CBG--The Return

Early on in this I commented that I was going to make myself a cigar box guitar at some point. Well, given some time off from work and an unbelievably sweet little girl (read: sleeps alot), I have made good on that threat. Being a first attempt there were of course several things I immediately would have liked to improve upon, but since the goal was to use as much material from around the house as possible, I am fairly pleased with it.

The neck inside the box itself was only glued to the lid, and the tension of the strings has caused it to bow (although not horribly) so next time I might nail the neck to the lid as well. Also, I neglected to make the headstock (where the tuning hardware is) lower than the fretboard, so the bolts acting as nut and bridge had to be way too big and made for a ridiculously high action--only good for slide guitar. Eh, that's the traditional way to play anyhow. Overall the sound is not too bad, some string buzz but nothing we wouldn't expect from someone's first homemade instrument.

To be extra-special traditional I also made a bottle-neck slide from a wine bottle. As it turned out I happened to have a glass cutter from a stained glass course in college, but I think you could use any pointed metal tool to score a line, then boil, then chill. Voila!

It is definitely an addicting hobby and I am already planning the next one. But of course in the mean time I need to figure out how to play the thing. Here is an early attempt at playing with the bottle-neck slide (Microwave Dave would be ashamed, but hey, we all gotta start somewhere):

It's a Happy Moonpie New Year!

   This year New Year's Eve was quite a bit different than the past few years. First, we're in a place that gets significantly more weather than Santa Barbara - the thunder and lightning kept me awake well into the night with its show. I think some places nearby had tornadoes and flooding; and to think I thought thunderstorms were a summer event! Now despite the weather, we still decided to stay in due to the fact that this holiday seems primarily centered around drinking (which I am currently not partaking in for obvious reasons), not to mention that my usual bedtime is somewhat earlier than it used to be. So, end result was a pleasant night in.

   In keeping with tradition, Derek made homemade cioppino (which was delicious by the way), and we enjoyed playing card games and watching various TV coverage of New Year's Eve celebrations around the country. Now for those of you who have never lived in the Central Time Zone, here's an interesting trivia point - have you ever noticed that TV programs always state the viewing time as something like "10/9c"? I bet you never paid attention, but you'll notice it now. What does this mean? It means that rather than airing programs at the typical time (say midnight for this example), they merely broadcast the program at the same time that they are airing it on the East Coast (aka 11pm Central Time). At first this is really really confusing and frustrating, because it means that everytime you see an advertizement for a tv show, you must remember that it will be aired one hour earlier than what they say. After a few weeks, however, you get used to it and thank your husband for springing for the DVR we have.

   Of course, this also means that on New Year's Eve the ball drop in Times Square is aired at 11pm, and that Jay Leno is on TV at midnight - a bit anti-climactic. Thankfully, local broadcasting came to the rescue and we were able to see a real-time celebration at midnight. What was it? The Mobile Moonpie Drop!

   As I had never heard of a moonpie before, I had to look it up to find out what it was. Answer - a cookie comprised of 2 graham crackers stuck together with marshmallow and then dipped in chocolate. Apparently it is a typical "southern" dessert and has been around for about 200 years. And on New Year's Eve, the city of Mobile, Alabama has begun their own tradition of dropping a large disc representing a giant moonpie at the stroke of midnight. Not quite as flashy as the ball in Times Square, it was entertaining to watch and made us feel a bit more like locals.

   Now I just need to find out where I can get one of these and try it out. Happy Moonpie New Year's everyone!