The garage is not yet empty. It is, however, closer to being empty than it’s been since the day we moved into the house.

Tomorrow. I’ll finish it off tomorrow.

This piece of wall hasn’t seen light in eight years.

Really Rob? A dumpster? Again?

Not for cleaning this time. It’s for clearing.

It’s Labor Day. The unofficial last day of Summer. The kids go back to school tomorrow. As national holidays go, it’s sort of a bummer. Still, it’s better than going to work. Thank your labor unions for this day.

Last night we got into the spirit of the holiday by having a little cook out. Nobody liked the food I made, but otherwise it was okay. This morning, my beloved wife is continuing the celebration by waking everyone up with pancakes. She rules, I drool.

Happy Labor Day, all you hard working, non-fascist, Americans.

It’s Labor Day weekend. The unofficial end of Summer. Damn it. I love Summer. It is the only season I love from beginning to end. It is the only season I wish would last the whole year. Now it’s ending and I am wicked pissed. The only good thing about the end of Summer is the start of the hockey season. Everything else can KISS MY PASTY WHITE ASS!

This year though, we have some big, big plans for September. First and foremost, we are having some renovations done on the house. We are hoping to turn our garage into a master suite. The plans aren’t final yet but we have a contractor who so far is doing right by us. We are excited and nervous and I still have a lot of stuff to move out of the garage. We’re not sure when work will start but it could be very soon.

The second thing is not as huge a project but makes me feel like less of a hypocrite. We have two cars. One is a 2011 with 152,000 miles on it. The other is a 2013 with 108,000 miles on it. The 2013 is earmarked to be my step son’s first car once he gets his license. The 2011 has already been traded in for a new car. We’re picking it up on Tuesday. The best news, it’s a hybrid. Finally. I’ve been waving this hippie flag since the early 1980’s and I am finally doing something about my carbon footprint.

I’m also going to try and get back on the music recording wagon but we’ll see how that goes. I’ve been saying it for three years after all. I’m going to start with this song by replacing all of the guitars, all of the vocals, reprogramming all of the drums and bass, and changing the tempo and maybe changing the key. I think the electric piano might be a keeper though.

 

 

In closing, this is a picture i took of a light in a tree last night because I guess I just want a picture of something.  Happy cleaning the garage, folks!

 

I asked Gumby why my knees are bothering me today and he had no idea. Useless Gumby.

Is this the last we will see of our trusty, beloved Nissan Altima?

I don’t know… maybe.

John McCain is an American hero and he deserves our respect and thanks. He served his country honorably for decades and his sacrifices are much appreciated by all of us.

I have mixed feelings. When he was continually running for President I never supported him, but he was one of the few Republicans I looked at and thought if they won it might not be so bad. I rarely agreed with his positions but I always had the feeling that he had a good enough head on his shoulders that we could work with him. He seemed like a good man, even if his politics seemed screwy to me.

He stood up to Trump. I will forever be grateful to him for that. However, my mixed feelings come from a totally irrational place. You see, I saw McCain as the one man the non-fascists and non-collaborators and non-appeasers in the Republican party could rally around to stand up to the evil taking over our country. That didn’t happen. Yeah he stood up to Trump, but he didn’t stand up enough… I guess. I said this was all irrational, right? He did a little, but he didn’t do enough. At least not for me. He blocked the insulting “health care” bill but he didn’t do the 50 other things I hoped he would do. Looking back on the last couple of years though, he did more than just about any Republican in Congress. I have to tip my hat to him for that.

Rest in Peace, Senator McCain.

I’m thinking about recording. I started re-recording a bunch of old songs back in 2015. I didn’t finish any of them, but every so often I listen back to rough mixes of guide tracks and I want to pick up where I left off.

One song on the list was from my 2012 RPM. The guitars were clean then, but my guide tracks are a little bit distorted. Not much, just a little hair. The lead parts of overdriven, but again not that much.

What if I were to mic up my Fender Deluxe Reverb and crank the volume up to where it just starts breaking up and use that for the rhythm sound. It would be a first for me as I never let things get that loud at home… and the Deluxe at the break up point is really loud. Really. Loud. Then for the leads, what if I just stopped messing around and dimed that sucker. Full blast. Actual tube amplifier overdrive. Get some tracks down using that. But wait, there’s more. What if instead of just cranking the amp I put a Tube Screamer in front of it with the gain all the way down and the level all the way up. How much more distortion would that push out of the amp? What if I did the leads like that.

What if I recorded some tracks the way all rock and roll tracks were recorded prior to Fender and Marshall (and Vox?) adding master volume controls to their amps?

Oh how my idiot brain likes to freak itself out with obvious things sometimes. Also, oh how my wife is going to hate the volume level coming out of the garage tomorrow. hehe Love you, sweetie!