Yesterday I learned an important lesson about myself, one that has really been a long time coming.

I was putting the finishing touches on a present for Jenn - my own version of George Harrison's "Something". And by "finishing touches" I mean "vocals".

Which should be your first clue that, deep down, I already knew what I was about to learn.

The lesson was: I'm really not a great singer. Mediocre, if you want to be generous. I can pretty much carry a tune, and I can sing along to my CDs just fine.

In my defense, "Something" was at the high end of my range, and the harmony, which sucked so bad that I abandoned it altogether, was definitely out of my range.

But after struggling with this relatively simple piece for a couple of hours, I definitely felt like I came away with an appreciation for the fact that singing well is really hard. And I'm about as good of a singer as Bot is a programmer. (And vice versa - follow my homepage link and download the "Real Inspector Hound Theme" if you want to see what I mean.)

Let's face it. I'll never make it as a singer.

So I guess it's good that I never had any plans to do so.