I miss my old guitar, Tuco.
Tuco was a MIJ 80's (I think) Fender Strat, bought in the late 80's. Heavily modded over the years with kill switches, two Lace Sensor pickups, expensive ones, more then the regular color named pups, and a killer DiMarzio hotrail bridge pickup. The original steel string retainers and saddles were exchanged for graph tech ones to deal with tuning issues. There was some damage on the back of the guitar due to a fall.
Tuco was my favorite guitar. The one I was going to take with me into the grave (together with my silverface Fender Twin Reverb). I bought Tuco in the late 80's as part of my OCD with getting an Fender Strat with large 70's headstock. Which at that time were sheer unobtainium as either Fender didn't make any or all my local music stores were utterly clueless in how to order one. And then glorious day I found two. Oh happy day!
Tuco wasn't the best looking guitar, hell, I always found the white yellow color quite ugly. What I really wanted was a black Strat. Tuco had a rosewood neck, I generally prefer maple. Tuco played well though, especially after the graph tech upgrades. It's funny how you can have two almost identical guitars and end up favoring one over the other. Even though it's an ugly bastard. Henceforth the Tuco name. If my home was on fire and I could only grab one guitar, Tuco would have been it.
Tuco got lost when I played a gig with my band at a festival, after which I went home, unloaded my gear in storage and didn't open the storage space for a month on the account of it being the summer holiday. Only then to realize that Tuco was not present among my gear. I still don't know whether or not Tuco got stolen at the festival, or that I misplaced Tuco when unloading my gear at home into storage, leaving it accidentally outside during the chaos of unloading (I lost a bike that way too). Tuco is sadly missed and even though I've bought and built other guitars, none has come forth to claim that 'if your home was on fire which guitar would you grab' position. I'm not looking for another guitar like Tuco, or which looks like Tuco, I just want Tuco back.