Nothing much exciting today. Cut my hair, ate LJS (again) with Shirui, ogled at some cute pets at Pets Station. Played with Fluffy, Shirui's hyperactive rabbit.

Oh yea, and i did the 20 min workout again. If you are wondering what the hell it is, here goes:

I cleared it in 30 mins though, skipping the step back jumpers, forgetting the hesitation jumpers, skipping the "screen" jumpers. 10 made basket at each shot type, 15 for 3s. Not too bad i guess, considering the heat, and some disturbance from kids playing football. Not to mention i was hitting alot of silents and there's no net for the rim, so i kinda had to pick the ball quite frequently.

I think it's quite a complete ball workout. Basically works on all your offensive skills, your fundamental moves, your dribbling, your stamina, your match accuracy. Best of all, it's really fun, though the "runners" and hook shot are considered kinda ugly for the Singaporean game. We seldom see such shots being made, cos most players arent very tall.

Guitar Update: Lesson 19: Sliding Scales

Essentially this lesson is on the extended minor pentatonic scale, and we are looking at the first type of such extended form which starts from 1 note behind the root note. You can also look at the scale as a combination of the 3 forms: G, E (Root) and D.

The reason they call it sliding scales is because, they use the slide technique to shift the fingers to the next form. And from the lesson i learnt that the way they slide and the way i slide is totally different.

In the book, they always slide with the ring finger. Meaning the sliding occurs where the ring finger is fretting the note. For me, i always slide with my index finger, which is 1 note before. So in A minor pentatonic, it will be something like this:

Book: C - D slide to E

Chang: C slide to D - E

To me, it's a whole world of difference. The book's way to approaching the scale makes playing it much smoother. But, i have to use my method to play some of my licks, like the chromatic-pentatonic scale run at the end of "You Wanna Be A Star".

As such, i spent alot of time working on this sliding scale. It's fun to me, like i've never played something like that before. I never approached it this way before either. It just din feel natural to me, but after working on it for a while, i actually feel that it's just as natual as my method.

So now i have 2 ways to articulate.

The rest of the lesson was just some licks to illustrate the usage of the sliding scale. Lotsa sliding, no bending. Sliding gives this slippery shuffle feel, like a Frank Gambale sweep. Tasty.

Ok my eyes are closing. I think im blabbering too. Bye.