Love Is In The Air

Brought my 8-string bass home today!
She's SO pretty, and like I suspected is brand spanking new.
This was the score of the century--no shit.
Whoever bought this bass and then pawned it soon after is either an idiot or just didn't know what to do with it.
His loss is my gain, because stringed instruments hold no mysteries for me.

I got a cramp in my left hand from the first 10 minutes of playing, but after several hours of careful adjustments to the neck's truss rod she's playing smooth and sweet.
It'll probably take 3-4 days before I get everything perfect because a pro-level instrument setup needs to be done slowly to allow the wood and steel to become accustomed to what you've done. Like a big meal with meat and onion rings, everything needs time to settle down and play nice.
Hopefully it'll rain soon so I can also account for extra humidity.
Instruments are like living things in that they can react to their environment in unusual ways.
When I lived in Upstate New York, taking my 6/12-string Ibanez Doubleneck guitar into a heated nightclub after driving through a blizzard was the ultimate tuning nightmare. 18 strings on 2 necks that were all freaked-out by sudden temp and humidity changes was the worst-case scenario, but I learned a LOT.
At least here in Texas most rooms are between 68 and 78 degrees farenheit year-round.

Sorry, but there aren't any pictures yet.
See this post for my first impressions and some sneaky photos taken while making the down payment in September.

I'll probably take a few pics tomorrow, and might even shoot some video so y'all can see and hear the difference between a regular 4-string bass and this sexy beast.

Where Was I?

Oh yeah--at San Pedro Springs Park, waiting for the sun to go down.



This spring-fed pool is enormous, but only 3 feet deep.
No swimming allowed anymore, but it's a nice place to just sit and enjoy the fine weather we're having.

Photos like this remind me of why I like shooting at night.
Need to get off my butt and get back in the game.

Halloween 2009

We had less kids than 2007 (65 vs 100+) but it was a successful night.
My new witch Selma did a great job!
One time she whipped open the door and barked "What!?!" at the punkasses, which left them speechless.
The magic words "Trick or Treat" totally left their brains.
After some "Uhhh....Mmmm..." action, witch Josie said "Well??? Are you going to say Trick or Treat, or don't you know what you're doing?"
We laughed our asses off!

Only one or 2 kids got TacoBell sauce instead of a handful of candy this year, which is an improvement.
Hey--if your costume blows or you don't say the 3 simple words, you get tricked instead of treated.
I didn't write the rules, I just enforce them.


When they come near our house, scary noises coming from a speaker behind the headstone attract them rather nicely unless they are with one of those parents who's small mind is locked into only ringing doorbells if the porchlight is on.
I mean, don't they think the spinning light on the mailbox (not to mention flames) mean we might be playing Halloween? Yet numerous morons walk right past our house every year.

When kids run up our driveway, the blast of a 500 watt shoplight through my garage window always freezes their asses in place.
That's when we sometimes hear such gems as "Is that real fire?" or "I better not touch that or I'll get burned".
Well...duh.

Then they see a biker zombie pushing his skeleton victim into the flames of hell.
Strobe on zombie and a red bulb + amber strobe + smoke machine in the black box of doom under the skeleton.
This is my new scene for this year, and it looked pretty cool in action.

If they are brave enough to make it onto our porch, the simple yet effective trick of hiding sheets of big bubble wrap under a rug gives the little weiners a final scare.


For the future: More automation so I can actually see the kids instead of spending all my time pushing buttons to activate everything. And if I could be in a scary costume wandering around our yard, there's no limit to the mayhem.

I'm designing a mechanical Jack'O'Lantern that's chewing on Elmo.

From bands past I have some experience building and using dry ice fog effects on the cheap, so there's some more ideas floating around.

But as long as one new thing gets added each year, I'm happy.
The leftover candy is good, too.

San Pedro Springs Park 2

A couple of months ago I couldn't even imagine spring water gushing out of the ground like this.
But after September and October delivered almost an entire year's worth of rain, I'm confident that the drought of 2007-9 can be considered over.
Sadly, our farmers and river outfitters took a big financial hit, as did the fireworks vendors.

What's been weird is seeing the vegetation act like it's Springtime this late in the year.
Flowers and peppers and vines are exploding all over the place.
Usually I'm done with the lawnmower by now, but cutting grass was something I've really missed so weekly sessions are most welcome.
Good exercise!

Tomorrow is Halloween!
I had to work last year (and needed a break anyway) so I'm rested and fired-up to put on a good show for '09.
As I was gathering up my stuff for inventory/inspection, the accidental placement of 2 items sparked an idea for a new centerpiece element.
Three days of sawing and drilling and electrical work later, it's ready to go.
Benefitting from aquisitions/modifications made for the band, I've combined several pieces into a single scene that's pretty cool, with the bonus of eliminating all cables from the porch and through an open window.
Remotes rule!

A bunch of new people are coming over thinking "party", but it's all work.
The goal (as always) is to hear someone confess that they pissed their pants.

San Pedro Springs Park

Some of us in my photography club had a meet and shoot yesterday at the title location.
Those of us with flashes and umbrellas/softboxes were passing along our knowledge and techniques to the others, while shooting the breeze and meeting new folks and just plain having fun taking pictures.
Chrissy had to work, and Sylvia wasn't interested in modeling, so I spent the last hour of daylight shooting infrared with my F828 (The Toronto Special).

Should have shot this one 5 minutes sooner--the shadows were creeping upwards fast.

This photo is growing on me. At first I didn't like the shadows but now I think they enhance a mood.
Professional photographer and all-around fun guy Chris Pichado said of these:"Keith - your infrared shots never fail to amaze me. You've got such a wicked eye for great compositions already, throwing a curveball to what the nekkid eye can see just adds so dang much to it. :-) LOVE em!"
Chris's energy and talent helped push our little party into high gear, once he finally got there. I was a guest at a wedding he was shooting and got jealous of his skills at directing models as well as his excellent results.

For example, this photo of me is a Pichado:
Within seconds of seeing what my hand was doing he got Sylvia to shoot me from the left and Juan (the organizer of the event and owner of the gallery where I have shows) to do the same from the right.
Boom, done, next! And he managed to make it fun for me, which is amazing.

Speaking of Juan, he suggested we meet at La Tuna afterwards and within 30 minutes we had stopped allowing the staff to pick up our empties so he could take this pic for fun, using my flash.

We had a great time all day!

And I nailed down some wall space for my next gallery show.
The First Friday of December, 7-10+pm, 121 Blue Star #5.
Preview Thursday Night and Post-View Saturday not yet confirmed.
My theme will be "Christmas In San Antonio" so you've already seen some of the prints I'll be hanging.
This is my first showing since May '08, and I'm excited to be doing it again.

More from the shoot coming soon

Chalk It Up As Finished