Silver Linings...

It happened. After years of carelessly leaving my music equipment in plain sight in my back seat, someone finally smashed the window and took off with my stuff.  Every other time I've heard about it happening to other musicians, I've had pity for them but part of me (the asshole part) always said "...but it was your own damn fault for leaving your stuff in your car". I don't get to say that anymore...

Here's a fun picture of my car window right now:

Anyway, I'm futilely trying to use social media and wanted posters to try and track down the stuff (see below) but I'm fairly positive I'll never see my sweet Gretsch again.  I'm trying to stay positive, so I'm looking at all the silver linings around this dark cloud:

• I tend to abuse the Bigsby bar when I play, which means I frequently have to re-tune my guitar. My now-main guitar doesn't have a Bigsby so less tuning = more time to tell tasteless jokes between songs
• I like my Thinline Squier Telecaster a lot, and wasn't happy with it being my back-up guitar. Now it's my main guitar so I get to play it more often
• I own a bad-ass looking Dean Flying V that almost never gets played. Now I have a reason to get it fixed up because it's been promoted to back-up guitar
• So many offers from friends to let me borrow their gear if I need it
• New friend requests on Facebook, as my "stolen gear" photo spreads somewhat virally
• Attention. Anyone that knows me knows I crave attention. After the hubbub over the bullshit lawsuit last year, I felt a giant attention-shaped hole in my life. Now everyone's paying attention to me and talking about me as if I matter. Feels great.
• I get to learn how to replace a car window. I've always been mystified as to what manner of sorcery goes on inside a car door to make the window roll up and down. Now after watching several instructional videos I've learned that it's a fairly basic but clever mechanism and I can't wait to try to replace one on my own.
• Today I was able to put off writing my 2014-15 Commitment To Excellence, my work's annual lame self-review document, so I could do various theft-related follow-up activities.
• My car could use a good vacuuming anyway

Here's a list of what was stolen, let me know if it ends up in your local pawn shop