Concert Review - Norah Jones in Little Rock, June 7 2007

We saw Norah at Robinson Center Music Hall in Little Rock last night, and came away impressed.  She brought the cast of regulars with Adam Levy on guitar, Lee Alexander on Bass, Andy Borger on drums, and Daru Ota on nearly everything else.  She opened her set solo, singing a more West Texasish version of "Come Away With Me" while playing a red Fender Mustang through a Fender Princeton amp.  It was a statement of confidence in her ability to play guitar that she would start off that way, although the band did join in after the first verse.  She continued with "Those Sweet Words" another favorite of ours from her second album before launching into several songs from her new album with the occasional tune from her first two albums thrown into the mix.

Many of the older songs have been altered like the aforementioned opener, which is a characteristic of many bands with jazz backgrounds. Underneath the pop pinnings and glamorous looks, she is really a player and has a great band to back her up.  "I've Got to See You Again" was even more jazz-centric and featured her spreading her improvisational wings on the keys. All the players impressed, but we were especially captivated by the versatility of Daru Ota. We had seen this same lineup in OKC in 2004, and at that time she mainly provided backing vocals and the occasional incidental percussion (at least as far as I remember it). This time she played bass (very well, mind) on several songs, as well as keyboards, flute, percussion and of course vocals. She reminded me of one of the multi-instrumentalists in Pat Metheny's band that has to cover all the additional instruments that the others can't. 

The band shined as usual with Lee Alexander holding the bottom line on electric and acoustic bass as well as several songs on guitar. Andy Borger was predictably good and added some variety to the mix with vibes and some other percussion. Adam Levy was usually his understated self but let go with some Scotty Moore-ish wailing on "Creepin In".  I wish he would do that more often, but I guess his style is primarily understatement. 

In all aspects Norah was even more polished, confident, and articulate than when we last saw her. And she was great then.  Her voice was full, pristine and mesmerizing during the whole show. She is more and more willing to stretch out and improvise the melodies as time passes without falling into the diva trap (vibrato, ridiculous scales up and down) so common with popular singers.  She was very competent on guitar and got a very pure fender tone out of her equipment. She shined on keys, mostly piano with a little Fender Rhodes thrown in.  During "Election Day" (the melancholy anti-dubya tune which got a lot of approval and laughter) they brought out a tiny little piano that set on top of her Yamaha, and she played a few lines on it while playing chords on the full size. It added a little sonic cheekiness as well as displaying her talents without showing off too much.

I should also mention that the production was spot on. Everything from the sound mix (with the exception of about 30 seconds of fender amp distortion/moodiness) to the lighting to the stage design was excellent. The stage design/lighting did a great job of conveying the moods of the songs. I recall one tune where they had the band in monochrome grayish spots and they doubled the same spot on Norah while she was also lit from a foot spot that was orange. It made her more three dimensional against the silhouettes of the band. These kinds of techniques were continuous throughout the show and really help set the mood. Concert production has really advanced in the time frame since I first started attending shows over twenty years ago.  I've especially been impressed by the shows of Norah, Sarah McLachlan, Rush and a few others over the last few years. It makes the ticket prices much more tolerable when you consider how complete a show you're getting.

With this tour, Norah has proven that she continues to grow in all aspects as well as adding new abilities to her repertoire.  The band is a very well oiled and polished machine that has benefited with such an extended period of time together. Definitely worth seeing if you're a fan of either Norah or adult contemporary with some jazz & country thrown in.

Innovation - Touchscreens

Microsoft has been making the rounds with a new touchscreen technology (article & video) that will debut later this year, mostly in commercial applications. It's somewhat reminiscent of the interface shown in "Minority Report" a few years ago, where they would manipulate images and video with their fingers on a screen. It will eventually make it to the home user (good luck guessing how much it will cost) although it will probably be several years. This is going to be a much more intuitive way of using a computer, much like the way you would handle items on your real desktop such as a pen, paper or photos. It also allows multi-user access so that multiple peope could sit around a surface and interact whether it's playing games, ordering food at a restaurant or something more creative. Very cool.

Movie Review - Pirates 3

The same cast of characters from the first two movies returns with the addition of several Pirate Lords played most notably by Chow Yun Fat and Keith Richards (in the role of Jack Sparrow's father, although I couldn't immediately tell a difference from his last Stones appearance, and I kept waiting for one of the other pirates to call him Keef). The story is a bit confusing as it consists of a meeting of the same Pirate Lords, the release of a mythical creature called Calypso, attempts to free Jack from Davy Jones Locker (the world of the dead?) and the battle(s) to gain control of the chest with Jones heart in it, control of the Black Pearl, control of the high seas, etc. I think there were at least three sides in the movie with the British Navy as one, Davy Jones & crew as another, and then the collection of the main characters as the third. 

The problem is that at any given moment one group is in league with another, someone from one group betrays the others and crosses sides, etc. After awhile I gave up on understanding where the plot was supposed to be going and just enjoyed the action and humor. Johnny Depp just seems made for this character and he is consistently funny throughout. The action sequences and special effects are as good as they come and although the movie was little too long at 2:45, the time went by fairly fast. If you consider yourself a fan of the first two, it's worth seeing in the theater once. If you weren't, this won't win you over. I give it a mild thumbs up.

Book Review - Cryptonomicon

Cryptonomicon by Neal Stephenson - A B&N browse and pick. The story is a few years old (I think 1999) and jumps back and forth between World War II and the turn of the millenium. It centers around a few main characters in WWII and their descendants, and it's focused on the cryptological (then) and information security (now)business. The cast of characters includes a kind of cryptological savant, a marine grunt, spies, treasure hunters, damsels in distress, lions, tigers, you get the picture. Ok, mostly it's about the spy business from the side of cryptographers (go figure with a title like Cryptonomicon) Stephenson shows quite the touch at handling the science (which he appears to be quite versed in) as well as offering a plausible and interesting plot. He also does a good job of handling multiple plot lines as he jumps back and forth between past & present and between different characters. This is often a risky venture and very few pull it off while maintaining the urgency of the story (George R.R. Martin has very succesfully written his entire Song of Ice and Fire series with this technique). Perhaps best of all, he is very funny in the most geeky sense of the word. Some of the metaphors he uses to describe a painful or exasperating experience are laugh out loud funny. I don't know how much of the technology described is real, but it all sounds convincing when he describes it. I really like his writing and will be reading his other novels when I get time.

Mac - So Far, So Good

After 3 days of migrating files, installing updates, downloading new programs that can't be transferred to the Mac from Windows, etc., I am finally getting close to functionality with my new system. I type this post from Wordpress running on my new Mac, and it was relatively painless. As is typical for me with computers in general, I can't describe the exact steps of how I got here in that I think most of the web server specific installs were already completed the first time I started using wordpress, but I did install a couple of programs that were necessary for me to interface from my Mac. I think it was MAMP and XAMPP that did the trick, although other than downloading, installing and turning them on, the actual functionality was lost on me. I'm guessing they were necessary for me to be able to actually run Wordpress from within my Mac browser (Safari) but anything they do is essentially under the hood as far as I'm concerned. The beauty of Wordpress is that once you get it installed, it's really no more difficult to use than a word processor/web browser. Which is nice.  Now that I'm getting close to having all the programs I had previously (whether using the same program for OSX like my Native Instruments soft synths, or using an equivalent like Transmit for FTP in place of Cute FTP which I used on the pc)  I can start delving into the Mac specific stuff as well as getting back to my routine of practicing guitar and writing music. My initial experiments with my music programs have been promising as they have installed with ease, and so far they have sounded better to my ears (with a nod to subjectivity) while putting absolutely no load on the quad core system I'm running now. More to follow. 

Mac - Anticipation

For all my fellow circuitheads, today is one of the more geektastic days that comes along every once in awhile. My new desktop computer is in a Fedex truck as I type this and it should be on my doorstep sometime today. Even more exciting is that it's an Apple Mac Pro which is my first Mac ever and it's basically geekmas in May. I know I'm going to suffer some sort of letdown because I can only think of all the great things that will come along with this system and I'm not concerned about any serious technical hurdles. In fact, my hope is that it's going to run so much smoother than my Windows PCs have that even if there are some glitches or temporary problems they will seem inconsequential compared to all the advantages of speed, efficiency and ease of use. 

The only negative right now is that where I live Fedex is consistently problematic in their deliveries.  UPS is like clockwork every time, delivering everything before noon without fail and that's with probably a couple dozen of deliveries in two years.  Fedex makes home deliveries in my area from about 40 miles away and it always seems like the driver is unfamiliar with the process (I live on a military base) and it usually adds a business day or two to the delivery because they often give up at the first sign of difficulty. There are multiple entrances to our base but they are not all open all the time. In the past, if a driver pulls up to a closed gate they usually just turn around and say they couldn't get in without trying to call and find out if another gate is open. Hopefully that won't happen today. If it does, I probably will have to wait four more days because of the holiday weekend. I don't know if it's because Fedex uses independent contractors (and therefore gets different drivers unfamiliar with the area more often) or what because they do seem to be the only carrier service that has this issue (DHL also has never had a problem).  

Musician - Muscle Memory

This is a concept that has application in every aspect of our lives, from tying shoes to writing your name to even more specialized activities like playing an instrument or flying a plane.  Perhaps more appropriately called "Motor Memory" this process is what happens when you repeatedly engage in some movement or activity to the point where you can do it without thinking any more. It starts the day you're born where you gradually learn to form words and speech based on hearing others talk. Later you use it to learn how to walk, throw a football, drive a car or type on a computer. We can all remember when we first learned how to type by hunt and peck until we hopefully learned the standard typing position to the point that we can type without looking at our hands.

It's been discussed and studied a great deal but it is still not fully understood. One theory contends that motor meory actually involves several different processes involving the brain, motor neurons, skeletal muscle, neurotransmitters like acetylcholine and serotonin, and other undiscovered processes.  One study found that brain trauma patients suffering from a degree of amnesia could be taught a new procedure they would retain while they forgot the process of learning it. For example, they could be taught to shuffle a deck of cards, but they wouldn't remember learning how. This lends credence to the idea that multiple systems are responsible for motor memory and not purely the brain. 

My specific interest in the topic is how it applies to learning and improving on the guitar. I find that learning new techniques or songs on the guitar is not only dependent on the amount of practice but also on the total duration in weeks, months, and years that I am regularly pursuing this new technique.  I think most experienced players and teachers agree that 30 minutes of daily practice will do more to reinforce new concepts than 3 hours once a week.  However the process works, it takes the body time to react to the mental and physical changes that are occurring to facilitate the new movement. Although there is a great deal of commonality in guitar techniques compared to the difference between playing guitar and needlepoint, there is still usually some degree of new learning involved in any new song. It's especially obvious when learning a completely new technique like an Eddie Van Halen or Tommy Emmanuel song when all you've been playing before are Bob Dylan tunes. 

Usually learning new things on the guitar is very gradual and it's often hard to tell that you're making progress even if you are.  One of the great joys is when you seem to make a sudden jump in capability overnight. Whether or not this phenomenon is more a subjective interpretation of the player, it does still seem to occur occasionally.  I liken it to the process of wiring a house during the construction process. The payoff is obviously instantaneous between the days or weeks of work and the first time that you switch on the lights after the wiring has been completed. The interesting thing is that it seems that the motor memory process continues to work after you stop practicing a technique. I feel this must be true because I have had some unavoidable gaps in practicing due to travel and temporary duties but I have often found that I am able to make a jump in my progress once I return to practicing again. 

The other great thing about motor memory is that it seems analagous to paving roads in your nervous system.  I played guitar (albeit poorly) for a few years as a teenager, but essentially didn't play at all for over fifteen years. When I decided to start playing again, I found that I was still able to form chords and play certain songs that I had learned all those years ago and although it took me a little while to get calluses on my fingers, the process of "re-learning" chords was nowhere near as difficult or time consuming as the first time. It seemed like I still had those neurological pathways in my body, but that they just needed to have some weeds and debris cleared off before they were as good as new.  Within a month of dedicated practice I think I was back to my original level of competence (not saying much, but even so) from when I quit playing all those years before.

Movies - The Golden Compass looks good

In the realm of fantastic fiction directed at children/young adults, Harry Potter is the reigning champion by any yardstick. J.K. Rowling doesn't have a monopoly, however. I grew up reading C.S. Lewis and Lloyd Alexander before I moved on to J.R.R. Tolkien in my early teens. If it had been written back then, I'm sure I would have read Philip Pullman's "His Dark Materials" trilogy. I have actually picked these novels up at the bookstore several times but  never got around to reading them. By all reports it's in a similar vein to Harry Potter but with a more adult sensibility to it.  Riding the wave of cinematic success of HP, LOTR, and Narnia the first novel has been made into a feature film and there's a really cool looking trailer here. I'm looking forward to this now and I'm more inclined to read the first novel before I see this.

Molehills

I'm sure everyone of us has many opportunities in their professional and personal lives to interact with people who tend to focus on the irrelevant. The old saying "making a mountain out of a molehill" is unfortunately still valid.  In my work especially, I deal with mostly adminstrative medical evaluations for employment and it seems to be a near daily occurrence that someone in the process will decide to focus on a point that is trivial to everyone else in the world (except them) to the exclusion of the truly important issues at hand. In my line of work, it's often more trouble to put someone in their place as opposed to just patting their hand until they go away and dump their molehill on someone else.

On a related subject, it's painful yet sometimes fascinating that you will get patients who are much more concerned about some administrative aspect to their exam as opposed to the fact that you are telling them they need to change their lifestyle or they're going to die before their 60.  The typical response you get is something along the lines of "Ok, I realize that I'm overweight, hypertensive, diabetic and at imminent risk for a fatal heart attack in the next five years if I don't stop smoking, overeating, drinking, not exercising, etc. But is this going to keep me from working overtime this weekend? Because I really need to pay for that new bass boat."  Not to mention people who get upset because it's such an inconvenience for them to come into the clinic once a year for 2-3 hours to have an exam that is a condition of their continued employment.  Most of them don't consider that their health should be more important to them than it is to us, but that's usually not the case. The unspoken but very common philosophy is work until you die, even if you could extend your life by twenty or thirty years with a few lifestyle choices. 

Movie Review - Spider Man & Shrek 3

We saw Spider Man and Shrek 3 this weekend and in both cases, I suppose the third time isn't as charming as hoped for. If you liked the first two of each, then these aren't completely forgettable, but they both suffer from where they occur in the series. I think we've seen all we need to see of both these series now (although I'll be surprised if there isn't a least one more sequel for each). Spider Man 3 - a little too long and too many villains. This movie suffers from trying to do too much and thereby gives too little attention to anything, leaving you wondering at the end exactly who was that Sandman guy, and where the hell did the black gooey stuff come from? And why couldn't it wait until the next movie? I'd say it's worth a rental, but you may want to save your theater money for something else. It does look great, though.

Shrek 3 - is at least visually impressive as they have managed to continue the graphics improvements with technology to the point that some things in the movie look very convincingly real. Unfortunately, the charm of the first two movies gets a little lost in this movie in which Shrek and Fiona are much more mainstream characters, reminding me of some sitcom roles as opposed to the rude and abrasive (and more entertaining) Shrek from the first two movies. The best roles (and lines) in this movie are for the minor fairy tale characters;  Donkey and Puss-n-boots are also underutilized.  It's still worth a rental (in about 6 months) unless you've got kids who will probably demand to see it in the theater. I really wish they could do an R-rated Shrek. If you pushed the vulgarity, sarcasm and exploited the twisted fairy tale idea to its limit this could be really funny. Sadly, that'll never happen.

A common theme in many sequels now is that they all benefit from the newest technology and manage to surpass their predecessors on some audiovisual level, but that is often the only objective goal they seem to have in mind. Look at the Star Wars prequels, for example. They all surpassed the original trilogy from a tech standpoint, but they all were found lacking in script, dialogue and characters. I'm unashamedly a techno geek and I will often watch a movie that is otherwise forgettable if it looks cool, but I'm really starting to tire of the tendency to treat story and dialogue as secondary. Why can't we make great looking, epic movies that also remember the importance of storytelling at it's most basic level?  The Lord of the Rings trilogy is an example of how you can do both although they had the benefit of a great story to start with.  I often wonder if all the tech advancements have been a positive for the movie industry. A great story begins and ends with words and unfortunately in a visual medium this is sometimes an afterthought.

Practice makes permanent

We've all heard the old axiom that practice makes perfect, but that's only true if your practice is perfect.  Most people associate practice with repetition, and it's true that some is necessary when working on a part that is technically challenging.  But it's vital that you are repeating the right parts and for the purpose of improving your weak points, and not just going through the motions. 

The best advice I have ever gotten about practicing is that you should take a song you're learning, and only play the song at the speed which you can execute it flawlessly. Think about that for a minute.  When you practice a song you will eventually get to a part of the song which is difficult for you. Instead of trying to play the song at full speed and fumbling over the difficult passage each time you go through it, you need to slow down. 

A good phrase to describe this is "isolate the difficulty".  You should choose a difficult section and focus on playing only that section at a much slower speed over and over until you can play it perfectly with the correct rhythm even if you still can't play it a full speed. You will be amazed how quickly your fingers can learn to go from half speed to full speed once you learn the part well at half speed. It's certainly much faster than trying to learn something at full speed and fumbling over it every time.  Steve Morse wisely expresses the idea as "To play fast, first you must play slow". 

My two favorite tools for "isolating the difficulty" are an audio player program called the Amazing Slow Downer and a tab program called Guitar Pro.  The ASD allows you change the tempo without affecting the pitch, although you can change the pitch if needed to match your tuning. It also  allows you to isolate any section of the song you want to practice repeatedly.  I'll save those sections so they are always easily brought up for practice, e.g. the solo section of "Back in Black".  Guitar Pro is primarily a tab based tool for learning songs, but it is also has the capability to import midi, powertab, tabledit, and ascii files. It also features a sample engine called the RSE or realistic sound engine which results in more realistic guitar and bass sounds.

Mac Community?

Now that I have a mac on the way, I'm inclined to start behaving appropriately so that I can fit in once I get my system.  I'm going to have to grow my hair longer, slouch more and start acting superior (the latter won't be such a transition). :)  Don't sniff, you've seen the commercials as well unless you've lived in a cave for the last few years. I find the idea of a mac community somewhat laughable as it is just a computer, but considering the overwhelming popularity of even more trivial activities like some of the social networking sites, I guess it's not as irrelevant as it seems.

I see the value in most web based activities, but I don't understand the relative importance anything like this plays in someone's life. If you use a certain piece of equipment or have a hobby you want to share with others the web is really the best place to network with others. But, too often people need to separate themselves from others as a means to establish their individuality and a common result is a mac user flaming a pc user or vice versa. I think both sides can argue for their advantages, but it's really irrelevant in the grand scheme.

I think demographically the Mac community is usually a little more wealthy, educated and artistic. I'm not making that up, I've read it in several places and here is an example of one study. That sounds like I just called the pc users poor, ignorant, and boring to boot. I don't relate education directly to mac use, but I think it's established that with wealth goes education and the likelihood of artistic pursuits (not counting the starving artists out there, I think those with more money usually have more opportunities).  So, because Macs cost more on average, I think the other statistics follow, and that's making no value judgment on the mac vrs a winpc. 

If pc users are less educated, etc., then so am I because I have been a winpc user for the last 15 years with an Amiga 500 as my last non-mainstream computer system.  It's difficult to say if a large portion of the loyal mac users are just sticking with what they know as opposed to actually analyzing the pros and cons of a mac vrs pc.  I think that most mac users are more familiar with pcs vrs the other way around.  In the case of musicians, it's very true that they are usually less willing to change once they have a working system hence the overwhelming predominance of macs and the related hardware/software within the professional recording world. It's probably the same reason that Fender and Gibson guitars still have such large market shares, when there are dozens if not hundreds of great guitar companies.

Popcorn season commences

There are some decentish movies coming out this summer, the overwhelming majority of which are franchises. Hollywood knows how to ride a horse until it drops. That being said, I am looking forward to the following corntastic flicks: Bourne Ultimatum, Evan Almighty, Oceans 13, Spider Man 3, Pirates 3, Harry Potter 5, Shrek 3, Fantastic Four 2. We typically watch dramas, comedies (and the less spectacular) on our big screen at home as you don't necessarily lose much compared to the multiplex. 

Those listed deserve at least one theater viewing.  We watch most movies at home and typically enjoy the experience more without the added multiplex frustrations (noisy kids, tiny seats, rigoldarndiculous food prices, etc.), but there still is something special about a screen so big you can't take it all in without panning your eyes left and right. I'm a big fan of IMAX, and I would probably go see more regular films in that format but they never offer them in the markets where I live (thanks Army, no really, thanks).

There’s no going back

Well, actually there probably is, but it sounded dramatic anyways. I have somehow talked my better half into allowing me to purchase an Apple Mac Pro Desktop system which is due for assembly and shipping in the next week or so.  In the last two years my typical computer based activity has been predominately music and to a lesser extent, video centered.  That combined with the fairly recent change of all Apple processors to Intel (allowing windows to be run natively) has made the decision to change platforms more appealing and decidedly less risky. 

My main reason for change is the (by all reports) much more stable and intuitive operating system, and the same user friendliness of the major software programs.  I am looking at a couple of the mid level audio/video programs to start with since my needs are still fairly simple and because the full featured programs start to get prohibitive from a cost standpoint (especially if you're just a hobbyist like myself). One other positive aspect of the change is that my comprehensive software sequencer package from Native Instruments (Komplete4, Kore, Guitar Rig 2) will run on Mac as well as Windows, so I will be able to transfer all that software over, and most likely it will run as good if not better on the Mac. 

The majority of programs I use regularly for practicing, composing and recording will all run on Mac. The only major exceptions are my DAW (Sonar) and Video Editing (Premiere Pro) programs. Considering that I have been relatively unhappy with the performance of both, I don't think I will miss them even if I start off with less featured programs.  I hear good reviews of even the most basic programs (Ilife with it's packaged software that's targeted at consumers) so I'm optimistic that the starter versions of the standalone audio/video editors will suit my needs well.

Career possibilities

My most recent foray into the wilderness provided ample time to ponder the next few years ahead, especially in the realm of career moves.  Currently I am scheduled to move to Fort Bragg, NC later this year (time tba) and should be going on an OEF (Afghanistan) tour next year for approximately 15 months based on current info.  After my return I should have about 14 months left on my current contract and at that point I will probably have a better idea of what the next few years after will hold (US political landscape specifically). 

Ae Young and I have discussed our options and preferences and at this point I am leaning towards signing another 4 year contract if I can negotiate a career move that's acceptable to us.  We have decided that geographically we would most like to go to Germany.  We haven't been stationed there, and we both would like to travel to points of interest around Europe, the Mediterranean and the former Soviet Union. 

Currently I owe the Army 3 1/2 years, which would put me at 23 years time in service. If I sign another bonus contract, then I would be obligated until 27 years.  Another option is pursuing a PhD in either Public Health or Education, depending upon the needs of the Army. That option would probably extend my career until 32-33 years active duty by the time school and contract were completed. That's another one of those choices that are too early to predict. Right now I think that retention is pretty good, at least in the PA ranks. With the recent bonus option, I think they have managed to stabilize the numbers, but the long term is still tough to predict.  The majority of people who took the bonus will be due to exit at the same time, mostly in October 2010.  That will also likely place a premium on assignment choices as everyone will probably be using the threat of retirement to negotiate for better assignments.  If everyone asks for the more desirable postings, there won't be enough to go around.

I have my concerns that the Army in general is setting itself up for a big fall in retention numbers when the majority of the active force has been on multiple combat tours.  I think retention was initially steady since soldiers were allowed to get tax free bonuses if they reenlisted while deployed. The problem is that most of these reenlisting soldiers were on their first OIF tours and now they are paying the price of multiple OIF/OEF tours, mostly measured in terms of losses. I have a feeling that the initial jubilation of getting a large, tax free bonus will be greatly tempered by the realization of the eventual cost in life and time away from home, family and pursuing life goals.

June is shaping up to be Jam-tastic…

with the afore-mentioned Police show in Dallas, and now with the added bonus of Norah Jones and ERIC JOHNSON (CAPS INTENDED) both playing in Little Rock. Yee-Fricking-Ha is all I can say. We have 6th row center for Norah and Eric is playing at Juanita's like last year (general admission, woo hoo), so I should be close enough to help him with tone control adjustments and brow wiping.

Juanita's is a small club about equivalent in size to an Applebee's (yeah, I've quite the discerning palate, get off me) with the stage taking up the corner.  Last August we saw him there and I was about 5 feet away from him for the whole show.  The downside is that I was also in a direct line of sight to his dual Fender Twin Reverbs and not far off the downrange hazard area of his Marshall double stack, all of which he had cranked loud enough for an arena sized show.  I had a hard time communicating with my wife on the drive home, my ears were so fried. I even felt kind of sick and hung over the next day and listening to electric guitar and similar frequency sounds was painful for a few days after. This time I'll be taking an assortment of earplugs and hopefully they won't kill too much of the dynamic range. Amazingly enough, my hearing hadn't deteriorated on my annual audiogram this year, but I'm not going to push my luck again.

Last year I got him to sign a guitar player magazine from 1986 that I had kept all these years (his first cover article) and I'm debating on taking my Fender EJ Strat to have him sign this year. I hesitate because Juanita's isn't necessarily in a bad part of town, but it isn't right next to the police station either. I realize that's borderline fanboy behavior, but I'm not embarassed when it comes to my guitar idols. Eric is the closest thing to an exact model of how I would like to sound (most people don't realize how great he is at fingerstyle and other genres, knowing only his electric lead sound). Not to mention that he is a great pianist as well.

Ah, collective punishment…

how I miss it. The military has decided to cut off access to multiple "social" sites, like myspace, youtube, etc. as a means of preventing unwanted information getting leaked by soldiers.  The intention is understandable, and these targeted sites are probably the most likely places that a large number of soldiers could inadvertently (or not) reveal classified or sensitive information.  The opportunity for those leaks still exists, but the likelihood is decreased now.  Still, I can't help but remember my days as a young enlisted soldier when the screw ups of a few led to punishment of the many.  I can't argue the logic that these sites aren't mission essential and can lead to decreased bandwidth for more relevant traffic. It does add more to "the suck" of deployments, though.

Sold! - Brian Moore IGuitar

The Brian Moore has been sold. Thanks to all who looked.

Off to the woods…

I'm taking a little camping trip at the behest of my buddies in the federal service. I'll be away for a short while but will return with renewed vigor for all things civilized. That will initially be focused on the running water, electricity, non-dehydrated food, you get the picture. Once the hierarchy of needs has gotten past the rudiments I'll be back at the electric lobotomizer. I'll take lots o' pics of trees, dirt, field expedient latrines, etc. so no one feels left out.

Cheerful Humidity Moment

is going to be my band's name, I've decided. Once I get one, that is. Or maybe "Ninth Vegetable Quartet".  Of course, I am particular to "Timely Gargoyle Mutiny" as well. Decision, decisions. Need some help with creative inspiration? Check out the Band Name Generator for some rather amusing word combinations that seem to work pretty well as band names.