Friday, June 28, 2002

Vacation

My vacation from my day job starts in about 20 minutes. I will not be at a computer much next week, so updates may be thin. If you get to Jonesin' for something good, just check the archive.

According to the prophecy of: Billy Rhythm [Link]

Strange dreams...

I've had a rash of strange dreams recently. Last night, I dreamed I was dating Nicole Kidman. We were comming home from somewhere, along with my good friend Al Pacino. Outside our house, Nicole's Granfather is stumbling around drunk. So, we invite him inside our house, which is a ranch style, master bedroom all the way to the end. We all end up talking down there. Al and I step outside the room for a minute. When we come back in, there's Gramps raping Nicole! (My girlfriend!) So we (Al Pacino and I) grab him and pull him off Nicole. We discuss what we should do with him, and I have the great idea that we should cut his ear off! So I hold Gramps in a sort of half nelson, while Al starts to sawing on his ear with a single edged razor blade. Al's about half way through his ear, when I think it would be a good idea to stop, and let Gramps live with his ear kinda dangling.

Then I woke.

According to the prophecy of: Billy Rhythm [Link]

More on the Pledge

It seems that Mr. Newdow has tried to get the Pledge changed before. When he was in Flordia, he tried a lawsuit against President Clinton, the U.S. Congress, and the School Board of Broward County. It seems his case was thrown out because his daughter wasn't even in school yet. He had another law suit thown out when he tried to get Geo. W. Bush from making statements about his faith.

(Edit) And about that lawsuit about Geo. W. Bush. "Newdow suggested the committee could be ordered to ban clergy from the guest list or to not let them speak (at presidential inaugurations)." (Source here.) Yeah, that's real Constitutional--banning people to speak!

According to the prophecy of: Billy Rhythm [Link]

Wednesday, June 26, 2002

Sorry, Ron

Hey TU! It seems the rest of your political cohorts aren't with you on this. Senate votes 99-0 to condem 9th circuit court's decision.

According to the prophecy of: Billy Rhythm [Link]

Under God

I Pledge Allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands, one Nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

According to the prophecy of: Billy Rhythm [Link]

Monday, June 24, 2002

Should I buy another drum set?

We played Friday nite, and Saturday morning, and Saturday nite. The plan was to pick up Blind Al at 8:30 Saturday morning, play the gig at 10 am, then go to Portland and hang for the day. While I was waiting for Blind Al Saturday morning, I leafed through his Sam Ash music catalogue. They had the Pearl Rhythm Traveler for $299. That's cheap. I thought I could pick one up and use it for practices and jams. So I called Northern Kingdom Music, the best music store in the world. (I once bought something from someone else, only to find out that Harvey could of got me the same thing for the same price. Now, before I buy any equipment, I check with them.) They couldn't come close. (Or so they thought.) So, I went to Sam Ash to order one. Now, here's the kicker. Shipping is $65! That's outrageous! So I called Northern Kingdom again. They can get me one, with cymbals (albeit cheap ones) for about $400. That's only $35 more, comes with cheesy cymbals, and I get it locally. That's aight!

Oh, and sorry for the lack of posts. I've been busy. This last weekend started 11 straight weekends in a row of gigs. Weekend updates may proove to be somewhat rare.

According to the prophecy of: Billy Rhythm [Link]

Thursday, June 20, 2002

A Brautigan poem

Someday, I will write a poem this good.

According to the prophecy of: Billy Rhythm [Link]

Wednesday, June 19, 2002

2 cigars in one week?!

See what I had for lunch today?

According to the prophecy of: Billy Rhythm [Link]

Monday, June 17, 2002

My girl, cigars, and whatnot

This is my little girl, along with her friend Taylor. Aren't they both wicked sweet!

Tonight I finally smoked that cigar that someone brought me from their trip to Honduras. It was well constructed, burned not to hot - not to cool, and had decent flavor. The wrapper wan't as full flavored as I like, but hey!

My new browser of choice? Mozilla. Not good on the Mac. Really not good. But very fast on my PC. It responds like Opera, but feels just like Netscape. An A+.

Chick Bailey gave me another drum today! A big 15" Ludwig Stainless Steel marching snare with gut snares. I've not got it tuned well yet; it's my first snare with catgut snares. It needs to be hit hard in order to get good sound out of it.

According to the prophecy of: Billy Rhythm [Link]

Sunday, June 16, 2002

New WFL picture

While I had my Dad's digital camera, I took a shot of my WFLs again,this time with the "new" splash cymbal holder in place.

According to the prophecy of: Billy Rhythm [Link]

Macquarium Tanks

I built 5 Macquarium tanks this weekend, and cleaned out 2 Mac shells.

According to the prophecy of: Billy Rhythm [Link]

Science Quiz

Ron from RA linked to this science quiz.
Here's how I did.

"Thanks for taking our quiz. You answered 89% of the questions correctly."

I only missed one. Here's the one I missed:

"9. A 10-liter sample of CO2 gas contains the same number of molecules as how many liters of O2 gas at the same temperature and pressure?
c. 20 liters is not correct. The correct answer is:
b. 10 liters.
36 percent of students answered correctly."

According to the prophecy of: Billy Rhythm [Link]

Friday, June 14, 2002

My new Macquarium Page

Billy Rhythm and his Macquarium Project!

Done becuase Ron was tired of fielding the Macquarium questions.

According to the prophecy of: Billy Rhythm [Link]

Tama Rosewood Snare for auction

Now This Tama rosewood snare is a strange beast. Most rosewoods of this era had brass/gold hardware. This one has brass rims, and chrome hardware. I've never seen chrome hardware on a rosewood of this vintage.

According to the prophecy of: Billy Rhythm [Link]

Thursday, June 13, 2002

The Unexplained

Whilst rummaging around The Castle of Spirits, and reading up on the Ouija board, I heard (and I am not making this up) the sound of rattled breaths, and the sounds of a young child. Weird.

Update!!! The customer out front had a baby in a carrier that I could not see. It's all explainable after all!

PS. I should also mention that this all came about because of the Haunted eBay Photo.

According to the prophecy of: Billy Rhythm [Link]

Tuesday, June 11, 2002

Happy Anniversary

Happy anniversary to my beloved wife. 8 years she's been married to that slob. How she does it is beyond me.

According to the prophecy of: Billy Rhythm [Link]

Maybe I'm simple, or maybe just a racist

Here's the way I see it. Maybe I'm simple, or maybe I'm just a racist. In any event, if I were to move to France, I would expect to learn French. I wouldn't expect the country of France to reprint everything for me in English. Likewise, if you want to move here, have at it. But here in the US, we speak English. You don't have to speak English if you don't want. But don't have a cow because everything's not handed to you in your native language.

According to the prophecy of: Billy Rhythm [Link]

Monday, June 10, 2002

More search engine madness

If you search Google for "electric valve trombone," you get no results. That's too bad. I knew that lyric was from a Dave Frishberg tune, but I couldn't remember which one. So I'll add this post, and google will index it, so next time someone searches for "electric valve trombone," I'll be the only one to come up!

The tune was "Just a Useless Waltz." The lyric?

"We'll take it up a half a tone/
Ovedub electric valve trombone/
It's well produced, with no apparent faults/
But what's the use, it's still a useless waltz."

According to the prophecy of: Billy Rhythm [Link]

Search Engine Strangeness

Timpani pedal fetish. Nice! Number one! I'm also high in the ranking for brake pedal fetish. I had no idea a site mainly about drums would draw in so many pedal fetish pervs. (I of course mean pervs in a kind, pedal loving kind of way.)

According to the prophecy of: Billy Rhythm [Link]

Friday, June 7, 2002

Being For The Benefit of Mr Kite

Here is an actual reproduction (whatever that may mean) of the circus poster from whence John Lennon somewhat lifted the lyrics for the song "Being for the Benefit of Mr. Kite" found on Sgt Peppers.

According to the prophecy of: Billy Rhythm [Link]

Thursday, June 6, 2002

My Blogger Code

Here's my Blogger code.

B5 d t+ k s+ u-- f i o++ x-- e+ l++ c--

For the code breaker, go here.

According to the prophecy of: Billy Rhythm [Link]

Wednesday, June 5, 2002

A link, a link!

Someone has linked back to me! It seems someone else got the shaft from Bank of America, and they linked back to me. Thank you, Amanda!

According to the prophecy of: Billy Rhythm [Link]

I have the blues

I can't sing. I can't play drums that much better than some high schooler. My weblog has spelling errors in it. I use e.g. and i.e. incorrectly. Only about 3 people in the world really and truly like me; the rest just tolerate me. My truck is broke down. My dog's been dead a long, long time. I sleep with one eye open for fear my wife may cut me up with a broken bottle.

Perhaps a little chocolate is in order...

I been down so long/
Bottom looks like up.

Atlanta Jones
Bluesman, and player of a big, yellow fiddle.

According to the prophecy of: Billy Rhythm [Link]

Tuesday, June 4, 2002

Kiss Condoms

Disturbing. Rocker Gene Simmons of Kiss getting into the condom business.

According to the prophecy of: Billy Rhythm [Link]

Monday, June 3, 2002

Thank you, Chick Bailey

Chick Bailey. His name is synonomous with Jazz drumming here in the midcoast. At 79, he's been playing drums for a lot of years. He recently became a customer of MIS, and when he stopped in, we had a good little talk. we'd played together before: he plays for the Lincolnville Band, and I play for the Midcoast Community Band. In he past, I mentioned that I was a fan of vintage drums. He owns a vintage set or two. So he asked if I might like some old drum parts that he had kicking around. Would I! So today, he brought me a grab bag full of drum parts. He mentioned that if anything ever happened to him, his wife would just think his whole drum collection is junk. (I can relate! My wife would have now idea what was worth something, and what was worthless..) So he's decided to give most of it to someone who will love it. He's also promised me a set of Slingerland congas (!) and a 15" cymbal.

Oh, and his vintage kit? A 1963 Ludwig in Oyster Black Pearl (the "Ringo" finish) win a 20" kick, two 12" rack toms (2 rack toms of the same size were popular when having 2 rack toms first came about), 14", 16" and 20" floor toms! And a matching snare! This set is really worth quite a few dollars in this finish, as ringo made it so popular. Strange enough, he bought this kit before the Beatles hit it.

According to the prophecy of: Billy Rhythm [Link]

Zoot Suit

Here's me in my zoot suit.

According to the prophecy of: Billy Rhythm [Link]

The prettiest girl on the web can be seen exclusively on this site. More photos in "More" section.

Set this day by the hand of Billy Rhythm [Link] [Get More Here]