The quest for perfection
In my quest for perfection on the public holiday Monday - I perfectly wasted a full day.
It all began when I decided I would kill two birds with one stone (damn…why are all my blogs animal related?!) and knock off two resolutions - improving my guitar playing skills while posting another blog.
I thought if a picture painted a thousand words, a video would surely paint a million! JOB DONE.
So in preparation I attempted to learn one of my current favourite songs.
"Not the only one" by Sam Smith (check out Sam's version here).
I agree. It is reasonably whiny, relatively heart breaking, and all in all a hardly uplifting song that one should play to improve their confidence in guitar playing or otherwise.
The result? If my iPhone or iPad gets hacked, there will be no nudie photos - just a gazillion versions of the one song with a guitar played sounding as if I'm wearing boxing gloves (on second thoughts, maybe nudie photos would be less offensive?).
The number of times I recorded the song well and truly exceeded the number of plectrums currently stuck in the body of my guitar.
No matter how much I shake my guitar, I can't set the little bastards free!
Anyway, just as I thought I'd learnt the relatively simple chord progression to begin the filming, I no sooner forgot the words, sang out of tune, realised my fingers were on the wrong fret or when I did the A# chord, I saw myself on the iPad and realised it looked like I was giving viewers the middle finger.
I could only presume there'd be future viewers.
I just couldn't get it right!
At one point I chucked a tantrum that was in aid of no one but myself. No one was home. Although I think the tantrum might have been a good change for the neighbours who were getting a bit sick of the "You sayyyyyyyy I'm crazy….'cause you don't think I know what you've done!" lyrics I'd sung a thousand times.
After I'd recovered from my childish tanty which involved me almost throwing my guitar like the rockstar I'll never be ... I thought about perfection and whether anyone else really pays that much attention to it.
Yep…that's exactly what I thought about directly after stomping to my room (forgetting to press pause and filming the whole thing) and thinking I should take up the highly popular and economic instrument, the recorder.
Maybe I get my perfectionism from my parents.
My Dad is a perfectionist in some ways (but like me - this doesn't apply to cleaning or anything chore-related).
I was at my folks' place on the weekend. I had purchased Dad a pomegranate plant for his birthday. He took about 30 minutes to decide where it should be planted. My step-mum and I watched while drinking wine as Dad also pointed out where he'd planted a few flowers.
"Are you sure you want to plant the pomegranate tree there Dad? I asked. "…Surely that position is a bit…ahhh...'orchard'?"
I crack myself up.
I do tend to be a bit hard on myself and should really assess whether certain things warrant the pain of ruthless attention to detail (I'm talking outside my workplace - I work in communications, things need to be top-notch). My mind wanders to when I was dancing in a show earlier this year.
In the opening number the move was to do a kick on a releve (the foot of the supporting leg rising to ballpoint) and then pencil turn.
So I did a kick on releve and with great gusto moved onto the next step and wondered why everyone was turning.
I felt the need to go home and take a good hard look at myself before I could move on with another show! Obviously I still haven't let this go.
The quest for perfection comes into my writing too. I consistently look over, look over, look over and look over my blog to try and alleviate spelling or grammatical errors. Some still manage to creap in. I mean…creep in (Damn it…and I hate ending sentences with prepositions!).
I wonder if I'll ever get to the stage where I can just take a deep breath and post a blog having looked over it just once before hitting 'publish'.
Really, the consequences of an error when writing via a blogging platform are relatively minor…I'd hope (I just thought I'd only love to be scolded by John Marsden or Bill Bryson saying, "…Not up to your usual standard Maree!"
Not really having an epiphany from my tantrum, last night I thought to myself, "Okay, I'll swallow my pride, make one recording and post it."
Five takes later and I hadn't posted it! My non-accustomed-uncaliced guitar playing fingers were burning.
It probably didn't help that my hands were soft from doing the dishes. I bet Santana never washed up in his life!
Anyway, by this point I was sick of the song so decided I'd just post it. I went to send the video from my iPad to my computer via bluetooth.
After all the guitar playing, data usage and the Academy Award winning tantrum, the video didn't work.
So my friends, I do apologise...tonight you do not get a video worth a million words, you get a rant about perfection.
Now that's orchard.
-Ends-
It all began when I decided I would kill two birds with one stone (damn…why are all my blogs animal related?!) and knock off two resolutions - improving my guitar playing skills while posting another blog.
I thought if a picture painted a thousand words, a video would surely paint a million! JOB DONE.
So in preparation I attempted to learn one of my current favourite songs.
"Not the only one" by Sam Smith (check out Sam's version here).
I agree. It is reasonably whiny, relatively heart breaking, and all in all a hardly uplifting song that one should play to improve their confidence in guitar playing or otherwise.
The result? If my iPhone or iPad gets hacked, there will be no nudie photos - just a gazillion versions of the one song with a guitar played sounding as if I'm wearing boxing gloves (on second thoughts, maybe nudie photos would be less offensive?).
The number of times I recorded the song well and truly exceeded the number of plectrums currently stuck in the body of my guitar.
No matter how much I shake my guitar, I can't set the little bastards free!
Anyway, just as I thought I'd learnt the relatively simple chord progression to begin the filming, I no sooner forgot the words, sang out of tune, realised my fingers were on the wrong fret or when I did the A# chord, I saw myself on the iPad and realised it looked like I was giving viewers the middle finger.
I could only presume there'd be future viewers.
I just couldn't get it right!
At one point I chucked a tantrum that was in aid of no one but myself. No one was home. Although I think the tantrum might have been a good change for the neighbours who were getting a bit sick of the "You sayyyyyyyy I'm crazy….'cause you don't think I know what you've done!" lyrics I'd sung a thousand times.
After I'd recovered from my childish tanty which involved me almost throwing my guitar like the rockstar I'll never be ... I thought about perfection and whether anyone else really pays that much attention to it.
Yep…that's exactly what I thought about directly after stomping to my room (forgetting to press pause and filming the whole thing) and thinking I should take up the highly popular and economic instrument, the recorder.
Maybe I get my perfectionism from my parents.
My Dad is a perfectionist in some ways (but like me - this doesn't apply to cleaning or anything chore-related).
I was at my folks' place on the weekend. I had purchased Dad a pomegranate plant for his birthday. He took about 30 minutes to decide where it should be planted. My step-mum and I watched while drinking wine as Dad also pointed out where he'd planted a few flowers.
"Are you sure you want to plant the pomegranate tree there Dad? I asked. "…Surely that position is a bit…ahhh...'orchard'?"
I crack myself up.
I do tend to be a bit hard on myself and should really assess whether certain things warrant the pain of ruthless attention to detail (I'm talking outside my workplace - I work in communications, things need to be top-notch). My mind wanders to when I was dancing in a show earlier this year.
In the opening number the move was to do a kick on a releve (the foot of the supporting leg rising to ballpoint) and then pencil turn.
So I did a kick on releve and with great gusto moved onto the next step and wondered why everyone was turning.
I felt the need to go home and take a good hard look at myself before I could move on with another show! Obviously I still haven't let this go.
The quest for perfection comes into my writing too. I consistently look over, look over, look over and look over my blog to try and alleviate spelling or grammatical errors. Some still manage to creap in. I mean…creep in (Damn it…and I hate ending sentences with prepositions!).
I wonder if I'll ever get to the stage where I can just take a deep breath and post a blog having looked over it just once before hitting 'publish'.
Really, the consequences of an error when writing via a blogging platform are relatively minor…I'd hope (I just thought I'd only love to be scolded by John Marsden or Bill Bryson saying, "…Not up to your usual standard Maree!"
Not really having an epiphany from my tantrum, last night I thought to myself, "Okay, I'll swallow my pride, make one recording and post it."
Five takes later and I hadn't posted it! My non-accustomed-uncaliced guitar playing fingers were burning.
It probably didn't help that my hands were soft from doing the dishes. I bet Santana never washed up in his life!
Anyway, by this point I was sick of the song so decided I'd just post it. I went to send the video from my iPad to my computer via bluetooth.
After all the guitar playing, data usage and the Academy Award winning tantrum, the video didn't work.
So my friends, I do apologise...tonight you do not get a video worth a million words, you get a rant about perfection.
Now that's orchard.
-Ends-
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