It may look light a dead tree against a murky evening sky, but look very closely & just a bit right & up a touch from dead centre there is a tiny light mark which is officially the McNaught Comet. (if you can't find it, play with with the contrast on your monitor or just trust me that it's there!)

Spectacular? Not, really. So, more attempts the following night...



Again, in this photo it's in about the same spot, a little brighter & the tail trailing upwards. Again, not spectacular, but we were battling through the smoke drifting across The Kingdom from a fire on Kangaroo Island.

Anyway, even more attempts the following night...



No comet here, but an amazing sunset. The chosen viewing platform was our landmark Chandlers Hill, which allowed an unrestricted view down through the valley & out to sea. After the first couple of nights, quite a crowd was congregating & around twenty car loads of people staring through binoculars were scanning the sky for that first glimpse. There seemed to be quite a challenge to be the first to find it & then instruct everyone else where to look. Lots of pointing, hand signals, reference markers & viewing equipment was exchanged for the half hour of viewing time before McNaught chased the sun under the horizon.

Other than a few clouds which tried to steal the limelight, I finally got the shot I wanted.



The McNaught Comet (named after Australian astronomer Robert McNaught) is to be visible until the end of February, weather permitting. However, it is expected to fade over the time as it gets further away from the sun, so I don't expect to get any better shots over the coming days.

Over in New Zealand, various emergency authorities have been called by concerned individuals mistaking the comet for a plane crashing to earth.... but taking an extraordinary long time in doing so! No, this is too funny to made up as the The New Zealand Herald reports here.

For those who haven't seen it, go & have a look if you have the chance. I think we all have memories of Halley's Comet which was a ridiculous disappointment. Remember staring at that insignificant fuzzy dot? McNaught is apparently 100 times brighter & once you work out where it is, is quite clear to see even without binoculars. I promise it's worth your while & if you miss it, it ain't coming back!

 

I can't begin to say how much I adore all stuff guitar related & when new products come on the market, I dig into the various review sites & compare to similar products, etc & get those endorphins racing around my veins.

Planet Waves & Line 6 (one & the same company) have come up with some of the best products over the last few years & have listened to what players actually want, whilst also thinking of things that we didn't actually know we needed but now rely upon. Sometimes, it's the simplest of items which makes all the difference, such as a string winder with integrated wire cutter, pure genius! It may have been thought of before, but never executed as brilliantly or their cables which eliminates the need for a soldiering iron to fix a busted wire! All cables should be made this way!!

Anyway, I have been searching for a replacement to my little hand held tuner which required unplugging, plugging, tuning, unplugging & replugging, all whilst balancing the tuner on my knee. Professional strobe tuners normally come in a rack format at extreme cost & a few of the pedal tuners I have seen in use, I haven't been impressed with for various reasons. Planet Waves heard my telepathy & their strobe tuner pedal was born.



It's been out a while in America & I've kept an eye on the pricing on Ebay, but eventually stumbled across "Nepean Music" who seem to be the only place in Australia to stock them & for reasonable prices! Kudos to them!

It's smaller than expected, which is good & in a glossy black/dark brown it looks dead sexy too. The "mode" button on top switches between the Strobe (the lights chase each other around until the string is in tune), Sweep (the lights move left or right until in tune) & User Calibration (allowing the tuner to be altered to compensate for the tuning of... let's say, a harp).

So far it isn't as accurate as my handheld tuner which used an analogue needle, but I'm getting used to it & I'm finding that I'm adjusting to it along the way. It sure beats the hell of getting down & unplugging stuff!

But what next? What else can this Company produce that I need but haven't wanted up to this point? I suppose if I work that out they would have to sue me for stealing their ideas!

Meanwhile, Strobey gets to line up alongside it's fellow pedal cohorts, Ed (the compressor), Dan Echo (Danelectro delay), Greeny (Ibanez Tube Screamer) & a Dunlop Wah (as yet unnamed).

 

Say "hello" to Austracantha minax.



& now say "goodbye", because this little lady disappeared sometime the last week!

This spider is nicknamed the Christmas Spider for obvious reasons & the only thing missing is some twinkling lights to get completely festive. She appeared during November & even though quite small, is easy to spot with her spikes & colours & the web is also distinctive with little clumps every inch or so along every strand. It's rather flamboyant for something I would normally squash in a heartbeat. Yes, I am an Arachnophobe!

I refer in the "female" sense because the male is quite supposed to be quite tiny in comparison, whilst this one is around a centimetre long. Anyway, how could something wearing this sort of garb be anything but a chick?!

We had one in the garden last year as well, which hung around for three months or so & then vanished in the same manner as this one. They aren't aggressive & with some contortionist moves, I was able to snap photos as close as a couple of centimetres away without it lunging it's fangs in my direction.