Delta Boogie Newsletter-Gamerplus News - November 2024 - Blues Fest Reprise - The Dragon's Egg - Embedding Mastodon Threads
Music
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On September 29 we all showed up at the Craighead Forest Bandshell for Blues Fest and there was no electricity. Fortunately, I had my JBL Eon One Compact to use with Bebop Beatniks and it has batteries.
We ran the whole day one that amp. After Bebop Beatniks we heard The Spencer Brothers and Doug Butler. All the performances were great. I'm already playing some of the songs on Something Blue.
On October 6 we had bands. Blues bands. Rock bands. We moved to another location at Craighead Forest Park that had electricity. Thanks to Doug Butler for putting on the show and all the extra work he had to do. Thanks to Hairy Larry and The Flying Hungarians, Mike McLeod, John Shepherd and, the host band, Anna and the Tanks for playing. I recorded video and audio of all the acts and will be linking to the performances in this newsletter as I get them done.
Besides Bebop Beatniks, a jazz quartet, I am working with two other bands, Jazz Buskers, a vocals group, and United Gospel Trio, piano, organ, and bass, playing jazz from the hymnbook.
I went to The Biscuit in Helena. I played a lot of music. I visited with a lot of friends. I had a great time. Hat tip to Brent, Pat, Mayor Mike, John, Josh Parks, Diamond Jack, Elan, Bilbo King, John Shepherd, Jeremy Burnett, Gregg Cook, and The Emporium Orkestra with Rhode Island Red, Pinky Lee, and Mark.
Tell me about your music and your festivals. I will share on Delta Boogie and in the newsletter.
Gaming
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I wrote a TTRPG called The Dragon's Egg.
At noon today I'm going to Library Game Day at the Jonesboro Public Library, which is hosted every month by NEA Gamers Guild. I'm going to play some RPGs and I may get to play test The Dragon's Egg.
Free Culture
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I wrote a program called Embedding Mastodon Threads that makes it easy to embed a conversation on Mastodon in your blog or website. I had some help. I want to thank.
I am working on two more Free Culture projects now, Indie Archive, an archive solution for indie shops who really don't want to lose their digital creations, and ExifGal, an addon to one of Malin's projects where he uses a Gitlab repository and exiftools to store and catalog Creative Commons and Public Domain images.
My music and games are also licensed Free Culture. I use the Creative Commons Attribution license, CC BY. Just like WOCs SRD but I did it before them and nobody had to twist my arm.
If you're not on Mastodon yet, you are welcome to join Gamer+DBN, Gamer+ and the Delta Boogie Network, here.
Thanks,
Hairy Larry
@hairylarry@gamerplus.org - address on Mastodon
https://gamerplus.org/@hairylarry - Mastodon link
hairylarry@deltaboogie.com - email
The Dragon's Egg
A System agnostic TTRPG by Larry Heyl
Licensed CC BY
The goal of the game is to steal the dragon's egg.
The game includes exploration, combat, and puzzles.
Exploration
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The DM adjudicates actions and decides when the dragon is going to attack the party.
When not in combat the party travels together to try to find the dragon's lair so they can steal the dragon's egg. The DM chooses the rules for exploration using any published system or their own system. The players make a character sheet for the chosen system.
The players encounter NPCs who can be good or bad on their travels who they can talk to. They also encounter animals or monsters on their travels that are more difficult to talk to. Every encounter should contain clues to the location of the dragon's lair.
The players act in any order saying what they would like to do and the DM adjudicates their success. The DM might use dice rolls to determine the difficulty of the action or the DM might not need dice rolls for this.
The DM just says yes you can do that or they can tell the player what to roll to suceed in the action.
The DM never says you can't do that. Instead they say that will be really difficult. To do that you'll have to roll a critical success and if you don't roll a crit bad things might happen.
And the story begins.
You are all drinking in a tavern called The Dragon's Egg. You've been staying here for over a week partying every night, sleeping in every day. It's already dark when you realize you don't have enough money left to pay for a room for the night. You call the barkeep, Olaf Cranberry, over to the table and explain your situation. You've been good customers and he doesn't really want you sleeping in the common room so he says, "You've been good customers so I'll put your room on the tab for tonight. But on one condition. I'll wake you early in the morning and off you go to steal the dragon's egg. After you sell the egg you'll be rich so you have to promise to come back and settle up with Olaf." You're all drunk so you agree and after one more round you trundle off to bed.
At the crack of dawn there's Olaf, waking you up and putting you out. Oh no, you think, barely remembering what you had agreed to do last night. Once Olaf has you out of his tavern he says, "Go north. All the dragons are in the north."
All of the above are just suggestions. It's totally up to the DM to decide how they are going to run exploration and start the story.
Combat System
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All players start with 5 d6 dice. The dragon starts with 5 plus the number of players d6 dice. Other antagonists will have fewer d6 dice to start with.
A Turn
The players attack in any order. They describe what they are going to do and they roll all of the dice in front of them. If they have n dice left they have to roll 3n to hit. If they hit the dragon puts one die in the middle of the table. If a player hits, the dragon shoots a firebolt at that player. If the dragon rolls n dice, a total of 3n or better hits. If the dragon hits, the player puts one die in the center of the table.
After the players roll the dragon uses her breath weapon. If the dice roll is not critical all players move one die to the center of the table.
Critical success is all sixes. Critical success gives double damage. Two die go into the middle of the table. If there is only one die left a six is a critical success.
Critical failure is all ones. One die goes into the middle of the table. If there is only one die left a one is a critical failure.
Combat ends when either the players have no dice left or the dragon has no dice left.
There is no death in combat. When a player has no dice left they are unconscious. If all the players are unconscious they wake up imprisoned in a dungeon. If the dragon has no dice left she flies away.
Combat with NPCs or monsters is the same except when their turn comes at the end of a round of cambat they attack with whatever weapons or spells they have.
If the players win the NPCs or monsters are unconscious and the players can safely leave without fear or worries about being followed. Their defeated enemies will not strike again because they don't want another whooping.
If the players lose they wake up where they are with no money, food, or weapons except knives, daggers, walking sticks, or other small weapons. Anything from a crossbow up is gone. Magic users still have their staff, books, and scrolls.
Imprisonment
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If the players wake up in a dungeon they must escape the dungeon before they can continue the quest. Every dungeon is a puzzle.
(Sample dungeons should be included. Also a way for people to submit their dungeon puzzles. The dungeons can be as simple as a three room dungeon with a monster guarding the exit to classic logic puzzles or magical runes and lore.)
The End Of The Game
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The final combat is in the dragon's lair. If the players win the dragon flies away, the players steal the dragon's egg, and they win. Now that they have the egg they can Rule The World but they don't really want to do that so they sell the egg and party until they run out of money.
If they play again they are on a quest to steal another dragon's egg.
If the dragon wins the players wake up in the dungeon under the mountain and it's the end of the game.
If they play again they must escape from the dungeon under the mountain, an even harder puzzle. The dungeon under the mountain is a cave with no entrances or exits so when the players solve the puzzle they are teleported to an unknown destination. From there they continue their quest to steal the dragon's egg.
This is Hairy Larry inviting you to enjoy Something Blue every Saturday night at ten. This week we’re featuring Hypotenuza, Snowflake and ccMixter, UK Jazz Explorers, and Steve Lawson. For more about the show visit the Something Blue website at sbblues.com.
Don’t miss Something Blue, Saturday night at 10:00 PM CST, at kasu.org.
When I moved G+DBN to Mastodon I lost the blog that I had in both of the previous Gamer+ social networks. Fortunately I have my own blog software in two versions, Plain Text Blog and Not Actually Plain Text Blog. So I installed Not Actually Plain Text Blog at
And if you're already on Mastodon or any other federated service like Firefish, Friendica, Peertube, or Funkwhale you can follow me at
@hairylarry@gamerplus.org
While perusing my G+DBN stream I often find links to interesting SFF short stories that I enjoy reading. So I have been tagging them with the sffshortstories tag in my Hairy Larry Rocks links program, Shaarli.
This is getting kind of long and very link heavy (but they're good links, I promise).
I went on a family vacation to Branson, Missouri, and Kier and Megan helped me Guerilla Livestream a scenic overlook. After I finished producing that video I went after my post production backlog in a frenzy. Of course I didn't catch up. But still ...
Thanks Marty. Today we're going to hear a jazz song played to a rock beat.
During the pandemic I couldn't play out but I still had to perform so I started livestreaming on twitch. To avoid copyright issues livestreaming I played only originals. After a few months of livestreaming 2 or 3 times a week I had settled in on 16 of my own compositions that I called my streaming repertoire.
I called my stream Hairy Larry Practicing Piano. It turns out that if you practice the same 16 songs week after week for two years you get pretty good at them. I had a routine. I'd record the stream. Then I'd listen back writing the song titles in order and I put a star next to the good takes. Then I'd make a video of the starred songs.
At first I would get two or three songs with stars but later on sometimes they would all be starred. And then I realized I had an album.
Jazz Buskers, Conley Hunt playing percussion and Hairy Larry playing piano and singing in front of GHO on Main St. in Jonesboro, Arkansas.
Songs
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00:00 1 Low Earth Orbit
09:28 2 Tangerine
18:55 3 Stella By Starlight
26:55 4 After You've Gone
33:55 5 Malaysia
"Low Earth Orbit" and "Malaysia" by Larry Heyl - licensed CC BY
"Tangerine" by Schertzinger and Mercer
"Stella By Starlight" by Victor Young
"After You've Gone" by Layton and Creamer, Public domain, arranged by Larry Heyl - this recording is licensed CC BY
I have an algorithm that picks the music and it's a random algorithm. I pick 6 albums randomly and then I randomize the tracks. I wrote the code in php. It also writes the text file listing the albums and dating the show.
The show is two hours long and it is possible that 6 albums wouldn't be long enough but it hasn't happened yet.
My agency starts and ends with adding material to the library. (and making sure the shows are long enough)
The library is currently 21.3 Gigabytes of mp3 files. Every so often I go into a frenzy of searching for and adding albums. If you have released Creative Commons jazz let me know.
640 meg holds 1 hour of .wav files so approximately 10 hours of mp3 files. So 2/3 of a Gig is approximately 10 hours of music. In total around 320 hours of jazz.
Each week I run the program, check that it's long enough, and then I upload to a linux instance on the google cloud for streaming to anonradio and to the internet archive for public listening.
Here's the MixRemix Radio collection on the Internet Archive sorted with the most recent shows at the top.
This collection also includes shows from when I ran a 24/7 streaming station from at home. I may do this again sometime but I have been awfully busy lately.
The library is also available in a web player that supports playlists.
Click Random and then play and it randomizes the whole library.
Click Music Folder Player for the player code. It's a plain text program licensed AGPL-3.0. By plain text I mean it doesn't use a database. Music Folder Player is written and maintained by ltguillaume. It's on GitHub and Codeberg.
My generate the show code is very specific so it is unreleased. If you want a copy email hairylarry@gmail.com.
how did “documentation” become six youtube videos of conference talks and a discord channel? was there something wrong with opening a text editor and just typing out how your project works? did people at some point say “i hate scannable, searchable references”? was there a study that showed copy-pastable examples cause cancer?
it’s 2035 and your api reference is now six emojis, a folk song, a short series of improv scripts and the zapruder film with subtitles. if you have any questions, contact us on nextdoor or call this 1-900 number.
technicat responded:
@ghorwood I expect text scores higher on accessibility than video of a laptop screen. Where's the alt text police when you need them?
hairylarry responded:
@ghorwood
I have always been a proponent of text documentation for every stage of the project. Back in the day I wrote "The Document Is The Program" for Freshmeat (now defunct).
Now a good specifications document. With code walkthroughs? (code free code walkthroughs) Now that will save you some time. It's a lot less work to write the document than it is to code to an ambiguous spec.
Look I know it's going to change. But you still have to know where to start.
Songs
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00:07 1 After You've Gone
08:48 2 Low Earth Orbit
21:00 3 Tangerine
29:05 4 Malaysia
"Low Earth Orbit" and "Malaysia" by Larry Heyl - Licensed CC BY
"Tangerine" by Schertzinger and Mercer
"After You've Gone" by Layton and Creamer, Public domain, arranged by Larry Heyl - this recording is Licensed CC BY
Personnel
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Hairy Larry - piano and vocals
Shane Chastain - piano
Alex Washam - drums
Microphones
Vocal - Audio Technica AT4055
Room - 2 Realistic 1070D
Drums - Audio Technica ATM25
Roland FP-4 into JBL Eon One Pro direct to deck
Vocal and Roland Go:Piano into JBL Eon One Compact direct to deck
This was my first video production using the Zoom L-12 recording deck.
I mixed right on the deck, converted the .wav file in Audacity, and mastered in SAW Classic
Video editing done with Open Shot on Xubuntu, both open source.
"You can buy it right now from the Zine Store, or click the button below. Every sale is distributed among participating artists, so if you want to support them, that’s the way to go!"
Ok now, I've put all my eggs in one basket. Gamer+, a server on the fediverse, has now incorporated the Delta Boogie Network. Both Gamer+ and the Delta Boogie Network have a long history of running social networks on unfederated servers, the kind where you only see people who have logged onto that particular server. That's the past. The fediverse is the future. On G+DBN you can follow anyone on any federated server, whether it's Mastodon, Firefish, Peertube, Funkwhale, &&etc.
So, for me, G+DBN is the one ring that rules them all. The place where I post and read and respond to your posts. I still have my account on mastodon.social and I do boost my hype there. But G+DBN is where I make all my social network posts.
And what is G+DBN all about? My two consuming interests gaming and music viewed through a free culture lens. I love RPGs but all gaming is on topic. I play jazz and blues but all music is on topic. Free culture is a way to share your work with copyright licenses like Creative Commons or GPL licenses.
I license my music CC BY so that you can collaborate with Hairy Larry.
So now that the Delta Boogie Network has been folded into Gamer+ what about deltaboogie.net?
I wrote a program to display All My Feeds - Gaming, Music, Free Culture. RSS or Really Simple Syndication was the first social network, tying blogs and websites together since 1999. It remains one of the best social networks today. It's a standard specification not a company. Anyone can use it for free.
Collaborate On Crates With Hairy Larry
Turn this jazz trio into a quartet
Recorded Live at HairyLarryLand on 2024-01-04
In a nutshell
Play along while listening on headphones.
Record to phone or tablet in vertical mode (portrait not landscape).
Share your video with hairylarry@gmail.com.
I will add your video to the left side of this video and post the finished video.
Details
Your shot
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Pick a good background in a well lit room.
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Collaborate On Crates With Hairy Larry
Turn this jazz trio into a quartet
Recorded Live at HairyLarryLand on 2024-01-04
In a nutshell
Play along while listening on headphones.
Record to phone or tablet in vertical mode (portrait not landscape).
Share your video with hairylarry@gmail.com.
I will add your video to the left side of this video and post the finished video.
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I played this on my twitch livestream on October 17, 2021, with an arrangement designed for collaboration. Collaborators play over a piano trio with the bass and drums provided by an irealpro script with the chords for my original song, "Malaysia". The irealpro app can be viewed running on my tablet on the right side of the video screen.
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Something Blue – Conversations – November 23, 2024
This is Hairy Larry inviting you to enjoy Something Blue every Saturday night at ten. This week we’re featuring Bruce H. Mccosar, Jesse Spillane, NJHB, Tom La Meche, and Jazoo. For more about the show visit the Something Blue website at sbblues.com.
Don’t miss Something Blue, Saturday night at 10:00 PM CST, at kasu.org.
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Thanks Marty. Today we’re going to hear jazz from NJHB recorded at the very beginning.
I was planning on starting the New Jazz In Jonesboro concerts at TheArts@311 in 2013. It was Christmas break so I scheduled a session on December 29, 2012, with the founding members on NJHB.
I was rolling tape but I wasn’t really expecting to record an album. Turns out we played pretty good and we did. We recorded live in the studio, with just two mics recording the room, and we did it the NJHB way. We improvised the arrangements. We recorded four songs. I think I was the only musician there who had ever played them before. As I usually do with NJHB songs I made a radio mix for Arkansas Roots.
In our favor we had a room full of outstanding musicians.
Mike Lovell – guitar
Garrett Tyler – drums
Matt Jackson – bass
Hairy Larry – Fender Rhodes
Cody Ballard – tenor sax
and
Joseph Curtis – trumpet and flugelhorn
This is Hairy Larry inviting you to enjoy Something Blue every Saturday night at ten. This week we’re featuring Eilen Jewell, Melissa Carper, Anna and the Tanks, Angie Owens, Lady Day and The Prez, and Amy Helm. For more about the show visit the Something Blue website at sbblues.com.
Don’t miss Something Blue, Saturday night at 10:00 PM CST, at kasu.org.
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This is Hairy Larry inviting you to enjoy Something Blue every Saturday night at ten. This week we’re featuring Josh Parks, John Shepherd, and Phil Lesh and Friends. For more about the show visit the Something Blue website at sbblues.com.
Don’t miss Something Blue, Saturday night at 10:00 PM CST, at kasu.org.
John Shepherd – Blues Fest – October 6, 2024
hairylarryland.com
Phil Lesh and Friends – Terrapin Crossroads – July 15, 2018
www.phillesh.net/
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Drucilla's Horrid Hobby
Drucilla Alexandra Fenworth-Covington was a disappointment, a source of great frustration to her parents and siblings alike, and a delicious monster. The family couldn't understand or relate to Drucilla, and lived in a constant state of trepidation regarding family gatherings and public functions. When dainty footwear and tailored outfits of linen were required, Drucilla might arrive in black shiny knee-high punk goth boots, torn fishnet stockings, and a dress perhaps best described as an industrial explosion of black lace, taffeta, and faux-patent leather. Where her twin sisters wore understated pearl necklaces, light lipstick and imperceptible blush, Drucilla was likely to wear a wide stainless-steel choker with a ring, black shiny lipstick, and a piecing in her nose. It was very unsettling at best, and nobody in her family knew what to do about her.
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Bebop Beatniks Live At Blues Fest Craighead Forest Bandshell Jonesboro, Arkansas September 24, 2023
Songs
00:00 African Violet 11:24 Thanks Mr. Cloud … 12:14 The Blue Crane 21:20 The dance floor is open … 21:42 Low Earth Orbit 31:08 Honky Tonk Jazz … 31:54 Sail Boats 38:37 In the audience … 39:15 Freddy’s Blues 45:34 Silence … 45:19 Malaysia 55:53 Introducing the band …
All songs by Larry Heyl
Personnel
Tyler Remagen - sax and flute Hairy Larry - piano and vocals Jeremy Jackson - bass Alex Washam - drums Conley Hunt - percussion and vocals
Bebop Beatniks Larry Heyl Composition Recital ASU Band Room September 10, 2023
Songs
00:00 African Violet 14:30 The Blue Crane 23:30 introducing the band … 24:24 Low Earth Orbit 33:32 Sail Boats 42:22 Freddy’s Blues 52:35 Malaysia
All songs by Larry Heyl
Personnel
Rike Robinson - trombone and vocals Tyler Remagen - sax and flute Cody Daugherty - trumpet Sophie Hacker - guitar and vocals Craig Collison - drums Jeremy Jackson - bass Conley Hunt - percussion and vocals Hairy Larry - piano and vocals
Livestreamed to Youtube from my Samsung Galaxy S10
Bebop Beatniks At Beatles Park Walnut Ridge, Arkansas May 27, 2023
Songs
00:00 We are Bebop Beatniks … 00:23 The Blue Crane 08:53 What a wonderful audience … 09:00 Candles 16:43 I’m going to rap … 17:04 African Violet 28:24 When Conley was a percussion student … 28:48 Low Earth Orbit 38:17 OK, here’s a swing song … 38:25 Sailboats 45:11 Crates is the companion piece to Candles … 45:20 Crates 53:36 One more song … 53:46 Malaysia
Personnel
Hairy Larry - piano, vocals Alex Washam - drums Conley Hunt - percussion Rike Robinson - trombone
Bebop Beatniks
On The Twitch Porch
April 2, 2023
Songs
00:00 Stardust by Hoagy Carmichael, public domain
08:27 African Violet
17:05 Sail Boats
24:26 Malaysia
33:37 Low Earth Orbit
42:37 The Blue Crane
Something Blue – Conversations – November 23, 2024 This is Hairy Larry inviting you to enjoy Something Blue every Saturday night at ten. This week we’re featuring Bruce H. Mccosar, Jesse Spillane, NJHB, Tom La Meche, and Jazoo. For more … Continue reading →
DJ Hairy Larry Presents NJHB Playing Circular Logic From The Archives Of Something Blue 2024-11-17 Thanks Marty. Today we’re going to hear jazz from NJHB recorded at the very beginning. I was planning on starting the New Jazz In Jonesboro … Continue reading →
Something Blue – Goodbye – November 15, 2024 Amy Helm – Silver City This is Hairy Larry inviting you to enjoy Something Blue every Saturday night at ten. This week we’re featuring Eilen Jewell, Melissa Carper, Anna and the Tanks, … Continue reading →
DJ Hairy Larry Presents Anna and the Tanks Playing White Rabbit From The Archives Of Something Blue 2024-11-10 Anna Lowery Thanks Marty, today we’re going to feature a song from the sixties recorded live at Blues Fest in 2024! Jefferson … Continue reading →
Something Blue – Burning – November 9, 2024 This is Hairy Larry inviting you to enjoy Something Blue every Saturday night at ten. This week we’re featuring Josh Parks, John Shepherd, and Phil Lesh and Friends. For more about the … Continue reading →
DJ Hairy Larry Presents Josh Parks Playing Part Time Love From The Archives Of Something Blue – 2024-11-03 Josh Parks Playing At The King Biscuit Blues Festival Thanks Marty, today we’re going to hear an Arkansas Blues Man play a … Continue reading →
Something Blue – Splendour – November 2, 2024 This is Hairy Larry inviting you to enjoy Something Blue every Saturday night at ten. This week we’re featuring Geri Allen and Kurt Rosenwinkel, Nigel Harpur, and ADHD. For more about the … Continue reading →
DJ Hairy Presents Bebop Beatniks Playing The Blue Crane From The Archives Of Something Blue – 2024-10-27 Bebop Beatniks Photo By Rachel Ann Wilson Washam Thanks Marty. Today I’m going to play the title track of the soon to be … Continue reading →
Something Blue – Hand – June 12, 2021 – October 26, 2024 This is Hairy Larry inviting you to enjoy Something Blue every Saturday night at ten. This week we’re featuring Dirk Quinn, Billy Jones, and Soule Monde. For more … Continue reading →
Thanks Marty. This week on From the Archives of Something Blue we’re hearing some real blues recorded at Bluesday Tuesday. Billy Jones Bluez is from Central Arkansas so Bluesday Tuesday in Newport was a good fit for them with less … Continue reading →
