Archive for the ‘General’ Category

When you scroll through the annuls of history and study the leaders and rulers that have shaped our world, it is sometimes hard to believe the actions and decisions they made.  Whether it’s Kim Jung-il thinking he can take on the world and win, or Marie Antoinette losing touch with reality to the degree that cake becomes a logical famine remedy.  It’s hard to believe that reality is so out of reach for these people.  How could someone so misguided become so powerful?

But it’s not really out of the ordinary.  Take Kanye West par exemplar.  Mr. West’s behavior at award shows is typical of someone who no longer lives in this plane of reality.  But is it his fault?  Well yes, but he’s not alone.  Fame, wealth and power corrupts people entirely.  Not so much corrupts as interrupts that feed of data coming from the world around that gives you bearing.

Our modern celebrities may pale in comparison with the despots old, but given enough time and attention, I think we can get them there.  Only kidding of course…

The old (not vintage) solid state Princeton65. Your days are numbered, my friend.

If I keep this up, I’ll have a category for each post.  But if I stuck to one subject that would betray who I am.  I think I’ve brought new depth to what “Jack of all Trades” can mean.  At any rate this is but one of my many interests.

Since the 9th grade I’ve been leading worship in one capacity or another.  For all but the last year and a half that has been with an acoustic guitar.  Electic guitars were to complicated and honestly, I didn’t know what I was doing.

Enter:  Jason Day

My beauty: the Epiphone Sheridan II

Jason came to Life Church to be the Worship Pastor (now he’s that and the host pastor, but that’s a separate and very long story).  He’s also been a worship leader for a long time.  He plays a lime green Gretsch (oh so sweet).  Like a drug dealer, he offered to let me borrow a Fender Telecaster to try out.  Innocently, he told me, “Hey try any of my stuff.  Go on, do it!”  And after that, I was hooked.  Now I have a full rig of effects, a new electric guitar, and I’m looking to replace my old (not vintage) amp with a low wattage tube amp.

Using the borrowed Tele I began assembling an FX rig, mainly buying whatever Jason was selling.  It’s a great gear relationship that we have.  He likes buying new, and I like trying things out before I buy them!  Once I had saved enough pennies I bought an Epiphone Sheridan II.  It’s a semi-hollow body electric with dual humbuckers.  It’s almost too sexy for church.  As far as effects goes, I’m only one pedal away from having a “complete” rig.  I put complete in quotations because, like any eletric guitar player will tell you, it’s never complete.

Currently the Sheridan goes through the rig like this:

• BOSS TU-2 Tuner
  

  My blank canvas

• Carvin A/B switch…
  • A goes to the rest of the fx chain
  • B goes to an IMP2 direct box to the house system (for my Taylor acoustic)
• Visual Sound Route 66 Compressor/Overdrive
• Voodoo Labs Sparkle Drive (Distortion/Overdrive)
• BOSS TR-2 Tremolo
• BOSS CE-5 Chorus Ensemble (which I have set to color the signal with a vintage recording sound)
• BOSS DD-5 Digital Delay with FS-5U tap tempo
• Line6 DL-4 Delay Modeler
• Fender Princeton65 Amp mic’d with an Audix Instrument Microphone

All I need now is a reverb pedal.  Right now I’m looking at the Line6 Verbzilla.  This summer I’ll also be purchasing a Fender Blues JR, which is a sweet 15 watt tude amplifier that is great for small venues (like churches) and it has great tone.  After that all of my new purchases will be upgrades of what I already have.  Thanks to Jason I have a new expensive and addicting hobby.  But it has revolutionized the way I lead worship and brought back my feeling of inspiration and zeal for worship music.

I just recieved my new toy…I mean investment!  This is my first big investment into my new company, Next Mountain.  Even though the main impetus for buying a digital SLR is for design and photography, my main subjects will most likely be my family.  I mean come on!  Look at how photogenic they are!

He's a model...

I guess it’s not all bad.  I know the grandparents will be happy with the improved photo quality!

I’m really looking forward to further developing my photog skills (pun!), and I think that the ease of use and the high quality of the Rebel XS will greatly help.  Though every time I think of the Canon Rebel line of cameras,  I remember the Andre Agassi commercials when he was at the height of his ridiculousness.

So here are just a few of the 200 pictures I took within the first 6 hours I owned the camera.  Enjoy!

Ethan is trying out for a preschool rendition of Alfred Hitchcock Presents

0.5 away from the American Dream!

Ellie may not be capable of abstract thought, but that doesn't keep here from trying!

We'll see how long Ethan enjoys "mowing"

Erasure: the new waterboarding?

Much of the issue with modern education is the inability of the administration to scare its students.  Once a child decides that education doesn’t matter, there’s not a whole lot that you can legally do to him to scare him back onto the right track.  In-School Suspension?  Fine, gets him out of the classes he doesn’t care about anyway.  Out-of-School Suspension?  Great, now he doesn’t have to go to the school at all.  Expulsion?  Even better.  He was going to drop out anyway.

But really what are the options left open for the schools?  You can’t beat students anymore and like I said earlier, most administrative options only benefit the miscreant.  And now water-boarding has been taken off the table.

So here’s what I propose:  Only In-School Suspensions.

But Daniel, you just said that those don’t work.  Good catch, reader, but there’s a twist.

It worked for the US Military in Panama to get rid of Manuel Noriega, it’ll work on the youth of today.  Cause, you know, kids are our future!

(If you’re not familiar with the song search for it on iTunes and download it now and thank me later.)

I am not a very direct person, at least not when I drive.  Where others would draw the straightest lines between point A and B, I prefer to draw the meandering line that stops by rivers, creeks, waterfalls, weird sights and cool little towns.  When I work in Indian River School District, the possibilities are endless.  Usually I take a route that takes me by three waterfalls and dewatered stretch of the Indian that looks pretty interesting.

It was on one of these “excursions” that I met my new friend.  Really our introduction was all due to him, as he was basking in the middle of a road.  My new friend, whom I’ve decided to name, “Franklin” (those of you who are Arrested Development fans will now where that came from), was a heavy weight snapping turtle, and a grumpy one at that.

franklin the angry snapping turtle

Being the crunchy guy that I am, I couldn’t let Franklin sit there in the middle of the road.  It’s clear that he didn’t fully understand the severity of the predicament he was in.

So I said, “Franklin, you really should get off the road.  Cars come through here all the time.”

“You get off the road, hippie,” snarled Franklin, “I’ll take you and any car that tries to come down this road!”

Obviously, diplomacy was beginning to break down.  I briefly considered going “Crocodile Hunter” on Franklin and grab his shell from behind and wrestle him off the road to safety.  But then I remembered that the Crocodile Hunter is dead because of stuff like that, so another means would have to do.  Luckily, I still had my guide paddle in my jeep, and it seemed that it would make a great turtle spatula.

Franklin & The Paddle

Of course Franklin was against this idea, but then again, he shoots down anything I say.  So without his blessing, I went about wedging the paddle under Franklin.

“I’LL RIP YOUR FACE OFF! I’LL KILL YOU I WILL!” laughed Franklin.  It is very fortunate that I bought a heavy-duty guide stick, because snapping turtles have earned their moniker.  Several times Franklin lashed out at the blade, putting gouges in the hard plastic.  I think it really has to do with never knowing his father, but when ever I bring it up Franklin just withdraws into his hard shell (both figuratively and literally).  But in the end the turtle spatula won the day, and I safely deposited Franklin back in his semi-natural habitat.

“Thanks a million, Daniel,” hissed Franklin, “I was on a path leading to self-destruction.  But now I can get my life back on the right track!”

“Good-bye, Franklin!” I called back.  But Franklin wasn’t listening.  He spied a brood of muskrat babies and took off in hot pursuit.

That Franklin, what a guy!

This blog will be the chronicles of me.  Well, that sounds a bit more self centered than I prefer.  How about this blog will be the heralds of a life lived out-of-bounds.  That’s better.  And vague.

All kidding aside, let us commense with the introduction.

My name is Daniel Cash.  I’m many things at different times:  raft guide and whitewater kayaker, graphic and web designer, worship leader, teacher (ok, substitute), husband, father, friend, outdoorsman, photographer and now blogger.  This blog will really be a window into my life as I begin a new venture called Next Mountain.

Next Mountain is a design company that seeks to offer its clients easy access to great design.  Thereby allowing them to keep their focus on their next goal (or shall we say, Mountain).

This new adventure is both exciting and terrifying.  But if you look at life in general, we are all looking at the next mountain.  In every facet of life we press against the obstacles that keep us from our goals.

So expect to hear about everything and I’ll try to keep it interesting and worthwhile.  I heard that the greatest obstacle for writers is believing that what you have to say is worth hearing.

And here I thought it was the whole “Who v. Whom” debate.