short, you can…
Buy a copy of my children’s novella, Westly: A Spider’s Tale
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