Just wanted to share a couple of pics of my Christmas surpriseā¦ but first a bit of backstory!
In late November, my dear wife was asking me whether I had anything that Iād like in my stocking this year. Now, she knows that the GAS is very strong & so she assumed that I wanted a new guitar.
She was surprised when my answer was a pedalboard, since I have a few pedals that I have to get out & set up any time I want to play with one (or more) of them!
āThatās it? You donāt have a guitar on the Wish List?ā she queried. āWell, Sweetness, thereās ALWAYS at least One on the Wish List, but Iād really rather have a pedalboard or maybe a new AI with a DAW!ā āOkā she responded, āYou go ahead & put down what you want & weāll see what Santa can do.ā
So I researched & picked out a nice Ghostfire pedalboard with all the necessary cables to hook everything upā¦ chose a PreSonus Quantum ES-2 AI that came bundled with a couple of Eris 3.5 BT monitors along with a perpetual license for Studio One Pro software.
A few days went by & one day I came home from work to find this:
āWhat did you do???ā I asked!!! āYou have to wait till Christmas to find out!!!ā she saidā¦ and then, cruel woman, actually made me wait for weeks to open the box!!! I had to pass it in our hallway multiple times a day!!! Then, finally, Christmas morning arrived & the new Epiphone had to wait & was the last gift I got to open!!! She knew me well enough to know that if it wasnāt last, I would not even get to any othr gifts till the next day!!!
So here it isā¦
The, ummm, signature ES-335 version that one of āTHOSE OTHERā YouTube guitar teachers out there wrangled out of Epiphone!!! The graphic on the back of the headstock may just give it away!!!
At any rate - meet Mitch!!! I call him Mitch ācause he helps to scratch the itch I have to play !!!
Heās a really nice guy & Iām getting along with him really wellā¦ some of my other guitars feel neglected but I havenāt forgotten about them! They all get rotated regularly!!!
Tod
Happy Christmas Tod!
What a nice Christmas present.
Unexpected it sounds like too. Nothing better than getting something you werenāt expecting.
Itās for sure a real looker. Iām pretty partial to ES style guitars. I just think they look too cool!
Very cool ya got the spectrum too. From strat to ES. Yer gonna get any tones your desiring for sure. Single coils to humbuckers. Man, yer all set! And all in red too. Very nice.
What a lovely guitar; surely, sound-wise itās a great complement to your Squire, a completely different beast in every respect. Congrats and best wishes
Those 2 different red guitar colors āclashā a bit togetherā¦( we call it Curse) ) like with me the purple new guitar and the carpet itās onā¦I have to buy a new rugā¦But with you you can just fit a black guitar in between.
Greetings and I like that kind of guitars very much
Hi Tod, congrats on this beautiful new guitar! A thoughtful present from your wife. I wish you lots of fun and inspiration from this instrument and many very happy guitar hours!
Happy NGD Tod! and yes! a very merry Christmas!
What a beautiful gift
Waiting that loooonnngg time to open it would make it so much more juicy to open
I love the colour too.
Glad to hear you and MItch are getting along so well, wishing you many hours of enjoyment together
What a beauty Mitch is! I love that colour (and now I want something similar, tooā¦ GAS is real, aināt it?).
But your wife, that cruelty of facing the box every day not allowed to open it. That sounds like some tough weeks for you.
But Iām sure you can make up for this by enjoying playing Mitch to the fullest! Have fun!
Wow! All these nice replies to my postā¦ Iām a bit behind with respondingā¦
Adrian,
Thank you for the nice commentsā¦ it is a wonderful Christmas present - but the best present is actually my wife!!! Her first name is Carol & sheās always been my Christmas Carolā¦ she makes my heart sing!!! Now I just have to put this āFestive Redā to use learning some Christmas songs for 2026ās Holiday Season!!!
This is true!!! When I purchased my Squire Bullet Strat, it was for a really great sale price & I was able to apply some rewards points that were days away from expiring. So it cost me about $70 US brand-new! I keep it in my office at work. Although my door locks, many people have access so if one of my guitars were to disappear, that would be the least mourned. Itās not a great sounding instrument, but works well enough to āscratch the itchā to play on a break during my work day!
Thanks for your admiring comments!
Rogier,
Although I see your point, when I think of guitars & clash in the same context itās more like āClashāā¦
Besides, the wall hanger in my office is the spot reserved for the āGuest Guitar of the Weekā!
I bring a different guitar at the start of every week & play it as much as I can fit in at my lunchtime or coffee break! So, maybe the colors clash a bit but itās technically just temporary!!!
Thanks for your reply!!!
Andrea,
This guitar - well, actually ALL my guitars are inspiring - will definitely inspire me to play!!! Many happy guitar hours are the goal! Thatās why I love guitarā¦ lots of happy moments that keep me coming back for more play time!!! Learning new stuff is fun, but just ānoodling aroundā and killing a few minutes here & there is joyful! Thanks for your encouraging words!!!
Jasmine,
It is definitely beautiful, sounds great & feels amazing to me!!! Juicy - I like the taste of that word as relating to guitar!!! Juicy!!! Love it, & yes it was!!! Thank you for commenting!!!
Nailed it my friend!!! Thanks!!!
No struggle Michaelā¦ no struggle at all!!! My wife has been through this craziness we call āLifeā before guitar & will be long after Iām too old & feeble to play!
(Besides, this isnāt the first time sheās surprised me with something like this!!! )
Thanks Mark!
Iām definitely a fan of the āstoriesā youāve shared with us here! Those guitar build threads are so coolā¦ I just feel for your āLong Suffering Wifeā who has to put up with your obsession! (Good idea to rope her in - and with bass so she can accompany you!!! )
Hi Beenie!!!
Funny the comments about the colorā¦ red, to me, is a rather neutral color. I donāt dislike it but itās not my go-to either. The only other red guitar is the Squireā¦ as I mentioned up thread, it was an amazing deal & I had no choice color wise. This red, however is just different! Iām really lovinā it!!!
Confession time - (head hung low in shame )
I sometimes watch Marty on YouTube
(crowd gasps in SHOCK & SURPRISE)ā¦
and I have had GAS for his ES-335 for a long time but I guess that I always thought it was a several thousand dollar Gibson. So I just kinda āpushed the desire awayā knowing that it wasnāt going to happen! One day, watching guitar stuff on YouTube, a shameful addiction, I know, I saw the Epi reviewedā¦ REVELATION!!!
I could probably afford that one!!! So, it went on my wish list - alongside a whole bunch of other gear that Iāll never purchase - until my Carol saw it there! Did I mention that I really love that woman?!?!?!
Thank you for the lovely comment!!!
You just know you have something good going on, when your other half gives you a guitar.
I got into guitar when my wife came home one day with my first guitar.
Never stopped since.
Never will stop remembering that moment either.
Similar memories here as wellā¦
First guitar was a Fender that we saw at Costco - a ābig boxā store here in the US. I remarked that I had always wanted to play guitarā¦ went to work an evening shift & came home to find it waiting!
My second guitar was an almost identical storyā¦ our son was learning drums in school & we went to a music store to find him a drum kit. After seeing the guitar room I basically told my wife to make the drum choice & went over to the guitars. I spent about an hour playing a blue Ibanez guitar! Again, came home from work the next day to find it on a new stand in our living room!!!
I still own both & play them both regularly!!!
The graphic on the back of the headstock may just give it away!!!
itās the perfect colour in my opinion and looks great.
I love that colour (and now I want something similar, tooā¦ GAS is real, aināt it?).
That sounds like some tough weeks for you. 
)
