Vanishing Plectrums

Subject: RE: Vanishing Plectrums
From: VirginiaTam
Date: 18 May 09 - 02:18 PM

Think I have sussed it.

They are flat - really kind of 2 dimensional when in the larval stage. When they pass through the rift they take on a 3 dimensional shape.

plectra adult stage

Subject: RE: Vanishing Plectrums
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 18 May 09 - 02:22 PM

Pinched by tiddlywinkers?!

Subject: RE: Vanishing Plectrums
From: GUEST,highlandman at work
Date: 18 May 09 - 03:43 PM

VT, maybe you have it there...
If they are 2-dimensional perhaps they are never really gone, just turned so they aren't visible in our space.
-Glenn

Subject: RE: Vanishing Plectrums
From: GUEST,TJ in San Diego
Date: 18 May 09 - 03:53 PM

Anything as small, flat and light as a guitar pick is too easily lost. I have found myself wishing they were like coathangers in a closet. If you shut the door for a day or two, it seems like they multiply in the dark! My son asked what sort of picks I would prefer prior to last Christmas. He gave me a box of 100. I figure that should last about three months, give or take....

Subject: RE: Vanishing Plectrums
From: GUEST,geordieladdy
Date: 19 May 09 - 10:31 AM

my picks used to end up in Alan Hulls back pocket (GRHS)

Subject: RE: Vanishing Plectrums
From: Tig
Date: 19 May 09 - 05:46 PM

If anyone is interested in Glow in the Dark picks pm me and I'll see what I can do.

The brightly coloured ones would cost a lot more.

Subject: RE: Vanishing Plectrums
From: Tim Leaning
Date: 19 May 09 - 06:53 PM

They are usually inside the instrument somehow.

Subject: RE: Vanishing Plectrums
From: Uncle Phil
Date: 19 May 09 - 08:46 PM

Oh, pish and tush. There's no reason to postulate worm holes, coat hanger transmogrifications, or disruptions in continuity of the space-time continuum. This thing is just another example of Uncle Phil's Law of Selective Gravitation, which states that gravity is *not*, in fact, a constant. Gravity is stronger in some places than others for many things. An obvious example -- flatpick gravity is especially strong inside guitars. How else would you explain the fact that flatpicks fall inside of guitars rather than falling towards the center of the earth until the floor catches them?

My spare bedroom/office has especially strong flatpick gravity and they litter every available surface. Unfortunately I can't get them to go anywhere else with me, though I wish they would start following my guitar around. Oh, and paradoxically there is negative thumb pick gravity in the same room and thumb picks disappear forever as soon as I set them down in there.
- Phil
For extra credit use Uncle Phil's Law of Selective Gravitation to explain the peculiar behavior of buttered toast when accidentally dropped in the kitchen.

Subject: RE: Vanishing Plectrums
From: john f weldon
Date: 19 May 09 - 09:03 PM

On my 50th birthday (many years ago) my friends gave me 50 picks and then flung them all over the house, on the theory that, wherever I looked, there would be a pick. Well, it worked for a while...

...a few weeks ago, a friend was having his 50th, so i gave him 50 picks, but in a nice little ceramic box my wife made. I hope he'll at least be able to find the box.

Subject: RE: Vanishing Plectrums
From: NormanD
Date: 20 May 09 - 01:13 PM

Uncle Phil's Law of Selective Gravitation to explain the peculiar behavior of buttered toast when accidentally dropped in the kitchen.
I'm assuming that this law says that it always falls butter side down. But the first amendment to the law is that when it doesn't fall butter side down, then the toast must have been buttered on the wrong side.

Can I extend the discussion a bit and ask for suggestions of what might be good to cut up for a pick? Sorry if this has been covered before.

Oh, and how can you stop losing them......?

Subject: RE: Vanishing Plectrums
From: PoppaGator
Date: 20 May 09 - 01:18 PM

Cut up your credit cards to make picks....

Subject: RE: Vanishing Plectrums
From: Songbob
Date: 20 May 09 - 01:20 PM

I carry a small leather pick-pocket at all times. I don't depend on any instrument case to have what I need (and specialized minstrel-banjo 'thimbles' especially), so I just have them at all times. Never loose in a jeans pocket, never in the other instrument case, but on my person at all times (except when I am not wearing my pants, like, you know, sleeping).

But I also have (belt AND braces) tins in most of my major instrument cases, filled with regular and specialized picks, no pun intended, "just in case."

Bob

Subject: RE: Vanishing Plectrums
From: bald headed step child
Date: 20 May 09 - 02:28 PM

"For extra credit use Uncle Phil's Law of Selective Gravitation to explain the peculiar behavior of buttered toast when accidentally dropped in the kitchen." -Uncle Phil

I have observed this for years, and also the law that a cat always lands on it's feet. I still want to know if you spread the cat's back with butter, which way will it land? Lin won't let me use her cats for the experiment, so I may never know.

I always know where at least one flat pick is, as it is always in the strings of my Martin D15, which is fine if that is the instrument I grab on the way out the door. Unfortunately I don't know exactly where the other 80-90 are, as I put them in a bag to make sure they didn't get lost. I'm 99% sure they are in the bag where I left them, but I forgot where I put the bag, so in reality I have one. Good thing I play mostly banjo with no picks.

As Bobert and others have stated above though, I do know exactly where every fingerpick is that I own. They are rather expensive, and I have more time invested in the shaping. Maybe that is the key. If you make your own, maybe you won't lose them.

BHSC

Subject: RE: Vanishing Plectrums
From: Tim Leaning
Date: 20 May 09 - 03:40 PM

ok most of the time the cat lands on its head rarely on its back
But it always lands....

Subject: RE: Vanishing Plectrums
From: Uncle Phil
Date: 20 May 09 - 09:08 PM

Perhaps we should take a moment to thank The Creator of the Universe for the fact that flatpicks fall into guitars and cats fall to the floor. It could get really ugly if it was the other way around.
- Phil

Subject: RE: Vanishing Plectrums
From: GUEST,highlandman at work
Date: 21 May 09 - 10:03 AM

A few years ago I read a theoretical treatise about the buttered cat question.
The hypothesis was that the opposing laws would reach equilibrium, and the cat would hover about ten inches off the floor and spin.
I don't think this ever got as far as physical testing with an actual cat.
-Glenn

Subject: RE: Vanishing Plectrums
From: MC Fat
Date: 21 May 09 - 10:17 AM

All your missing plectrums are down the back of God's sofa

Subject: RE: Vanishing Plectrums
From: Don Firth
Date: 21 May 09 - 03:33 PM

Missing picks, like the odd socks, slip into a wormhole where they both transmute into wire coat hangers. The other end of the wormhole is in your closet, where they emerge in an inextricable tangle.

Don Firth

Subject: RE: Vanishing Plectrums
From: Charley Noble
Date: 21 May 09 - 08:38 PM

Actually I gave up using picks with my banjo. I usually can find my fingernails, although sometimes after a session they look rather strange.

But I have noticed a surplus of flat picks appearing in my banjo case. I'm not sure how they get there but if you need one, just ask.

Cheerily,
Charley Noble

Subject: RE: Vanishing Plectrums
From: Rowan
Date: 21 May 09 - 10:19 PM

Not playing any form of stringed instrument (plucked or bowed) I have acquired an extensive collection of plectra/plectrums/flatpicks. The last one I picked up was on the ground outside the local Credit Union and I swear there's been no musical instrument within cooee of the place ever.

I'd offer to post them to the needy but I suspect they'd turn into socks or coathangers on the way.

Cheers, Rowan

Subject: RE: Vanishing Plectrums
From: Peace
Date: 22 May 09 - 01:34 AM

I could find the 3-D kind of picks if they stayed in the fourth dimension. But, for me, alas . . . .