Thursday, October 16, 2008

No strings attached


No strings attached, originally uploaded by epredator.

I finally got around to putting some new strings on my old electric guitar. I bought this strat-alike when I started working as an industrial trainee at IBM in 1988. I have never been very good, atleast at rythm and chords, but I love the blues scale and just freeforming around to find that blue feeling that resonates deep into your soul.
Since the whole guitar hero/rockband thing I have felt the urge to restring and have anotehr tinker with it. Having old strings from atleast 10 years ago does make it tricky. The course layer of rust and oxidized layer basically hurts like hell if you try and slide or bend the strings.
So I said to myself, time to start again. Ordered some strings from amazon and whilst elemming was out tonight and the predlets in bed I gave it a go.
I managed to restring, retune and have enough of a go to make myself start to feel the potential again. My amp was a little unhappy some contacts inside being a bit messed I think.
Still its done, and if I keep the strings shinyby playing then that will be very cool indeed.
Restringing guitar
Now all I have to do is work my soft tipped fingers back into the caloused state again. I remember the blisters and the pain, but when you want to play the blues it sure helps :)

Wednesday, October 15, 2008

Roo on Watchdog


Roo on Watchdog, originally uploaded by nol.

Nick managed to capture this interesting moment of Roo's move into the world of television. That BBC move was always going to lead to this

Monday, October 13, 2008

New phone please.... Experia X1?

My N95 phone contract has expired. That is clearly no secret as I seem to have constant "helpful" phone calls from people in all sorts of weird and wonderful sales organizations that want to move me places. Of course non of these are really worth talking to as I like to pick and choose the tech. it is my job after all. The balances of minutes and texts pale into insignifance when compared to the needs for a good data deal.
Anwyay, I dont think i will wait around for the Google G1 phone. Though I love it's Augmented reality potential as seen in some of the videos showing google streetmap.
I pretty much decided I wanted to move off Nokia. The new N96 is the same as the N95 and i have loved using it, but I need new toys.
An iphone is the obvious choice, but we have one in the house.
So I saw the sony experia X1 and liked the look, the adverts even and the funnyviral ads and videos, the engagement with the web community, they are even on twitter. All good ticks in boxes, to see what has swayed my buying choice.
Also it shipped on 30th September, something Sony Ericcson are very proud of. The trouble is, its not available yet in any of the mobile providers. They seem to be happy to sit on stock, to wait a bit. Bascially this make a mockery of SE releasing anything. Its not a release dataif you cant use it as a member of the public.
Thats all a pity as I do want to change my phone, and in a very Web2.0 way I want to do it now! ;)
So I may not bother, supply chains and marketing departments getting all to controlling for my liking.
Find your passionate supporters and look after them. They will sell the product for you. Let them down, and they will have a huge impact too.