opinions, please, and the betrayal of mabel

hi all,
so out of curiosity, if i were to enter a songwriting competition, which of my recorded songs (that being the key word), should i enter? keeping in mind, also, that it has to be under 5 minutes long, drat it. they don't realize how verbose i can be at times. drop me a line at info@vanessapeters.com or post a comment here and let me know which song says to you "i will win a contest, darn it, or fizzle out trying!"

so i have a confession to make.

i too have been sucked in by the great beast known as EBAY. yes, even over here, thousands of miles from you all, i have been clicking away like a mad hatter, betting my dime against the dimes of others, in the hopes of obtaining a new....

guitar.

yes. i am an evil, traitorous wench. at least i feel that way. a little. because beloved as my mabel is to me, i can't bring myself to cross an ocean again with a guitar. it is just such an amazing hassle, and besides that, dangerous for the guitar. both times i have traveled with her, she has suffering life-threatening injuries, and on her most recent trip to see miracle-luthier-carlos, he informed me that if i traveled with her again across an ocean, and she came back wounded, he would refuse to fix her out of principal. and he is right. the sane thing to do would be to keep a guitar in italy and one in the states.

the only problem is that i LOVE my guitar. LOVE IT. she has suffered so many nicks and bumps and breaks and bruises and still she is shiny and lovely to me. she has a ribbon tied around her head, a testament to her most serious injury, when she was beheaded in the summer of 2004 (God, was that only a year ago?). she has been signed by sarah harmer and aimee mann. nearly every song i have ever written has been written with her help, save the first few on mirabilandia. how can i leave her behind and take up with another? it is betrayal of the highest order.

and yet, there it was. a Norman B20 HG cutaway, gleaming and glistening, hardly used. bidding was at $145 when i saw her. $145??? A mere pittance for that guitar. Mabel is a Norman B20 (the same, just no cutaway) and I think she cost somewhere in the neighborhood of $500....but I am consisently told by other guitarists that she sounds better than some Martins and Taylors that cost upwards of $1000. So to find this other Norman, nearly identical to Mabel, starting at $145 was more than I could resist. BID NOW! said the button, and so I closed my eyes, and I clicked.

and by golly, I won. Not at $145, mind you, but at $255. Not bad for a nearly-brand-new, blemish-free guitar, complete with a tuner, strap, hard case, and new strings. This new guitar will be waiting for me in the States when I arrive on May 31st. I haven't yet broken the news to Mabel that she isn't coming home with me....and that she may never again. She may become a permanent expatriate, learning to speak Italian better than English (her English is already shaky, as French-Canadian is her native tongue). I hope she will forgive me for this act of reckless internet purchasing. I swear, I did it for her own good. She could not have sustained another Rome-Amsterdam-Detroit-Houston and then Dallas-Newark-London-Bologna. Could you??

So, let me know what you think about that best-song-under5-minutes-that-I've-got thing. I'm curious to have other input...

see some of you in less than 2 weeks! tell them all i'm coming...
love
vanessa