Thankful

I did it!!! Spent almost all of yesterday working on smoothing out my splices and by the very end of the day, I managed to get my tape to play the whole way through and recorded! After my first pass, I was able to get it to play a full eight minutes so I knew I was on the right track. Next I got it to play for eleven minutes (that sore spot took two attempts at the ol' scissors and tape to get through). Then I made ALMOST all the way to about twenty-nine minutes. And after I got that last spot worked out, I had it! It took lots and lots and lots of winding by hand and Bic crystal and watching. And mainly it took lots and lots of surgical pruning and grafting as well. Now I have a pretty good understanding of how finicky cassettes are about the dimensions of that straight line of tape (as well as the effects of exposed sticky tape when spooled). It was kind've a fun experience though I'm glad it's finished. Thought I might have to give up a few times. But once I worked over my original splices and progress was being made, I knew I just had to keep at it. Though much thanks to Mary Beth for the initial observation that I should spool it back up while in the case (not impossibly try to spool it first and then put it in the case). I think I may have dumbly given up otherwise. Also last night Mary Beth and I met my family (mom, dad, sister, nephews) at P.F. Chang's for our thanksgiving dinner. Now it's the day of thanksgiving. I should wrap up this little musical piece and get everything finalized. There was one thing that didn't go right with the cutting-up. I had a distinct beginning and end, and they were to stay attached to the spools and they're remain the beginning and end. Well, the sixty minute tape had like thirty-two or so minutes on a side so there was extra time at the end. I tried to account for it, but I was just eyeballing and I misjudged. So the end got mixed up with the rest of the stuff in the middle (also a bit of silence after the end got mixed up). So I'm going to have to do a little editing in the daw to get it to my satisfaction. I mean, that'll be easy. The whole collage of the original source was done through many many many edits in the daw (I mean, that's kinda the primary composition technique). I had the foresight to record the whole thing backwards onto the b-side. I foresaw the likelihood of some of the bits of tape getting turned around (so I didn't want the sound inaccessible on the other side, so at least this way, the sound the same sound would be there, just backwards). The actual initial cutting delved much further into chaos than I'd ever imagined so I was surprised at how few sections got flipped around backwards. I was expecting something close to 50-50, but it wasn't very many. A few here and there are backwards, which is about the effect I desired. Though a lot of it perhaps wouldn't be noticed (though I do have some percussive segments that are very noticeable). Anyway, I'm getting to the place where I'm rambling so much I should stop!