PrairieDog

Right on! First time I ever came across McMurtry was an Austin City Limits that came on with the TV. He was doing Choctaw Bingo. I was agape. Nearly monotone, but just the right inflection here and there, and pretty basic chucking along. The thing was way too long, but I still didn’t want that effing song to end 😂 20 years later we still throw random quotes from it into conversations, “Tried to miss him, but didn’t quite,” lol. That “mmhHHmmm” he throws in at the right moment is a stroke of lyric genius, talk about saying everything by saying nothing at all. An American musical legend.

So far we’ve been lucky and it’s a pretty standard -20 or so with the windchill. that is really not bad with a good jacket. Sorry about the garden. We had terrible drought for a few summers and lost the gardens and even some trees. We had a super wet spring this past year so we went ahead and planted 3 new trees. By July the rain had dried up. Dang. We put on soaker hoses to minimize waste, because we had to keep them watered. But We’re on a well, but it’s not as deep as it should be, so it’s a choice between watering or making sure the house doesn’t run dry. Nerve wracking. The weather has just gone nuts. I was in shirt sleeves at the end of December, in Minnesota. Our lilac buds had even started to swell.

Hey spaq, that was terrific. Maybe you saw the same thing I did, that the temps and windchill is in the northern tier are hitting unknown territory and they are speculating that even critters and birds adapted to subzero temps could suffer huge kill-offs. Not to mention the cattle and such that are just exposed out on the prairie with nothing to stop the wind. The -60s windchills they are projecting for NDAK, etc, is the new scale. Under the old measure this would be -90. That’s Antarctica. Btw, we’re -10 and feels like -23.

Sure, that would serve the same purpose to sort of ease your listeners into what they are about to hear…. Just mentioning “they talk” is a bit passive, it removes your audience from the story a step, (implies they are listening to second hand news)… you want them in there with you. How ‘bout just, “a crime so grim, it still chills me to this day.” I’m a writer and a long time editor (I know, you wouldn’t know from my posts, chuckle, busman’s holiday). And I realize I’m just blathering uninvited here, I have no ego invested, so take what helps, brush off the rest… Knock ‘em dead at the show!

So, I like this revision. Just wondering, what about bookending the song with your last verse? it’s a great evocative image. I’d maybe add that as an intro to suck the audience in, “hey, what’s that now?” then give it a poignant reprise at the end.

Or, the paperwork isn’t for this guitar? Until the doc matches the serial number in the instrument, good luck with the “glue”, somebody could have swapped docs, or something got put back in the wrong case at a shop, or otherwise mixed up at some point. I’d say, any id info that is not found somewhere on the guitar itself, means all bets are off as to whether any paper with it is for the guitar.

Yeah, so recent, it’s a kindness to let her past be. But I like the names at the start. I was wondering really why the kids took those two out in particular? I mean, couldn’t they have killed anyone in the “perfect” crime. Did they not like the dudes, somebody move on somebody’s girl, gave the kids a bad look one day, did they have money? Seems like there might be a bit more to the story than just their claim to commit perfect murder. Of course, they were dumbasses to start with, so maybe I’m over thinking it.

Good time!

Score! And I really liked the sound from the port when I played something that had it. With my poor hearing I felt like it helped round out what I was picking up on.

Nice!! Congratulations. Looking forward to hearing it.

Walnut is pretty dense. I feel like my J 45 Studio feels awfully sturdy compared to my rosewood Taylor 714 ltd. My DIF is maple, but somehow it seems more delicate, but that could just be I feel like it should be. I’ve never bashed it against anything to test it out 😎

We’re dodging bullets left and right this winter. All around folks are deep in snow and we still had grass showing until this afternooon. Now we on the northern, backside of this one, so we’re gonna miss the worst, fingers crossed. We went through a bomb a couple years ago, early spring. The red wing blackbirds were already back. I made a video of the crazy wind, with the bird calls in the background. A couple got caught up in the gale and blown right past my camera. That was a bummer.

Here in Minnesota it’s 13, feels like 5 and dropping. it actually went up a couple degrees this afternoon when the snow started. We were at 8 this morning. Bottom will fall out tonight. Hoping everyone stays safe and warm, especially you folks getting whacked who aren’t set up for this kind of weather.

Ahh, oops, sorry, I see now. Thanks.

You’re right. S.A. is the abbreviation for South Africa so I read it that way too. Could also be Saudi Arabia. And the name doesn’t need to be in France. Gafferall could be Dutch. That is a gorgeous guitar.

I guess thinking about it, the inkwells in our desks were on the right hand side too. didn’t realize what that meant for the poor lefties who had to use them back in the day. Awkward.

Ha ha! Another funny story: a bunch of us were eating at the new “real” Chinese restaurant where they had actual chopsticks set on the table. My buddy was having a dickens of a time trying to make them work. My brother leaned over and observed: “hey, I know! those are right-handed chopsticks, that’s the problem. Ask the waiter for a left-handed pair.” Much merriment at the poor guy’s expense ensued when the waiter laughed himself out of the dining room. Not sure Greg ever forgave my brother. To the rest of your comment, yeah, but I think learning an instrument where both your hands have to act independently trains your brain to cross over and naturally makes you more ambidextrous. The concept of brain plasticity, which is at the root of what we are talking about is really fascinating. How stroke victims can learn to speak and walk again, etc. We all have it. It just gets harder to access the more hardwired we are to one favored side as we age. Re writing, I learned to print when I was in preschool, I went to some beatnik, let the children “blossom” on their own kind of place. I don’t recall being forced to use my right hand, I think that is just the hand teacher put the pencil in, so that is the one I assumed I should use. I remember being seven or eight, and my older sister crying over the table, I was using my knife and fork backward! First time I was aware there were “hands” at all.

Ahh, you responded before I could get back to you on your original observation, which I do agree with. No matter which hands are in play, the string hand is the personal expression.

I’m glad to hear it Murph. I probably am a lefty, I only write with my right hand, everything else my left hand jumps in to do. I never understood the fixation with left hand/right hand guitars. Righties, many whose left hands “are just along for the ride,” learn to fret, hammer on, pull off, and slide with their lefts. After all, piano players don’t get left handed pianos, flutes, reeds, and drums aren’t sorted. If Eddie Van Halen could fly up and down the neck with his left hand even picking notes at the same time his right hand is, then a lefty can certainly learn to sound strings with their right hand. They are just different motions. A lefty’s right hand still “works.” Most kids going into lessons wouldn’t even know the difference if parents don’t make a big deal out of the possible challenge. They have amazing brain plasticity. Funny story, in grade school, I was not athletic at all, puny, asthmatic, didn’t know the rules, never picked etc. One recess, some kids on the play ground saw me throwing a ball with my left hand and got all excited. They asked me to be their pitcher! Thrilled, I went over to join the game. I threw the ball fast and accurately, right into the box. I was relieved I did it. But the other guy got a hit. Then I did it again, another hit. And again. My team was yelling at *me* and despairing. I was confused. Why were they mad? Being raised Quaker, I thought the point was to help the batter hit the ball! They threw me out before I could show them I switch hit.

Yeah, the Songwriter started out as the Songbird, which began as the Ferguson CL30? Songbirds were only produced for just over three years, til they got sued by another company that already had the name. Gibson tweaked the inlays, and renamed it the Songwriter. This one has the rosewood and sounds rich.

Nah, it really looks (and feels) like that. I described it as orange peel in another thread. I played one before I really understood what ML or VOS meant, just that it was the latest release. I put the thing back because I thought it looked like a mistake/factory second. I assumed the nitro had been rushed and not allowed to cure correctly between layers. Now that I even know what the point of ML and Relic-ing is, I’m still not impressed. It has all the hallmarks and drawbacks of a poor finish. It doesn’t look “aged” at all. Even back then my neophyte eyes could tell it didn’t look like all the real vintage ones from the 40/50s onward, with honest aging, hanging on the same wall next to it.

If you have any farmer’s markets, or organic coops near you, check them out for corn-free chicken and eggs. Lots of small farmers and organic growers are switching to corn free feeds. It’s a good niche for them. At their size they can provide the alternatives folks are looking for. And just fyi, you gotta watch your fish source too. Farmed fish like salmon are fed pellets that can contain corn. If you ever have strange flare ups, look back to whether you ate any assumed ‘safe’ fish.

These “small accomplishments” can steamroll… Every year, with the deck out of service for the winter, our little house starts to feel even smaller, and our thoughts turn to how can we make the space more useful. With chaos burgeoning in the living room, cases and guitars leaned up against various walls, we swapped our unused dining room into a music room. We got the five case rack and everything loaded into it neatly. Well, a sad reso and my starter Yamaha had to be tucked off to the side, behind the door. We got a couple comfy armless task chairs from Office Depot, enough stands to keep the favorites handy, put in a spare tv so we could stream the lessons, and we were in practice-encouraging business. Not sure how, but there are accidentally five more cases leaning willy nilly up against the walls. (Did we feed the first ones after midnight?) There are stands and other bits of gear everywhere, the room is a full mess again, and I still hadn’t gotten my keyboard, hand drums and celtic harp loaded in yet. So, on a lark last night, we spent the evening measuring our bed to see if we could swap the music room for the master bedroom that has a bit more floor space. It’s doable, but seemed like more than we want/should really tackle. Which brings me back to winter dreaming about space. Every winter for 20 years we fantasized about bumping out the end of our modest 70’s rambler to make a larger living/dining area for entertaining. For 20 years we were foiled by various delays/false starts. Now, post-covid, entertaining isn’t a much of a thing anymore, our friends are away or not venturing out much. A couple years ago we conceded, huh, that was a bullet dodged we didn’t spend all that money. We adjusted our attitude and agreed, how much space do we really need to watch tv and read? Last night in the aftermath of several hours of measuring, and back and forth over the bedroom/music switch, the obvious dream woke back up. Hey, what if we built the room off the end of the house as a proper music room? With built in racks, storage, wired up with sound, and acoustical treatments, etc? I joked, we could make a proper “conservatory” like in the old manor houses. I chuckled at the idea of folks arriving at our little box, me greeting them at the door and in my best Masterpiece Theater voice: “Please, won’t you come join us in the conservatory?” 🤣

☺️ Okay, I got that bit, it’s just I’m a half century from pedals and mixing boards, and where whatever noise you ended up making was the noise you used, lol. We weren’t too concerned back then with the niceties of tone, balance, and capturing the authentic sound of the instrument, just enough to made sure your white noise wasn’t louder than my distortion 😆 I’m not sure I could tell if all the little dials and sliders were working within their parameters.

Nothing like a good enabling friend 😆