Music... Trumpet versus Xaphoon!?

I've come to the conclusion that I need to find some creative outlets to try and develop my creative side.

One of my challenges is that I can be (Ok, I admit it, it's not that I can be it's that I am!) too technical/clinical/black & white and that isn't helping with my photography. I was discussing this the other day and I can see where some of that has come from.

When I was at High School I learned to play the piano, I got to grade six in both theory and practical and apparently that is a good thing... When I was 16/17 I just thought that it was a skill that I wasn't very good at. The problem, as I saw it at the time, was that it took so very long for me to learn each piece of music. None of it became intuitive, it wasn't fun it was an enjoyable chore (practice got me out of other chores!), it was a mathematical, calculated chore that I was able to do with planning and consistency but no fun and spontaneity. So I quit the piano and tried the trumpet for a few months but by then I had lost the musical desire.

So for the last few weeks I have been making enquiries about trumpets and imagine my joy on discovering that technology has made life easier!!! There is a thing called a silent mute that allows you to play a trumpet without disturbing others (much) and yet you can hear yourself in a headset... Bring it on! The costs at present are a little prohibitive (That's another of my challenges. Why buy the cheap one when you really want the good one?) and in reaserching trumpets I found what may be the ultimate, cool portable instrument, a Pocket Sax by Xaphoon.

Basically an ABS plastic or bamboo recorder (video clip) that uses a saxaphone reed rather than a whistle to produce sound. And it sounds like a cross between a saxophone and a clarinet. Sexy, cool and portable, did I mention cheap relative to a trumpet!