Aha! Search term!

Just discovered that those chrome pickup guards on my electric bass are called ''ashtray-style'' covers. Aha!

Plugged that in to my search term, and received a lot more useful hits! Woo-hoo!


--GG

Truly was a rare guitar

While waiting for The Lady, here at Uni (she had to go in to finish up some online course-posting things, and I'm watching The Kid -- who's currently asleep), I'm doing my intermittent thing of browsing e-bay for a replacement of my Ibanez Roadstar II electric guitar, which was pinched during the burglary we had a few years back.



I hadn't realized how rare that guitar was. If e-bay is the arbiter of how hard an item is to come by, I simply can't find any versions of that guitar that match mine: all of them listed either have one humbucker, one humbucker with two single-coils, three single-coils, or a pair of humbuckers that look completely different from mine. Plus, mine was pleasantly unusual in that it didn't have a pick guard.



On a similar note, the Austin bass that I lost, with chrome pickup guards shielding the two pickups, also hasn't ever surfaced on e-bay. By ''pickup guards", I mean the chrome thingies like on the Fender Precsision bass photo that I grabbed off e-bay: my bass was black, with a tortiseshell pickguard, and the finger rest (that rectangular block of wood) was on the other side of the strings, and served as a thumb rest). But essentially, that's what my bass looked like.


Ah well: I'll keep looking...


--GG

Coerced by Google-Blogspot

Well, after much resisting, I was finally coerced into switching from the ''Old Blogger'' into the ''New Blogger'' format.

As usual, I clicked on the ''use old version'' button -- but that kept routing me to the ''change to the new blogger'' screen. Gar!

Since I wanted to post a blog, I didn't have much choice, did I?


Ah well: Free service, good interface. Can't complain about ''free'' too much... ;)


--GG

Windows adds insult to injury

So, I'm typing away on my Ph.D. Dissertation (estimated completion for the ''99% good'' draft: March 5th-15th), and suddenly some sort of ''system error'' window gets thrown up on the screen. Uh-oh; not good.

After clicking a few ''OK'' buttons, it's clear that I can't go on. I try doing the Cntrl-Alt-Del thing, but no go -- the PC is locked up too badly. O.k., so I hit the ''Reset'' button on the PC case.

It reboots, and the blue screen helpfully comes up, to say (as per usual):


Because Windows was not properly shut down, one or more of your disk drives may have errors on it.

To avoid seeing this message again, always shut down your computer by selecting Shut Down from the Start menu.


Um -- I have a better idea: I **would** use the ''Shut Down'' option, if you wouldn't lock up on me! Stop freezing up, and I'll do it the right way.

Stop making out like it's my fault.

Stinkin' PC.


My documents don't **seem** corrupted, anyhow. Luckily I reflexively save every minute or so.


--GG

Wonderfully rainy day

Despite still being summer, today was wonderfully rainy -- hearkening back to my groovy-doovy days in Old Seattle. Nicely cool and overcast the whole day, interspersed with showers of varying intensity. Temperature at 4pm was about 75F, with a light breeze -- enough that I was slightly cool in my t-shirt and gym shorts, and had to toss on a flannel shirt.

The photo is out the laundry room window, somewhat towards our house that's nearing completion.


--GG

No job

Well, I didn't get the job. Not surprised, since their immediate needs were much more computer-y than what I could provide: there would have been too much start-up costs, to get me up to speed.

That said, I was flattered to find this out by receiving a phone call from the person in charge, to tell me directly that I didn't get the job. Apparently, I was trumped by some guy with a Computer Science Ph.D. Fair enough.

But, the director lady said that they were all impressed with me; she has several grant applications working their way through the system, and she encouraged me to apply for the relevant positions when they appeared; and she looked forward to working with me in the future.


--GG

Weird wrench

This last weekend, I went to a garage sale and picked up a woodworking vice (light surface rust) for two bucks Australian (about US$1.50). I also picked up this brass-looking wrench (the camera's flash doesn't show the color correctly) for a buck (US$0.75). Also two pulleys; and I fished a black plastic Black & Decker case for a cordless drill out of the skip out in front of the house (clearly, they were sorting through the garage and tossing a lot).

Anyone know the intended use for this thing? Clearly, the design is functional in some manner. Is the brass-ness to prevent sparks (e.g. for working on flammable items)? Has ''GEE-JAY'' stamped into one side.

The woodworking vice, BTW, says it's six inches, ''MADE IN AUSTRALIA'', and has a brand name of ''CARTER''. Don't know if that's a good brand or not, but the screw turns just fine, I've been needing to buy a WW vice anyhow, and new ones cost AU$30 (about US$23) -- and this one has more ''character''.


--GG

Optical mice loophole

A few days ago -- and apparently I think it's important enough that I'm blogging about it -- I learned by accident that optical mice don’t work on black tabletops.

Makes sense: the mouse's optical sensors need to have light bouncing back from the red LED -- and ''black ''means that all light is being absorbed.

Still, it took me a little bit to figure it out: ''What the **heck**....? It worked fine last night...''

--GG

Earned GeekPoints?

I was talking to my wife's departmental I.T. guy, and mentioned I had five working PCs at home. He seemed surprised.

I keep forgetting that (1) most folks don't have that many computers at home, and (2) most folks don't think that having five computers would be neat-o.

Surely I deserve four or five GeekPoints for (1) having the computers, and (2) thinking it's cool -- despite my not having fiddled with them for many, many months.

The five PCs don't count The Lady's laptop, or my Mac Classic or Apple II-GS that are in a box, under a box, behind a box, out on the veranda.


--GG

Maybe a job

Well, **that** was a prety quick turnaround! Submit a job application last Friday, and this recent Friday (yesterday), get a voicemail message that they'd like to interview me -- this **upcoming** Friday.

We'll see how it all turns out. ;)


--GG