Long lost Gibson Guitar Les Paul Gold top stolen from ago · Saturday March 20, 2021 by colin newell
A very long time ago (1985) I was a Gibson guitar player – The Gibson Les Paul guitars are awesome for Rock, Blues, Jazz, pretty much whatever you want to play.
And I played this one in a few eighties bands… in a life a long time ago.
That said, I was not a big fan of this for some reason. It might have been the colour or the weight.
Ah, the weight! It was like carrying around a large dog draped around your shoulder – like a Lab or a Bull Mastiff -
The sound of the Gibson Les Paul is unmistakable – it snarled like a cornered tiger and effortlessly took charge of any musical performance it was involved with.
But the weight got me down… literally… and one day I sold it to a notable and successful gigging musician and session player. That was in 1990.
The new owner traveled the World with it – and the old Gibson took on a new life of its own. Click photo for bigger view
Then one day in 1992, it was in the locked trunk of of the owner, “Sean’s” 1980 Buick in underground, gated parking beneath the Seagate Apartments on Esquimalt Rd. He came home after an afternoon practice and had left it for around two hours before he had to head out to another practice. Two hours in a locked basement garage. It could have been an inside job, an unscrupulous neighbour… someone that clearly did not appreciate the fact that this particular guitar playing fellows livelihood depended on those 6 stringed instruments. Guitar be gone.
Anyway – occasionally I make a shout out to the World about this missing guitar – likely in the wrong hands, maybe getting played, maybe not or in the hands of someone that is not aware that it is hot.
Click Photo for a bigger view.
Anyway – here is the picture of the guitar stolen years ago – and somewhere out there, this guitar is waiting to come home to its owner. If you see it, please send it on its way.
The original owner thanks you!
This was a 1971 or 1972 Gibson Les Paul Deluxe with hard case stolen from the Seagate Apartment parking lot in 1992. The serial number is 171568 –
Any intel on this item would likely be rewarded with cash or whole bean coffee! Or both!
The Soul Commotion - photos and music from the 1990's · Friday March 19, 2021 by colin newell
Soul Commotion from the archives!
Download here – Track-1-Small.mp3
Way back in the 1990’s I did a photo shoot for a Gospel R&B band that rehearsed at Glad Tidings Church. The objective was to get some tight band shots for use in promotional materials. I shot a few rolls. The band leader was not excited about the results. So I put them in my film archive with the other 12,000 film images I have taken over the years.
Now 27 years later I am opening the archive. I also have a copy of the bands 4 song EP that I am digitizing for them – and I will scan all the other photos. Above is a sample track for downloading or listening.
Enjoy!
Nice buns - sourdough style. · Tuesday October 20, 2020 by colin newell
Pull-apart rolls have always been part of our childhood, whether they were dinner table accessories during Thanksgiving, market bought for summer BBQs, or served at school alongside baked beans and mac ‘n cheese. These sourdough rolls take the classic soft roll and improve on the texture and, most importantly, the flavour.
Working with sourdough has opened quite a few doors for me. It is the current faddish bragging right – but sourdough items are nutritious in a way that makes them worth the extra effort and planning.
Plus, this particular recipe has a sweet, buttery, and curiously tangy profile that keeps you coming back for more.
You’ve been warned!
This is a simple recipe. Follow the steps and the weights!
Take your sourdough starter. Create a functional levain. Away you go!
Disclaimer Note: This is not a masterclass on starters and levain. The assumption is: you know the difference.
Fed Levain –
24 grams ripe sourdough starter
60 grams all-purpose flour
60 grams water
12 grams white granulated sugar
Roll ingredients
440 grams all-purpose flour
180 grams warm water
115 grams whole milk, cold
75 grams butter (softened)
23 grams granulated sugar
10 grams fine sea salt
Instructions
Fed Levain – Add 24 grams of your ripe starter to a bowl. Add 60 grams all purpose flour and 60 grams warm (but not hot) water. Stir to combine. Add 12 grams (or less if you are inclined) granulated sugar to this mix. Combine. You can leave this on a counter for 2-4 hours until it starts to rise up in the bowl. Depending on your timing, you can put it in the fridge overnight. It will still need 2 – 4 hours to “come to life…”
When you are happy that your levain is perky and ready, get your main roll ingredients out and a suitably large mixing bowl.
Here is the order in which I add things – it may vary from the standard but the end result is the same.
Add 180 grams of warm water to your mixing bowl (Use a digital scale to make sure everything is exact!)
Add your levain. Gently mix these two together.
Add your milk.
Add your sugar.
Add your salt.
Add your 440 grams of all-purpose flour to this mix.
For this recipe I use a kitchen-aid mixer but you can do the following by hand if you want.
Mix for three to five minutes until the dough starts to unify and hang onto the mixing hook.
Add the butter in “tabs” or “portions” – just not all at once. Keep mixing until the butter is incorporated into the dough.
At this point you can leave the dough in the mixing bowl or transfer it into another vessel.
This will begin a 4 hour “bulk ferment”. If you have started all of this early in the day, the bulk ferment can take place in the bowl on a countertop in a reasonably warm kitchen – 71 degrees (F) or 21C. Things develop faster in a warmer space and slower in a cooler space. If you started this process in the early evening, you can bulk ferment overnight in a fridge for 8 hours or more.
Whichever way you choose, you need to do some stretch and folds on this dough to develop the gluten. If I am making bread during the daytime, I observe the following schedule: I do “pull and folds” or “Slap and folds” every 20 minutes for an hour. That is three “pull and folds” in one hour. And then two pull and folds over the next hour. And then one pull and fold in the third hour.
Obviously this is impractical if you are doing a refrigerated overnight bulk ferment. If you do an “overnight” then in the morning you should do a sequence of pull and folds. YouTube is a great resource for various pull, fold and slapping techniques for dough.
However you decide to do the bulk ferment and pull/fold combinations, you will still end up with a bowl of dough that has “risen” or increased 60 to 80% in volume. This is when you ready the dough for “segmentation” into 16 suitably sized balls (60g give or take) of dough for a greased (buttered) 9 × 13 glass casserole dish (2” deep generally).
I used a bench scraper for cutting off pieces of dough – but anything reasonably sharp will work.
Organize these balls of dough into the buttered casserole dish and don’t worry about them avoiding social distancing.
They are going to expand anyway – and when they are done, they’ll pull apart easily.
The Proof
For some, this is the hardest part of prepping dough for baking. How much time should pass during proofing before the dough is ready for the oven? You are going to need a minimum of 2 to 3 hours in a moderately warm kitchen (21C) and maybe longer. I did 4 hours of proofing and my buns were fine. The question remains: How do you know when the dough is suitably proofed?
My method is the poke test. The dough should raise by 60 – 80% by volume and pressing your finger gently into the dough should yield a slow 75% spring back. If it quickly springs back 100% it needs MORE proofing. If there is no spring back, then it is over proofed!
Baking
Preheat your oven to 425°F (220°C) with a baking rack in the middle of the oven.
In a small bowl, whisk together one egg and a tablespoon of whole milk until frothy. Using a pastry brush, gently paint the egg wash onto the proofed dough in a thin, uniform layer.
Slide the pan with dough into the oven and bake for 25 minutes at 425°F (220°C). After this time, rotate the pan 180°, turn the oven down to 375°F (190°C), and bake for an additional 10-15 minutes until the rolls are golden brown. The internal temperature should be above 196°F – 210°F (93°C-96°C).
When baked, remove the pan from the oven, let rest 5 minutes, then turn the rolls out to a wire rack to cool completely, about 30 minutes.
Sea to Sky series Chapter 1 - with Bush pilot Ryan from Papua New Guinea · Monday September 7, 2020 by colin newell
I’ve often thought that God has to have a sense of humour. Moments after creation, the supreme being paused for a moment, and during a millisecond of pique, created Papua New Guinea as an exercise in extremes.
For Papua New Guinea is a land of unapologetic beauty, impossibly isolated mountain ranges, with waterfalls emptying into valleys of inexhaustible fertility.
Ryan Farran was fascinated by aviation while growing up in Papua New Guinea. The child of missionaries, it was during adolescence he decided that a life of service to the people of PNG, from sea to sky, would be his career choice.
His work for Ethnos360 Aviation, a non-profit organization, assists tribal church planning missionaries, running MedEvac missions and supplying safe water projects, to name a few.
We asked Ryan where his interest began, “I have had the itch to be a pilot since probably first grade. It’s always been an interest, but it wasn’t until about 11th grade that I made the decision that being a pilot is what I wanted to do. More specifically, a missionary pilot. Flying with the airlines looks too monotonous and boring. I like the fast pace, single pilot aspect of my job.”
We reflected, how “a kid from the United States…” would adapt to a cultural mosaic that could not be more diverse and separate from his own.
The actual answer is likely more complex. Papua New Guinea is, on geography alone, a place so exquisitely secluded, that a 25 minute flight between villages is a 4 day trip through impenetrable jungle. This is where the benefit of bush flying comes in. However dangerous this job might be, and not without a myriad of challenges, a skilled pilot makes the difference between getting supplies to an isolated community a reliable option versus, well, not at all.
Ryan continued, “I was born in Missouri, but grew up everywhere. My parents went into missions when I was 5, so we moved around a lot for that. We lived in Papua New Guinea in the late 80’s and early 90’s for 4 years. That is where I got my first introduction to bush pilots. From 6th grade on, we lived in the States, mainly in Michigan where I finished off high school and started my flight training at age 19.”
Ryan discovered, early on, that the people of Papua New Guinea are easy going and friendly. Guests in this country must be mindful that this is a paradise where time and distance are not measured in quite the way we are familiar with.
Today, tomorrow or next week all can mean the very same thing. On some primordial level, this is simply the way things get done.
For Ryan, this sense of time suits him just fine. His greatest joy is planning out his day, making all of the important decisions and completing his mission safely, “on time” in a World where time is often meaningless.
Ryan again, “We live, on a missionary center, and it’s kind of like raising your kids back in the 1950’s in a small town where everyone knows one everyone else. We live on a 35 acre village with about 250 other missionaries.
There are a ton of kids for our kids to play with, and a school that has K-12. It really is great when one finds his purpose in life doing what he loves, and having eternal value while doing it. It’s definitely a rewarding and fulfilling life.”
Ryan’s company aircraft is the Kodiak. Purpose built in Sandpoint, Idaho, the Kodiak is considered one of the more robust STOL (Short take-off and landing) aircraft seemingly destined for the most efficient humanitarian workloads. With a cargo capacity approaching 1000 kg, it’s a lifeline to communities that are separated by the most rugged of countryside.
For those seeking a career in bush pilot flying, be advised, the training is a long haul, 10 years or so according to Ryan. If our readers think there is anything routine about this line of work, Ryan offers…
“Yes, my most memorable flight days have been usually linked around bad weather.
Coming to the field with Very little IFR (instrument ) experience, it has made me learn it very well and fast.
PNG’s weather can change in a blink of an eye, keeping you on your toes at all times.
That aspect of the ever changing weather can be challenging at times, and fun other times.
Even though we fly a lot of the same routes to different bush locations, no two flights are ever the same. Cloudy or rainy weather can make the area look completely foreign.
I wind down with my hobbies. I love riding my dirtbike through the local mountains. I’ve probably put on 8000 miles over the past 4 years. I’ve always had a passion for photography, and it’s only been in the past 6 years that I’ve started getting into videography, and actually enjoy it even more.”
Ryan’s Missionary Bush Pilot YouTube channel is a delight to watch if you are interested in aviation and rugged terrain.
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