To Tweet or Not to Tweet?

Not just Twitter actually, but any type of social media.  Some form of the subject question seems to come up on a semi-regular basis, probably more so in circles where the age creeps upwards and usage of social media is not a de-facto way of life.  The question came up recently where I work, so I thought I'd put a somewhat more reasoned answer in one of the forms of media that sparked the question.

Cutting right to the chase - why do I tweet, blog and book?  There is no one easy answer.  I took my time entering the field of public posting, attempting to make sense of it all first.  I doubt I've made perfect sense of it all now.  However, I think I have learned some things and can provide a "how it works for me" answer.  So in no particular order, here we go:

• Staking out a claim in cyberspace.  With a name like mine, there are not too many of us with the same name - but somebody had to be first.
• Preventing XPFA.  Short for Cross-site Personality Framing Attack.  Semi-related to the point above, follow the link for a not only a good explanation, but the original coining of the acronym.
• Connecting with old friends.  I have found and been found by friends that I'd known all the way back to Junior High.  We'd disconnected for various reasons, mostly unintentional and benign neglect.  The boundary free nature of social media provided a way to reconnect.
• Staying connected with current friends.  Short quick status updates initially seemed like shouting into cyberspace.  Over time, face to face meetups started to include conversations seeded from something that had been posted.  Instead of eliminating in person connections, social media has enhanced them.
• Keeping my friends.  I previously had the habit of occasionally sending out mass emails to various groupings of friends and family with everything from vacation pictures to political views.  I'm a realist, probably a lot of time they were just deleted.  Social media allows the recipient to tune how, when and if they view content you share - maybe helping me keep a few friends in the process.
• Professional connections.  I spent a couple of decades with a large international business that I still very much admire.  However at the time I was there, it was very much inward focused, not participating and thereby missing out on a lot of good people and ideas in the industry as a whole.  Focused national organizations and business networks provide a way to maintain connections and share very specific ideas.
• Giving something back.  It goes without saying that like most people, I've learned a lot through other people posting their experiences to the internet.  Not that anything I've put up is necessarily unique or special, but it just might give someone another perspective to consider.

Overall, it has been a very positive experience.  In addition to the benefits above, I've been contacted by persons who found my words to be useful and found my content cross linked in positive ways.  Being more in the public space has resulted in some harvesting of my name into various bogus listing services, but so far no harm done.

Sometimes blogging can still seem to me like answering questions that haven't been asked.  I started this post with one and will end with another.  Whether you consider yourself a reader, subscriber, follower, connection or friend - are you yet a writer?  There are a lot of choices, don't try and make too much sense of it, just get started and what is important will become clear.

Enjoy.

Fret Dressing

Collecting guitars is a trap many players fall into.  There's always thoughts of a "next guitar".  I'm likely no different.  The youngest of my first two sons (Steven Cimijotti) and I both agreed for years that the Fender Stratocaster sunburst finish was our favorite guitar style.  Neither of us did anything about it at the time, but I never changed my mind.

Fairly recently I came across one at a great price and decided it was my next guitar.  The neck was solid and straight.  The action was low and fast.  The finish was beautiful.  The one not so perfect element was the frets.  They were rounded nicely, but the cutoff ends were not finished well for a number of frets.  It was accounted for in the price and so I bought it, knowing one day I'd fix them.  That one day turned into many until our recent run of snowed in days.  It was time.

Let me say right off the start - I am not a luthier.  I have adjusted truss rods, replaced nuts and experimented with many different strings in making several guitars I've owned more playable.  However, I've never dressed frets before.  Never needed to actually.  So if you're using this as a guide, proceed at your own risk, but it did work for me.

There are lot of sites and videos that will show fret detail and dressing techniques for various repairs.  The problems I needed to correct were sharp edges on the bottom of multiple crowns where they'd been cutoff.  Also three frets where the tang was not flush with the neck.  Here are the steps I took to correct them.

Preparation

• Assemble the following:  micro file set,  painter's tape, wire cutters, polyurethane (optional).

Setup

• Relax and cutoff both E strings.  To keep tension on the neck during the work, I left the middle four intact, just removing what was needed for filing.
• Tape down each side of the neck, just below the frets.  Using blue painters tape insures that it will come off easily and be easy to see if hit with the file.
• Tape down in parallel to the frets, as close as possible without touching.

Dressing

• Pick a flat file that seems suitable, maybe one with a taper.  Starting roughly parallel to the fret, draw the file around the end of the fret and down.
• Start near the bottom, around 12th where still have some room, develop technique in a lesser played area.
• Use the flat side of a tapered file.  One direction, rolling motion, starting parallel to fret, rounding over end and down (end of stroke illustrated)

A couple of tips to keep in mind along the way:

• If you're tempted to not use tape - don't.  The tape, especially the blue tape which turns white when roughed up, provides a visual of when getting too deep.  Plus a thin margin of error for slips.
• Place the tape across the frets like laying out string for a setting a fence - as close as possible without touching.
• Near the body frets are narrower than the tape so you can't pre-tape the whole neck to do the job factory style.  There will be iterations of tape removal and resetting.  This is more craft anyway, take your time.
• Since the strat is a double cutaway, I was able to dress 16 on one side and 19 on the other side.  I never play further down the neck anyway, so risking the paint shop finish on the body (the main reason I bought the guitar) wasn't worth it
• Filing took about two hours, a slow and meticulous process, running my hand along entire neck many times as comparision for each one as it was being worked.

Completion

Overall, this was a great success and I'm glad that I did it.  The neck feels much better now when playing.  There are one or two spots where I should have stopped which resulting in a couple micro fine and very short grooves next to a fret.  They weren't enough to require any refinishing, therefore the polyurethane was listed as optional above, more as a warning.

The neck more than passes the 6x6 rule (visible at 6 inches, but not from six feet) which is good enough for me.  However, if you're really particular and/or have a very expensive guitar, finding a professional luthier to do the work for you might be less stressful.

The picture below (that I couldn't get the lighting just right on) provides some idea of what the finished product looks like, restrung and back hanging on the wall. 

For me, this project was probably as much about customizing the guitar as it was just trying something different to see if I could do it.  Looking back, I'd do it again without hesitation.

Now to take it back off the wall and enjoy.

The Best Discussion

STRTweets posted an entry last week linking to Joe Holland's blog post on "8 Tips for Talking to Kids About the Sermon".  In that original article Mr Holland begins and ends with two observations about kids:

1. They retain more than you think they do
2. They understand more than you think they do

Both are accurate statements in my experience.  The first is encouraging to any parent wanting to pass along their values to their children.  The second echoes my previous thoughts on the ability of children to think critically.

In between those two observations, he makes a number of good suggestions on how to create opportunities to introduce your children to Jesus.  My own experience as a parent is filled with both failure and success, many of each, in making those introductions.  Especially in the area of post sermon discussions.  The remainder of this post focuses on some elements of the successes, as additional considerations in addition to the "8 Tips" linked above.

We've tried a number of techniques to both emphasize a sermon message and to use it as spring board into broader family discussions.  When children were very young, completing the picture in a children's bulletin was a start.  That graduated into writing any three notes about the sermon, which typically became a song title, picture and Bible verse.  Finding the right balance after those early stages has been more challenging and varies between children.  Particularly when as a parent you believe a child isn't "working at their potential", to use a common school phrase. 

Two things that have generally worked well in our family have been big picture discussions and chasing rabbit trails.  The big picture is typically easy to grasp, even for wandering attentions, and leads naturally to a discussion on life application.  Often though, it branch off down a rabbit trail, which has lead to all sorts of interesting insights.  In both, open ended questions help encourage thinking and typically provide guidance for where the conversations will or should go.

In the end, the best discussion might be not be a specific discussion technique at all.  It might be the experience of spending time and talking with your children.  It just might provide a memory of what you value to them, in more ways than one.  Something to pray about.

Enjoy.