What do we do?

Just curious. I know I'm a relative "newbie" here to the site, but I feel like I've already made some real good friends in a very short time and hope to keep adding to the list.

I know we all love to: build guitars, play guitars, look at guitars, discuss guitars and occasionally the music we make on them. But that's all I know. I've always found the cross section of society that we musicians (and builders) make up, pretty interesting, and I'm just curious about what some of us do for the "day gig".

Some of you may be lucky enough to do this full time or even make a living playing music, but I'm sure most of us aren't. Don't get me wrong, I'm not looking to get "too" personal. Company names and such are not necessary or asked for. Just curious what you might call your "profession", and I thought it might be a good way for some of us to get to know each other just a little bit better. If this is too "off topic" or if no one is interested, I apologize for the intrusion, and the written results will speak for themselves.

So here goes: I'm a printer. Technically, I work in what is called the prepress department. Been in the business for almost 40 years (I'm 57 by the way). The people in my department PREpare the files and documents for the PRESSes. I got into it by accident as a part time job back when I was in college (a LONG time ago) to make some money so I could by a Fender Rhodes electric piano. Found out I liked it, the pay wasn't too bad and it was even somewhat creative.

Back in the old days it was all cameras, film and chemicals. In 1991, the company I worked for at the time decided to get one of those "new fangled" Macintosh computers and I was selected to see if I could make it work for us. This was back in the early days of what was then called "desktop publishing". Computers were expensive and slow at the time. An 8 megabyte RAM upgrade cost over $3,000 and that was a HUGE amount of RAM at the time. In the mid '90's our first gigabyte hard drive for file storage was ONLY $1,000 ($1 a megabyte) and we thought that was SO cheap at the time.

Anyway, I'm still at it after all these years, and I haven't looked back since. In between times, I've been lucky enough to have been married for almost 35 years, raised a beautiful daughter to adulthood and her own marriage (still waiting for grandbabies!) I've played in a couple of very good semi-pro bands (blues/rock) and have had my share of good times doing that. In more recent years I've been concentrating on just improving my playing, doing a little home recording when I can and building up my guitar collection (about 17 as of last count - not including the ones I've built myself).

Well, That's what I do. How about you?

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Worked in marketing for 12 years.  Lost my job and fell back on cigar box guitars and my music.  Kept on going even when things were tight.  Now I recently hired a manager and I'm looking to tour in 2011-2012!

 

Follow your dreams! 

shane

i started as a baby in ohio.  quickly grew through taht stage an d worked as a cook through high school.  moved to waco tex after high school and be came a chef a the hilton hotel there.  got marruied, moved back to ohio and cooked for a fe yrs.  then ran a muinature golf course for 40-5 yrs, moved to indiana to work for a small familty owned luber yard.  work there for ten yrs till my first heart attack at 39 yrs old.  took it easy for a few yrs had a few more small heart attcks then bypass surgery in 1989.  worked part time at a bowling alley for 5 yrs.   then went to work at home depot for 6 yrs.  had to retire because of failing eyesight and couldn't drive.  kidneys failing, left leg lost duem to MRSA in hospital, but other than that i;m great.  but let it be said, if it wasn';t fior God in my life, i would be miserable.

 

im lookm forward each day looking to make at least 1 person laugh or smile and learn to deal with their problems.  most of us think we have roblems, but when we look around, there is always someone who has it worse  than us.

 

i look forward to  getting into the shop daily whether i only get 1 neck cut, 1 guitar  strung, or 1 amp circuit soldered up every day with me being leagally blind, i'm still grateful i can  get out there.

 

enough preaching lets hear more.

Mark,

 

Thanks for the story... I wish all the whiners in the world who have it "easy" could get a handle on how blessed they are and appreciate them.   Gratitude keeps us with perspective....

 

you da'best,

 

Wichita Sam

mark "Stumpy" quigley said:

i started as a baby in ohio.  quickly grew through taht stage an d worked as a cook through high school.  moved to waco tex after high school and be came a chef a the hilton hotel there.  got marruied, moved back to ohio and cooked for a fe yrs.  then ran a muinature golf course for 40-5 yrs, moved to indiana to work for a small familty owned luber yard.  work there for ten yrs till my first heart attack at 39 yrs old.  took it easy for a few yrs had a few more small heart attcks then bypass surgery in 1989.  worked part time at a bowling alley for 5 yrs.   then went to work at home depot for 6 yrs.  had to retire because of failing eyesight and couldn't drive.  kidneys failing, left leg lost duem to MRSA in hospital, but other than that i;m great.  but let it be said, if it wasn';t fior God in my life, i would be miserable.

 

im lookm forward each day looking to make at least 1 person laugh or smile and learn to deal with their problems.  most of us think we have roblems, but when we look around, there is always someone who has it worse  than us.

 

i look forward to  getting into the shop daily whether i only get 1 neck cut, 1 guitar  strung, or 1 amp circuit soldered up every day with me being leagally blind, i'm still grateful i can  get out there.

 

enough preaching lets hear more.

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