Where you been, Brown?

1. My car’s in the shop today for what promises to be a good chunk of money. However, I should be able to cover the costs no problem and the beast will be ready for a road trip or two, if everything goes well.

2. The new/old guitar sounds really good. Nice and clean, with a broad range of tones, although I suspect it’ll growl well with a little extra gain. However, my amp’s in the trunk of my car and I’ve got a short in the cable, so any significant playing will have to wait till later, maybe even tomorrow.

I haven’t taken any pictures yet, but it looks like a period dinosaur. Jay did as little modification as he could — a jack in the side, screw holes for the pickup, and a couple of screws to hold the knob assembly onto the pickguard. I like it — it looks right for its era. He also was able to keep the original clear knobs, which we weren’t sure was going to happen.

All this and new flatwounds for all of 62.00. Not bad.

3. Today is going to be spent working on the curriculum and set up for the online course. I’m excited to use the software package — it’ll not only help me with this course, it’ll help me in the future with other things I may be doing.

4. I took a long walk in the woods yesterday up at our local wildlife sanctuary and saw frogs, a ribbon snake, and two of the fastest moving woodchucks I’ve ever seen. It was nice to get out in the quiet and the woods and just think.

5. I haven’t been writing as many poems lately. I think this is a double edged sword — I like what I have been writing, while recognizing that the relative lack of the human interaction I used to experience at work is affecting how I think about poems — I just am not talking with people often enough to have my head fed. It’s ok though — I like the direction the new work is taking me. I’m even starting to think about a new chapbook of the Jim poems when I’m finally down with them.

6. On the down side, I just watched “Teletubbies.” Dear God.

7. XM Radio rules. I heard a ska show yesterday that pleased me mightily.