One year ago today: May 20, 2016, typical trip log.
Five years ago today: May 20, 2012, the first space camera.
Nine years ago today: May 20, 2008, jammin’ with Johnny D.
Random years ago today: May 20, 2011, they still make Old Spice?
Did you read my mean-mouth review of rock tumbling from y’day? It seems I would not do it after that, but wrong. I’m issuing a warning to those who may be lulled into thinking of doing it for a hobby. It will try your patience and your pocketbook. But for the after-robot club, it is a challenge. We may have to reactivate the club just to get access to all the record keeping equipment and specialized tools. Here is the first batch of rocks working away in the tumbler out in the shed.
Not this time, the drum is only 60% full, not the recommended 70%. Plus, I had no way of measuring rock hardness, so there are only two sizes of rocks inside, instead of the advised three. Shown here, the unit is set up in the work shed where the grinding noise bothers nobody. The neighbor’s squeaky toy windmill is louder. These drums are rubberized inside and out anyway. I’ll check it a few times but this operation is slated to take an entire week to produce unknown results. Now, let’s look at the grit.
The book recommended cerium oxide, but what is cerium? I bought a sample spar pack of the four types of grit at Harbor Freight. That’s the package that costs $14 for one batch. The packets are used for comparison. A fifty pound back of aluminum oxide is $7. As much as possible, I compared the aluminum and cerium and could find no difference in the granularity. The rule of thumb is one tablespoon of grit per pound, so the drum as shown here contains two scoops and a dash of dishwashing liquid. Now hurry up and wait 168 hours.
Original channel tunnel, 1882.
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Right after noon I was in north Auburndale. What can I say, the new guitar guy is doing the homework. He’s got calluses and he’s asking the right questions. He’s had four hours exposure to the theory and did he catch on quick. What a contrast to what went before. He seemed to realize this was the opportunity he’d been waiting for, and I naturally tend to agree. Even the songs he’s already choosing obey the rules for duet arrangement. That’s pretty amazing considering I could not even get the other guitar players to listen, much less try it. Applying on the theory, we breezed through 18 songs today.
See the picture, this is something new to me. Silicon fingertips to help guitarists who get stringfinger. I know I do. They come in sets of four and a variety of designer colors. Say, that reminds me, the guy is still somewhat bowled over, I met his wife and she says he was about to give up ever playing in a band until he met me. It’s the same old tale from the trailer court—he knew there was something wrong with the way the others were approaching starting a band, but didn’t know how to articulate it or go up against other guitar players. I have no such restriction.
If he keeps up this pace, we will be playing somewhere soon, as in by June sometime. We played a series of songs instantly today, I’m saying we did not sit down and meticulously rehearse the. Each time we covered a bit of theory, we’d just outright play a song. It’s magic, just playing the song properly first time without rehearsal. He was impressed but he’s not the type to dish out compliments.
Here’s the songs we just played first time:
Pirate Looks At Forty
Save The Last Dance
Tell Me Momma
Don’t Rock The Juke Box
Act Naturally
Margaritaville
Party Till Money Runs Out
This may not seem so great to some, because they’ve played with new people before and got through lots of material. But that is not a fair comparison. The other people had played the music before and were just polishing it up. What’s happening here is different. The new guy necessarily had never heard some of music before and had never played any of them. Yet by applying the theory and watching my queues, we played these right first time. If he keeps glomming onto the theory, in another few days, the world will be our musical oyster.
And did he ever pick up the trick of playing the guitar like the drum line. This has always been a hurdle with other guitarists because it sounds stilted without the bass line and it would not really be suitable for solo strumming. Any sports fan will recognize the issue, the other guitarists, for all their talk about “teamwork”, are unwilling to become team players if it means giving up their god-given right to solo. A few came close, but they were the guitar players who comped. You can comp, you know, but that would be foolish. Because I will rapidly take to playing the parts you leave out and still squawk like crazy if you try to play even one bass run.
Take note that except for Jag, no other guitarist other than Trent has gotten this far in five years. Hmmm, I noticed Jag’s old number still rings and he’s got my Fender guitar . . .
"Everything that can be invented has been invented."
--Charles H. Duell, US Patent Office, 1899.
The follow-on issue is that I am woefully out of practice myself. But don’t worry, whenever there is money involved, I always come through. Even if it is trailer courts, playing a month of those will produce more income than the 6-1/2 years with the Hippie and the 1-1/2 years with the five-piece. I found out something about my Fishman Solo. It only has the two front inputs. See, I always plugged into different channels, so never spotted that the plugs are exclusive till now. On each channel if you plug in one jack, it disables the other. I’ll see if I can work the accessory jack around back, but in this duo, we need four jacks. You know, he has an excellent little guitar amp he might want to use. The alternative is a mixer but they don’t make proper ones any more.
The next development is Agt. R found a set of rapids in the river. He brought back a bucket of rocks and reports there are swirling eddies at that point. It is just downstream from an abandoned railway trestle. And the water is flowing fast enough to operate a sluice. If so, it won’t be long before we get that checked out. It is only the textbooks saying there is no gold in Florida, it’s not like I’ve talked to anybody who has in point of fact got off their asses and actually looked.
I examined much of the rock he brought and it is different, but it is also mixed with railroad rock. You know, that generic crushed rock they use for embankments. The good news is I was able to recognize various types, causing the onlookers to think I was some geologist or something. I had to tell them I just looked at this library book this week. But it does show you how novel it is for them to meet someone who actually does the research first. Good, I like that because it [research] is the one thing most seat-of-the-pants operators never do. So if I look like an expert, hey, that beats the hell out of bragging.
ADDENDUM
While all this is going on, I filled out the most important document in my twenty previous years. May has always been an eventful month for me that way. It was a year ago I bought this house, and it was 21 years ago today that I retired from my cubicle at the monster corporation. After I signed and sealed it, I said to myself, do I trust the system? No, quite frankly I do not. Lazy, ambitionless people go work for the government. It’s the best job they can get to sit back and collect a fat paycheck without incurring any real responsibility or having to make real decisions.
No thanks, I’ll take what I can, but place my trust elsewhere. And playing music has never let me down. Guitar players, yes, but music has been good to me. I still maintain it is the cleanest part time business you can get into and still work until you are 85. Retirement, or any fixed income has peculiarities of its own. Seniors living out their lives in genteel poverty is more of a concept when peanut butter is $7 a plastic jar. One of the first lessons I learned about income is that the difference between poverty and happiness isn’t that great. Not richness, but happiness. That’s where the band comes in. Imagine your own life now if suddenly you had an extra $100 per week spending money.
Well, when you go to retire, that tiny amount of money can mean the difference between steak and cheese-flavored cat food. I’ll say it again, even if you do not intend to work later in life, at least do not seal off that option. Later today, I’ll be fitting together some candle lanterns in my very own workshed, and yes, if I sell three a week, I’ll be fine. But music is the better option, I’ve been sounding out the prices and a one-nighter pays between $140 and $200, plus tips. The median is skewed toward $150, however.
[Author’s note: this tiny income difference between poor and happy is more definable that a lot of people think. Fixed income creates attitudes and I don’t just mean retired people on fixed incomes. Every rich kid I hung out with who got an allowance that covered his cost of living never amounted to a thing in this life. What? The others that went on to other things? Well, I didn’t hang out with them, again the attitude thing. The ones I didn’t hang with were spoiled, the ones I did hang with never got to first base. I’m just sayin’.]
My game plan remains the same, I’m targeting the venues that hire solo guitarists. There are too many monotonous such yahoos out there, a real glut on the Florida market. They have crowded out other musicians, so if something comes along to upset their little world, it’s just their turn. I’ve nothing against guitar in general, I play one myself and could do a solo—but I wouldn’t be proud of it. But I’m against how all the guitar players all exactly the same music and have the same attitude about it. They don’t allow for variety and they are an obstacle to any.
Further discussion with the new guy indicates he has ties with the entertainment associations of the said 200 trailer parks in this area. (I’ve used such places before to practice before graduating to lounges, which occasionally have women I find attractive.) Listening close, it’s as I suspected. The committees have trouble hiring bands that play the music assortment they want. We’ve all seen it, the band that hires on as country. They play two country songs and revert to their blues rock set list. Hearing this out in the Lakeland wilderness, well, you can definitely say it was music to my ears. Never forget, my forte is managing bands, not cloning guitar music.
Last Laugh
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