As habits go mine is probably typical. I think highly of myself, but quickly quash that instinct with post-natal discoveries of weakness, character flaws, arrogances and fallibilities. I am nothing. I do not inhabit or inform even a single word in the chatter of conversations crackling through the air. But what of waking up? Why does that moment allow itself a whiff of happiness, of relief at having survived the night’s sleep without attack by a predator, invasion by an enemy? Why allow myself even that moment of anticipatory joy when the granite cloud of reality floats just above my half-asleep naked body? I know better than to be happy. I know reality. I know what breaths and what dies.
I created a new archive.org account, https://archive.org/details/@wsbj. Its sole purpose will be to collect some of the 24-hour webcam captures I’ve been recording out my apartment window. I wish more webcam streamers preserved their streams in this way, and by doing so myself perhaps it will encourage others who have contemplated such a project. It is time- and resource-consuming but I’ve already found efficiencies to make it as passive a project as possible. It takes about 20 minutes to convert 1440 1-minute mp4 files into a single 24-hour blob, although for reason I’ve not had time or desire to analyze it seems this process adds a minute or 2 to the final blob. I end up with a video that is something like 24:02:12 when there should be no bleeding of time to create that extra 02:12. My guess is it is simply the accumulation of split-second gaps in the files being written. It is a WYZE camera, not a high-end device by any estimate but I like it for its relative simplicity. I am not really a fan of ultra-hi-def everything, prefering the calm, more approachable look of grainier resolution. That is, after all, closer to the way humans really see things.
24-hour videos are also plagued by another nuisance. After you hit the play button they can take a while to start. Sometimes they don’t start at all on the first try and have to press the start button again. When it starts it’s good, though.
Another unfortunate hmm, probably blamed on the size of the files, is that archive generates a zillion thumbnails from the video but only ever uses the first one. Further to that when you mouse over the time line you only see that first thumbnail, not a chronological sequence. So it seems I will end up with a page where all videos have a seemingly identical thumbnail. Not a problem, per se, but those bazillion thumbnails seem like they should get some use. A damn waste of some fine thumbnails.
The process of producing and uploading the videos can not ever really be totally passive. There appears to be no way to transfer the video files from the camera to the PC other than by removing the memory card from the camera and sticking it into the PC. I found no way to mount the WYZE as a remote file server or whatever, but even if I did I would think transferring that stuff over WiFi would be glacial, unless, of course, each file was automagically transferred upon final creation. But that would require keeping the PC on 24/7 and that’s not an option given energy costs and other considerations. Somehow being able to FTP each file to the web server could also be useful but I suspect the current process will stay. The chief drawback is that it requires the camera to be momentarily offline and not recording for however long it takes to move the files from the memory card to the PC.
Between that last paragraph and this I had a privilige of earthy magnificence, performing a bowel movement that will feed this planet for weeks to come. I don’t shit into normal porcelain silos. I go to the tunnels, the tubes, the esophaguses of the Earth where hunger awaits, hunger for anything, from waste to wonderment I have found channels where the planet eats it all. I am among the select few with knowledge of these tunnels, and I proudly keep the planet alive with my soul-draining bowel movements. Fuck, I think I need another half mg of Ativan.
