Ting Ho Dung

I knew his brother.

Actually my ducks do run for cover!! How can you tell it's the monsoon season? Ting Ho Dung is pissing in the pool again.

Pretty cool Doc.

Shout it, Shout it, Shout it out loud. Ba Ba Ba Ba Bababa

After talking to Josh about so many things including pickups for a few hours the other day, he suggested I try his Mongoose model in my "Strat." I agreed to give it a shot. Then he called me back a few hours later and asked me color preference and wire preference. I said cream and black with cream on the screw side and 2 wire since I'm not going to split the coils. The pickup arrived just a few days later and this is what I found. So I was thinking, "Okay, no slugs. I guess you can mount it either way." Then I flipped it over. I called Josh back and asked about the pickup because it wasn't quite what I had ordered. I wasn't mad or disappointed, just ever so curious. He said after talking with me about what I wanted to do he custom wound this pickup for me and said it's just a prototype and to try it out that we can tweak it anyway I want to. I made a joke that it must be my signature pickup. He said yes it is and we need to come up with a name because "Thornbucker" is taken by Suhr and Pete Thorn. So I'm thinking about reptilian flavors of pickups. Of course there is always Crown Of Thorns (COT) because I was named after an Archangel.

Just a thought, but you may try walking away from partying first. I partied like a rock star every night since the late '80s. Toughest thing I physically had to do was quit. So glad I did. Quitting may give you perspective for your other questions too. You may also look into home recording. Then you can send all your friends an MP3 or video they can listen to / watch before they go to bed.

Thanks Carl. I'm feeling a lot better and getting more done. That's for sure.

I've been isolated here for a lot longer than the pandemic. Actually got out a lot more during the pandemic because I started gardening about 4 months before it hit. So I met a lot of neighbors who didn't know what it was like to stay home all day. They bought dogs and tennis shoes and walked by every day while I was out front in the garden. There were babies born too. Some of my neighbors' wives are pretty hot too. But I had some extra money from a good year in 2021 and bought a Monaco Elite for me and a Strandberg 8 string for Brandon. I also went back to my roots and bought a Kurzweil SP6. Oh, and I quit drinking in 2021.

Do we still call Dibs? Dibs!

Maybe not but I've been known to flash my nice moobs for beads.

Trigger!

Paul @ptm1diver and I were texting the other day and as an old guy, texting gets to be bothersome. So we went to voice and chatted it up for a couple hours. In the conversation he asked me about my project guitar he had read about. I said I had a few projects and told him about them. One was my new Luna acoustic that could use new tuners and the other is a humbucker Strat needing pickups. Paul said he had a couple new sets of Gravelin pickups and sent me pictures. I didn't know what the sticker abbreviations meant so got on the phone to Josh @JGravelin and we talked for a few hours. After talking with me about what I was trying to achieve he finally suggested I get the second set of pickups which are what he calls Charlotte. They arrived yesterday. I don't believe I've ever seen new pickups before and they are shiney. Included in the package was a brand new set of 3-on-s-side Sperzel locking tuners for my Luna. Thanks Paul for your generosity. I'll be putting these things together in the near future. Rodi @0054 found out I am restoring an '80s Blitz. Some kid had bastardized it with a Floyd at one point and it just didn't quite work out. I never quite new what the problem with the guitar was, I had given it to the kids, but it was an incorrectly mounted Floyd. There are also truss rod issues so it could need the fretboard opened up but I'm hoping that won't be the case once I fill in the Floyd locking nut holes. Rodi sent me a NOS Sustain Block Bridge to bring the Blitz back to glory. The problem was the great big hole that the Floyd left behind. Not a problem, a friend of mine from Dean, Pat Baker, gave me a huge slab of African mahogany to cut and fit. There's enough there in case I don't make it a perfect fit on the first try. Pat is a great guy and if you are ever in the TampaBay area you can get a tour of the Dean facility with Pat. He lives down the street from me and was kind enough to bring this hog home for me. He's also one of the best guitarists I've gotten to know. Look him up on YouTube if you want to get depressed about your playing ability. As you can imagine, this project is going to take a bit of doing. I have a friend with a pretty good work shop who is going to let me use his space and machines. Thanks Rodi for your generosity. @stobro and @JGaleeach sent me a set of 6-in-line tuners for a couple necks I have going on as well. Thank you guys for your generosity. Mark @Jakeboyalso sent me a set of tuners but they are off in USPS lala land. I've filed a missing person's report on them. Thanks Mark. Hopefully they will show up in the mailbox some day. There will always be another neck laying around to put them on. This is just a few guys here at the HFC who have helped me out. So many of you have helped me in one way or another, many of you probably are not even aware of what you have done for me from just being the kind of you that you are. A big thank you, --Ting

I don't know who Stacy Morgan is but I substituted Morgan Freeman's voice and it worked.

Man, I hope so.