jayratkowski.com

So we’re not quite moved in… but we are functional at the new place.  We got my office painted last night (we’ve given up on painting, but found Kathi’s brother-in-law is good at it and doesn’t mind doing it, so he did our bedroom and office).  I still have to unpack my office, which has way too much crap in it.  I need to reduce that.  We have to put stuff on our walls.  We also have to figure out our kitchen a little better.  In the old place, our kitchen was not big, but had a lot more cabinet space as well as a large (about 9′x1.5′) pantry.  Here, we have two windows in the kitchen, which is nice, but takes up a lot of potential cabinet space.  We also have a pantry of sorts, but it is from the 1930’s, so it’s about 8′x1′ and about 6″ deep.  We’re having a hard time finding places to put both food and appliances and even dishes.  A little creativity and we’ll figure it out though.  We do have some nice built-in china hutch things in the dining room that will help.

We’re also entertaining the idea of car shopping.  Not for me, for the lady.  Her current car averages in the low 20’s for mpg.  At $4.19/gallon - that’s not good.  She’s also facing a relocation of her job that will put her weekly fuel cost well over $100.  I’m already at about $60/week, but we generally carpool to work.  That’s just absurd to go through that much gas if we both are putting on that kind of mileage.  We’re looking first at hybrids, second at fuel efficient cars that are still safe (so a Smart is out, Yaris is a tough call).  The hybrid market is still poor in my eyes.  There are several vehicles that call themselves hybrids, but really offer little benefit (the GM line for example).  There are also a few that are just too expensive or the wrong type of vehicle (the Lexus models or the hybrid SUVs).  So we’re left with Honda (which I will never allow in my driveway again after owning a Civic), Toyota Prius or Camry, Nissan Altima and that’s it.  The Camry is priced higher than we want to pay right now.  The Altima is similar, but at least comes with a great fuel credit from the government.  The Prius is still the best bet overall.  The problem is buying one.  Used it out of the question, as they are still listing higher than new ones based on the “limited availability” of new models.  As for new ones, the supply has caught up, but dealerships are still playing on the incredible demand and inflating the prices artificially (even though hybrid sales are great - auto sales are still poor to the point where you’d be silly to pay MSRP or above for a Prius - but a lot of dealers won’t budge).  So not only do you have to be a jerk to talk them down on price, but you generally have to try and talk them down on price for a vehicle that isn’t even on their lot; which dealerships hate to do.  Which leaves us likely paying a lot more than we care to do for a Prius.  Probably the next best bet is a Corolla.

In other news, I think I am sick.  My throat is sore and my head is congested and my nose is running.  It’s pissing me off.  The next person who tells me there is a flu going around is going to get my foot broken off in their ass.  I don’t care what’s going around, I just care that I’m sick and the world should immediately stop what they are doing to help me.  Well, probably not, but I could use some daytime cold/flu drugs.

So I’m making it a point to actually start finishing some of the projects I’ve had in progress for several years now. Enough screwing around and delaying things, it’s time to get stuff done!

I’m taking this weekend to get moving on some things. First up to bat was an easy one, finishing the headstock on the DNA. I put the neck from a JEM7VWH on long ago, but the headstock was in really bad shape. It was all dinged up and badly painted. Looked terrible for a $50 guitar, forget about something that costs 100 times that.

So I sanded the headstock down, glued a piece of veneer over the top, painted it black, put a clear on the top and slapped on a new Ibanez logo made at work (the “JEM” logo has “23/300″ for the DNA number, if you can’t see in the pics below). It’s not a professional job by any means, but it looks a ton better than it did and I’m happy with it right now.

To kind of recap, here’s what’s been done to the DNA:
- Bridge pickup replaced w/ Seymour Duncan JB
- Neck pickup replaced w/ Seymour Duncan Jazz
- Middle pickup removed
- Knobs replaced to match bridge/tuner
- Neck from Ibanez JEM7VWH circa 1999
- Tremol-No with Deep-C
- 5-way switch with coil splitting

So what’s next? I’ve really got two major guitar related projects to complete.

1) Gibson Les Paul Smartwood - I need to finish refretting it, replace all the hardware with chrome, replace the electronics and get it repainted (notice I imply that I will not do the painting! that’s one thing I’m not capable of doing). I will update with progress of that, but I’m hoping that by Monday it will be pretty much ready to be painted. I think I have everything needed to get to that step.

2) Ibanez RG770 - this is a project that went way too far. It got a scalloped fretboard, new frets, some crazy experimental onboard preamp, etc, etc, etc. I’m going to strip it for parts and just scrap the thing.

That will do it for the time being. There are other projects out there, but those are the ones that I started and gave up on midway. It will be great to get them finished so I can move on to the next goals.