Speaking of failure rates, one of my customers brought back a PA head he bought. Obvious power supply problem. Made horrible noises when you turned it on. Instinctively I gave the box a shake. Something rolling around inside the chassis, about the size of a roll of quarters. I opened it up to investigate further. Well gee, there's the power supply problem - one of the main filter capacitors is like rolling around. The other one is only half soldered in. Fixed it - but the customer had already exchanged it for a cheaper one that worked. This means I've really gotta' plug in and try every last thing which comes through the shoppe before a customer does. It's a time and space issue so I was hoping it wouldn't have to be this drastic - but until I know which lines to trust it's just another part of the job.

Went out this evening after work to see some local talent at the coffee house. It's the same guy who bought the defective PA so I figure it's the least I can do - go out and support the arts. The PA sounded pretty good. But I'm taking mental notes - neither of the guitars is adequate sounding for his style of playing. File it away...

Making room for drum sets. This company makes the Cadillac of drum hardware. You take one look (yes, even you) and everything is built like a tank. And they have starter sets - 24 colors. I don't have any room for more than about 3.