Well, you like guitars, I like sexy cars...and since this is my blog........besides, guitars and cars rhymes, and I've been told it would be nice to mention guitars once in awhile, as this IS a guitar site, after all. Seems fair enough.

I've got a Morris Minor convertible painted red with red upholstery and a white top...a total cartoon car. It's been back and forth across the Atlantic FIVE times due to my various moves to and from the UK and the West Coast. It's also been all over Europe, around Nurburgring and the Monaco circuit (not during race day, of course), and all over California. If you are English, you will have heard of Noddy.......before I move back to the UK in the spring, I am going to have the Moggy painted canary yellow with red fenders and blue wheels and red upholstery and carpets with the white top. It will be a total Noddy car (for you Americans, the same as Mickey and Donald's cars back in the 40's...you can still buy toy versions of them at Disney stores and various toy shops)...and when I drive the Moggy around England with the top down, I will wear a Noddy hat! Lesley, my former girlfriend (see the bio section on my site), who is whizz at sewing, w ill make me the Noddy hat, complete with bell on the end!

Why is the Morris called a Moggy? Because cats in England are called moggies (and I don't why that is), and the Morris just purrs along, with that distinctive Austin "A" engine sound. Mine is a '66 I purchased in Byfleet in 1976 for £472...its original color was sage green with a tan top and green upholstery. I have the original English plates on it and also a California vanity plate that reads: "66 MOGGY." It now has a 1300cc MG Midget engine in it...same block as the original 1098, but with twin carbs and different bore and stroke---twice the horses. With an anti-sway bar in the front and telescopic shocks all around, it now corners like a sports car and goes like hell. The guy I bought it from was pussywhipped, and had just bought a new Triumph Trident motorcycle and his wife said he could only have the bike if he got rid of the Moggy. His loss was my gain. His wife was a cracker, so I could forgive him for being whipped. She oozed sex...the kind of girl we all want. But he was paying for it, well and truly. I'll bet he rues the day he sold the Moggy, though. I have so many English people come up to me and say they once owned one and wished they had never sold it. I'll never make that mistake. Lots of others, but not that one!

I lived in Barnes, southwest London, with the aforementioned Lesley in the 70's....and in the mid 80's I went to a club on Ventura Blvd just opposite Universal City, and parked the Moggy outside. I remember watching a boxing match where the underdog beat the heavyweight champion in a surprise result, but I can't remember the fighters' names....anyway, I came out to find a note pinned to my windscreen. It was obviously a girl's handwriting and said, "I learned to drive in one of these in Barnes, where I grew up...such a cute car!" If only she knew! I may have even known her.

In 1986 I entered the freshly done-up Moggy in an English car show a t Sepulveda dam...or near there, anyway, and positioned it with all the other Morrises in the Morris owner's patch, then wandered around to look at all the wonderful English iron of every stripe...fantastic Jags, Bentleys, 3 wheel Morgans, the lot. Also, not a few Cobras. Hundreds of cars. I zeroed in on the metallic blue 427 Cobra---my favorite car in the world (though the new Ford GT might just take over)---and sitting in it was Jay Leno. He wasn't very famous then, so he wasn't mobbed with star seekers, just car lovers like himself. I said, "You bastard, you have one of my two favorite cars in the world!" We laughed and chatted, then he said, "What's your other favorite car?" I replied, "A white XK150 (Jaguar) with red upholstery and a white top." Jay smiled and said, "Are you going to be here for a bit?" I said I was, and he said, "Wait here, I'll be back in 20 minutes," and he fired up the 427 beast (shaking the ground) and tore off. 20 minutes later he comes zinging in to the compound in a WHITE XK150 WITH WHITE TOP AND RED UPHOLSTERY laughing his ass off! I shouted, "You son-of-a-bitch!" and we both laughed. What a great guy he is. I can't stand his show, but he's really a lovely guy. I wish, when he told a joke, he would not explain the punchline and tell you why it's funny...drives me nuts. But he's good soul with his heart in the right place.

I correspond with a lovely young girl I have never met named Panda---well, her name is Amanda, but I call her Panda, and she now calls herself Panda as well....she prowls around NYC at night. Anyway, Panda lived in Pittsburg and went to the Detroit car show where Ford unveiled the Ford GT (a road version of the lovely 60's Ford GT racing car...the most beautiful racing car ever designed) and she called me up and said, "PAUL! That car is sooooo sexy, it has hips!" and this is a girl who isn't into cars like guys are. What a great line! Ford should use it, and pay her lots of money...she's st ruggling in New York trying to find a graphics arts job or a bellydance gig (she's a bellydancer as well as an artist).

I "met" Panda though my website....she wrote me a nice note telling me she was painting an elevator at her college (Oberlin) and said my poster collection inspired her and gave her reference for what she wanted to do. She was going to paint the lyrics of her favorite song, "A Whiter Shade of Pale" in the elevator and have them swirl around the whole inside of the carriage. She didn't know I know Gary Brooker and Keith Reid, who wrote it and sang it (well, Keith wrote the lyrics, Gary wrote the music and sang it), and when I wrote her back telling her I would get the words from the source, she flipped and sent me an email saying, "Pauly Golly Gee!" and enthused from there. So I call her Panda, and she now calls me Golly...except when I piss her off, then she calls me Paul. I know I'm in trouble then!

Now to some serious stuff...IRAQ. Sorry, but the elephant is in all our rooms, and I'm going to talk about it. Where the hell are all the protesters against this terrible travesty of a war that idiot in the White House foisted on us!!? What is happening, or not happening on our college campuses? I'm beginning to think we deserve that cretin because I don't see anyone mounting an effort to protest this debacle. When I was in the Marines and was going to be shipped over to Vietnam, I read all I could about the situation and why we were there and decided I wasn't going to partake in that mess. I applied for a CO discharge, was told by my commanding officer to fuck off, so I split. Ended up in jail, then in Federal court in San Francisco, where I beat the rap and received an honorable discharge 20 years later and protested the Vietnam War every way I could...being in San Francisco was the place to be, to be sure. But where is all the outrage now? I guess most America students are more interested in their iPods and McDonal ds than in what's really important in the world. Depressing, and another sign of the rot setting in.

What we should have done is go into Afghanistan big time and nail that bastard Ben Laden, then set up sniper teams all over the Middle East---and it would take years to do it----and start taking people out who talk about terrorism....just infiltrate them and take them out with no fanfare, Eventually, we would make some progress. And of course, we have to be even-handed in the Israel/Palestine thing, which we never have been, and which has caused all this crap in the first place. Unfortunately, we are not a democracy anymore....powerful lobbyists run everything in Washington, and the poor Palestinians have no such powerful lobby as do the Jews, since we have a huge population of Jewish people, and hardly any Arabs or certainly Palestinians. So, consequently, they get the hind tit. Until we address that, this bullshit will continue.

As an American, I am SHAMED by what we are doing in Iraq, and I apologize to any Iraqis who may read this for that asshole and his lying crew we have elected AGAIN in Washington....this country is becoming more and more ignorant, blindly arrogant, and stupid, and it's such a shame. We are doing the "Christian" thing by killing Iraqis to save them from themselves. Was it Ceasar who said, seeing the Christians fighting each other, "See how these Christians love one another." One of the English papers (the Guardian, possibly?) had a totally black page the day after the election, and on it, it said simply in small type: "Oh my God." Spot on.

I'll give you my prediction: most Americans are fat, ignorant, and asleep---hell, look at who we just elected---and as Pete Petersen says, we are running on empty and don't even know it. Within five years (and I think it will be much sooner) we will be a third world country just like Argentina. We produce nothing the world wants other than food...they can get everything else elsewhere for less money now...that wasn't so five years ago, but it is now. We are rude, loud, and unworldly. Do you know that only 7% of adult Americans have passports!!?? Our century was the last one; this century belongs to China and India...we are being sidelined and don't even realize it. We are being snookered. The Euro will become the new world currency and I am afraid we could see the dollar crash in even a few months....I sure as hell hope I'm wrong, because it hits me badly if I am to move back to the UK, and I certainly don't want to see all the good things about America get sandbagged. And there are lots of good things....problem is, the bad things are very bad and will sink us, I'm afraid. If gold hits $500, hang on to your pants. It won't be like 1980...because we no longer have any manufacturing depth or intellectual depth, and our TOTAL account balance is a negative TWELVE TRILLION DOLLARS! We have the lowest personal savings of any western country, and the highest personal debt. Soon, the loans will be called in and there won't be enough to pay for them. The countries holding dollars won't be able to buy more to shore up the dollar because there isn't enough money in the world to do that, and then they will try to get rid of them and the dollar will crash. It will make 1929 look like a cakewalk. The next ten years will be very interesting to be sure...hell, the next five years will be interesting.

Put any liquid assets you have into vintage guitars! (snuck that one in there, didn't I?).

Now, back to more pleasant things...the Ford GT! You can have one for a mere $140,000.....mmmmm, if I had the money, I'd buy one, because they will become an instant classic and be worth a bomb in a few years, and must be a kick in the pants to drive....such a pretty (FAST) car! I admire Ford for bringing it out. Well done, lads and lasses.

And if you find yourself in San Rafael in Marin County, and love vi ntage guitars like I love vintage cars, stop in to eguitars on 4th (the main drag) and E streets and hang on to your cajones as you walk in...you won't believe what Michael has on his walls. Say hello to Michael, Kermit, Danny, or Lloyd when you stop by...all good guys. Michael, Danny, and Lloyd know their vintage guitars, and if you're a heavy hitter, talk to Michael. You'll love the place. Guitarists walk in there all the time and stand there with their mouths open, gazing at all the amazing guitars hanging on the walls. One guy walked in, looked around, shook his head, walked back out then walked in again to make sure what he was seeing was real!

I remember rehearsing with Saiichi in Bermondsey, London, at Terminal studios (sounds sort of final, doesn't it?) and he brought in an old, beat-up Marshall stack...but the bottom cabinet was taller than the top one...very unusual....but it looked like crap. Well, you should have seen all the other guitarists in the place fairly drool over this thing! They couldn't stop talking about it and oggling it and running their hands over it like it was the holy grail! It looked like it wanted to be thrown in a dumpster, but apparently it was rare and had to have belonged to either Hendrix, the Who, or Zepp, or something. Guitarists.

My friend Dave Bronze, who plays bass (you can see him on the "Concert for George" DVD), was loaned a Fender bass by EC for one of the tours they did, and at the end of the tour Clapton said Dave could have it. A lovely gesture. It was worth a few bob, but not overly pricey. Then Eric added as an afterthought, "Oh, by-the-way, Bronzey, Bill used that bass on 'Satisfaction.'" Eric smiled, Dave just about fell through the floor. That guitar went from being worth maybe a few grand to being worth six figures, just like that! Eric loves doing things like that with his friends. Brooker is like that, too. 'Loves to slip stuff in there.

So, let's see...if I could ha ve a collection of cars what would I have? A 427 Cobra, the new Ford GT, a Noble (made in England...carbon fibre body and a beautiful, fast car), a Jag XK150 drophead, a 1960 red Buick convertible, a red 1959 Corvette, a '32 Model A (original) in dark green with black fenders, a '68 Firebird hardtop, the new 200 mph Mustang, an original Mini, Ferrari Modena in red and a Dino in yellow....uhhh, I think that would do! Oh! And of course a Deusenberg Model J....how could I forget THAT!

For bikes, definitely a '66 Bonneville, and the new Yammi FJR 1300, and maybe a nice thumping tourer....Harley soft tail or similar.

Why do most people spell "definitely" "definately?" Drives me nuts. I always have trouble with "separate" and "accommodate" myself. Have you ever tried writing the word "Egypt" really fast in longhand? Try it....it's tough! And why doesn't glue stick to the bottle? Why do banks charge a fee for insufficient funds when there are insufficient funds? Do th ey use sterilized needles for death by injection????? We know the speed of light is 186,000 miles-per-second...what's the speed of dark? If the temperature is zero today, and tomorrow it's going to be twice as cold...how cold will it be? If you send someone styrofoam, how do you pack it? I'm sure most of these came from George Carlin....'sounds like him.

What else can I bore you with? Well, I'll tell you what...if you want to make an investment in a guitar, and can't come up with the $100,000+ for a '59 sunburst, you might want to seriously consider buying one of these hand-built, Custom Shop Trower signature strats I am going to paint....I think Bananas are selling them too cheap ($9,999 for pre-sale)...I'm trying to get Bananas to up the price when they are done to $12,500 as originally planned. But if you think what a '56 Strat or a '59 Les Paul goes for, this is small change, and you will not only have a beautifully-made hand-built Fender Strat, you will have a on e-of-a-kind piece of art. My paintings sell for solid five figures, so these guitars are real a steal of a deal...they really are (do I sound like a used car salesman yet?). I was in Orlando last week and stopped into a guitar shop in one of the hip malls near Disneyworld, and they had a Custom Shop hand painted Strat for sale for $12,999 and told me they had sold two of them! And they were painted by who knows who? Certainly no one whose work is known. Nice paint job, but still......so these guitars I am doing for Bananas are really a deal at $9,999. Too cheap. Grab one. And if you're into Star Trek, the Star Trek guitar I do will be something else....I'll paint it just like I painted the Starship Enterprise, with the same type of pearl paints....it will shimmer like nobody's business and you could turn around and sell it on eBay for double or treble what you paid for it to a Trekkie guitarist. I also have the LAST decal sheet made for the original Enterprise model (I saved some, and they are all gone now but one), and I MIGHT put the big "1701" decal on the guitar as well...which will really add to its value....but if do that, that guitar will double in price. I'm really looking forward to doing these....I think they'll turn out really nice. Such pretty guitars to start out with.

Fender have assured us they are on track to deliver the guitars sometime in December. So if I get them the first week or so of January, I should have them finished by the end of February or a little into March. I will do what I can to urge Bananas to put up the price once they are done...but maybe they won't...anything is possible....it's their call, totally. But right now, if you pre-buy one, you'll get one hell of a deal. And you'll be able to play the thing because even the pick guard will have several coats of tough polyurethane on it, so you won't harm the paintjob with your plectrum or your fingernails. Fender made one of these for Robin as a prototype ( then made 100 more, all of which are sold), and he said it's the loveliest Strat he's ever played. The guys at the Custom Shop are really turning out some stunning guitars these days.

I hope you all have a happy Christmas....I shall be up in the gold rush country near Nevada City and will hopefully get a start on the guitars up there.

If you have any comments or rants, let fly!