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The
Squamidian Report – Mar. 19 / 22
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#1034 From Russ The Ontarion
Hi All, Well now, this was certainly an uneventful week, at least for me. I don’t want to talk about world events or even the brain dead idea that this pandemic is somehow ‘over’. So therefore, I don’t have much to talk about. Too cold and wet to go out on my motorcycle, too cold and wet to do any yard work although Sue did give herself a couple of big ugly blisters while clipping the front hedge into small enough pieces to fit into our garden waist bin. About the most ambitious thing I did was change the strings on my two main guitars. Mind you, that is a fairly big job, at least relative to doing absolutely nothing. The first step in changing guitar strings is to clean off the kitchen table so I have a work surface. Then I must get out all my ‘guitar care stuff’ which is kept in a box in a closet. The box contains my supply of new strings as well as various tools, instrument cleaning supplies, and so on. It also contains my handy-dandy home made neck support thats needed to hold and brace the guitar neck while I work on it. Anyone who has ever tried to change strings while having to hold their guitar knows how frustrating that can be. I had made several of these stands years ago, gave away all but a few, and couldn’t get along without them. Second step is to check over each guitar to get a handle on anything it might need from a maintenance point of view. This includes looking at the neck and string height to see if any adjustments are in order. Then, I remove all the strings. Did I just hear a gasp from some of you guitar players? Well, removing all the strings is actually the right way to do it as it lets you give the unit a good cleaning as well as giving access to the truss rode and saddle. If the neck was not quite straight its a lot easier to give the truss rode a gentle tweak to get it to where you want it with the strings out of the way. If the strings are sitting too high along the neck a saddle adjustment is required, and well, with the strings all off the saddle is right there in front of you, easy to remove and adjust. The tuner nuts can and should be checked for tightness at this time and if any of the tuning pegs are too tight or loose, that should be addressed. Then give that guitar a good cleaning, including the string free neck and finger board. Third step is to put your new strings on. I was going to say ‘back on’ but the new strings were never ‘on’ so you can’t put them ‘back on’. Care should be taken to be sure to put the correct string in the correct position. It doesn’t matter if you start with the high E or low E but I find starting with the high E and going down notes in order (E B G D A E) keeps my fingers away from those sharp string ends. My main guitars all use the bridge pin system where the pins hold the ball end of the strings in place. Be sure the ball on the end of the string is inserted into the hole and pulled up against the underside of the guitar top. The easiest way to accomplish that is to put a small bend in the end of the string about half an inch up from the ball, making positioning easy. Each pin has a slot in it that permits the string to sit between the pin and the bridge wood. Be sure its orientated correctly, toward the string. The pin simply holds the string and ball in place, there is actually no string pressure or pull on the pins, just the squeeze of the pin hole fitment. At the neck end, the string should be snipped to the correct length before attaching it to the tuner. Use the distance between your tuner posts to get the correct length. For the high sounding strings use the distance between two tuner posts as a guide, snip the remaining length off, poke the new end through the hole in the appropriate tuner post, with perhaps 3/16th of an inch sticking out the other side. With pressure on the string, wind the tuner peg making sure the string feeds correctly onto the post, always working it’s way down, not up. For the lower sounding strings, about one and a half tuner post distances works quite well. Be sure to wind the strings the right way, all stings must be on the ‘inside’ of the posts. One other thing I use is a product called ‘nut juice’. Its like a very fine white grease but is specifically for instruments and is used to lubricate the slot in the neck nut where the string sits. This stops the string from binding due to friction during those tiny movements it makes when tuning. You know, when you turn the tuning peg and nothing happens and then all of a sudden the string moves with a weird noise and is then too tight. In a pinch you can also use simple soft pencil ‘lead’ as graphite works too, just not as good. Fourth step, tune the guitar. Put all the strings on, tune it up to close to proper level, then pull each string up and back and forth to work out the stretch. This step eliminates the chances of the strings constantly going out of tune. Do it again, this time getting the guitar into tune and then stretching the strings. Don’t worry, you won’t break them. Once you have done this a few times the strings will still be in tune after being stretched and they will basically stay there with the exception of temperature and humidity changes. And there, you are done. All of the above assumes an acoustic guitar, not an electric. And for any of you who’s eyes haven’t long since glazed over, here are some pics of my handy-dandy neck stand.
doug ****
From Russ
He was no "Saint!" Saint Patrick - the patron saint of Ireland; he wasn't Irish - he found his faith (Christianity) while being held a prisoner by a gang of Irish raiders who kidnapped him from his wealthy parents at age 16 while living in England. He wasn't a "saint' - although he converted many Irish to Catholic, he was never Canonized by the Roman Church as a "Saint'. He never banished the snakes from Ireland. March 17th is not his birthday - it is his 'death day'. My eldest brother, Lorne Elwood was born on March 17th, and although only five years older than me, I was always afraid of him. Our parents often put him 'in charge' of us younger siblings - a task he didn't savor hence, he became kind of a 'bully'. He dreaded having his picture taken with us kids, and as we grew older, brother Howard and I began to harmonize - sometimes our dad would join in - he had a base voice that gave me the chills. But, Lorne would not sing with us! Later in life, music became his "life". He sang with an octet, a chorus, and loved barber-shop. He 'trained' these groups to sing! His chorus sang at his funeral - how fitting! Lorne loved to fish, but rarely went along with his brothers on our frequent escapes to the Bruce Peninsula. I never felt 'close' to Lorne - he was sort of 'untouchable' - if fact, if you touched him at all - he would repel, if not recoil! I guess that's where you get it, Doug. When brother Howard, and sister, Evelyn passed away, Lorne and I grew closer - in fact, he and wife, Vivyan were frequent over-night guests at my wee cottage in Point Clark. Lorne had a terrific memory and when he told a story, everyone went quiet so as not to miss a single word. We played cards, drank Scotch, and 'shmoozed' into the wee hours. Lorne had a special kind of 'dry humour'. God I miss you, Lorne! Happy Birthday, 'Wise One'
Kid
brother, **** THE ONTARION REPORT
HELLO EVERYONE Here’s hoping you all had a lovely St Patrick’s Day! We here in KW enjoyed a sunny day with a maximum temp of 19c and a mild breeze all day long! It was a busy day with no rainbows, no pot of gold and no leprechauns, however, we did have a lovely supper of corned beef on rye and boiled cabbage! Not a traditional Northern Ireland supper but a delicious meal none the less! I was kept busy most of the day spending money like it was water running from a tap! I first of all had to spend a couple of hours in the optometrists office having my eyes checked for new glasses. Then, There was a stop at the optical store to order and pay for my new glasses. Thinking that was the end of it all I went home and once there, Carole reminded me to call the optical store back and add sun tinting to my order for the new glasses and that was another $80.00 on top of the bill of $115.00 for the glasses I had just ordered. To top the day off, the Jeep was out of gas and I had to run to Costco to fill up to the tune of another $90.00! WOW! I sure don’t like expensive days like that very often! Especially when the eye check up had already cost me $90.00 in the first place! Oh well, such things are hard to do without when you’re getting up there in years! The one thing I like to do is to be able to see well! The other item that’s a necessity is gas in the car so we can do the necessary running to the doctors and out for groceries etc! The day was most certainly enjoyable other than the cost of things. We spent a good amount of time out in the back yard enjoying a coffee under the lovely sunshine of the day! What a bonus after putting up with the miserable cold of this past winter! I guess we’ve got little to complain about when we consider the problems over in Ukraine! The snow has almost melted in our back yard and to make things better, we’ve got a set of Chipmunks already running about out back as well! You know Spring has sprung when the Chippies are on the move again. Which brings to mind that old saying once again. “Spring has sprung, the grass has Riz, I wonder where the boidies is? Could it be the boid is on the wing? How absoid, the wing is on the boid!” LOL! Now that is an oldie for sure! I think I learned that one from my mother when I was about 8 years old! To change the subject I was shocked today to hear on the news that there was an 18 year old lad charged with first degree murder this morning due to the fact that he stabbed and killed a 15 year old girl. The crime took place up in Waterloo in a residential area but the police wouldn’t release any further details. I’m sure over the next couple of days we’ll hear more about how, why and who the persons involved were! It makes me wonder what this world is coming to? The regional police chief stated the other day the there have been more shootings in the first three months of this year than in the past three years in the Region of Waterloo! He also stated that most of the perpetrators of these crimes are gang members traveling here from the Toronto area! I guess they figure they can come here and commit their intended crimes and then quickly jump onto the 401 to disappear in the traffic heading back to the Toronto area! We’re becoming a “big city” these days and with the population of the Region growing it’s only going to get worse! I have noticed, and I hate to say this but, most of the names released by the Waterloo Regional Police are of a foreign nature when it comes to stating the identities of those responsible for the committal of these crimes! It’s starting to sound like New York City more and more each time we watch the news! Oh well, I guess that the size of the region will keep growing and so will the crime rate! Not much we can do about it but be as careful as we possibly can when we are out and about! Gotta be careful who we open the door to and also who we tick off when we’re driving these days! That’s about it for this week folks! Thanks for tuning in and I’ll look forward to talking to you all again next week in The Ontarion Report! Bye for now…. Greg PS: Something to Think About> Keep the people of Ukraine in our thoughts and prayers! ****
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