A Vintage Guitar God I’d Never Heard Of

I was just surfing around YouTube, looking at different music videos of guitar players, and came upon one guy name Tommy Emmanuel.  He’s simply amazing.  My daughter has taken to teaching herself guitar these days, and I told her she should learn to play Classical Gas, just because it’s one of the amazing vintage guitar songs I remember from my youth.  In my search, I see that the most viewed version of the song is by this Tommy Emmanuel guy.  So, I give it a listen, and damn but is this guy good.  Energetic, and fast as well.  I’m now listening to a playlist of his songs on YouTube while I write this post.  It’s currently playing a duet he does with J.Shimabukuro on mandolin of the George Harrison classic “While My Guitar Gently Weeps”.  It’s a really beautiful rendition of a great tune.  My favorite so far, has to be an improv he does, where he tells the audience in concert that he is going to playing Classical Gas, but keeps breaking into other favorite tunes every few bars or so.  It’s in incredible ad lib by a true genius of the guitar.  The internet never ceases to amaze be by showing me how much I don’t know.  This guys has been playing since 1962, and I never heard of him till like 30 minutes ago.  Wow!

A Bulldozer Tank?

What’s the difference between a bulldozer, and a tank?  Well, to some people not too much.  While a bulldozer is generally considered a tool to be used for constructing and building things, that’s not to suggest that they can’t be used for destructive purposes.  There’s the much documented case of a few years ago, feature the “killdozer”.  In small town USA, there was a rather disgruntled business man, that was basically pissed at just about everyone in his home town.  From certain bussiness partners to the local city council, he had a axe to grind.  So, he took an old Caterpillar bulldozer, and totally armored the vehicle and went on a rampage destroy property including entire buildings that were owned by anyone who had crossed him in the past.  While that may be a inappropriate use of a bulldozer / tank, there have been some more legitimate uses in history.  The Israeli have used armored bulldozers to locate and disarm land mines, and tear down buildings that were of military strategic advantage to its’ adversary’s.  The bulldozers were impervious to all kinds of weapons including machine guns.

Trimble GPS Is Coming To Your Cellphone

Everyone knows what GPS is, but how many average consumers know the brand name Trimble?  Chances are not that many, but that could change soon.  As location based technology invades the personal cell phone market, more and more people will know Trimble, and use it.  Location based technology, means you can do things like know where are you friends are within a few meters, because their cell phone tells you so.   Those among the privacy paranoid brigade will be freaked out by this, but those who aren’t can see all the good uses for this kind of stuff.  A few years ago back in 2006, Nokia signed an agreement with Trimble to incorporate their GPS tech into Nokia cell phones.  Last year, Blackberry did the same thing incorporating Trimble GPS innovation into the Blackberry 8830 and 8130.  Apart from the personal location type stuff, you can also use your phone as a GPS for navigating, travelling, hiking, geocaching, or whatever other outdoor activity, you happen to participate in.  It’s pretty cool stuff.  Trimble is a great company to partner with for this sort of stuff, as they’ve been doing industrial strength GPS hardware, software, infrastructure, and networks for years now.  It’s pretty exciting to see where this goes.  If the location type tech sounds a little murky, just check out one of the last scenes in the new Batman movie, where Batman get’s to see where all the bad guys are, no matter where they go, by using a network of hacked into cell phones.

Chainsaw Carving Is Dangerous

I’m sure, that everyone has seen those old tree stumps carved into all kinds of outdoorsy sort of scenes and creatures.  Bears, raccoons, eagles, mermaids, or even dolphins.  I even had an old stump on my front lawn, I was thinking of getting carved into a light post.  I figured it would be pretty easy to hook it up to a solar power light that would give something a little unique to the neighbourhood.  It never happened, but it seemed like a good idea at the time.  It’s quite a tricky skill, to carve something so amazing using a tool like a chainsaw.  I suppose the trick, is to use a sharp chainsaw.  Even former rock stars, have been know to do chainsaw carvings.  Who knew it was such a popular activity amongst so many folks.

Don’t Build ‘Em Like They Used To

How often have we heard this phrase.  Generally speaking, it’s an unwarranted knock on the quality of current assembly line products, with too much plastic, and not enough craftmanship put into them.  I tend to bristle at comments like those, as I think they’re mostly just made by people longing for the good old days.  I do believe, that there is just a larger variety of products available these days, at all different levels of quality.  If people choose to buy the cheapest product, built in some country with less skilled craftsman, then they’ve got no business complaining in my books.  I’m also a big believer in technological advancement applied to the production of anything.  Cub cadet tractors seem to fall into this category, of being built better in long past years.  It’s a bit unwarranted I think.  Although, I would have a hard time convincing owners of older Cub Cadet tractors blades, built by the original manufacturer International Harvester.  Originally, they were built for the blossoming number of larger home owners, that were still farmers at hear.  You can take the boy off the farm, but you can’t take the farm out of the boy.  Just that fact, that Cub Cadets are still manufactured today, says something for their longevity.

The Melding Of Metals

If your looking for a good welder, be sure not to jump at the first one you find, or the cheapest one you find.  There’s generally a good reason why it’s so cheap.  Unless, it’s because the seller doesn’t know the value of the welder he has, you may want to look around a little longer.  If it is a case of the seller not knowing the value of his product, that jump on that deal right away.  The first thing to consider, is how much amperage your welding unit will need to supply.  Generally, the more amperage, the thicker the steel you can weld.  A 180 amp welder can weld as think as 7.5mm of steel, whereas a 90 amp welder will likely only do a thickness of 2 mm.  This number of course depend on whether your doing, for instance a butt weld requires more amps per thickness than a V weld of the same thickness.  Check out the reputation of different welder manufacturers.  Lincoln welders have been manufactured for close to a hundred years in the US, and are considered on of the better makes.  Miller and Hobart and ESAB, are a few other manufactures with solid reputations.  It’s hard to get a bad welder from any of those manufacturers.

A Strong Tailwind

If your a biker (bicycler, not motorbiker), then you can really appreciate the benefit of having a good tail wind.  Conversely, you can also appreciate the challenge of pushing through a strong head wind.  If I’m in a hurry to get somewhere, I know I’d want a strong tailwind.  Using that as my initial analogy, I’d like to segue into a discussion on green power.  While that may be a bit of a stretch, it’s really not.  Wind power, is one of the most promising forms of energy on the horizon.  And, we are in a bit of a race.  That we being, every single person on the planet, and that race being our desperate need to reduce reliance on dirty energy.  Energy like fossil fuels, coal, and nuclear energy.  While many may argue over the dangers both real and imagined from those forms of energy, in the long run, we’d all be better off if we could get by without them.  Wind is a naturally occurring, ever present, and totally self renewable source of energy.  There’s no denying those facts.  Where there is some controversy, is what is the best means to harness wind energy.  Does it make sense to put wind turbines in every home?  Does it make sense to build even larger wind generators, and place them in farmers fields, along shore lines, or in the middle of the ocean?  While I’m sure our first few attempts will be filled with mistakes, the biggest mistake would be to give up trying.  The longer we stick with it, the better the chances are for a viable wind energy strategy.

Why Pay A Pro To String Your Racquet

It doesn’t matter if you play badminton, tennis, racquetball, or squash.  Eventually your going to break the strings in your racquet, and need to either buy a new racquet, or get your old racquet restrung.  If your racquet is just a cheap racquet, and you only paid around $50 for it, the $35 or more for stringing may seem to be hardly worthwhile.  Well, in that case, having a professional string your racquet may not be worth it.  Unless, you consider that your original racquet basically becomes junk with broken strings.  So, many people just pay the price and have the stringing job done.  If you happen to have a more expensive racquet that you paid upwards of $200 for, then the restringing fee may seem reasonable.  Of course, if you go through this scenario enough times, you may consider another option.  That is , buying your own stringing machine, doing your own strings.  You may be put off by that prospect, because you don’t want to spend the time learning how to string, or you think stringing machines are too expensive.  Well, you may be surprised on both fronts.  You can get a decent stringing machine  for personal use for about $300.  Plus, once you’ve done a racquet or two, you’ll find you can string a racquet in 30-60 minutes depending on the quality of your machine.  And, since the price of string is only about a third of the total professional stringing fee, you may find that stringing your own racquets can save you some money in the long run.

Riding A Skid Steer Is Fun

Just don’t get too crazy, and get your self hurt. While a skid steer (bobcat), can have a very practical side, there’s no denying they can be a lot of fun to bomb around in. They’re not particularly fast (then do have treads you know), but they are extremely versatile. Given that each of the wheels, or drive mechanisms can be independently controlled, these machines can virtually turn on a dime. They’re great for a wide range of terrains, as if one or two wheels can’t get traction, then the other 2, or 1 can pull you through. I even saw a video, of a guy popping forward wheelies with a skid steer. He basically, used the front end loader, to pull the weight of the skid steer forward just enough to tip it up on it’s front two wheels, but not have it fall over. He then proceeded, to drive around on those front two wheels doing figure eights, and all kinds of fancy moves. A clear case of a driver with a little too much time on his hands. What I’d really like to see, is some skid steer races. You could have a lot of fun with that. Maybe racing, while balancing a load. Like a carton of eggs or something. First vehicle across the line with the least amount of broken eggs wins the race

Go Get Yourself Some Online Learning

Time for procrastination, that MBA or bachelors of sports psychology is yours for the taking, so stop talking and take some action.  With the abundance of online universities popping up all over the place, and a big nastsy recession staring over every ones shoulder, it’s the perfect time to go back to school  The beauty of taking courses over the internet, could be summed up in one word . . . convenience.  You can schedule your learning to take place at a time that fits into your schedule.  This really opens up the door for those individuals that couldn’t normally find the time to further their education simply because of all the demands their regular life placed on them.  Demands like family and job.  If your family is very young, then that presents a whole different set of demands on your time.   I read an article the other day, that gave some good ideas for balancing family and an online education.  It really does make sense.  Add to the flexibility, the proliferation of online computing devices like smart-phones, and mini laptops/net-books, then you can be doing your school work just about anywhere.  Waiting for a ride, standing in line, or waiting for a doctors appointment could be the perfect time to review some class notes, and edit that essay that’s due tomorrow.