All Is Quiet On New Year's Day
HAPPY NEW YEARS folks. It's 2007....as if you didn't know. Today is the last day of "holidays" for me. It's sometimes strange for me to have time off because (as most musicians will attest) my job never really stops. Ever. It's not like there's a clock that we punch and go home at the end of the day. Music, like a young child, demands constant attention. I have forever a list of things that must get done: technique, tunes, transcriptions, my book, lesson preperation, composition, listening, etc.....so why the hell are you spending time blogging?????? Good question but that too is music related too in a round about way. I think I have a good ethic when it comes to practicing and time management, so I don't mind throwing a little blog up once and while.
This "holiday" was in fact the closest thing I've had to down time in a while. My regular Sunday (Republic with Retrofit), Monday, and Tuesday (Bar None with Soulstream) fell on holidays (Christmas Eve, Christmas Day, Boxing Day, New Year's Eve, and New Year's Day) so there was really NO GIGS! Trust me I'm not trying to brag here, but I work quite a bit and not to have a gig in 12 days has never really happened before.
This allowed me some great down time and a chance to catch up on writing my instructional book. A while back somehow, the introduction and Chapter 1 mysteriously disappeared from my hard drive. I went out the next day and bought a back up drive. Luckily, I had a printed version of it. I figured I could scan it in and maybe there was a program that could convert PDF files into word documents. After much searching, I found one. I bought it and then realized it was only for PC. No problem, I emailed the PDFs to myself and I opened them on my brother's PC....it didn't work. So I ended up back at square one. The good news however was that I figured out how to import the music graphics from the program that I use (Syballius' G7 program) into word. This was an amazing discovery because it means that I can do all of the musical graphics and examples for my book myself! So I've now gone back through everything and started putting the musical examples that I had in mind when originally writing the text; this has made rewriting the intro and Chapter 1 a little more endurable.
I have also been able to find my running legs again after a long recovery from the marathon. Don't get me wrong, I've been running regularly but just not the distances that I was doing with ease pre-marathon. I never knew how much of a toll a marathon would have on your body. It's only recently that I've been able to break the 2 hour mark again and to do that weekly is almost impossible. The goal this year is 3:15 and qualify for Boston. Seriously. I think I'm going to skip the spring marathon and only do the Scotiabank half marathon and focus on a fast fall/winter marathon....maybe Las Vegas. This means an intense amount of training between now and then. I finished my first marathon (Victoria) in 4 hours albeit injured. In top shape I could've shaved 15 or 20 minutes, but certainly not 45. That's the goal between now and fall. If I do qualify for Boston it would mark my first return there since I lived there.
I have also included a little snowboarding in the holidays. I did a warm-up at Cypress on Wednesday night and then I was in Whistler Thursday and Friday playing the Chateau Whistler's staff party. They gave us a special room rate and I brought the board and went on Friday. There was a blizzard but it was fun nonetheless. I think I've raised my snowboarding status from "OK" to "Not Bad".
A last little item of note is the Christmas gift to myself of a Vox AC-30. This is the same amp used by the Beatles and The Edge. I had read great things about their tone and when I opened for Heart, their guitar player had a row of them. While in Tom Lee, I tried one and melted immediately. I had a gig at the Commodore the next day and decided to see if Long and McQuade would rent me one...."Uh, yeah. We don't rent THOSE, but we have a 30 day money back guarantee if you don't like it." Hmmm. OK. It's pretty sweet. I am having one little issue with it however. A high whistle occassionally, maybe a microphonic tube or something. So, I'm gonna bring it back and have them look at it. Otherwise, it's great!
Alright. Lots to do, I AM on holidays after all.
This "holiday" was in fact the closest thing I've had to down time in a while. My regular Sunday (Republic with Retrofit), Monday, and Tuesday (Bar None with Soulstream) fell on holidays (Christmas Eve, Christmas Day, Boxing Day, New Year's Eve, and New Year's Day) so there was really NO GIGS! Trust me I'm not trying to brag here, but I work quite a bit and not to have a gig in 12 days has never really happened before.
This allowed me some great down time and a chance to catch up on writing my instructional book. A while back somehow, the introduction and Chapter 1 mysteriously disappeared from my hard drive. I went out the next day and bought a back up drive. Luckily, I had a printed version of it. I figured I could scan it in and maybe there was a program that could convert PDF files into word documents. After much searching, I found one. I bought it and then realized it was only for PC. No problem, I emailed the PDFs to myself and I opened them on my brother's PC....it didn't work. So I ended up back at square one. The good news however was that I figured out how to import the music graphics from the program that I use (Syballius' G7 program) into word. This was an amazing discovery because it means that I can do all of the musical graphics and examples for my book myself! So I've now gone back through everything and started putting the musical examples that I had in mind when originally writing the text; this has made rewriting the intro and Chapter 1 a little more endurable.
I have also been able to find my running legs again after a long recovery from the marathon. Don't get me wrong, I've been running regularly but just not the distances that I was doing with ease pre-marathon. I never knew how much of a toll a marathon would have on your body. It's only recently that I've been able to break the 2 hour mark again and to do that weekly is almost impossible. The goal this year is 3:15 and qualify for Boston. Seriously. I think I'm going to skip the spring marathon and only do the Scotiabank half marathon and focus on a fast fall/winter marathon....maybe Las Vegas. This means an intense amount of training between now and then. I finished my first marathon (Victoria) in 4 hours albeit injured. In top shape I could've shaved 15 or 20 minutes, but certainly not 45. That's the goal between now and fall. If I do qualify for Boston it would mark my first return there since I lived there.
I have also included a little snowboarding in the holidays. I did a warm-up at Cypress on Wednesday night and then I was in Whistler Thursday and Friday playing the Chateau Whistler's staff party. They gave us a special room rate and I brought the board and went on Friday. There was a blizzard but it was fun nonetheless. I think I've raised my snowboarding status from "OK" to "Not Bad".
A last little item of note is the Christmas gift to myself of a Vox AC-30. This is the same amp used by the Beatles and The Edge. I had read great things about their tone and when I opened for Heart, their guitar player had a row of them. While in Tom Lee, I tried one and melted immediately. I had a gig at the Commodore the next day and decided to see if Long and McQuade would rent me one...."Uh, yeah. We don't rent THOSE, but we have a 30 day money back guarantee if you don't like it." Hmmm. OK. It's pretty sweet. I am having one little issue with it however. A high whistle occassionally, maybe a microphonic tube or something. So, I'm gonna bring it back and have them look at it. Otherwise, it's great!
Alright. Lots to do, I AM on holidays after all.
posted by Hammer at 12:22 PM
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