A LOT more social media and email stuff this morning..and some West Highland Way Gifts’ orders.
There’s an email in with a potential show booking – Margaret follows up and it looks like there’s be a nice Scottish show end of August. Watch this space!
We drive to the village for a swim and get back home in time for a late lunch.
I have a couple fo in person guitar students in the afternoon. Both go good then Margaret has a local community trust meeting…I chill and play some guitar 🙂
UP EARLY to get the sourdough in the oven then a morning of guitar lessons – first an online session then in-person – before I get busy with some merch production.
There’s a bunch of one-off ‘comes in many colours’ brass guitar pendants – while there’s a few of them, each has a unique colour pattern in the hexagonal inlays. It’s a fiddly job and takes a lot of time and attention.
We head into Glasgow late afternoon for a publishing event at the Scottish Music Centre then pick up some shopping and head for home.
WE’RE UP early (again!) – Margaret’s off to Edinburgh to meet Les and get her hair done…and I have an 8am start for my ‘speeding awareness’ course via Zoom. It’s three hours long and there’s a bunch of other folks on the session…some interesting stuff but the ‘tutor’ is trying to hard to be a comedy act and starts to get on my tits a bit.
Anyway, once done I get busy with emails and the routine stuff then get an Etsy merch order packed and in the post. There’s a few other merch items I need to finish off too.
After lunch I venture out for a wander through the wood. Crap weather and not long before it starts pishing rain.
I’m back in good time for a guitar student arrives then I prepare the magret duck breasts and marinade the meat for tonight’s brouchettes, Betty’s coming for dinner.
Having been premiered to the Wildcats’ last nights the Soul of a Man video goes live on Facebook, YouTube at 6pm. Hopefully it’ll get some traction. My evening guitar student arrives just before 6pm so I guess I’ll have to wait ‘til later to find out.
Once done I get the grill and charcoal prepped outside, set the table and sort some other dinner stuff.
It’s 7.45pm when Margaret gets back – she’s also picked up a load of shopping in Edinburgh which we get put away before Betty arrives.
MARGARET has an early appointment with the audiologist so I’m up at a decent time and manage to get some work done before an online session with one of my guitar students.
An Etsy order came in for a pewter guitar pin that I don’t have in stock which means I need to get busy casting and stuff. I make an extra while I’m at it and get them all sanded and finished ready for an epoxy inlay.
After lunch I prep the epoxy then set some pins on the back of the wee guitar so I can get it I the post tomorrow (Tuesday). Next, some video stuff for my pal Duncan then my afternoon guitar students arrives.
I SPEND the morning in the office working on a stone engraved with a fossil. The end result is poor – I think the stone/rock isn’t the right type. I’ll look for some alternatives next time I take a walk up the lochside.
We’re running short on brass guitar pendants and pins so I start a wee production line to run while we go off to Doune to see Catriona – it’s her birthday today (46!) and we have a gift to drop off.
Leaving the office I almost stand on a toad. It’s that time of year when we get loads of frogs and toads 🙂
We spend a nice couple of hours out int he garden with everyone at Catriona’s then go into Stirling to pick up some shopping.
A surprise visit to Betty to play a couple of her favourite songs
AFTER spending most of the morning dealing with emails and socials while drinking coffee in bed. I was up early to get some dough ready for rolls and I onto the oven…but it’s good to let them cool a bit before breakfast.
I get the brisket I rubbed yesterday out the fridge one onto the smoker. Only a small piece of meat so shouldn’t take more than eight hours.
Margaret is on a mission to tidy the shed and some of the garden stuff…I hit the studio to finish editing the Soul of a Man video we shot on Thursday, nipping back to the garden to spritz the brisket every hour or so. I can monitor pit and meat temperatures on my phone so I don’t have to babysit the smoker.
Once the video work is done I leave the final files to render and go for a walk through the woods.
When I get back the video is done. I take it to show Margaret the results of her filming and check the brisket. It’s reached 165 farenheit so time to wrap then back in the smoker ‘til it reaches 203 degrees internal.
A bunch of folks, including our pal Jeanetta, are going to Betty’s for dinner tonight. Jeanetta contacted me last week to see if I could drop by for a surprise visit after dinner and play a couple of songs for Betty after dinner. Probably around 9pm.
The brisket reaches temperature round 8.30pm and should ideally rest for at least an hour…I get a message from Jeanetta saying they’ve finished eating and ready for my surprise visit. Margaret and I grab a guitar and banjo and wander along.
I’m a little worried as if feels a bit weird and I’m not exactly ‘the singing telegram’ but all goes to plan and we have a grand hour or so with a couple of tunes and a drink with the party 🙂
The brisket is well and truly rested by the time we get home and we enjoy it worth some BBQ I made earlier, veg and mash.
THERE’S some promo to be done for the upcoming Finland and Estonia shows then I try and work out why the video footage we filmed yesterday is out of sync with the main audio track.
Looks like something's been automatically ‘conformed’ during import to the FInal Cut project so I clear everything out and start again. Sorted.
The gimbal – a DJI RS4 Mini – wasn’t playing ball yesterday so spend some time re-balancing and updating firmware etc. I think I can rescue some of the footage tho’ and add various trackers and stuff to some of the clips to try and make the shots more consistent.
It’s another nice day and I take advantage by taking a wander up the lochside then get some pizza dough out the freezer to defrost for tonight.
There’s a letter in from Cumbria police following up my speeding notice. Caught doing 47mph in a temporary 40mph zone on the motorway at 1.30am on the way back form the Huddersfield show a few weeks ago. There’s an option to book (and pay for!) a speed awareness course rather than a £100 fine and three points. I do some online research and find I can attend he course online and the cheapest place is Hartlepool at £83. I book onto Tuesday’s three-hour course. Ah well, saved £17 and the points.
Back in the studio, the trackers and other adjustments have done their processing and I spend the next few hours trying to pull together a rough edit of Soul of a Man. It’s gonna need a considerable amount of ‘styling’ and colour grading, but it might turn out usable. At worst it’ll let us see if my ‘break all the rules’ approach of a long shot cut with extreme close-ups might work.
Eventually I get back to the house and fire up the pizza oven. The pizzas ain’t my best effort tho’ – partly, I think down to the last batch of dough I made which was a departure from my usual approaches.
WE HAVE an extremely long lie…apart from sleeping through all our alarm, we make coffee and I deal with all my emails and socials before we get up.
It’s a nice day and I suggest we try out some filming for a video idea I have. Margaret always agrees with some trepidation – she’s not very confident with the camera or gimbal and I can be a bit impatient. Don’t mean to be but sometimes I can’t contain myself!
First I need to spread the word about the Glasgow show with my pal Charlie Parr at the end of May. I repost the promoter’s post announcing the show (despite the fact that he’s billed me as Dave ‘Acari’….grrrr….!!!) and get something out to my mail list.
Rather than use the location I have in kind we decide to use the wooded area behind the studio and spend a few hours trying to get some footage in the can.
There’s not time to do much with the footage before it’s time to head off to Gartmore for dinner with our pals Duncan and Irene where have a grand evening catching up.
SOURDOUGH today so I’m up early to get the oven on. I’m baked, cooled and breakfasted before my first guitar student of the day – a 9am online session.
Dawn, my regular Wednesday morning student, arrives just as I’m finishing the online session and we spooned some times working on varying rhythm/strum patterns with a song.
There’s a few bits and bobs to sort out in the studio then I manage to get out for a paddle…first time in five or six weeks. It’s been windy and choppy every day for ages. I do a wee livestream while I’m out on the water.
Back home a shower and a late lunch before my afternoon kiddies arrive for their lesson. I’m puggled afterwards – despite feeling fine earlier, I’ve started to feel very again and have a nap.
A Messenger note comes in asking if I’m available to open a show for our pal Charlie Parr at Cottiers in Glasgow at the end of May. Of course! Charlies been a great pal for more than 15 years and we’ve played loads a shows together in the USA and Ireland…he’s always been championing for me to be on the bill at his Scottish shows but somewhere along the line – maybe promoter, agent or tour manager – has been bombed. He’s insisted this time and it’s happening 🙂
We should be able to announce the show tomorrow (Thursday) afternoon….
WE NEED some shopping and I have a photo that I created for Betty that needs printed…I send it to Asda’s Max Spielmann photo service, make up a shopping list and off we go into town.
I’m still full of lurgy and sleep while Margaret drives then wander round Asda ina bit of dwam.
In the studio I mess more with tabbing out guitar stuff using the MIDI pickup. Still a bit of a mess, but promising.
I have a guitar student at the house late afternoon then I have a nap, go back to the studio and get some more stuff done before we wander along to Betty’s for dinner.
