Shotgun, huh? We have a new, stand alone, one room rehearsal/concert hall building at the school where I work. Birds get it from time to time. One recently visited just before a performance. Didn't have any firearms handy but did offer to get my bow out of the car. They turned me down--imagine that! Guess the concert crew doesn't care for the taste of foul. Alan Eder -----Original Message----- From: Scott Gray <pelican2 at gmx.com> To: pianotech at ptg.org Sent: Mon, Mar 1, 2010 8:07 pm Subject: Re: [pianotech] Tuning with birds Wow... New use for the tuning hammer... and it's better than lugging along a shotgun and shells. That's what that extension on some hammers is for. Better leverage! Huh? Scott Gray On 3/1/2010 2:12 PM, Dempsey Jr., Paul E wrote: I had this happen a couple of years ago, posted it to the list, but it's worth re-telling. feathered onlookers empsey Jr., Paul E dempsey at marshall.edu on Feb 11 13:12:48 MST 2008 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- I have serviced Betty Ann's lovely Steinway L for many years. Just as you enter her home you see a rather large aviary with several parrots, cockatoos, cockatiels....you get the picture. Every time I had been there the birds were in the enclosure. They occasionally will screech, whistle, etc. the usual bird talk, but never much of a bother. Until..... As fate would have it, one day I came to tune and Betty Ann greeted me at the door and then disappeared to the other end of the house. noticed that the aviary was open and vacant. thought little about that and began work. The great room where the piano is located has high vaulted ceilings, ledges, exposed beams, a highly polished parquet floor. I began tuning, thankful that Betty Ann was in the other end of the house (she's a talker ;-). I was about half way through the tuning when suddenly, from behind me; there was the sound of a screeching B-52 coming straight at my head. Startled, I did a duck and cover- both hands and arms flying up to cover my head. My tuning hammer was still clutched tightly in my hand and SMACK!!! One of the birds had zoomed down from the rafters making this God awful sound, arriving at my head the same time as the tuning hammer in my hand. POW- there the bird went.. spiraling across the polished floor a good 10-15 feet and then just laid there ON IT'S BACK! I thought " O MY GOD, I KILLED BETTY ANN'S BIRD". About then Betty Ann sings out from the other end of the house " Paul, is the bird bothering you?" I blurted back " Not any more" Fortunately, the bird flopped back to its feet, squawking for all it's worth and flew back up to its perch in the ceiling. It never came back down and it never shut its beak the entire rest of my visit. aul E. Dempsey, RPT iano Technician Sr. arshall University untington, WV 04-696-5418 04-617-1149 ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- revious message: Soundboard repair question ext message: Jacks for Wood-Brooks 90 degree action essages sorted by: [ date ] [ thread ] [ subject ] [ author ] -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- ore information about the Pianotech mailing list Paul E. Dempsey, RPT iano Technician Sr. arshall University untington, WV 04-696-5418 04-617-1149 -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: <http://ptg.org/pipermail/pianotech.php/attachments/20100302/9570cf9b/attachment.htm>
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