iTunes outrage

I'd heard stories of this happening to other people, but I didn't know it would happen to me so soon....

I started buying songs at iTunes less than a year ago. I felt pretty good about it. the songs were pretty cheap (I got many of them from discounted gift card auctions on ebay). and I could pick what songs I wanted from new albums that came out since, inevitably, a "good album" only has 3-4 decent songs on it nowadays.

so after reformatting my hard drive this week, I had a startling discovery - a couple HUNDRED songs were missing. they were all songs I'd purchased on iTunes (again, these were discounted itunes gift cards, or ones I'd received as gifts - just so you don't think I blow a couple hundred $$ on music in one sitting).

I keep all my mp3s on an external hard drive. I have iTunes load them directly onto it so that when it's time to re-format, or if my computer crashes, I'll have it backed up already.

but iTunes counts how many machines you save your files onto. you're allowed only a max of 5 machines on which to keep your songs. i'm guessing it thought my newly re-formatted computer was a 'new machine' and wouldn't even copy the library onto it. fine - i still had the originals i'd downloaded on my external drive, right? nope.

when I searched on the external hard drive for the missing songs (I can't remember all of them, but there are entire albums missing), they're gone. itunes erased them off my external hard drive. i double checked my ipod, which hadn't yet been updated since the re-format and... all the songs are there. specific albums that are presently on my ipod, that I purchased from iTunes, are no longer on my external hard drive.

this is infuriating. I know there are people who are suffering in this world a lot worse than I am, so I'll simmer down. but I'm never buying a song from iTunes again.

if anyone knows of a respectable online store where individual songs can be purchased and loaded onto an ipod, please let me know. until then, limewire, here we come....

"the movie"

jodi and I went to see the DaVinci Code tonight.

you might even say it was 'DaVinci Day' for us. the church where we led worship this morning showed a video by one of our least favorite Christian authors, Lee Strobel discussing why the Dan Brown novel is wrong and why we're right.

our initial responses include, but are not limited to the following....

-this is a fictional novel/movie. it's pretty evident when you see it. so why are we jumping to refute it - as if it claims to be an authoritative piece of historical writing?

-let's say Jesus and Mary Mag did have a family and kids and have a bloodline (although I personally don't believe it - don't worry tina). how would that change our faith and the way He's affected our lives? as Tom Hanks' character says near the end of the movie, maybe Jesus was a human with a family, AND did all those miracles (paraphrased). and maybe such a large role for Mary Mag would indeed open more empathy toward women and the marginalized within the Church - not entirely a bad thing.

-isn't our faith and our God bigger than all this? let's thank God for another great opportunity to dialogue with others about his Son, shall we?

my rig and me

here's why I think God is telling me I should quit playing the electric guitar: in the past month, I've blown out two very good guitar amps and one pedalboard.

it started when I decided to re-tube my prosonic combo. It played great for about one minute... then it began to smoke... then it died. turns out one of the tubes (a Philips/JAN NOS 12AT7 from mojotone) had a short in it. this would usually cause minor problems and cause any other amp to stop making sound. in my amp, however (which was a "one in a million chance of bad luck" according to my amp tech), it caused the whole thing to heat up. the smoke was from my circuit board being fried to the extent that diodes began melting through the sauter, and falling off of it. Rob at guitar electronics graciously found the problem and fixed it. but not without a price tag of $120 - almost what it cost me to buy all new tubes in the first place.

while my amp was being resuscitated, I borrowed a fender hot rod deville from a local church. I was only intending to use it for one rehearsal. when I first plugged in, the thing rung like a bell. so beautiful. but by the end of the first song I ever played through this amp, it died too! sounded like a tube blew, but I don't know exactly what happened. I ended up apologizing like a moron to the pastor of the church, and to the band I was sitting in with.

my very next gig, I had to borrow yet another amp (which ended up working great). but my pedal board decided to poop out. it just stopped powering all my pedals. turns out all the adapter plugs were warped - from the Arizona heat or from being crushed or whatever.

so here I sit a few hundred dollars in the hole from new tubes, amp repair costs, and a new power supply for my pedal board. my pedals are jimmy-rigged with 9-volts and various adapters with wall-warts until the new power supply comes. but there's an upside....

my reward: wahba got a new tone - uh-huh - wahba got a new tone. i'm so excited to play again.

best review ever!

this is a humbling, God-glorifying review of my CD.

cat video

video #1 - jodi's reaction to catching the cat - should be up and running. let me know if you have any problems running the video....

video shoot

no, not my video, but brandon's. he's asked me to sit in with his band for the video for his new song "Castle" (check out a sample of the song on his website), and to possibly play guitar with his band for a few dates.

brandon's a great guy who's been blessed with some amazing connections. for example his new album and his road band will feature andy robbins (anyone remember the christian metal band, holy soldier? andy was the founder and bass player), and troy luccketta from the band tesla. these two incredible artists also showed up for the video shoot and...

let's just say the jams between takes were so sweet. troy is a madman on the drums and andy plays his '67 p-bass like butter. they're both such incredible guys too - so kind and humble. I'm chomping at the bit to jam with them again soon....

baby pictures....

i know this is wicked late, but here's the first ever picture taken of our baby! sorry it's so blurry - this is actually the first picture I've ever scanned in my life. I'm so behind the times....



the little lump in the middle is our firstborn. this was taken when jodi was 8 weeks prego (now she's almost 13 weeks!).

our second visit/ultrasound is next week....