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Dedicated to the proposition that every thought that's ever been thunk may be of interest to someone . . .

 
THEE: I just LOVE the tone and even tempered attitude of Hself.  
His second paragraph must make you feel pretty good, I would 
expect.  I quote: 

> There are large gulfs between the islands of certainty in 
evolutionary theory and the natural history of Earth; 
anyone who doesn't acknowledge that or attempts to paper over 
them with conjecture is being, well, conjectural rather than 
scientific, and if they try to rope science into their guff, 
especially those 'scientists' who should know better, then they 
deserve to be shown up  - and you do, quite rightly and very 
well.  

Do you feel you finally have found someone in your corner? :-) 

He points out, fairly eloquently, what I have been trying to pin 
you down on since we have been having these discussion.  I don't 
believe you have a problem with the "fact" of evolution, which, 
as Hself mentions, seems pretty clear from the fossil record - 
reflecting a progression of simple to more complicated life forms 
as the rocks the fossils' are found in decrease in age.  In other 
words, I have never heard you say that its your belief that all 
life on earth that ever existed was created at the same time, the 
only other alternative to "evolution" that I can think of.  
Rather, it's the currently accepted "mechanism" of evolution that 
you take exception to, i.e. as suggested by today's evolutionary 
biologists: a succession of small changes via genetic mutation 
that randomly results in beneficial traits (or which "weed out" 
harmful traits) which, when continued over many eons, gives rise 
to different structures within a species and, ultimately, 
different species. 

Am I right here? 

 
ME: Not exactly.  For a start, I don't know what anyone means by 
"the fact of evolution", beyond "evolution is something", which 
is in no way scientific or useful.  

 
THEE: Some time back I came across all the work you have done on 
the Francois Campion scordatura.  I downloaded quite a few 
pieces, and although I managed to print them out more or less OK, 
I found myself getting very confused with lines and spaces and 
only five strings, etc.  I have therefore been redoing them using 
Alain Veylit's Stringwalker program purely for my own 
consumption, but having done them, I would like to make them 
available on the net (free), either through the Stringwalker site 
or another early music site.  I know they're not strictly yours, 
but Minkoff claim worldwide copyright on their facsimiles under 
Swiss law, and as it's your work I'm copying, I wanted to check 
that you have no objection. 

 
ME: No objection whatsoever.  I'd be pleased to see my tablature 
work spread far and wide.  

 
THEE: I can't believe I found this site.  Last spring my college 
buddies and I came up with a version of roofball, very 
similar to, but different from yours.  I just put up some stuff 
on my web page about it, and looked for it, and found yours.  I'm 
glad roofball has been providing fun for many since before we 
came up with our version.  Anyway, in our game, we play with 
either a basketball or a 4 square ball (depending on the house) 
and you must jump, catch the ball, and throw it back on the roof 
in mid air.  Scoring occurs when the ball hits the ground, or is 
served out of bounds (but there is second service in some games). 
Anyway, we had a tournament and everything. 

 
THEE: 

> I was hoping to surprise you with Zahr Myron Bickford's 
Story of the Strings in the mail ... 

And, you did! Thank-you! It arrived in good order and quick 
as a flash, I scanned the first "movement" and converted it to a 
MIDI file so I could hear it (I'm not a very good sight-reader).  
Fascinating to hear music which probably has not been heard for 
70 years ... I will be able to play this stuff, too! 

 
THEE: I happened to land on your site doing a search on Zani 
di Ferrante's Carnival of Venice. What a great job you 
are doing!! WTG.  I play only passably and years ago when I was 
(actually) better than today I tried very very hard to play the 
Ferranti Carnival of Venice, but as you know it is quite 
difficult. Are there any recordings at all? I have never been 
able to find a single one. I have typed the piece into some music 
software, but, really, that hardly does justice to the piece.  
Thanks for any help you may render, and again, great site! 

 
ME:  Glad you liked what you saw in my guitar pages. No, I've 
never heard of a recording of Zani di Ferrante's 
Carnival of Venice, or, for that matter, ever seen it 
listed in a concert program. Sounds like a good question for the 
guitar discussion group, rec.music.classical.guitar . 

 
THEE: Good afternoon Donald!  Just wanted to let you know I 
received the Beatles cards [Beatle Significa] in the mail 
today, and thank you for the little added surprise too!  It is so 
cool!  How did you get a negative of Paul McCartney like that?  


ME: Glad you're pleased with the little Beatles game. The 
"negative" of Paul McCartney is actually a frame from the 
Let It Be Movie. A friend of mine found a few big lengths 
of Let It Be film on the ground (or friend of his did) and gave 
it to me. I chopped it up into individual frames, or two frames 
together. I hope it turns into a "collectors' item" for you 
someday! 

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Hself = generic name, male or female (Himself, Herself).

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