Tigertown Rats

I really enjoy these "pitch meeting" videos. I love how he always works in "barely an inconvenience" into every one of them. LOL!

I watched Coming 2 America last night. Passable but forgettable and not really very funny. I did enjoy a sequence featuring "Get Off" by Prince, but that was about it.

I've had a breakthrough of sorts with the D - Em - G - D chord progression, mostly through sheer force of will... LOL! Working from home is a real benefit here, because I can just pick it up for a few minutes at a time whenever I have/need a break. As luck would have it, I found time for a number of breaks yesterday and no one else was home, so I knew my constant terrible strumming would not annoy anyone (aka The Mrs.). I just kept doing it over and over and over and over and over and over.... Don't get me wrong, it's still not great, but it's good enough that I can move on to the next lesson anyway while continuing to practice it.

Honestly, that's how we ended up with statewide mandates in the first place. They tried to leave it to the local (or even business) level, and it was a disaster.

🖕 (j/k)

I've hit my first real frustration point. Been stuck on the same lesson a few days. I'm supposed to switch from D - Em - G - D while using the "universal strumming pattern", and it's going nowhere. I can get D - Em alright, and even G - D is OK, but Em to G simply takes too long, and even when I get it, it sounds terrible. In the lesson it was recommended to actually have the last up strum be open string, to give more time to switch, but that hasn't really helped. Going to keep working at it, but just needed to vent a little... It took awhile to even get G right, so it shouldn't be too surprising that switching to it is cumbersome for me. To take my mind off it, I tried learning the beginning of Margaritaville, which also was a disaster. So that didn't help... LOL! It also uses a G, but I couldn't even get past the 5-7, 5-7, 5-7, 3-5, 5-7 opener...

Sure, they are terrible, but BGSU knows how to announce a football schedule...

I think I have 21 unwatched episodes of TWD on my DVR. Not sure why I haven't deleted them and the season pass recording. I doubt I ever decide to watch them. I believe I left off with Negan escaping and Maggie was MIA.

Definitely finding that to be true. Can't tell you how many times I did the riff part of the song before it finally just clicked, and now I can mostly do it on autopilot. Now I enjoy playing it, because it actually sounds halfway decent. I may go ahead and immerse myself in something like Margaritaville. It's my second least favorite popular Buffett song (Cheeseburger taking top "honor"), but it looks to be fairly straightforward with lots of walkthroughs out there.

I've tried the A chord both ways, and having pointer finger on all three is definitely the more comfortable way, though so far it is not the easiest to switch to from another chord. At least, I haven't yet found the trick to it. As to whether my progress is "awesome" may be up for some debate, but I am at least happy with it. The members of my household who have to overhear my practice may prefer "tolerable". A couple of days ago my wife was only wearing one earphone while reading her book, instead of completely blocking me out and using two. I take that as a very positive sign.

Uh oh... Now this group is going to hold me accountable too?? LOL! Just kidding. I appreciate the check-in actually. It's going pretty well, I think. I'm satisfied with my progress anyway. I'm able to play through an entire song, though it's a pretty basic riff with two different strumming patterns and three chords (E minor, C major 7, and B7). Nothing too complicated. I play that everyday, while also working on switching between different chords (E major, A major, D major). I have a lot of work to do in terms of being able to quickly find the notes on the guitar. Ask me to find the A# on the D string and it'll take me about 5 minutes to work through it. It's a little easier for me to read a tab, but I'll still fumble through it a bit. Any time I feel like things are going well, I'll look up a Jimmy Buffett song, fumble around for two minutes and realize I'm still not ready to freelance. If I really dug in on it though, I'm sure I would get it eventually. I'm on lesson 19 of the 30 day intro challenge, so almost done. I believe there are more beginner/intermediate lessons from the same guy that I can work through after that though.

What kind of store would have The Ranch on in the waiting room? It's a pretty vulgar show.

Apparently John C Reilly will take any paying job, even if it's payment in cans.

"Over by Easter", to quote a former game show host. And to think people thought he was wrong about everything...