Dejavu
How long has it been? I was a sophmore in high school when I made my first post on LiveJournal. Now I'm a junior in college lol. Hmm, I wonder what happend to my old account? Oh wait, I deleted it in an angst spree of smite and confusion after I broke up with my at the time girlfriend (who too had LJ). Haha, woo, good ol' puppy love, right?
Well honestly, a lot has happened in the last few months. I wished I had started this earlier. It would have been nice to did a progress of these events, but instead I'm just going to summarize here. Oh god, just like those television shows and their "flash-back" episodes lol.
I saw my father again. Been a few years. Ok, I lied. Several. Haven't gotten an email or a call from him either in awhile too - not as long, but maybe a year? Yah, we don't talk much so it was a big deal to me to see my father.
He is a pastor and he was looking for a new church since his wife, my step mom, has health issues with her lungs. How is that relevant? They live in New York and her lungs don't perform well in cooler climates / cold air (and if you don't know, it snows like a mother fucker in the winter over in the big En-Why). California was a good place to look, right? Anyway, I got news that the church was actually in higher elevation and wouldn't have worked out. My father has since moved to Florida to attend at a new church. He's lived in Florida before (his wife has lived there for many years) so its not like he'll be homesick or misplaced and indifferent in some new environment.
I learned a few things from my father. He used to do stand up at local bars. Thats pretty cool. I always wanted to do stand up. I did some during Communication Studies class (our teacher had us have intermissions between speeches and one such type was comedy). He's also a lot older then I thought. Its weird to realize something like that until your college years. He moved out when I was 12 when my parents divorced, so I guess I never noticed, but he had about 10 years or so on my mother. If I recall correctly, he's in his early 60s. Kinda weird. My parents are that old? Lol kinda weird.
We spent time together and it was nice. Some good news. He finally quit smoking. He was doing almost a whole carton a day - it was really bad. Now, he's all done. Weird thing is, cigarettes have niacin (vitamin B3) and since he smoked so much, his body grew dependent on it. He has to take niacin pills now just to supplement for it.
I also learned that I am a lot like my father. I'm a messy eater lol I get made fun of that often. We have the same laugh and same sense of humor. He also likes writing - was working on a scifi in his youth. Weird thing is that he never told me about that and I never knew he liked to write. I like to write as well and its usually in the scifi or fantasy genre. I also write realistic dramas as well.
Funny to learn something like this so late in my life about my father that I thought was practically a stranger to me. But even after years of being practically strangers, when we met again, we were very alike and we were very much as family.
---
On other terms, I keep myself busy with a lot of projects. As you can see, I record music. I like to write. I wish to start a web comic and a machinima once my skills atone and my resources are acquired. Anyway, lately, I've been doing a lot of "crafty" stuff. Want to see?
This right here is my amp. Its a Vox Pathfinder 15R.
It has an 8" speaker but I wanted to get a better quality speaker AND a larger speaker as well. So I bought a 10" Weber Blue Dog ceramic 15W speaker; however, it was too big for my amp, so I modified it to this:
Yah, I moved the circuit board section on top, painted the metal black, painted the knobs and decal gold, added a black grill cloth since the brown diamond grill cloth was too small, removed the plastic trim around the border, cut a bigger hole in the baffle board, relocated the handle, added a painted piece of wood on top of the circuit board (to keep out dust) and I plan to add neatly placed grill cloth on the sides of the circuit board (to cover the holes). I also plan to put black cardstock paper around the speaker because I cut the hole for the baffle a bit too big and under certain lighting (like in this pic), you can see through the grill cloth. And yes, I know, the grill cloth is crooked lol thats okay. IRL, its so black, you can't really tell. Plus, its for recording and I'm very very laid back person haha NOT a perfectionist :P Call it lazy, I call it... well, I call it lazy too actually haha.
Another project was this guitar that I bought from Guitar Center for 80 bucks (20 bucks lower then normal used price). Its a Squier Affinity. Looked like this upon purchase.
I replaced the pickguard with a GFS 3-play black HSS pickguard and also got a bigger, all zinc tremolo block and new electronics (alpha pots) from GFS too. Bought some Fender Custom 57/62 pickups (that I got from Craigslist) on the middle and neck position and a Seymour Duncan C5 in the bridge that I had laying around, and blam! Took out the tuners and replaced it with some Kluson Deluxe that I also got on Craigslist and also added a graphite nut (yes, myself - not that hard - I cheated - its already preslotted lol). Btw, yes, I'm an Craigslist addict. And an eBay mongol. Better watch ya bid the last 15 seconds because I'll go ninja and swoop in on ya ass! SWOOP-DE-WOOP! Anyway, I then primed the hardware with metal primer and then painted it black. It looks sick now. I love the maple fretboard (my only maple fretboard guitar. Other: rosewood, ebony, and composite). Anyway, finished product (just need to solder)
Its my road guitar :)
I also bought an office chair (the ones with wheels on the bottom but no arm rests - I hate those - can't play guitar in them) and a massge chair thingy (normally $120 but I got it for $20 lol). Yah, so I spent about $25 bucks on this chair (I combined them together lol) and painted the office chair which was a baby blue color (it was girly) in a GOLD color and then posted a word on the back... what word? You'll see (pic below). This frankenstein chair is... Cheesy? Corny? Tacky? YESSSS. Normally, I never am that - at least in public. I hate tacky by all means, but this one exception, I actually like it. I wanted to paint it black at first but I ran out and I had left over gold paint from a previous project so yah... RISEEE!
Gold spray paint from a previous project? Yah, actually, its a different color, but this is the project that I was talking about. I made this guitar rack with PVC, some foam thingy stuff I think thats for piping - err... yah, insulation foam?, crushed velvet, creme colored rubber feets, and gold spray paint. Well thats that. I'll keep posting on something more valid later lol. Just wanted to do a quick summary of things. And yah, those are my guitars lol (old pic - they look a lil different now).
---
Haha, oh yah, one more thing. I also made an anime music video. Its on my YouTube page (look at Links on the left side of this page). Yah, its a Dragon Ball Z AMV to the song Battery by Metallica. Haha, yah did all that the last few months lol. Anyway PEACE
Well honestly, a lot has happened in the last few months. I wished I had started this earlier. It would have been nice to did a progress of these events, but instead I'm just going to summarize here. Oh god, just like those television shows and their "flash-back" episodes lol.
I saw my father again. Been a few years. Ok, I lied. Several. Haven't gotten an email or a call from him either in awhile too - not as long, but maybe a year? Yah, we don't talk much so it was a big deal to me to see my father.
He is a pastor and he was looking for a new church since his wife, my step mom, has health issues with her lungs. How is that relevant? They live in New York and her lungs don't perform well in cooler climates / cold air (and if you don't know, it snows like a mother fucker in the winter over in the big En-Why). California was a good place to look, right? Anyway, I got news that the church was actually in higher elevation and wouldn't have worked out. My father has since moved to Florida to attend at a new church. He's lived in Florida before (his wife has lived there for many years) so its not like he'll be homesick or misplaced and indifferent in some new environment.
I learned a few things from my father. He used to do stand up at local bars. Thats pretty cool. I always wanted to do stand up. I did some during Communication Studies class (our teacher had us have intermissions between speeches and one such type was comedy). He's also a lot older then I thought. Its weird to realize something like that until your college years. He moved out when I was 12 when my parents divorced, so I guess I never noticed, but he had about 10 years or so on my mother. If I recall correctly, he's in his early 60s. Kinda weird. My parents are that old? Lol kinda weird.
We spent time together and it was nice. Some good news. He finally quit smoking. He was doing almost a whole carton a day - it was really bad. Now, he's all done. Weird thing is, cigarettes have niacin (vitamin B3) and since he smoked so much, his body grew dependent on it. He has to take niacin pills now just to supplement for it.
I also learned that I am a lot like my father. I'm a messy eater lol I get made fun of that often. We have the same laugh and same sense of humor. He also likes writing - was working on a scifi in his youth. Weird thing is that he never told me about that and I never knew he liked to write. I like to write as well and its usually in the scifi or fantasy genre. I also write realistic dramas as well.
Funny to learn something like this so late in my life about my father that I thought was practically a stranger to me. But even after years of being practically strangers, when we met again, we were very alike and we were very much as family.
---
On other terms, I keep myself busy with a lot of projects. As you can see, I record music. I like to write. I wish to start a web comic and a machinima once my skills atone and my resources are acquired. Anyway, lately, I've been doing a lot of "crafty" stuff. Want to see?
This right here is my amp. Its a Vox Pathfinder 15R.
It has an 8" speaker but I wanted to get a better quality speaker AND a larger speaker as well. So I bought a 10" Weber Blue Dog ceramic 15W speaker; however, it was too big for my amp, so I modified it to this:
Yah, I moved the circuit board section on top, painted the metal black, painted the knobs and decal gold, added a black grill cloth since the brown diamond grill cloth was too small, removed the plastic trim around the border, cut a bigger hole in the baffle board, relocated the handle, added a painted piece of wood on top of the circuit board (to keep out dust) and I plan to add neatly placed grill cloth on the sides of the circuit board (to cover the holes). I also plan to put black cardstock paper around the speaker because I cut the hole for the baffle a bit too big and under certain lighting (like in this pic), you can see through the grill cloth. And yes, I know, the grill cloth is crooked lol thats okay. IRL, its so black, you can't really tell. Plus, its for recording and I'm very very laid back person haha NOT a perfectionist :P Call it lazy, I call it... well, I call it lazy too actually haha.
Another project was this guitar that I bought from Guitar Center for 80 bucks (20 bucks lower then normal used price). Its a Squier Affinity. Looked like this upon purchase.
I replaced the pickguard with a GFS 3-play black HSS pickguard and also got a bigger, all zinc tremolo block and new electronics (alpha pots) from GFS too. Bought some Fender Custom 57/62 pickups (that I got from Craigslist) on the middle and neck position and a Seymour Duncan C5 in the bridge that I had laying around, and blam! Took out the tuners and replaced it with some Kluson Deluxe that I also got on Craigslist and also added a graphite nut (yes, myself - not that hard - I cheated - its already preslotted lol). Btw, yes, I'm an Craigslist addict. And an eBay mongol. Better watch ya bid the last 15 seconds because I'll go ninja and swoop in on ya ass! SWOOP-DE-WOOP! Anyway, I then primed the hardware with metal primer and then painted it black. It looks sick now. I love the maple fretboard (my only maple fretboard guitar. Other: rosewood, ebony, and composite). Anyway, finished product (just need to solder)
Its my road guitar :)
I also bought an office chair (the ones with wheels on the bottom but no arm rests - I hate those - can't play guitar in them) and a massge chair thingy (normally $120 but I got it for $20 lol). Yah, so I spent about $25 bucks on this chair (I combined them together lol) and painted the office chair which was a baby blue color (it was girly) in a GOLD color and then posted a word on the back... what word? You'll see (pic below). This frankenstein chair is... Cheesy? Corny? Tacky? YESSSS. Normally, I never am that - at least in public. I hate tacky by all means, but this one exception, I actually like it. I wanted to paint it black at first but I ran out and I had left over gold paint from a previous project so yah... RISEEE!
Gold spray paint from a previous project? Yah, actually, its a different color, but this is the project that I was talking about. I made this guitar rack with PVC, some foam thingy stuff I think thats for piping - err... yah, insulation foam?, crushed velvet, creme colored rubber feets, and gold spray paint. Well thats that. I'll keep posting on something more valid later lol. Just wanted to do a quick summary of things. And yah, those are my guitars lol (old pic - they look a lil different now).
---
Haha, oh yah, one more thing. I also made an anime music video. Its on my YouTube page (look at Links on the left side of this page). Yah, its a Dragon Ball Z AMV to the song Battery by Metallica. Haha, yah did all that the last few months lol. Anyway PEACE