It’s lucky that I got the guitar, because I’m singing the blues! Sportsgoddess asks, “What on earth has happened to the Lady Gophers?” That my dears is one hell of a good question. I don’t get it. They lost by one to Michigan State at home, pretty much taking themselves out of contention for the Big 10 title. They lost because Michigan State wanted it more. They were nonchalant in their ball handling and passing in the last five minutes, no one other than Whalen seemed to want to shoot and again they got outhustled. I was a little upset about the fact that at the end of the Purdue game I saw smiling and laughing on the bench like they didn’t care that they were getting beat. Did they think they were done when they were 15-0. Did they think that the Big10 wasn’t going to be the toughest part of there schedule? Have they been hanging out with the Vikings?

So far no buyer’s remorse. I love my new axe. Either amped or not it sounds great, it’s relatively easy to play, even for my electric pampered fingers. I’m looking forward to improved playing from increased hand strength. I’m not sure why the call it Hawaiian, it’s not particularly set up for slack-key or slide playing. Maybe it’s just because it looks so different from a folk guitar. I think it’s a little smaller than a normal dreadnaught, but still has a deep body. The neck is narrow and the strings set up close. It looks like an old jazz guitar. Me and Django.
In 1970 my college roommate played the guitar. In those days I was listening to Cream and Butterfield and Taj, really great guitar driven blues. I wanted to play. Mike showed me the basics of the 12 bar blues progression, the Chuck Berry “spread” and what he called the blues scale, which is the minor pentonic scale. One Saturday morning I was in the music store in Northfield with a crushing hangover amplified by too much coffee. I forked over $65 for a Fender Mustang and a little Fender Champ amp. I still have them both today. I didn’t help the value of the guitar when I put decals on it, even though it already looked like it had been dragged behing a truck. So I took my new toy home and played that blues scale about a million times. BB will tell you that in our shack in Silverton, Idaho, I almost drove him and Configliaco insane. That being a pretty short drive in 1972. Mike had given me a gift. Because he didn’t sit down and show me any specific songs, just gave me the format and let me figure out how to find my way around in it, I learned how to improvise. It’s beyond a joke to compare myself to Stevie Ray, but I often go back to something he says at the beginning of one of his songs. “Roll it and I’ll just FEEL something.” I cannot begin to play Stairway to Heaven.

I just looked at the 10 day forcast. They are pedicting a high of -1 and a low of -2 for Friday. Ugh.