About the timeing thing if your just bored with licks,
meleody lines ect.
If your practicing by your self.
You could play a few beats useing a blues shuffle beat,
then play a few melody notes bends ect then go back to your,rhythm and repeat untill you get the timing of the notes and Rhythm to flow togather this would be good,
for deveoping your ear plus timing.
What you do here is use your Rhythm as your metronome,
plus use your ear to put Rhythm in your licks notes
ect so it will be in the same meter or timimg of the
beat of your Rhythm.
If you aready have timing its good to mix Rhythm chords,
with your melody lines or licks..........
You never know! like me a Rhythm man just gets in my way,
unless he's doing harmony guitar as a lead man with ,
me other wise i would much rather use my keyboard player,
for my Rhythm player.I would rather cover my own Rhythm,
You never know when you might have to do a 3 peice gig
or your Rhythm player could become ill and not be-able to,
do the gig with your band.

Just my opinion for what its worth.
Mark