Local Flavor: Happy 4th, Back-N-Forth

Yesterday was the most subdued 4th of July I've had in the last 15+ years. COVID kept our jam group from playing on the park and so for the first time in -- 10 years? 11 years? -- we didn't do our yearly 4th of July concert. That was hard on me. I'm very attached to that.

We did get a good long swim in with the kids at the river and that was fun. Bonnie and the kids got spooked by a sea lamprey carcass dangling around some rocks, though. I'd seen in the other day but didn't mention it. Humans have a way of being terrified of the unknown, afterall.

Because the kids have been littler, we haven't been going to fireworks shows because they start so late -- but they're older now and so we caught a bit last year and caught a lot more this year. The Granville Fire Department was launching them from a clifftop this year so people could remain in/around their cars and separated while parked along the highway. While they were smaller and farther away, it brought back some of the cheer I'd been missing.

For the earlier part of the day I puttered around in the workshop, though. I helped my friend Todd rout for a truss rod in a neck he's making for his electric Chess Guitar project -- then we glued the rod and fretboard on it. 

This is a Kalamazoo KG-32-style guitar that I had to yank the (poorly-reglued) back off to solve various problems -- cracks, much loose bracing, whatnot. Check out the size of those braces, though! These sound good "as normal" and that definitely is "as normal."

I should've taken a third shot with all the new kerfing in and the medium-ish shaving job I did to the braces, but suffice to say this box is all glued-up and should be back in order on Tuesday.