The other good news is that a new local friend of mine referred me to a guy who can take care of initial set up and maintenance for me. (I may finally get some work done on my old strat too, at last).
 
I was actually quite stoked to find out that the gentleman in question used to work for Ed Roman and has a list of very high profile customers.
 
 

Rain

batsbrew
there are so many better made guitars out there besides a gibson..
 
better quality, better design, better sound, better feel, better quality control, just better.

In my case, I don't believe anything fits the bill better than a Gibson LP. First because I've wanted one for so long.
 
Second because it's the sound I love - I find it quite useless to go the long way around and buy a different guitar only to try to nail that LP sound.
 
Feel is a tough one. I mean, this isn't really something all too objective is it? In my case, different guitars have the best feel for different things.
 
Design-wise, I have ultra classic tastes. Call me neurotic, blame it on my background as a poor kid, but I've had to settle for cheap copies and never got to get the real thing as a kid. So getting what I really want is important to me. And since I'm the one playing that guitar...
 
A PRS or a Music Man has no real appeal to me. They utterly uninspiring. And the fact that a Les Paul or a SG please me the most sort of annihilate any rhetorical question of which is better. You can't command inspiration or love, and that's everything when you talk music. IMHO. 

Perfectly said Rain.  
 
The reason I am not interested in the other brands....  they are not the guitars that I have dreamed about owning all of these years.  I am vintage all the way, as well.  Gibson, Fender, Martin, Rickenbacker....pretty much all I'm interested in.  
 
Hope you get that Black strat fixed up after all of these years.  Black and maple is my favorite strat combo.  I will probably own an EC Strat one of these days in black/ maple as well.  

Believe me I understand the purist urge to own certain pieces. I'll never get my early seventies Les Paul Deluxe back. And, while the only guitar I've always wanted but never owned is a Rickenbacker triple pickup Miami model like John Lennon played, it is now quite unlikely I'll ever own one. But who knows?? I could have a miraculous windfall. That said, it's been my experience that most all of the guitars I've purchased over lo these many years lost their luster rather quickly. Again, the guitar tells you...not you, the guitar.

PS...I should add that even if I were to acquire the Rick....I might find that I absolutely hated it.

Agree to that, Ol'Pal.  
 
Funny, the guitar usually finds me, when I am not really in the market for one.  The last time that happened, I was not at all looking for a Strat.  I came upon an American Deluxe in an old run down music store.  It was not the color I would ever pick, but it caught my eye that it was definitely a quality instrument.  After picking it up and playing around with it for 10 minutes, it was obvious that it was an extension of my hands and that I had to have it.  
 
The store owner said to me that it was the best instrument in his shop, while I was noodling on they guitar...and that he was surprised that it had not sold, all this while.  I happened to have a used Epi LP with me, that was in really good shape.  I offered him the Epi LP and $200 and walked out with that Strat.  Years later, I traded the Strat for my Gibson Studio Plus LP, in a similar deal.  Honestly, I still miss the neck on that American Deluxe Strat.  It just melted in my hands.