Try perhaps taking a break off technique and doing some ear work. Try playing some songs just from hearing them. Easy, right? Now try playing some sax lines just from listening to them - sax players use interesting lines that aren't that easy to duplicate on guitar.

Hmmm, try working on accents in your picking. Play an A Minor scale, 4 note ascending pattern, accent the 1st beat of each measure. Here's an example, capital letters are accented. A, b, c, d, B, c, d, e, C, d, e, f, D, e, f, g, and so forth. Now, try accenting the 4th note in each measure, which is the last note in each pattern. a, b, c, D, b, c, d, E, c, d, e, F, d, e, f, G, e, f, g, A, so forth. Different feel, different sound, exact same notes. It might feel easier to start with an accented note, so try this if you can't do it. C, a, b, c, D, b, c, d, E, c, d, e, F, so forth. It feels easier, because you're accenting the last note in the pattern, but now it's the 1st beat of each measure instead of the 4th. Can you swing well? Practice.

Can you connect arpeggios well? Not just your stock major and minor and diminished arpeggios, I'm talking 16ths, half measure each of something like Dbmaj7 to C7 to Fm to Ebm7 (hehe, that's "Just the Two of Us", but cut time).

Work on some cascading/crosspicking patterns. Here's a neat one (obviously in E Minor). Let all the open notes ring. (this is from memory, no guitar around, so I hope it sounds right)


|---8-7-----0------------------0~--|
|-------8-7-------0------------0~--|
|-------------7/5-----0--------0~--|
|-------------------7-------0--4~--|
|-----------------------7/9----2~--|
|-0----------------------------0~--|



Haha, this seems easy, but playing the pentatonic scale patterns, picking each note, 2 notes per string is not that easy to play fast... I can play a full blown 3 notes per string A Minor scale faster than I can play the A Minor pentatonic picking every note.

Try alternate picking arpeggios instead of sweeping them.

Try improvising over a progression using a glass slide only (no fingers, you'll find it's a bit difficult when you can't rely on your old buddies to hammer on and pull off... this makes the melodic content of the solo ultra important)

Learn a song from a genre you don't necessarily like... for me, that was learning a couple country songs. It gave me a better appreciation for bending one note while playing a triad, or harmonizing in 6ths rather than 3rds, and some goofy sounding licks to pull off when the occasion demands.

Learn to play drums. They're fun and help your rhythm immensely. Or, if you want to stick to just guitar, when playing with a drummer, match his accents with your own. If he's playing something like a typical pattern, but with a triplet on the high hat before hitting the snare on 2, implement a triplet in your playing right before the 2nd beat. Tight syncopation is really cool, and the basis of good funk or metal.

Learn some new chord voicings. I just learned a new augmented 7th voicing yesterday as a dominant substitution.

Still bored? If you can do all of the above, you're a better guitar player than most of the rest of us! This stuff takes a lifetime to master. Don't get caught up in trying to play scales/sweeps fast. There's more to music than that.