Category: Life with Pratts

The End of a Shure Thing

Shure M91ED stereo phono cartridge

Record Store Day ten days ago reportedly set a sales record in both the US and UK. As the CD format dwindles in popularity against online streaming, the resurgent ancient LP continues to gain strength. Ironically, one of the oldest and biggest names in phonograph cartridges, Shure, announced today that it is discontinuing its phono-related products.

Niles, IL., May 1, 2018—For more than 90 years, Shure has been committed to manufacturing and delivering products of the highest quality, reliability, and value. This commitment requires consistency in materials, processes, and testing, as well the capacity to react to fluctuations in demand.

In recent years, the ability to maintain our exacting standards in the Phonograph Cartridge product category has been challenged, resulting in cost and delivery impacts that are inconsistent with the Shure brand promise.

In light of these conditions, and after thorough evaluation, we have made the difficult decision to discontinue production of Shure Phono products effective Summer 2018.

Given our decades-long history of participation in the Phono category, we recognize that this decision may come as a disappointment to our channel partners and end users.

We are grateful for the support and loyalty demonstrated for Shure Phono products through the years and we are proud of the impact that these products have made on our customers’ lives and the reputation of the Shure brand. We believe that the proud legacy of Shure Phono is best served by exiting the category rather than continuing production under increasingly challenging circumstances.

Shure will continue to bring reputable, high quality products to market and we look forward to meeting and exceeding customer expectations on our current and future offerings. As Shure expands into new markets and product categories for audiophiles, our enduring commitment to premium performance and technological innovation will remain at our core.

I use a Shure M92E in one of my turntables, and fortunately I have several factory-sealed replacement styluses (nobody says “styli” anymore, do they?). My first Shure was the very popular and affordable M91ED, like the one pictured above. I was only seventeen when I bought it, and I remember being astounded by how much better it sounded compared to the bottom-of-the-line Pickering cartridge that came with the stereo I’d purchased months earlier with money from my part-time job. I recall the M91ED cost $20, which is equivalent to $120 today. For that much money the best cartridge currently available is probably the Nagaoka MP110, from Japan. Audio-Technica, also in Japan, continues to manufacture a line of cartridges, as does Ortofon in Denmark. They’re the two biggest remaining names in the business, with Grado holding its own in America, but not without some quality control problems that I have experienced myself. My A-T and Ortofon cartridges are both excellent and durable. Viva vinyl!

Now that I’m on the subject, I pulled out an oldie from college, my Ortofon FF15E. I figured I needed a cartridge from Denmark to go along with my Dynaco A-25 speakers from Denmark. Yes, I really did think that way. Still do, I suppose.

Ortofon FF15E

I’m going to give it a spin, despite the wear on the stylus from long ago, to hear how it sounds compared to my newer Ortofon cartridge. But right now I have to get back to not eating anything, because tomorrow I’m having a colonoscopy. You can read about my first colonoscopy, ten years ago, at this link. The prep this time around was much easier than the awful stuff I had to drink last time.

Easterner in West for Easter

The plastic surgeon in Boston who closed the hellish wound on my head from melanoma removal gave me the okay to travel. So I’ve been in Phoenix for the past week, once again tackling the aftermath of my father’s death.

Sun City West, Arizona

The other certainty in life besides death is, of course, taxes, and that’s one of the things I’ve been doing here. I met with a CPA, who will take care of my father’s final personal income tax return, and then he will get started on the Trust taxes. I have to drop off some more papers at his office tomorrow morning, after meeting with my lawyer, and then I’ll be at a couple of banks to see about closing out accounts to be consolidated in an account Dad had back home that is now my responsibility.

Besides money-related matters, two of my sisters and I have been going through Dad’s house, deciding what can be tossed and what should be kept for an estate sale. We came up with 63 lbs. of paper to be shredded, and I hauled that over to a Staples store, which offers Iron Mountain’s shredding service at a cost of $0.99/lb.

Through all of this I keep going back and forth in my mind, thinking I might want to take over my parents’ retirement house — despite the fact that, thanks to skin cancer, the Sun is now my burning enemy. The pro|con list for buying the place from my siblings, who each own an equal share of the property, is about evenly split.

And so it goes… !

Big Boys Don’t Cry

I should have been in Belgium the summer of 1975, after my sophomore year of college. Long story, about a girl, of course. Instead, I spent that summer working the night shift at a Cape Cod restaurant called the Hearth ‘n Kettle. I cooked, I bused tables, and I washed dishes. Back then the workers weren’t immigrants. The crew included the year-round locals and the summertime college kids. There was some flirting, and some of that paid off, but mostly we all just worked hard and got along.

A radio was always playing in the back room of the restaurant. The big songs that summer included “Love Will Keep Us Together” by The Captain and Tennille, “Rhinestone Cowboy” by Glen Campbell, and “Listen to What the Man Said” by McCartney and Wings. But the one that I never tired of hearing was, “I’m Not in Love” by 10cc.

“Alexa, Where’s the Nearest Chinese Laundry?”

Thankfully, I have had only two bouts of lower back trouble. The first time was almost ten years ago, as posted here. What got me moving again were a couple of Percocets. I was amazed at the immediate relief the drug provided, but it made me feel terribly sick. One tablet would have been enough, and I later commented to my primary care physician that I couldn’t imagine becoming addicted. He replied, “You’re not a 15-year-old with a football injury. They have a very different reaction. It makes them feel great.”

So here we are, once again struggling with opium as a nation and a society, centuries after the first crisis. My buddy Denro sent a link with a brief history from the Smithsonian.

“It’s a poor town now-a-days that has not a Chinese laundry,” a white opium-smoker said in 1883, “and nearly every one of these has its layout” – an opium pipe and accessories.

So far, post-op I’m doing all right with Tylenol and Celebrex. I have a prescription for an opiate painkiller, but do not anticipate having it filled. By the way, my original post regarding back pain turned out to be wrong. The problem was a simple muscle spasm, and taking a muscle relaxant would have been just as effective as the Percocet. After the second time my lower back gave me trouble, a physical therapist told me the best preventive measure is doing push-ups, and he was right.

Scalpel on the Scalp

Waking up from general anesthesia yesterday, I was tempted to yell, “My leg! Oh my God, what have you done? Where is my leg??” But my voice was so weak, and my throat sore from the breathing tube, I could barely manage a whisper, sparing the post-op nursing staff from my sick joke.

What a long day. Having had nothing to eat or drink after midnight, long before I was put under at 5 PM I had a “dehydration hangover,” because a hangover was exactly what it felt like.

The picture is from the plastic surgeon’s Facebook page. He said it took 90 minutes to close the wound in my scalp from the melanoma removal last week that was done by a dermatologist. Not entirely coincidentally, the two doctors attended Harvard Medical School together.

Before the surgery I was given a choice of procedures. A skin graft or something called a “flap.” The surgeon explained that the latter is more difficult and takes twice as long to do, but the outcome is better. If I were ten years older, or had been a smoker, he wouldn’t offer it, because it requires a healthy blood supply. So a flap it was.

My head now looks like a mess of stitched-together raw hamburger, covered by a transparent adhesive bandage. But it’s better than the open wound was. The surgeon showed me a picture that was taken last week by the dermatologist, after removing the cancer and before the inch-thick bandage was applied. If I had seen it then, I would have yelled, “My head! Oh God, what have you done to my head??” The opening was huge, and incredibly deep! I had no idea the scalp is so thick. Anyway, thanks to seeing how horrible the injury was, I knew I’d made the right decision against a skin graft.

All I can do now is rest and heal. I have two pain med prescriptions, one narcotic one not. But I won’t need them, because it doesn’t hurt very much after taking a single 500 mg extra-strength Tylenol. Before I cover up my head with my new hat, here’s how it looks.