So, yesterday, on the way home from work, I saw my wife's car, with my wife's mane of fiery red hair, headed down the hill, away from home, as I went up the hill.

Yet, it wasn't my wife. There's some gal that lives up around where we live that drives the same car and has the same hair, and same basic body-type, as Mrs. NFB. I've seen her walking up there occassionally and almost made lewd comments, but always managed to stop myself just in time.

But this time I could have sworn it was her.

Anyway, this weird identity crisis is apparently boiling over in my brain because last night. . .

It started simply enough. I'm in a public restroom and suddenly there's my pups, and my kitties, except, all of them younger. Like, right when we got them young. Which makes no sense, because we got them in pairs at very different times. Separated by years. But yet, there they all were, just babies, all together.

I was weirded out by it, so I left the public restroom only to walk into an open field. Turning around, there's no building behind me. Not even the building I had just walked out of. Turning back around, I'm surrounded by buildings, as if I were in the middle of a large city. So, I go to get into my car. . .

Which promptly turns into a huge Dodge Ram pickup in the same color. I decide I need to drive to get the hell out of this weirdness. I start driving and AFKS shows up as his fifteen year old self and climbs into the speeding truck as if it isn't moving and starts chatting with me about how strange the weather is today. Clouds appear. AFKS morphs into Seth Rogan as he appeared in Freaks and Geeks, not that that's much different from what he looks like today, but as he morphs into Seth he lunges for the steering wheel and turns it.

Just as the truck makes the corner I look up and see Mrs. NFB as she looks in this picture of herself she gave me when we were dating. She was quite a bit younger in that picture than when I met her, and looking very fine indeed. Anyway, I see her coming at me, in her old car, a white Corsica, and she aims right for the truck. Plows into the front of the truck and her car skims up over the top of the truck. I stop, and get out.

No sign of her car, but there she is, only now super-stick-thin-skinny, on the roof of the truck. I pull her down, and ask her if she's OK. She says yes, but she's feeling hungry. She's covered in small scratches and bruises, but she smiles at me.

Then I wake up.

I hope I don't see not-Mrs. NFB today. I don't think my mind can take another sighting.

BREAK

Paybacks are a BITCH.

Since Mrs. NFB has purchased me a popcorn machine like I've always wanted, I've been looking for either a cotton candy machine, or a slushie/slurpie type machine for her. I've found a couple of inexpensive cotton candy machines that people say work pretty well. I've found no slushie machines for less then four big bills that work worth a crap according to reviews.

Anybody have any recommendations on slushie machines? I realize it's a niche product for the home market, and as such not likely to be something many people use, but I figure it's worth a shot.

BREAK

So, for some reason, blixco's entry about playing violin got me all fired up again about violin. It's been hovering on the brink of my brain for several years anyway, and now that I'm kicking the music back up it's been more present in my mind and that entry tipped the scales and I started google searching, yet again, for that elusive, affordable, electric violin.

If we were to win the lotto tomorrow, I'd be ordering one of those awesome Mark Wood Viper five strings, but I'm not loaded enough now to think a three thousand dollar instrument is the way I need to go.

So, I'm shocked to discover this new eViolin since the last time I looked that clocks in at a measly $89. Meant as a quiet practice instrument, it actually has specs that makes me think I could make use of it. Most reviews say that it requires a lot of setup work, which is no big deal as even the most expensive new instruments require setups. Then I find there's a place online selling them for a ten dollar markup that do the setup for you and. . .

Well, it's not ordered yet, but it's on the list. I've heard complaints about the sound quality, but hey, it's just gonna get sent into the POD to be distorted and destroyed sound-wise anyway, and pickups can be replaced if it really doesn't work for me.

Which sent me traveling down the path of questioning instrument costs.

Gibson charges around a thousand bucks for their entry-level Les Paul that may, or may not, play worth a shit out of the box. It's not the quality you're paying for at that level, it's the name. It's not until you hit the three to four grand mark that you're pretty much guaranteed to get a good quality instrument from them.

Meanwhile, supposedly inferior Chinese and Korean guitar shops are churning out surprisingly consistent instruments that, while not perfect, offer affordable playability for around the two to three hundred dollar mark. With the same setup that an entry level Les Paul needs to have perfect playability, it's going to feel just about the same. The bugger is in the setup. Spend the extra bucks to get it Plek'ed, which everybody says a cheap instrument isn't worth, and it'll be perfection regardless of how much the up-front cost was. If you know what you're doing, you may or may not be able to get that setup quality on your own.

I've played a few two hundred dollar guitars that I wish I could have convinced their owners to sell to me over the years. I've also played a few three to five thousand dollar guitars that you couldn't pay me to play until they'd had a good setup done to them.

It's all in the setup. Well, OK, it's mostly in the setup. Buy a guitar without a trussrod and a shit quality bridge and no amount of setup is going to fix it.

Over the years I evolved into the mid-range guy. I don't buy the cheapest, I don't buy the most expensive. I buy what I consider to be the entry-level into the realm of instruments that get a good setup right from the manufacturer.

The eViolin world is much, much smaller than the electric guitar world, so I expected the prices would never come down on them. Yet, here we are, an eViolin clocking in at under a hundred bucks with a pro setup from the selling shop. Now, I'm not expecting it to be terrific at that price, as I wouldn't expect a guitar to be terrific at that price, but with a shop-cut bridge and a shop-filed nut, there's really not much else necessary to get an eViolin in playing shape. So long as the fingerboard is well radiused and not bumpy, it should work for my purposes.

The more expensive instruments will just have to wait. No need to toss money at the problem until I determine if my moronic idea will even work on a small scale.

If it does, you'll be the first to suffer with that knowledge, I assure you.

BREAK

Zippy's taken up a new habit. Or has evolved an old habit. He's taken to listening to his ear-buds through the day and tapping his fingers loudly along with the rhythm of whatever shit music he listens to. Today the rhythm is being pounded out by a fist smashing repeatedly into the desk, hard enough to knock the picture off the cube wall on my side.

Asking him to stop resulted in a momentary calm. Then, it double-timed. It's like he's got a rubber mallet in his hand and is just slamming it down repeatedly into the desk.

BB asked me if he should put his gum in Zippy's hair to give him something to occupy his hands for a while. I told him that's not a bad idea, but wait, because this might be the final straw to break the proverbial dromedary's vertebrae and Zippy may end up getting cut down if he keeps it up.

Suddenly, it grew quiet. We'll see where the rest of the day leaves us.

Bleh. Outs.