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thelmasirby32 · 5 years ago

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How to Read Google Algorithm Updates

Links = Rank

Old Google (pre-Panda) was to some degree largely the following: links = rank.

Once you had enough links to a site you could literally pour content into a site like water and have the domain's aggregate link authority help anything on that site rank well quickly.

As much as PageRank was hyped & important, having a diverse range of linking domains and keyword-focused anchor text were important.

Brand = Rank

After Vince then Panda a site's brand awareness (or, rather, ranking signals that might best simulate it) were folded into the ability to rank well.

Panda considered factors beyond links & when it first rolled out it would clip anything on a particular domain or subdomain. Some sites like HubPages shifted their content into subdomains by users. And some aggressive spammers would rotate their entire site onto different subdomains repeatedly each time a Panda update happened. That allowed those sites to immediately recover from the first couple Panda updates, but eventually Google closed off that loophole.

Any signal which gets relied on eventually gets abused intentionally or unintentionally. And over time it leads to a "sameness" of the result set unless other signals are used:

Google is absolute garbage for searching anything related to a product. If I'm trying to learn something invariably I am required to search another source like Reddit through Google. For example, I became introduced to the concept of weighted blankets and was intrigued. So I Google "why use a weighted blanket" and "weighted blanket benefits". Just by virtue of the word "weighted blanket" being in the search I got pages and pages of nothing but ads trying to sell them, and zero meaningful discourse on why I would use one

Getting More Granular

Over time as Google got more refined with Panda broad-based sites outside of the news vertical often fell on tough times unless they were dedicated to some specific media format or had a lot of user engagement metrics like a strong social network site. That is a big part of why the New York Times sold About.com for less than they paid for it & after IAC bought it they broke it down into a variety of sites like: Verywell (health), the Spruce (home decor), the Balance (personal finance), Lifewire (technology), Tripsavvy (travel) and ThoughtCo (education & self-improvement).

Penguin further clipped aggressive anchor text built on low quality links. When the Penguin update rolled out Google also rolled out an on-page spam classifier to further obfuscate the update. And the Penguin update was sandwiched by Panda updates on either side, making it hard for people to reverse engineer any signal out of weekly winners and losers lists from services that aggregate massive amounts of keyword rank tracking data.

So much of the link graph has been decimated that Google reversed their stance on nofollow to where in March 1st of this year they started treating it as a hint versus a directive for ranking purposes. Many mainstream media websites were overusing nofollow or not citing sources at all, so this additional layer of obfuscation on Google's part will allow them to find more signal in that noise.

March 4, 2020 Algo Update

On May 4th Google rolled out another major core update.

Later today, we are releasing a broad core algorithm update, as we do several times per year. It is called the May 2020 Core Update. Our guidance about such updates remains as we’ve covered before. Please see this blog post for more about that:https://t.co/e5ZQUAlt0G— Google SearchLiaison (@searchliaison) May 4, 2020

I saw some sites which had their rankings suppressed for years see a big jump. But many things changed at once.

Wedge Issues

On some political search queries which were primarily classified as being news related Google is trying to limit political blowback by showing official sites and data scraped from official sites instead of putting news front & center.

"Google’s pretty much made it explicit that they’re not going to propagate news sites when it comes to election related queries and you scroll and you get a giant election widget in your phone and it shows you all the different data on the primary results and then you go down, you find Wikipedia, you find other like historical references, and before you even get to a single news article, it’s pretty crazy how Google’s changed the way that the SERP is intended."

That change reflects the permanent change to the news media ecosystem brought on by the web.

The Internet commoditized the distribution of facts. The "news" media responded by pivoting wholesale into opinions and entertainment.— Naval (@naval) May 26, 2016

YMYL

A blog post by Lily Ray from Path Interactive used Sistrix data to show many of the sites which saw high volatility were in the healthcare vertical & other your money, your life (YMYL) categories.

Aggressive Monetization

One of the more interesting pieces of feedback on the update was from Rank Ranger, where they looked at particular pages that jumped or fell hard on the update. They noticed sites that put ads or ad-like content front and center may have seen sharp falls on some of those big money pages which were aggressively monetized:

Seeing this all but cements the notion (in my mind at least) that Google did not want content unrelated to the main purpose of the page to appear above the fold to the exclusion of the page's main content! Now for the second wrinkle in my theory.... A lot of the pages being swapped out for new ones did not use the above-indicated format where a series of "navigation boxes" dominated the page above the fold.

The above shift had a big impact on some sites which are worth serious money. Intuit paid over $7 billion to acquire Credit Karma, but their credit card affiliate pages recently slid hard.

Credit Karma lost 40% traffic from May core update. That’s insane, they do major TV ads and likely pay millions in SEO expenses. Think about that folks. Your site isn’t safe. Google changes what they want radically with every update, while telling us nothing!— SEOwner (@tehseowner) May 14, 2020

The above sort of shift reflects Google getting more granular with their algorithms. Early Panda was all or nothing. Then it started to have different levels of impact throughout different portions of a site.

Brand was sort of a band aid or a rising tide that lifted all (branded) boats. Now we are seeing Google get more granular with their algorithms where a strong brand might not be enough if they view the monetization as being excessive. That same focus on page layout can have a more adverse impact on small niche websites.

One of my old legacy clients had a site which was primarily monetized by the Amazon affiliate program. About a month ago Amazon chopped affiliate commissions in half & then the aggressive ad placement caused search traffic to the site to get chopped in half when rankings slid on this update.

Their site has been trending down over the past couple years largely due to neglect as it was always a small side project. They recently improved some of the content about a month or so ago and that ended up leading to a bit of a boost, but then this update came. As long as that ad placement doesn't change the declines are likely to continue.

They just recently removed that ad unit, but that meant another drop in income as until there is another big algo update they're likely to stay at around half search traffic. So now they have a half of a half of a half. Good thing the site did not have any full time employees or they'd be among the millions of newly unemployed. That experience though really reflects how websites can be almost like debt levered companies in terms of going under virtually overnight. Who can have revenue slide around 88% and then take increase investment in the property using the remaining 12% while they wait for the site to be rescored for a quarter year or more?

"If you have been negatively impacted by a core update, you (mostly) cannot see recovery from that until another core update. In addition, you will only see recovery if you significantly improve the site over the long-term. If you haven’t done enough to improve the site overall, you might have to wait several updates to see an increase as you keep improving the site. And since core updates are typically separated by 3-4 months, that means you might need to wait a while."

Almost nobody can afford to do that unless the site is just a side project.

Google could choose to run major updates more frequently, allowing sites to recover more quickly, but they gain economic benefit in defunding SEO investments & adding opportunity cost to aggressive SEO strategies by ensuring ranking declines on major updates last a season or more.

Choosing a Strategy vs Letting Things Come at You

They probably should have lowered their ad density when they did those other upgrades. If they had they likely would have seen rankings at worst flat or likely up as some other competing sites fell. Instead they are rolling with a half of a half of a half on the revenue front. Glenn Gabe preaches the importance of fixing all the problems you can find rather than just fixing one or two things and hoping it is enough. If you have a site which is on the edge you sort of have to consider the trade offs between various approaches to monetization.

monetize it lightly and hope the site does well for many years

monetize it slightly aggressively while using the extra income to further improve the site elsewhere and ensure you have enough to get by any lean months

aggressively monetize the shortly after a major ranking update if it was previously lightly monetized & then hope to sell it off a month or two later before the next major algorithm update clips it again

Outcomes will depend partly on timing and luck, but consciously choosing a strategy is likely to yield better returns than doing a bit of mix-n-match while having your head buried in the sand.

Reading the Algo Updates

You can spend 50 or 100 hours reading blog posts about the update and learn precisely nothing in the process if you do not know which authors are bullshitting and which authors are writing about the correct signals.

But how do you know who knows what they are talking about?

It is more than a bit tricky as the people who know the most often do not have any economic advantage in writing specifics about the update. If you primarily monetize your own websites, then the ignorance of the broader market is a big part of your competitive advantage.

Making things even trickier, the less you know the more likely Google would be to trust you with sending official messaging through you. If you syndicate their messaging without questioning it, you get a treat - more exclusives. If you question their messaging in a way that undermines their goals, you'd quickly become persona non grata - something cNet learned many years ago when they published Eric Schmidt's address.

It would be unlikely you'd see the following sort of Tweet from say Blue Hat SEO or Fantomaster or such.

I asked Gary about E-A-T. He said it's largely based on links and mentions on authoritative sites. i.e. if the Washington post mentions you, that's good. He recommended reading the sections in the QRG on E-A-T as it outlines things well.@methode #Pubcon— Marie Haynes (@Marie_Haynes) February 21, 2018

To be able to read the algorithms well you have to have some market sectors and keyword groups you know well. Passively collecting an archive of historical data makes the big changes stand out quickly. Everyone who depends on SEO to make a living should subscribe to an online rank tracking service or run something like Serposcope locally to track at least a dozen or two dozen keywords. If you track rankings locally it makes sense to use a set of web proxies and run the queries slowly through each so you don't get blocked.

Once you see outliers most people miss that align with what you see in a data set, your level of confidence increases and you can spend more time trying to unravel what signals changed.

I've read influential industry writers mention that links were heavily discounted on this update. I have also read Tweets like this one which could potentially indicate the opposite.

Check out https://t.co/1GhD2U01ch . Up even more than Pinterest and ranking for some real freaky shit.— Paul Macnamara (@TheRealpmac) May 12, 2020

If I had little to no data, I wouldn't be able to get any signal out of that range of opinions. I'd sort of be stuck at "who knows."

By having my own data I track I can quickly figure out which message is more inline with what I saw in my subset of data & form a more solid hypothesis.

No Single Smoking Gun

As Glenn Gabe is fond of saying, sites that tank usually have multiple major issues.

Google rolls out major updates infrequently enough that they can sandwich a couple different aspects into major updates at the same time in order to make it harder to reverse engineer updates. So it does help to read widely with an open mind and imagine what signal shifts could cause the sorts of ranking shifts you are seeing.

Sometimes site level data is more than enough to figure out what changed, but as the above Credit Karma example showed sometimes you need to get far more granular and look at page-level data to form a solid hypothesis.

As the World Changes, the Web Also Changes

About 15 years ago online dating was seen as a weird niche for recluses who perhaps typically repulsed real people in person. Now there are all sorts of niche specialty dating sites including a variety of DTF type apps. What was once weird & absurd had over time become normal.

The COVID-19 scare is going to cause lasting shifts in consumer behavior that accelerate the movement of commerce online. A decade of change will happen in a year or two across many markets.

Telemedicine will grow quickly. Facebook is adding commerce featured directly onto their platform through partnering with Shopify. Spotify is spending big money to buy exclusives rights to distribute widely followed podcasters like Joe Rogan. Uber recently offered to acquire GrubHub. Google and Apple will continue adding financing features to their mobile devices. Movie theaters have lost much of their appeal.

Tons of offline "value" businesses ended up having no value after months of revenue disappearing while large outstanding debts accumulated interest. There is a belief that some of those brands will have strong latent brand value that carries over online, but if they were weak even when the offline stores acting like interactive billboards subsidized consumer awareness of their brands then as those stores close the consumer awareness & loyalty from in-person interactions will also dry up. A shell of a company rebuilt around the Toys R' Us brand is unlikely to beat out Amazon's parallel offering or a company which still runs stores offline.

Big box retailers like Target & Walmart are growing their online sales at hundreds of percent year over year.

There will be waves of bankruptcies, shifts in commercial real estate prices, more people working remotely (shifting residential real estate demand from the urban core back out into suburbs).

More and more activities will become normal online activities.

The University of California has about a half-million students & in the fall semester they are going to try to have most of those classes happen online. How much usage data does Google gain as thousands of institutions put more and more of their infrastructure and service online?

Colleges have to convince students for the next year that a remote education is worth every bit as much as an in-person one, and then pivot back before students actually start believing it. It’s like only being able to sell your competitor’s product for a year.— Naval (@naval) May 6, 2020

A lot of B & C level schools are going to go under as the like-vs-like comparison gets easier. Back when I ran a membership site here a college paid us to have students gain access to our membership area of the site. As online education gets normalized many unofficial trade-related sites will look more economically attractive on a relative basis.

Categories:

google

from Digital Marketing News http://www.seobook.com/reading-google-algorithm-updates

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setitfast-blog · 7 years ago

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Penetrated In Anchors - Adhesive Vs Mechanical

There are two sorts of entered in stays: mechanical and stick catches. Mechanical remains secure themselves by screwing/wedging into the challenge at the tip. Concrete stays require an opening to be infiltrated, cleaned, stacked with a paste, and after that the hook can be implanted.

Mechanical Anchors

Mechanical hooks are all things considered more straightforward to both present and uninstall. This kind of hook should be used just with solid, strong concrete. In case the strong is frail the catch won't properly settle and won't ability to its potential. Since all the weight and stress is assembled at the tip of the hook it has been known to cause parts in the bond, especially with weaker concrete. You ought to guarantee that the traverse of the hole is no more prominent than the stay, or it won't authentically stick set up. While on occasion unavoidable, make a point not to enter the catch into any air or powder pockets as this will cause a greater hole than the stay itself. On the off chance that this some way or another figured out how to happen your select decision is to make another hole adjoining; don't continue with the primary opening. Another genuine security measure while using mechanical hooks is to stay away from the edges as this will instigate breaks impressively less requesting. While they are essentially less requesting to present they are moreover unstuck generously less requesting. drop in anchor setting tool stays can regularly remove on account of vibrations and can without a lot of an extend rust.

Paste Anchors

Paste catches are secured falsely and are all the more difficult to present, and in addition the strategy is all the more exorbitant moreover. You don't have to worry over the nature of your strong while using bond remains as they will work even with low quality concrete. Remembering the true objective to present a concrete stay you should first enter and clean the hole. Once the hole is cleaned you fill the opening with your sticky material. It is imperative that you clean the opening totally as any additional clean or particles will phenomenally reduce the suitability of the paste. Paste hooks are known to be more secure and tried and true in light of the fact that the concrete allows the weight/weight to be spread all through the stay rather than putting everything at the tip. This mulls over numerous less parts and furthermore diminishes underhandedness to the surface paint of the divider. Other than being all the more expensive and a lengthier strategy, stick stays are investigated for not working fittingly under high temperatures.

Two Method Approach

Most jump at the chance to complete an endeavor using either mechanical or bond, staying unsurprising for both purchasing and building. In case furnished with the time and money, some get a kick out of the opportunity to use a two technique approach where the concrete stays take most of the weight and the mechanical catches act fundamentally as a support.

#hammer drill

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thecoroutfitters · 7 years ago

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Written by R. Ann Parris on The Prepper Journal.

Editors Note: Another contribution from R. Ann Parris to The Prepper Journal. As always, if you have information for Preppers that you would like to share and possibly receive a $25 cash award, as well as being entered into the Prepper Writing Contest AND have a chance to win one of three Amazon Gift Cards with the top prize being a $300 card to purchase your own prepping supplies, then enter today!

Caches periodically come up in preparedness. When they do, there’s routinely talk of burying them. Buried caches can work, but there are some considerations.

One of the things warned about regularly is making sure you can find them again as things ebb and flow in the area. GPS makes a handy backup for now, but in some disasters that GPS unit may not be functioning. I won’t belabor that one. Instead, I’m going to work my way through some considerations for after they’ve been located: Getting into them and getting them out.

Why A Cache?

There are all kinds of caches, for all kinds of reasons. Someone planning a long bugout might stash water purification, energy or ration bars, and drink powders. Someone who uses mass transit or who expects major traffic delays in a crisis might stash some good boots and decent pants.

Others may be creating a network of chipmunk holes because their primary storage areas are limited, or because they fear theft, now or later. Still others may be motivated to create at least a little resiliency to tornadoes, house fires, and flooding – common risks to our primary storage.

The ability to pull up caches with even just the equivalent of a 72-hour kit can buy some less-panicky time to make a better decision than running around with absolutely nothing.

Buried Treasure

Blame my parents for hooking me young, but I love the moment pirates and archaeologists pop something out of the earth.

Thing is, in real life, the earth tends to hold onto her prizes pretty tightly. TV and movies are the only place where something that’s been underground 1-5 years (or longer) plops out without serious effort. See, dirt clings to stuff. Over time, it rains. Sodden soil oozes and fills in the gaps around what we bury. Then it dries and hardens there. Successive seasons repeat this, until the object of our desire is fully cemented in place. (Sandy-soil peeps have a whole other set of issues.)

I don’t have a whole crew of workers like Indy to get my Lost Ark out, so I have learned to be a little smarter about how I plant them in the first place.

Surface Changes & Handy Tools

One of the first things to stay aware of, is how much surface growth we have, and what type. Hand in hand with that, is the kinds of tools we anticipate having if we need our caches.

If we’re hiding 3 of 5 rifles we bought together with one phone call in case a foreign entity ever invades, maybe we have no problem heading out with a machete, loppers, and a trenching shovel or post hole digger, and we’re going to be wearing good boots, good gloves, and decent pants.

If we’re planning our “coming home from a wedding/funeral, truck went boom, had to bail with whatever is in the front seat” disaster-run stash, or if this is a cache built for a wildfire where we all raced for the river/pool after our tires melted, we might have …a pocket knife? …a good camping/hunting do-all blade? …an e-tool? …a hatchet?

So when we site our caches, we want to look around. Not just at “now” level care, but at what springs up inside 1-2 and 3-5 years in the abandoned areas around us.

Siting Snags

Brambles may help keep critters and peeps away from our goodies, but we’re going to have to get through them, too. So it goes with kudzu from nearby areas (that’s about snakes, tangling and tripping, and having to whack it) and poison ivy or ants.

The same goes for anchoring or burying stuff at the edge of waterways. That’s where erosion, sediment deposit, bank shifts, and undergrowth are most likely to exert changes.

We also want to look up as we dig and when we cruise through eyeballing things.

Are there nearby trees with damaged limbs hanging? Diseased branches or trunks? Tree roots in loose banks and shoulders? Those may drop big branches or a whole tree may come down, right on top of our cache.

Don’t just consider healthy, well-fed “now” conditions and abilities. Think about mud and the rolling marbles of a boom acorn year, already injured, and demoralized by loss of home, loved ones, and/or crops due to invaders, fires, or floods. Consider icy ground, dehydrated, a cold bordering on bronchitis, and footsore after 50-80 dodgy miles on very little.

What tools and abilities will I have in the worst case?

Because, if we’re hitting caches, chances are good we’re in that worst case scenario. And I still have to get into the earth to get my cache of cold meds, Pedialyte, hatchet, and gloves.

Shallow vs. Deep Burial

The shallow-deep aspect is twofold. It’s looking at not only how far underground we stick something, but also the size and shape of our container.

If we go too shallow, our containers can bulge upwards as the earth moves or peek through from erosion. They or contents can be melted in big fires. Floods can unearth them if they and soil isn’t heavy enough.

If we go too deep, however, getting to them with a pointy stick, a rifle stock, or a Ka-Bar is going to be ‘funtastic’.

There’s a sweet spot by location, of 6-12” to the surface of your cache. You’re still susceptible to temperature fluctuations, but chiseling through clay soils in summertime isn’t as grueling as going deeper and they’re less likely to reveal themselves or wander.

If you’re healthy, you can plan on covering the buried treasure with something on the surface (tire, some lumber, small log) and use as little as 4” of topsoil.

That still gives you a buffer to scatter some old bolts, lead bullets, or similar over and in the area off to the side of a cache and cover them with an inch or two of soil. Deposits that build up will still leave a reasonable amount of digging, while it takes a serious flood and time to move four inches of earth once it’s packed down.

That leaves the container. There’s several aspects to wide-skinny containers to think about.

Container Size & Dimensions

First up, consider being off by a few inches. Like, this is for-sure the exactomundo square foot. Our container (or some edge of it) is 100% for-sure inside this here square foot marked by the old steel wheel or big rock. Start digging, Joe.

Only, something scooted. So we need to add 2-6” to our search area.

Most of our caches will be measurable in inches on at least one side. When we’re moving even just 4-6” of earth, especially by hand, do we want to be looking for something that’s 6” across, or something 10- 18”?

Now, consider that it’s not 4-6”, but 12” of topsoil. And not a square foot, but a square yard. Even if we have pre-staged some thin rebar right there by our cache so we can pole for our lid, which do we want to be hunting? The 6” cap to a piece of PVC, or 14” toolbox lid?

That’s just uncovering the top. We still have to get it out.

Earth Clings Tightly

If we need to actually unearth our whole cache to carry our goodies, holy cows. Please, please, please take the time to bury a bucket this autumn/early winter and then dig it up sometime after soil dries this summer. Earth clings. It clings harder the longer something is there.

It’s easiest to define the edges and then dig and spear-wiggle right around the edges of a container if you do need to pull it. That’s another place where shallow or wide has advantage over deep and skinny.

Don’t count on the finger grooves on the underside or the handle holding up to this abuse (or the elements). If it’s really, really smooth with nowhere to grip like a lockbox or PVC tube, for sure you’re going to have to free a big portion of it, depth-wise, to get it out.

Nesting Containers

We can avoid some of the pain of unearthing caches by not actually pulling up the outer containers.

Buckets are made for this. Stack two buckets, inner/upper one with a lid and our goodies. Clear the edges, lift, and go. Really. Storage totes, too, routinely come in stackable sizes. A single bucket or tote can be holding a backpack, tool boxes, etc.

(Psst…kitty litter comes in GOOD buckets, and usually animal rescues getting a bag of dog/cat food will happily let you have empties.)

Remember, ideally the outer shell is pretty tough. That shell is making it easier to unearth those. However, the inner container can be a softer target.

We can slide 4-6” PVC into 6-8” PVC – just the pipe, we don’t have to buy a second round of caps. Toss a chunk of wood or an old boot over the top and-or bottom of it, and-or wedge in an old towel to help keep soil from filling the space between them.

Another option is using a trash can as an exterior for a cache.

The round or squared 13-18gal types work well for various buckets. There are some 6-8gal sizes at Walmart that fit Plano ammo boxes, tackle boxes, and toolboxes really well. (Psst … they also fit inside a backpack while heading out somewhere.)

Slide your container(s) into your trash can, slide a pair of contractor trash bags over it, and slide your trash can into your hole. Top with a seat from an old chair, a freebie-site desk drawer, or planks from the curbside-pickup shelving unit to make it even easier. Bury, roll.

Tie-Offs

Another way to avoid having to un-bury a whole container, especially deep PVC tubes or trash cans, is to tie off each item inside with heavy-duty fishing wire or cord (paracord).

We unwind that all the way to the top, leaving extra trailing out. Tie off and wedge in the next, and eventually wrap the cords into a bundle that will sit on top. Wedging something that won’t settle much like a Ziploc of gloves or socks near the top, the cords above it, will help ensure the cords don’t wiggle down into the depths of our PVC. We can also duct tape the bundle to the inside at the very top.

Remember, if the PVC is 3-4’ long at a table, no big deal. When there’s another 6-12-18” of dirt or debris we’re reaching past and we can’t tilt it, no Bueno. Most of us do not have 4’ arms, and fingertips are not always sufficient for lifting 250 rounds of … lead fishing weights.

Treasure Chests

Caches are an excellent backup, whether we plan to relocate for disasters or just want to nature-proof and people-proof some of our storage.

How we pack our supplies and where we opt to put them so we can get them again are whole articles on their own. Buried caches have their own sets of pro’s and con’s versus other types, but can be pretty effective. A little awareness and others’ “oh, my” moments can help eliminate some of the drawbacks and keep you ready for anything.

The post Buried Treasure – Caching Caches appeared first on The Prepper Journal.

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aureliasaid · 7 years ago

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Rebel Red Carpet Vandy vs Ole Miss

October 13-15, 2017

Friday

Our bright-eyed and bushy-tailed 7am American Flight to Charlotte and onto to Memphis for an 10:30am arrival turned into bleary-eyed and draggin ass daymare when American canceled our flight and basically almost canceled our trip. But we endured a 4 hr drive to Charlotte, two failed stand-bys, inept and rude American Airlines employees to finally arrive in Memphis at 8:30pm central time. Rental car and a dark road to Oxford landed us at our final destination around 9:45pm, almost 12 hours later than we were originally to have arrived. A martini was more than in order…in fact bring on a shot…or two.

Arrived at The Shanty, a cute shabby-modern chic house that our friends and hosts John and Pam Coffman arranged many months before. We went directly to The Square which was in FULL swing, with people in the streets and hanging from the outdoor balconies, police on bike and horseback, lines at every bar, cars cruisin the Square, and bands blaring inside. It was a sight to behold. Dawn Lassiter nailed it when she said it looks like a movie set and it does…as if it was one big fake facade with lots of hired extras. Surreal, mind blowing and fun…lots of fun. And we had not even had a drink yet!

Met with other NC friends and their children, and headed in Boure and imbibed in their specialty Bedrock before claiming a spot on the balcony simply to watch. Popped in the Round Table (the jr and sr bar) where a friend’s son is a bartender. Got hot beers and ventured forth from the shabby dive front room to go into multiple rooms and levels with bands and outdoor space before heading to the even bigger multi-spaced spot called The Library. Parents and students co-mingled as the HYDR attitude effused from every crevice. Quite the homogenous Southern scene that made you think you knew everybody there somehow and if you tried hard enough, probably had 6 degrees of separation with each person. But 22 hours and the bar closing time sent us packing for 1015 S. 11th street.

Saturday

Saturday morning and a walk was in order. Down University Ave and through campus, The Grove was already in tailgate order with every inch covered with a Rebel tent, perfectly aligned in symmetry and flush with the next one. Truly an amazing sight. The campus itself is beautiful with a mix of old buildings, magnolias and new structures blending in well. The fraternity and sorority houses are massive and seem to be quite nice with upwards of 300 members or more in each.

The town is so walkable and renting houses is a mainstay for accommodations, though there are some nice hotels if you can get a room. (One friend was staying with friends in a rented house, another was staying in the refurbished Greyhound bus station that rents out, others had bought condos when their children decided to be Rebels and still others had gotten a hotel room at the Hampton Inn for $500 pn!)

John arranged for a tuk to take us, sort of a golf cart type thing a la Bangkok, as walking in your finery and heels can be bad for your health. Dropped at the edge of campus, the police don’t question contents as long as it is in a cup. We made our way in the maze to the Raleigh Rebels tent, a group of semi-converted Heels who’s money now goes with their children to Ole Miss. The entire thing is quite the setup - you engage a person who is your tailgate manager…at 6pm the day before a game, the Grove opens, and it transforms by way of the hired tailgate pros. They set it up, store your coolers and tables and guard it so no one moves it. Cold beers, Red Roosters and an array of food welcomed us despite our Gold and Black garb (which was very scarce in the sea of red and blue.)

This is Southern and actually Deep South at its finest. Women and co-eds were decked in various definitions of red, THE EVERPRESENT ROMPER and stacked heel boots and wedges. Even the now required clear handbag ruled was dolled to perfection. New frat pledges had on their required ties and blue blazers. Fortunately, our experienced hosts and friends anticipated the 90 degree 100% humidity even in October and had snagged Rebel Club seats, meaning AC, treats, and a stocked liquor locker for those with friends in high places.

The game was a surprising rout and we opted out early choosing a cold beverage and tour by tuk of a bit of Oxford, including Rowen Oaks, home of William Faulkner. Bus Depot people watching was a pre-cursor to dinner at the Memphis-born Mesquite Chop House just off the Square with the Coffmans, Angel McKenzie and Barbara Dominick, both sans spouse this go round. It was perfect and home by 10pm. No studying at The Library tonight.

Sunday

We walked for our breakfast, but crowds and hour waits already formed at Big Bad Breakfast and Fillup at Billups, so we opted as maybe we should have from the get-go for homemade biscuits at the Chevron convenience store, famous for its food. Its cousin on the other side of the Square ain’t bad either with its famous (fried) chicken on a stick, which we partook of on Saturday. Alas, time to head back to Memphis, but it was a time and place to remember. American once again wreaked havoc on us with late planes and missed connections - something to remember…avoid American at all costs if possible. But one’s thing for sure, we liked putting our Anchor in Oxford especially as the Coffmans truly rolled out the Rebel Red Carpet for us!

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clevelandhewlett-blog · 7 years ago

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Checking out A Mother Dork Him Off In The Porn Cinema.

Republican governmental candidate Donald Trump tried to provide an unusual pep talk on Thursday evening, as well as this engaged in in addition to you could possess thought of. I have two ladies and also they would certainly always ask me just what's for supper on Sunday as well as that is actually dropping in. I slid down right into a dark opening the final couple of times, for reasons that possessed no basis in reality, just prognostications and also fears, full-on delusions from the thoughts. A dark power strays the cellar, appearing sometimes as a pulsing black mass. Managers experiencing the decrease or even terminal illness of a pet dog for the first time will commonly wait up until the exact end to create that tough choice. And also vegetarian people may likewise discover this plan difficult as that features egg and also tuna. Trump's child, Ivanka, and her partner, Jared Kushner, that excercises4u-portal.info each operate at the White Residence, likewise were actually amongst the dinner guests. Pack a wonderful picnic dinner along with a really good bottle of chilled wine as well as some cold soft drink for the youngsters and also spend a delightful summer season evening under the celebrities as your looks after melt away.

Baked cow-corn kernels were actually to be their entire supper; there was actually absolutely nothing else on their food selection. Supper: 2 Hot Dogs, (no danishes), 1 Cup from Broccoli, 1/2 Mug of Carrots, 1/2 Banana, and also 1/2 Mug from frequent Vanilla Ice Cream. It's absolute best initially a good food yet bear in mind that if the pet dog possesses a trouble along with every good food you try that isn't really the end from the planet if you need to supply an inexpensive food. Phantoms of thin captives flicker basics of the dark darkness from solitary confinement, tucked deep in the bowels of the building. The yearly dinner is actually a charity event for the effective Roman Catholic Archdiocese of The big apple, as well as during governmental political election years, both nominees typically talk.

The technique to supplying a huge supper event crowd - we are actually talking 10 individuals or more - is to keep your food selection low cost, and also low-maintenance. This is actually exceptionally complicated to locate projects nowadays but think of performing your work search along with an impairment. The only disappointments for us were the bathtub towels: low-priced hotel quality, and also bathroom robes (very old and shabby). I in fact favor the Entrance hall bar to the Alchemy on this this ship, a rarity for me. Supper tonight excellented, I bought: the Beetroot Carpaccio (2), the Iceberg Wedge Tossed salad, the Sliced Beef Sirloin entree, as well as discussed a Meat Taco meal. That is after that toughest at dinner and also has a little more influence on not eating blood sugar. I prefer to eat gently on those times making certain I am actually plenty starving when supper opportunity rolls around. Our experts possessed a good supper at anchor and also a peaceful night, as well as awoke Wednesday so much more laid. Ways to Obtain This: Alesmith used to offer its barrel-aged draft beers at a one-day celebration like Dark Lord Day or even Hunahpu's Time, but the logistics of managing dozens folks became overwhelming. What might masquerade dinner for 4 in some component of the planet is the beginning of a food in Greenville.

I rarely participated in PTA meetings this year, but I aimed to be a good employee bee and registered to do straightforward, substantial activities- like offering mixed greens at the pastas dinner as well as reading through a publication aloud in the class on DOCTOR Seuss time. The two leaders satisfied for a working supper prior to with each other participating in a France vs England friendly soccer match at the Stade de France coliseum in Paris. I enjoy the heat that the baskets offer exactly what could appear like a cool utilitarian area.

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nigelmarmot · 7 years ago

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Just Come Barging in Here

This weekend was a pretty interesting gig(s) up in Miller’s Bay on lake Okoboji in Iowa. It was actually a double header, which made things a bit interesting (more on that later); the first gig being a festival called “Lake Affect” (my first gig on a boat!), the second being an evening double set with Des Moines staple The Nadas.

Grammar Nazi

The first of the two gigs, Lake Affect, was started by a well established local musician Damon Dotson 11 years ago. The idea was essentially his band and several of his friends bands go out on a boat on the lake, and play to other people who also bring their boats out. Cool idea, and by the 11th annual event, they had the process figured out pretty nicely. There was a local lakeside engineering company (they design boat hoists, docks, and other waterfront machinery/structures) that owned a small feet of barges who sponsored the event for some sort of reduced or free cost for use of the barges (the details of which I’m not 100% sure on). One of the barges was to be used as the stage, and the other one was the on-the-water equivalent of a stage wing; it had extra gear, coolers, a better vantage point of the stage, and even a cybo (they have obviously learned over the years!)

All of this being said, it absolutely killed me the whole time that the fest was called Lake Affect instead of the proper spelling of Lake Effect, referring to the erratic weather patterns due to being in proximity to a lake. There might have been some sort of meaning at one point as to why it was A vs. E, but it might have also just been an honest misspelling. I got over it, and it was a fun gig anyway.

I’m on a boat (Everybody look at me cause I'm sailin on a boat)

The Lake Affect festival was scheduled to go from noon to 5PM, and it was on lake Okoboji, so that meant an early day for me. Call was 5:30 AM, followed by a 3+ hour ride right to the dock at about 9:30AM. The barge was right on the beach when we got there, so we backed the trailer right up to it, and loaded all the gear onto it. Mild incline, but with help of the boats crew and Damon himself, it was on deck in short order. Since the actual performance area was a 10-ish minute ride across the lake, we didn’t do much setting up, and instead secured anything on wheels to make sure it didn’t tip overboard. We did put together the 32′ truss that the tops would hang from so they could zip tie the Lake Affect banner to it on the way over.

A short (but nerve-racking!) ride over to the spot, and we already see about 40 boats moored together, obviously having gotten there early for a good spot. The barge pulls in slowly, and with Damon calling the shots on placement, we drop two hydraulic stabilizer anchors and start to set up.

The boat deck was probably about 45-50′ long, and maybe 16-20′ deep. There was some space, but not a lot of it. We put out 2 JBL VerTec 8880 subs a side, and hung two Bag End Crystal tops from the 32 foot truss on two crank genie lifts. The amp rack and the mixer lived on stage right, directly behind the massive crane on one end of the barge. We got everything set up by about 10:45, which was a good hustle. The original plan was to check Damon Dotson (playing third) first, and then “festival style” the first two bands, but by the time the second barge arrived and all the gear was on deck, Damon made the correct (in my opinion) call to just throw-and-go the whole day. From a technical perspective, we probably could have done the check, as the board we were using (a Midas Pro1) had store/recall functionality, we could share lines like guitar/bass/keys, and the last two bands were sharing a drum kit (the first one didn’t have a kit at all, making it easier), but it was more a question of time than space or tech.

As I mentioned before this was my first gig on a boat, and as such the first time experiencing the challenge of not really being able to hear the PA (and therefore not be able to hear what I was mixing) at all. I’m no stranger to the “mix from the side” sort of gigs, as I’ve been in and out of a lot of crammed venues, but this is the first time I’ve been physically unable to go and see what it sounds like in “the house.” You know. Cuz’ of the water. At the very least there were two saving graces. First off, there was a spare wedge and amp channel available, so I could set up what’s called a “cue wedge.” A cue wedge is essentially another monitor mix strictly for the monitor engineer. Normal monitor mixes consist of a certain set of channels set to a certain level and sent to a monitor, based on that monitor’s recipient’s desires. This monitor mix works slightly different, in that the monitor engineer can “solo” or “pre-listen” to individual channels, artists monitor mixes (so they can hear what the artist is hearing through their wedge), or even the main mix. Since I could hear the main mix through my cue wedge next to me, I at least had a bit better idea of what I was spitting out through the mains.

The second saving grace was the fact that the second barge was at a 90º angle to the first one, and had a little bit of space out front to be able to hear the PA somewhat. I took a few short trips out there just to insure a few main EQ things, and the rest of the time I relied on the cue wedge (mostly because there was a tent over me and I didn’t want to burn too badly).

(image credit to Dronography Iowa)

With the cue wedge, I was able to get what I think was a decent (probably not my best) mix for the day. The unfortunate thing though was how underestimated the crowd size was. Don’t know if this was on the sound company’s or Damon’s part, but I’m not faulting anyone here. The short end of it was that there probably wasn’t enough PA. As you can see in the pictures below, there were boats as far as we could see from the barge. Just an absolute ton of people. Again, without the ability to really go out into “the house” to hear it, I wasn’t able to see how far the speakers threw. My guess is “nowhere close to enough,” but that sort of thing was above my pay grade for this gig. I was here to help put it together and mix, which I did!

(last two image credits to Dronography Iowa)

Cover Band Mania

The first group was Pianopalooza, a dueling pianos duo. Most people that know me close have probably heard my tirade on dueling pianos being one of the lowest forms of musical entertainment, but these guys are damn good, and funny to boot. I’ve worked with one of them a number of times at various gigs, and he’s kind of a staple around the Des Moines scene. Definitely not disparaging those guys and what they do, but I put dueling pianos in the same category of “you’d have to pay me to go to this event” as karaoke. Considering I was getting paid to be at this event, all was well!

The interesting bit about this group, most especially in this setting, was that they had full piano “shells.” If you’ve ever been to a touring concert and seen somebody seated behind a big old grand piano, there are three possibilities (in order of probability):

They are using a normal portable electric keyboard inside a hollow piano shell, made to look like a real grand without the giant pain of having to tour with a real grand

The grand is owned and supplied by the venue the artist is playing at

They actually tour with a piano, spawning a giant list of things that suck:

They’re very heavy

They’re very fragile, and as such a lot of careful packing and/or even heavier cases are involved to transport it with care from one place to the next

They’re very heavy

The large volume of a piano requires it to be taken slightly apart in between each show, increasing load in and out time

The large volume also [generally] increases the size of the touring vehicle that one would need, increasing costs, fuel consumption, etc. etc.

They’re very heavy

You have to travel with a piano tuner, or find and pay a local tuner in every city you play

You have to tune the piano every single show

The only two acts I’ve seen personally that actually tour with pianos are Lorie Line (hers is a beautiful white grand named Esmerelda) and Ben Folds. Everyone else is option one or two above. I digress. The moral of the story is here we are out in the middle of a lake on a big flat metal boat, and it looks like there’s two grand pianos on this boat. Funny looking picture.

Anyway, Pianopalooza, like any dueling piano gig, is essentially a bunch of covers with lyric changes and witty [and often dirty] banter between the two guys. Perfect book for drunk people on a lake, honestly, and I mean that in no negative sense.

Next up was Pork Tornadoes, a really tight group that are also regulars around the DSM area, doing mostly 90′s covers. Crowd loved it, they had a good time, and they were off.

Final group was Damon Dotson, who did a mix of originals and covers. They did have a little rap battle medley that included “Lose Yourself,” “Gangster’s Paradise,” “Ice Ice Baby,” among others, which was entertaining on two fronts: 1: It was entertaining for its own sake, and done well at that, and 2: it was a bunch of white dudes doing the white dude rapping thing for a bunch of white people on a lake. Still a good time.

The one rub I have with doing multiple cover bands in a day is that chances are there’s going to be set list collisions. Specifically for this show, there were two that I remember - “Ring of Fire” by Jonny Cash, and “Sweet Caroline” by Niel Diamond. The former I’ve heard covered a billion and a half times (and always know to toss on a real tight slap-back delay to get that “50′s sound”), so though it’s a good song I’m pretty numb to it at this point. The latter is one that I don’t hear covered too often, but for some inexplicable reason it seems to be the drunken battle cry for Cyclone fans across the state. Not so much the actual lyrics of the song, but the “BAH BAH OOH” and the “SO GOOD SO GOOD SO GOOD” parts that are easy to remember when you’re 8 deep into Natty Light and can’t remember where you lost your left shoe [I kid. Mostly.]

After Damon finished up his set, we tore down the bands and slowly made our way out of the spot. There were still a lot of boats lingering, and the second barge actually got stuck, so an assist was needed, but we eventually made our way out and back across the lake and packed up the trailer, only to drive across the street and....

Load In [down] and Load Out [up]

The second gig of the night was with the Des Moines group The Nadas. They’ve been around for almost two decades now, have a large body of work, and where I’m concerned, have done plenty of gigs in plenty of venues on plenty of different sound systems. The short end of it is that they as a band sound really good, which makes my job easy. As the drunk guy in the bathroom told me [as I’m still urinating mind you] “You’re doing a great job - they sound great. They’re great to start with, but all you do is accentuate, you know? Accentuate.” I rarely say this, but you’re right Drunk Guy. You’re right.

The gig itself was relatively straightforward. We were actually able to set the console up at a normal mix position in front of the PA, so I could actually hear what was going on, and the owner of the company I was with had mixed them not more than 3 weeks prior, and had a show file saved for them already. I normally have some hesitation with using past show files, especially when I didn’t create them myself. There’s a number of reasons for this:

The input patch/input list may be different (which is easily taken care of by either physically patching differently, or patching within the board via “soft-patching”

The outputs may be different

Could be going from in-ears to wedges, or vice versa

The wedges might be in different spots or numbers (again, soft-patching could take care of this)

The band is probably going to have a different stage volume

Though ideally, eq decisions on the input side of things shouldn’t reflect shortcomings of the PA or the room, that is never the case

The monitors or mains may be of a different make, location, and definitely interact with the room differently, so eq and level choices will probably need to be adjusted.

All that being said, I went with the show file considering the small amount of time we had, and it did actually have a good starting place to be. I had a few minutes to listen to the PA after it had been set up, so I threw on my usual go-to’s of “Your Latest Trick” by the Dire Straits and “That Moon Song” by Gregory Alan Isakov to just make sure the PA sounded good and balanced. A few eq tweaks and I was good to go. I will say the wait staff and manager of the place (The Okoboji Store) were super helpful and nice - they asked if they needed to turn their house music off so I could tune without their music messing me up. I didn’t want to provide house music between then and the Nadas starting, so I told them to keep theirs going. The main PA was loud enough I could tune out their house music anyway.

Anyway, got PA tuned, did a quick line check and monitor level check, and then got ready for the band to start. Lake Affect had ended at about 4:30, we got back to the dock at 5:30, and had the PA completely ready to go by 7:20. The Nadas had arrived and set up before we got there, so we filled in around them. The Nadas were slated to start at 7PM, but we had been in enough communication to them that they knew that was unlikely. We hustled the out at Lake Affect and the in at the Okoboji store and were ready to go, so it was mildly irksome that the band didn’t actually start until shortly after 8PM. I had a few audience members come up to me and ask what the deal was, to which I claimed ignorance. Plausible deniability, and it was again above my pay grade to tell the band when they were supposed to go on. I was a mercenary for this gig, so mercenate I would.

The band played two one hour [almost on the dot] sets, and were happy with the sound. There was a weird bit in the middle where the bassist all of the sudden felt like there was a lot more snare coming through his wedge (it honestly could have been me with some gain and eq adjustments, and he didn’t notice it till later), but just your normal garden variety “more of this, less of that” non-verbal communication that a good seasoned band can have with their engineer.

After the band was done, we tore down, and then loaded out one of the worst load outs possible. There was a parking lot about 16 feet above the stage by elevation, with a pretty steep (I’m talking 20-30º) grade from the parking lot to a landing behind the stage. In this landing is a layer of gravel, which is on par with mud as the worst thing to drag heavy things on wheels through. After the gravel, there were two 3 inch deep trenches in the concrete, with a railroad track running through one of them. After the railroad track is another 15º-ish grade back up to the stage. Load out is all of that in reverse.

All in all a good days worth of work, and I’m pretty happy with the mixes I got out of things, especially given the spacetime circumstances. Holy crap do my calves hurt though.

#Lakeaffectboji #i'monaboat

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