I Know Better

My father passed away on January 3rd 2012.

My father sold tubes.
I had never in my life paid for a set of tubes. I'd ask or call and tell dad what I needed and that was that.

My amp is fairly new, and although I had gigged it a lot it has been performing flawlessly...until last night.
Last night I turned my equipment on while preparing for the end of the work day and some time to record. And then I noticed a rhythmic clicking noise. I would have characterized it as crickets, but that would be inaccurate.
My smartphone has a recording app so I recorded the sound and went to Styles to see if anyone could diagnose it for me.
One of two things, a filter cap or the tubes. Standard dumb guitarist test is to tap the tubes while the amp is on and check for noises. I tried it and heard nothing.
Damn...filter caps will cost me a lot more. The labor for finding which capacitor is the culprit could amount to a lot of time and money. And no amp to boot.

Greg (one of the great people at Styles) gave me some symptoms to watch for in the future.
Tonight as I plugged in my guitar to play, all of Greg's symptoms began to occur.
ALL.
So I raced like a banshee to Styles and got a set of replacement tubes. $81 and change. A very fair price, actually.

I take them home, replace the tubes and of course, the troubles are gone, the amp is fine...now.
I had to buy my first set of tubes. Yeah...total coincidence. Totally...
(I've had sets last years (10+) with heavy gigging/use - this amp is three years old max)

Padre,
I wasn't the greatest son, but you loved me nonetheless...and THAT made you a great father.