One year ago today: January 3, 2018, allowable excuses.
Five years ago today: January 3, 2014, low in the water.
Nine years ago today: January 3, 2010, he could play, but . . .
Random years ago today: January 3, 2015, talent isn't a setting.
I scored this practically new Takamine guitar case for five bucks this morning. What a find, these normally sell for around sixty. It’s a touch too small for my dreadnaught, which has that ninety-dollar cases, but I may modify this one and use it to transport one of my basses. Did I say basses? Yes, I took my five-string out of the shed and intend to give it another try. It’s the model with the extra low or B string. I did not pursue it, but it gets credit for a profound effect on my playing. I used it to experiment with lower fifths, which pose a problem in popular music in the keys of E through A.
The following is more about music on the bass than you need to know. Okay, the bass is a 3-octave instrument. Thus, even starting at the top note of most keys, you can’t do a 4-octave walk-down. So how do I do 6 on a regular 4-string instrument? First, not all passing tones are equal, so you focus on the ones that are weakest. You have to combine the next two techniques so listen up. For effect, I regularly play open string notes, but I will pretend to fret the note below the nut. If I find a scale tone lands on such an open string, I will fret the note but play the next note an octave higher on the next string. If that’s not clear, it’s because I don’t want it to be.
What’s happening is the audience, or at anyone paying attention, sees my hand below the nut and associates that with a lower note. Anybody who sees a walk-down knows the bassist eventually has to move his wrist up the neck as he switches strings. All I do is move it up to a higher string instead of lower, and I move 12 frets, not five. The illusion is you both see and hear a 6-octave walk-down.
For those who find this an eye-opener, I’ve hand you a couple more items to enhance the effect. Pretty much the only instrument you can do six or more octaves is the piano. But there are few pieces of music that have that many opportunities for such a technique. What you do is begin the phrase earlier than expected. You will often be in another key, and the ideal two keys are E and A. Thus, when the rest of the band and likely the audience is expecting to play a walk-down, you’ve already been playing it for at least two measures. Some guitarists find this disorienting until they catch on. Doing this only three times a show may not seem like much, but that is more than enough to show them how it’s done.
The kickstart.
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I’ve never seen this particular tree fungus before. Having lived for years near the Hoh Rain Forest, I’ve commonly seen these growths. Usually, they are better camouflaged. So is this like a rare species or an albino? Easily the unusual event of today, since I’m working under the house again. This time it is pressurized pipe, so it takes me longer. I find it better to take your time and do it right. Now that I’ve been wanting a chest of drawers, nothing for months. Before I’d see them abandoned on the curbs. Right up until I need one. Welcome to Florida.
Before you got a window sticker. Now, they want the sticker renewed every year. They just forgot to tell everyone about it and started handing out tickets to “expired” stickers. Like I say, this crazy process usually continues until they do it to some lawyer or rich guy. The tickets are $40 and if they come around again any you’ve not moved, they add more tickets. The problem was, few people knew about it so they did not go out and move their cars.
When they call City Hall, they get the runaround. That the notice of the stickers was posted somewhere. So pay the tickets and settle the issue later. Well that is the point, you pay that ticket and you’ll never see your money again. They have no incentive to settle anything.
Getting back to plumbing, I found the vent. It is alongside the show piping, and that section looks in pretty good shape. I’m wondering if there is a way to simply bypass the part of the plumbing that is leaking, but since that’s too risky for an amateur, I’m redesigning what I already have. If it some to worst, I’ll simply put an entire new brace of concrete blocks under the bathroom floor. Part of the problem is the last guy scabbed the joists, but he used untreated lumber. Tomorrow, I have to get the car in for the A/C and rotors, putting me further behind schedule.
Then, looking in my plumbing book, I see that some of the pipe joints I’ll be needed are not part of the set. I may have to build them up from pieces. I’m getting a handle on this. I did some serious inspections under the floor and the cold water piping seems to be in excellent shape. Possibly hot water is catalytic to the decay of the cast iron. I could save a lot of time by tapping into the existing pipes, but this turns the plumbing into a confusion of old and new. But, do I care?
ADDENDUM
I’m writing this section for my own purposes. I seem to be able to handle a full 8-hour day once more, but that eight hours is not a workday. Worse, for the last 15 years, that has become an unfair comparison. The mind can put in a full day, but the back can’t. So what 8 hours today means the rough equivalent of 2 hours back then. I’ll explain, because late today I received some encouraging news. Don’t mix that up with good news. Shown here is the rough-in pressure lines for the twin sinks. Visible are the new plastic lines, and beneath them the old iron pipes. This is as much fun as it looks like. I’ll get back to this in a moment.
While insulating the front wing of the attic, I was up and down that ladder 226 times and the back wing is not done yet, it is only tarpapered. You get a similar situation under the house. When you put the water on to boil, you might as well stand around and wait, because that seems to take exactly as long as getting back to work. So save yourself the ladder climb and wait.
It is those little waits that add up. I sure could use some help around here. I have three potential sources of that help suddenly arise. This cabin always was a prime location for getting in or out of Florida. There are people who would help out just to get out of Dodge for a while. I’m focusing on the front bedroom and that bathroom because I’m seriously considering the offers. Funny, because if I get those two projects done, that’s the majority of what I need the help for.
No sense trying to put in more hours; that entails either longer siestas or more days off to recover, as it were. The neighbor’s house was built the same year as this one, and he’s having plumbing problems of the same nature. Let me tell you about that nature. He’s got a woman, so he can’t leave the bathroom floor ripped up for weeks on end, like I did. He can’t afford a helper, so he’s stuck. I told him I’d lend a hand, if only to hand him the tools as needed. With the right prep work, we could do it in a day.
Both of our plumbing began to leak in the same way. The cast iron pipe is intact, but it seems to settle slightly over the years, causing slow, dripping leaks. Is it the weight of the pipes, or that the fixtures in both buildings are directly above the stack, adding weight when the floors weaken. You get the cycle, the leak gets the wood wet, which attracts the termites, which further weakens the damn floor.
[Author’s note: the floor is uncovered. That’s not the whole account. There is a piece of plywood that easily folds down when needed. During the day, just walk across the exposed but termite-injured joists. It’s easy but I can’t expect any company to do that. Moreover, that same floor area, when open, serves as a hatch to get at the now centrally located electric lines. Eventually, that function will be taken over by the hallway, which is also the last part of the house to still have oak flooring.]
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