Way back in 2006, SOTW member, and saxophone historian, Paul Lindemeyer, developed a GAS test as a way to numerically quantify how badly a person was suffering from gear acquisition syndrome. At the time I didn’t participate, but after talking with my insurance agent yesterday, I thought about Paul’s thread again.
The conversation with my insurance agent, reminded me of all the small stuff that I have that is quite valuable, but that I don’t even think about anymore, because I haven’t used it in years. If something were to happen to our house, would I even remember that I have these things? Likely not.
So this morning I revisited Paul’s GAS test, and used it as the starting point for getting a gear inventory together. As I diligently wrote down the gear, and then gradually went through the questions in the GAS test, I must admit I was a bit stunned. I didn’t expect the score that I got.
I’ve decided to include the test here for you to do in the privacy of your own home. While it certainly is funny, and I’m the first to find humour in the almost any situation, this can also have some practical applications—like it did for me.
In whichever way you use this, enjoy… Thanks to Paul for developing it. And yes, I’ll share my score, but only at the end. :devil2:
For every saxophone you own over one each of SATB, give yourself 10 points.
– For each sax that is the same pitch as another sax, add 5 points.
– For each sax that hasn’t been played in more than six months, add 5 points.
– For each mouthpiece in excess of the number of playable saxes, add 2 points.
– For each mouthpiece that hasn’t been played in more than six months, add 2 points.
– For each mouthpiece marked with the words NEW YORK or HOLLYWOOD, add 10 points.
– For each mouthpiece professionally refaced, add 5 points.
– For each mouthpiece professionally refaced more than once, add 20 points.
– For each sax not currently playable, add 5 points.
– For each sax that has remained unplayable for more than one year, add 10 points.
– For each sopranino, bass, or sax in a key other than Bb or Eb, add 20 points.
– If you own or have ever owned more than one bass sax at a time, add 100 points.
– For each weirdo instrument such as straight alto, typewriter, slide, plastic body, padless, tubax, etc., add 25 points.
– For each High Pitch, manual octave key, experimental, prototype, or 19th century Franco-Belgian horn with little round blobs instead of roller keys, add 40 points.
– For a full-size contrabass, add 200 points.
Classifications:
0-9 points: You are relatively free of GAS. Blow in peace, and remember that an artist never blames his tools.
10-49 points: You have a roving eye but still put most of your air through the horn. Stay focused!
50-99 points: You may have GAS. If you’re either spending more time acquiring gear than playing, or acquiring more gear than you’ll have time to play, open an eBay store or seek support in SOTW Forum.
100-199 points: You have GAS. In addition to the remedies previously discussed, family intervention may be necessary, along with moving to a smaller living space.
200-499 points: You have Bipolar-Acquisitive Disorder with GAS (“BAD GAS”). In BAD GAS phase, your living space HAS become smaller. Your family has either intervened or left completely. If you have ever attempted to play more than 3 saxophones at once, or gone more than a year without needing to buy reeds, you definitely have BAD GAS.
500 or more points: You are a GAS Hoarder, Obsessive Genus (“GAS HOG”). Why are you reading this? Go look at The Marketplace. Or eBay. Or netinstruments.com. Or Craigslist. Or the classifieds. Or… :scratch:
OK folks, it’s confession time. What was your score? What did you think you would have? Was your actual score higher or lower? I didn’t think mine would be this high, but I ended up with 653 points! 😯
I’d best get onto Craigslist and start looking for my next tenor. You know what they say: You can never have too many shoes, or tenor saxohones. 😈
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UPS…..1780 points (And I am sure that i have forgotten some points) :saxy:
😯 😯 😯
I suspect my friend, you will likely be invited to speak at the next GASaholics convention.
Congrats on your achievement ❓
:cheers:
I am honoured! I will celebrate it by find a saxophone to add to my collection 😉
My score was 244, The sopranino, bass, c melody, and two tenors and two alto’s set me overboard!!! But I also have brass instruments and electric instruments as well and they weren’t added!
Oh you’re just a beginner Jason. 😉
You don’t even need any Gasex tablets.
i need a computer to help me score this is great stuff helen.still kickin and playing 74 nxt month and man i hate it when they say ,can you play in the mood curses and other bad words will they remember getz,woods,stitt and on and on but for sure glenn miller no dis but good grief .thanks helen hope you are ok and thanks for all.your sax 🙄 bud sam 🙄 😉
Hi there Sam. Nice to hear from you!
Yes, I must confess, I used an Excel spread sheet to come up with score. Sad isn’t it? :devil2:
This weekend I’m going to spend a few hours going through my gear and putting it all into the spread sheet that I created. I’m going to start putting this together for insurance purposes. I don’t think most of us realize how much we have spent over the years for small stuff like ligatures, etc. OK, as I write this, I realize that I won’t get it done, but at least I’ll get a good start on it this weekend. 😈
Just in music books alone, I’ve got hundreds, if not thousands worth of stuff. I’ve got material going back 30 years—ever since I started studying privately. With my homeowners insurance, I have replacement value coverage on everything.
TVs, PVR, etc are easy to replace, but this kind of stuff, you don’t think about, because it’s been amassed over a lifetime of playing. I’m sure you know what I’m talking about Sam. I suspect you too have lots of things that you don’t even realize that you have anymore.
I wouldn’t necessarily replace all my things, but since I have the insurance, I should at least have a listing (as well as a photographic record) so that I can prove that I have these things.
Wow, this is an interesting post.
I have bad gas. 234 points. This is a fun quiz / commenting survey.
Is that it Chris? I would have thought you’d have a higher score. 😈
Yes, sadly, I didn’t get a higher score.