Saturday August 8, 2026. 7am. I’ve been awake since 5:30. Just one of those mornings where you want to get started early. Plus I had a task at hand. A family member and fellow bass player asked if I could set up his bass guitar. This is something that I have done hundreds of times for many bassists but have not done it in about twenty five years or so. Let’s see if I still got it…..

I usually eat breakfast at home but not today. Chick-Fil-A minis to the rescue as I did not have the desire to cook breakfast. Breakfast is finished and all tools are gathered by eight o’clock. Let the work begin.

The customer says the strings are buzzing against his fretboard when he tries to play making an undesirable sound. This should be an easy fix. However, there are several factors that can contribute to this condition of the bass. Improper neck alignment, nut adjustment or saddle height are the usual suspects. I measure the neck alignment and it seems to be fine. Next, I inspect the saddle height and determine that they are inconsistently adjusted. The C-string and G-string saddles are too low so they are raised to the appropriate height based on the manufacturers suggestions. The sound improved, but not up to my standard. So I set all strings to the manufacturers suggested height and then reinspect the neck. The pickups were then adjusted accordingly. Again, improved but not quite where I needed it to be. So…..

I inspect the nut and realize that it has been cut too low for the higher strings on the guitar. One final adjustment and I think we’re there. Now it sounds like a bass guitar should sound! My work is done and the customer is called by 10am. I think he’ll like it.

And I think I still got it……. Who’s next?

I don’t listen to traditional radio as much as I used to.  On one of the rare occasions that I did I heard this great song. Check it out.

One of my favorite quotes.

Still working on the chords. Great song from Toto. Eric Benet has a nice version as well. My set  list is growing…….

Yes it’s true it’s true. My time as a sports fan has finally come to an end.  It was a really tough decision to make and I contemplated for several months.  But the truth is, I am not the fan that I used to be. Here’s why.

I no longer possess the mental toughness required for when my teams underperform. I no longer have the emotional maturity to refrain from cursing at the television when the players I support make bad plays. Also my physical skills have diminished and I no longer feel like jumping up and down and running around the house when my teams win. Ultimately though the fact is, I’ve become a sore loser in my advanced age and I don’t want to be in a situation where I have to take medication for hypertension, stress or cholesterol, knowing full well that all these things are really the byproduct of being an overly dedicated sports fan. Well I’m also a husband and a father too. But that’s beside the point…….

The Maryland cap you see pictured was gifted to me recently. It is the latest piece of sports attire that I’ve acquired over the years of which I have bought none. I have never worn my favorite teams jerseys or colors, and never my favorite players’ jerseys or shoes. Just not my style. But come game time, I was definitely in front of a television or sitting in the stands, listening to a radio or watching a live stream.

I’ve been watching sports for half a damn century now. It all started somewhere in in the mid-seventies when I became a fan of the Minnesota Vikings and one of my favorite running backs, Chuck Foreman. Sometime thereafter I watched the Vikings lose to a team with a cool blue star on their helmets and I became hooked. That team drafted a running back by the name of Tony Dorsett and I became a fan for life.

Around the same time I discovered college football and was made aware that my home state had a college football team, the Maryland Terrapins. I also was a fan of the Nebraska Cornhuskers and Pittsburgh Panthers college football teams as well.

Through Maryland football I discovered Maryland basketball. I became obsessed with Maryland sports. I spent a small fortune on college football and basketball magazines to keep up with recruiting and rosters. A truly unhealthy amount of television hours were consumed watching these teams. Combined with how much time I spent watching the Dallas Cowboys I probably could have earned my PhD. by the age of 25 had
I spent that time studying instead.

All of that time was invested just to see my teams win Championships or Super Bowls. Dallas did not disappoint having won a couple of super bowls in the 70s and following up with three more in the nineties, but there were some lean years in between. Hello anxiety. The Nebraska Cornhuskers won three national enchantmentships in the nineties as well. Nothing since. Hello stress. But Maryland…… I had to endure nearly 30 years of heartache and disappointment before Maryland finally won the basketball National Championship. As for the football team it’s forty years and  counting…… Hello high blood pressure.

So the time is now. No more watching games from beginning to end. No more sitting out in the heat and the cold with high hopes only to have another disappointing season. Come on Coach Locksley let’s go!!!! No more going to Xfinity Center during the regular season only to have the basketball team not make it past the Sweet Sixteen. Nope no more.

The Dallas Cowboys jacket you see pictured above has been in my possession for over thirty five years. Anybody remember Triple Fat Goose coats??? Lol!!! I have worn it on two occasions around my house to shovel snow. That’s it.

But now that I’m retired, I think I’m going to get a matching hat for my Cowboys jacket and a matching jacket for my Maryland Terrapins hat. At the end of each respective game I’ll check the score. If my team wins, I’ll maybe put on a hat and the jacket and take a walk around my neighborhood.

I have passed the torch on to my sons. Hopefully they will not inherit my sports fan high blood pressure, stress and anxiety.

Go Terps! And how ’bout them Cowboys!

You ever have one of those days where you wanted to do something that no one knew about? You had the perfect time and place with nobody around? Well I thought today was a such a day.

It is Saturday. First day of August 2026. I needed some extra rest due to staying up way past my bedtime a couple of days this past week. So I planned to take a secret afternoon “siesta” in my private VIP section of the house (I cannot reveal the location).

1:30pm. The atmosphere is set. No TV. NO PHONES. Peaceful quietness……until…….

I hear the faint sound of a phone alert ring out into the silence. And then I hear it again. A few minutes later again. I grab my phone and notice the time: 3:40pm. I was gonna get up at 4 anyway. Check the notifications: it’s my brother. Didn’t he know that I was sneaking an AARP nap! Guess not. So I call back and he wants to stop by after a spin on his bike.

4:30pm. My brother is here. We have a great time and great conversation. As fate would have it my sister calls. Even better. So we call our father to see how his day is going. All is well, but…..I had to disclose the fact that I was napping in my secret space.  Being chastised by my siblings was not in todays plans. The life of an older brother….Oh well.

I love having family around and I am grateful for the time we get to spend together. Even if they do interrupt my plans every now and then. Now let’s see, who’s buying me dinner now that I am awake?