Jim Dye

I'm not sure what kind of tuners they are. They look pretty generic to me. The peg has broken off. Nothing too serious. I have a friend who repairs guitars looking at it. I don't have much extra time right now to do it myself. I think i'd like to put the humbucker back in, but that'll be phase 2. I just want to get it set up correctly. I appreciate the offer!

Here are some pics.

My wife called me at work today and said a friend gave us an old electric guitar. Our friend works at one of those strip mall mail and packaging joints. Someone sent this guitar last year and no one ever picked it up. It turned out to be a 1972 Electra 2238WC Rock 'n' Soul. It has one tuner broken off and the set up is way off, but the neck is pretty straight. It doesn't have the original pickups, but I plugged it in and it sounds OK. It'll need some repair work, but I may have found a nice little player. How much would it cost to have someone replace a tuner and set it up? Should I attempt to do it myself? I'll post a pic later. Here is an ad for the guitar. It's the black one on the right: [edit - pic did not show up]

You can use the free Foobar2000 to convert directly from FLAC to LAME MP3.

Looks great! I used an Andreas Viklund template for a site I made at work.

Hope you had a great birthday, Lon!

The 2005 remaster of Standing On The Verge of Getting It On is extremely messed up, with edited songs and early fades. I think Ace UK fixed it, but even the US versions are from the wrong master..

Damn! I should drive down.

I'm sure Howard Johnson is going to be there!

http://www.apple.com/trailers/paramount/wtc/ Here is a link to several high quality versions of the trailer. I am more inclined to see this one than United 93. Perhaps because I was very familiar with the WTC and the whole downtown area.

I loved mine. I say loved because I still have them, only they are now empty sitting in my garage. I sold most of my collection years ago to finance my bachelors degree. If anyone is near Nashville and is interested in some used forest green can-ams, let me know! They are a little dinged here and there, but in relatively good shape.

Hang in there Jim! We really appreciate what you do. I was in the process of changing my web host and domain name registrar because they have been so flakey, and I saw that a bunch of people were posing in the back room. Thankfully, I hadn't changed my nameservers. Glad to see we're back again.

There was a Saturday Night Live commercial from the 70s that never aired called Placenta Helper. "Placenta Helper lets you stretch your placenta into a tasty casserole, Like Placenta Romanoff--a zesty blend of cheeses makes for the zingy sauce that Russian czars commanded at palace feasts" etc. The last line was supposed to have been a voice-over from Don Pardo: "Placenta Helper--make a rare occasion, a rare occasion."

I'll catch you the first of the month when I get paid. I promise that's not an April Fools Day joke!

The person running the server let anyone SSH in and set up their own user account. They probably exploited this: Directory Services CVE-ID: CVE-2005-2713, CVE-2005-2714 Available for: Mac OS X v10.3.9, Mac OS X Server v10.3.9, Mac OS X v10.4.5, Mac OS X Server v10.4.5 Impact: Malicious local users may create and manipulate files as root Description: The passwd program is vulnerable to temporary file attacks. This could lead to privilege elevation. This update addresses the issue by anticipating a hostile environment and by creating temporary files securely. Credit to Ilja van Sprundel of Suresec LTD, vade79, and iDefense (idefense.com) for reporting this issue. It was patched with a security update last week.

Wow! What a nice piece. Elvis Mitchell writes about movies for the New York Times.

Mac Attack a Load of Crap Commentary by Leander Kahney | Also by this reporter 02:00 AM Feb, 22, 2006 Is the sky falling in on our smug little Mac universe? On Tuesday, there was news of a security hole in Apple's Safari web browser that allows a system to be compromised by merely visiting a website. And last week, the first worm to pose a serious threat to Mac OS X, Leap-A or Oompa Loompa, raised its ugly little head. These security woes prompted a rant from one of our editors in a daily story meeting. Mac security-threat stories are annoying, he said, because they play off misconceptions -- held with a fervor bordering on the religious -- that the Mac platform is inherently more secure than Windows. Not so, he insisted. Microsoft has done some stupid things that exposed its customers to unnecessary risks compared to Mac users. But all systems are theoretically vulnerable, so it's inevitable that the Mac citadel will eventually be breached. The Mac has had no viruses to date, he said, primarily because of its small market share. It's got a superior track record compared to Windows, but it's not invulnerable; rather, no one has bothered to spend much time trying to attack it. Now that hackers are taking more notice, life will get harder for Mac owners. He suggested I tackle this "wake up call" in this column. Naturally, I agreed. "You're right," I said. "The Mac is sure to become a target now it is becoming more popular, and by definition, no system is 100 percent secure." So, imagine his reaction when he sees this: I'm not going to be running any anti-virus software anytime soon, just as I haven't run it for many years. Also, I'm not going to turn off any preferences that make my daily computing habits any less convenient (the browser takeover is protected against by disabling the "Open safe files after downloading" preference in Safari). The smuggest of smug Mac users is right: the platform is more secure, and these new security threats are no more threatening that a paraplegic kitten. The Leap-A malware was a poorly-programmed Trojan horse that relied on "social engineering," or trickery to perform its nasty function. There's a simple way to protect against this kind of threat -- common sense -- and in testament to this, a lot of people didn't fall for it. I'm not going to catch a virus this way any more than I'm going to send money to the honorable Dr. Mobuntu, head of the Central Bank of Nigeria. When it comes to Leap-A, I'll continue practicing the same common-sense precautions I take when using a Windows machine, like not opening any "nude pictures" of Britney Spears I get in e-mail. As for the Safari hole, it's a vulnerability, not an exploit, and there are probably dozens of these in OS X, maybe more. The same is true of Windows and other platforms -- there are dozens of potential ways in, according to the SANS Institute, but a vulnerability does not an exploit make. These Mac security holes are a storm in a teacup. They've inspired hundreds of stories in the press and even the national network news, but if they were Windows holes, no one would have blinked. That's because holes in Windows are routine, business as usual, while it now appears the Mac is under attack thanks to Apple's brand-new high profile. But this isn't the case. Last month, there were four "massive" virus attacks on Windows, according to Commtouch, an antispam and antivirus vendor. Indeed, viruses are now so aggressive, they routinely outpace attempts by antivirus companies to distribute protective signatures. This state of affairs is now so common, I hadn't noticed -- and I work for a technology news site. "Virulent computer virus infects millions worldwide, other non-news at 11." These Mac "threats" are only news because of their novelty, not the threat level they pose. I'm so confident in my Mac's security, here's my IP address in case any hackers want to take potshots at my machine.... Just kidding. I'm not that dumb.

The back covers are shown over at Vintage Vanguard. (I cannot link because they are dynamic images) They may be in the correct track order.

After some technical difficulties over the past few weeks, I am happy to announce that the Back Room is Back!

Wrong. An iPod is a playback/recording/storage medium. You are making the wrong comparos here. Huh? Sure, it's not really cost effective to cut your own records. However, both tapes and CD's are inexpensive playback/recording/storage medium. I was making the point the iPod is hardware, software and storage "all in one" - very different from a turntable, cd player or cassette deck. Not a deep thought. Not really. An iPod, like a walkman, is pretty much just a playback device. With an iPod, a hard drive holds the music, just like cassette tape holds the music in a walkman. What has changed is the amount of music that you can carry with you. With a package 1/3 the size of a walkman, you have at least 1000 times the storage space of a cassette tape.

Wrong. An iPod is a playback/recording/storage medium. You are making the wrong comparos here. Huh? Sure, it's not really cost effective to cut your own records. However, both tapes and CD's are inexpensive playback/recording/storage medium.

Jack Crystal is on the right. [Portrait of Milt Gabler, Herbie Hill, Lou Blum, and Jack Crystal, Commodore Record Shop, New York, N.Y., ca. Aug. 1947]. Gottlieb, William P. 1917- photographer.

Here is the message from my web host: Monday February 13 2006 - Load issues Our staff is currently aware of load issues that we are experiencing on the server. Our network technicians are working on the server to resolve the issues. We expect to have the issue resolved shortly and all services should work properly shortly. --- Our staff have been reviewing this issue with the Datacenter technicians and our Server Management team to return the server connectivity. The system core OS services are reporting several errors that is going to require a system reload to correct. Our staff have confirmed that the last account backup cycle from last night is listing in good condition and we will be performing the recovery process once the main system OS reload is complete. We expect to have this issue corrected this afternoon and will update this news listing with the progress on correcting the connectivity of the server and hosting accounts. Support --- Monday February 13 2006 - Load issues Our Staff is currently performing the restoration of accounts, we expect this to be resolved shortly. We apologies for any inconvenience.

I'm not sure what is going on. I'll let you know what I find out. Thanks for the heads up.