Grouchy Six Year Old Likely To Get Testy

This marks the sixth year that I've been running this show and as usual we post the picture of the unknown grouchy kid at left.

My interests have changed focus-being creative takes a lot out of you and lately the guitar amp business has presented challenges-the deeper I go into it the more I discover I don't know. Such is the price of tackling something new that you didn't imbibe with your mother's milk, so to speak.

It requires a lot of thought and experimentation. There are a lot of people out there Who Shall Remain Unnamed who seem to think that you cannot be permitted to attempt to repair a guitar amplifier unless you have a PhD in electrical engineering, are on speaking terms with the ghost of Lee DeForest, and have about 200 years of experience. They also posit that unless you understand exactly how and why something works from theory outward you have no business poking around inside one and ought to be publicly flogged with a Tektronix scope for your temerity.

Parenthetically, these are the same people who never seem to be able to advance a cogent and simple explanation of why or how something actually works.

Of course, saying that you don't have to master the minutia of a device to restore it to proper functioning is heresy to these folks. Knowing what doesn't change the parameters of a malfunction is just as important in the repair process because it whittles down the work load to a manageable level.

Well, as my old crew chief Wayne Hawkins used to say, "F**k 'em if they can't take a joke. Get back to work."

Part of my new years' resolutions are to ignore these and a lot of other annoying people. I'm simply not going to deal on any level with people who offend me and I am going to be happy whether they like it or not.

They're not getting any forgiveness from me despite whatever bait they may try and dangle in front of me.

Life, as they say, is far too short. People rarely change on a fundamental level, and a life spent in making other people miserable does not have any attractions for me.