Tales from Pennsylvania

Hello again my faithful (I hope) readers. I am finally back to blogging now that I have the winning combination of 1) a working computer, 2) a working camera and 3) some free time. I've been a little extra busy recently. Last weekend Noah and I played two gigs in Pennsylvania with our friends Jay Ungar and Molly Mason. They are such great people to hang out with. The first concert was in Coudersport where we stayed two nights at the Frosty Hollow Bed & Breakfast, which I would highly recommend if you happen to find yourselves in that neck of the woods anytime soon. The second concert was in Oil City, a little north of Pittsburgh. It was a lot of fun playing with Jay and Molly as always. On the way back we came through the Allegheny National Forest and even though it was cold and rainy, the drive was absolutely beautiful. Now a couple weekends ago we had a not-so-picturesque encounter, also on the road in PA. Check this out...

Is that gross or what!? Some idiot tied two dead deer to the top of their car; there was blood dripping down the sides, all over the widows. Click here for another view (I mean, you don't have to if you want to). Okay, let's stop thinking about that now. Let's see... nothing much happening on the birding front recently. The material for the new CD is coming along nicely though. We've been practicing for a couple hours pretty much every day; tweaking the arrangements, adding tunes or verses to songs, recording demos. It's fun. More info on that soon. Yesterday I borrowed a mandocello from my friend Allen Hopkins. What an instrument! Hope to use that on at least one track. It's tuned just like a cello so the lowest note is a full octave below middle C. A few weeks ago Noah built me this really cool board / case for my guitar pedals. Right now I'm using a Dunlop GCB-95 Cry Baby wah, a Boss OS-2 OverDrive/Distortion, a Boss CE-5 Chorus Ensemble, a Boss DD-6 Digital Delay, a simple boost pedal for bouzouki solos and a Planet Waves tuner through a Fender Blues Jr amp. My guitar is a 1989 American-made Fender Stratocaster. I gotta say, I love my guitar. I got it a couple years ago from a music store in Oswego. The fingerboard was really worn when I got it but I thought it looked cool so I just left it the way it was. I just switched over to the new Beta Blogger and it's working much better now. We have a gig tonight and I'd kind of like to go for a walk or something before I have to go set up so this'll be it for now. This is the picture I've been trying to upload all day...

I love you honey! Thanks for putting up with me. See you tomorrow!