Today was one of those days where it seemed like nothing will work right. I’ve been building the mics for the Lads for the past few days but today was full of big problems. The first problem: those last-minute throat mics that my manufacturer got to me didn’t work at all. I did scrounge up a couple throat mics today in my inventory that I didn’t realize I still had (time for some Spring Cleaning!). Those have now been tested and work perfectly.

Second problem: the belt-pack processors with USB. My throat mics use a circuit I designed to process the audio and power the mics and it’s housed in a belt-pack enclosure. In my previous blog post, I talked about how I’m converting the belt-packs to use USB for power and audio. I’ve done this before and it worked previously. Now the mod is not working for these new belt-packs I’ve assembled for the Lads. I looked around my studio closet some more and found a fully functioning unit I made for another company last year. It was my one unit to keep as reference. Oh well, it’s coming to the UK!!

I also found one more unfinished circuit board that I made special for that other project. I’m going back to the studio tonight to try to finish it (hope I have all the components I need!). I leave tomorrow night, so let’s hope this last bit goes easily. Little has so far. It was a pretty rough day, very disappointing and difficult to see past the problems. What do you do when nothing works? You have no choice but to pause, take a deep breath, remember what you’re doing, why you’re doing it….and just f*cking make it work.

UPDATE 9:30pm: After a couple more hours of building another circuit board, I got them both working!!!! They sound great too. Now I will package them up tomorrow and finish packing for the UK! I pre-checked in for my flight tonight and also got a slightly better seat.