Cornerstone 2011 Review

I posted a full review of our couple days at Cornerstone Festival 2011 - Trouble is, I posted it to my concert review blog.    To see the post, click the link below:

Link to Cornerstone 2011 Review

enjoy

Book Review: "Quitter" from Jon Acuff

I recently completed reading Jon Acuff's "Quitter" and thought I'd post my review.

If you have ever pondered the balance between doing "what you love" and doing "what makes money", Jon Acuff's new book "Quitter" is for you.    This is not your typical "find what you love and the money will follow" motivational book.    This is more based in the "real world" and doesn't promise to solve all your employment problems.  

I first heard of Jon Acuff via his "Stuff Christians Like" blog and book.    His satirical look at the various hang-ups found in popular Christian culture definitely amused me.   Within a year or so after reading his first book, I started hearing about Jon joining Dave Ramsey's Financial Peace team.    With the encouragement of his new teammates, Jon brings us a story of his journey through various employment and frustrations.

Jon introduces us to his numerous past jobs, while painting a picture of his desire to balance income with passion.    Although he had achieved a certain level of success financially and had a reasonably secure employer, Jon struggled with spending his weekends pursuing his true passions.    There is plenty of warning regarding proper balance, and not just throwing caution to the wind, especially when needing to support a wife and family.     What I found most refreshing with "Quitter" is Jon's frequently comments on how a "day" job can help providing funding to start practicing or investigating your "dream job".    Jon encourages you not to simply quit without a plan or any experience.    Jon offers many great thoughts and exercises for helping build your confidence and talents in your "dream job", while keeping yourself financially solvent with the "day job".    "Quitter" also offers some great thoughts on how to find additional time to work on your "dream".

Another part I enjoyed about "Quitter", is the final couple chapters.   Jon doesn't end the book stating how everything worked out great and everyone lived happily ever after.   "Quitter" does cover some of the mistakes that could have been avoided, when he made the move to his "dream job".    If not handled carefully and thought through, chasing the "dream job" can easily turn into a nightmare.

I highly recommend this book to just about everyone I know.    There truly is something here for everyone living life today, as most of us aren't able to just quit our day jobs without a plan.    "Quitter" not only helps map out a plan to evaluate where you are today, but also how to consider any possible opportunities to chase your "dream job".      Go buy a copy today, and see for yourself.

Free sample chapter and more info at http://www.quitterbook.com/

Studio Updates

I recently got my hands on a new preamp designed specifically for transferring vinyl to the computer, for remastering and CD burning.     The unit is the ART USB Phono preamp.   Here's a photo:



What I've found very helpful, is that the unit easily allows me to get good volume levels.   Prior to this unit, my other preamps would frequently either distort or not have volume levels even close to other professional projects.    Although this may not be an issue you would normally think about, it would become a headache when trying to add these low volume tracks to a play list.    So, getting output that is at least "in the ballpark" with all other commercially marketed music, is helping.    Note of caution:  If you are using Windows 7, be sure to follow the setup directions on the ART site, for getting input/output settings correctly dialed in.




I recently updated Pro Tools 9, to the latest update of 9.0.3.    No significant changes, but many minor tweaks to help various issues.    I've got a low end digital drum kit talking to Pro Tools 9 via MIDI, and am able to use the digital kit to trigger voices within virtual drummer software Strike and Superior Drummer.    This has proven very helpful with drum tracking, as I can tweak the mix after the fact.    There are some limitations, but the benefits far out weigh any fixes needed.   




Finally, I've gotten started applying some of my learning for Adobe Dreamweaver.    At this point, I have the CS4 version (current is CS 5.5), but I've been slow in actually starting to use the software.   I've jumped into a couple of sites, and am getting the hang of it.    For now, my best shot has been with the site for my church - www.meadowspringschurch.org.    It's not all done yet, but does work and I like the clean layout.   I've also gotten a VERY basic site up at www.timhamm.com, and will be adding more info that that site soon.    I've moved most of my sites over to a new hosting service (www.bluehost.com), and am also learning more about various hosting settings.   Not all fun, but is good to learn some of the skills I've been studying for years.

That is all for now.

Coming Back in 2011

Hey all,

I'm back!!  I'm working to improve some of my updates, and this is one place that is in need of serious attention.     So, that is what it is going to get.

Updates or various news info coming soon.

Tim