Up, heater on.

 Another cold morning.

I practised my three instruments yesterday. 2 1/2 hours in total. I won't be expecting me to do every instrument every day, but I will be giving preference to the violin. 

Today's plan: 

- Take Shelley to 'balance'.

- Haircut.

- Go for a walk.

- Practice.

- Go to the supermarket.

- Pick up the boy from childcare.

C E G Eb - Eb G Bb F# - F# A# C# A - A C# E C 

This is a John Coltrane lick. It works over C7 or C7b9. It's made up of notes from the diminished scale starting on a semitone - C Db D# E F# G A Bb C. Bear in mind that I'm using some enharmonic notes there.

Enharmonic?

A# = Bb, Db = C#, etc.

I mention that for anyone who is not schooled up on music theory.

Peter's last post was hardly a post.

In a time when Rob has buggered off overseas you'd think that this is a good time for Peter to help out by writing some posts. He did sort of try with a post named *** POST CANCELLED ***. He starts off by mentioning some guy called Martin Heidegger, then he writes, "But, blow me down, today has sprung (well, Autumn really) a surprise in the form of blue sky and sunshine so no Heideggerian posers for you readers today I'm sorry. I'm off for a nice walk and hopefully some tennis in the afternoon.
Auf Wiedersehen." And, along with a silly picture, that's it!

There was a silly comment under the picture
but we won't bother with that.

This is why you're better off coming to Richard's Bass Bag.*

Okay, I think I'll start the day with some guitar practice, followed by a short walk.

Ciao tutti.

* the original bass bagging site

Welcome back, old friend.

 I have decided to start practising my guitar again.

Yes, I know, that's three instruments I have to practise now. I have two guitars, but the one shown here is my favourite. It makes such a great sound. It's a small instrument, I think it's called a box guitar. There is nothing small about its sound. When I bought it, quite a few years ago, I had a pickup installed. My plan is to do most of my guitar practice in the evening, though time will tell. Why the evening? Well, hopefully it will take over the time I waste sitting on the couch and looking at Facebook. Don't worry, my violin will still occupy first position.

Obviously, I'll still be working on my double bass pieces too.

Here's an old video of my Gretsch in action.

Hey, that was quite a few years ago!

What's happening around the blogs.

Nothing really. Rob has buggered off overseas and, as you know, we only get the occasional post from Peter - normally about something in his house, like fixed windows, or a video of a song he likes. Don't worry though, Richard's Bass Bag* will be here for your reading enjoyment!

Well, that's about it from me this morning. I think I might put in a bit of time on my guitar.

Enjoy your Sunday and stay away from Catholic churches. Hey, it's only a mortal sin for not going to mass.

Ciao.

* the original bass bagging site

Morning has broken - just.

 I'm dressed and my heater is on.

No post from Rob this morning. Obviously nothing from Peter.

I plan to drop off some feijoas at Peter's at about 11.20am today. It doesn't matter if he's out walking or picking up things from his storage unit to sell, I'll leave them by his front door. It'll be a roundabout trip because I have to drop Shelley at 'balance'* and then pick her up at midday. I think, from memory, it's Lynn who really likes feijoas and not Peter. Peter prefers a pie but I'm not giving mine away.

Tomorrow morning I pick up Rob and L at 7am to take them to the airport. They're off to the Philippines. A big adventure for Rob that will probably mean no blog posts for a while. Though maybe he can still post from over there? Only his god knows.

"I know, but I'm not telling you."

I'm practising my 30 memorised tunes at the moment. I don't mean right now, I mean during practice time. I must get some double bass done too. You'll remember that I have 6 solo pieces, written by me, that I'm working on. I have no gigs, for either of my instruments, on the horizon. I guess this is why people take up busking, particularly as they get older. 

I have written this post without using RZ. Remember I told you about RZ in my last post? Ah well, if you didn't read the post, that's your problem.

That's it, I'm off.

Ciao tutti.

* Exercise for old(er) people at our local library.

A B C D E F G H I The truth behind AI.

 I see that bloggers around here have been looking into AI. In reality they're like musicians who only play in one key.

AI covers nine letters of the alphabet (A 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 I) and can really start on any letter. Let's take Peter's name - P Q R S T U V W X. Now let's look at Rob's - R S T U V W X Y Z. So, Peter should be using PX and Rob should be using RZ. I think that the old blogger boys should look into this.

* * *

Yesterday was quite a busy day, but I did manage to get 1 1/2 hours of practice done. 30 minutes of that was on the double bass. Not too bad. As you may know, I'm really into playing my violin like a singer. At our recent PBs jam we played a lot of tunes that no one had practised or played before. Daryl (on bass) was onto it, but I noticed that the other three boys were struggling a bit and two of them spent quite a bit of time playing percussion instruments. Playing like a singer gives your playing a whole new dimension. Though, I did notice that the lady who sang with us sang songs that she knew in keys she felt comfortable with. I played on every song, as did Daryl. I played a lot of melodies that I had never played before. No one said, "Well done, Rich." I guess they all had egos to look after. 

I'm presently making sure that all of my 30 tune repertoire is well memorised. If I ever get to play it anywhere, I won't have any written music in front of me. Actually, there were only four tunes that I didn't have fully memorised already. I've done some work on those.

* * *

Okay, okay, I admit it! I did use RZ to write my musical bit of the post today. 

That's it from me.

Enjoy your day and don't waste time worrying about sin. Especially if you're not a Catholic.

Ciao tutti.

Some interesting thoughts for all you readers.

 

BLANK

Sorry, but I have to go to work.

Ciao.

Another cold morning.

 

Again, not my actual heater.

I'm off to work soon. The car warms up when I climb the Nui hill. I'll look forward to that. 

Rob heads overseas on Saturday, to a place that has week weeks. "Here's where we will be based. In the second week week go to a little island resort for 3 days at the very top of Panay." Maybe they use a different form of English there? Sort of like how Americans talk about sidewalks and spell things differently. 

Peter wrote a short post yesterday. He seems to have a thing about a guy named Samuel Beckett. Ah well, it keeps him busy. Remember that Peter is the guy who uses the phrase, "For cough." I assume that means, "For a cough." Maybe he meant 'far cough' and just forgot to proofread again?

Okay, I'm off to work.

Ciao.

Monday morning and it's cold.

 

Not my actual heater, but you get the idea.