Vanishing Plectrums

Subject: RE: Vanishing Plectrums
From: VirginiaTam
Date: 17 May 09 - 03:04 PM

Tig really is making jewelry

Subject: RE: Vanishing Plectrums
From: GUEST,Greycap
Date: 17 May 09 - 02:41 PM

I suspect a rip in the time structure, same as the socks.
The plectra and other sock drift around either two or three minutes ahead, or behind, your real time, so you don't find 'em too often.
The rip occurs in washing machines and Levi pockets.....

Subject: RE: Vanishing Plectrums
From: VirginiaTam
Date: 17 May 09 - 02:00 PM

Maybe there is a wormhole for plectra as there is for the socks.

It wasn't the missing socks that disturbed me. It was the ones I didn't recognise showing up in the finished wash.

Spooky.

Subject: RE: Vanishing Plectrums
From: Dave Illingworth
Date: 17 May 09 - 12:48 PM

A company called Dickies make a small canvas "pick-purse" that can be attached to the guitar strap.
Very useful, but I still forget to put picks back in there, so still lose them. I do find that the little "ticket-pocket" in the front right-hand pocket of jeans the best place.
When I was teaching in primary schools and going to a gig straight from work, I have on a couple of occasions forgotten my plectrums, so had to use one of the plastic coins the kids used in their maths
(money) lessons.........

As well as leaving behind picks, capos, leads (even a guitar stand, once), I sometime pick up other people's by mistake. Have been kindly lent a capo, and embarrassingly taken it away with me.
I did return it by post, though.
Then there is the stuff you leave behind at home before the gig - once my guitar, but remembered just in time to turn back home.
Once woke up one morning, not knowing where my guitar was from last night's gig - but the cause of that was no doubt Shepherd Neame
Mssterbrew Bitter.

Subject: RE: Vanishing Plectrums
From: GUEST,iancarterb
Date: 17 May 09 - 12:39 PM

I believe in all manner of conspiracies, and I think it's the Couch Association. I suggest finding a copy of Tom Hunter's 'My Washing Machine Eats Socks.' I rest my case.

Subject: RE: Vanishing Plectrums
From: wysiwyg
Date: 17 May 09 - 12:18 PM

Just buy only the ones made of plectranium. They will not only glow without any treatment but they will find their own way home. They come from Planet Plectraniac.

~S~

Subject: RE: Vanishing Plectrums
From: Les in Chorlton
Date: 17 May 09 - 12:09 PM

Wher have all the plectrums gone?
Long time passing ...............

Same place as biros

L in C

Subject: RE: Vanishing Plectrums
From: GUEST,punkfolkrocker
Date: 17 May 09 - 11:56 AM

I've not purchased any new plectrums since about 1980;
and still have a few of that batch left [and some even older very well worn and rounded favourites]
which I still use and keep in the same vintage mid 70's 'Strepsils' tin
I started using in my mid-teens.

I rarely lose a plectrum, but have found enough of other guitarists lost strays
to have been kept sufficiently supplied for nearly 30 years..

..thanks for all the 'donations' guys !!!!!

[my mum's family lost their home and every possession
when they got bombed and evacuated in the Blitz,
so she brought me up to respect thriftyness
and not be too proud too pick up even the least valuable coins
and reusable items found lost and discarded in the street....]

Subject: RE: Vanishing Plectrums
From: Ebbie
Date: 17 May 09 - 11:27 AM

I think I know the answer- there are thieves out there.

When a friend of mine retired to Sequim, Washington, from Juneau, Alaska some years ago he brought me a Mason jar FULL of plectrums. Don't tell me he BOUGHT them all.

I busied myself for two months handing them out and I STILL have a small bowl full.

I must admit that I have never gotten back my favo(u)rites so he evidently didn't get them all. There must be more thieves out there.

Subject: RE: Vanishing Plectrums
From: Darowyn
Date: 17 May 09 - 10:55 AM

Owing to a simple numerical misunderstanding, I bought six dozen (instead of six) of my favourite ones some years ago. It was at Music Live exhibition and they were very cheap.
Oddly enough, since then, I've never found it hard to find one.
There's one on every stringed instrument- even the violin, oddly, one on every flat surface in my music room, and several on the bedside table upstairs where I took them out of my pocket before putting my clothes in the wash basket.
If you own 72 plectrums, it becomes quite easy to find one.
Cheers
Dave

Subject: RE: Vanishing Plectrums
From: VirginiaTam
Date: 17 May 09 - 10:54 AM

Oooh. I'll have a half dozen. Not that I lose plcks. i just like the whole jewelry them and glow in the dark is always good.

Subject: RE: Vanishing Plectrums
From: Tig
Date: 17 May 09 - 10:31 AM

I've sorted it for some people!

I make earrings and chains with glow in the dark plectrums on them. These are medium weight standard plecs and if you drop them on the carpet in a dark area they DO actually glow a green colour so you stand a chance of finding them.

The fact that they come on a fine chain means you have one round your neck and don't have to go grovelling.

Subject: RE: Vanishing Plectrums
From: Alan Day
Date: 17 May 09 - 10:14 AM

Will
Been there seen it !!
Something that really annoys me is the person who gets up on stage ,opens up a little tin full of plectrums and then keeps the audience waiting whilst he/ she sorts through them looking for a suitable one.
Can this not be done prior to getting on stage?
Will has no problems he just asks the audience if he can borrow his back again.
Al

Subject: RE: Vanishing Plectrums
From: Will Fly
Date: 17 May 09 - 09:33 AM

I usually buy them a dozen at a time. Each one lasts for just one gig as I throw the used plectrum into the adoring audience. You should see the dears scrabbling around and fighting each other, just to get hold of it...

Subject: RE: Vanishing Plectrums
From: Acorn4
Date: 17 May 09 - 09:00 AM

The law of plectrums:-

Whatever volour your plectrum, the pub carpet or floor will be the same colour.This appplies evenn for bright orange.

Subject: RE: Vanishing Plectrums
From: NormanD
Date: 17 May 09 - 08:13 AM

Midchuck wrote: Wouldn't the proper plural be "plectra?"

Wikipedia says:
"Plectrum" has both a Latin-based plural, plectra (from Greek plural πλήκτρα) and a native English plural, plectrums. Plectra is used in formal writing, particularly in discussing the harpsichord as an instrument of classical music. However, plectrums is more common in ordinary speech. In vernacular speech the abbreviation "pleck" or "plec" (plural: plecks) is sometimes used.

I say: Who calls them "plecks"??

Subject: RE: Vanishing Plectrums
From: VirginiaTam
Date: 17 May 09 - 07:19 AM

Smurfshit - ROFLMAO

Perhaps a ninja turtle is stealing them. Will the turtle be unbroken.

Subject: RE: Vanishing Plectrums
From: wysiwyg
Date: 17 May 09 - 07:14 AM

Ah, I have very light fingerpicks for autoharp, and they squash like little bugs if they are left loose. One is usually TAPED to the harp itself with medical tape that I use to keep it stiuck well on my finger, just to keep it from squashiong. The adhesive makes a nasty mess on the metal part I stick it onto! (The cases I like best have no inner pocket, is the problem.)

I use a lot of Altoids in connection with our church work, and yesterday I made a steal-- 2 tins were on sale so cheap that for the first time, I bought them for the tins they come in and the mints will go in a ziploc for refilling!

And as far as your flat picks go, Altoids now makes a smaller tin for smaller mints-- that would fit the flat picks just great.

~Susan

Subject: RE: Vanishing Plectrums
From: Midchuck
Date: 17 May 09 - 07:13 AM

One of the advantages of living in a small village and doing a lot of my shopping at the small store just down the street (other than being insufferably "green" about not starting the car every time I need anything) is that the store staff pick up all the flatpicks that they find on the floor in front of the cashier's counter and give them to me. I get most of my own back, plus a few others.

P.

PS: Wouldn't the proper plural be "plectra?"

Subject: RE: Vanishing Plectrums
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 17 May 09 - 06:45 AM

Very true. I keep a "matchpik" book in each guitar and mandolin case, a selection of my favourites stuck with smurfshit inside the lid of my capo box, and some in every change pocket in every set of jeans - and a spare set of capos in a 12-string case and another the mandolin case.

I have still at least once turned up at a festival with no capos!

Subject: Vanishing Plectrums
From: NormanD
Date: 17 May 09 - 06:36 AM

Where do they go? Is there a place called Pick Heaven? Is there any significance in the fact that they're vaguely gravestone shaped?

When you're in the music shop, you never just buy one, but possibly six. There are the ones that especially suit you, then there's a new shaped one you've not tried before, then a couple of bright colours to make them stand out more, so you give them a punt.

Give it a couple of weeks and you're back to scrabbling around, going through the pockets before you put your levis in the wash, looking through the case, looking accusingly at other players......

I have thought of keeping them all together in one neat little box or ornamented case, but if (or, more likely, when) you mislay that, then you're really buggered.

I know that you always end up with missing socks after the wash and dry. Perhaps, one day, all those missing socks will turn up, and in the bottom of every one there'll be a plectrum.

Norman