I’m adding a (short) new post just so folks still know I’m alive. Here’s a quick, off-the-top-of-my-head update on “what’s new.”
I’ve been riding bike my bike more lately, which has been a lot of fun. I think I’m averaging between 170-200 miles a week, which is probably 50 miles or so more than I was riding before. I joined two clubs a month or so ago: Swamis and Ranchos. I’ve been riding with Swamis on Thursday mornings and, occasionally, on Sundays. I’ve been riding with Ranchos on Saturdays. Both clubs are very fast and have been a challenge for me, which is why I decided to join them. I also bought a touring bike in early summer. It’s been really fun to get that outfitted with the proper gear. I’m hoping to post a lot more about the bike and our touring adventures in the near future.
Otherwise, there’s not too much else to report. Life is good.
I can’t believe I haven’t already written about this. I guess I’ve been tweeting most of my updates rather than blogging them. Should try to change that. At any rate, I was talking to one of my coworkers last November and somehow the topic of guitars got brought up. I launched into a sales pitch and was trying to get my friend to buy my Fender Stratocaster, which has been lying fallow for years. But the more I talked about it the more I realized how much I missed trying to play the damn thing. Maybe it was simply my friend’s enthusiasm that rubbed off on me or perhaps it was just awesome timing, but 5 minutes later we were on eBay searching for effects processors. A couple weeks later I had one in my office. More importantly, though, I had a renewed sense of purpose: once and for all I was going to learn to play guitar.
I think I started trying to play when I was a sophomore or junior in high school. But, that was pre-Internet and I didn’t really have any resources available except one instruction book and an old hymnal from church. Needless to say, it didn’t go very well and I was quickly discouraged. I made a second run at it in college, but once again didn’t stay on it. Which, looking back, is a major shame because some of my friends were awesome musicians/guitar players and I could have really learned something. But, it’s such a damn hard instrument to learn that if you aren’t really dedicated to it, you’re going to fail.
So, I picked things up with renewed vigor in November. Heidi got me the Gibson Learn and Master Guitar DVD course for Christmas and I picked up a beautiful used Les Paul on eBay. I’ve been playing about 6 hours a week for the last 2.5 months. It’s harder than hell and there are times when I get super frustrated, but it seems different this time. I can’t really play anything besides scales, a dozen or so chords, and some cheesy old folk songs, but it’s still been a lot of fun.
Happy new year everyone.
I posted a link to this on Twitter a while ago, but thought I should also add it here.
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The last song he played at Vegas. Gets cool at 4:00 with the snow falling. Hypnotic at 6:45 to end. Like standing in the middle of a tornado. In heaven.
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