Grudgingly Talking

While I would love to sit here and type that really WANT to be here typing, I only feel a compulsion to do so. I don't actually WANT to. The reason I don't want to is because I know it'll knock down my maps. Has anyone noticed the change in states or countries that have been going to the 5th Fret and if so (or not, I guess it applies to both camps) does anyone really care?

There's this guy named Henry Rollins who has a show and writes a blog too. A blog Google Reader can't subscribe to (which is an awful shame, by the way) but a blog nonetheless and I like the behind the scenes kind of feel to it. I've toyed with the idea of blogging about how the 5th Fret is doing on a more personal level. I mean, if CNN (Hey! I'm not comparing myself or the 5th Fret to CNN, it's just for an analogy) were to let the anchors talk during the time where they would normally be reporting the news about how happy they are to be there and how they've come so far and all that, wouldn't you be a little pissed? I know I would.

But if you had a favorite reporter and they had a blog about that kind of stuff, you may find that interesting, right?

I'm looking for a little encouragement here. I mean look at the maps! Those are current places, just the current places. I KNOW the 5th Fret has been viewed before from Africa but did not mark it off on the map because it was not currently visible (the log only goes back 500 entries). This month has already become the record holding month. I've interviewed my favorite podcast hosts, I've got a couple of ideas in motion, and Guitar World has picked up the blog for the Blips page, a page where tons of guitar blogs are funnelled in perhaps to ease the worry of a guitar player who is looking for all the blogs but I think it has more to do with the fact GW wants some money. That has to be it.

Honestly though, I couldn't take myself off the page if I wanted to, so instead I'm trying to focus on things that might not be so mainstream. Companies and products that are not as big as they should be. Maybe my blog can help out a little and if it can, that's great, and if not, I tried.

Anyway, I'm not saying this blog is going to turn into the 5th Fret Pt. 2, or anything like that. More average blogs will be coming when I have more time to write them. Right now there's a lot going on at home.

But I'll be back, you know I will. Until I do come back, keep checking the maps. You see I have more than 20% of the WORLD covered?

The Whole Conquer Thing

I'm pretty proud of how many people are reading the 5th Fret and where those people are from. There's a ton of people in the US reading and there's quite a few in Europe (it started out with more visitors in Europe than the States) and I've been looking at visitor maps for a while and the site I use only keeps so much of a log.

Well, I wanted to see just how much of the world the blog has been read by so I started cataloging them and you can now see what's going on. As I was putting it together I thought that I'd like to share that with YOU so you can see. The little blog that is making its way into more and more homes and I'm so incredibly proud of it, I don't really know what to say. This is the first time in my life I've ever made something that people are reacting to positively (or at least not sending me angry or disappointed emails), something I started from scratch and with the help of my excellent writer friends, has become accepted in a few circles, acquired quite a few hits, and the longer it goes on the more I feel like I'm part of this thing I love so much - the guitar.

So I apologize if I seem a little proud or gushy but this is the first time anything like this has happened to me and I'm so stoked that it's grown to what it is and hope it will keep growing.

The 5th Fret Conquers the World Pt 2 (The WORLD!)

visited 135 states (60%)
Create your own visited map of The World

The 5th Fret Conquers the World Pt. 1 (USA)

visited 50 states (100%)
Create your own visited map of The United States or jurisdische veraling duits?

Just What Did I Watch?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=it71O2KupEE

I know you're curious what we do in the desert, well, what we may watch on TV in the desert anyway. This was a video that was constantly on and I think it would serve as a WONDERFUL thing to show at sexual harassment seminars because even though you can't tell what she's saying (or I can't tell what she's saying, anyway) the message is clear: Sexually harass, and you're going to jail, Bozo.

Enjoy!

More of these to come. There are some CRAZY videos out there!

Hey Everyone!

I'm back. It's awesome to be back and hopefully you can look forward to ruglar blogs once more. Once I get all set up, I mean. You know how it is.

I'd post pictures but they're being edited by my super talented photographer of a wife. Once she's done, I'll post them.

Thanks for reading. It's really good to be back.