We still talk too much!!

New board!

Been a tough little bit here. And remember me mentioning the pegs on my violin might be a problem? Yeah well they are. I had a fight with it yesterday, and it totally won. It would cost $130 for a new peg box set up which is what they recommend since the peg box is not in correctly. but We don't have that. Plus not really sure it's worth putting that money into it. So Mum had me call the store and we asked about their rental program. The first year is 100% money back in shop credit. Which is great because you basically get to try the instrument and see how everything goes. And the money you pay can go to buying the rental instrument or anything else in the store--even if it's a viola or cello or a bunch of strings and it's $22 a month, plus tax. $5 extra if you want 100% replacement should anything from cat, dropping or running over it with you vehicle, which they don't recommend 😊. Anyway so Dad and I and Melody drove up to Atlanta today and set up a year rental. Mum opted for the $5 extra insurance since we dont own it and all. I had them swap the rental's strings for the one i own. He said he did some research and the strings the rental had should have little to no nickel so it would help me if I want to use the old violin. He also took the chin rest off and instead of swapping the Warner I have one the old violin, (which is the no metal exposed one) he just put a Warner on for me. So I can now play both instruments without too much worry. He also replaced the broke E string at no additional cost. This saved us $40 together. So pretty pleased about that.

I didn't test her out when I was there, He said the one he was setting me up with was an excellent one that was just turned in today. it really is lovely. It was a long two hour trip home but after we finally got home and put stuff away, I did try her out and OMW does she sing! There's a large difference in her sound. I love it!!! So whilst I know we really could use not to have to spend the extra money, I am grateful and I got a lovely sounding violin :D

Paddy: true. Oh it's been so painful and today will has been high pain with it. I'm hoping it calms down soon :/ hehe Aliens are awesome cute new ha too :D

Pinkpanther Right?! I'm over surgery! lol don't feel bad, I died an embarrassingly high number of times myself :P

that violin definitely sounds like a great one! :D And their year rental is perfect too, as you don't have such a huge outlay as if you were buying another one :D

I was stuck for ideas and Niamh wanted purple, so I figured she might as well use those pjs :P I love the musical look today - especially that little mouse :D

at least not up front :D. I'm really loving the sound difference lol. mind you I'm still hitting sour notes ;)

well its cute :D

thank you :D lol I couldn't resit the little mouse with it :D

Sounds like a fun experience all and all. Especially if the stuff you produced got published. :D I never really learned how to take pics, I just grab the camera (app) and hope for the best. lol

Makes you wonder what phones will be like in 20 years. Or if we will have smartphones at all, or it be something else? O_O

Sounds like you got a great violin, happy for you. :D Sadly I have never been musically inclined, I always envied those who had musical talent. Or for dancing. Also glad to hear that I was not the only one struggling with the battling in Hogwarts Legacy... what did you do to get past it?

thanks. Me too. I love music so it amazes me when people play so well. Im not entirely sure i have a talent for it but im gonna keep trying lol

Okay so the trick is that it sort of lights up a little when the statue is about to lunge at you. Thats ehen you cast protego. The game wants you to cast it a certain amount of times which it says in tiny writing. I think it was 6 times. As soon as you have one statue nearly killed finish it off if you can. I tried to kill all but two and then finished the amount it wanted me to shield against. Then finished the remaining ones off. There is another battle after them as well. But if you time it so you cast protego and stupefy the baddy it goes a bit better. Though i did have to start over at that battle too.

hopefully the sour notes will sharpen (or flatten, depending on which way they need to head) after a little practise ;) I reckon having a violin that actually has a decent tone would be a good incentive to actually get those notes clearer - if it all sounds a bit naff (down to the quality of the violin), it doesn't encourage you to actually play does it? ;)

It wouldn't be as good without the mouse ;)

If I remember right, I got £4 per photo that they printed in the paper (or £5 if it was printed in colour), and something like 8p per line of text which eventually went up to 11p per line.... that's why I preferred photos as they were better money for the time spent! Honestly that's all I've ever done with photos as well laughs just point, shoot and hope everything comes out right :P At least now with digital cameras / phones, you can see the pics straight away and can take another if the first one wasn't in focus ;) Back when I started doing that for the local paper, I had a camera that not only took rolls of film, but also had to be manually wound on between shots (and the flash took 3 minutes to rechaarge after each use!) 😊

If you think of how technology has changed over the last 20 years, I have absolutely no idea what to expect for 20 years time!

Even your HA seems to be practicing hard. xD Thanks for the tips for Hogwarts Legacy, I shall try that next time I boot up the game.

Still sounds better than my job as a teen, working at a fast food place. :P Granted it was nice to earn some spending money for myself. 3 minutes is a long time to wait for the flash to recharge. o_o Makes you thankful for digital photography. It must seem even more crazy to people that are older to us... but I feel like there is such a huge change from when I was bon in 1980.

thankfully I managed to avoid the fast food jobslaughs they weren't the most attractive jobs out there, although at that point any job that paid something was kind of appealing!

nods it seems really crazy to think about how computers and things have moved on in that time, or even the internet o.O

Well, it was our family business (I worked with my parents, aunt, uncle, brother, and a few of my cousins). So yeah. lol Would not have been my first choice.

Yup. My laptop died a couple of days ago. Bought a new one yesterday. So far it seems to work really well. Fast, even when running sims4. :D I might be able to do some gaming on this one. :D

No way of escaping working there then! Although I guess in a way you knew a bit more about it before you started there, so at least you knew what you were letting yourself in for! ;)

That stinks on your laptop deciding it'd had enough :K but hopefully the new one will keep up the pace so you can try gaming :d Were you able to save all your files and everything to put onto the new one?

I finally decided it was time I updated my computer (it's been limping along for months, and the disc drive stopped working in January) - the new one arrived last week, but I still haven't got everything swapped over from the old one yet 😊

yeah I think i am getting better with some songs :D I've added some more too so I'm really enjoying it :D

lol yes, though hes got the cello :D But I've been practicing almost everyday for at least an hour, sometimes more :D I absolutely love it. Good luck :D

tried any Christmassy songs on the violin yet? I had a go with my 'Christmas songs for the flute' book on the whistle (ignoring the ones in the wrong key :P) and some of those worked quite well :D

Love the sparkly background by the way :)

I started helping out at our restaurant when I was very young. :P I don't even remember when. lol

I had my files saved in the cloud, so I did not lose anything important. :D I am quite paranoid about that, so I have things stored 3 places. Laptop, cloud and external hard drive. :P Good luck sorting out your own computer. :D

You have been practicing a lot then! True that... your HA is a bit too big to be a violin I guess, but still works. xD

I've never felt comfortable with stuff being saved in the cloud - I think I just got so used to the idea of it being on a computer and a backup drive that having it somewhere else that I have no control over, just feels unnatural :P

I find cloud storage very convenient. But of course, I can understand there being some security concerns for people.

Oh dear... It is snowing a lot today. AND I am going to this year's last football match with my dad and brother. It is going to be cold. lol

and it's probably a lot cheaper than having an external hard drive as well!

Snow is great to look at but not so much when it comes to a football match! Over here they'd just most likely call off the match and reschedule it :P Did your team win? :D

The snow is pretty to look at for sure. :D It takes a lot for them to cancel a football match due to the weather here, but I just think they need to have the season end earlier in the year like they used to! Sadly we did not win and lost out on getting a medal. >_<

you can tell we don't get snow all that often - even the tiniest little bit on the road and the bus service stops round here (admittedly there's some steep hills to negotiate) and slightly more snow and everything seems to be unable to cope!

That stinks with them losing and missing out on the medal :K maybe next year will go better :D How come they changed it so the season ended later in the year?

In the meantime it will be interesting to see what new players we will get and who will move on to other teams. They have had a lot of games to fit into the schedule for the season, other than that, not sure why. O_o