ZOOM H2 Portable Recorder

I just bought this about a week ago.  It is an excellent recorder for the price.  It has great bang for the buck.  I got it for about $140 at Amazon.com.  It came with a 1GB card and that can record up to 6 hours of MP3's.  I have since used it to record my lesson that I have once a week for Hammered Dulcimer and I recorded the worship service at my Church last weekend.  It worked great, I just need to find a better place for it to be.  The accessories that come with made it perfect for me to start recording and transfer straight to my computer.  I think the ZOOM H2 Handy Recorder is an excellent out of the box recorder for going professional right away.  It even does 2 channel and 4 channel stereo, also front and back 90 to 120 degrees.  It does an excellent job and is well worth the money.  The benefits are awesome.

If you want an inexpensive hand held recorder with lots of accessories this is the one for you.  I can't say enough about it.

School assemblies are cool. . .

I am taking Hammered Dulcimer lessons from a student at a college near me.  I travel there once a week and we meet for an hour and practice rudiments, skills and some songs.  I recently played for an assembly yesterday at a school that I work for.  The grade school kids just loved it.  They were grades K-5 and it was in two different settings.  I did not play anything special.  I played My Country 'Tis of Thee, Twinkle, Twinkle and a few odds and ends from a Breton song and some of my own doodling or tinkering.  I had a good time and it went well. 

The really cool thing was that I knew I made some mistakes.  I know that some of what I was playing was nothing special.  I know that to me it was not the best I could have done.  But the important thing to me and to the kids and parents and teachers, was that I played.  I played well to them.  I played peacefully, according to them.  I did a wonderful job.  I have been asked to come back to play for the school's 85th birthday.  So I may not be the best player, but to them I did a wonderful job.

And the most important part is I had a good time and the assembly enjoyed the performance.  That is what I can take away from it and that is what I will take away from it.  I will strive to just play better and have a good time, instead of trying to be perfect in my playing.  I will endeavor to play my Dulcimer and enjoy it.

Because School Assemblies are cool !

Snow this Morning....

I have an official sighting of snow.  It was about 6:30 this morning and right up to around 7 that I saw snow on my drive into work.  Now I live in central / upstate New York.  Which means I live far from NYC and about half way between Albany and Buffalo.  We have had a nice warming trend up until this past weekend and to top it all off they not only predicted snow for today, but I saw it.  The weather people were right this time.  It would have been more interesting if it was a full blown snow, but the few flakes I did see was very interesting.  I wonder if we will have a good snow fall this April or May.  We will just have to wait and see.

The more you focus on progress the less you progress.


The less you focus on progress the more you progress.

I learned that yesterday and today I am just living, not worrying about tomorrow or this summer or anything.  Just going to live in today and enjoy what comes my way and what happens.

Enjoy the day that God has given you.  It is all we have.

Coals of Shame

 Romans 12:9-21 Read it, it is good. It tells us to not return evil for evil. Bless those who hate you. Don't be like them. I like the last verses from here Romans 12:19-21 (NLT)

¹⁹ Dear friends, never take revenge. Leave that to the righteous anger of God. For the Scriptures say, “I will take revenge; I will pay them back,” says the Lord.
²⁰ Instead, “If your enemies are hungry, feed them. If they are thirsty, give them something to drink. In doing this, you will heap burning coals of shame on their heads.”
²¹ Don’t let evil conquer you, but conquer evil by doing good.

 

I like it because it gets me out of trouble. I can try to just be a blessing to those that hurt me. Not be mean back or hold a grudge. Not holding a grudge is harder than walking away and not saying anything to anyone. I don't want to forgive everyone that hurts me or someone I care about. But I can try to be more understanding and be more Christ like.

That does not mean I can not confront someone and let them know that they hurt me or someone I care about. It does not mean that I let them walk all over me and get away with every hurtful word or action. I means that I can tell them they are wrong and what they did hurt. Whether or not they apologize. I can stand up for myself and others. There is nothing wrong with that. If it is within your power to stand up when something is happening and you can help, then it is the right thing to do, to help and be of assistance. It is wrong to just sit back and watch.

The verses also say that we should take care of our enemies, feed them, give them drink, do what you can for them in spite of the their actions toward you or others. In this you shame them. You make it so they will feel ashamed for what they did to you or others. In the end God knows the count, God will take care of those people in His own way. It is up to us to just respond with compassion and understanding.

Do what is right by your enemy and God will do what is right in His eyes for you and your enemy. He will take care of the situation. All you can do it bless them and take care of them.

Dulcimers and Family

I have the best family in the world.  I am practicing My Country Tis of Thee for a school assembly for music month.  I am also practicing Lamb of God for an Easter service.  My wife made me practice for half and hour with out talking to me or allowing me to talk to her.  That was so nice.  I am using my new Warbler with the extended bass bridge it makes thing more interesting and more challenging.  The sound is so full and it is such a beautiful instrument.  I thank my wife and my God.  My wife for the instrument and my God for the skill to learn to play it.  Now if I can only learn faster.  :-)

To top it all off.  My wife helps with my playing by telling me I am playing too hard or too fast.  She lets me know what sounds good and when I am sounding better.  She is wonderful to me.  I can say that I could not do what I do without her support.