Update for everyone: I'll probably be out of hospital some time next week.

This question is one that hits me very directly as it is connected to my permanent condition as an Autistic... We in the Autistic Spectrum tend very much to overemphasize our shortcomings and belittle our capabilities - it's just one of the expressions of how our brain is functioning. I don't say that only we experience this; but most of us are more prone to thinking we are not good enough than Neurotypicals. I'm looking at my own example: I finished my Leaving certificate with best marks, being third in a class of 129; I completed undergraduate university in record time with an MA in history as third of a class of 355. I then completed my PhD in record time - less than a year - coming second in a class of 88. And yet I always sought after becoming better still because being second was already a cause for depression - I was simply unable to put my achievements in relation to what others managed to do. Even when I reached the absolute pinnacle of my chosen profession and was awarded a Professorship in Trinity College, Dublin, Ireland, I was not content. I could not strive for more, but there was that nagging thought I was not good enough... it ended with a divorce and deep depression; several years of therapy which did not help me at all because the therapists did not recognize the root of the problem, i.e. my Autism (and please forget everything about Rain Man and similar movies: There are such people about, but they are at most one % of the Spectrum). Only when one clever psychiatrist, at the goading of my wife, took the trouble of testing me for Autism did I suddenly receive the master key to everything that had ever happened in my life, and to my own mind. Since then, I have found the key to compromise and happiness; and now, I am not driven any more to try and reach unattainable goals, but am content to be what I am, and - in music - to be a good player within my own comfort zone. I still try to do as well as I can; but I now accept my own limitations while still trying to improve. And I am happy that way.

Hope you could make some sense out of this.

Well, after mourning TM and my hard-earned status as fortissimo user, I'm here.

Whether you are celebrating Christmas, or Hanukkah, or Diwali, or the 12th Week of Halloween, or Birthday or Wedding Anniversary or Happy 9th Divorce, my Season's Greetings to you. May all of you enjoy the best of health, the best of food, the best of company, and the best of trumpets!

@BigDub In a local paper: "The inventor of Autocorrect just pissed away. He was an anthole. Restaurant in pieces."

@bigdub Sir Thomas Beecham is best remembered for this incident... He loved to mingle with the audience in Covent Garden during the interval. One day a guy rushed into him and without apology, asked him where the loo was. Sir Thomas told him to follow a certain passage, adding, "The first door is labelled "Ladies". Don't go in there. The second door is labelled "Gentlemen". Go in there nevertheless."

Two trumpet players in Rome, in the only caffè possible!
barliman2001, left, and ssmith1226, right.

Suddenly, after a longish wait, I found "Global Moderator" beside my name... well, quite a few people here know about me from TM, but for all those who don't or who did not really care at the time, here's all about me. I don't have a fancy website - more or less because I'm busy updating my wife's website. But here's everything of interest about me:
I'm a 53-year-old Bavarian (well, German national, but I prefer my local tribe) living in Austria, near Vienna. Married to an opera singer (www.reginaschoerg.com). By trade, I am a historian.
My musical past consisted of children's choir, then the local church choir and finally, after studying voice with several renowned teachers, soloist with the Passau Cathedral Choir and the Dublin Guinness Choir. From age four, I played piano - did not really like it, but was good at it.
Until I accidentally put my hand through a glass door and cut a nerve. Fortunately, the same year I had won my first trumpet in a raffle... went on to Kinneil Band in Scotland (current British National Champions!), then back to Germany. Seven years in Ireland, playing with a number of brass bands and the Greystones Symphony, eventually conducting this orchestra. Since then, Principal Trumpet of the one and only Vienna Klezmer Orchestra (www.klezmerorchester.at) and webmaster for Munich-based Markus Fluhr Big Band (www.bbmf.de).
So far, I have performed on trumpet in twelve different countries and a total of 97 orchestras or bands (usually as a sub). I have been known to pack the car at a moment's notice and drive several days just for one interesting gig...
My finest moment in history? When I walked into a Vienna coffee house and they had a clarinet converted into a table lamp!

Feel free to contact me - I'm sure to answer.

Three important points:

1. I would be extremely honoured if Rowuk were to consent to share the Holy Office of Moderatorship.

2. I acknowledge that administrators are human beings with all human failings. But perhaps the administrator could be persuaded to open a second account as "admin - private" to voice those topics he/she/it can't address in an official capacity. Then we could soundly abuse him without abusing the office...

3. The main reason for the disappearance of TM was that no one knew who the admin was, where the community was based and how to access the server and such small technical details. I am not aware that the situation as to TB is in any way different. If we don't want to have the same thing happen to TB, we need to make sure someone else apart from the admin knows how to manage things in case the admin has toothache or the runs or is incapacitated by the three main reasons why trumpet players disappear: Drink, Dungeon or Death.

@dr-go Can you distinguish a difference?

@administrator a vacuum cleaner, originally produced by the Hoover company.

@kehaulani-0 Just goes to show you can never trust sax players... like that old joke: Why do sax players like to use the hoover so often?
.
.
.
.
.
wait for it
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
They think they are practising their sound quality!!

Prague is a hotbed of music of all descriptions. Small jazz bands at every second corner, community bands of all styles everywhere. Language might be a barrier, though.

Being a bit of a Buescher enthusiast, I'll start the bidding: $ 200 + shipping.

@dale-proctor From my rather extended experience with Buescher trumpets, normal mouthpieces fit easily and without problems, and the 204 model # stamped on the valve block excludes it being a trumpet shaped cornet. So my guess is that that Herco mouthpiece might have begun life as an alto horn mouthpiece...

And one more bit of info:
http://www.buescherloyalist.com/serial.html
This list puts it between 1930 and 1931

Just looked more closely - it's a Low Pitch model (meaning it works with today's tuning) and is a model 204.

Data on early Buescher instrument serial numbers is somewhat sketchy. With good valves, this could qualify as a peashooter; but it is nothing really special, nothing like the later Aristocrat series. I have a similar one which I got for $ 150.

Just found this ad. on FB:
"Contact us for your Best prices on Tornbomes, Saxophones , Trumpets , Flutes , Clarinets ,E.tc And they are available in all Brands and Models in USED & Brand New and all our items comes with international warranty.."

Did I read right? TORNBOMES??