Goodbye.

[iiipopes]

Yes, I just might come back. I concur with Donn's observation.

[arpthark]

Wow! What a difference a week or a few days make. Just stuck my head in here to see how things were going. I was happy to see no more spam cluttering the place and causing security alerts with ZoneAlarm. It had to be a lot of work.
Thanks to the new mods and Farah for tidying up this forum.

That was great, for sure, but what sort of bowls me over is the hum of activity since that comment was written a couple of days ago. What could have been a spring cleaning maintenance project seems to have turned into a new generation Tubenet with a very healthy administrative climate in the control room and the forums focusing their energy on interesting and useful discussions. It isn't just better than the recent breakage, I think it might be better than it has ever been as far back as I can remember. That's probably a temporary honeymoon effect to some extent, but even so it's good to see.

I really quit visiting the forum around 2012 because of the quality (lack thereof?) of posts, etc. Always enjoyed seeing Joe or Dan Oberloh restoration/repair job but the tenor of the forum was kind of vitriolic - this was around the time people were a lot less accepting (and vocal about it!) regarding Chinese tubas, etc. Tempers were really flaring. Glad to see people like Jonathan Hodgetts and Tom McGrady are very upfront and helpful about the quality and origin of their instruments, people like Mark and Farah are actively trying to improve the site and people like Wade and Joe will still give out the lovingly(?) curmudgeonly responses and lots of great(?) advice. Relations seem to have normalized and I think the forum is in great shape.

[iiipopes]

Mark and Farah have been very gracious to me, welcoming me back. After a couple of trial posts, if the rest of the TNFJ will have me, I am pleased to re-join everyone.

Thanks for all your support. Don't forget about dropping in to say "Hi!" to Schlep occasionally as well, so we can all be good neighbors in the virtual cyber-forum-neighborhood.

[iiipopes]

One of my favorite Beatles' songs. Thanks.

[MaryAnn]

Well I missed the whole damn thing. I guess that's good. Me no like spam.
I did have one fellow (?) years ago try to hit on me via Tubenet (not a tuba player, clearly) and I PM'd Farah and bingo he was gone. The guys I've been talking to off and on since WAY back are great guys and I'm glad to see some of them still here.