back in 1964 my dad bought me a used blue strat. i held on to it for 10 years, selling it around 1974 to buy a les paul custom.

faster forward to dec. 24, 2009. i decide i want a strat again. over to guitar center, and walk out with a new mim strat. like my previous strat, this one is blue with maple neck.

on sunday i take it to a birthday party to show my brothers. when i opened up the case, my dad looked at the strat and wondered why it looked nicer than the last time he saw it.

i explained that it was a new one, and the first thing he wanted to know is "why is there no cover over the bridge area?" followed by "what is different about the pickups" (i have the hss btw.)

keep in mind that i sold the old strat about 35 years ago. amazing the things we remember sometimes!

Dad's are pretty sharp dudes. I noticed my Dad was a lot smarter when I was 40 than when I was 20. (Or maybe that was me getting smarter... )

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Old age and treachery will win every time over youth and enthusiasm.

"You can never have too many Tele's." A quote from my Sweetwater Sales Engineer

No, parents definitely get smarter the longer you're out of your teens...

Amazing how people pay attention to things you don't think they noticed.

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It wasn't Willy-Nilly, it was at crows.

Your dad was probably really thinking to himself, but trying to be polite, "What the heck went wrong with this boy, He would have had a sweet vintage strat, but now he is bringin home a MIM, all because of a Les Paul!!!!! Where did I go wrong????"

Im totally joking dude!! Thats cool that he remembered that about the bridge though!

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"Wait a minute, somethings wrong here!"

welcome back to fender (strat), what took so long?

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2012 American Vintage Telecaster 1958
09 Fender american deluxe strat.
97 Gibson les paul special P90's double-cut
65 Princeton reverb re-issue
2010 Guild Gad-F40e

well- i went through many changes over the years.

in 78 i quit playing in a band. i had a regular day job, and after 12 years of gigging, i had enough. when you also look at the music scene in the late 70's, a lot changed. a lot of great rock clubs went disco, and people started using dj's for weddings. the live music scene changed dramatically.

i then got married and had kids. then a couple of car accidents happened. i injured my shoulder, and the weight of the les was just too much. i decided to sell it, and the last 20 years just played my ovation acoustic.

last year i was buying some new strings and spotted the strat. i didn't know much about the mim strats. i did a little research, and came home with this little beauty on christmas eve.

i now practice about 1-2 hours a day, and plan to get back into gigging soon.

As the father of two teens I hope that I appear smarter to them when they get older....

That is a good thing to have to talk to your dad about, didn't have that with my old man.

You ever regret letting go what would now be a savage vintage guitar today?

yes- but who new back in 1974 that prices would go that high. if my parents saved all the metal cars that i had in the 50's, i could retire. the strat was sold to a friend, but i lost track of him. i hope he's enjoying it still