Living in the key of E

Finally, after a week of having no high-E string, my guitar is back to her normal self. I got a new pack of strings just as Tom Lee was closing (phew...I would have had to wait ANOTHER long weekend if I missed out), and reclothed my baby. If you have an Ibanez, you know the pain in the arse it could be replacing your strings. My Ibe has a free tremolo unit, so tuning one string will change the tension on all the other strings. Also, you have to replace each string individually (no taking all 6 off, then putting on new ones...haha bad idea: if you release the tension on the tremolo, all the springs go out of wack). I learned the hard way last time I replaced my strings to be gentle as your tightening a new string into place. Every half turn of the tuning knob I pull the string away from the fretboard and run a finger under it for the whole length to 'pre-stretch' it. That way, no busting a string as your replacing it (happened to me with that nasty high-E before). I love the sound and feel of new strings. However, I'm getting weird harmonics on my D-string. I think one of the harmonics sounding is resonating with something on my guitar, and it sounds very odd (my mind goes back to wave equations and graphs in first year physics, ugh). But, the pickups don't seem to be catching much of the sound, so it's fine with the amp turned up. (By the way, I'm not talking about the sound of a played-with-finger harmonics.)

On another note, our college group at church was surprisingly good tonight. Our new approach with this new year seems to have a lot going for it. The time and effort which went into planning the evening actually showed in how good it was. But, alas, the question is whether it can be continued. Tune in next week...

And the final note in today's triad is about DVD-RWs. I decided to pick up a few DVD-RWs on my way back from Tom Lee, as I'm becoming paranoid about the amount of time my computer has gone without being destroyed by a virus. I once lost everything I had (mostly un-backed up) back in high school when that nasty Chernobyl virus hit. So I come home hoping that XP can use DVD-RWs as easily as it can CD-RWs. Wrong. Eventually, I figured InCD will do the trick, and that took a good 45 mins to get the CD key working. But eventually everything worked, and I got my life backed up on a shiny laser-engraved disc. Yummy.

Oh yeah, happy new year. Now I actually have to look at the date on cheques marked 2005 instead of throwing them back as postdated (yes life can be lame when you work at a bank). That's the significance of 'new years' to me. A far cry from those wonderful celebrations of new years back in the ancient near east I got to read about in school, with their recitals (of Enuma Elish, great story) and drama and feasts. But then again, when you think your liturgy is actually part of the process of recreating the world again and again, year after year, so it doesn't fall into chaos, that kind of celebration is what you'd tend to get.

And to let you know, comments have been set to no registration required (since so many punks seem to be on that ugly looking Xanga stuff).

Go donate money for tsunami relief.
Peace.