Yeeha Geetar!!!

Being an only child I have had a lot of practice amusing myself... seeing as there have been very few others. Mainly, I like to name and decorate things, basically I like to create an experience opposed to just running the motions.































Recently, with the inspiration of Guns 'n' Roses' Slash (Yes, I'm reading yet another autobiography about drugs and rock n roll) and his emphatic description of playing the guitar... an enthusiasm that could not be denied rose and decided to reside with me. I tried to ignore it but it insisted and so I bravely asked my friend "not to laugh" and whether he would help me to "learn how to play the guitar"... 6 days and 4 numb finger tips later I am considerably worse at touch typing but better at guitar.




















Here I would like to serve "mad props" as Randy Jackson would say to Emma Baker for lending me her guitar... Benjamin... I have since learnt that's his name.

As when I was 10 and inspired by the X-men cartoon series to create my own family of mutants I left my guitar progress report laying around and someone else discovered it. I would just like to take this moment and verify when I say I was creating my own family of mutants I wasn't creating real mutants... I was just drawing some pictures detailing and left them laying around.

To keep myself amused and my acquisition of a new skill on track I began keeping a guitar progress report. For your viewing pleasure please see below... please note I refer to the guitar as Brett, the pick as Jermaine and when you start applying your body weight's worth of pressure to the steel guitar strings it feels like razor blades are stuck in your finger tips. Apparently the pain will go but the callouses will come later...

My long nails that I had to sacrifice for the sake of my art

String marks on my finger tips... this is not normal!!!

My swollen fingertips after my first sesh of sticking blades in my finger tips

The view when I lay down at night... my hand drawn chord patterns

Apparently my guitar progress report is amusing to more than one person so I have decided to publish it here for your viewing pleasure even if it's just for one other person...

Larissa's Progress

Feb 23rd -->

Brett, Jermaine, Larissa = Present

C Major = Average, 3rd finger is giving attitude, muting thumb = roobesh
D Major = Mint, 2nd finger slid onto fret
E Minor = Absolutely flippin mint
G Major = Good
- Fingers building resistance :-)

Feb 24th -->

Benjamin aka Brett, Jermaine, Larissa = Present

C Major = Much better but pretty much still roobesh, 3rd finger needs strength, muting thumb = roobesh
D Major = bit of cheek
E Minor = Still flippin mint, old faithful
G Major = OK

- Need to stretch fingers and get used to spacing them out
- Fingers feel discomfort rather than pain so much
- Numbness increasing
- Finished practice as fingers seemed to not be able to hold down any note in the end
- Very twangy and muted
:-(

Feb 25th -->

Benjamin aka Brett, Jermaine, Larissa = Present
C Major = Memorised chord and yeah boy, nailed the chord
D Major = YAY! good, snagging a little, 2nd finger has attitude
E Minor = Nailed, YAY!
G Major = YAY!

"I knew Brett would come to his senses"
- 3rd finger still a bit weak
- Finger resistance even better
- Holding notes
- Getting somewhere!!!