Year: 2007

HOT-dog!

No Uncle Dave Macon here, but some minor banjo repairs.

My Gold Tone BC-350 (which I still like, despite all my friends playing Rickards) has a “hot-dog” armrest, a piece of bent steel that always seemed to be in the wrong place. Ken Perlman noted its incorrectness at the past Midwest Banjo Camp, so I took it off shortly afterwards.

But the banjo never quite seemed right without the armrest, so tonight I shifted it down a set of brackets. This isn’t quite trivial; the rest sits on two special shoes, so you have to completely remove the pair of adjacent shoes and swap them. After that you have to get the armrest level and the head tension right. But it sounds good, is comfortable to play now both sitting and standing. So what if it doesn’t quite sit straight in the instrument stand?

something other than wind blows here

Dave Bidini‘s article in today’s Globe & Mail, An ill wind blows (now irritatingly hidden behind a paywall, but helpfully cached here) troubles me about what got through basic fact-checking:

  • “The turbines expected on the island are open-bladed, a style being replaced in Europe by closed-blade turbines, which do less damage to wildlife.” What are closed-blade turbines? I’m in weekly contact with colleagues in the European wind energy industry. If people were installing a radically different type of machine, I’d know about it.
  • The article cites the National Center for Policy Analysis as a source. Quoting the NCPA on wind energy and the environment is a little like quoting the NRA on gun control. Check out the NCPA’s E-Team: Providing Accurate Information on Energy & Environment Issues. Overall, I’d say that ExxonMobil are getting great VFM on their donations to NCPA [PDF] if they’re now being quoted as a credible, balanced source.

Robyn Hitchcock Live at The Mod Club on 2007-11-14

Internet Archive: Details: Robyn Hitchcock Live at The Mod Club on 2007-11-14

Set 1: 81′ 28″

Balloon Man
Autumn Is Your Last Chance
Uncorrected Personality Traits
Olé! Tarantula
Only The Stones Remain
I’m Only You
I Something You
Glass Hotel
Cynthia Mask
No, I Don’t Remember Guildford
Alright, Yeah
Full Moon In My Soul
Swirling
Creeped Out
Queen Of Eyes
Are You Experienced?
You & Oblivion

Set 2: 21′ 24″

Visions of Johanna
(A Man’s Gotta Know His Limitations) Briggs
Adventure Rocket Ship

Robyn’s stolen guitar(s)

Robyn Hitchcock had his blue Fender Telecaster stolen in Toronto on Tuesday. For last night’s show he managed to borrow Barenaked Lady Stephen Paige’s black Tele.

I also suspect that his Fylde acoustic was stolen too. He was playing a small-bodied acoustic last night.

Mean people suck.

whoa, I won something!

My strategy of dropping off my business card at every trade show booth that promises quality swag paid off. I just received an MP3 player from Genivar – thanks, folks!

It’s a weird little unit. Looks almost identical to a nano, but is your plain-vanilla USB mass storage device – something that Apple could learn from, but they’re in the business of selling players tied to iTunes. It also has a standard USB connector for days transfer and charging – Apple and iRiver please note.

It seems it’s an S1 type player, so can play videos in its own weird format. It also has a voice recorder, which again records in its own special format (likely some hacked version of GSM).

It will be fun playing with it.

Update: Looks like it’s an ATJ-2135 Actions Semiconductor player of some kind. It can record in ADPCM wav (which sox can convert), or its own weird ACT format (which can be converted using this Windows-only program).

take it or leave it

I got Daniel Quinn’s Ishmael from the library on a friend’s recommendation. I tried, but I don’t feel the love for the psychic gorilla.

It’s not that the wise protagonist is a psychic gorilla. I can get past that. It’s just that the conclusions are so pat. I wonder how many readers come away with the romantic notion that they’re the only Leaver in a Taker society? (they’re wrong, of course; I’m the only one to which this applies …)

I also didn’t get the “Takers need prophets” deal. if you decide to follow the ideas in the book, what is Ishmael but a prophet? A not-for-prophet?

Writers like Jared Diamond (though flawed) and Julian Cope (though fried; but at least can play mellotron) wrote it better. Ain’t but the one way, as the Drude sang.

What I did like about the library copy that I borrowed was that it had clearly made an impression on a previous reader. Crabbed on every page in tiny, infra-neat madperson handwriting was a seemingly endless thesis about something. What, I can’t tell; the diligent guardians of the Toronto Public Library erased almost every word, so I couldn’t tell if a worldview had been shattered or affirmed. Maybe it was the wisdom of the ages. Who can tell?

easily amazed

I know the technology is not that nifty, but I amused and amazed myself by sshing into the home server whilst on the Via train somewhere between Smith’s Falls and Ottawa.

STEEL REINFORCED NECK

My Harmony banjo arrived today. For something essentially made of plastic, with a brown-painted neck, it sounds great.

non-numinous

I had assumed that an admin here at work liked obscure Shakespeare plays when they called our server cressida. But I found the real reason when I noticed that the Richmond server is called rav4 …

DO NOT WANT

The Vega is still at Encore. The price is still in the upper atmosphere. One of Dave’s regulars pointed out that the heel has a major crack in it. Do not want!!

Mind you, they did have a mint Squier P-Bass (yeah, they’re cheap, I know) for very few $ …

pretty much it for now

the way out of Richmond

Well, that’s pretty much all for my BC trip. Got another day in the office, then fly out this afternoon.

I managed to be a bit more sociable this time. Dinner with Dave and Leanne in a very high-tone restaurant, curry with Kelly on Davie St on Halloween, then dinner with colleagues last night.