Big Day

It's been a big day for me.

First, while harvesting pretend crops on a pretend farm for pretend rewards on the ever-popular Facebook game Farmville, I decided that I was never really having any fun and it was more just something to do. Five to ten minutes once or twice a day and you're done.

But why do it when it isn't fun?

So I quit. The rice I planted has not fully grown yet, but it won't be harvested when it does. I'm not playing anymore. We'll see what the repercussions of that are.

Maybe I'll have a little more time to peruse the internet forums

Oh yeah, I'm not so hip to them right now either. I've got nothing against them, it's just that right now it doesn't look like anything really interesting is happening right now.

Though I will say that the Telecaster forum never fails to post some great looking pictures of worn out Teles and I want one pretty bad. Not a worn one (well, maybe a worn one) but a lacquered one and not JUST lacquered on the body but the neck too. Half the fun of showing wear is showing it on the neck. Unfortunately, Fender doesn't offer this except on the really high end guitars (about 17-2,000.00).

Now, there are builders that will build you a Tele to your specs and more and more are popping up every day so when I say that I've been thinking about a sea foam green la cabronita Tele with a single TV Jones Powertron in the bridge, there are people that can do it (for less than a real Fender too).

But I'm not close to getting a new guitar at all. Not at ALL. Oh well. I'm pretty happy with the ones I have. Sometimes I think I should replace the neck on my Tele for one that's a bit more chunky like an old Tele is, but the idea of carrying the whole guitar stock throughout my career is pretty tempting too. Maybe the frets just need leveled out or replaced. I'd be more prone to do that, honestly.

I also had an afternoon to myself and I drove up to Macon to a Mac store there. Not an official Apple Store with a glass front or anything, a small store that had a fairly knowledgeable staff that helped me out and answered my questions. I told them if I were to get the Macbook Pro like I want it would probably be while deployed and they didn't say they could ship it or that if I ordered it from THEM that I wouldn't pay tax.

Though I would like to order from them.

I'd like that very much.

It would be nice to support a small shop like this one and say that there is a market for this kind of stuff.

Perhaps I could email him from the desert and organize a mail-order.

When I went in there was a kid carrying out a 27" imac. His mother/grandmother referred to it as his toy and it blew me away. Here I am, 26, trying to convince my wife that a Mac is what I need to be able to jump into audio recording and hopefully not break a computer like I seem to have a knack for and this 15 year old kid is getting a "toy" from his relatives.

The manager of the store said that a soldier bought a macbook pro, a real expensive one, and also bought a super duper case. One that costs somewhere around 400.00 that has Kevlar and titanium and all that. In Iraq, while carrying the computer in the case a sniper shot two shots. One ripped the guy's leg right off. The other hit the case. The guy lived and brought the case and macbook in to show that the 400.00 was well spent because nothing on the inside was hurt though the outside looks like... well, like it was shot by a sniper.

The afternoon off was a big thing for me. Kim likes to think that me going to work is a break and I don't want one from the family or kids which just isn't true. I think everyone needs a little time to themselves and always try to give Kim that time because she's a little more vocal about needing it. When I told her it would be nice for ME to have a personal day she sat back and said it honestly hadn't occurred to her that I would want one.

Driving back, with the sun coming down from its apex, music up loud and going a bit faster than I should have, I was having a good time.

And I didn't spend a dime. Not even on a book I want to get called Love Is A Mix Tape.

So I got home, took Kim's library books back, took Annie to the park where no less than seven ladybugs landed on my shirt (must be the color), burned the living hell ut of some pork chops in the last grill of the season, and after putting the kids down for their sleep settled in for a good forty minutes of reading God's Middle Finger, a travel book about the Sierra Madre mountain range in Mexico. Very entertaining. Doing coke with cops, being chased by armed gunmen who want to kill you because they're bored, watching fat prostitutes (mucha carne) strut by batting eyelashes because no Mexican girl apparently feels bad about themselves and every one is confident in their looks, all of this makes for some great reading.

So yeah, big day.