One year ago today: July 20, 2018, TX sugar pie.
Five years ago today: July 20, 2014, told ya it didn’t work.
Nine years ago today: July 20, 2010, the perfect tree?
Random years ago today: July 20, 2008, Miami near-death event.
Some days just take all day. That cold water pipe connection that didn’t work y’day did the same thing today. Several times. I think I finally got the pieces that work. The only consolation is that the final cost—if it works—comes out to less than an hour by not hiring a plumber. It cost me $62 to find out about a few basic parts that were not mentioned in the manuals. I realize now it would have been cheaper and faster to replace the entire feed assembly than to tap into an existing line. It’s one of those situations where smarter arrives later, after the money is spent.
Here’s one for you to decide. One of the advertisers for musicians on craigslist writes this longwinded description of what he wants, explaining in depth how he wants people with experience. After a couple weeks, he replies saying he wants videos something he can listen to. Scratch his claim to want to be out playing soon. So I send him three videos, all in AVI format because it is as close to universal as need be. He waits another two weeks and says they won’t play on his equipment. What? Maybe he’s using Win 98. Typical guitarist. Instead of figuring out why his gear won’t play something, he expects the other guy to reform and resubmit. Anything else, your majesty? Sounds like he’s really anxious to get underway.
Worse, he’s slow on the take up. He described what he wants in a second guitarist. I sent him a note saying that I could provide all that and much more on the bass, and that I would guarantee it by learning his songlist sight unseen. A lot of work, but even more work if I’m lying. It’s adding up to him doing the same shtick for so many years he doesn’t need to try anything new. You and I already discussed this, it’s like he hasn’t got his investment back yet on his old act. I’ll see if I can get you a print of his ad so you can see for yourself.
And it’s not like he’s the only option. Read on about this evening. Meanwhile, it is not like guitar players have any monopoly on sheer stupidity on this planet. Today, I pulled up at a traffic light near the lumber yard. There was a crew blocking both exit lanes instead of just the one they needed. I rolled down the window and asked the foreman if he was aware he was causing a traffic jam in the Wal*Mart parking lot two miles up the road. (The nearest place to turn around because of his roadblock.)
He stops chewing gum for a second and asks how I figure that. I paused, and told him it was impossible for me to answer that question. He stops chewing again and asks how I figure that. Well, sir, if you could do a little figuring on your own, you might have amounted to something. He didn’t get it. How do I know? Easy. He didn’t stop chewing. Now, don’t take me the wrong way, sometimes apparently stupid things aren’t stupid at all. Look at this set of directions.
The written instruction says to trace a hole that is 5-1/8” x 5-1/8”. Duh, since when are two dimensions required for a hole? Ah, when dealing with millennial public school grads. Think about it. The directions are not stupid at all. They are addressing the fact that there are one hell of a lot of idiots out there who only think they can drill a hole of the right size in the right place. It would take a special kind of stupid to mess up this one. These directions are not so much about the hole in the table as the hole in the head of the last two generations of high school grads in this land. Well said.
The business of prison.
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This [morning] wore me down, what did you expect? Chalk me up for a five-hour siesta. When the radio says 60% chance of rain in Florida, they mean 100% if you plan to work outside. Stockouts are still becoming disturbingly common, made the worse by how often it is the most popular item. You’d think one thing a store would do in a contracting economy is keep fully stocked with the items that sell the fastest. Here we have the lumber yard out of 3/4” elbows. They seem to have plenty of any items that shot up most in price last month. For example, the correct GFCI outlets for the bathroom have gone from $8 apiece to $23.
He explained why, for the same reasons I cut it out five years ago. Big bands are a logistics headache and the money is gone. Bands that don’t make money break up. The bigger the band, the longer the process, because they try all kinds of fixes that don’t work. It’s when he began to play tunes that are on my own song list that I wound up staying the entire evening. First off, he has a big band stage personality, and was over-playing the crowd, but in the sense of overkill. He was vastly talented beyond what the crowd could realize, soloing nearly impossible versions of Neil Diamond and, get this, he played “Spiders & Snakes” identical to the way I independently arranged it back in 2009.
We traded contact info and he said he had to play out his bookings with the big band, but emphasized that he was out. He said several times he was nervous because this was his first solo gig, which I mistook for stage banter until I paid attention. He is used to playing at the crowd, which can kill an otherwise decent act. I realized he wasn’t kidding when made certain mistakes, but I can tell you immediately, we would be, locally, a dream team. I’ve got a lot on my plate just now. Yet, until you get on that stage with a confirmed and committed act, nothing is too much.
The rest here is just for the record. He has excellent timing and doesn’t gloss over any tricky parts or syncopation. I do the same on bass. My specialty is arranging such style for duo presentation. He would be amazing to work with because I’m used to a far lower caliber of guitarist. I think the audience knows when musicians on stage are “following”. That would not be the case with us. We would automatically have enough voicings to deliver the wow.
[Author’s note: voicings is the term I use to describe playing in a manner where the listener begins to hear parts that aren’t there. My specialty, I do, after all, solo on bass. This is usually done by slightly changing each instrument to play into a type of musical lattice, a major part of how I’ve learned to arrange music specifically for acoustic and bass. I already know how astonishing this effect can be, and with an accomplished guitarist, who knows?]
ADDENDUM
I’m going to run the pipes for the washer at the biggest size I can find listed on various sites. That’s 2”, and there is no agreement on that. These on-line experts are a bunch of cowboys. Some say always use a pinch cutter, others say never use them. And neither tells you why. The books on the topic are not much better even when they do bother to mention this common subject. Checking outside, I don’t have that much space, the appliances have to fit between the bathroom window and the air conditioner cut out in the bedroom. That one was predictable, but too far in the future at the time.
If there are two tools I consider the home plumber and electrician, I would say it is the oscillating saw and the jig saw. Reciprocating saws do too rough a job. Another slight problem is the location of a small bathroom light. One doesn’t need six bulbs for a midnight leak, so there should be another switched light. Except, there is no convenient place to put it. Does this mean I get to go up to the Fubar and think this over? Sure, that’s exactly what it means.
That explains the picture. Charla, the lady that owns the place has a hobby she crochets things. See photo. Yep, they’re for sale.
