(second block, fourth letter of the prisoners' quadratic tap code...)

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...am here to tap through the walls.


Fri Oct, 05 2007

A Last Train From Clarksville

"It's very unfortunate that as much power and authority we have as a nation, we could fail to assist a hard-working small business man with a simple request. He's not selling drugs; he's offering a much needed service to a community. Mr. Ward conveyed the need for zoning permits and we failed him."
An important part of what makes me sick to death about an episode like this is the language with which it will always be taken up, now. "Mr. Ward conveyed the need for zoning permits...", as if it is and should be the natural run of things that a man -- in America -- must go begging, hat in hand, to the local commissariat for permission to conduct his private affairs as he sees fit.

The comment above is found here. I've seen lots more like it.

Last evening, Ronald "Bo" Ward shot himself dead during a Clarksville, Tennessee city council meeting after the council voted 7-5 against re-zoning his home.

If you go looking about for comment on this thing, you will find the word "coward" all over the place. I say that cowardice or courage have little or nothing to do with it. A nation of people bred now to everything but freedom will generally find it unimaginable that a man might simply have enough of the mortal indignity of so-called "public servants" arbitrarily deciding on the terms and conditions of his life, as if it is theirs, and not his. Yes: there were evidently immediately practical aspects of this. It looks like Ward had taken a chance on expanding his business and had gotten himself into a corner in the effort. However, the city of Clarkesville held the power to unilaterally decide on market conditions directly affecting his ability to manage his affairs within these artificial constraints, and there was nothing he could do about that. Try to understand, kids: it was not a market that Ward was dealing with. It was the forcible diktat of those conditions.

It may be unusual -- certainly, it's not often that a person jumps this logic of power to such a complete conclusion -- but nothing about it should surprise a thinking person in possession of the elementary facts.

This man realized that his life did not belong to him.

It's a very rare insight.

Oct 05, 07 | 10:53 am

AxeBites

Various guitars I see floating by, mostly Gibson and mostly eBay.

Early Norlin ES-335 -- 1970, in Walnut ("ES-335TDW"). This is a period-piece look and feel, and arguably the sound as well but that's to cut things very finely. A "classic" 335 would be the original of 1958 in the Sunburst or Natural finish, or the Cherry Red of 1959; the Walnut of 1970 (second year of that finish offering) is not really a "classic" 335. In the history of the Gibson aesthetic, this is analogous to, say, vertically-striped polyester bell-bottoms or Bahama Blue shag carpeting. None of this is to say that they're not cool guitars, and this is a nice one. Excellent photographs.

Chrome hardware, featuring the trapeze tailpiece (like my L-47 and I've always liked it) and ABR-1 bridge with period-typical nylon saddles. Bound rosewood fretboard, with small block markers, and then the crown inlay at the machine head. These would be the T-top Humbuckers. Vintage Nazis would moan that the upper bouts are pointy (the body templates were wearing-out in the factory) and the fourteen-degree machine head with the volute signals a sometimes not-fun era of the line, but these things really do rock or moan or whatever you want a 335-type semi-hollow to do. ...which, of course, is because it really is a 335.


In the months since I've let AxeBites languish all to bleedin' hell, Gibson's Robot Guitar technology has sifted out to other models than the original Les Paul application. I don't know how it's going: I still haven't even seen one of these self-tuners. I don't see piles of them burning on the sides of the highway, nor reverent hangings in display cases over bars, so who knows? This 2008 Robot SG is ready to rock in the Metallic Red. Nickel hardware; it's the stoptail wired for data to send to the tuners, with dual Humbuckers. It's a bound rosewood fretboard, but I really like the single-bound machine head with the crown inlay. That's a real cool old-school look, right there, to set off that crazy-ass color. {nod}