I was sitting in my office and looked over and saw my plant sitting there and started thinking... I've had that plant for a long time.  I'm not sure what kind of plant it is.  It's just one of those green wide leafed trailing plants that can continue to grow in almost any condition and can't be killed.  I cut off a little piece of plant, from a plant my mother had, when i lived at home... way back in junior high or high school time.  This little piece became my new plant.  I decided that i wanted a jungle in my room for some reason and so i started growing this plant in my room.  Soon after, I got another plant and I would string the plants from the ceiling and started creating my own personal jungle.  It grew for years until the room was covered with plants.  That's one way to create your own personal jungle.

 

In any case, I eventually had to move and cut down the plants... some of the plant vines we almost 30 feet long.  Needless to say, they got a little pruning and i took them to my new house where they hung from the 10 foot high ceilings and grew quite nicely near the windows.  No problems in this house.  They then survived another move to the house I live in now.  I also hung them by the windows from the ceiling and they were quite happy there as well.  So up until this point, the plants had lived really sun filled happy carefree days.  But this was about to end.  I then got married and kicked out the roomates, moved in all the new stuff and in the shuffle the plants were put out on the back porch in the hot sun.  As a joke, I always accuse my wife of trying to kill the plants at this point in their life's.  In any case, out in the hot sun without water for a while they were soon on death's bed.  luckily these plants are very resilient and, like i said, would take a lot for them to die.  So i took them in, pruned them down to the barest amount... a long way down from their jungle room heyday.  So, to help them out, I planted them in new pots and fed them well.

 

    Now, a few years after "the incident" they are alive and well.  Two very green healthy plants who sit by the windows again and enjoy their easy going lives.  They are probably about 70 years old in human years.  They started our small, grew into a massive jungle, lived stately lives, looked death in the face, and then came back to live in my office.  Wow!  That's Incredible!

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Ladies and gentlemen, the band is heading into the studio this week to start the next album! These songs have been kept under wraps for some time now, and it's almost time to unveil them.  No release date scheduled yet, but check the website for updates, video, and sneak previews of the impending awesomeness!

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.. People Watching should be a sport. If you define a sport as something that A) is fun, B) is good for you and C) teaches you something. One of the best things about people watching is it teaches you that there is infinite variety in the world. Literally every person that you meet is totally unique. I think that people watching is a lot like enjoying nature for that reason. Nature is also nothing but a display of unlimited uniqueness. Everything that you see in nature is unique. As the saying goes, no two snowflakes are the same.

Why is it that a jagged landscape on the horizon looks beautiful, but a row of cookie-cutter manufactured homes all painted the same color looks ugly? There is something so compelling about this. Something in us craves uniqueness, maybe it is because it is the natural state of all living things on the Earth. Maybe we inherently look for things to match the uniqueness that we all have within us. Whatever the reason, I’ve noticed that, for me at least, truly beautiful things are unique.

Nothing supports this thought more than having a child. Now that I have two, I am amazed at how totally different they are. Of course our first is a boy and our second child is a girl, so there is an obvious difference there, but the differences go so much further than physiology. They come to Earth totally and completely distinct, unique individuals. There is really nothing more beautiful in this world than seeing a perfectly unique new little life come into the world. It instantly makes you realize that we are all a part of a big picture and the drama that is playing out in our lives is a long string of irreplaceable, distinct, unique experiences.

This is one reason I love music so much. I love that every time I play I am participating in something completely unique--a moment in time that will never return. I feel lucky to have a lot of unforgettable moments playing music.

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..

I remember back to when I was a sophomore in high school. It was the very first day of school and the halls were flocked with people wearing new clothes and shoes. It is pretty much the most important day of school year. It’s the time when if you want to get noticed, that day was it.

            That morning, just before the classes were to begin, I was walking around the halls in the school. Seeing friends and acquaintances that I haven’t seen over the summer break. I was feeling pretty good. I was excited about the new year.

            I decided to go ahead to my locker and drop off some stuff and get ready to goto my first class. My locker was in senior hall so that was really cool. Walking down the hall, I felt someone’s hands grab my sides and lift me into the air. I was held in the air for about 10 seconds until I was finally let down to the ground. I was shocked and immediately felt embarrassed. Standing there, not being able to move, my legs were being held by this person, while an outside observer assisted in wrapping my ankles with duct tape. The taping went up my legs until my waist. My hands and arms were behind my back tied together with this stuff  called duct tape.

            They left me there standing in the middle of senior hall, all tied up . I remember students walking by laughing and with looks of amazement written on their faces. I never felt so embarrassed before in my life. I saw one of my friends from church and he came and pulled me aside. Helped loosen the sticky duct tape from my arms and hands. I had enough strength to just pull apart the binds from my ankles. I was set free free in minutes. I picked up my books from off the floor and proceeded to my locker.

            I knew that I was scarred for life with having this experience. The next couple of weeks were of students asking me how it was being duct taped. I told them it sucked. It sucked bad!

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..

When I was young, I always repaired and maintained my own instruments out of necessity.  Come to think of it, my first banjo was purchased in pieces from a band mate for $100.  So naturally, I assembled it and learned a few things along the way about basic banjo construction. As time went on, things like changing strings, adjusting the neck tightening the head refitting a bridge…these were all things that I just did as needed.  I guess it never occurred to me that I should have someone else do what had to be done on my instruments. I figured, if some one has to fix this, it might as well be me.  If I didn’t know quite how to do something, I would just read about it, ask someone, or best of all, just learn as I went.  Eventually, the types of things I “fixed” became more and more involved.

 

           Here’s an example.  I purchased my first mandolin at Acoustic Music in Salt Lake City for $300.  It needed some work but of cours I though “I can fix that”.  One day, after fixing all the obvious problems and playing it for a while, I decided that I didn’t really like the color and I wanted a radiused fret board and I would love it if it had binding on the back and on the peg head and so on and so on.  Basically, I wanted a $3000 mandolin.  But I didn’t have $3000.  So I cleared off the ping-pong table downstairs at my parents house, gathered some basic tools and supplies and dismantled the mandolin down to the bare wood!  Over the next few weeks, I added every feature on my wishlist to the best of my ability…Learning as I went, of course.  The best part of it was that it actually turned out pretty good.  That was the beginning of me as a Luthier.  Since that project, I have build (or rebuilt) 6 different instruments including a bouzouki, a banjo, another bouzouki, another mandolin, a dreadnought Guitar, and another Banjo.  Maybe I’ll tell you about each of them some time. "...if some one has to fix this, it might as well be me..."

 

 

When I was young, I always repaired and maintained my own instruments out of necessity.  Come to think of it, my first banjo was purchased in pieces from a band mate for $100.  So naturally, I assembled it and learned a few things along the way about basic banjo construction. As time went on, things like changing strings, adjusting the neck tightening the head refitting a bridge…these were all things that I just did as needed.  I guess it never occurred to me that I should have someone else do what had to be done on my instruments. I figured, if some one has to fix this, it might as well be me.  If I didn’t know quite how to do something, I would just read about it, ask someone, or best of all, just learn as I went.  Eventually, the types of things I “fixed” became more and more involved.

 

           Here’s an example.  I purchased my first mandolin at Acoustic Music in Salt Lake City for $300.  It needed some work but of cours I though “I can fix that”.  One day, after fixing all the obvious problems and playing it for a while, I decided that I didn’t really like the color and I wanted a radiused fret board and I would love it if it had binding on the back and on the peg head and so on and so on.  Basically, I wanted a $3000 mandolin.  But I didn’t have $3000.  So I cleared off the ping-pong table downstairs at my parents house, gathered some basic tools and supplies and dismantled the mandolin down to the bare wood!  Over the next few weeks, I added every feature on my wishlist to the best of my ability…Learning as I went, of course.  The best part of it was that it actually turned out pretty good.  That was the beginning of me as a Luthier.  Since that project, I have build (or rebuilt) 6 different instruments including a bouzouki, a banjo, another bouzouki, another mandolin, a dreadnought Guitar, and another Banjo.  Maybe I’ll tell you about each of them some time.

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..

The temptation to lump people into categories in an attempt to better understand them is too great for me to withstand.  Historically, I am not alone in this.  From the beginning of time there has been the Believers and the Non-Believers, the Have’s and the Have-Nots, the Natives and the Aliens, Royalty and Peasantry, the Conservatives and the Liberals, the Starred and the Non-Star-Bellied Sneetches, and so on.

For years I found the most useful way of categorizing people in a way that helped me to better understand them was to make two groups – those who “got” Gary Larson’s Far Side comics and those that didn’t (sub-category: those who pretend to get it but don’t).

Now I have arrived at a new level of judgementalism, one with such far-reaching connotations that it’s hard to believe the accuracy with which I can assess any individual and their inner-most feelings after but witnessing one solitary act:

Clapping along to a song.

There are two types of people in the world:  One-And-Three-ers and Two-And-Four-ers.  The names, for the less musically inclined, are derived from a typical song which is counted in 4/4, which means the musicians keep time by counting to four over and over again.  Typically, emphasis is given to certain of these four beats, which provides feel, groove, rhythm, and awesomeness.  Nothing detracts from said awesomeness, however, like an audience member who misinterprets the emphasis and begins to clap along to their own alternate-reality-version of the song.

One-And-Three-ers clap on beats one and three, using two and four to prepare for the next clap.  Two-And-Four-ers, in a similar fashion.  They each have their place.  But if you want to see the true nature of a person, a veritable window to their soul, a litmus test of hipness test, play a song, and have them clap.

 

Example:

 

Bingo:

There WAS a FARMer HAD a DOG and BINgo WAS his NAME-OH

               1              2                 3                 4                     1                     2                        3         4

 

Practice singing this while clapping only on beats 1 and 3.  If this feels natural to you, you are a One-And-Three-er.  Perfectly acceptable.

Now sing it again while clapping only on beats 2 and 4.  Does this just make you feel awesome inside?  Do you feel like you are in harmony with nature and the cosmos, and everything is going to go your way?  Congratulations, you are a Two-And-Four-er.

Both types of people are welcome at a concert of mine.  But to those who are born with 1&3 tendencies, here are some pointers to help you fit in at concerts that involve groove:

1.     Watch the drummer.  When he hits his snare (the loud one right on front of him), clap.  Incidentally, I don’t know any drummers who are One-And-Three-ers.

2.     If you’re aware of a 1&3 pre-disposition, watch for hip-looking people in the crowd, and wait to clap until you’ve ascertained that you are in sync with them.

3.     If you’ve been diagnosed with a pre-existing 1&3 condition and have been unable to obtain treatment, you can always just sit in the back.

4.     Limit your concert attending to musicals, children’s plays, cowboy poetry, traditional bluegrass, and polka-thons.

5.     Before attending your next concert, buy yourself a Stevie Wonder CD and practice in the comfort and privacy of your own condo, or while driving your Corolla.

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..

I play a violin that has been in the family for a long time.  So, i thought i would tell a little history of how this violin became what it is today.  A long time ago, i think that the violin was in my great aunts closet.  My dad saw it and asked if he could fix it up and use it.  As long as i could remember, he had been playing this violin.  He used it every morning when he  got up with me to practice.  Eventually when i got old enough he gave it to me and i have been playing it ever since.

 

The violin was built in 1934.  I'm not sure where all the flaws on this violin came from but there are a bunch of cracks, divots, scrapes and other imperfections.  I'm sure that someone who played quite well used the violin at one time because there is some wear up by the neck from playing up high.  I'm almost sure that the headstock, at one time, was actually ripped off.  Also there are all sorts of other cracks from weather and other various unknown forces.  The most dangerous crack is right on the back under the sound post.  The crack is not getting any bigger at the moment and the violin remarkably still sounds great despite this potentially fatal flaw.  This also foreshadows the remote possibility that the violin might explode at any given moment.

 

Since i have had the violin I fixed the headstock with epoxy and glued the violin back together.  I've taken this violin all over the United States including Hawaii and Alaska, Canada, and to Europe a few times.  We've seen a lot of jam sessions and shows.  One particularly large gouge in the top of the violin was made when i was playing in a large fiddle group.  One of the other fiddlers bowed right down into the top of my violin.  Also, when I was performing a show... Colin Botts, our bass player at the time, threw his whole body back in a flying stage antic.  The bass headstock went smack in the middle of the violin and smashed the whole thing.  It would be equivalent to taking a baseball bat and smashing the violin like a pinata... needless to say, it was unplayable after that.  I took it to Dan Salini in Salt Lake City who fixed it up quite nicely.  Since then i've been pretty successful at keeping the violin intact and it surprisingly still sounds the same.  It is amazing how much kinship you can feel towards an instrument and how much character it can develop over the years.

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..

We live in a world of seemingly infinite options. The technological advancements of the past century have taken mankind from isolated communities to a worldwide community. The internet has opened a window into the lives of people from Shanghai to Los Angeles. Dating sites make a new relationship just a key stroke away. With all of the options out there, it can be hard to feel settled about settling down with one person for the rest of your life. There is a very different way to look at commitment than the conventional “ball and chain” mentality. The reality is, by giving up everything completely to a committed relationship, you get everything in return.

 

It is easy to keep the “grass is greener” mentality when you’re dating. It seems like there is always a more intriguing option just around the corner, and the more you keep one foot out when you step into a new relationship, the easier it is to take off at the first difficulty that comes along. This is an endless cycle that too many never break out of. The common portrayal of a “man’s man” is the James Bond character, the guy who lives a life of independent adventure and always has a new beautiful girl on his arm, merely an eye candy dessert to be consumed and discarded without a second thought. What Hollywood doesn’t show you is the end of the movie---a man who reaches the end of his life and still hasn’t found what he’s looking for, as U2 put it. Because really, if you spend your whole life looking, you’ll never give yourself the chance to start experiencing life authentically. You don’t really know yourself until you give yourself away.

 

Commitment is the key to making real progress in your life. Your character is pushed and stretched as you are put in difficult situations, and your spouse goes through the same kind of spiritual growth. You watch each other grow, and at the end of your life, you have someone who remembers the good ol days. This is something you don’t think about when you’re living the fast paced James Bond life, you don’t think about what it will all mean if nobody remembers the early days, if nobody understands how you’ve progressed or what you’ve experienced. What’s more, you won’t have that person in your life who you saw develop and grow, who you helped to become the person that they are at the end of their life.

 

If you want to see more reasons why long term relationships are better than hundreds of short lived romances, movies and TV aren’t helping much. It seems the popular shows typically portray the James Bond type character and glamorize the swinging bachelor life in countless scenarios. Almost every reality show comes to mind, Hugh Hefner comes to mind. It is tough to watch him with his triple blond harem (who have all left him for their own TV shows or other romantic exploits) without feeling a sense of pity. No amount of stuff can compensate for being alone at the end of your life.

 

True happiness, at the end of the day, comes from a committed relationship. At the end of your life you won’t look back and wish you had more conquests, you’ll want to look back with someone whose love has carried you through.

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Hey all, the MOOAP Stickers are in the store at www.shupe.net- we've had all sorts of requests for them.  Check 'em out!

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..

Just recently, I saw a kid walking around with a balloon tied to his wrist. I immediately cringed because when  I was a kid, the balloons I had didn’t even last 1 minute. Thanks, one of my brothers( His name I will not mention). Everytime  I would get balloons either at a birthday party or at the county fair, my brother would pop it. Balloons are the most awesome thing in the world when you a child. You don’t care about anything else. I thought I would share a tidbit of my childhood experience. Now, I feel a little better by getting this out. 

 

Until next time…

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