Insuring Dulcimers

[r l reid <ro...>]

Beverly Woods wrote:
> "So you're saying that I'm more than twice as dangerous
> with a hammered dulcimer on the sidewalk, as I am with a ton of steel
> hurtling down the interstate at 65 mph?"

We all know what careful drivers females over 25 are.  No such statistics
exist for dulcimer playing.  Are teenage males more likely to have a 
serious accident while flailing?  How about the actuarial tables on
the effects of youthful drinking on the quality of ones tremolo?  The
potential damage inflicted by a careless tremolo is frightening, as 
Pete "Moscowitz" Ruschevsky never fails to remind me.

And what if a hammer gets loose?  I once saw Deborah "Ruach" Strauss's bow 
almost fly into an audience on a particularly vigorous bit of phrasing.  
You could put someone's eye out!

Going down the highway with your ton of steel, everyone else is 
also protected by THIER ton of steel.  No such safety measures exist
for dulcimers.  A broken string can scar a pretty face for life.

And these folk "artists" with thier non-regulation non-Hungarian instruments -
most of them don't even have dampers!  If they have to damp, they use
thier fingers or arms, putting themselves at list of life and limb.

I think it is outrageous that we've let this menace go on as long as
we have.  Safety measures need to be required.  Blood alcohol levels
should be set and dulcimers fitted with anti-lock dampers.  Air bags
that deploy in case of a sudden change of tension in a string.  And
a lockout function that triggers if the tremolo sucks.

"If I could write, I would write a letter to my congressman,
if he could read."*

Roger "Fathers Against Drunk Tsimbling" Reid

*(quote from Miz Beaver of Pogo by Walt Kelly (z"l))

-- 
r l reid        ro (at) rreid(dot)net


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